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The arbitrariness of fate

[DICKENSON, John].
Speculum Tragicum. Regum, Principum, & Magnatum superioris soeculi celebriorum ruinas exitusque calamitosos breviter complectens: in quo & iudicia divina & imbecillitas humana  insignibus exemplis declarantur.





Delphis Batavorum, Iacobus Foenicolius, 1601. Small 8vo. Contemporary vellum, with red title-label on spine. (6), 127, (11) pp.

First edition of a popular literary work on the tragic fate of many of the Great of the Earth by John Dickenson. In 1602 the work was taken over by the Elzevirs and several times republished. The book is dedicated, under the author's full name, Ioannes Dickensonus, to George Gilpin, the commercial agent of Queen Elisabeth of England in the Low Countries. It is still undecided wether the present author, whose latin prose and verse is described as having the charm of ease and elegance, is to be identified with the popular English author of the same name, who wrote romances in the  English tongue, much in the tradition of Lyly and Greene, the  best known of which was "The Shepheardes Complaint" from about  1594. The present work contains numerous short stories on the tragic fate, not only of European and Russian princes, but also on Turkish, Moorish and Egyptian princes, and even the story of Motexuma from Mexico, and of Atabalipa, the King of Peru. The genre was very popular and judged most educational as they reminded people of the arbitrariness of human fate.

Fine copy of the rare first edition, with the bookplate of Clifford Coates.- (Small piece cut out of title and repaired, not affecting text; line of greek characters in old ink on top-margin on title).
Cf. Willems 44 (Elzevir-ed. of 1602).

Related Subjects: 17th Century  Greek & Latin  History  Literature 

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