Henry of Friemar - Preceptorium Nicholai de Lira [only one book printed w. Regnault Chaudière] - 1520

ONLY THIS EXEMPLAR PRINTED BOOK!!

Henry of Friemar – Preceptorium Nicholai de Lira

(Henry of Friemar). Preceptorium Nicholai de Lira. 68 nn. Bl. With a full-sheet woodcut printer's mark of the Regnault Chaudière on the cover. 12.6 x 8.7 cm. Modern marbled leather of the date (back slightly lightened). O. O., o. Dr. and J. (i.e. Paris, Regnault Chaudière, c. 1510). Mellot-Quéval 1134. Renouard, Marques, 155. Moreau I, 1510/160.

Very rare postincunabula edition of the "Preceptorium", which was attributed to the French theologian, the "Doctor planus et utilis" Nicolas de Lyra (1270-1349), which is doubted today. The small Vademecum also contains the "Compendium de vita Antichristi". In fact, the texts come from the German theologian Heinrich von Friemar the Younger (1285-1354), "born around 1245 in Friemar near Gotha [he studied theology] before 1265 in Bologna, [was] provincial of all German Augustinian monasteries from 1290-1299, professor of theology in Paris from 1305, again in Erfurt since 1315, developed an extensive literary activity there [and died on] 18 October 1340 in the Augustinian monastery in Erfurt. Of the three different Augustinian magistri that bore this name in the 13th/14th century, it is the most important. The Decalogue explanation "De decem praeceptis", often attributed to Nicolaus de Lyra, is today undoubtedly attributed to Henricus de Friemaria.

Some red manuscript illuminations, previous to my own.

The present one is an early example of an "édition roulée", as the print was also published at the same time as Jean Petit's printer's mark. Both refer in typesetting and volume (68 nn. sheets) to the incunabula edition of Michel Lenoir from 1495. Brigitte Moreau mentions three Paris editions alone, one by Jean Petit around 1510, one by Bernard Aubry and Pierre Gandoul probably not until 1519, and another published by Jean Petit around 1522 (Inventaire 1522-378, 1519-2158).

The bookseller and publisher Regnault Chaudière can be traced in Paris between 1509 and 1554, first in the Rue Saint-Jacques, then in the Rue Saint-Jean de Beauvais "à l'enseigne de l'Homme Sauvage". Renouard depicts various variants of the printer's marks, some with breaks in the wooden webs (as here in the lower margin of the frame, which he dates to 1519. Cf. also Haebler, Verlegermarken des J. Petit.

Ex-libris note, few marginalia, partly a little browned, but hardly stained, nice copy. Remarkably rare, bibliographically not verificable (ONLY THIS EXEMPLAR PRINTED) with the printer's mark of Chaudière.