Thomas à Kempis

Chancery folio (281 × 201 mm). Collation: [1-2¹⁰ 3¹⁰ (±10 sit in scripturis) 4-7¹⁰ 8⁶]: 76 leaves, 76v blank. Initial spaces, rubricated red (simple lombard initials, capital strokes); worming at beginning and end. Early nineteenth-century sheep, gilt spine (laid down) with label, red-sprinkled edges. Bound with six (of eight) other theological tractates printed by Zainer, 1472-1473, in identical format and layout, plus one later incunable, as listed below.

Weissenau, Premonstratensian convent — Bonaventura Brem, 1755-1818, last abbot of Weissenau (engraved bookplate, B A Z W) — Francis Fry (descriptive note in his autograph pasted in) — S[arah] M[atilda] Barclay, daughter of Francis Fry (inscribed “S. M. Barclay, Reigate 1888, after F. Fry’s Death”)

Goff I-4; BMC II 318 (IB.5542); BSB-Ink T-165; Bod-inc T-95

Chancery folio (281 × 201 mm). Collation: [1-210 310 (±10 sit in scripturis) 4-710 86]: 76 leaves, 76v blank. Initial spaces, rubricated red (simple lombard initials, capital strokes); worming at beginning and end. Early nineteenth-century sheep, gilt spine (laid down) with label, red-sprinkled edges. Bound with six (of eight) other theological tractates printed by Zainer, 1472-1473, in identical format and layout, plus one later incunable, as listed below.
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First edition of the most influential devotional work of the later Middle Ages, still alive in Christian spirituality, and the greatest literary achievement of the Devotio Moderna (Printing & the Mind of Man no. 13). Thomas à Kempis’s treatise was widely dispersed in manuscript copies during his lifetime with authorship frequently attributed to the famous theologian Jean Gerson, former chancellor of the University of Paris. This false attribution was common in incunable editions and persisted for hundreds of years, but Zainer correctly assigned it to “Thomas, canon regular of St Agnietenberg near Utrecht”. Zainer’s edition is one of a group of nine devotional editions that Zainer published in 1472-1473, which could be bought separately, in small groups, or as a full set with a printed contents label. The present volume contains seven of the nine. The texts for many of these may have been supplied by manuscripts from the Carthusian house at Buxheim, near Memmingen. A 1471-dated manuscript of Imitatio Christi at Harvard University, formerly owned by the Buxheim Carthusians, presents a text extremely close to that of Zainer's editio princeps, and like it assigns authorship to Thomas à Kempis. Most copies, like this one, have leaf 3/10 as a cancel, a few only preserving the uncancelled state.

Bound with:
1. St. Augustine. Soliloquia; [Anonymus], Speculum peccatoris. [Augsburg: Günther Zainer, c. 1472-1473]. [1-2¹⁰ 3^8]: 28 leaves (3/3v blank). Goff A-1333 + A-1337; BSB-Ink A-902; Bod-inc A-602

2. Pseudo-Jerome. De essentia divinitatis; St. Thomas Aquinas, Summa de articulis fidei. [Augsburg: Günther Zainer, c. 1472-1473]. [1-2⁸]: 16 leaves. Goff H-179; BSB-Ink E-105; Bod-inc H-95

3. [Johannes Nider]. Dispositorium artis moriendi. [Augsburg: Günther Zainer, c. 1472-1473]. [1¹⁰ 2¹⁰ (+6* Dubitatur)]: 21 leaves. Goff A-1089; BMC II 319 (IB.5547); BSB-Ink N-151; Bod-inc N-75

4. Processus iudiciarius (alias: Litigacio mascaron contra genus humanum). [Augsburg: Günther Zainer, c. 1472-1473]. [1¹⁰]: 10 leaves (fo. 1 blank). Goff P-1001; BMC II 318 (IB.5545); BSB-Ink B-211; Bod-inc P-472

5. [Jean Gerson]. Donatus per allegoriam moralisatus. [Augsburg: Günther Zainer, not after 1472]. [1⁸]: 7 of 8 leaves, lacking fo. 8, blank. Goff G-221; BMC II 318 (IB.5546); BSB-Ink G-174; Bod-inc G-142

6. [Theobaldus subprior]. Errores iudaeorum; Probationes Novi Testamenti. [Augsburg: Günther Zainer, c. 1472-1473]. [1^12]: 12 leaves (12v blank). Goff E-106; BMC II 318 (IB.5544); BSB-Ink T-136; Bod-inc T-70.

7. Hugo de Sancto Victore. De sacramentis. Strassburg [Jordanus de Quedlinburg Press], 30 July 1485. Liber I only (of II). π4; a-f8.6 g-k6: 69 of 70 leaves, lacking k6 blank. Goff H-535; BMC I 133 (IB.1837); BSB-Ink H-433; Bod-inc H-244.