University of Virginia Library

The Second Edition of the Compagnia Del Mantellaccio
by
Curt F. Bühler

A small body of literature has grown up about that anonymous, witty poem entitled La Compagnia del Mantellaccio, formerly (and incorrectly) ascribed to Lorenzo de' Medici. Under no. 7260, the Gesamtkatalog der Wiegendrucke describes the only fifteenth-century edition of this work recorded by the Kommission: [Florence: Francesco di Dino], 13 April 1489. A facsimile of this printing, together with a listing and discussion of the then-known editions of this poem (thirteen in all, printed between 1489 and 1817) had previously been issued by R. Salari (Florence: Antonio Cecchi, 1861). Lastly, an article by the Marchese Roberto Ridolfi ("La 'Compagnia del Mantellaccio'e la sua sconosciuta edizione originale," La Bibliofilia, XLII (1940), 282-288) described the earliest existing edition from the unique copy in the author's library [Florence: Bartolommeo di Libri, 1482/3]; in a postscript, Ridolfi noted still another fifteenth-century printing, of which the only known copy then belonged to Dr. Giuseppe Martini. Ridolfi expressed the belief that this was the second edition of this "bizzarra composizione quattrocentesca," an opinion which the present article seeks to confirm.

The Martini copy of this edition of the fifteenth-century poem is now in the Pierpont Morgan Library and may be described as follows:

The only recorded copy is in the Pierpont Morgan Library (Check List no. 1133A). It measures 199 x 132 mm. and is bound in brown morocco as item 3 in a "Sammelband" containing: (1) Luigi Pulci. La Confessione. [Florence: Tubini and Ghirlandi, 1510]; (2) Luigi Pulci. Frottole due. [Florence: Societas Colubris, 1499]; and (4) Epistola consolatoria dei Caldi, Freddi, e Tiepidi. [Florence: Lorenzo Morgiani, 1496]. The volume was formerly in the collections of William Roscoe, Richard Heber, Sir George Holford, and Giuseppe Martini. Obtained by the Morgan Library in February, 1948.

Due to the happy circumstance that Ridolfi, in addition to supplying certain specific readings, reproduced the first and last pages of his volume and that the 1489 text is available through the facsimile, it becomes easily possible to establish the position of the Morgan incunabulum in relation to the other two editions. Since the Morgan Compagnia del Mantellaccio contains only the shorter text (262 lines), without the additions ("la giunta facta di nuouo") found in the 1489 printing which extend the poem to 475 lines, it certainly belongs to the earlier redaction. The Morgan edition shares certain variant readings with the Ridolfi text:

• line 32: & se il suo uista bene & uoi il togliete (Morgan and Ridolfi) et se il suo uista bene uoi il togliete (1489 edition)
• line 97: Poi si riuolse da sinixtra mano (Morgan and Ridolfi) Poi si riuolse da sinixtra mano (1489)
• line 236: & da sei mesi inqua non cene stata (Morgan and Ridolfi) [The 1489 text has "stato", though "stata" is required by the rhyme. This text also has incorrectly "mese".]

In other instances the Morgan Compagnia del Mantellaccio sides with the text of the 1489 edition:

• line 31: Ma fate uenire ad uoi el Solosmeo (Ridolfi) Ma fate ad uoi uenire el Solosmeo (Morgan and 1489)
• line 240: che di nouizii ha seco una funata (Ridolfi) che di nouizi ha seco una chiassata (Morgan and 1489)
• line 249: & sta poi audir gli statuti nostri (Ridolfi) & sta audir poi gli statuti nostri (Morgan and 1489)
• line 259: Pero non saccetti in queste prouince (Ridolfi) Pero nol mecterei in queste prouince (Morgan and 1489)

Two lines deserve our special attention. In line 159, we find in the first edition a very curious bit of Latin, which Ridolfi reprints as: dilacuis renuis corpus sine more. For this mysterious text, Ridolfi offers a clever solution, namely that only by misreading a manuscript source could the compositor have arrived at this faulty passage. The Morgan and 1489 editions sensibly provide: dilaceremus corpus sine more. It is easy to see how the compositor could have misread the manuscript ending "-remus" as "renuis" by misinterpreting the minims; the "dilacuis" may be accounted for on the basis of dittography or dittology.

In the next line (line 160, not 159 as Ridolfi states), the Morgan text has: Et lorenzo chalchagni il gran martire. While the Ridolfi text also provides the name of Lorenzo Calcagni, the 1489 edition substitutes that of Giulian Grassina, perhaps because Calcagni had died in the meantime. Both the gentlemen are shadowy figures. Who Grassina may have been, I have been unable to determine, unless he be identical (which seems doubtful) with the "Grassi (Jules), prof. de philos. et médec. 1498" listed by

Chevalier (col. 1850); the former certainly seems to be the "Calcagni (Laurent), de Brescia, jurisc., 1478" noted by the same authority (col. 750). He is described by Jöcher (Gelehrten-Lexicon, 1750-51, I, 1557) as "ein Edelmann und Eques auratus von Brescia, im 15 Seculo, war der Rechten Doctor, dabey ein Philosophus und Historicus." Possibly this Calcagni may be further identified as the author of the Frottola del Villan "per el Venerabile homo ditto Calcagno", which begins "O maluasio rio vilā". This was described as an incunabulum by Copinger (no. 1405) but is now assigned to an otherwise unidentified, early sixteenth-century, Italian press in Proctor's Index (no. 14063).

From the above discussion it becomes evident that the Morgan copy, since it agrees in part with the version as found in the Ridolfi volume and partly with the 1489 edition, was certainly printed after the former and before the latter. The type is a good deal more worn than in the first printing and does not contain the gothic capital C, present in the earlier incunable. It is not unlikely that the later di Libri printing, since it contains a great many of the readings subsequently appearing in the di Dino edition, served as the "copy" for this edition after suitable additions had been made; it may, therefore, be dated as not later than the early months of 1489, and probably in 1488. Under these circumstances, the Morgan incunabulum is unquestionably the second surviving edition of the Compagnia del Mantellacio.