La liberazione di Ruggiero dall'isola d'Alcina : balletto rapp. ta in musica al ser. mo Ladislao Sigismondo principe di Polonia e di Suezia nella villa imp. le della sereniss. ma arcid. ssa d'Austria gran duch. sa di Toscana / del sig. r Ferdinando Saracinelli Bali di Volterra.
1625
Items
Details
Title
La liberazione di Ruggiero dall'isola d'Alcina : balletto rapp. ta in musica al ser. mo Ladislao Sigismondo principe di Polonia e di Suezia nella villa imp. le della sereniss. ma arcid. ssa d'Austria gran duch. sa di Toscana / del sig. r Ferdinando Saracinelli Bali di Volterra.
Uniform title
Liberazione di Ruggiero dall'isola d'Alcina. Libretto
Created/published
[Florence] : Per Pietro Cecconcelli, alle stelle Medicee, 1625.
Description
45, [1] pages (last blank), [5] folded leaves of plates : illustrations ; 21 cm (4to)
Associated name
Caccini, Francesca, 1587-approximately 1640. author.
Note
This is a PRELIMINARY RECORD. It may contain incorrect information. The "FAST ACC" number is a temporary call number. Please email catalog@folger.edu for assistance.
Item Details
Call number
FAST ACC 271024 (quarto)
Folger-specific note
From dealer's description: "4°; 46 pp., 1 blank l., 5 folding plates. Excellent copy, uncut and unbound, still retaining the original manuscript title-flag ("liberazione di Ruggiero"), this is probably how it was distributed to the audience during the performance. In a 20th-century red morocco box. Outstanding copy of the first edition of the earliest opera/ballet ever composed by a woman, based on Ariosto's Orlando furioso. It is highly exceptional to retrieve these early seventeenth-century “libretti di sala", with all engravings and in such pristine condition. Francesca (1587-c.1637) was the daughter of Giulio Caccini, the composer of the earliest surviving opera (L'Euridice) in 1600; she worked for the Medici family for nearly four decades (1600 to 1637). This ballet is characteristic of early seventeenth-century Florentine opera, with its mix of elaborate scenery, singing and dancing, including the final "Ballo a cavallo", shown in the first engraved plate. The first performance was held at the Villa Poggio Imperiale in Florence on 3 February 1625, before Prince Ladislaus, the future King Sigismund IV of Poland. Watanabe-O'Kelly & Simon ignored this performance, while recording a shorter piece given to celebrate the same event, i.e., Salvadori's La precedenza delle dame, with music by Jacopo Peri (cf. no. 1273). The engraved folding plates by A. Parigi (after his father Giulio Parigi's set designs) depict the Villa of the grand duchess of Tuscany and four of the elaborate stage sets. The latter is a highly valuable document, as the building was destroyed in the eighteenth century. Two separate issues of Ferdinando Saracinelli's libretto can be distinguished. This is the rarest of the two issues, with 45 pages signed A-F4. Copies of it are found in BL (11715.cc.20.), Harvard (Theatre Collection, TS 8385.598 1625) and BnF. In fact, standard bibliographies only mention the shorter 36-page issue, which does not include Andrea Salvadori's sonnet in praise of Saracinelli and which display a different typesetting. Priority between the two has yet to be established. Francesca Caccini's music sheets were also published at this time and this is the only opera by her to survive. Allacci 482. Cicognara 1432. BM STC (Italian) 822. Not in Sonneck or Watanabe-O'Kelly & Simon. For the 36-page issue, see Berlin Kat. 4113." Ordered from Libreria Antiquaria Mediolanum, D9296, 2019-03-18, Purchased at New York Book Fair. March 2019.
Folger accession
271024