Morie Encomion, in German - photo 1
Morie Encomion, in German - photo 2
Morie Encomion, in German - photo 3

Morie Encomion, in German

Lot 66
16.10.2025 10:00UTC +01:00
Classic
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CHRISTIE'S
AuctioneerCHRISTIE'S
Event locationUnited Kingdom, London
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ID 1471989
Lot 66 | Morie Encomion, in German
Estimate value
$ 7 000 – 10 000
ERASMUS, Desiderius (c.1466–1536). Das Theur und kunstlich Buchlin Morie Encomion. Translated by Sebastian Franck, with other texts by Franck. [Ulm: Hans Varnier, 1534].

First German edition, in a contemporary binding; rare, only one copy recorded at auction. The most well-known of Erasmus's works, In Praise of Folly is a biting satire which criticizes all human professions, from monks and theologians to grammarians, poets, and rhetoricians like himself. Erasmus's inversions and doubles entendres begin with the title, playing with the name of his friend and host Thomas More, in whose London house he wrote the book, and continue by having a personified Folly tell the tale, so that Folly ridicules folly. Erasmus followed classical models of ironical eulogies by Isocrates, Lucian and Seneca, in its composition, and infused it with Christian Platonism.

This translation is by the German humanist and freethinker Sebastian Franck (1499–1542), whose sympathies with “heretics” led to his imprisonment in Strasbourg in 1531 and subsequent expulsion from that city. In 1534 he settled in Ulm, and published the present work. This edition is augmented with Franck's translation of Agrippa's De vanitate and two of his own works. It is one of two published in the same year, and the Bibliotheca Belgica gives it priority. The other edition consists of 170 leaves and has the printer's device with his name on it at the end. Bibl. Belgica II. pp.923-4, E 968 and 969, the former being the present work; not in Adams.

Quarto (198 × 141mm). Title-page in red and blank (toned, spotting and dampstains largely in first and final quires). Contemporary German quarter brown sheepskin on marbled paper boards, covers ruled in blind, spine tooled in blind, springled edges (rubbed, corners bumped, head of spine chipping away, hole at head of lower cover though to pasteboard). Provenance: Christian Godfried Jahn (1690–1748; bookplate) – H. ?Rutland (18th/19th-century inscription on pastedown; “R” embossed on title-page).
Place of origin:Germany
Auction house category:Printed books
Address of auction CHRISTIE'S
8 King Street, St. James's
SW1Y 6QT London
United Kingdom
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02.10.2025 – 16.10.2025
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