Werner Rolewinck, 21 December 1481

ROLEWINCK, Werner (1425–1502). Fasciculus temporum. [Venice]: Erhard Ratdolt, 21 December 1481.

Third Venetian and second Ratdolt edition, the Feltrinelli copy, of Rolewinck’s chronological history of the world. His ingenious design of a double time-line measures time from both the Creation and the birth of Christ, demanding a remarkably complex typographical layout. The work was immensely popular, being printed 32 times in the 15th century, including translations into French, German and Dutch. The text is a page-for-page reprint of the earlier Venetian editions, but concludes with a new note on the death of Sultan Mohammed II, the conqueror of Constantinople, in May 1481.

Most of the woodcuts are from the Ratdolt edition of the year prior, which includes some copies from Georgius Walch's first Venetian edition of 1479. Walch's blocks, based on the those of the Cologne editions, are noteworthy for replacing the view of Cologne with a woodcut of Venice. That cut of Venice is the first known printed view of the city, showing the Piazza San Marco as seen from the Gran’ Canale.

One entry for the year 1457 on f. 64r provides an early, poetic reference to Gutenberg’s press revolution: ‘Et impresores librorum multiplicantur in terra’ (And the printers of books multiply in the land). H *6928; BMC V, 285; BSB-Ink R-242; Bod-inc R-115; Essling 278; Goff R-264; IGI 8416; ISTC ir00264000.

Super-chancery folio (310 × 212mm). 72 leaves. 6- and 10-line woodcut ornamental initials, chronological time-line with printed woodcut or metalcut roundels throughout, 64 woodcuts from 25 blocks, of which 19 are town views, 2 of the Temple of Solomon, and one each of the Creation, Noah’s Ark with rainbow, the Tower of Babel, and Salvator Mundi, the last four colored by a probably later hand, as are the 2 woodcut initials. (Some minor spotting, a few small stains, inkstain on 6/6r obscuring a few letters, insignificant short tears at lower margins of 5 leaves.) Modern blindstamped quarter goatskin over wooden boards, original lower flyleaf. Provenance: extensive marginal annotations in a neat 16th-century hand, a few marginalia in a different early hand, later erased marginal inscription on last page – 18th-century Jesuit inkstamp on first leaf over an erased 17th-century inscription naming ‘S. Bernardini ...’ also erased from bottom of opening text leaf and below first woodcut – Giannalisa Feltrinelli (bookplate, blindstamp on flyleaf; sold Christie’s NY, 7 October 1997, lot 85).