Avancini

17th-century embroidered binding, on a rare meditation on the life and doctrines of Christ.

Vita, e dottrina di Gesu Cristo raccolta da'quattro evangelisti, Nicola Avancini. Parma: Galeazzo Rosati, 1686.

Vet. F3 f.128

The author, Nicola Avancini, was a Jesuit, and Professor of Rhetoric and Philosophy at Gratz, then of Theology at Vienna. This work, originally written in Latin, appears to have been his most enduring. It was translated into several European languages, including English in 1875. This edition of the Italian translation is unrecorded elsewhere.

The binding is red silk/satin with large embroidered foliage in silver, yellow and white threads, and with gilt and gauffered edges. A child’s hand has written "magister meus et unus est Christus" (my one lord is Christ) in ink on the lower flyleaf.