Bartholomaeus de Chaimis - [Incunable] Confessionale - 1482

From the Butcher to the Merchant - The Sins Exposed at the Point of Death - Engraved in Gold
This copy features an extraordinarily rare decorative element for a pastoral manual: beautifully rubricated drop caps added later by hand in gold, red, and blue, with large initials at the first and second pages, giving the object an exceptional character and aesthetic quality.
Milanese Franciscans attentive to the concrete reality of penitents, Bartolomeo de Chaimis structures in his Confessionale a system of questions calibrated to different social conditions — children, spouses, priests, merchants, artisans, students, butchers, tavern owners — offering the confessor a meticulous guide fully embedded in the religious practice of late medieval times. The Interrogationes for the dying, derived from Anselmo of Canterbury's Admonitio morienti, represent one of the most intense texts of medieval agony spirituality.
Market value
The current price range for copies with such decorative apparatus is around $5,000–$6,500. In the presence of rubricated initials, they can reach values exceeding $7,000, thanks to the high demand for incunabula with illuminated interventions.

Physical description and condition - collector's copy
Rebound in full 18th-century parchment, adapted, with a gilded patch on the spine, titles unrelated to the historical anthology. Collation: pages (1); 112; (2). Exceptionally sturdy and well-preserved paper. The decorative apparatus is remarkable: beautiful rubricated initials by a later hand in gold, red, and blue, with two large initials at the beginning of the first and second pages. These interventions, executed by an expert hand, give the volume a visual prestige above the average of unrubricated incunabula. Sharp Gothic characters, good structural integrity, ancient marginal marks.

Full title and author
Confession or Interrogation. Interrogations to be conducted on a dying person.
In Milan, at the place of Saint Mary of the Angels, on the 13th day of June, 1482.
Bartholomaeus de Chaimis; Anselmus Cantuariensis; Hermannus de Schildesche.

Context and Significance
The 1482 Milanese edition, printed by the community of Santa Maria degli Angeli, is particularly rare.
The Confessionale by Bartolomeo de Chaimis is one of the most important pastoral texts of the second half of the Quattrocento. Organized by social categories, it allows confessors to adapt the moral interrogation to the concrete reality of penitents. The Interrogationes for the dying, based on Anselmo of Canterbury's Admonitio morienti, represent a central document in spiritual care at the moment of agony.
The 1482 edition, linked to the production of the Milanese convent of Santa Maria degli Angeli, testifies to northern Italy's central role in the dissemination of inquisitorial and penitential manuals. The presence of gold rubrication and large initials on the first two pages reveals not only a particularly careful use but also a form of aesthetic enhancement that was rare for a work with a utilitarian purpose.

Biography of the Author
Bartholomaeus de Chaimis (fl. 15th century), Milanese Franciscan friar, was the author of moral and devotional manuals widely circulated in northern Italy. His work, pragmatic and attentive to the real life of the faithful, profoundly influenced premodern confessional practice.
Anselm of Canterbury (1033–1109), theologian, archbishop, and Doctor of the Church, a prominent figure of scholasticism, profoundly influenced medieval reflection on death and judgment.
Hermannus de Schildesche was a compiler of disciplinary texts for the clergy, including the Speculum Sacerdotum, which was often associated in old editions with the Confessionale.

Printing history and circulation
The Confessionale saw numerous editions between the 1970s and 1980s of the Quattrocento, especially in Milan, Pavia, and Venice. The 1482 edition reflects the vibrancy of the Lombard context and the role of convents as centers of book production aimed at the clergy. The success of the text is measured by its many variants and its extraordinary circulation in manuscript and print, which made it one of the main pastoral tools of premodern Italy.

BIBLIOGRAPHY AND REFERENCES
GW 4293; Hain 4712; Goff B-1087; ISTC ib00487000; BSB-Ink B-496; Pellechet 2623; Proctor 2105; Walsh, Catalogue of Incunabula in American Libraries; BMC VII, passim; Polain, Catalogue of Books Printed in the 15th Century in the Libraries of Belgium, nos. 658–660; IGI 1237; CIBN B-1087; Oates, A Catalogue of the Incunabula in the Libraries of the University of Cambridge, II, pp. 312–314; Reichling, Appendices to Hain's Repertorium, no. 4712; Schreiber, Manual of the Collector of Woodcut and Metal Engravings of the 15th Century, references to Lombard incunabula.

For the doctrinal and pastoral context
Tentler, Thomas, Sin and Confession on the Eve of the Reformation (Princeton, 1977);
Bataillon, Louis-Jacques, Medieval Pastoral (Paris, 1993);
d’Avray, David, The Preaching of the Friars (Oxford, 1985);
Casagrande, Carla – Vecchio, Silvana, The Seven Deadly Sins. History of the Sins in the Middle Ages (Turin, 2000);
Rusconi, Roberto, The Order of Penitents. Confession, confessors, and penitents in the medieval age (Rome, 1998);
Miccoli, Giovanni, Gregorian Church and Pastoral (Bologna, 1966).

For the manuscript tradition and the Milanese context.
Schiaparelli, Luigi, The Lombard Miniature in the Quattrocento (Milan, 1911);
Fumagalli, Giuseppe, Lexicon typographicum Italiae (Florence, 1905), entries on Milan and Santa Maria degli Angeli;
Baldi, Andrea, The book production in Milan in the late Quattrocento (Milan, 2008);
De Robertis, Teresa (editor), Miniature and Book in 15th Century Lombardy (Florence, 2012).

For the spirituality of agony and the Anselmian legacy.
Southern, Richard, Saint Anselm and His Biographer (Cambridge, 1963);
Gilson, Étienne, The Philosophy of Saint Anselm (Paris, 1953);
Constable, Giles, Three Studies in Medieval Religious and Social Thought (Cambridge, 1995), chapters on Anselm and the care of the soul.

For codicology and annotated interventions.
Derolez, Albert, The Palaeography of Gothic Manuscript Books (Cambridge, 2003);
Mazal, Otto, Book Art of the Gothic (Graz, 1985);
Leroquais, Victor, Manuscript Breviaries of the Public Libraries of France (Paris, 1934), for comparisons on the late rubrication;
Wieck, Roger, Painted Prayers: The Book of Hours in Medieval and Renaissance Art (New York, 1997), for the late Gothic miniature and the use of gold in rubrication.