370

Anthony Cope (d. 1551)

The Historie of Two the Moste Noble Capitaines of the Worlde, Anniball and Scipio. A Fragment.

London: In ædibus Thomæ Bertheleti regii impressoris typis excusum, 1544
First edition in English, quarto, incorporating the work of Titus Livius or Livy translated into English by Cope; the earliest printed Livy in English, preceding Philemon Holland's rendering of the whole work published in 1600; dedicated by the author to Henry VIII; lacking 8 leaves in total: 5 preliminary leaves, including the title page, and the final three leaves [Nn2-4]; B4 misbound after C4; [hand]2 bound at the end of the text; H3 torn with loss; a well-used copy with evidence of great wear and many a schoolboy doodle; with an interesting early English version of italic type used in the headlines, text otherwise in a gothic type; ornamented with woodcut initials throughout; many pages with dog-eared corners; modern parchment; 7 3/4 x 5 1/2 in.

STC 5718; ESTC S108669, showing 5 copies in U.S. libraries.

"The sixteenth century saw the study of classical history flourish. From debates over the rights of women to the sources of Shakespeare's plays, the Greco-Roman historians played a central role in the period's political, cultural, and literary achievements. [...] Livy's History of Rome [exerted influence] on the most pressing debates of the day, from Tudor foreign policy to arguments concerning the merits of monarchy at the height of the English Civil War. [...] Livy played a fundamental though unexplored role in the development of vernacular literature, historiography, and political thought in early-modern England."

"Sir Anthony Cope['s translation of] Livy's account of the Second Punic War for his The Historie of Two the Moste Noble Capitaines of the Worlde (1544), showcas[es] the martial prowess of Scipio and his Carthaginian opponent, Hannibal. Cope deliberately reworked the third decade as a commentary on contemporary foreign policy and war with Scotland. Cope imbued his translation with a diplomatic lexicon which was becoming standardized under Henry VIII. By doing so, Cope produced a translation which supported the official Henrician view that all peaceful avenues of negotiation with Scotland had been exhausted. The struggles between Rome and Carthage thus became, in Cope's hands, an endorsement of Henry's renewal of hostilities with Scotland, complementing wider trends in Tudor Propaganda. In Cope's Livy, as in Henrician England, there are limits to diplomacy." (Quoted from John-Mark Philo's 'An Ocean Untouched and Untried': The Tudor Translations of Livy, Oxford: OU Press, 2020.)

  • Condition: Lacking first 5 leaves: a1-4 and [hand]1, A-Z4, Aa-Mm4, Nn1 (lacking Nn2-4; [hand]2 bound after Nn1.

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