Classic Texts and Fine Printing

Engraved title page after Peter Paul Rubens, 1640

Greek and Roman classics in early and finely-printed editions were eagerly sought by collectors in England and Europe during the early nineteenth century. But as the classical languages have gradually lost their place in the curriculum, so too have their texts lost favor in the eyes of collectors. The recent donation by Mrs. Katherine Bowie of the small but distinguished collection formed by her first husband, Philip Schulte, besides materially strengthening Georgetown's holdings, offers us a first-hand insight into the collecting taste of earlier times. Mrs. Bowie's gift was made specifically because of the anniversaries we are celebrating in the "Year of the Library," and we are indeed grateful.

Mr. Schulte's lifelong interest in the classics led to the formation of a considerable library. But in addition to the working staples of modern scholarly editions, he gathered more than a hundred volumes which would have excited Thomas Frognall Dibdin, the English collector and bibliographer, whose Introduction to the Knowledge of Rare and Valuable Editions of the Greek and Latin Classics is present (fourth edition, 1827) in an obviously well-used copy.

At the heart of the collection are Baskerville's beautifully printed, if not always textually reliable, editions of Catullus, Horace, Juvenal, Lucretius, Sallust, Terence (two copies), and Virgil. These are supplemented by his editions of Ariosto and the Greek New Testament, the latter his only attempt at printing in that language. The Foulis press of Glasgow is represented by its magnificent folio edition of Homer's Iliad and Odyssey (four volumes, 1756-58). The presses of Elzevier and Aldus are represented too, the latter by the first edition of the letters of Pliny the Younger (1508). The works of Apuleius are present in a richly illustrated Venetian edition printed in 1510.

The list of noteworthy volumes could be extended, but one point is abundantly clear: the twin debts that the library owes to the discernment of the collector and to the generosity of the donor.