In textual and classical scholarship, the editio princeps (Latin for first edition; plural: editiones principes) of a work is the first printed edition of a work that previously had existed only in manuscripts (which had to be copied by hand in order to circulate).
For example, the editio princeps of Homer is that of Demetrius Chalcondyles, now thought to be from 1488. The most important texts of classical Greek and Roman authors were for the most part produced in editiones principes in the years from 1465 to 1525, following the invention of the printing press around 1440.Briggs, Asa & Burke, Peter (2002) A Social History of the Media: from Gutenberg to the Internet, Cambridge: Polity, pp. 15–23, 61–73.
In some cases there were possibilities of partial publication, of publication first in translation (for example from Greek to Latin), and of a usage that simply equates with first edition. For a work with several strands of manuscript tradition that have diverged, such as Piers Plowman, editio princeps is a less meaningful concept.
The term has long been extended by scholars to works not part of the Ancient Greek and Latin literatures. It is also used for legal works, and other significant documents.
For fuller lists of literature works, see:
List of editiones principes in Latin List of editiones principes in Greek List of editiones principes in languages other than Latin or Greek
Notable works The following is a selection of notable literature works. DateAuthor, WorkPrinterLocationCommentJohannes GutenbergMainzThe 4th century translation of the Bible, two editions: 42 line and 36 line, see Gutenberg Bible.1465Anthony Grafton et al. 2010, p. 142Cicero, De OratoreConradus Sweynheym and Arnoldus PannartzSubiacoThis edition was published without date but it is believed to be before September 1465.1465–1470 Franco Volpi (ed.), Dizionario delle opere filosofiche, Mondadori, 2000, p. 7Augustinus, ConfessionesJohannes MentelinBrian Cummings and James Simpson (eds.), Cultural Reformations: Medieval and Renaissance in Literary History, OUP, 2010, vol. 2, p. 652StrasbourgThe second edition came out in Milan in 1475, followed by editions in 1482 and 1483. Other two incunable editions came from Strasbourg in 1489 and 1491, but the book was not separately reprinted until 1531.Harold Samuel Stone, St. Augustine's bones: a microhistory, Univ. of Massachusetts Press, 2003, p. 181467John Neville Figgis, The Political Aspects of St. Augustine's City of God, Forgotten Books, 1963 , p. 91Augustinus, De Civitate DeiConradus Sweynheym and Arnoldus PannartzRobert H. F. Carver, The Protean Ass: The Metamorphoses of Apuleius from Antiquity to the Renaissance, OUP, 2008, p. 162SubiacoThe following year Johannes Mentelin printed in Strasbourg another edition; it offered the earliest textual commentary, by Thomas Valois and Nicholas Trivet. For the next two centuries, the De Civitate was the most often printed of all Augustine's works; 17 editions appeared in the 15th century and eight in the 16th century.1469M. von Albrecht 1997, p. 866Gian Biagio Conte, Latin Literature: A History, JHU Press, 1999, p. 375LiviusConradus Sweynheym and Arnoldus PannartzRomeEdited by Joannes Andreas de Buxis. The Rome edition included only Books 1–10, 21–32, 34–39 and a portion of 40. In a 1518 Mainz edition, the rest of Book 40 and part of 33 were published, while in a 1531 Basel edition, Books 41–45 were published, edited by Simon Grynaeus. He had discovered the only surviving manuscript of the fifth decade in 1527 while searching in the Lorsch Abbey in Germany. In 1616 the remaining part of Book 33 was published in Rome, by which all extant Livy had reached print.M. von Albrecht 1997, p. 863Periochae L. Bessone, "Le Periochae di Livio", vol. 29, 1984, pp. 42-55, in Atene e Roma, p. 431469M. von Albrecht 1997, p. 702S. Füssel 1997, p. 78William Henry Parker, "Introduction" in Priapea: Poems for a Phallic God, Routledge, 1988, p. 32VergiliusConradus Sweynheym and Arnoldus PannartzRomeEdited by Joannes Andreas de Buxis. Together with the three standard Virgilian works, Busi included the Appendix Vergiliana and Donatus' Vita Vergilii. He also included the Priapeia, then attributed to Virgil.PriapeiaAppendix VergilianaAelius Donatus, Vita Vergilii1469M. von Albrecht 1997, p. 429Julius CaesarConradus Sweynheym and Arnoldus PannartzRomeEdited by Joannes Andreas de Buxis.1469S. Füssel 1997, p. 79Plinius MaiorJohannes de SpiraVenice1469R. H. F. Carver 2008, p. 171Aulus GelliusConradus Sweynheym and Arnoldus PannartzRomeEdited by Joannes Andreas de Buxis.1470M. von Albrecht 1997, p. 460Sallustius, Bellum Catilinae and Bellum IugurthinumVindelinus de SpiraVeniceIn the same year an edition of Sallust was also printed in Paris.1470M. von Albrecht 1997, p. 1408Suetonius, De Vita CaesarumJohannes Philippus de LignamineRomeEdited by Johannes Antonius Campanus.Paul A. Winckler (ed.), Reader in the History of Books and Printing, Greenwood Press, 1978, p. 285G. B. Conte 1999, p. 543Ronald H. Martin, Tacitus, University of California Press, 1992, p. 238Tacitus, , , Germania and Vindelinus de SpiraVeniceThis edition only has books 11–16 of the Annales. Books 1–6 were rediscovered in 1508 in the Corvey Abbey (now in Germany) and brought to Rome. There they were printed by Étienne Guillery in 1515 together with the other books of the Annales while the edition was prepared by Filippo Beroaldo.1471OvidiusBaldassarre AzzoguidiBolognaEdited by Franciscus Puteolanus. There is some dispute regarding the possibility it may have been preceded by the Roman edition printed by Sweynheym and Pannartz, which is without date but thought to be also from 1471.Boethius, Hans GlimSaviglianoUndated, others have suggested the incunable's date to be 1473 or 1474. This would probably make the editio princeps the lavish edition that came out in Nuremberg in 1473 from Anton Koberger's press, containing a commentary traditionally attributed to Thomas of Aquin and a German translation.1471–1472M. von Albrecht 1997, p. 612Varro, De lingua latinaGeorgius LauerRomeEdited by Julius Pomponius Laetus1472PlautusJohannes de ColoniaJulie Stone Peters. Theatre of the Book, 1480–1880: Print, Text, and Performance in Europe. Oxford: OUP, 2003, , p. 316-1470A. Grafton et al. 2010, p. 930VeniceEdited by Georgius Merula basing himself on the Codex Ursinianus. With a dedication to Iacopo Zeno, bishop of Padua.De Melo, Wolfgang. "Introduction", Plautus, Amphitryon. the Comedy of Asses. the Pot of Gold. the Two Bacchises. the Captives: 1. W. De Melo (ed.). Harvard University Press, 2011, , p. cxiii.1472Leighton D. Reynolds (eds.), Texts and Transmission: A Survey of the Latin Classics, OUP, 1983, p. 222Macrobius, In Somnium Scipionis and SaturnaliaNicolaus JensonVeniceJ. Robert Wright, A companion to Bede: A Reader's Commentary on The Ecclesiastical History of the English People, Eerdmans, 2008, p. viiiBeda, Heinrich EggesteinLaura Cooner Lambdin and Robert Thomas Lambdin (eds.), Arthurian writers: a biographical encyclopedia, ABC-CLIO/Greenwood, 2007, pp. 10-13Bede, Ecclesiastical History, Books I-III, J. E. King (ed.), Loeb, 1930, p. xxivStrasbourgThe edition is undated, but it is agreed to have been printed between 1474 and 1482. It was followed in the same town in 1500 by a second edition, this time bounded with a Latin translation of Eusebius' Historia Ecclesiastica.1475A. Grafton et al. 2010, p. 874M. von Albrecht 1997, p. 1199Seneca Philosophus, Dialogi, De beneficiis, De Clementia and Epistulae morales ad LuciliumMatthias MoravusNaplesThe first complete edition of Seneca's philosophical works. Due to a confusion between the son and the father the volume also includes Seneca the Elder's widely known epitomized version composed of excerpts from his Suasoriae et Controversiae; the complete surviving text was printed in 1490 in Venice by Bernardinus de Cremona together with the younger Seneca. Also in the edition is Publilius Syrus, whose Sententiae are in the so-called Proverbia Senecae. The mistake was corrected in 1514 by Erasmus when the latter published in Southwark in 1514 an edition of Publilius that is generally considered to be the real editio princeps. Erasmus was followed in Leipzig in 1550 by Georg Fabricius, who also added twenty new sentences to the print.Rodolphus Agricola, Letters, A. van der Laan and F. Akkerman (eds.), Uitgeverij Van Gorcum, 2002, p. 338R. A. H. Bickford-Smith 1895, pp. xxix, xxxiiM. von Albrecht 1997, p. 1253Seneca RhetorPublilius SyrusR. A. H. Bickford-Smith (ed.), Publilii Syri sententiae, 1895, p. xxix1475Vergil Polydore 2002, p. 615David Magie, et al. The Scriptores Historiae Augustae (Loeb Classical Library) London: W. Heinemann, 1922, p. xxxviiHistoria AugustaPhilippus de LavagnaMilanEdited by Bonus Accursius.1510M. von Albrecht 1997, p. 1447Quintus Aurelius Symmachus, Epistulae and RelationesJohann SchottStrasbourg1512E. P. Goldschmidt 1969, p. 73E. Paratore 1992, p. 563Gregorius Turonensis, Historia Francorum and De Gloria ConfessorumJodocus Badius AscensiusParisAdo Viennensis, Chronicon1478–1479Aesopus, FabulaeB. & J. A. de HonateMilanEdited by Bonus Accursius. Undated, the book contained also a Latin translation by Ranuccio Tettalo. These 127 fables are known as the Collectio Accursiana, the newest of the three recensions that form the Greek Aesopica. The oldest Greek recension is the Collectio Augustana, in 231 fables, that was published only in 1812 by Johann Gottlob Theaenus Schneider in Breslau. The last recension is the Collectio Vindobonensis, made of 130 fables, that was first edited in 1776 by Thomas Tyrwhitt. Concerning The Aesop Romance, of it also three recensions exist: the one printed in this edition is the Vita Accursiana, while the second to be printed was in 1845 the Vita Westermanniana, edited in Braunschweig by Anton Westermann. The Last recension to be printed was the Vita Perriana, edited in 1952 in Urbana by Ben Edwin Perry.Vita AesopiHesiodus, B. & J. A. de HonateMilanEdited by Bonus Accursius. Undated, only Theocritus' first 18 idylls are contained in this edition. A wider arrange of idylls appeared in the 1495–1496 Aldine Theocritus which had idylls I-XXIII.N. Barker, The Aldine Press: Catalogue of the Ahmanson-Murphy Collection of Books by or Relating to the Press in the Library of the University of California, Los Angeles, Incorporating Works Recorded Elsewhere, University of California Press, 2001, pp. 51-52. A further amount of yet unpublished idylls were printed in Rome together with their old scholia by Zacharias Calliergis in his 1516 edition of Theocritus.Theocritus, Idyllia1484–1487Frontinus, De aqueductuPomponius Laetus, Sulpicius VeranusRomeText of Frontinus De aq. based on manuscript acquired by Poggio Bracciolini in Monte Cassino monastery in 1429.Vitruvius,