Grazzini, Antonfrancesco (1504-1584). Lezione di Maestro Niccodemo dalla Pietra al Migliaio: Sopra il Capitolo della Salsiccia del Lasca. Florence, Domenico and Francesco Manzani, 1589.
Grazzini, Antonfrancesco (1504-1584). Lezione di Maestro Niccodemo dalla Pietra al Migliaio: Sopra il Capitolo della Salsiccia del Lasca. Florence, Domenico and Francesco Manzani, 1589.
Grazzini, Antonfrancesco (1504-1584).
Lezione di Maestro Niccodemo dalla Pietra al Migliaio: Sopra il Capitolo della Salsiccia del Lasca.
Florence, Domenico and Francesco Manzani, 1589.
Sausage ‘alla fiorentina’
Grazzini, Antonfrancesco (1504-1584).
Lezione di Maestro Niccodemo dalla Pietra al Migliaio: Sopra il Capitolo della Salsiccia del Lasca. Florence, Domenico and Francesco Manzani, 1589.
8° (157x108 mm). Collation: A-D8. 60, [4] pages. Roman and italic type. Woodcut printer's device on the title-page and on the verso of the last leaf. Later vellum over pasteboards. Spine with four raised bands, with inked title and imprint. A good copy, slightly browned and foxed throughout, heavier to fols. B1-C1; a few marginal stains in the last leaves.
Provenance: faded ownership inscription on the title-page no longer legible.
The first and very rare edition of this gastronomic burlesque work in praise of pork and sausage, dedicated by the Florentine printer Domenico Manzani to the Archconsul of the Accademia della Crusca, Pier Francesco Cambi.
Grazzini was a member of the Accademia degli Umidi, which wanted to revive the Florentine tradition of burlesque poetry. In 1582, he was co-founder of the renowned Florentine Accademia della Crusca, adopting the nickname, or nome di Crusca, of 'Lasca'. The booklet was issued from the press of Domenico Manzani, mostly engaged by this Florentine academy, and well-known for the printing, in 1591, of the Commedia edited by the Crusca, the first modern critical edition of Dante's masterpiece.
The Lezione contains the composition in verse Capitolo sopra la salciccia, supplemented with an extensive commentary. Grazzini celebrates here many different kinds of food, but comes to the conclusion that pork meat is the finest of all and that sausage is the most delicious part of the pork, preferable to any other. He then gives the recipe for sausage 'alla fiorentina' (in Florentine style), which, according to him, is the absolute best, and reports several entertaining stories related to sausage with comic and occasionally erotic effect.
STC Italian 370; C. Spalanca, Anton Francesco Grazzini e la cultura del suo tempo, Palermo 1981; F. Pignatti, “Il ‘Comento di maestro Nicodemo dalla Pietra al Migliaio' del Lasca. Preliminari per un'edizione e note critiche”, A. Corsaro - P. Procaccioli (eds.), Cum notibusse et comentari-busse. L'esegesi parodistica e giocosa del Cinquecento. Seminario di letteratura italiana Viterbo, 23-24 novembre 2001, Manziana 2002, pp. 99-108; M. Plaisance, Anton Francesco Grazzini dit Lasca (1505-1584). Écrire dans la Florence des Médicis, Manziana 2005; Philobiblon, One Thousand Years of Bibliophily, no. 163.
