La Divina Commedia di Dante Alighieri col comento di G. Biagioli...

Three volumes, 8° (207 x 127 mm). [8], xliv, 634; [4], xvi, 574; [4], xv, [1], 583, [1] pages. Uniform binding in white vellum over pasteboards, signed on the spine by the relieur du roi René Simier (1772-1843). Smooth gilt-tooled spine, title and volume numbering on double lettering-piece. Marbled pastedowns and flyleaves. Gilt edges. A very fine copy, slightly foxed and browned in places.

The first edition with the highly regarded commentary by the Italian exile Niccolò Giosafatte Biagioli (1769-1830), who in 1799 emigrated from the papal states to the France, becoming a teacher of Italian language at the Court of Marie-Caroline of Bourbon, Duchess de Berry. He began to work to on the Dantean text in about 1808, on the basis of the Commedia published by the Accademia della Crusca in 1595. introducing some variants from a fourteenth-century manuscript once belonged to the British ambassador in France Lord Milne-Stuart. He also published Italian grammars and a commentary on Petrarch, and therefore played an active role in the diffusion of Italian culture in France.