Piselli Ciuccioli, Orazio

Notizie istoriche della chiesa parrocchiale di S. Maria in Monticelli di Roma col ristretto della Vita del regnante Pontefice Clemente xi . restauratore della medesima.

Montefiascone, Stamperia del Seminario, 1719

quarto (220 × 155 mm), (113)ff. signed π1 (half-title Notizie istoriche ; verso blank) π⁴ A–Z⁴ Aa–Dd⁴ and pagi­nated (10) 1–115 (i.e. 215) (1). Woodcut initials and ornaments.

provenance Biblioteca Fondazione Marco Besso, ink­stamp on verso of title-page (repeated on D1r, Dd4v) — deaccessioned (certificate from the librarian, dated 21 March 2007, loosely inserted) — Bloomsbury Auctions, ‘Libri e Auto­grafi. Asta 2: Grand Tour’, Milan, 17 March 2007, lot 188

Short tear in the half-title (repaired at time of binding), paper fault in folio O1 (resulting in loss of a dozen letters); head­cap torn and slight abrasions to binding, otherwise in very good state of preserva­tion.

bound in contemporary Italian speckled calf, back deco­rated in gilt.

Only edition of an account of the medieval church of S. Maria in Monticelli in Rome and its renovation in 1715–1716 by the architect Matteo Sassi (1646–1723), a pupil of Carlo Fontana, modifying the designs of a fellow-pupil, Domenico Antonio de Sanctis.¹ On 21 November 1716, Clement xi had reconse­crated the church with a dedication to the Pres­enta­tion of the Virgin, however the altars remained unfinished until 1719 (Piselli Ciuccioli pp.74, 82).

The author, parish priest of S. Maria in Monticelli, dedicates his book to Cardinal Annibale Albani (1682–1751), a cousin of Clement xi (Giovanni Francesco Albani), and its second half is a review of the programme of restoration and embellishment of the early Roman churches which Clement had insti­gated. The author was well-informed: among much valu­able information he offers in this latter part is the first mention of Specchi’s new façade for the Roman church of Sant’ Anna de’ Palafrenieri (p.142).²

In the first half of the book, together with accounts of the re-laid mosaic floor of S. Maria in Monticelli, and other elements retained to pre­serve the memory of the antiquity of church, Piselli Ciuccioli describes the newly-decorated interior, mentioning over-door tondi painted by Andrea Procaccini, altarpieces in the side chapels painted by Odoardo Vicinelli (‘The Agony in the Garden’), Jean Baptiste Van Loo (‘Christ flagellated’),³ Giovanni Antonio Creccolini, Giovanni Battista Puccetti (‘Saint Ninfa’, ‘Saint John the Baptist preaching’), Pietro Rasina, and others.

The book is a product of the occasional press estab­lished about 1695 in the Seminary in Montefiascone⁴ and is thus relatively uncommon: four cop­ies only can be located in North American libraries (Harvard, Canadian Centre for Architecture, Columbia University, National Gallery of Art Library), a single copy by copac in the United Kingdom (British Library), a single copy in France (Institut National d’Histoire de l’Art, Paris), two copies in Germany (Staatsbibliothek zu Berlin–Preußischer Kulturbe­sitz, Universitätsbibliothek München), and just eight copies in Italian libraries (including Bibliotheca Hertziana and British School at Rome).

reference Ferdinand von Platner, Katalog der Biblio­theca Platneriana enthaltend Municipalstatuten und Staedtegeschichten Italiens (Rome 1886), p.325; Leo S. Olschki, Choix de livres anciens, rares et curièux en vente, xi : Roma (Florence 1936), no. 17821; Antonio Pescarzoli, I libri di viaggio e le guide della raccolta Luigi Vittorio Fossati Bellani. Catalogo descrittivo (Roma 1957), no. 957; Ludwig Schudt, Le guide di Rome: Materialien zu einer Geschichte der römischen Topographie (reprint Farnborough 1971), no. 925; Sergio Rossetti, Rome: a bibliography from the invention of printing through 1899 (Florence 2000–2004), no. 8237