Leaf twenty-seven of a forty-leaf xylographic Biblia pauperum.
Cut in the Low Countries and printed in southern Germany or northern Italy, s.n. c. 1465-70.
Royal folio (leaf 389 x 269 mm.). Woodcut on paper in brownish-grey water-based ink (image 267 x 192 mm.).
In a passepartout.
THIS LEAF WAS PRINTED FROM THE SAME WOODBLOCK USED TO PRINT THE FIRST XYLOGRAPHIC POOR MAN’S BIBLE and once belonged to the preeminent bibliographer of xylography, W.L. Schreiber (1855-1922).
THIS PRINTING IS THE ONLY XYLOGRAPHIC EDITION OF THE BIBLIA PAUPERUM ON ROYAL FOLIO PAPER.
“One of the most intellectually sophisticated of medieval biblical commentaries” (de Hamel), this picture Bible arose in the 13th century for devotion and pedagogy. Its illustrations visually confirm the fulfillment of Old Testament events and prophecies in the life of Christ — one composite image uniting multiple books of the Bible. By the latter half of the 15th century, a series of forty composite illustrations, one to a page, had become the standard, each page resembling an altarpiece or a stained-glass window.
The book was typically printed from twenty large woodblocks, with one cut on each side of the block, or, as here, with two images on the same side, separated by only a few millimeters. In the latter case, the image for one page was inked, a sheet of paper laid over the prepared surface and a pad, piece of wood, burnisher or frotton rubbed over the back of half the sheet to transfer the ink. The sheet was then removed, the block’s other image inked and the process repeated, the second image printed alongside the first.
THE LEAF OFFERED HERE WAS ON THE LEFT HALF OF THE WOODBLOCK AND WAS THE FIRST OF ITS PAIR OF CUTS TO BE PRINTED, as five millimeters to the right of its frame is the lightly inked left frame of the woodblock’s other image. Our leaf, without watermark, is beautifully printed, wide-margined and uncolored. The chain-lines are c. 37 mm. apart. The chain-lines are c. 37 mm. apart.
One Aluisius signed the blank side of the leaf and dated his signature 25 February 1564 in Italian. Also a single leaf, the only other recorded copy of this “edition” also has 16th-century Italian provenance, strengthening the possibility that it was printed in Italy (ÖNB Ink 2.D.11; trimmed close to the image area, mounted in an album with damage and loss).
In his 1902 Manuel, Schreiber described his thirty-leaf fragment from which this leaf comes. He sold the fragment (Katalog (1909) 79), and it reappeared in the Pforzheimer collection, each leaf in a passepartout (Sotheby’s, Valuable Books (12.VI.1978) 8). The Haarlem State Library acquired twenty-five of the leaves. Of the five remaining, one is at Brigham Young University (leaf 30), one was offered in 1982 by a New York dealer (leaf 32; current location unknown), a third belonged to Alan Thomas (leaf 28, Sotheby’s, Catalogue (21.VI.1993) 67; current location unknown): one is untraced. Our thanks to Dr. John McQuillen for his assistance and census.
In good condition (outer margins darkened with some stains), some left margin deckle preserved.
¶Schreiber, Manuel de l’amateur de la gravure sur bois et sur métal au XVe siècle IV: 6-7 Éd. VII & 62-63 (leaf 27); de Hamel, The Book. A History of the Bible 158-63; Blockbücher des Mittelalters: Bilderfolgen als Lektüre. Ausstellung (1991) 263-310, 365, 367 (Schreiber copy), 392 (Vienna copy), 402-5 (census) & see nos. 19a-b & 20; Hind, An Introduction to a History of Woodcut I: 4-5 & 230-42.
Price: $85,000.00