'Manuductio ad coelum' in Armenian (1674). Printed in Rome. No U.S. copies.

Giovanni Bona / Vardan Hounanian [trans.]. [In Armenian:] Manuductio ad coelum. Romae: Typis Sacrae congregationis de Propaganda Fide, 1674. 8vo [15.5 x 10.4 cm], [2] ff., 41 pp. [numbered in Armenian], [3] pp., 394 pp., [3] ff., 81 pp., [1] p., with woodcut roundel on colophon. Bound in contemporary vellum, title in manuscript on spine, red sprinkled edges. Minor staining and dustiness to binding, shelf-marks on verso of half-title and on lower free endpaper, unidentified cardinal’s stamp on last page (colophon). Well preserved.
 
 
Very rare (no U.S. copies) first edition (1674) of the first Armenian translation of the highly popular Manuductio ad coelum (“A Guide to Heaven”), a mystical-devotional work by the Cistercian cardinal Giovanni Bona (1609-1674).
 
The book was translated by Vardan Hunanian (1644-1715), the Armenian Archbishop of Lviv, and was printed in Rome by the Propaganda Fide.
 
The Manuductio ad coelum (first ed. 1658) collects the wisdom of Church Fathers and pagan philosophers to tutor the  reader to avoid deadly sins, control one’s body and senses, manage emotions, and develop virtues, etc.
 
 
OCLC, OPAC/SBN/ICCU and KVK locate copies at the Bibliothèque nationale de France, Bibliothèque Mazarin, and Bibliothèque Sainte-Geneviève.
 
*Kevorkian, Incunables arméniens, 176; Kévorkian, Les imprimés arméniens des XVIe et XVIIe siècles: Catalogue, vol 1, p. 33, no. 66; P. Maurerm, “Kardinal Giovanni Bona: Cistercienser, geistlicher Schriftsteller und Pionier der Liturgiewissenschaft,” Analecta Cisterciensia, vol. 59 (2009), pp. 3-166.