A Volume from the Library of Sebald
Pirckheimer: Libri
Impressi Cum Notis Manusciptis, VIII
by
Curt F. Bühler
[1]
The Pierpont Morgan Library recently acquired a copy of Ovid's
Metamorphoses printed at Parma by Andreas Portilia in 1480
(Hain 12160). Below the colophon on the last printed page of the
volume (PML 46607) there is a note which now reads: "Rubrica
per me sebaldum Pirkeymer anno m cccc lxxx
&
Octaua
epiphanie."[2] It is with the
identity of the Sebald Pirckheimer who rubricated the volume that
we are now concerned.
This copy of the Metamorphoses also bears the stamp
of
the Royal Society in London, which plainly tells the history of the
volume.[3] It will be recalled that
Wilibald Pirckheimer's[4] library
remained in the family till 1636, when Hans Hieronymus Imhoff sold
the books to Thomas Howard, second Earl of Arundel. Thirty-one
years later, his grandson, Henry Howard (sixth Duke of Norfolk),
presented his library (including the Pirckheimer books) to the
Royal Society. The greatest part of these books was sold by the
Society in 1873 to the antiquarian bookseller Bernard Quaritch, and
the present volume appears in his General Catalogue of Books
(London, 1874, p. 1444, no. 18109) with this description: "Ovidii
Metamorphoseos libri, folio, with MS. notes by Pirckheimer, who
writes his Christian name Sebald, a few rude drawings on the
margins, bd. Rare £ 12. Parma, Andreas Portilia, 1480."
However, to return to the inscription as quoted above, history
records only three contemporary Sebald Pirckheimers, all descended
from Hans Pirckheimer the second (d. 1400). His grandson
Sebald,[5] through the family of his
first marriage (to Katharina Graser), died at an early age shortly
after the turn of the century and can thus be excluded from our
consideration. Sebald's nephew and namesake, in turn, was married
to Katharina Praun, became a member of the "grosser Rat" of
Nürnberg in 1477, suffered a catastrophic bankruptcy in 1492
and thereupon retired to the Carthusian monastery in
Nürnberg.[6] He also appears in
the records as "Sebald the Carthusian", but such books as he had
(mostly on moral philosophy) he left to his Charterhouse. The third
Sebald[7] was Wilibald's younger
brother, concerning whom precious little is known; he and Wilibald
were, of course, the
great-great-grandsons of Hans Pirckheimer II by his second wife
(Katharina Teufel). Dr. Hans (d. 1501), the father of the boys,
records Sebald's birth (Arundel MS. 449, f. 278v) as
"Anno
domini 1475 quinto
kalendas
februarii,
quae fuit dies sabathi."[8]
In
1475, January 28th did fall on a Saturday, thus establishing the
fact that Dr. Hans was using the "style of the Circumcision"
(January 1st) as the beginning of the year;[9] this was then the
customary style at Nürnberg. This Sebald was certainly still
alive on 26 April 1485, when he was mentioned in the will of his
step-grandmother, Walpurg Dönninger (Doniger).
[10] It is generally assumed, on what
authority I have been unable to discover, that he died before his
mother; the death of Barbara Löffelholz Pirckheimer took place
on 21 March 1488.
Since the Ovid we are discussing subsequently turned up with
other books from Wilibald's library, it seems reasonable to suppose
that his brother was not only the former owner of the volume but
also the author of the note. But on 13 January 1480, Sebald
Pirckheimer was not yet five years old; even in the fifteenth
century children were not so precocious that they could rubricate
volumes at this early age!
Fortunately, modern technology can here come to our aid and
offers a solution for our problem. In studying the inscription, one
notes that the "-aua" is written in a different colored ink, with
the last two letters written beyond the edge of the type-page and
extending well into the inner margin. Examination by microscope
suggests that another letter lies below the first "a". Further,
only the characters "aua" have offset on the opposite (blank) page.
The fourth letter of "epiphanie" seems to have been an "f" over
which another hand has written a "p". The "-hanie" may also have
been written at the same time and with the same ink as the "-aua".
In the infra-red photograph of the inscription taken by the
Library's expert photographer, Mr. Mark D. Brewer, almost the
entire passage disappeared, the only characters clearly surviving
being the "-aua" and "-phanie." Incidentally, the rubrication in
the colophon (capital strokes and underlinings) made by the same
ink also disappeared in
this process.
It is plain by now that the original inscription has been
tampered with. Furthermore, close examination reveals that it is
equally probable that the original letter under the beginning of
"-aua" was an "o". This now suggests that the inscription be read
as: "Rubrica per me sebaldum Pirkeymer anno
m
cccc
lxxx & Octo. epif." It would, of course, have been quite possible
for Sebald Pirckheimer to have rubricated the volume, and drawn
some of the crude but interesting sketches in it, by 6 January 1488
when he was almost thirteen years old. In any event, that is how
the present writer reads the inscription. But why, then, was the
date altered? The only explanation that is at all plausible is that
some later reader "corrected" the date to agree with the year of
the colophon (M.CCCC-LXXXX) without noting that the inscription now
proclaims the astonishing fact that the book was rubricated before
it ever was printed (Idibus MaiisMay 15th)!!
Since we are now assured that Sebald Pirckheimer was alive in
January 1488 and did not die shortly after 1485,[11] a further deduction becomes
possible.
Among the "carmina mea quae Paduae composui anno domini 1491,"
there is a poem by Wilibald addressed to his "most gracious"
grandfather ("Ad avum obsequentissimum")
in which reference is made to the "iuvenes nepotes."
[12] Now Wilibald arrived in Padua to
commence his studies there in the autumn either of 1488 or 1489
(the authorities disagree).
[13] Dr.
Emil Reicke, in editing this poem, assumed that the word "nepotes"
had to refer generally to descendants rather than specifically to
grandsons, since he maintained (without offering evidence to that
effect) that by this time Wilibald was the sole surviving grandson.
May one not assume, just as readily, that Sebald was still alive at
the time of the writing of this poem or, at least, that Wilibald in
far-off Padua still thought that his brother was alive in
Nürnberg? Such an interpretation would certainly underscore the
words "avus" and "nepotes", and give them a natural and proper
relationship. In that case, it is clear that Sebald was either
still alive or Wilibald believed he was so when Wilibald was a
student at Padua.
Notes