Vocabularius Bibliae - photo 1
Vocabularius Bibliae - photo 2
Vocabularius Bibliae - photo 3

Vocabularius Bibliae

Lot 27
28.01.2025 10:00UTC -05:00
Classic
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CHRISTIE'S
AuctioneerCHRISTIE'S
Event locationUSA, New York
ID 1360743
Lot 27 | Vocabularius Bibliae
Estimate value
$ 7 000 – 10 000
HENRICUS DE HASSIA [Guillelmus Brito] (c.1325–1397). Vocabularius Bibliae. [Ulm: Johann Zainer, c.1476]. [Bound with:] NICOLAUS DE HANAPIS (c.1225–1291). Auctoritates utriusque Testamenti. [Strasbourg: Heinrich Eggestein, c.1475–1480].

Two rare works of medieval Biblical scholarship. The only edition of the Vocabularius Bibliae, it was printed by Zainer around 1476 and this unpressed copy shows off his impressive, large interlaced initials. The colophon of the first work attributes the text to the 14th-century German theologian Henricus de Hassia, but it is now known to be the work of the earlier scholar Guillelmus Brito. The work was Guillelmus’ most important and influential work and provided explanations, derivations (sometimes from the Greek or Hebrew) and etymologies for the most difficult words in the Vulgate Bible. This dictionary had a wide circulation in manuscript and was regarded as an essential scholarly tool: already in 1284 it was one of the three texts that Archbishop John Pecham instructed Merton College, Oxford to be kept chained to a table in the library and thereby available for the instruction of poor and orphaned members of the founder’s family. Rare in print, and rare at auction, with only one record from 2018 in RBH.

The second text, Auctoritates utriusque Testamenti, is the third of four incunable editions of the abridged Virtutum vitiorumque exempla by Nicolaus de Hanapis. Published here without naming its author, the work has sometimes been attributed to S. Bonaventure. The work compiles examples of vice and virtue from the Scripture, teaching through exempla. Rare, with only two auction records in RBH for 1994 and 1966. Claire Bolton, The Fifteenth-Century Printing Practices of Johann Zainer (Oxford Bibliographical Society, 2016). I: H *8396; BMC II 525; BSB-Ink G-481; Bod-inc H-029; GW 11871; Goff H-37; ISTC ih00037000; II: H *3534; BMC I 72; BSB-Ink N-102; GW M26425; Goff B-848; ISTC in00103300.

Two works bound in one, chancery folio (291 × 201 mm). I: 280 leaves; rubricated foliate woodcut initials hand-colored in red. II: 48 leaves; 6- and 3-line manuscript initials in red, rubricated (some light worming at ends affecting a few letters, II: 5/3-6 reinforced at hinge). Contemporary alum-tawed pigskin over unbevelled wooden boards, tooled in blind, hole for chain staple on lower board, leather strap and catchplate, leather index tabs in pink and white in I, vellum quire guards (without flyleaves, small wormholes). Provenance: 18th-century ink shelfmark 209 on front free endpaper – modern bibliographical notes on front flyleaf – Christie’s, 12 December 2018, lot 82.
Genre:Religious genre
Place of origin:Germany
Auction house category:Antiquarian books, Printed books
Address of auction CHRISTIE'S
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