Gifted Books

This is a copy of Plutarch’s ‘Parallel lives’ containing biographies of 46 famous Greek and Roman philosophers and politicians. The lives are arranged in pairs, comparing the virtues and vices of Greek and Roman lives. The book was a Renaissance 'best seller.' Many of the Latin translations were completed by leading Italian humanist scholars and famously served as a source for writers such as Shakespeare and Dryden.

Books were expensive gifts but Liddel received many. This folio copy of Vitae virorum illustrium was given to Liddel by Heinrich Vestring (1562-1650). Vestring, only a year younger than Liddel, studied at Rostock after Liddel had graduated from there in 1587 and went on to live and work in Tallinn for the rest of his life as a teacher and pastor.

The inscription reads: Hunc librum M. Duncano Liddel p[rae]ceptori suo multare colendo dedit ni perpetua sui memoriam profecturo Henricus Vestringij Wesphalius.