Add MS 8521

BASSETTI LETTER-BOOK; circa 1688-1689. Italian. Copies, 1716? (the date of a letter on f. 91v, possibly a slip of the scribe disclosing the year of the copy). Register of letters of Abbot Apollonio Bassetti, Secretary of State to the Grand Duke of Tuscany Cosimo III de' Medici (1670-1723). The register is divided into two section. The first section (ff. 1-63v) contains undated letters of Bassetti to Count Ranuzzi of Bologna, who is probably identifiable with Vincenzo Ferdinando Antonio Ranuzzi Cospi (1658-1726), Conte della Porretta, page to Prince Ferdinando de' Medici and collector of manuscripts. Some volumes from his collection are now Add. 16442-16558: among them Add. 16501-16503 are a three-volume copy of Bassetti's account of Cosimo III's travels in Germany and Holland in 1667-1668, and Add. 16505 contains the autograph of Ranuzzi's account of Prince Ferdinand's trip to Milan, Bologna and Venice in 1687. The second section (ff. 64-146v) contains dispatches from Bassetti to Francesco Terriesi, Florentine representative at London, dated 13 Feb. 1688 - 4 Oct. 1689. For transcripts of Terriesi's dispatches to Florence see Add. 25358-25381: in particular Add. 25375 (ff. 192-273), 25376-26378, 25379 (ff. 1-7) are relevant to the period covered by the dispatches of Bassetti in the present MS. For Bassetti see DBI, 7 (1965), pp. 117-118. Title gilt on spine 'Lettere diverse'. Inc. (f. 1) 'Al Signor Conte Ranuzzi di Bologna del Signor Abate Bassetti, Segretario di Stato del Gran Duca di Toscana / Mi trovo onorato dalle due benigne repliche', expl. (f. 63v) 'Gran terremoti nel Perù; le resto etc.'; inc. (f. 64) 'Al Signor Francesco Terriesi Ministro in Inghilterra de 13 marzo 1687 ... / Essendo questa sera il dispacciamento del Corriero per Francia', expl. (f. 146v) 'Al medesimo de 4 ottobre 1689 ... Va in gran predicamento d'esser Papa il Cardinale Ottobono Veneziano. E io qui resto'. Old shelfmarks in black ink 'No. 9' (f. i, upper margin) and '111' (f. i, at centre; crossed out). Acquisition note (f. i verso) 'Comprato dall'Eredità Comolli in Gennaro 1795 da Giuseppe Casali'. Owned by Frederick North, 5th Earl of Guilford, but lacking his armorial bookplate. '338' in pencil in upper left corner of f. i verso. Purchased, together with Add. 8522 and 8527-8530, from R. H. Evans, 8 Dec. 1830, lot 338 (part).

Paper; ff. 146+iv. circa 259 x 195mm. One Italian hand. 18th-cent. Italian binding of mottled brown leather with gilt-tooled spines in compartments; mottled edges.