LUDOLPHUS DE SAXONIA.

Dit es dleven ons liefs heren jhesu cristi anderwerven gheprint gecorrigeert ende merckelick verbetert met addicien van schoonen moralen ende gheesteliken leeringhen ende devoten meditacien. Oeck daer toe gevoeghet schone oratien oft gebeden int eynde van elcken capittele. Item desen boec heeft oec twee tafelen int beghin te weten die eene vanden capittelen des boecks. Ende die ander tafel is om te vinden Epistolen ende die Evangelien vanden sondaghen ende oec vanden heyligen doer alle dat iaer.

      One of the most profusely woodcut illustrated Dutch books of the period. Antwerp, Henric Eckert vanHomberch, 'int huys van Delft' (Eckert's native town), 26 July 1512. Folio. 17th-century sprinkled calf, spine ribbed and gilt with title lettered in gold. Title printed in red & black with large contemp. handcoloured woodcut showing the creation of Eve out of Adam's rib, 145 woodcuts in text (of which 25 almost full-page), 7 of which are coloured by a contemporary hand. Gothic type, 2 cols., 42 ll. to a page. (8), 321, (1 with colophon on recto) lvs.; collation: A-B4, a-z6, *6, 'con'6, A-Z6, Aa-Ee6, Ff4). Rare complete copy of a richly woodcut illustrated edition of one of the most popular devotional books of the late Middle Ages, a collection of mystic contemplations on the Latin Vita Christi (the life of Christ) by Ludolphus de Saxonia, adapted and translated into Dutch. After five incunable editions (IDL 3017-21, the first being printed by Gerard Leeu in Antwerp, 3 November 1487), our copy belongs to the third sixteenth-century edition in Dutch, enlarged with the gospels and with prayers added at the end of each chapter. The first sixteenth-century Dutch edition was also published by Eckert van Homburg in 1503, partly with the same woodcuts; the second by Adr. van Berghen, also in Antwerp in 1510. Further Dutch editions appeared in 1521: two editions, both in Antwerp, by Eckert van Homberch and Claes de Grave who also printed an edition in 1536. The Flemish editions belong to the most profusely woodcut illustrated Dutch books of the period. The original Latin edition was printed in Strasbourg in 1474. Ludolphus de Saxonia, a famous German mystic, lived in the fourteenth century, and became prior of the Chartreuse at Strassburg, where he died in about 1370. His life of Christ became one of the most popular works of the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries, and was translated into several European languages.Following the liturgical calendar Epistles and Gospels are incorporated as well as dialogues between the asking human being and the answering Scriptures. Most of the chapters end with a meditation. The work became one of the most important sources of inspiration for lay devotion in the Low Countries in the sixteenth century. The present edition by Eckert van Homburgh is lavishly illustrated with over 140 magnificent woodcuts by a great Flemish artist called by Delen "Premier Graveur d'Anvers". The fine woodcuts, 25 almost full-page, are quite different from the earlier, fifteenth century editions, and when Delen recognizes the standing Christ from the 1487 edition by Gerard Leeu, it proves by comparison to be only loosely based on the original, here drawn in a more elegant style, and flanked by two Gothic altars (Delen II, p. 13, cf. Vol. I, plate XXXV, and the present edition on verso of leaf II). On the whole the woodcuts here are less primitive and drawn with greater elegance. A curious large woodcut on verso of leaf V shows Christ as the Lord of the Cosmos with the winds blowing and raining at the outside of a large circle, with winged angels in the outer ring, the stars, sun and moon under their feet, with fishes swimming in the seas in the inner circle, with in the center a picture of the Garden of Eden and God creating Eve from Adam's rib. There is a fine large woodcut of the Annunciation, the apostles fishing in the lake of Galilea with Christ speaking from a boat to the people, the Ascension, etc. There also runs a series of 38 smaller woodcuts through the book, with a format of 6,8 x 9 cm., which according to Delen first appeared in a small life of Christ published by Adrien van Berghen at Antwerp in 1500. As 23 woodcuts of this series were used by Eckert van Homberch in his first Ludolphus-edition from 1503, Delen concludes that the woodblocks really belonged to Homberch (Delen II, pp. 15-16). All woodcuts here are in fine strong impressions. Very good complete copy.- (Top of spine dam., some marginal waterstaining; title-page cut out and mounted (lacking blank margins); restorations to lvs. Ff2-3, tear in q6 and B6 repaired; marginal water staining in last lvs., inner margin of Ff2/3 strengthened, first quire A loosening). Nijhoff-Kronenberg 1409 (lists 10 copies of which at least 7 incomplete); Jaspers, De 16e eeuw in de Stadsbibl. Haarlem 416; STC Dutch 126 (incomplete); Adams L1684 (ed. 1521); Cf. Machiels 507 (ed. of 1521); Fairfax Murray 247 (1st Eckert-edition of 1503).