Dolce, Lodovico: Vita di Carlo Quinto. Venice: Gabriele Giolito de‘ Ferrari 1567. 22,4 x 15,5 cm. With a title page, 1 woodcut title (intertitle), 15 large woodcut initials, and 2 repeated woodcut printer’s marks. 13 leaves, 315 (recte 324) pages. (Quires: ★★⁶, ★★★⁴, ★★★⁴ [repeated], A-K⁸, L¹⁰, M⁴, AM⁸, N-T⁸, V⁴). Later leather binding on 3 bands with back decoration and a back label.

(Slightly rubbed, minimal scuffing, small wormholes on the front spine joint. Endpapers show signs of glue discoloration. Book block slightly trimmed. Page ★★★² has a small hole in the spine. Water stains in places on the top and bottom margins. Pages G³⁻⁴ show more severe water and brown stains. Slightly browned and with occasional signs of wear.)

Adams D 756. Graesse II, 418. - An expanded and extensively revised Venetian edition of the biography of Emperor Charles V, first published in 1561 and written by the humanist Lodovico Dolce (1508–1568), who worked closely with the famous printer Gabriele Giolito de’ Ferrari and is considered one of Italy’s polymaths. The work describes the life, military campaigns, and political achievements of the Habsburg ruler; it includes sonnets as well as notes on popes, writers, and artists of the time; and is supplemented by Anatholius Desbarres’s “Immortalità dell’invittissimo et gloriosiss(imo) imperator Carlo Quinto,” presented here in Italian translation. - The magnificent portrait of Charles V on the title page is attributed to the famous Italian engraver Enea Vico (1523–1567) and is based on his well-known depictions of the emperor after Titian.