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Published online by Cambridge University Press: 12 April 2016
The first widely distributed printed comet images appear in the Nuremberg Chronicle, whose Latin edition appeared in 1493, followed closely by a German edition. In the first section, we begin our consideration with the comet image that has frequently been cited as a representation of the A.D. 684 apparition of Comet P/Halley. To better understand this image, we present a thorough survey of the 13 comet images that appear in the Chronicle, all reproduced from four woodblocks, representing 14 apparitions between A.D. 471 and A.D. 1472. In the second part, we present an analysis of the unpublished preparatory drawings for the comet images in the handwritten Exemplars (manuscript layout dummies) for both the Latin and German editions in the Stadtbibliothek, Nuremberg. Finally, in the third part, we demonstrate how the Chronicle presaged the proliferation of broadsides--woodcut prints that functioned like tabloids of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. We examine broadsides recording historical comets over such Bavarian cities as Nuremberg and Augsburg. In spite of their superstitious, hysterical journalism, fed by turbulent political and religious upheavals, these broadsides reveal a nascent scientific attitude.
We would like to thank Robert Volz, Dr. Roy Wright, Dr. Elisabeth Beare, Wayne Hammond, and Emma Hoops for their invaluable assistance. We are also most grateful to the National Endowment for the Humanities for Travel to Collections Grants to each of us, as well as the Committee on Faculty Scholarship of Wheaton College and the Division III Research Grant Committee of the Bronfman Science Center of Williams College. JMP thanks the Institute for Advanced Study for its hospitality. He also acknowledges an American Astronomical Society International Travel Grant
1 Baer, L. (1903) Die Illustrierten Historienbiicher des 15. Jahrhunderts, Heitz, Strassburg, LXXVff, gives a chronology for illustrated printed histories after 1473Google Scholar.
2 Liber cronicarum (cum] figuris et ymagi[ni]bus ab inizio mu[n]di. The reproductions in this article are taken from the Klopfer Copy in the Chapin Library of Rare Books at Williams College. (The German edition is entitled Das Buch der Croniken und Geschichten.) Johann Schönsperger of Augsburg published three smaller pirated editions in Latin (1497) and German (1496 and 1500).
3 General background references include: Bullen, H.L. (1930) The Nuremberg Chronicle, Book Club of America, San Francisco Google Scholar; Shaffer, E. (1950) The Nuremberg Chronicle, Dawson Book Shop, Los Angeles Google Scholar; Wilson, A. (1969) The Nuremberg Chronicle Designs, Roxburghe Club of San Francisco and the Zamorano Club of Los Angeles, San Francisco Google Scholar; Rücker, E. (1973) Die Schedelesche Weltchronik, Germanisches National museum, Munich Google Scholar; Zahn, P. (1974) Neue Funde zur Entstehung der Schedel’schen Weltchronik, Renaissance Vortrage, Stadt Nürnberg Museen, Nuremberg Google Scholar; and Wilson, A. (1976) The Making of the Nuremberg Chronicle, Nico Israel, Amsterdam Google Scholar.
4 For Schedel’s library, see Stauber, R., and Hartig, O. (1908) Die Schedelsche Bibliothek, Herdesche Verlagshandlung, Freiburg im Breisgau Google Scholar. On pages 240ff are listed the modem histories in his library.
5 His press existed from 1471–75, and from it Regiomontanus issued a broadside listing a large number of scientific texts that he intended to publish (the broadside is described in [1914] Einblattdrucke des XV. Jahrhundert, Heitz, Strassburg, reprinted in 1968, and reproduced in Geldner, F. (1968) Die deutschen Inkunabeldrucker, I. A. Hiersemann, Stuttgart, ill. 68, 171 Google Scholar). One of the texts he planned to publish was his De Cometae magnitudine, listed in the broadside but not published until 1530.
6 Stevenson, E.L. (1921) Terrestrial and Celestial Globes, I, Yale University Press for the Hispanic Society of America, New Haven, 46–58 Google Scholar.
7 Stauber, and Hartig, , 105ff; 137–138; 153; 183; 207; 232; 240 Google Scholar.
8 The Nuremberg Chronicle is not the first history to include panoramic cityscapes, for very general, stylized views were included, for example, in editions of Rolevinck’s Fasciculus Temporum, of which Schedel owned a copy (see Stauber and Hartig, 117; 203, who do not list an edition). The most topographically correct cityscapes in printed books of the fifteenth century were found in Bernhard von Breydenbach’s Peregrinado in terram sanctam, published in Mainz in 1486, with elaborate woodcuts by Erhard Reuwich. That Schedel owned a copy is documented by Stauber and Hartig, 166. See also Baer, 172–184, on the Nuremberg Chronicle.
9 Pingré, A.G. (1783, 1784) Cométographie, L’Imprimerie Royale, Paris, 417–424 Google Scholar; within the time bracket 1288–1304, he also records comets in 1293/94, 1296, 1297, 1300, and 1301 (2) including P/Halley, as well as ones in 1302, 1303, and 1304. See also Hasegawa, I. (1980) ‘Catalogue of Ancient and Naked-Eye Comets’, Vistas in Astronomy, 24, 80 Google Scholar. For the comet of 1299, see Marsden, B.G. (1986) Catalogue of Cometary Orbits, International Astronomical Union, Cambridge, MA, 8 and 45 Google Scholar; Yoke, Ho Peng (1962) ‘Ancient and Medieval Observations of Comets and Novae in Chinese Sources,’ Vistas in Astronomy, 5, 194–195 Google Scholar, who also notes comets in 1297 (2), 1299 (2), 1304 (2), as well as P/Halley in 1301; Kronk, G. W. (1984) Comets: A Descriptive Catalogue, Enslow Publishers, Hillside, N.J., 4–5 Google Scholar; and Vsekhsvyatskii, S.K. (1964) Physical Characteristics of Comets, Israel Program for Scientific Translations, Jerusalem, 93, 98 Google Scholar, who also lists P/Halley in 1301.
10 Mucke, H., and Meeus, J. (1983) Canon of Solar Eclipses, Astronomisches Biiro, Vienna, 784 Google Scholar. Meeus, J., and Mucke, H. (1979) Canon of Lunar Eclipses, Astronomisches Biiro, Vienna, 145 Google Scholar, list five lunar eclipses for 684–685, but four of these were during European daylight and the fifth was penumbral, and thus none would have been visible in Europe.
11 For P/Halley in 684, see Ho Peng Yoke, 170 (who also cites comets in 681 and 683); Marsden, 8 and 45; Vsekhsvyatskii, 93; Schove, D.J. (1984) Chronology of Eclipses and Comets AD 1–1000, The Boydell Press, Woodbridge, Suffolk, 293 Google Scholar. Pingré, 333–334, who does not cite the Chronicle as a source, lists two comets in 684 (although the passage at the top of p. 334 may be interpreted as a third), perhaps the same comet before and after perihelion. Hasegawa, 72, lists three comets in 684 (possibly the result of his reading of Pingré), as well as ones in 687 and 693. See also Olson, R.J.M., and Pasachoff, J.M. (1987) New information on comet P/Halley as depicted by Giotto di Bondone and other Western artists,’ Astronomy and Astrophysics, 187, 1–11 Google Scholar (also available as Grewing, M., Praderie, F., Reinhard, R., eds. [1988] Exploration of Halley’s Comet, Springer Verlag, Berlin, 1–11)Google Scholar.
12 Wilson (1976), 46–47, discusses the surviving documents and the evidence of an earlier contract in 1487, indicating that the book was begun earlier and that the production time was longer. For the contract of December 29, 1491, see pp. 50–52.
13 Roeder, J.P. (1742) ‘Catalogus librorum qui saeculo XV A.C.N. Norimbergae impressi sunt,’ Nuremberg Google Scholar, n.p.; see also Gümbel, A. (1902) ‘Die Verträge über die Illustrierung und den Druck der Schedelschen Weltchronik,’ Repertoriumfiir Kunstwissenschaft, 25, 430–437 Google Scholar.
14 Wilson, A. (1975) The Early Drawings for the Nuremberg Chronicle,’ Master Drawings, 13, 115–130 Google Scholar. Wilson mistakenly identified eight rather than five leaves; we have confirmed the existence of only five. They are inventoried in Solg. 68 (V, VI, IX, XI) and Solg. 69 (X) in the Nuremberg Stadtbibliothek.
15 Ibid., 115–130, and Wilson (1976), 60–61, 76, 193–205. Panofsky, E. (1948) Albrecht Dürer, I, Princeton University Press, Princeton, 19 ff Google Scholar, states: “It is even possible and, I think not improbable that young Dürer was allowed to participate in a small way….” See also volume II, 52–53.
16 Perhaps it was a mistake by the formschneider, but a prophetic one at that.
17 Durrer, R., and Hilber, P., eds. (1932) Diebold Schilling: Luzerner Bildchronik, Genf: Sadag s.a., Geneva, folio LXIv.
18 Ibid., fol. CLVIIr.
19 See Baer, XX-XXIV, for a listing of the several later editions with comets, beginning in 1481. For example, the 1490 edition, published in Strassburg by Johann Pryss, contains one of these small, thumbnail comet illustrations (folio Lllr) printed from a rather crudely carved woodcut.
20 See Dall’Olmo, U. ‘Latin Terminology Relating to Aurorae, Comets, Meteors and Novae,’ Journal for the History of Astronomy, 11, 11–27 Google Scholar; Massing, J.-M. (1977) ‘A Sixteenth- Century Illustrated Treatise on Comets,’ Journal of the Warburg and Courtauld Institutes, 40, 318–322 Google Scholar.
21 See Hess, W. (1910–1911) ‘Himmels- und Naturerscheinungen in Einblattdrucken des XV.-XVin Jahrhunderts,’ Zeitschrift für Bücherfreunde, 2, 353–404 Google Scholar; Geisberg, M. (1974) The German Single-Leaf Woodcut 1500–1550, 4 vols., Hacker Art Books, Inc., New York Google Scholar; Strauss, W.L. (1975) The German Single-Leaf Woodcut 1550–1600, 2 vols., Abaris Books, Inc., New York Google Scholar; and Alexander, D., and Strauss, W.L. (1977) The German Single-Leaf Woodcut 1600–1700, 3 vols., Abaris Books, Inc., New York Google Scholar.
22 Véron, P., and Tammann, G.A. (1979) ‘Astronomical broadsheets and their scientific significance,’ Endeavour, 3, 160 Google Scholar. The authors believe that the earliest cometary broadsheet dates from 1531, the year of Halley’s Comet. See Alexander and Strauss, 1, 20–21, for an interesting table analyzing the subject matter of single-leaf woodcuts between 1550–1600 and 1600–1700.
23 Ibid., 164.
24 Strauss, III, 1344, and Hess, 400. See also G. Leidinger, Einzel-Holzschnitte des Fünfzehnten Jahrhunderts (Heitz und Schrieber, XXI-XXX), II, J.H. Ed. Heitz (Heitz und Mündel), Strassburg, 1926, 38, no. 65 (as well as Heitz und Schrieber, LXXXI-XC, no. 28).
25 Hess, 395–396; who also lists the 1492 broadside by Sebastian Brant of the meteor that fell to earth at Ensisheim in 1492; see also Stauber and Hartig, 160, 161, 171, 173, 191ff.
26 Hess, 395–396, ill. 29.
27 Hcllman, G. (1921) “Die Mcterologie im den deutschcn Flugschriften und Flugblattern des 16. Jahrhunderts,” Abhandlungen der Preussischen Akademie der Wissenschaften, Physikalisch-mathematische Klasse, Berlin Google Scholar.
28 Strauss, II, 648.
29 Ibid., 11, 480.
30 Ibid., 11, 939. Strauss, III, 937. Schultes attempted to establish a periodical newspaper, but the project did not succeed until after his death. In 1625, Lucas Schultes (probably a son) issued the first Bavarian biweekly newspaper in Oettingen (between Augsburg and Nuremburg).
31 Ibid., II, 879.
32 Robinson, J.H. (1916) The Great Comet of 1680: A Study in the History of Rationalism, Press of the Northfield News, Northfield, Minnesota Google Scholar. See also Olson, R.J.M. (1988) “The Comet of 1680 in Dutch Art,” Sky and Telescope, 76, 706–708 Google Scholar.
33 Véron and Tammann, 163–164.
34 Alexander and Strauss, I, 53.
35 Véron and Tammann, 164.
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