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Lot 278* - A192 Books - Monday, 15. June 2020, 02.00 PM

INCUNABULA -

Fridolin, Stephan.
Schatzbehalter. With 96 (including 5 repeated) full-page text woodcuts by Michael Wolgemut and Wilhelm Pleydenwurff. With 3 painted initials by an old hand (8-, 9- and 11-line) with gold heightening and rich foliate border in gold, blue, red and green, as well as one 6-line initial in blue and red and numerous other initials in blue and red, some leaves rubricated in red.
Nürnberg, Anton Koberger, 18 November 1491. Folio (33.5 x 24.5 cm). [352] leaves (without the two blanks). 2 columns. 40-43 lines. Gothic type. Type area: 26.0 x 16.0 cm. Leaf format: 33.0 x 22.5 cm. 19th century blind-tooled leather binding in the style of the period over wooden boards with stamped decoration and roll-stamped ornamentation (slightly rubbed, front hinge cleanly restored).

GW 10329 - Hain/C. 14507 - Goff S-306 - Proctor 2070 - Pellechet 10350 - Polain 1521 - BMC II, 434 - BSB-Ink F-263 - Schramm XVII, ill. 315-406 - Schäfer 134 - Madsen 3786 - Oates 1018 - Ohly-Sack 1162 - Muther 423 - Fairfax-Murray 392 - Slg. Schäfer 134.

— The first and only edition of one of the most beautiful and most important works of incunabula. — This Early New High German series of sermons is dedicated to the life and suffering of Jesus Christ and is illustrated by 96 woodcuts from the Wolgemut-Pleydenwurff workshop. — In addition to scenes from the Old and New Testaments, allegorical interpretations can also be found in the iconographic programme. — The illustrations owe their special status not least to their richness of detail in terms of costumes, weapons, interior and landscape. — This book for devotion and edification was “written by Fridolin (preacher and confessor at St. Klara from 1482-1498) at the instigation of the sisters of the Poor Clares at Nuremberg and their abbess, Caritas Pirckheimer, and according to Bellm, printed in an edition of about 150 copies" (translated from: Schäfer). — Privately owned copies are extremely rare. — Leaves g2, t1 and t6 probably supplied from another copy. The first and last sheets reinforced in the bend during rebinding, a few leaves with restored marginal defects, leaf P with professionally renewed area of loss (slight text loss) in the upper inner corner, P6-Q5 with slight worming in the lower white margin, light browning in the margins, slightly damp stained margins at the front and back (occasionally more heavily stained and in the bend), occasionally somewhat foxed and finger-stained; however, overall a clean copy. - The first leaf with marginalia by an old hand. — Provenance: Michael Balehus (ownership inscription on a2r). - Edgar S. Oppenheimer (pencil note on paste-down). - Walter Schatzki, New York. - Acquired from the above by Arthur and Charlotte Vershbouw in 1961. - Christie's 2706 (New York 2013) Lot 181. - Private collection, Switzerland.


CHF 45 000 / 65 000 | (€ 46 390 / 67 010)