Aldo Manuzio, a humanist born around 1450 near Rome, opened his workshop in Venice in 1494 with a clear programme: to give the learned world correct editions of the Greek texts. The Aristotle in five volumes (1495–1498), Aristophanes, Thucydides, Sophocles, and then, from 1501, the Latin and Italian classics in small octavo format set in the italic type cut by Francesco Griffo, established the house's reputation, whose device, the anchor and dolphin borrowed from a coin of Titus, illustrates the motto festina lente. After Aldus's death in 1515, his parents-in-law the Torresani, then his son Paulus Manutius and his grandson Aldus the Younger carried on the business until 1597, with declining brilliance but editions still sought after.
Aldines were collected as early as the sixteenth century, in France by Grolier, who had them bound in morocco bearing his name, and bibliographers described them early on: Antoine-Augustin Renouard, himself a bookseller and collector, gave their Annales in 1803, revised in 1834, which remain the standard reference alongside the catalogue of the Ahmanson-Murphy collection at the University of California. For the bookseller, an aldine is described by its reference in Renouard, by the generation of the workshop (Aldus the Elder, the heirs, Paulus, Aldus the Younger), by its completeness, its margins, and its binding; an aldine from the first period in a contemporary binding, or of humanist provenance with marginalia, is a major piece. An aldine of 1590, such as the Essame de gl'ingegni by Huarte printed by Aldus the Younger, is honestly described as a late aldine.
Counterfeits are contemporary with the originals: Lyon printers copied the italic octavos as early as 1502, device included, and Aldus protested with a printed notice; Florence and Venice itself also produced them. The paper, the watermark, the detail of the type, and the readings of the text distinguish them, with Renouard in hand.
