The only complete copy of the 1492 Nichomachean Ethics recorded in modern commerce, formerly owned by Pope Pius VI. 100 leaves. Folio. Bound in eighteenth century armorial calf for Pope Pius VI, with his gilt arms to the centre of each cover. Gilt tooled frame to each cover, and gilt decorated compartments and gilt titles to spine. There is marginalia throughout by at least one early humanist scholar. On the verso of the prefatory letter, there is a long manuscript note over thirteen lines providing a commentary on the first book of the Nicomachean Ethics, closing with: “RATIO HEC EST. Si omnis habitus humanus et actus proprium habet finem, et homo simp- liciter suum proprium habebit. Sed uerum primum, [ergo] uerum et posterius.” “[THE ARGUMENT IS THIS: If every human disposition and action has its own proper end, then man, considered simply as man, will also have his own proper end. But the first is true; therefore the second is true as well.”] The first page of text of the Ethics (a4v) is also heavily annotated, with notes on different aspects of Aristotle’s work under ruled headings, with cross-references to Seneca and Cicero. There is another group of extensive annotations to the margins of b1r, at the beginning of Book 1, Chapter 5. In all there are contemporary annotations to 22 pages throughout.
 
A very good copy. Some rubbing to the binding, particularly at the spine ends and corners, but sound. Internally generally clean, with some worming throughout. Manuscript note “very rare edition” to front free endpaper verso.
 
The only complete copy of the 1492 Ethica we can trace in modern commerce, heavily annotated by at least one early humanist scholar, and later owned by Pope Pius VI. The text is the Latin translation of John Argyropoulos, and in this edition opens with a prefatory letter by Pietro Marso addressed to Virginio Orsini. In this copy we see extensive annotations by an early humanist scholar, including a long manuscript preface outlining Aristotle’s arguments. There are no ownership inscriptions of this early reader, but the book was later bound for Pope Pius VI in the late eighteenth century. It was then owned by John Strangeways Donaldson Selby, Lord of the Manor of Lindisfarne, and then by the Jersey bibliophile Philip De Gruchy.