Incunable binding

When and where was it bound? The binding is of the "schoolbook type," half-leather (probably calfskin) over oak boards. Thick oak boards with beveled edges, brown calfskin with pictorial blind-tooling, double cords and catch/clasp fastenings are all typical of 15th-century Northern European bindings. This style dates the binding to approximately the same time and place as the textblock. The oak boards may indicate that this binding was a product of Germany's once-vast oak forests and that it was bound relatively close to where it was printed.

The Library of the Arnold Arboretum's Crecenzi incunable binding: Spine, Calfskin with blind-tooling, Clasp.

Certain touches indicate that the book held special importance for its owner: the embossed brass catches and clasps and the elaborate blind-stamped images of a hunt scene, for example. The style and components of the binding suggest that it is original to the textblock. Repairs were done to the book, perhaps in the early 20th century. Along with many of the Library of the Arnold Arboretum's finest holdings, it was transferred to Houghton Library in 1947, and came to its present location on Divinity Avenue in 2006.