The Dyson Perrins-Hermann Marx copy of the 1495/98 Ars Moriendi: a nearly uncut copy

[Ars Moriendi]. Ars moriendi ex variis scripturarum sententiis collecta cum figuris [...].

€ 95.000,00

An early and extremely rare Latin edition of this classic work on how to die a good death: the fourth edition printed by Kachelofen and the seventh altogether, containing the complete original text of the block books (printed entirely from carved blocks of wood) occasioned by the horrors of the Black Death and consequent social upheavals in the late Middle Ages. Thirteen of the fourteen woodcuts are taken from Kachelofen's German editions from 1493 and 1494; the last one is re-used from his 1495 Latin edition. These are "copies from the block book edition Schreiber IV/D, as it is the only one to include St Michael the Archangel. The opening 'confessional' woodcut is a new addition, but by the same woodcutter. The artist is apparently identical with the creator of the title woodcut in Kachelofen's 'Epistola de miseria curatorum' editions" (cf. von Arnim, Bibliothek Schäfer I, 20).

A very fine, nearly uncut copy of this famous Ars Moriendi incunable. ISTC cites only 16 copies of this edition, of which three are imperfect.