Delle lettere [...] Libri tre, dedicati all'Illustriss. & Eccellentiss. Sig. Sforza Pallavicino Marchese di Borgo San Donino, di Cortemaggiore, &c. et Governatore generale del Sereniss. Dominio di Vinegia

8vo. (8), 259, (1 blank) leaves. *8, A-Z8, Aa-Ii8, Kk4. Colophon at l. Ii8v. Quire T misbound. With the printer's device on the title-page. Contemporary vellum. Ownership's entry of Leonardo Trissino (1834).
Adams, P-114; Basso, pp. 250-251; Edit 16, CNCE 37519; Quondam, pp. 305-306; B. Richardson, Print culture in Renaissance Italy, (Cambridge, 2004), p. 2; P. Trovato, Con ogni diligenza corretto: la stampa e le revisioni editoriali dei testi letterari italiani (1470-1570), (Bologna, 1991), p. 16.
 
FIRST AND ONLY EDITION. The volume opens with the author's dedication to Sforza Pallavicino, marquis of Fidenza (anciently called Borgo San Donino) and Cortemaggiore, dated Lonato, January 1, 1566. There follows a prefatory letter addressed by Giuseppe Pallavicino to Francesco Sansovino, reviewer and editor of the text, and the latter's answer. The collection itself, divided into three books, begins after the prefatory matter.
In the letter to Sansovino (dated Lonato, December 1, 1565), Pallavicino recalls his activity as a physician and his hesitations about publishing his letters, considering that he would have probably been the first “medico” to issue an entire volume of vernacular epistles. But encouraged by the examples of authors like Fracastoro and Tomitano, whose letters had previously appeared in several anthologies, he eventually decided to send his manuscript to Annibal Caro to have it corrected. Shortly afterwards, however, Caro was forced to leave Parma to follow his patron. Pallavicino therefore turned himself first to Paolo Manuzio, then to Girolamo Ruscelli, but they were both engaged in other projects. Only Francesco Sansovino finally proved himself willing to correct and revise the text of the letters. In his answer, dated Venice, December 8, 1565, Sansovino avers his approval for Pallavicino's initiative and praises the style of his letters. In the same letter he also shows gratitude to his patron Paolo Giordano Orsini, duke of Bracciano, for the appointment as his secretary.
“Le recueil proprement dit contient 219 lettres, y compris quelques letters écrites au nom d'autrui et quelques réponses des destinataires; il est divisé en 3 livres. Un certain nombre de lettres, datées, sont disposées dans un ordre chronologique presque rigoureux, ce qui permet d'affirmer que le livre I contient 64 lettres des années 1544-1557, le livre II 70 lettres de la période 1558-1560, et le livre III 85 lettres datées de 1561 au 24 novembre 1565. Une lettre est encore ajoutée, à la suite de la table, de la liste des erreurs d'impression, du registre et même du colophon, par laquelle Pallavicino s'efforce d'apaiser des rivalités entre deux familles, à la date du 4 janvier 1566. Le destinataire principale est la famille de l'auteur, suivi de B. Sozzo (14 l.) en partie responsabile de la publication des lettres. On peut relever 6 lettres à Bernardo Tasso, toutes de 1563, et 4 à A. Caro, avec 1 réponse du premier et 2 du second. Lettres de sujets variés qui, dans l'esprit de leur auteur, constituent d'une part un bilan plus qu'un journal, sorte de revanche contre son destin […], et, d'autre part, des exercices littéraires imités de B. Tasso et proposés successivement à la correction d'A. Caro, de P. Manuzio, de G. Ruscelli et de F. Sansovino, de l'aveu même de l'auteur” (J. Basso, Le genre epistolaire en langue italienne (1538-1662). Répertoire chronologique et analytique, Roma & Nancy, 1990, pp. 250-251).
In the dedication, Pallavicino recalls the reason which led him to collect and publish his epistolary, a sort of revenge against the many misfortunes of his life. “L'epistolografo, dunque, vicino al diarista se si considera nell'atto di scrivere ogni singola lettera, diviene affine all'autobiografo quando in un preciso momento storico raccoglie (spesso con integrazioni e falsificazioni) le testimonianze del proprio passato in un libro. Libro che può essere esplicitamente offerto a una lettura in chiave autobiografica, come attest