Dante con l’espositioni di Christoforo Landino, et di Alessandro Vellutello. Sopra la sua Comedia dell’Inferno, del Purgatorio, & del Paradiso. Con Tauole, Argomenti, & Allegorie, & riformato, riueduto, & ridotto alla sua uera Lettura, per Francesco Sansovino Fiorentino.

Folio (321 x 215 mm). Collation: a⁸, b⁶, c⁴, d¹⁰, A-V⁸, X¹², Y-Z⁸, AA-ZZ⁸, AAA-CCC⁸. [28], 392 [i.e. 396] leaves. Italic and roman type. Woodcut printer's devices on fols. a2r, a5r, b2r, c1v, c2v, and X8r. Large woodcut portrait of Dante on the title-page, within a richly decorated oval frame. 100 woodcuts in text, taken from the Marcolini Commedia of 1544. Woodcut animated initials at the beginning of each canto; large headpieces introducing the three cantiche. Late eighteenth-century mottled calf over pasteboards. Spine with four raised bands. Corners of the upper cover and the extremities of the spine restored. On the lower edge, ‘dante' in brown ink. Pastedowns and flyleaves renewned. A very good copy, light foxing throughout; a few stains, small loss to the lower blank margin of fol. A1.

Provenance: Historisches Seminar der Universität Hamburg (small stamps on the verso of the title-page; sold ('Ausgeschieden') in 1978); Livio Ambrogio collection.

The last reprint of the famous 'Big nose edition', first published by the Venetian printers Sessa in 1564. This late edition bears a new version of the famous cat-device.