JÉRÔME (Saint). Epistolæ. Parma, s.n., 1480. 2 volumes in-folio (43 x 28.5 cm) of [252] ff. (out of 254) and [330] ff. (of 329), stamped black morocco on wood, quadruple frame of roulettes and cold fillets, two of which decorated with fleurons, delimiting a central rectangle decorated, in the first volume, with two spheres decorated with rope interlacing, and in the second volume, with a single sphere and four spandrels with the same decoration in a frieze frame, traces of clasps, title and tomation handwritten on the lower edge (Binding of the period). A sumptuous and rare incunabula edition of the letters of Saint Jerome, published in Parma twelve years after the Roman princeps edition. Printed in Roman type, it is based on the Venetian edition of 1476 procured by Miscomini, but revised and enlarged by several letters and a Life of Saint Jerome wrongly attributed to the Benedictine Sebastianus Casinensis. It also includes the table of contents compiled by Teodoro de Lellis. This edition is the first of four publications attributed to a Parmesan workshop active in 1480 and 1481 only, identified as the Printer of the Hieronymus of 1480 (along with a Nonius Marcellus of 1480, an undated Chrysoloras and a Silius Italicus of 1481). Father and Doctor of the Church, Saint Jerome (c. 347-420) was the author of the Latin translation of the Bible known as the Vulgate, as well as numerous lives of saints and an extensive correspondence. His letters include dogmatic, exegetical and polemical writings as well as family letters. A very wide-margined copy decorated with four initials and four miniatures (two of which are repeated). The two volumes of this copy are each decorated, on the first table leaf, with a very fine initial painted in colour and gold and, at the bottom of the page, with a medallion portrait of Saint Jerome supporting the Church ; and on the first page of the text, a second illuminated initial and, at the foot, a medallion bearing the arms of the Dolfin, or Delfino, family, one of the most powerful patrician families in the history of Venice, to which it gave a doge and several cardinals, patriarchs, bishops, ambassadors and procurators of Saint Mark. The rest of the work has not been rubricated. Very interesting Venetian bindings of the period, each decorated with a finely embossed motif of intertwined ropes. Ex-libris of J. Ladimir François, with handwritten mark. From the library of Jean Furstenberg (1983, n°39), with bookplate. The copy was included in the exhibition of the Fürstenberg collection held at the Musée d'art et d'histoire de Genève from 3 May to 5 June 1966. Spines rebacked. Light staining at the foot of the volumes, more pronounced on the first and last leaves and affecting the illuminated medallions, fine tear repaired on the first leaf of the first volume, restoration in the margin of the last three leaves of the second volume. 3 blank pages missing. ISTC ih00169000 - HC 8557 - Goff H169 - Pr 6855 - Pell-Pol 5971 - CIBN H-104 - BMC, VII, 942 - GW 12429.