Anello De Sarno
De Sarno Anello
Latest Civil and Criminal Practice with a Special Treatise Entitled The Fiscal Doctor for Optimal Knowledge of Crimes in General, Poisoned Corpses, Deflowered Virgins, Abused Children, & Other Similar Cases,.... Naples, Raillard, 1717. (34 cm, 556+ pp. with many index pages; old binding with antique cardboard).
Interesting ancient edition, edited by Aniello De Sarno, Neapolitan author, former judge in Puglia, in Taranto and Brindisi, and auditor in the province of Trani, in this work assisted by the Neapolitan Nicola Vincenzo Scoppa and another famous Neapolitan jurist, Leonardo Riccio (or Ricci); obviously impossible to give an exhaustive synthesis of the broad and articulated legal and specialist content of over five hundred pages of dense writing, countless norms and articles of law both pertaining to civil and criminal legislation; very interesting is also the "criminal" part, that branch of legislation that intertwines with medical science, in a condensate of jurisprudence and pathological medicine; we find, for example "...crimes of beatings, crimes of false writings, theft and breaking with false keys,...counterfeiting of money, corpses drowned at sea (for whose examination two doctors or barbers expert in this method were consulted),... crime of abortion, burned body, crime of rape in muliere vel in puero, poisoned, drowned,....."; and of this special section, a part by itself is that curated by the "fiscal doctor" Orazio Greco relating to the recognition of crimes in general, with particular attention to crimes by poisoning, for which the author makes a necessary premise to specify what poison is, which parts are affected or offended in the corpse, the signs, that is all the operations necessary for the "fiscal" or legal doctor, to establish the causes of criminal death; the part on poisoning crimes is followed by that on rapes, and also in this case the author dwells well on explaining the criminal action and all the actions to follow to investigate the outcomes; the last part of the work examines tortures or "torments that in the Vicaria tribunal are today in use" where the author dwells on those torture penalties imposed at the time by the Neapolitan tribunal of Vicaria, limiting himself to particular descriptions "...we will only say of torments, which are daily practiced in the tribunal of Vicaria, which are the rope, the cords, called acute torture, the rod, & the torment called of the colt, although since the popular revolutions it is no longer practiced..."; follows then the examination of the various torture operations, treatment integrated and enriched also by beautiful illustrations, very expressive and suggestive, almost full page, images impressed with xylographic technique (that is from wooden matrix), where inquisitors and condemned are depicted, four beautiful engravings; some allegorical or floral xylographic friezes embellish some pages, at the frontispiece or as endings at the end of some chapter, but also present some beautiful figured initials; work of great cultural interest as well as legal, medical-legal-pathological, historical-local and bibliographic specialist interest; rare edition, of this edition currently no known copy in the national library system; decent general conservation, signs and defects of use and period, scattered and widespread blooms, woodworm signs on some pages, some marginal stains, beautiful frontispiece with characters engraved in black and red, old scribble, loose binding and possibly to be rearranged, but very fascinating specimen in its lived experience. (the attached images show details of the entire work, any further information on request)
(Private collection)
