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210 - [17th-century manuscript]. ANONYMOUS. History of the Popes. …
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Estimate €400 - €500
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Description
[17th-century manuscript]. ANONYMOUS. History of the Popes. An interesting unpublished manuscript recounting the history of the popes from the 13th to the early 16th century, comprising 980 folio pages carefully handwritten in black ink at the end of the 17th century, and more precisely around 1677, according to the handwritten date on the first endpaper: ‘15 May 1677’. No place, 1677 (?). One folio volume (350 x 250 mm). Soft full contemporary vellum, plain, unmarked spine. 980 pages. Vellum faded, with marks and small tears; fastenings missing. Threads slack at the hinges; the first hinge split at the top. A few ink stains. Worm damage on several leaves with loss of a few characters. With no title page or mention of the author, written in neat handwriting in black ink, the manuscript contains several corrections and erasures. The first endpaper bears the handwritten date of 15 May 1677. It is a chronology of the lives of the popes, beginning in chapter four, The Life of Pope Gregory X (1210–1276), and ends with the twenty-sixth chapter, devoted to Clement VII (Giulio de’ Medici, 1478–1534). This final chapter, the longest (pp. 822–980), is of great interest for understanding the complex geopolitics of Europe in the early 16th century, particularly the tensions between the papacy, Emperor Charles V and Sultan Suleiman the Magnificent. Provenance: Henri de Juvenal, with a large engraved heraldic bookplate. An interesting, previously unpublished chronology, which appears to form part of a wider corpus on the history of the Church and Europe during the Renaissance, following in the footsteps of André Du Chesne (1584–1640) and his *Histoire des papes et souverains chefs de l’Église*... (1616).
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About the sale Fine antique and collectible books, manuscripts and modern illustrated works
Auction location
Auction time 06/29/2026 at 2:00 PM
Pictures credits: Contact the Auction House
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