Jump to content

Incunable

From Wiki Knights Errant Life

Template:Short description Template:Redirect

Page from Valerius Maximus, Facta et dicta memorabilia, printed in red and black by Peter Schöffer (Mainz, 1471). The page exhibits a rubricated initial letter "U" and decorations, marginalia, and ownership stamps of the "Bibliotheca Gymnasii Altonani" (Hamburg).
Illumination with doodles and drawings (marginalia), including an open-mouthed human profile, with multiple tongues sticking out. Copulata, "De Anima", f. 2a. HMD Collection, WZ 230 M772c 1485
Image of two facing pages from "Phisicorum", fols. 57b and 58a, with doodles and drawings. HMD Collection, WZ 230 M772c 1485

An incunable or incunabulum (Template:Plural form: incunables or incunabula, respectively) is a book, pamphlet, or broadside that was printed in the earliest stages of printing in Europe, up to the year 1500.[1] The specific date is essentially arbitrary, but the number of printed book editions exploded in the following century, so that all incunabula, produced before the printing press became widespread in Europe, are rare, where even some early 16th-century books are relatively common.

They are distinct from manuscripts, which are documents written by hand. Some authorities on the history of printing include block books from the same time period as incunabula, whereas others limit the term to works printed using movable type.

Template:As of there are about 30,000 distinct incunable editions known.[2] The probable number of surviving individual copies is much higher, estimated at 125,000 in Germany alone.[3] Through statistical analysis, it is estimated that the number of lost editions is at least 20,000.[4] Around 550,000 copies of around 27,500 different works have been preserved worldwide.[5]

Terminology

Incunable is the anglicised form of incunabulum,[6] reconstructed singular of Latin Template:Lang,[7] which meant "swaddling clothes", or "cradle",[8] which could metaphorically refer to "the earliest stages or first traces in the development".[9] A former term for incunable is fifteener, meaning "fifteenth-century edition".[10]

The term incunabula was first used in the context of printing by the Dutch physician and humanist Hadrianus Junius (Adriaen de Jonghe, 1511–1575), in a passage in his work Batavia (written in 1569; published posthumously in 1588). He referred to a period "Template:Lang" ("in the first infancy of the typographic art").[11][12] The term has sometimes been incorrectly attributed to Bernhard von Mallinckrodt (1591–1664), in his Latin pamphlet Template:Lang ("On the rise and progress of the typographic art"; 1640), but he was quoting Junius.[13][14]

The term incunabula came to denote printed books themselves in the late 17th century.[15] It is not found in English before the mid-19th century.[9]

Junius set an end-date of 1500 to his era of incunabula, which remains the convention in modern bibliographical scholarship.[11][12] This convenient but arbitrary end-date for identifying a printed book as an incunable does not reflect changes in the printing process, and many books printed for some years after 1500 are visually indistinguishable from incunables. The term "post-incunable" is now used to refer to books printed after 1500 up to 1520 or 1540, without general agreement. From around this period the dating of any edition becomes easier, as the practice of printing the place and year of publication using a colophon or on the title page became more widespread.Template:Sfn

Types

There are two types of printed incunabula: the block book, printed from a single carved or sculpted wooden block for each page (the same process as the woodcut in art, called xylographic); and the typographic book, made by individual cast-metal movable type pieces on a printing press. Many authors reserve the term "incunabula" for the latter.[16]

The spread of printing to cities both in the North and in Italy ensured that there was great variety in the texts and the styles which appeared. Many early typefaces were modelled on local writing or derived from various European Gothic scripts, but there were also some derived from documentary scripts like Caxton's, and, particularly in Italy, types modelled on handwritten scripts and calligraphy used by humanists.

Printers congregated in urban centres where there were scholars, ecclesiastics, lawyers, and nobles and professionals who formed their major customer base. Standard works in Latin inherited from the medieval tradition formed the bulk of the earliest printed works, but as books became cheaper, vernacular works (or translations into vernaculars of standard works) began to appear.Template:Citation needed

Famous examples

Template:Center

Famous incunabula include two from Mainz, the Gutenberg Bible of 1455 and the Peregrinatio in terram sanctam of 1486, printed and illustrated by Erhard Reuwich; the Nuremberg Chronicle written by Hartmann Schedel and printed by Anton Koberger in 1493; and the Hypnerotomachia Poliphili printed by Aldus Manutius with important illustrations by an unknown artist.Template:Citation needed

Other printers of incunabula were Günther Zainer of Augsburg, Johannes Mentelin and Heinrich Eggestein of Strasbourg, Heinrich Gran of Haguenau, Johann Amerbach of Basel, William Caxton of Bruges and London, and Nicolas Jenson of Venice. The first incunable to have woodcut illustrations was Ulrich Boner's Der Edelstein, printed by Albrecht Pfister in Bamberg in 1461.[17]

A finding in 2015 brought evidence of quires, as claimed by research, possibly printed in 1444–1446 and possibly assigned to Procopius Waldvogel of Avignon, France.Template:Citation needed

Post-incunable

Many incunabula are undated, needing complex bibliographical analysis to place them correctly. The post-incunabula period marks a time of development during which the printed book evolved fully as a mature artefact with a standard format.[18] After about 1540 books tended to conform to a pattern that included the author, title-page, date, seller, and place of printing. This makes it much easier to identify any particular edition.Template:Sfn

As noted above, the end date for identifying a printed book as an incunable is convenient but was chosen arbitrarily; it does not reflect any notable developments in the printing process around the year 1500. Books printed for a number of years after 1500 continued to look much like incunables, with the notable exception of the small format books printed in italic type introduced by Aldus Manutius in 1501. The term post-incunable is sometimes used to refer to books printed "after 1500—how long after, the experts have not yet agreed."[19] For books printed in England, the term generally covers 1501–1520, and for books printed in mainland Europe, 1501–1540.Template:Sfn

One notable example from this period is Hakob Meghapart (Hagop Meghapart), who in 1512 became the first known printer of Armenian books. Working in Venice, he published Urbatagirk (The Book of Friday) and several other early Armenian printed works. His books retained characteristics of manuscript tradition, including red and black ink and decorative initials, aligning them stylistically with incunabula despite being post-incunable by definition.

Statistical data

Printing centres in Europe
Incunabula distribution by region
Incunabula distribution by language

The data in this section were derived from the Incunabula Short-Title Catalogue (ISTC).[20]

The number of printing towns and cities stands at 282. These are situated in some 18 countries in terms of present-day boundaries. In descending order of the number of editions printed in each, these are: Italy, Germany, France, Netherlands, Switzerland, Spain, Belgium, England, Austria, the Czech Republic, Portugal, Poland, Sweden, Denmark, Turkey, Croatia, Serbia, Montenegro, and Hungary (see diagram).

The following table shows the 20 main 15th-century printing locations; as with all data in this section, exact figures are given, but should be treated as close estimates (the total editions recorded in ISTC at August 2016 is 30,518):

Town or city No. of editions % of ISTC recorded editions
Venice[21] 3,549 12.5
Paris[22] 2,764 9.7
Rome[23] 1,922 6.8
Cologne[24] 1,530 5.4
Lyon[25] 1,364 4.8
Leipzig[26] 1,337 4.7
Augsburg[27] 1,219 4.3
Strasbourg[28] 1,158 4.1
Milan[29] 1,101 3.9
Nuremberg[30] 1,051 3.7
Florence 801 2.8
Basel 786 2.8
Deventer 613 2.2
Bologna 559 2.0
Antwerp 440 1.5
Mainz 418 1.5
Ulm 398 1.4
Speyer 354 1.2
Pavia 337 1.2
Naples 323 1.1
TOTAL 22,024 77.6

The 18 languages that incunabula are printed in, in descending order, are: Latin, German, Italian, French, Dutch, Spanish, English, Hebrew, Catalan, Czech, Greek, Church Slavonic, Portuguese, Swedish, Breton, Danish, Frisian and Sardinian (see diagram).

Only about one edition in ten (i.e. just over 3,000) has any illustrations, woodcuts or metalcuts.

The "commonest" incunable is Schedel's Nuremberg Chronicle ("Liber Chronicarum") of 1493, with about 1,250 surviving copies (which is also the most heavily illustrated). Many incunabula are unique, but on average about 18 copies survive of each. This makes the Gutenberg Bible, at 48 or 49 known copies, a relatively common (though extremely valuable) edition. Counting extant incunabula is complicated by the fact that most libraries consider a single volume of a multi-volume work as a separate item, as well as fragments or copies lacking more than half the total leaves. A complete incunable may consist of a slip, or up to ten volumes.[31]

In terms of format, the 30,000-odd editions comprise: 2,000 broadsides, 9,000 folios, 15,000 quartos, 3,000 octavos, 18 12mos, 230 16mos, 20 32mos, and 3 64mos.

ISTC at present cites 528 extant copies of books printed by Caxton, which together with 128 fragments makes 656 in total, though many are broadsides or very imperfect (incomplete).Template:Citation needed

Apart from migration to mainly North American and Japanese universities, there has been little movement of incunabula in the last five centuries. None were printed in the Southern Hemisphere, and the latter appears to possess fewer than 2,000 copies, while about 97.75% remain north of the equator. However, many incunabula are sold at auction or through the rare book trade every year.Template:Citation needed

Major collections

The British Library's Incunabula Short Title Catalogue now records over 29,000 titles, of which around 27,400 are incunabula editions (not all unique works). Studies of incunabula began in the 17th century. Michel Maittaire (1667–1747) and Georg Wolfgang Panzer (1729–1805) arranged printed material chronologically in annals format, and in the first half of the 19th century, Ludwig Hain published the Repertorium bibliographicum—a checklist of incunabula arranged alphabetically by author: "Hain numbers" are still a reference point. Hain was expanded in subsequent editions, by Walter A. Copinger and Dietrich Reichling, but it is being superseded by the authoritative modern listing, a German catalogue, the Gesamtkatalog der Wiegendrucke, which has been under way since 1925 and is still being compiled at the Staatsbibliothek zu Berlin. North American holdings were listed by Frederick R. Goff and a worldwide union catalogue is provided by the Incunabula Short Title Catalogue.[32]

Notable collections with more than 1,000 incunabula include:

Library Location Country Number of copies Number of editions Ref.
Bavarian State Library Munich Germany 19,717 9,381 [33]
British Library London UK 12,500 10,390 [34]
Template:Lang Paris France 12,000 8,000 [35]
Vatican Library Vatican City Vatican City 8,600 5,400 (more than) [36]
Austrian National Library Vienna Austria 8,030 [37]
National Library of Russia Saint Petersburg Russia 7,302 [38]
Template:Lang Stuttgart Germany 7,093 [39]
Bodleian Library Oxford UK 6,755 5,623 [40]
Library of Congress Washington, D.C. US 5,700 [41]
Russian State Library Moscow Russia 5,360 [42]
Huntington Library San Marino, California US 5,000 (more than) [43]
Cambridge University Library Cambridge UK 4,650 (more than) [44]
Template:Lang Naples Italy 4,563 [45]
Danish Royal Library Copenhagen Denmark 4,500 [46]
John Rylands Research Institute and Library Manchester UK 4,500 [47]
Berlin State Library Berlin Germany 4,496 [48]
Harvard University Cambridge, Massachusetts US 4,389 3,627 [49]
National Library of the Czech Republic Prague Czech Republic 4,200 [50]
National Central Library of Florence Florence Italy 4,089 [51]
Leipzig University Library Leipzig Germany 3,800 [52]
Jagiellonian Library Kraków Poland 3,671 [53]
Library of the Ludwig Maximilian University of Munich Munich Germany 3,598 [54]
Bamberg State Library Bamberg Germany 3,550 [55]
Yale University (Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library) New Haven, Connecticut US 3,525 (all collections) Template:Citation needed
Herzog August Library Wolfenbüttel Germany 3,477 2,835 [56]
University Library Freiburg Freiburg im Breisgau Germany 3,448 [57]
Wrocław University Library Wrocław Poland 3,250 (more than) [58]
Template:Lang Madrid Spain 3,159 2,298 [59]
Göttingen State and University Library Göttingen Germany 3,100 [60]
Library of the University of Würzburg Würzburg Germany 3,100 [61]
Palatina Library Parma Italy 3,042 [62]
Basel University Library Basel Switzerland 3,000 (more than) [63]
Template:Lang Venice Italy 2,887 [64]
Frankfurt University Library Frankfurt Germany 2,800 [65]
Uppsala University Library Uppsala Sweden 2,500 [66]
Template:Lang Bologna Italy 2,500 (circa) [67]
Template:Lang Paris France 2,400 2,120 [68]
Braidense National Library Milan Italy 2,368 [69]
Library of the University of Cologne Cologne Germany 2,350 [70]
Template:Ill Colmar France 2,300 [71]
Newberry Library Chicago US 2,200 (more than) [72]
Casanatense Library Rome Italy 2,200 [73]
National Library of the Netherlands The Hague Netherlands 2,200 [74]
Library of the University of Tübingen Tübingen Germany 2,148 [75]
Library of the University of Innsbruck (Universitäts- und Landesbibliothek) Innsbruck Austria 2,122 1,889 [76]
National and University Library Strasbourg France 2,120 (circa) (7,000 destroyed by fire in the 1870 Siege of Strasbourg) [77]
Template:Ill Nuremberg Germany 2,100 [78]
Library Angelo Mai Bergamo Italy 2,100 [79]
Morgan Library New York US 2,000 (more than) Template:Citation needed
Library of the University of Erlangen–Nuremberg Erlangen Germany 2,000 (more than) [80]
Template:Lang Rome Italy 2,000 [81]
National Széchényi Library Budapest Hungary 1,800 (more than) [82]
Heidelberg University Library Heidelberg Germany 1,800 [83]
Estense University Library Modena Italy 1,662 [84]
Bibliothèque de l'Arsenal Paris France 1,623 [85]
Turin National University Library Turin Italy 1,600 (more than) [86]
Template:Ill Halle (Saale) Germany 1,600 [87]
Template:Lang Lisbon Portugal 1,597 [88]
Template:Interlanguage link Padua Italy 1,583 [89]
Zentralbibliothek Zürich Zürich Switzerland 1,562 [90]
Strahov Monastery Library Prague Czech Republic 1,500 (more than) [91]
Template:Lang Paris France 1,500 [92]
Template:Ill Salzburg Austria 1,385 [93]
Baden State Library Karlsruhe Germany 1,365 [94]
University Library of Bonn Bonn Germany 1,338 1,307 [95]
Biblioteca Augusta Perugia Italy 1,330 [96]
University Library in Genoa Genoa Italy 1,321 [97]
Trivulziana Library Milan Italy 1,300 [98]
Template:Lang Lyon France 1,300 [99]
Library of the Catholic University of Eichstätt-Ingolstadt Eichstätt Germany 1,290 [100]
Walters Art Museum Baltimore, Maryland US 1,280 [101]
Verona Municipal Library Verona Italy 1,230 [102]
Bryn Mawr College Library Bryn Mawr, Pennsylvania US 1,225 (more than) [103]
Library Teresiana Mantua Italy 1,281 1,083 [104]
Template:Ill Zwickau Germany 1,200 [105]
University of Illinois at Urbana–Champaign Urbana, Illinois US 1,200 (more than) [106]
National Library of Poland Warsaw Poland 1,198 1,031 [107]
Template:Lang Seville Spain 1,194 [108]
Queriniana Library Brescia Italy 1,158 [109]
Central Library of the Region of Sicily Palermo Italy 1,136 [110]
University of Graz Library Graz Austria 1,115 [111]
Angelica Library Rome Italy 1,100 [112]
University of Glasgow Glasgow UK 1,062 [113]
University Library in Bologna Bologna Italy 1,021 [114]
Bridwell Library Dallas, Texas US 1,000 (more than) [115]
Library Passerini Landi Piacenza Italy 1,000 (more than) [116]
Abbey library of Saint Gall St. Gallen Switzerland 1,000 [117]
Library Intronati Siena Italy 1,000 (circa) [118]
National Library of Serbia Belgrade Serbia 1,000 (circa) [119][120]
National and University Library in Zagreb Zagreb Croatia 1,000 (circa) Template:Citation needed
Bibliothèque municipale de Besançon Besançon France 1,000 (circa) Template:Citation needed

See also

References

  1. ↑ Template loop detected: Template:Cite book
  2. ↑ The British Library Incunabula Short Title Catalogue Template:Webarchive (retrieved 16 August 2021) gives 30,518 editions, though this includes some which have been re-dated to the early 16th century.
  3. ↑ According to Bettina Wagner: "Das Second-Life der Wiegendrucke. Die Inkunabelsammlung der Bayerischen Staatsbibliothek", in Griebel, Rolf; Ceynowa, Klaus (eds.): "Information, Innovation, Inspiration. 450 Jahre Bayerische Staatsbibliothek", K G Saur, Munich 2008, {{#invoke:CS1 identifiers|main|_template=isbn}}, pp. 207–224 (207f.) the Incunabula Short Title Catalogue lists 30,375 titles published before 1501.
  4. ↑ J. Green, F. McIntyre, P. Needham (2011), "The Shape of Incunable Survival and Statistical Estimation of Lost Editions", Papers of the Bibliographical Society of America 105 (2), Template:Pp.. doi:https://doi.org/10.1086/680773
  5. ↑ Badische Landes-Bibliothek (in German)
  6. ↑ As late as 1891 Rogers in his technical glossary recorded only the form incunabulum: Template loop detected: Template:Cite book
  7. ↑ The word incunabula is a neuter plural only; the singular incunabulum is never found in Latin, and is no longer used in English by most bibliographers.
  8. ↑ C. T. Lewis and C. Short, A Latin Dictionary, Oxford 1879, p. 930.
  9. ↑ 9.0 9.1 Template:OED
  10. ↑ "Fifteener" was coined by bibliographer Thomas Frognall Dibdin, a term endorsed by William Morris and Robert Proctor. Template:Harv.
  11. ↑ 11.0 11.1 Hadrianus Iunius, Batavia, [...], [Lugduni Batavorum], ex officina Plantiniana, apud Franciscum Raphelengium, 1588, p. 256, line 3.
  12. ↑ 12.0 12.1 Template:Cite journal
  13. ↑ Bernardus a Mallinkrot, De ortu ac progressu artis typographicae dissertatio historica, [...], Coloniae Agrippinae, apud Ioannem Kinchium, 1640 (in frontispiece: 1639), p. 9, line 16. The term appears within a long passage of several pages (pp. 27–33; corresponding to Batavia, Template:Pp.), set in italics to indicate a quotation, and attributed to Junius.
  14. ↑ Template:Cite journal
  15. ↑ Template:Cite web
  16. ↑ Oxford Companion to the Book, ed. M. F. Suarez and H. R. Woudhuysen, OUP, 2010, s.v. 'Incunabulum', p. 815.
  17. ↑ Daniel De Simone (ed), A Heavenly Craft: the Woodcut in Early Printed Books, New York, 2004, Template:P..
  18. ↑ Template loop detected: Template:Cite book
  19. ↑ Template loop detected: Template:Cite book Template:Free access
  20. ↑ BL.uk Template:Webarchive, consulted in 2007. The figures are subject to slight change as new copies are reported. Exact figures are given but should be treated as close estimates; they refer to extant editions.
  21. ↑ Template:Citation
  22. ↑ Template:Citation
  23. ↑ Template:Citation
  24. ↑ Template:Citation
  25. ↑ Template:Citation
  26. ↑ Template:Citation
  27. ↑ Template:Citation
  28. ↑ Template:Citation
  29. ↑ Template:Citation
  30. ↑ Template:Citation
  31. ↑ Template:Cite web
  32. ↑ Template:Cite web
  33. ↑ Template:Cite web
  34. ↑ Template:Cite web
  35. ↑ Template:Cite web
  36. ↑ Template:Cite web
  37. ↑ Template:Cite web
  38. ↑ Template loop detected: Template:Cite book
  39. ↑ Template:Cite web
  40. ↑ Template:Cite web
  41. ↑ Template:Cite web
  42. ↑ Выставочный проект На благое просвещение: Румянцевский музей, Московский период, Индрик, 2005, {{#invoke:CS1 identifiers|main|_template=isbn}}
  43. ↑ Template:Cite web
  44. ↑ Template:Cite web
  45. ↑ Template:Cite web
  46. ↑ Template:Cite web
  47. ↑ Template:Cite web
  48. ↑ Template:Cite web
  49. ↑ Template loop detected: Template:Cite book
  50. ↑ Template:Cite web
  51. ↑ Template:Cite web
  52. ↑ Template:Cite web
  53. ↑ Template:Cite web
  54. ↑ Template:Cite web
  55. ↑ Template:Cite web
  56. ↑ Template:Cite web
  57. ↑ Template:Cite web
  58. ↑ Template:Cite web
  59. ↑ Template:Cite web
  60. ↑ Template:Cite web
  61. ↑ Template:Cite web
  62. ↑ Template:Cite web
  63. ↑ Template:Cite web
  64. ↑ Template:Cite web
  65. ↑ Template:Cite web
  66. ↑ Template:Cite web
  67. ↑ Template:Cite web
  68. ↑ Template:Cite web
  69. ↑ Template:Cite web
  70. ↑ Template:Cite web
  71. ↑ Template:Cite web
  72. ↑ Template:Cite web
  73. ↑ Template:Cite web
  74. ↑ Template:Cite web
  75. ↑ Template:Cite web
  76. ↑ Template:Cite web
  77. ↑ Template:Cite web
  78. ↑ Template:Cite web
  79. ↑ Template:Cite web
  80. ↑ Template:Cite web
  81. ↑ Template:Cite web
  82. ↑ Template:Cite web
  83. ↑ Template:Cite web
  84. ↑ Template:Cite web
  85. ↑ Template:Cite web
  86. ↑ Template:Cite web
  87. ↑ Template:Cite web
  88. ↑ Template:Cite web
  89. ↑ Template:Cite web
  90. ↑ Template:Cite web
  91. ↑ Template:Cite web
  92. ↑ Template:Cite web
  93. ↑ Template:Cite web
  94. ↑ Template:Cite web
  95. ↑ Template:Cite web
  96. ↑ Template:Cite web
  97. ↑ Template:Cite web
  98. ↑ Template:Cite web
  99. ↑ Template:Cite web
  100. ↑ Template:Cite web
  101. ↑ Template:Cite news
  102. ↑ Template:Cite web
  103. ↑ Template:Cite web
  104. ↑ Template:Cite webTemplate:Dead link
  105. ↑ Template:Cite web
  106. ↑ Template:Cite web
  107. ↑ Template:Cite web
  108. ↑ Template:Cite web
  109. ↑ Template:Cite web
  110. ↑ Template:Cite webTemplate:Dead link
  111. ↑ Template:Cite web
  112. ↑ Template:Cite web
  113. ↑ Template:Cite web
  114. ↑ Template:Cite web
  115. ↑ Template:Cite web
  116. ↑ Template:Cite web
  117. ↑ Template:Cite web
  118. ↑ Template:Cite webTemplate:Dead link
  119. ↑ Template loop detected: Template:Cite book
  120. ↑ Template:Cite web


External links

Template:Commons category

Template:Books

Template:Authority control

Retrieved from "https://wiki.knightserrant.life/index.php?title=Incunable&oldid=1921"