RARE 17th-century edition of `Decameron` - a masterpiece of classical early Italian prose by the great Renaissance humanist, writer, a correspondent of Petrarch and himself a poet - Giovanni Boccaccio (1313-1375). This version of the immortal literary masterpiece by Boccaccio was revised and somewhat censored by one of the leading 16th-century Italian philologists Lionardo Salviati (1539-1589), because the work had been placed on the Index of prohibited books in 1559 because of its anticlerical character. Contains a b&w woodcut on title page. 220x155mm. [XII], 472 pages. Marbled board hardcover with brown leather gilt spine. Spine yellowing, worn, stained, wrinkled/rubbed and slightly peeling. Cover corners and edges bumped and peeling. Spine rubbed and slightly scratched. Spine edges slightly bumped. Front endpaper wrinkled and glue-stained. Small stamp on front whitepage. Rear inner cover coming loose (binding visible). Rear endpaper, whitepage and several last pages bottom corner/edge slightly stained - NO damage to text. Small hole on rear whitepage. Several small holes on two last pages with slight damage to several letters of the text - text easily reconstructible. Title page and first introduction page repaired with damage to text. Last page edges/corners repaired with tape - NO damage to text. Binding visible between last introduction page and page 1. Pages yellowing, wavy and age-stained. [SUMMARY]: This extremely rare four hundred year old edition of one of the greatest literary masterpieces is in good reading condition for its age.