A Treatise of Painting by Leonardo da Vinci. Translated from The Original Italian, And adorn’d with a great Number of Cuts: To which is prefix’d The Author’s Life; Done from the Last Edition of the French.

DA VINCI, Leonardo.

$15,000.00

Item Number: 147201

London: Printed for J. Senex, at the Globe in Salisbury Court; and W. Taylor, at the Ship in Pater-Noster-Row, 1721.

Rare first edition in English of da Vinci’s classic treatise on painting. Octavo, bound in full speckled calf with elaborate gilt tooling to the spine in six compartments within raised gilt bands, burgundy morocco spine label lettered in gilt, elaborate scrolling and cornerpieces stamped in blind and speckled calf inlays to the front and rear panels, gilt turn-ins, title page printed in red and black, illustrated with engraved frontispiece portrait facing title, thirty-one full page plates, and three folding (thirty-five in total), final two leaves of publisher’s ads present after text. In near fine condition. A superior example. First editions are rare.

“Leonardo's writings and notes long remained in manuscript. Shortly after his death an industrious compiler brought together those passages from his posthumous papers dealing with painting and combined them into a Treatise of Painting (Trattato della pittura); but this important manuscript, which also preserves much that is no longer to be found in Leonardo's own notes, was only edited and published in the 17th century in France" (E.H. Gombrich, The Literature of Art).