Adversus gentes libri VII; cum recensione viri celeberrimi & integris omnium commentariis; editio novissima atque omnium accuratissima

by Arnobius | with commentary by Geverhart Elmenhorst, Dirk Canter, Godescalcus Stewechius, and Hérauld Didier

Leiden: Joannes Maire, 1651

[12], 255, [1]; [2], 191, [85]; 156; 283, [21] p. | 4to | [asterisk]^42[asterisk]^2 A-2I^4; chi1 A-2A^4 2B^2 2C-2M^4; A-T^4 V^2; A-2P^4 | 199 x 153 mm

A later edition of the North African's fervent, anti-pagan, fourth-century apology for Christianity, first published in 1542. Dirk Canter's commentary first appeared in 1582, Elmenhorst's in 1603, Stewechius's in 1604, and Didier's in 1605. This was the first edition to bring them all together. ¶ Early anti-Christian polemics, issued just before Diocletian began his systemic persecution of Christians—generally considered the Roman Empire's largest and most violent crackdown on the nascent faith—provided the impetus for this no-holds-barred defense of Christianity and verbal assault on its enemies. For a rhetorician, critics often find this work rather rhetorically unimpressive. "There is little effort to appreciate the merits of literary form in pagan literature, to find the truth hidden in error, or to assume good will on the part of his adversaries. His one purpose is to refute whatever position the pagan may assume" (Swift). Still, the work is not entirely without value. "Arnobius deserves to be better known," Konstantine Panegyres writes. "A writer of wit and vivacity...he offers much insight into the syncretic religious atmosphere of the Roman world under Diocletian." ¶ We don't doubt that Arnobius has merit, but we're really after this edition's extraordinary edition statement, which occupies a separate full page facing the title (Contenta in hâc novissima editione...). The publisher lists the specific learned commentaries found herein; promotes his forthcoming edition of Julius Firmicus Maternus's De errore profanarum religionum, the work of another fourth-century Christian apologist, which Maire appears to have published in 1652 (USTC 1804769); and notes that he will next publish "all the Greek fathers" who wrote against Gentes (presumably more along the lines of Arnobius and Firmicus). More than an edition statement, it functions very well as an advertisement, for this book and forthcoming related titles alike. It seems to evince a longstanding practice of posting loose title pages as ads. "Pinned up on walls and stalls," Raven and Proot note, "they were soon used as a way to advertise new editions." As it happens, quite a few copies of this edition have been digitized, some half of which lack this leaf. We rather suspect some were sliced from the opening gathering and deployed as advertisements, and that perhaps that was the intention. ¶ Also missing from half of those digitized copies is our version of the dedication, with its half-page heading printed on a cancel slip pasted over the earlier version. Subsequently printed copies have the dedication printed directly on the integral leaf. We can see that Henricus Thibault was the dedicatee in the earlier version, thought it's difficult to make out what exactly changed. We can at least confirm the earlier version appears shorter, and so perhaps lacked some of the titles and honors found in the final version. Since dedications commonly functioned as indirect solicitations of favor or financial support, we can understand the desire to get it just right. ¶ It's a fun book, betraying some unexpected vestiges of early modern book production.

PROVENANCE: An early reader annotated the ad facing the title, noting the 1652 publication of Firmicus, and further adducing Jules-César Boulenger's Eclogae ad Arnobium.

CONDITION: Contemporary full parchment over boards; edges sprinkled red; old paper title label on spine. Title printed in red and black; engraved title vignette; some decorative initials. ¶ Lower corner dampstained throughout, affecting the textual area, but mostly quite faint and never terribly dark; occasional similar dampstaining in the upper corner, mostly marginal; title a trifle soiled. Parchment soiled and spine a little cocked. A solid copy.

REFERENCES: USTC 1829471; Brunet, Manuel du libraire, v. 1, col. 492 ¶ Louis J. Swift, "Arnobius and Lactantius: Two Views of the Pagan Poets," Transactions and Proceedings of the American Philological Association 96 (1965), p. 439 (cited above), 440 ("his professed aim is clearly stated in the opening chapters of Book 1: he hopes to refute the pagan claim that Christianity is responsible for innumerable ills that have befallen mankind"); Konstantine Panegyres, "Christian and Non-Christian Agricultural Deities: Arnobius and Local Religion in Africa Proconsularis," Mnemosyne 70 (2017), p. 115-116 (cited above), 116 ("Arnobius was a teacher of rhetoric in Sicca Veneria, a city in the north of modern Tunisia. Adversus nationes was written between 302 and 305, as a response to anti-Christian literature published immediately prior to Diocletian's persecutions beginning February 303."); James Raven and Goran Proot, "Renaissance and Reformation," The Oxford Illustrated History of the Book (2020), p. 143 (cited above); Catherine R. Evans, "Locating Devotion: Sermon Title Pages and the Early Modern Book Market, 1620-1642," The Library 7th Ser 24.1 (March 2023), p. 7 (“In seventeenth-century London, books were primarily advertised by their title pages, pasted on the walls of the city, hung from sticks, and on the bookseller’s stall. Extra copies would be printed for this purpose and the reverse of the title page was left blank in early modern books to enable this.”); Leon Voet, The Golden Compasses (1972), v. 2, p. 422 (Plantin's Paris representative asks in 1570 for "posters and preliminaries, for display, because this makes the book sell well"); Lisa Jardine, Worldly Goods: A New History of the Renaissance (1996), p. 317 (“Wealthy patrons regarded printed artefacts (woodcuts and books) much as they did the portrait medal—as a convenient vehicle for mass-producing and circulating their enduring fame. They acknowledged (and rewarded financially) elaborately complimentary prefaces to themselves in printed books, which offered the work to them as an unsolicited gift, as a specially selected, worthy recipient.”)

Item #747