Tutte L'Opere Di Niccolo Machiavelli Segretario E Cittadino Fiorentino. Con Una Prefazione Di Giuseppe Baretti. Volume Primo [Secondo e Terzo] de Machiavelli, Niccolo, 1469-1527 - 1772

Londra [London] Stampata Per Tommaso Davis, MDCCLXXII. [1772]. Hard Cover. Three volumes: [10], lx, 4, 407, [3]; [6], 453, [3], [2] p.ages, 3 tables; [6], 580, [2] pages; 30 cm. Frontispiece of Vol. 1 is portrait of Machiavelli signed "G. Collyer, sculp." Bertelli/ Innocenti, Bibliografia Machiavelliana, 18th Cent., 106; Burd p. 4. This Italian edition printed in London was edited by Giuseppe Baretti, 1719-1789, Turin-born writer, critic in London, and a friend of the Thrales; he knew Johnson and Garrick and is mentioned in Boswell. He published a Dictionary and Grammar of the Italian Language. Baretti shared in the English Commonwealthman, as well as the Italian, tradition of reading Machiavelli as a Republican and a nationalist. This copy has the bookplates of George Pretyman, Bishop of Lincoln. Pretyman (1750-1827) was William Pitt the Younger's Cambridge "governor" and close friend, to whom Pitt left his papers. Pretyman was elevated to Lincoln in 1787 and in 1803, upon falling heir to a large estate, changed his name to Tomline. Very good copy bound in modern half leather. Stock#OB318.