Descrizione

8vo (173x108 mm). XXI, [3], 479, [3: errata] pp. Nicely bound in contemporary richly gilt red morocco, spine with lettering piece, gilt edges, marbled endleaves (joints and panels' edges slightly worn and rubbed). A very good, clean copy.
First edition, rare. Girolamo Giuseppe Vincenzo Spanzotti was born in Turin in 1741. After earning a degree in utroque iure in 1765 and being ordained in 1770, in the hope of securing a professorship, he published in quick succession the Juris ecclesiastici libri duo (Venice, 1769) and the Juris civilis liber singularis (Venice, 1770). In the first work, he analyzed Church doctrine, ecclesiastical discipline, and worship, directing some criticism at papal primacy. In the Juris civilis liber he expressed his general adherence to the principles of natural law. These works did not earn him the desired professorship, but they secured his election to the University's College of Advocates (1772). He later also published the De reipublicae utilitate ac commodis dissertationes (Turin, 1777), in which he contested the legitimacy of the right of resistance and identified religion as one of the foundations of political life. In the early 1790s, Spanzotti must have been among those enthusiastic about the developments in France, and in 1794 he was arrested shortly before the discovery of the Turin republican conspiracy. Spanzotti took an active part in Turin's political life after the flight of Carlo Emanuele IV and the establishment of the republican government in 1798. Spanzotti's major works, Disordini morali e politici della corte di Roma (Siena, 1798) and Tirannia (Turin, 1799), date from these years. In 1807, Spanzotti was removed from his position as university secretary and replaced by Gaetano Donaudi. He died in Turin in 1812 at the age of 71 (cf. G. Schettini, Spanzotti, Girolamo Giuseppe Vincenzo, in: “Dizionario Biografico degli Italiani”, vol. 93, Rome, 2018, s.v.).
Italian Union Catalogue, IT\ICCU\TO0E\019437.