Icilio Federico Joni (1866-1946):

Painted ”tavolette” book covers in Biccherna style (86,5 x 29 cms), forgery of Renaissance book covers, late 19th century.

Two rounded wooden covers joined by a leather spine blindstamped with intersecting quadruple fillets, the front panel depicting Arrighi presenting a written grant to Bergeni, 5 youths behind, two standing beneath an arch, a river and hills in the background, the rear panel recording the gift of land by B. Arrighi to Laura Bergeni, notarised by Fra. Girolamo Monaco in 1465, each panel with six coats-of-arms at the side and 4 metal bosses.

Crack in each board, some ?intentional wear, lacking three clasps. Mounted in a top-opening wooden and plexiglass case (99 x 40 cms), deep red velvet lining (a few nicks and scratches).

Provenance: Christie's sale 6125, June 2, 1999, lot 45a (GBP 3,450).

A rare example of the work of the 19th-century binding forger Icilio Federico Joni, a Sienese painter and restorer who produced imitations of the wooden panel bindings (tavolette della biccherna) used to cover the accounts of Siena from the 13th to the 15th centuries. While he sold a number of his bindings as 15th-century originals, he also openly described his forgery work in his autobiography (1932, English translation 1936), even detailing his technique, layering the wooden panels with plaster and painting them with tempera to imitate fifteenth-century bindings. Joni, by his own admission, never visited the city archives to examine a genuine example of the tavolette bindings. Somewhat curiously, he appears to have intentially made his forgeries anachronistic. From 1459 the accounts were bound in leather and the tavolette, although still created, had evolved to become paintings on wood framed for hanging. Joni's bindings, however, all bear dates after 1459; the present example, for instance, is dated 1465. At least 14 examples of Joni bindings are known, and they have graced some of the most renowned collections of bibliophiles, such as Borghese, Hoe, and Wilmerding (cf. Nixon), and more recently, Beinecke Library.

See H.M. Nixon, ”Binding Forgeries”, Transactions of the the VIth International Congress of Bibliophiles, 1969 (1971), pp. 69-83, and M. Foot, ”A Pair of Bookcovers of the late 19th Century by I. F. Joni”, The Book Collector, 1985, pp. 488-89.

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