Second Venice edition and fourth edition overall. [309] leaves, lacking the preliminary blank. a-z¹⁰ (-a1), A-H¹⁰. Initials and rubrication in red and blue throughout, large illuminated initial on A2. Printer's device on colophon printed in red. Super chancery folio (315x210mm). Modern calf over wooden boards, panelled in blind, hinges and clasps. Small repairs in upper margin of the two terminal leaves. A beautiful copy. ISTC it00171000; GW M46390; HC 1484; BMC 301; Goff T171; Proctor, 4680; Pell 1071; Polain 3735.

Item #371098

Aquinas’ commentary on the fourth book of Lombard's theological compilation, written circa 1250, stands among “his first important theological writings” and is one of “the immediate forerunners of the Summa Theologica,” his masterpiece (Catholic Encyclopedia). Peter Lombard, a chief precursor to medieval scholasticism, wrote his Four Books of Sentences in the mid-12th century to deal “in an orderly fashion with the main themes of Christian theology… It eventually became the basic textbook for the teaching of theology in the universities … Therefore the works of major scholastic theologians usually include a Commentary on the Sentences” (González I:314-15). The work was printed as early as 1469 by Peter Schöffer in Mainz (Proctor 87).