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1493 Incunable leaf. Nurnberg Chronicle, Hand Colored Woodcuts. Sabatz, Sabac.

Hartmann Schedel
LIBER CHRONICARUM
[Nuremberg Chronicle]

folio leaf from the 1493 original incunabulum GERMAN edition
FOLIO CCLIII

Recto has a large Hand Colored Woodcut of
the Turkish fort of
SABATZ (SABAC)
in present day Serbia

Verso has colored woodcuts of of popes
SIXTUS IV and INNOCENT VIII

with black letter German text describing the subjects of the woodcuts

Woodcuts by Pleydenwurff and Wohlgemut
Text by Hartmann Schedel

Anton Koberger, Nuremberg, 1493.Original German Edition translated from the latin.

Rare and beautifully colored original woodcut views of Sabac

Šabac fortress (Serbian: Шабачка тврђава; Turkish: Böğürdelen Kalesi), is a fortress next to modern day Šabac, on the right riverbank of Sava.

History
Originally the location where the fortress was built was a trading square of the settlement known as Zaslon, where the merchants from Ragusa would trade their goods.

The fortress was built in 1471 by Isa-Beg Ishaković, but soon afterwards, in 1476, it was captured by the Hungarian army with the help of the Serbian despot Vuk Grgurević and Vlad The Impaler, who kept the Šabac fortress under his control for more than four decades. In 1521, on his campaign on the way to Belgrade, Suleiman the Magnificent captured Šabac. As soon as he got hold of it, he had the earth palisade fortifications replaced with bulwark constructions with towers. In the period from 1717 until 1739, during temporary Austrian occupation, the fortress underwent significant adaptations and its surface was extended with additional construction of outer fortifications.

The leaf is sandwiched without any matting between two glass panes secured in a black metal frame, thus affording complete visibility of both sides.

Leaf Dimensions: 11-3/4” x 16-1/2” Frame Dimensions: 17” x 21”

Important Note
This auction is for the unframed leaf only and the leaf will be shipped to the successful bidder without the frame. If the buyer desires the frame, we will ship it separately to any address within the continental 48 States at no additional charge. We will not ship the frame to any other location.

Please note that some of the photographs may include artifacts due to reflections and glare caused by the glass panes, as well as shadows due to uneven lighting. Careful comparisons of the photos will reveal which of these feature are real and which are not.

Description of Folio CCLIII
RECTO
ILLUSTRATIONS
SABATZ (SABAC)
9 x 9.4 inches

TEXT
FOLIO CCLIII VERSO
ILLUSTRATIONs
portraits of
Sixtus IV
Innocent VIII

Year of the World 6670
Year of Christ 1471
Sixtus IV of Liguria, a native of the city of Savona, and previously called Franciscus, a general of the Barefoot Order, was, after the death of Pope Paul, chosen pontiff by the cardinals on the 9th day of August in this year. From childhood his parents consecrated him to the service of God, and he entered upon it with the brothers of the Franciscan Order. When he had grown up he went to Padua; and there he remained almost twenty years, reading, studying, and writing, becoming illustrious throughout the world for his wisdom. He wrote a book on the power and majesty of God, one about the blood of Christ, another on the conception of the Virgin Mary, and others. In the Franciscan Order he passed through all the offices, and he became a cardinal. Before and during his pontificate he was a mild man, of moderate retired life, and generous and helpful to the poor, but most of all to the clergy, to whom he extended privileges. He was kind to his friends and servants; lenient toward the guilty who deserved punishment. He assisted with funds and lent a hand to the poor princes and noblemen, particularly the sons of the emperor of Constantinople, and the queen of Posen, who had been dispersed by the Turks. By incredible goodness he also protected the Knights or Rhodes, and Ferdinand, who had been attacked by the Turks. He also improved the city of Rome which had fallen into decay; built a bridge across the Tiber at great cost, and extended countless benefits to the city of Rome. During his pontificate he did nothing culpable, except, that as usually happens, he loved his own too much—an error into which many of his predecessors had fallen. In the fourth year of his pontificate he celebrated the Jubilee, or Year of Grace, instituted by Paul, his predecessor. He enrolled the blessed Bona Ventura. in the number of holy confessors. And although he had detractors and columniators, he was a very pious pope and a diligent shepherd and pastor, an enemy of avarice, a moderator of anger, and an extirpator of evil. During his pontificate he made twenty cardinals. He finally died in the thirteenth year of his pontificate.

Year of the World 6683
Year of Christ 1484
Innocent VIII, a Genoese, of middle class but honorable family, previously called Giovanni Battista, a cardinal, was elected pope on the 13th day of the month of August in this year. His parents were of noble family and bore a good reputation in the conduct of their affairs. They came from Genoa by the sea—a city that outshines all other Italian cities in elegance, in the beauty and size of its buildings, and in the abundance of all those things which arrive there by land and sea. And as Innocent distinguished himself among all the cardinals for his humility, ingenuity, virtue, resignation and ability, he was chosen from among the rest as a pope. He was a man of prudence and worldly experience, and at Siena and Rome performed the duties of his office of legate so wisely that the cardinals placed great faith in him. The inception of his pontificate was fraught with wars with the citizenry; for what he was able to attain from princes and communities, he was unable to obtain from his own people. When emissaries were sent to him in Germany and Italy, he diligently urged peace, asking all mankind to lay down their arms and end the wars. But not long thereafter some evil-disposed person took it upon himself to hinder and defeat the pope in his good intentions, and to bring about his illness; and soon he incited discord between the Orsini and the Columna, the two noble and mighty Roman families. This greatly distressed the pope; yet he did not attempt to allay contention by threats or force of arms. Although Innocent set himself many tasks involving his papal office, the common good of Christendom, and the needs of the Church, he was not able to accomplish these things for lack of time, and because of his illness and the prevalence of wars. Yet he showed himself beneficent toward his friends, and thankful toward God. When he recovered his health, he endowed the Church of Santa Maria del Popolo. He enrolled in the number of holy confessors the name of Duke Leopold

Nuremberg Chronicle

The Liber Chronicarum by Hartmann Schedel printed in Nuremberg by Anton Koberger in 1493, or Nuremberg Chronicle as it is generally called, is one of the most important German incunables and the most extensively illustrated book of the 15th century.

The text is a universal history of the Christian world from the beginning of times to the early 1490s, written in Latin by the Nuremberg physician and humanist Hartmann Schedel (1440-1514) on commission from the Nuremberg merchants Sebald Schreyer (1446-1520) and Sebastian Kammermeister (1446-1503). Drawn by the author from multiple medieval and Renaissance sources, such as Bede, Vincent of Beauvais, Martin of Tropau, Flavius Blondus, Bartolomeo Platina and Philippus de Bergamo (Iacopo Filippo Foresta), the Chronicle also incorporates geographical and historical information on European countries and towns. The narrative is divided into 11 parts, the so-called world ages, and is profusely illustrated by images of biblical and historical events, and topographical views of towns and countries in Europe and the Middle East, including Jerusalem (and its destruction) and Byzantium.

Schreyer and Kammermeister commissioned the printing of the Chronicle to the Nuremberg printer Anton Koberger (ca.1440-1513), owner of the largest 15th-century German printing house. The Latin edition was printed in Koberger's shop between May 1492 and October 1493. In the meantime, a German translation was commissioned by the two financiers to Georg Alt (circa 1450-1510), a scribe at Nuremberg treasury, and the German edition was printed alongside the Latin one between January and December 1493. The project was completed on 23 December 1493.

Both editions are lavishly illustrated with 1804 xylographical images created from 641-643 woodblocks by the Nuremberg artists Michael Wolgemut (circa 1434/37 – 1519) and Wilhelm Pleydenwurff (circa 1450 – 1494. The woodcut illustrations of a number of copies, both in Latin and in vernacular, were also supplied with hand colouring by contemporary German artists. The alleged involvement in the creation of the woodblocks of Albrecht Dürer (1471-1528), has now been rejected on the documentary evidence that he only worked as an apprentice in Wolgemut's workshop between 1486 and 1489, well before the beginning of the production of the Chronicle.

The beauty of the illustrative apparatus, the skilful production and the elegant mise-en-page of the both the Latin and German editions of the text account for the 'enduring value' of the Nuremberg Chronicle, which survives in circa 1240 copies of the Latin edition and in circa 1580 copies of the vernacular.
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CONDITION: The leaf has a small torn lower corner affecting only the blank margin. One lower corner is soiled and stained, affecting only the blank margin; otherwise, the blank margins are lightly soiled, especially at the edges, and the edges also have a few very small chips.
The text block and illustrations are intact and clean with only a single tiny wormhole between two lines in the center.
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