Il Paradiso perduto di Giovanni Milton, tradotto in verso italiano da Felice Mariottini col testo inglese a rencontro.

Rome, Nella Stamperia de Romanis, 1813-1814.. FIRST EDITION. 3 volumes. 8°, contemporary boards, spines covered with blue paper and with printed labels (chipping at joints, darkened). Facing pages English and Italian. Uncut. Pinpoint wormhole in inner margin of about the first 70 leaves of volume I, never touching text; more serious worming to about the 60 final leaves of volume II, affecting 5-6 letters per page from p. 356 to end. Overall in good condition (if not for the worming, in fine condition). Contemporary signature on verso of front free endpaper of Roiz [i.e., Rodriguez?] da Silva. 447; 383; 480 pp. *** First edition thus, with English and Italian on facing pages. Mariottini's translation of the first book of Paradise Lost was published in London, 1794; to a critical review in The British Critic he retorted with An Italian warning to the British Critic, London, 1794. Mariottini's translation of the entire Paradise Lost was printed in London, 1796, by G. Polidori.Felice Mariottini (Città di Castello, 1756-Rome, 1827) took orders in 1769 and became a member of the Arcadian academy in 1779, as Aurisio Pierideo. In 1783, he was chosen to instruct the sons of Philippe d'Orléans in Italian, but had a falling out with their supervising teacher after two years. Working in Rome, Naples, and Città di Castello, he published several collections of poems. In 1792, hearing that teachers of Italian were in demand in England, he moved to London, where he published his translation of Paradise Lost. Back in Rome by 1797, he published I congressi del Monte Sacro, 1799, in which he criticized the temporal power of the pope as a "sacra tirannide" and education in the Papal States as hopelessly behind the times. This made him persona non grata when Pius VII was elected pope. His criticisms of the French made him unpopular when the French occupied the Papal States. Mariottini published this bilingual Paradise Lost in Rome, after the restoration of the papacy, but it was not a commercial success and led to legal battles. He passed the rest of his life in poverty and was buried in the Lateran.*** On the translator, see E. Ciferri in Dizionario Biografico degli Italiani, vol. 70 (2007). Orbis lists a 1796 Italian edition. Hollis lists 1794 and 1796 Italian editions. Jisc lists many copies of the London, 1794 and 1796 editions, but not this edition.