Hypnerotomachia Poliphili

Venice · from 1499

The Hypnerotomachia Poliphili is an illustrated romance printed at Venice by Aldus Manutius in December 1499. Its text is written in a hybrid of Italian, Latin and invented compounds, and it is illustrated with a series of woodcuts whose designer is not documented. The relation between the woodcuts and the text on the page is the reason the book is studied as closely for its typography and layout as for its narrative, and it is among the most frequently described of all fifteenth-century printed books.

Also recorded as Poliphilo's Strife of Love in a Dream; Hypnérotomachie.

Overview

The edition is identified by its 1499 Aldine imprint, its woodcut series and the disposition of type around the illustrations. Copies are described in detail because completeness of the woodcuts, and the state of the leaves carrying them, govern how a copy is catalogued.

In detail

Illustrated romance printed at Venice by Aldus Manutius in 1499.

Connections

Each connection was recorded deliberately, with the basis for it kept on the internal record.

Associated with

Sources

Each source is named with the standing the house places on it, so the evidence can be weighed rather than taken on trust.

  • Library record · Institutional or primary · British Library

    Incunabula Short Title Catalogue (ISTC), British Library, record for the Hypnerotomachia Poliphili, Venice, 1499

    Consult the source