SODERINI, Giovanni Vettorio

A good copy of the first edition of this collection of three treatises on horticulture, the most important of which on vines and wine by G.V. Soderini (1526-96). He was an Italian agronomist who studied philosophy and law at Bologna; after being spared execution by Ferdinando I de Medici for his political opposition, he was exiled to a Tuscan estate. The result of his years of forced otium , the Trattato focuses on viticulture, examining the soil, weather and techniques which can elicit the best production of grapes and wine. The early annotator of this copy was a keen practitioner interested in the growth of vine cuttings ( magliuoli ), ways of preserving them from worms and tying them to one another, and the best time ( between the two moons ) to harvest grapes. Soderini also considered the nature and making of wines e.g., sweet, hot , watered ( acquetta alla romanesca ) or dry and ways of giving them a specific flavour or smell with the addition of herbs. The second, shorter treatise Bernardo Davanzati Bostichi s Coltivazione toscana delle viti reprises selected topics on viticulture with the addition of material on fruit trees and vegetables, and methods of killing caterpillars and worms. The third Leonardo Giachini s In difesa, et lode del popone (dated 1527) is a hilarious mock-celebration of the melon, its flavour and properties (as well as of the de re rustica genre) set against the criticism thereof of an improbable physician who wouldn t even be good enough to castrate pigs . An intriguing horticultural florilegium with a twist of flamboyant Renaissance satire.