[Caxton] Higden (Ranulphus) [Polychronicon] single leaf from the Liber Ultimus

[Caxton] Higden (Ranulphus) Polychronicon, a single incunabulum leaf from the Liber Ultimus showing the end of the 6th chapter and beginning of the seventh (capitulum septum) from the first edition, lettre batarde, 40 lines and headline, rubricated, one 2-line initial and several side-notes in red, some early ink annotations, small folio (17.3cm x 22.6cm), Westminster: William Caxton, 1482 within a red cloth chemise with gilt lettering to front board;

together with an early printed Hebrew leaf and plate CCCXLI presumed from Fuchs (Leonhard) De historia stirpium commentarii insignes, Pfersichbaum [(sic) Pfirsichbaum - The Peach Tree] (3)

incunabula

Footnote:

Ranulf Higden (c.1280-1364) was a Benedictine monk and a chronicler. He lived, and is buried, at the monastery of St. Werburgh, now Chester Cathedral. Thought to have been completed around 1363, Higden’s great work, the Polychronicon, belongs to that most ambitious category of book – the universal history. Testament to its importance and popularity, the Polychronicon was copied out “hundreds, if not thousands of times during the later fourteenth and fifteenth centuries” (Given-Wilson, p. xxii). Often, in the process, the text was brought up to date with the addition of the history of the intervening period, making the title of this work – ‘chronicle of many times’ – particularly apt. He continued widespread use of Higden’s Polychronicon was further cemented in 1482 when William Caxton (c.1422-1491), England’s first printer, chose to stabilise in print the first English translation of Higden’s work, which was made by John of Trevisa in the 1380s. Trevisa’s translation included an extension taking the history of the final book of the Polychronicon up to 1360. 100 years later, Caxton made his own contribution to this well-established historiographical tradition, with a continuation covering the events of the intervening century up to 1460. Caxton named this appendix the Liber Ultimus. [*]

Condition Report:

Caxton: Slight chipping to margins, outer corners with small losses, a little scattered spotting, diagonal band of browning, one smudged word as picture. light dampstain to centre

Please enquire for condition report on other items in the lot