Lot 373C email save

Lycosthenes.Ostentorum Chronicon

Lycosthenes (Conrad) Prodigiorum ac Ostentorum Chronicon,

first edition, large woodcut on title, woodcuts in the text, some repeated, device at end, C2&3 (a double-page scene of sea-monsters), head-line title to the head of double-page illustration slightly shaved, some slight damp-staining and soiling to the rear, corner of Xx4 missing (paper fault), early vellum with yapp edges, soiled, manuscript lettering to spine, bookplate of "South Library", The Macclesfield Library, to the inside front paste-down with it's blind-stamp to the first 3 leaves, [Adams W-250], folio, Basel, Henricus Petri, 1557.

***In 1552 Lycosthenes published the first separate edition of Julius Obsequens, a Latin writer on prodigies. The publication was a success, and so, he undertook the present work. He believed that prodigies or portents had a religious significance and that they show "God's anger and severity towards crimes, and fortell great changes in the world". He admits that such occurrences often had natural causes, but that God was ultimately in control. His work of 1557 begins with the serpent talking to Adam and Eve and goes through to the year of publication. Discussion of portents, fabulous creatures, and alike is also found in the Nuremberg Chronicle (see lot 365) and in the work of Camerarius, Belon and Polydore Virgil..