1536, Venice: BERNARDINO STAGNINO FOR GIOVANNI GIOLITO
This edition of 1536 was printed "ad instantia" (at the request)
of Giovanni Giolito, head of the Giolito de' Ferrari family (active 1508-1523)
and father of one of the most famous Venetian printers of the Renaissance,
Gabriele Giolito. The familial relationship existing between Giovanni Giolito
and Bernardino Stagnino is unclear; perhaps they were cousins. In any case,
upon Bernardino Stagnino's death a part of his typographical equipment passed
to Giovanni Giolitto and was eventually inherited by his son Gabriele.
The colophon of this edition of the Divine Comedy with the Landino
commentary no longer speaks of Pietro da Figino, whose text is used nevertheless.
Instead, the title page insists rather noisily that the text has been "corrected
and emended," despite the fact that the text is essentially unaltered
from Stagnino's previous editions which were based upon the revised text
of the 1490s. Consequently, the title page illustrates well the promotional
value which title pages by this date increasingly assumed. What is essentially
an old book is transformed by a new cover, and the addition of a "table":
The Comedy of the Divine Poet Dante Alighieri, with the
learned and elegant exposition of Cristoforo Landino, with the greatest
diligence and most accurate study newly corrected and emended: purged of
infinite errors, and in addition adorned with extremely useful postils.
There is also added a new and very abundant Table, in which are included
the histories, fables, sentences, and things memorable and worthy of note
which are found throughout the work.
