Burney MS 343

A deluxe humanist copyof Giovanni Gioviano Pontano’s love elegies in two books known as the Partheopaeus.

Contents:

ff. 1r-27v. Johannes Jovianus Pontanus, Partenopeus. Tit. 'Joviani Pontani Umbri libbellus [sic] amorum cui titulus est Partenopeius adsodalem Laurentium Miniatum'.) (printed by J. Oeschger, Ioannis Iovani Pontani Carmina,(Bari, 1948), pp. 65-121, but the elegy with no. XXV is placed after no.XVI in the manuscript; elegies from Book I no. XXIX to Book II no. XIV omitted;and with a different final line: 'Pignus polliciti muneris esto mei'.)

Decoration: 1miniature, in colours and gold, occupying the space left for a large initial,depicting a half-length layman holding a book, and enclosingthe first letter ‘I’ of the text; the border with the arms and devices ofAlfonso II: the escutcheon in the centre of the lower border: quarterly, 1 and4, or, four pales gules, 2 and 3 argent, a cross of Calabria, surmounted by a jewelled coronet (deMarinis (1952), type 8, see vol. I, p. 130) and supported by four putti each holding acornucopia; the right-hand border with a broken rope attached to a branch ateach end; a spider on a web; the border also inhabited by birds and animals andputti battling dragons, one of the putti holding a shield with the Aragonesearms (for the arms and devices cf. de Marinis, IV, pls. 193, 200, 201, 220,221, etc.) (f. 1r). Small whitevine-stem initials, in colours and gold.