An early printed edition (ca. 1450-1480) of Ovid's De Arte Amandi, or, The Art of Love.
Opening page of a fifteenth-century printed edition of Ovid's De Arte Amandi (Ars amatoria). Rauner Special Collections Library, Incunabula (89).
About the Collection
About the Book
De Arte Amandi, also referred to as “Ars Amatoria” or “The Art of Love,” is an elegy written by the Roman poet Ovid circa 2 CE. Composed in elegiac couplets, De Arte Amandi is an instructional treatise in three parts that offers advice on attraction, seduction, and relationships that is playfully delivered and, oftentimes, delightfully modern: section titles include, for example, “Don’t Forget Her Birthday!” and “Look Presentable.” Although the poem’s perceived immorality is debated to be one possible cause of Ovid’s exile from Rome, the work was also enduringly popular.
Dartmouth’s copy of De Arte Amandi speaks to the long history of the poem’s reception. Although no publisher or publication date is identified on it, this edition is identified in Ludwig Hain’s bibliography of incunabula as the first edition of the text in Italian, and as printed before 1480. It is one of only two known copies of this edition in an American library. Dartmouth’s copy preserves traces of an early reader, as well, in the form of marginal annotations and manicules.
The original book is available at Rauner Special Collections Library by asking for Incunabula 89.
Rights Information
Dartmouth College Library assigns a Creative Commons BY-NC license to the digital work and associated web site.
Collection Permalink: https://doi.org/10.1349/ddlp.3986