Author: [WEYNSEN, Matthias (editor)].
Title: Fascicul[us] mirre. Hier beghint een seer sonderlinghe ende devote materie van die passie ons Heren Jesu Cristi gheheten (dat busselkijn of dat bondekijn van mirre) vergadert ende gecompileert van eenen gheestelijcken ende seer verlichten broeder vander minrebroeders oerden van die familie der observanten in die provincie van Colen ...(Colophon:) Antwerp, Henrick Eckert van Homberch, 18 January 1518. 4to. With the first word of the title printed in red, 35 woodcut illustrations in the text (of which 8 repeats), with Christ's wounds coloured in red, and 53 decorated woodcut initials. The work is rubricated throughout. 17th-century gold tooled mottled brown calf.
Description: [196] ll.One of the earliest Dutch editions of a highly popular devotional work, with 35 splendid woodcut illustrations by the Master of the Delbecq-Schreiber Passion, which are not present in most other editions. The text contains meditations on the life of Christ, especially on the Passion, and was a bestseller in its own time. The present copy was owned by nuns or religious lay women in at least the 17th and 19th century. The present edition is quite rare, as we have only been able to trace one other copy in sales records of the past hundred years.The work was written by an anonymous Franciscan from Cologne. It was edited, and possibly also translated into Dutch, by his fellow friar from Antwerp, Matthijs van Dordrecht, also known as Matthys or Matthias Weynsen (1480-1547). The work became a bestseller in the Low Countries in the early 16th century, as the universal short title catalogue (USTC) records nearly 30 editions. The first (undated) editions were printed in Germany in the late 15th century, in German and Latin. The first Dutch edition listed in Nijhoff and Kronenberg was printed in 1517 in Delft. The present edition is listed as the second, and the first printed in Antwerp. However, the USTC records an undated Antwerp edition that may have been printed as early as 1504.It is now known that the prints were used by a small number of Antwerp printers in the late 15th and early 16th centuries, in particular Henrick Eckert van Homberch (active 1500-1521), one of the most productive Antwerp printers of the time, who started his career in Delft. He also used the woodcuts in some of his other publications.Due to a printing mistake, many copies of the present edition accidentally lack one leaf of text between quires A and B. After Eckert van Homberch discovered there was some text missing, he added a leaf (cancel) between these two quires, hence the collation "A8+1" in some copies. Since the added leaf is not present in our copy, it is likely that it had already been sold before the printer discovered his omission. According to De Troeyer, there are five states of the present edition (A-E), which are easily recognisable by small variations on the title page. Our copy belongs to state A, because it has the word "mirre" in line 2, and the phrase "cum gracia et previlegio" flanked by three dots at the bottom. Nijhoff and Kronenberg have only been able to trace one copy of state A.With a 17th-century ownership annotation on the first flyleaf ("Looft Godt altijdt. Desen bock is tot gebruijck van Suster Maria Verhavert Religeus onwerdigh"); a 19th-century ownership annotation underneath ("Deezen boek is tot gebruyk van zuster Elisabeth Goris Religieuse in Olv Gasthuys tot Mechelen int jaer 1831"), and a cropped 16th-century entry in the lower margin of fol. a1v ("Desen boeck hoort toe tconve[n]t va[n]"). The edges and corners of the boards are somewhat scuffed, the boards are somewhat rubbed, with a brown stain on the front board, the joints are somewhat weakened, but the structural integrity of the binding is still intact, missing small pieces of leather at the head and foot of the spine. The title page is slightly soiled, a small water stain in the outer margin of the last few leaves, folio k2 and k3 have been bound in the wrong order. Otherwise in good condition.l De Troeyer II, 128; Nijhoff and Kronenberg 923; Pettegree & Walsby, NB, 12108; USTC 400397 (11 copies); WorldCat 65890198, 902269846, 1052901755 (9 copies, of which 2 incomplete); cf. Cockx-Indestege, E., De Passie Delbecq Schreiber houtsneden in drukken, 1500-1550. In: Ons geestelijk erf 63 (1989), pp. 245-78; Delen, A., De Meester der 'Passie Delbecq-Schreiber'. In: Oude Vlaamsche grafiek: studies en aantekeningen (1943), pp. 5-21; not in STCV.

Keywords: [KCRG291IIT91] EARLY PRINTING & MANUSCRIPTS|[KCRG291IIT91] EARLY PRINTING & MANUSCRIPTS -> [KCRG36P9OEHF] Religion & Devotion|[L12BKU763RAL] LOW COUNTRIES|[L12BKU763RAL] LOW COUNTRIES -> [L12NA2A1X7LM] Antwerp|[L12BKU763RAL] LOW COUNTRIES -> [L12BOIW4BQOH