Plan your visit. 225 Madison Avenue at 36th Street, New York, NY 10016.

Plan your visit. 225 Madison Avenue at 36th Street, New York, NY 10016.

Spiegel des menschlichen lebens.

Accession number
PML 139
Creator
Sánchez de Arévalo, Rodrigo, 1404-1470.
Object title

Spiegel des menschlichen lebens.

Published

[Augsburg] : [Günther Zainer], [about 1476]

Description

[10], Clxiiii leaves : illus. (woodcuts) ; 32 cm (fol.)

Credit line
Purchased with the Bennett collection, 1902.
Notes
Title from incipit (leaf [1]/1r): Diese büchlin genannt d[er] spiegel des menschlichen lebens. von dem hochwirdigen Rodorico von hyspania byschoffen Zamorensi gemachet...
Printed in Zainer's type 2:118G.
Published in 1476 according to Zainer's catalogue (Burger, Buchhändleranzeigen, no. 20 (16) (CIBN). Goff dates about 1475-78. BSB-Ink dates after 26 Mar. 1474. A copy in München BSB has a rubricator's date 1478.
Collation: [1¹⁰; 2-10¹⁰ 11⁸; 12-16¹⁰ 17-18⁸]: 174 leaves.
Paper format: Chancery folio
Translated by Heinrich Steinhöwel.
Incipit on leaves [2]/1r and [12]/1r printed in red.
50 woodcut illustrations. Printed initials.
A copy of this book was given by Zainer to the Charterhouse at Buxheim (BMC).
Author's name also recorded as Rodericus Zamorensis.
Bearer type visible at bottom of leaves [7]/2v, [7]/10r, [9]/5v, and [18]/8v.
PML copy leaf dimensions: 30.6 x 21 cm.
PML copy with leaf [1]/10 detached.
PML copy listed under Division B in Checklist.
Binding
Contemporary blind-stamped pigskin over wooden boards (32.5 x 21 cm), sewn on 3 supports by Paulus Paurenfeint/Pawrnfeint in Nördlingen (EBDB w000346), active ca. 1474. Plain paper pastedowns and fly leaves (modern); plaited leather endbands; edges stained red. 4 plain corner bosses. One single-pin strap clasp; repaired. Hole in rear board from former chain attachment.
Variant title
Speculum vitae humanae [German]
Inscriptions/Markings
Hand decoration: Rubricated not required, printed intitials. Annotations: Marginal and interlinear contemporary notations in tabula. Notation at bottom of leaf [8]/10r supplying missing printed line, likely supplied in printing house (nearly identical hand in BSB and Heidelberg copies).
Provenance
Landshut (Bavaria), Franciscans(?), abraded inscription: [Ad minores] i[n] Landczhüt, 15th century (leaf [18]/8v); unidentified shelf mark: H 33. (leaf [1]/1r), likely also Landshut Franciscans, 16th century; Georg Kloss (1787-1854), bookplate (front pastedown); Kloss sale, Sotheby's, 7 May 1835, lot 4490 (lot clipping pasted to front pastedown); Henry Sotheran & Co., cat. no. 496 (23 July 1890), no. 546 (lot clipping pasted to front pastedown); William Morris (1834-1896), Kelmscott House, Hammersmith, booklabel (front pastedown), bibliographic notes by Sydney Cockerell (tipped-in to front pastedown), and inscription, August 1st 1890 (front fly leaf recto); Richard Bennett (1849-1930), armorial bookplate (front pastedown) and price code: rm/-/- (front pastedown); Pierpont Morgan (1837-1913), purchased with the Bennett collection, 1902.
Classification
Century
Department