The Bookseller of Florence: The Story of the Manuscripts That Illuminated the Renaissance by Ross King

The Bookseller of Florence: The Story of the Manuscripts That Illuminated the Renaissance Reviews

• 
  TBV (on hiatus)

  “‘All evil is born from ignorance,’ as Vespasiano wrote. ‘Yet writers have illuminated the world, chasing away the darkness.’ This darkness he and his friends hoped to dispel by casting on to their fractured and unhappy times the pure radiance of the past, one scribe and one manuscript at a time.”
  
  Author Ross King starts by discussing the origins of writing, what material they wrote on, who the great writers were, and the collection of manuscripts into libraries such as the Ptolemaic Library of Alexandria. The origins of several book-related words currently used are provided too.
  
  Vespasiano da Bisticci (1421-1498)
  The main narrative unfolds in the Via dei Librai (Street of Booksellers) where there were several booksellers and stationers, cartolai (from carta, i.e. paper). In 1433 Vespasiano da Bisticci, an uneducated boy, started work at the bookshop of Michele Guarducci. It was a good place to be, as the intelligentsia gathered in that street to discuss and argue various issues. ”By the 1440s the bookshop had become a gathering place for Florence’s intellectual luminaries. Philosophical and literary discussions now took place not sul canto del palagio but inside the corner shop itself as visitors filed through the doors not merely to purchase manuscripts of Cicero or Pliny but also to hear or participate in learned philosophical discussions about them. One visitor claimed the shop was ‘redolent of philosophy.’” In addition, ”If the arrival in Florence of the Roman Curia had been a great boon to booksellers, five years later, in 1439, when Vespasiano was seventeen years old, the cartolai in the Street of Booksellers suddenly found their shops filled with dozens of even more brilliant and discerning customers, or what Vespasiano called ‘learned men from all over Italy and beyond.’ Russians, Armenians, Bulgarians, Ethiopians, and Mesopotamians were among those who arrived. The majority of these distinguished scholars came, however, from Constantinople...”.. As a fourteen-year-old Vespasiano was part of the huge crowd of people who celebrated Brunellesci’s great achievement of designing and creating the large dome of Santa Maria del Fiore. Later he would meet erudite men such as ”The other is Pico della Mirandola, Marsilio Ficino’s friend and fellow Plato enthusiast: a tall, green-eyed intellectual virtuoso who can read, among other languages, Aramaic and Chaldean, and who can recite the entirety of Dante’s Divine Comedy both forwards and backwards. The awestruck Ficino regards him as a member of ‘a superhuman race.’”
  
  The boy, keen to learn, acquired a great deal of knowledge and by the age of twenty he made an independent sale. His advice was now being sought in acquiring ancient manuscripts. Eventually he became an expert in all aspects of finding manuscripts and having them copied for wealthy clients. He got to know the powerful people of the day, finding and supplying manuscripts for their personal libraries. Using some of the best craftsmen of the time, he facilitated the copying, decorating and binding of these works, and he soon gained a reputation of being the best person to go to if one wanted to acquire manuscripts. Magnificent libraries were being built and stocked.
  
  Vespasiano lived in Florence when the Medici family was in power, from Cosimo de’ Medici (1389-1464) to his son Piero (1416-1469) and his grandson Lorenzo (1449-1492). ”Vespasiano later wrote that Cosimo showed the greatest generosity to ‘those who busy themselves with books,’ since he knew they were often ‘poor in possessions but rich in virtue.’” “Cosimo came to possess a good knowledge of Latin – ‘more than one would expect,’ Vespasiano claimed, ‘in a great citizen burdened with the affairs of state.’ His interests and expertise ranged over a formidable territory. ‘He was so universal in his knowledge,’ wrote Vespasiano, ‘that he could talk to anyone,’ whether about agriculture, astrology, medicine, philosophy, or theology.”. Vespasiano’s client base included leaders from other regions too. For example Federico da Montefeltro and King Alfonso of Naples were clients of his, and as such Vespasiano exported manuscripts.
  
  During Vespasiano’s lifetime Johannes Gutenberg’s printing press was created. The Florentines were quick to learn the new skills, and ”In the years 1475 and 1476, some 570 titles were printed in Italy: more than half the total published across the whole of Europe. Germany accounted for only 265 titles in these years, France for 101. By the beginning of 1476, twenty-four Italian towns and cities had printing presses compared to only thirteen in Germany and six in France. By 1476 at least a hundred printers were operating in Italy, three times as many as in Germany.” Leonardo da Vinci sketched a design for an automated printer, but his invention did not see the light of day. Ross King takes the reader through the history of printing and printed books of that era. But the beautiful illuminated manuscripts were still in demand for the libraries of the rich and famous. The reader also learns about the scribes, materials of their craft, and the manuscripts that they copied by hand. We learn for example that ”Manuscript illuminators needed to master the skill of painting in miniature on parchment, an apprenticeship that might take as many as eight or ten years.”. From that flows detail of exactly how they used their skills. And then there was the dissemination of the manuscripts or printed books.
  
  Whilst all the illuminating educational things were happening there was of course also a lot of bloodshed (e.g. the Pazzi conspiracy) as well as territorial strife between different regions. There were even some who destroyed magnificent works, such as Cesare Borgia who ripped carefully crafted bindings from books. Also, ”But casualties of the Turkish conquest of Otranto also included manuscripts from one of the West’s greatest storehouses of Greek literature and philosophy.” Centuries later ”On 30 September 1943, as reprisal for the killing of one of their number in the village square in San Paolo Bel Sito, fifteen miles outside of Naples, a squad of Nazi soldiers set fire to the nearby Villa Montesano, to which the Royal State Archives of Naples had been evacuated. Seven hundred years of history were lost – thirty thousand manuscripts and fifty thousand documents.”
  
  There is a wealth of information in the pages of Ross King’s book, and I have barely scratched the surface. There are plenty of beautiful illustrations, plus extensive notes and a comprehensive bibliography. Although I read the Kindle edition, I liked it enough to also buy a print copy for my home library.
  
  #####
  
  “In May 1468 Bessarion wrote a letter to the doge, Cristoforo Moro, justifying his gift with an eloquent plea for learning. He pointed out that ‘there is no more worthy or honourable possession, no more dignified and valuable treasure,’ than a book. ‘They live, they converse and speak with us, they teach us, educate us, console us,’ he wrote. Books bring the past to life and place it before our eyes, they offer examples to emulate, they tell us of things both human and divine. Without them, he wrote, we are rendered ‘barbarous and unlettered.’” [Venice]
  
• 
  Blaine DeSantis

  Ross King, just his name tells us this is going to be a well-researched book, and one about the Renaissance period in Italy - he has written about some non-Renaissance topics, but the Renaissance is his wheelhouse! And for the first time he has turned his eyes to the lost art of bookmaking, and printing in the 15th century and a minor character, Vespaciano, who rose from humble origins to become a leading bookmaker, bookseller and friend to the greats in Florence and beyond. He supplied many of these people with beautiful and elegant copies of old masters such as Plato, Cicero and other Greek and Roman writers, his services were in demand even after the invention of the moveable type printing press.
  No matter how much I will rave about this book, it is not a book for everyone, as you have to wade through the development of papyrus to codex to parchment to paper, with much detail about all of these developments. Then we learn about how ink is prepared, how scribes used to copy on parchment and how parchment was prepared. There is a lot of book history here, a lot of philosophy here, a lot of Renaissance history and historical figures here, and finally a massive amount of names and places in the development of the printing press - so much so that I have failed to understand why so many examples are included when maybe 5 would be sufficient. But, then again, we are talking about Ross King who does immense research and will give you all you need to know, and most likely all that is known on a topic.
  I really enjoyed this book but it was not one that I could read cover to cover at one time. I was easily able to read a few chapters, close the book and return to it. A well done effort and I look forward to King's next book no matter what the topic!
• 
  Nancy

  It was an age when scholars studied the ancient Greek and Roman philosophers in search of answers to contemporary concerns. Book collectors scoured monasteries and abbeys across Italy and Europe seeking rare and neglected books.
  
  Golden Age Florence was a a republic, a literate city that educated boys and girls, a place where both wealthy and tradesmen ordered volumes for their personal libraries.
  
  It was also an age of cruel acts of vengeance, political intrigue and family wars, a time of plague, while the Ottoman empire threatened from the East. The church was in turmoil, powerless girls were married off or sent to an abbey, either way locked away from the world.
  
  While some sought truth in Plato and Aristotle, others rejected anything but the Holy Bible and traditional Christian beliefs.
  
  As one bookseller in Florence wrote,"All evil is born from ignorance, Yet writers have illuminated the world, chasing away the darkness." He was Vespasiano da Bisticci. He started life as an eleven-year-old assistant in a book shop, a stationer and bookbinder, doing manual work that required great strength. He went on to be renowned as the "king of the world's booksellers", a trusted friend to the wealthy and powerful and the scholar.
  
  The Bookseller of Florence is the story of Vespasiano's career, set against the story of bookmaking during the shift from hand written and illuminated manuscripts bound in velvet and jewels to the mass production of the printing press. And it is the history of Florence and Italy during the early Renaissance.
  
  Saving ancient manuscripts, copying them, and distributing them for scholarly study did not protect the texts. Without libraries to store and protected them, many sat neglected or where destroyed by fire and warfare, or carried off to disappear.
  
  King covers a lot of territory! I was only vaguely familiar with Italian and Catholic history previously---and found it fascinating. I will read more! (Such as King's Brunelleschi’s Dome, on my Kindle TBR shelf.) I learned about every aspect of book making, the switch from papyrus to parchment to paper, the advances in writing fonts, how printing presses work.
  
  Yes, the book is filled with a huge cast of historic people and events, but my interest never flagged. I was swept up in this epic history.
  
  I received a free egalley from the publisher through NetGalley. My review is fair and unbiased.
• 
  Constantin Beda

  Cartea asta a venit absolut natural după "Istoria Evului Mediu", și ca timp subiectiv pentru mine, dar și din punctul de vedere al istoriei cronologice. Librarul din Florența începe cam în aceeași perioadă în care se termină Evul Mediu; deci lectura ei a fost o preluare de ștafetă și o continuare a cursei. Însă mai este un motiv important pentru care am citit-o: e foarte personală, am parcurs-o cu o implicare totală. Ca fost librar și anticar (de fapt, anticar ești pe viață, odată ce ai intrat în lumea asta) timp de vreo 10 ani, lucrarea de față mi-a fost absolut necesară. Nu numai pentru informațiile istorice despre manuscrise și inventarea tiparului, dar și pentru că cititul nu e doar o pasiune sau un simplu hobby, ci un mod de viață. Și cred că oricine gândește la fel ar trebui să o aibă, să o citească.
  
  Vespasiano da Bisticci - un nume care îmi place, e foarte melodios, încercați să-l rostiți cu voce tare - și-a început cariera de foarte tânăr, la doar 11 ani, ca ucenic în librăria unui legător și vânzător de carte de pe strada Librarilor (evident, cum altfel?). În doar câțiva ani s-a făcut remarcat de colecționarii și cărturarii vremii, ajungând în scurt timp să fie cel mai căutat librar, nu numai pentru că era foarte capabil să găsească ediții vechi și rare ale scrierilor clasice, dar și pentru transcrierea și legarea manuscriselor. A fost librarul personal și apropiatul multor oameni puternici și influenți din secolul al XV-lea, printre clienții lui se numărau bancheri, cardinali, regi și papi. Vespasiano a adunat într-un volum numit Vite di Uomini Illustri (Viața oamenilor iluștri), care nu a fost publicat în timpul vieții lui, biografiile tuturor personalităților pe care le-a cunoscut și care i-au călcat pragul librăriei.
  
  În anii 1400 cartea era un obiect de artă. Pregătirea și scrierea pe un pergament se făcea cu deosebită atenție și meticulozitate. Scribii erau cei care se ocupau cu asta, iar pentru ei procesul de scriere era un adevărat ritual. Copertele și paginile erau impodobite cu miniaturi, ilustrații și anluminuri, aproape fără excepție, și produsul finit era o adevărată piesă de colecție, de o valoare inestimabilă pentru cei care îl comandau.
  
  "Apoi Ser Antonio înmoaie penița într-una dintre cele două călimări. Una are cerneală neagră, cealaltă, roșie. Ingredientele din cea neagră sunt vinul, sevele și scoarțele mai multor specii de copaci, printre care și gale de stejar, niște protuberanțe mici, bogate în acid tanic, care cresc pe ramurile stejarilor, acolo unde o specie de muscă (Eurosta) își depune ouăle. O rețetă italiană pentru cerneala neagră spune că trebuie luate 110 grame de gale măcinate și amestecate cu o sticlă de vin alb tare, coajă de rodie, scoarță de scoruș, rădăcină de nuc și gumă arabica - adică seva unui copac de acacia. Aceste ingrediente erau lăsate în soare și amestecate o dată la câteva ore. După o săptămână, în amestec se mai adăugau câteva grame de vitriol roman sau sulfat de cupru. Lichidul era pus la păstrare încă vreo câteva zile și amestecat în mod regulat. Era pus apoi pe foc și fiert "cât un Miserere" adică atât cât îți lua să reciți cele 19 versete ale Psalmului 51. Fiertura neagră era răcită, filtrata printr-o pânză de in și lăsată în soare încă vreo două zile. "Dacă puneți în ea și puțin alaun, va deveni mai deschisă la culoare", spune rețeta, "și va fi o cerneală de scris perfectă"."
  
  Librarul din Florența și manuscrisele care au iluminat Renașterea nu e doar o biografie. Veți găsi acolo istorie, detalii despre viața socială a Florenței în secolul XV, îi vom cunoaște pe membrii familiei de Medici, pe papii Sixtus al IV-lea și Nicolae al V-lea, chiar și pe Leonardo da Vinci. Am citit aici despre apariția tiparului în 1453 (același an în care a fost cucerit orașul Constantinopol) și cum asta a însemnat declinul lent, dar sigur, al manuscriselor legate. Despre cât costa o carte sau angajarea unui scrib. Cuvinte pe care le folosim astăzi în mod uzual și-au dezvăluit originile, unele de care habar nu aveam. Câteva exemple: hârtia velină vine de la cuvântul vellum (în latină vitulus) care înseamnă piele de vițel; bibliografie sau bibliofil ( bibliotecă prin extensie) își are originea de la papirus, trestie folosită pentru documente și pe care grecii o numeau byblos, după orașul-port cartaginez cu același nume; liber, tot din latină, era scoarța membranoasă a papirusului, cuvânt care s-a transformat în library/librarian.
  
  Trebuie să spun și despre felul în care arată volumul. Cred că poate fi considerat o ediție bibliofilă, de colecție. Începând de la copertă, culori, grafică și ilustrațiile color din interior, totul arată superior calitativ. Și mai cred că poate lumina orice bibliotecă, nu numai minți. Și mai ales, cum spuneam la început, mi-a adus aminte cu plăcere de anii în care profesam ca anticar. Din punctul meu de vedere cartea asta e completă, de la aspect până la conținut.
• 
  Ari Pérez

  
  An extensive account of fifteenth century Florence’s literary world.
  
  Familiar Italian history author Ross King sets his sights on fifteenth-century Florence, but especially pays attention to the role that manuscript copyists played during the Renaissance. King focuses in part on a general biography of Vespasiano di Bisticci, a bookseller and manuscript hunter who worked for the most demanding clients and with the heaviest purse. Throughout his forty years as a salesman of hand-copied manuscripts, he served popes, governors, and high-ranking people who sought the wisdom of the ancient Greeks and obscure religious writings which would enable them to win philosophical debates. Vespasiano who ‘was the most accomplished, prolific, and influential producer of manuscripts during the fifteenth century’ lived during turbulent political times: from the conquest of Constantinople and through the Pazzi Conspiracy, he dedicated his life to learn and rediscover lost currents of thought. He was the go-to guy for rare religious texts, new translations, and beautiful deluxe editions of already known philosophical works. And Florence was also the place where all knowledge converged, it was — at that time — one of the most cultural places of all of Europe and Vespasiano took advantage of that. It was thanks to the manuscripts that academics and theologians could prevail over their intellectual opponents since they had no longer to rely on memory or on suspicious translations. But the process of copying manuscripts was an arduous and costly one. Some editions costed more than entire farms or a year of one’s wages, and they took months to produce. However, the end result was a beautiful piece of art which people like Cosimo di Medici were happy to pay for. Author Ross not only outlines Vespasiano’s dealer trajectory, and not only does he give an extensive overview of Florence and its political events, but he also gives detailed accounts of some of the most important manuscripts of the day; when talking about a certain Cicero’s publication or one by Aristotle, he makes sure to inform the reader the contents of it and why people wanted them. The time of Vespasiano was one in which the old Greek works were being rescued and ‘married’ to a catholic way of living, but it was not always a very successful attempt since most of them were perceived as pagan. But it didn’t stop academics to learn the language and produce translations, and Vespasiano had a pivotal role in that. But this famous cartolaio also lived in a risky period for his trade, which was in the advent of printing. He was menaced by a machine by a certain Gutenberg guy which produced the same work as his but much faster and in larger quantities, and soon the office of copyist was no longer in great demand. Even though Vespasiano never embraced this new invention, his legacy remains as one of the most — if not the most — renown bookseller of his time.
  
  This book will remain an authoritative work on the dissemination of manuscripts, and possible the one biography of Vespasiano da Bisticci that will be referred to for a long time. ~
• 
  Linden

  Vespasiano, a bookseller in 15th century Florence, is the person referenced by the title of this history. The author tells of how books were produced, which before the printing press, involved scribes hand copying the text. The history of the printing press and movable type is also discussed. He describes the intrigues of Florence, involving ecclesiastical figures and powerful men, wars, plagues, and murders, so there is a lot more involved than just Vespaciano and his book shop. Thanks to the publisher and Netgalley for this ARC.
• 
  Shawn Callon

  A really enthralling read full of historical facts about Renaissance Italy, the big split in the Roman Catholic Church, the introduction of printed books, the capture of Constantinople by the Turks, Savanarola's pyramids of book burnings and the wonderful references to the Greeks and the Romans. The author's style is entertaining and at times amusing, holding my attention throughout the book. I learned so much!
  The novel takes us through the life of Vespasiano as he grows to be recognized as the king of the world's booksellers. Florence's bankers and wool merchants brought untold wealth into the city and that abundance encouraged magnificent architecture, sculpture, painting and literature. Vespasiano's skill lay in seeking out the original manuscripts written by the ancient Greeks and Romans and then creating his own beautifully adorned copies for his rich clients throughout Italy. We learned that he had to be very careful how he handled his clients because Italy in those days was full of warring parties jostling for power. At times his bookshop became known as "a political nexus, a listening post for the subversive and the disaffected."
  
  As printed books became more popular throughout Italy, demand for Vespasiano's skilled craftsmanship began to wane. In 1480 he retired and moved away from his beloved city. The author
  includes a great quote from Vespasiano that is still relevant today - "All evil is born from ignorance; yet writers have illuminated the world, chasing away the darkness."
  
  This review was written by Shawn Callon, author of The Diplomatic Spy
• 
  Valerie

  Goodreads giveaway given to my dad to read. And let me just say he LOVED this book. "This is the type of history they should be teaching in school." was his first comment upon finishing. He would share all of these cool, interesting facts with me, which I would have found really, really cool, except all of these facts and figures were shared prior to my morning coffee.
  Not only that, my dad also won't let me share (MY) copy of the book with anyone, he's already squirreled it away on his bookshelf to read again at a later time. He recommended this book to his sister, a major History and book lover, but won't share his copy with her, either. For MY Goodreads giveaway prize, he's extremely possessive of it.
  Maybe eventually I'll get my hands on it and read it. If that ever happens I'll be able to give a more insightful review of the book itself. Until then, all I can really say is he absolutely LOVED this book and highly recommends it to history and book lovers.
• 
  Boudewijn

  Er zijn schrijvers die de wereld hebben verlicht en de duisternis hebben verdreven
  
  Ingetogen biografie over Vespasiano, een Florentijnse boekhandelaar en manuscripten vervaardiger die leefde in een overgangsrijd tussen twee technologieën in. Hij perfectioneerde de productie van talloze met de hand gemaakte en geïllustreerde manuscripten terwijl die op het punt stond om te verdrongen te worden door de opkomende boekdrukkunst.
  
  Door de komst van de drukpers zakte het vervaardigen van de manuscripten in, waardoor er plots meer boeken werden gemaakt en de prijs van een gedrukt boek aanzienlijk lager kwam te liggen.
  
  Desondanks bleef Vespasiano manuscripten vervaardigen om tegemoet te komen aan de leeshonger van een groeiend publiek van geletterde en geleerden, vorsten en potentaten die in navolging van de lezers uit de klassieke oudheid indrukwekkende bibliotheken aanlegden.
  
  Het boek geeft een mooi inzicht in het 15e eeuwse Florence, midden in de Renaissance en de bloeiende economie van kennis verzameling. Vespasiano wist in zijn tijd de aandacht te vestigen op de schittering van de oude Griekse filosofen en plaveidde daarmee de weg voor de groten van de Middeleeuwse wereld.
• 
  Mark Hebwood

  I am disappointed with myself but I have to admit that in the end, I did not like this book very much. It took me almost 200 pages to notice that I didn't like it, but once I had sensed that I didn't, I could not banish this thought from my mind again, and the rest of the book felt rather tedious to read.
  
  Just before I picked up this book, I had finished Brunelleschi's Dome, also by Ross King. That book, I thought, was excellent. In it, Ross chronicles the construction of Florence's famous dome, and tells a vivid tale of how its architect Filippo Brunelleschi managed to overcome the manifold challenges he encountered during the several decades of his work. Ross embeds his account into an analysis of the politics of the time, he introduces a suite of historical figures that impacted the dome's construction, some well-known like the Medici, some lesser-known like Filippo's personal rival Giovanni da Prato. Ross peppers his analysis with anecdotes, some funny, some tragic, and as his account develops, the reader shares Brunelleschi's fears, hopes, trepidations, and, finally, a sense of relief and pride in his crowning achievement.
  
  In The Bookseller of Florence, I was looking to find such an intimate historical retelling again, this time of the life and times of Vespasiano da Bisticci, apparently one of the most influential booksellers in the Italian Renaissance.
  
  Well, I say 'apparently', for after reading about 400 pages about the man, I am still not sure exactly who he was, and why he rose to such a position of eminence. Ross did not really tell me - we are treated to pages and pages of detailed information about topics related to the bookselling trade, how manuscripts developed, how they were manufactured, what training one needed to have as a scribe, or an illuminator, how much the manuscripts cost to produce, how much they sold for, how the coloured inks for the illuminations were manufactured, who V's customers were, how many manuscripts they managed to collate in their libraries, how they got them, where they found them, by which method they were transported, how the printing press began to change the market place for manuscripts, who the authors of the manuscripts were, what times they lived in, why they were famous, what type of reception they enjoyed by whom in what century. And that's just a short selection. There is more.
  
  But what there isn't is any mention of Vespasiano. Ross must have felt the same thing, because every so often he injects a dutiful "V must have thought that...", "to the young V, this must have felt like...", but beyond these fillers, we are not treated to anything V actually did in his own right as a historical actor before page 83. And even then, we never learn who Vespasiano actually was, we do not know anything about his habits, his fears, his hopes, his triumphs. After less than 200 pages of Brunelleschi's Dome, I felt so close to the architect of Florence's dome that I started calling him "Pippo" in my head. After 400 pages of The Bookseller of Florence, I admit I had to look up the spelling of his name for this review, since I had already forgotten it.
  
  So there it is. To me, Ross did not manage to do for Vespasiano what he so brilliantly did for 'Pippo'. His subject matter never became alive, it never jumped off the page, it did not draw the reader in. Still, to anybody with an interest in medieval manuscripts, this book will be a treasure trove. I still recommend reading it to those with such an interest, but perhaps forewarned may be forearmed in this case: Don't expect to learn a lot about the bookseller of Florence. If you approach the book as a grab-bag of topics related to 15th century book production, loosely held together by the professional life of a bookseller superstar, you will probably get a lot more joy out of the book than I did.
• 
  Johan

  Interessant, maar een beetje te veel een opeenstapeling van "weetjes" en te weinig "spanningsboog".
• 
  Dakota Morgan

  It's a book about books! I'm instantly sold. A slow start leads into a mesmerizing look at the history of the written word, how that written word morphed from manuscripts to printed publications in the 1400s, and how one bookseller in Florence dealt with all of it (not to mention the numerous wars and intrigues taking place on the Italian peninsula and beyond).
  
  Ross King packs a ton into The Bookseller of Florence, but his storytelling skills rarely lead you too deep down a rabbit-hole. The gentle tug of history pulls the reader along until, one day, the printing press is everywhere and manuscripts on vellum are passe. It's a fascinating bit of history that would be especially appealing to those who ponder why and how we read.
  
  The only drawback to The Bookseller of Florence is its occasionally intense focus on the writers of long-past eras - Plato and the like. Obviously, booksellers and readers of the 1400s were fascinated with these ancient masters, but King can get bogged down in in Platonic babble that's less interesting to listen to. Still, I came away from The Bookseller of Florence with plenty of new knowledge and an unexpected appreciation for 1400s Florence. Now, where's that time machine?
• 
  Jennifer (JC-S)

  ‘The Street of Booksellers, Via dei Librai, ran through the heart of Florence, midway between the town hall to the south, and the cathedral to the north.’
  
  A discussion of the origins of writing, the materials written on, some of the great writers and the collection of manuscripts into libraries is how Mr Smith begins his narrative. And once the scene is set, we move to the Via dei Librai in Florence. It is here, in 1433 that Vespasiano da Bisticci (1421-1498) started work in the bookshop of Michele Guarducci. By the 1440s, the bookshop had become a gathering place, where philosophical and literary discussions took place. Many distinguished scholars came from Constantinople. Vespasiano da Bisticci was keen to learn, and 15th century Florence was the perfect place: magnificent libraries were being built, manuscripts were being sourced and copied for wealthy clients. Vespasiano and his team of scribes and illuminators produced exquisite manuscripts for many important people across Europe.
  
  ‘All evil is born from ignorance,’ as Vespasiano wrote. ‘Yet writers have illuminated the world, chasing away the darkness.’
  
  But the age of illuminated hand-written manuscripts was ending. In 1476 a printing press was set up in Florence. The Convent of San Jacopo di Ripoli, a community of Dominican nuns, acquired a printing press and began producing books and pamphlets.
  
  ‘Vespasiano occupied a tenuous and unenviable position, straddling as he did two different technologies.’
  
  Vespasiano lived in Florence when the Medici family were in power. This book is the story of his career, the story of bookmaking and a history of Florence during the 15th century.
  
  I would recommend this book to anyone interested in the history of books and 15th century Florence.
  
  Jennifer Cameron-Smith
• 
  Elena

  We think our modern achievements are being upended by technological revolutions, wars, and pandemics, well it's not actually all that new in history. An unprecedented flowering of stunningly beautiful manuscript production enabling the recovery of ancient wisdom was upended by the Gutenberg revolution. There was also internal warfare, the Pope's army was up to no good, and threats came from the Ottoman Turks who claimed Constantinople and threatened Europe. And of course there were surges of plague, sound familiar? In Florence, the art of copying manuscripts survived quite a while after the invention of the printing press. Vespasiano facilitated the production and sale of priceless illuminated manuscripts, mostly in the Latin language which he himself did not know especially well. The German invention of the press spread quickly in the Italian states, but somewhat slower in Florence. Eventually the art of hand copying and illuminating manuscripts as fine works of art was superseded, just as our offset printing has been superseded by less beautiful but cheaper print on demand. The first press in Florence was established in a convent with nuns doing the typesetting, nothing new about employing women who have taken on a vow of poverty. One nun named Marietta, had been consigned to the convent at age 3. I can't help but wonder what she thought of it all. And in a brief note that today's booksellers will relate to, some of the early printed inventory was found unsold in the convent 300 years later... Thank you, Ross King, for all of these poignant details from the history of the book!
• 
  Joseph

  A fascinating look at the birth of modern books, this book was a real treat. We meet Vespasiano,"king of booksellers". We learn of his career in Florence in the time following the early Crusades. Although he never grew rich from his profession, no doubt he had an outsized impact on how we have come to view ancient writers and early history. Without his efforts, many works of antiquity would undoubtedly not survived. This volume was a much deserved tribute to a forgotten figure from the past.
• 
  Erik Rostad

  What a neat book! It centers around a bookseller and manuscript producer named Vespasiano who lived in the late 15th century in Florence, Italy. This book covers the history of books, of Florence, and of the shift from manuscripts (done by hand) to printed books. Vespasiano's focus was to "recapture the wisdom of the past and bring it back to life for the sake of the present." Works by Plato, Aristotle, and many others were introduced into Italy, paving the way for the Renaissance.
• 
  Marks54

  “The Bookseller of Florence” is a story of the importance of books in the Italian Renaissance told through the biography of Vespasiano da Bisticci, the undisputed top bookseller in Florence during most of the 15th century, the crucial time period in the richest phase of what came to be called “The Renaissance” by Burkhardt and others. Indeed, the claim in Ross King’s book is that it was Burkhardt’s encounter with a work by Vespasiano in his life that convinced Burkhardt to begin focusing on this period in Italian history and eventually to write his seminal book on “The Civilization of the Renaissance in Italy.” That makes Vespasiano an important figure to appreciate.
  
  The book recounts a fairly linear account of Vespasiano’s life from 1421 to 1498. Along the way, he appears to have met, done business with, and stayed friendly with virtually anyone of importance in 15th century Italy (and Europe more broadly). Not sure of the history? Not a problem! King does a fine job in providing background on the current events of the day and failing that one can always check Google as a last resort. Given the violence of the times, as well as the lifestyles of the players, especially for people in high places, Vespasiano’s long career by itself is an accomplishment. The analogy today might be contemporary media moguls, except that booksellers did not seem to make much money for their efforts.
  
  The book is much more than a survey of 15th century Italy through the life of a central node in the social networks. There is also the story of the business of manuscript preparation and sales at the time. The 15th century was the high point of the time of Illuminated Manuscripts - fancy and well constructed volumes that were written out by hand by scribes as well as engraved, illustrated, illuminated, and bound on a custom basis for rich clients. Very few people were literate at the time and many of those who were had sufficient wealth that they could build fine libraries. King explains how these books were made, including a fairly intricate division of labor in which the final delivered was the result of a team of contractors rather than one or two solo artists. These books also involved a supply chain including different inks, quills, and different media that were written upon ranging from paper and papyrus to various types of vellum and leathers. Who would have expected that book production would be so tightly linked to the livestock business in an area? The details are a bit gross so I will not offer any spoilers on this.
  
  In addition to this, the book also chronicles the growth of an alternative technology for producing and distributing manuscripts — printing. From the mid-century onward, an increasing number of works were printed rather than produced in the traditional manner by scribes and such. King also provides some good detail about how this nascent business works and how it differed from traditional manuscript preparation. At the time, the long term differences were not entirely clear and lots of clients still demanded traditional manuscripts. As the end of the century approached, however, it was clear that printing was the way of the future and that the days of the manuscripts were numbered. Who knew? I started thinking about my old floppy disks and cassette tapes. The archaic business story reminds me of Andrew Pettegree’s 2010 work “The Book in the Renaissance”.
  
  This a rich and thoughtful book that is well written and well worth reading.
• 
  Kim

  The rare book trade is not unique to the modern era. It has, in fact, been a staple of society since there were books to trade, whether said books were in the form we know them as today, handwritten manuscripts, or scrolls. Once something has been written down and declared to be valuable– either for the words written within or for its status as an artistic object. In Florence in the mid-fifteenth century, the book trade was especially vibrant in the city that is often seen as the epitome of the Italian Renaissance. One man, Vespasiano da Bisticci, was at the heart of the Florentine book trade, and while his occupation did not bring him wealth, it brought him fame among the literary and artistic circles of the time. His clients included artists, noblemen, poets, popes, and generations of the Medici family itself. Even in the latter half of his career, with the Gutenberg moveable-type printing press made hand-copied books nearly obsolete, Vespasiano continued to have scribes copy texts by hand, creating beautiful editions of works by such luminaries as Plato and Petrarch long after most bookmakers had switched to using the printing press.
  
  Ross King’s latest popular history, The Bookseller of Florence, is more than a biography of a single man. He uses Vespasiano’s life as an anchor point from which to expand his history of books, bookmakers, booksellers, and readers, and while the narrative roves from ancient Greek philosophers to the 1453 conquest of Constantinople by the Sultan Mehmed II of the Ottoman Empire, it always finds a line back to Vespasiano and his bookshop in Florence. Still, the scope of bookmaking is vast, and King doesn’t hesitate to go into detail about the history of bookmaking and the materials used, taking the reader back to Egypt and Rome to explain the origins of the materials and detail the process that took us from papyrus to vellum to paper, and from scrolls to the books we know today. There is a good deal of discussion, too, about the Greek philosophers Aristotle and Plato; their works were beloved and discussed by Renaissance philosophers and church officials who argued about the ancient philosophies about whether or not they were too pagan to be read by good Christian people, or whether they enhanced the teaching of the Bible and so were acceptable to be disseminated.
  
  Italian writers get a suitable page count, too, with Petrarch’s poetry, Dante’s Comedy, and Boccaccio’s Decameron. King makes special note of Boccaccio, whose critics warned that the raunchy stories were not fit for ladies’ eyes (indicating that, contrary to common modern opinions, upper-class women, at least, were educated and prone to buying books).
  
  And because art and literature are not separate from historical events– and because those events affected Vespasiano’s life and trade– King discusses the major events of the time, from the fall of Constantinople to the infamous Pazzi conspiracy of 1478, as well as the election of popes, the doings and deaths of poorly-behaved noblemen, and how monks and nuns got into the book industry themselves- and not just for religious texts.
  
  For readers lacking a solid foundation in the history of the Italian Renaissance, The Bookseller of Florence could be difficult to read. King sketches out the backgrounds of most of the figures he mentions, but there are enough of them that the flood of names and places could be overwhelming. Keeping a Wikipedia page open to look things up might be a good idea.
  
  But for those who have an interest and grounding in Renaissance history, The Bookseller of Florence provides a treasure trove of facts and insights about books, their history, and our ongoing fascination with them. At times it feels elegiac, like when King discusses the lost works from Greece and Rome, but more often than not it lights up with the love of the written word that all readers feel when presented with a beautiful book.
• 
  Carolyn

  This is a BIG book. It is very full of research and stories, and I am very glad to meet Vespasiano and learn about the transition from manuscript to print and even to hang out with the Medicis, but it took stamina to get through it. I would say this book is 3-4 times as long as it should have been.
• 
  Ceallaigh

  “In May 1468 [Cardinal] Bessarion wrote a letter to the doge, Cristoforo Moro, justifying his gift [of his entire manuscript collection to the library of the Basilica of San Marco] with an eloquent plea for learning. He pointed out that ‘there is no more worthy or honorable possession, no more dignified and valuable treasure,’ than a book. ‘They live, they converse and speak with us, they teach us, educate us, console us,’ he wrote. Books bring the past to life and place it before our eyes, they offer examples to emulate, they tell us of things both human and divine.“

  
  
  TITLE—The Bookseller of Florence
  AUTHOR—Ross King
  PUBLISHED—2021
  PUBLISHER—Chatto & Windus, an imprint of Vintage // Penguin Random House (UK)
  
  GENRE—literary nonfiction
  SETTING—Europe & the Near East, mid- to late-1400s CE
  MAIN THEMES/SUBJECTS—the life & work of Vespasiano da Bisticci, history of bookbinding & bookmaking, book production in the mid to late 15th c. CE in Europe, illuminated manuscripts of the Renaissance, early modern printing, monastery & private libraries, Popes & the Vatican, warrior lords of Italy and the Mediterranean, Byzantine scriptoria, major Renaissance cities: Constantinople, Venice, Florence, Rome, Naples & others, the invention of the printing press in Germany and its dissemination into Italy, the Medici—their politics & intrigue, Mehmed the Conqueror, King Alfonso (who kept giving me big Stede Bonnet vibes 🤣), Duke & other historical figures from the age, the role of women in Italian Renaissance society (brief glimpses, but even King’s brief treatment & insight made me want to learn more), major Classical authors: Plato, Aristotle, Cicero & others
  
  WRITING STYLE—⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
  DEPICTION of historical figures—⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
  NARRATIVE FLOW—⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
  BONUS ELEMENT/S—This was the ultimate book- & history-nerd read.
  PHILOSOPHY—⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
  
  

  “To the usual implements of warfare—battle axes, swords, lances, and cannons—a deadly new weapon, the printed word, had suddenly been added. The older weapons were still serviceable, of course, and they would ultimately settle the dispute.”

  
  
  This book had kind of a dark academia vibe to it but also a definite Game of Thrones vibe to it as well and all of the historical information from the technological processes of manuscript production, illumination, the printing press, and the design and composition of various historical libraries to the discussion of various political intrigues, scandals, and conspiracies kept me very engaged in what was really an incredibly informative and academic piece of literary nonfiction.
  
  King’s narrative voice was excellent. Reading every chapter felt like I was listening to a really dynamic professor giving a lecture on only the most interesting elements of the Italian Renaissance. He digresses into other relevant areas of information such as the history of the Byzantine scriptoriums responsible for preserving the majority of classical literature to the development of the printing press in Germany. I literally could have read 1,000 pages of this book.
  
  Anyway, completely obsessed. This book was everything I had hoped it would be. Took me ages to read and I was still sad when it was over. Definitely going to be rereading. What’s next from King??
  
  

  “The speed with which books could be produced, the quantity of them, and their relative cheapness in comparison to manuscripts—all of these things meant, they believed, that knowledge could spread far and fast, with everyone, even the poor, able to own libraries. Darkness would be dispelled and there would come, a friar would write in 1476, salutem in medio terre—salvation on earth.”

  
  
  ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
  
  TW // poisoning, fratricide, plague, violence/gore (Please feel free to DM me for more specifics!)
  
  Further Reading—
  - Map of Knowledge, by Violet Moller
  - The Name of the Rose, by Umberto Eco
  - Brunelleschi’s Dome, by Ross King—I read this in high school and remember loving it
  - A World Lit Only By Fire, by William Manchester—Another one I read in high school. I remember it being a bit controversial to have been assigned to an AP Euro History class but 🤷🏻‍♀️ I could be misremembering… I remember enjoying it though and I think I’d like to get the illustrated edition I saw at a bookshop recently and re-read it soonish…
  - Ex-Libris, by Ross King—TBR—one of King’s fiction novels! Actually has kind of bad ratings but based on what ppl say it sounds like I’d love it so definitely going to give it a try
• 
  Mathijs Loo

  Prima boek, de vele namen die voorbij komen duizelen je soms wel een beetje
• 
  Melisende

  A new found kinship with a fellow collector.
• 
  Alexandra

  I received this as an advance copy via NetGalley.
  
  This is one of the best history books I've read in years.
  
  It's written superbly. The language is a delight - but not so clever or lyrical that it gets hard to read. The pace is just right, and the level of detail is an absolute delight: the right balance of fascinating without getting into ridiculous minutiae.
  
  It's wonderfully historical: it uses primary sources and historians to make arguments and illustrate points, and they're all woven within the story seamlessly. It uses endnotes, so you don't have footnotes cluttering the page but you still have the reassurance that the author has done the research!
  
  It illuminates (heh) the context magnificently. The Renaissance, Italy, and Florence are really not my scene, beyond knowing a few names (Medici, Borgia. - and Sforza for some reason?). The author sets the general scene for all three so that I felt completely comfortable going in. The book is ostensibly about Vespasiona, the "king of booksellers", who started as a fairly uneducated boy working in a book binder's in Florence and became the man who could either track down a manuscript or have a beautiful new one made for you - where "you" could be a wealthy-enough person in Florence or, like, the Pope (a few of whom he knew by name, hello). Beyond being a biography, though (which would have been fascinating but not that long because info about his early life is lacking) this is almost a biography of TEXTS, as objects and sources of knowledge, in this crucial moment - the 15th century. Why was it crucial? Well, a bunch of ancient Greek texts were being rediscovered and translated - especially Plato, who was being brought into the Christian fold as Aristotle was two centuries before. There were changes in the way knowledge itself was perceived, and an increase in the number of people (let's be honest, basically men, but still) who were chatting/arguing/ getting fiery about various bits of knowledge. OH, and THEN, Gutenberg and his crazy weird moveable type (NOT first invented by him, of course, that was happening over in Asia already, and the author acknowledges that) comes along. The way the author contextualises that, and discusses the stats about book publication (mss numbers rose when print came along - probably because of increasing literacy) - it's all just an absolute delight.
  
  The book balances political history, social history, and a bit of economic history to make a thoroughly well-rounded examination of the period. And it still manages to revolve around this one man, Vespasiano, who coordinated the production of beautiful books and magnificent libraries, who became an author himself in old age, and was probably a bit of a cranky old man about those new-fangled print books.
  
  Gosh I loved this book.
• 
  Anne Morgan

  A fascinating story of the rediscovery of Greek and Roman texts by scholars in the so-called "Dark Ages", 'The Bookseller of Florence' proves to the reader that the time period was anything but dark. Focusing around the bookseller Vespasiano, Ross King tells us of the rise of the medieval manuscript, parchment and vellum, and the philosophers and scholars who worked to translate Greek texts, to rediscover Plato and Aristotle, and lead to a great humanist revolution . King answers questions about how such texts could be "lost" in the first place and where and how they began to be rediscovered, which I found fascinating. Covering such a large amount of history helped me by focusing on Vespasiano, a Florence bookseller who worked to build libraries of the rich and famous, to recruit scribes and illustrators and make beautiful manuscripts, and to make sure that the knowledge found within them was spread despite plagues or wars. When Ross King expands his book to explore more political and far reaching aspects of the time, or philosophies of people Vespasiano knew and considered friends, I often thought the text dragged and I got lost in it sometimes before working my way back to Vespasiano. It's obvious King wanted to do his best to provide a full picture of the life and times Vespasiano lived in and influenced, but sometimes it got a little much for me.
  
  However, overall this was a book full of fascinating information and tidbits I loved reading, although far too many for me to remember in one sitting. To fully absorb even a fraction of the knowledge King is passing on would take multiple readings and probably taking notes. Highly dense and occasionally slow, but fascinating if you stay with it,
  
  I received an ARC of this book from NetGalley in exchange for an honest review
• 
  Lisa

  No, this isn't a review of an historical novel.
  
  The Bookseller of Florence is a marvellous art history book about a hero of the Renaissance called
  Vespasiano da Bisticci (1421 – 1498) who was the preeminent book merchant of his era.  He contributed to the store of knowledge from which we still benefit today by hunting out manuscripts from the ancient world that were decaying in dusty monasteries all over Europe, and then he hired the most talented of scribes to copy the manuscripts and had them illuminated by the finest miniaturists so that the books were glorious works of art.  His clients were popes, kings and princes who proclaimed their status by founding magnificent libraries to outdo each other.
  
  My favourite chapter explains the technicalities of making a book before the advent of the printed book.  As King says, in the chapter called 'Antique Letters':
  

  The word 'manuscript' comes from the Latin manu scriptus, 'written by hand', but any manuscript was the product of much more work than simply the writing of a single hand. It was a months- or even years-long, multistep process calling for the expertise of a series of tradesmen and specialist craftsmen from parchment makers to scribes, miniaturists, goldbeaters, and even apothecaries, carpenters, and blacksmiths. (p.99)

  
  It began with finding the manuscript, the search for which is detailed in a previous chapter, where it is shown how important it was to get hold of a quality exemplar.  In Chapter 6, King tells us that Petrarch complained that, so sloppy were the scribes of his day, and so full of errors were the manuscripts they produced, 'an author would not recognise his own work.'  Vespasiano had a good eye for the best of texts, but he was also highly skilled in acquiring the best of materials.  Occasionally he used paper, but the most beautiful and expensive material on which to write was calfskin, or vellum.  Readers who are fond of animals are best advised not to read the details of the finest and whitest vellum available. Suffice to say that the supply of hides for parchment was always dependent on the dietary preferences of the local population, and in Italy the appetite was for goats, and that supply was impacted by Lent when people did not eat meat.
  

  
  
  Benedictine Antiphonary (Wikimedia Commons)
  
  For hundreds of years, the transmission of knowledge had depended on carnivorous appetites and good animal husbandry.  Large volumes with hundreds of pages required the skins of many animals.  One goat was often needed for each page of parchment in a large liturgical book such as an
  antiphonary, while a Bible might take the skins of more than two hundred animals — and entire herd of goats or flock of sheep. (p.100)

  
  And why were the butchers of Florence required to move their operations into the shops on the Ponte Vecchio? So that they, like the tanners, fish sellers and beltmakers, for reasons of hygiene, could turf their blood and slops into the Arno instead of fouling the streets.
  
  Clearly, from the description given of the processing (which I will spare you), parchment makers needed to have strong stomachs.  But they also needed to have considerable finesse in scraping the skins to 0.1mm (1/250 of an inch), because if they were careless it would be uneven, or tear.
  
  For Vespasiano, his work was a labour of love.
  
  To read the rest of my review please visit
  https://anzlitlovers.com/2022/12/22/t...