Warhafftiger grund und zeugnis unsers Christlichen glaubes, vellum manuscript, Leipzig, 1574, embroidered silk binding

Property from an Important California Collection

[Prayerbook]

Warhafftiger grund und zeugnis unsers Christlichen glaubes aus der Heilige Schrift des alter und newen Testaments trewelich und vleissig zusamen gezogen allen gromen Christen zu einer Lehr un Trost. Leipzig, 1574

12mo (129 x 76mm.), manuscript on vellum, 44 leaves, text in black and gold in an elaborate gothic hand, each leaf within a hand-coloured metalcut border, other hand-coloured metalcut illustrations, on title-page verso an armorial in gouache of the family of Winkler of Zurich, with a portrait of a young man opposite, also in gouache and heightened in gold, contemporary silk binding embroidered with silver thread, edges gilt, gauffered and painted, light finger soiling, silk faded from pink or red to beige, thread a little tarnished, edges slightly rubbed, lacking two pairs of ties or fastenings

A CHARMING MANUSCRIPT PRAYER BOOK IN A CONTEMPORARY EMBROIDERED BINDING, made for a member of the Winkler family of Zurich. Several similar manuscripts are recorded; see our sale of Western Manuscripts and Miniatures, 6 December 2005, lot 46 (dated 1560, in a panel-stamped calf binding, but with no mention of any contemporary provenance).

The woodcuts have been attributed to Ernst Voegelin, a printer in Leipzig in the later sixteenth century.

PROVENANCE:

a member of the Winkler family of Zurich, armorial and portrait; Hugo Marmorek (later Howard Madison), Vienna and Detroit; thence by descent