Zurich. Rat

Abschid der Stette Z!rich Bern vnnd sant Gallen, von wegen der widerte!fer aussgangen

      [Augsburg:: Silvan Otmar,, 1527].. In later plain wrappers. One word of title underlined in blue pencil; other minor pencillings; a five-digit number in ink in the upper inner corner of the title-page. Provenance indications as above and light dust-soiling to outer leaves, otherwise clean.. Small 4to (19 cm; 7.5"). [6] ff. . Rare and highly important first printing of the concordat of the cities Zurich, Bern, and St. Gall, against Anabaptists. In early August 1527 the city of Zurich invited the cities of Bern, St. Gall, Basel, and three others to come to Zurich for a conference in hopes of adopting a single document for gaining control of "the dangerous Anabaptists." The conference, held 12-14 August 1527, agreed upon a mandate, which was signed by Zurich, Bern, and St. Gall. #11; The concordat defines Anabaptism as a vice and the punishment ranges from fines to "drowning without mercy" depending on who the accused Anabaptist is; "foreigners" (non-natives of the jurisdictions), preachers, and backsliders are dealt with the most severely. Every citizen is bound to denounce anyone known to be or even suspected of being an Anabaptist. The concordat was a codification of Zwingli's extreme animosity towards the sect. = It is considered a major document in Mennonite history. #11; Provenance: Ownership signature on title-page of Howard Osgood, noted late 19th- and early 20th-century collector and scholar; old circular pressure-stamp on same page of a seminary (properly released). #11; WorldCat locates only three copies in North America and COPAC locates only the copy at Oxford, but there is a copy at the British Library.