Cultures of Knowledge in the Early Modern World

Edited by Ann Blair, Anthony Grafton, and Jacob Soll

The series Cultures of Knowledge in the Early Modern World examines the intersection of encyclopedic, natural, historical, and literary knowledge in the early modern world, incorporating both theory (philosophies of knowledge and authority) and practice (collection, observation, information handling, travel, experiment, and their social and political contexts). Interdisciplinary in nature, the goal of the series is to promote works that illustrate international and inter-religious intellectual exchange and the intersections of different fields and traditions of knowledge.

History, Medicine, and the Traditions of Renaissance Learning
Nancy G. Siraisi

The Information Master: Jean-Baptiste Colbert’s Secret State Intelligence System
Jacob Soll

Printing and Prophecy: Prognostication and Media Change 1450–1550
Jonathan Green

PRINTING AND PROPHECY

Prognostication and Media Change 1450–1550

Jonathan Green

The University of Michigan Press
Ann Arbor

Copyright © Jonathan Green 2012

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A CIP catalog record for this book is available from the British Library.

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Green, Jonathan.

Printing and prophecy : prognostication and media change, 1450–1550 / Jonathan Green.

p. cm. — (Cultures of knowledge in the early modern world)

Includes bibliographical references (p. ) and index.

ISBN 978-0-472-11783-3 (cloth : alk. paper) — ISBN 978-0-472-02758-3 (e-book)

1. Prophecy—Christianity—History. 2. Predictive astrology—Europe, German-speaking—History. 3. Books—Europe, German-speaking—History—1450–1600. 1. Title.

BR115.P8G74 2011

261.5'1309409024—dc22                                                              2011014827

Qenai meinai jah barnam meinaim

PREFACE

This book reflects the combined influence of scholarly instincts that I acquired early in my academic training. Within a few weeks of starting my first graduate seminars, I stumbled into a paper topic that grew into a master’s thesis and later metamorphosed into an article: Hildegard of Bingen’s Lingua ignota, the glossary of a revealed language that stands out both for its linguistic peculiarity and for its prophetic claims. The key to understanding the glossary, it seemed to me, was to consider what significance such a curious text could have held for Hildegard and what effect it could have had on her readers. The summer after I completed my thesis, I was set to the task of investigating the fifteenth-century printed volumes in the Rare Book Room of the University of Illinois Library, to see if perhaps the bindings had been constructed from scraps of older manuscripts. Of course, they were: medieval paper was tough stuff, parchment is even more durable, and both were too expensive to discard just because whatever text was written on them was no longer needed. From the fragmentary manuscripts spanning six centuries that I found, I learned that medieval literacy was vastly more concerned with devotional, utilitarian, and educational texts—almost always in Latin—than with the landmarks of vernacular literature I was reading in my seminars. I learned firsthand that texts are stubbornly physical and that one can fill imagined libraries with books that have been reconstructed from just a few scraps. The following summer found me preparing for dissertation research on the Nuremberg Chronicle, in which I tried to make sense of the wanton individuality of marginal commentary left by readers who seemed to have had little regard for the carefully printed text and illustrations to which they were supposed to respond. In this project, I have attempted to study printed prophetic texts in the context of their time and place, at the intersection of culture and commerce, where authors, artists, and audience struggled for control of meaning.

In my research, I tried to build my argument as much as possible upward from the foundation of early printed books that I could see and hold in person and to make fifteenth- and sixteenth-century evidence for what was printed and how books were treated the standard against which propositions were measured. Of course, my research also builds on over 150 years of articles, books, and dissertations. Where I signal disagreement with them, I do so because they are serious works, worth considering and worthy of disagreement. My research has benefited a great deal from conversations with many American and German scholars, including a presentation of my initial research direction in 2005 in Berlin (which subsequently appeared as “Bilder des fiktiven Lesers als Imaginationslenkung in Lichtenbergers Pronosticatio,” in Imagination und Deixis: Studien zur Wahrnehmung im Mittelalter, ed. Kathryn Starkey and Horst Wenzel [Stuttgart: Hirzel, 2007], 177–90).

As the roots of this project reach deep, many people and institutions have generously provided their guidance, resources, and expertise along the way. My thanks belong first to the Alexander von Humboldt Foundation, whose generous support made this research project possible, and to Prof. Dr. Ursula Rautenberg and the faculty for Buchwissenschaft at the Universität Erlangen for providing an institutional home (in every sense) while I conducted research. Dr. Oliver Duntze contributed many helpful insights, and Prof. Dr. Christoph Bläsi kindly shared half his office, two enjoyable seminars, and much good conversation. I am grateful to the libraries that permitted me to examine many works from their collections, including the Staats- und Stadtbibliothek Augsburg, Staatsbibliothek Bamberg, Landesbibliothek Coburg, Universitätsbibliothek Eichstätt, Universitätsbibliothek Erlangen, Universitätsbibliothek Würzburg, Ratsschulbibliothek Zwickau, Bayerische Staatsbibliothek München, Stadtbibliothek Nürnberg, and the library of the Germanisches Nationalmuseum Nürnberg. Dr. Stephen Bay provided valuable assistance with some tricky bits of Latin (the mistakes with the mundane parts are, of course, my own) as well as use of his office when it was most needed. I owe particular thanks to Dr. Aaron E. Wright for his decisive influence in launching my research, to Dr. Marianne Kalinke for keeping it afloat, and to Dr. Thomas Baginski and his colleagues at the College of Charleston for providing a friendly harbor where the specific course for this research project was mapped out.

I am deeply grateful to many other people who have contributed in essential ways to the success of my research, including Dr. Ralf Grünke and his wife, Emily Grünke, and countless numbers of their friends and relatives for making our stay in Germany an exceedingly happy, productive, and educational time. I owe my parents, Thayne and Verlene Green, special thanks for their unwavering support. I am particularly indebted to my wife, Rose, for her intolerance toward bad writing, to my children for their cheerful mobility, and to all my family for their companionship along the way.

CONTENTS

Introduction: Printing and Prophecy

CHAPTER 1.  The Sibyl’s Book

CHAPTER 2.  Prophets in Print

CHAPTER 3.  Prophets and Their Readers

CHAPTER 4.  Visions of Visions: Functions of the Image in Printed Prophecy

CHAPTER 5.  Practica teütsch

CHAPTER 6.  Fear, Floods, and the Paradox of the Practica teütsch

Conclusion:  The Prophetic Reader

Appendix:  Prophecy and Prognostication in Print, 1450–1550

Notes

Bibliography

Index

ABBREVIATIONS

GW          Gesamtkatalog der Wiegendrucke. http://www.gesamtkatalogderwiegendrucke.de/.

ISTC        Incunabula Short Title Catalogue. http://www.bl.uk/catalogues/istc/.

VD16      Verzeichnis der im deutschen Sprachbereich erschienenen Drucke des 16. Jahrhunderts. http://www.vd16.de/.

VD17      Verzeichnis der im deutschen Sprachbereich erschienenen Drucke des 17. Jahrhunderts. http://www.vd17.de/.

VL^2           Die deutsche Literatur des Mittelalters: Verfasserlexikon. Ed. Kurt Ruh et al. 2nd ed. 14 vols. Berlin: de Gruyter, 1978–2008.

Zambelli   Zambelli, Paola, ed. “Astrologi hallucinati”: Stars and the End of the World in Luther’s Time. Berlin: de Gruyter, 1986.

INTRODUCTION: PRINTING AND PROPHECY

The prophet is, first and foremost, a media phenomenon. Whether in biblical narrative or medieval history, what defines a prophet is not the prediction of future events but the communicative claims made by the prophet and accepted by his or her audience. While prophecy often includes foretelling the future and sometimes is reduced to prognostication, prophecy involves, above all, the claim, made by the prophet and understood by his or her followers, to be the middle participant in a two-part conversation. In the first part, the prophet faces upward, to God or angels or some other privileged source. In the second, the prophet faces outward, in order to transmit the divine communication to a secular recipient, a close circle of disciples, or the entire public. Revelations, according to sociologist of religion Rodney Stark, are “communications believed to come from a divine being,” or, in the definition of the Catholic Encyclopedia, “communication of some truth by God to a rational creature through means which are beyond the ordinary course of nature.” A prophet in the Old Testament was “not merely, as the word commonly implies, a man enlightened by God to foretell events; he was the interpreter and supernaturally enlightened herald sent by Yahweh to communicate His will and designs to Israel.”[1]

Consider, for example, the representation of prophetic communication from an early thirteenth-century book of hours. A single vignette tells both parts of the story. On the left, the prophet Samuel receives the divine injunction from a God who is half concealed, half emergent in the heavens: “Tell Saul that he will no longer be king” (see 1 Samuel 15:22–26).[2] On the right side of the frame, Samuel has switched directions in order to deliver this message to Saul and his attendants. In the first dialogue, God holds a scroll representing the message he gives to Samuel. In the second dialogue, Samuel holds the same scroll and transmits its message to Saul. The prophet was a medium in the literal sense: one did not hear the prophet speak; one heard God speaking through the prophet, animating the prophet’s tongue. The sixteenth century and the Reformation do not change this basic understanding. Martin Luther wrote in the preface to his translation of the Old Testament prophets, “Reading or hearing the prophets is certainly nothing else but reading and hearing how God warns and comforts.”[3]

Although claims to divine revelation were often met with skepticism, the understanding of how prophetic communication worked was broadly accepted in European society throughout the medieval and early modern periods, and the fundamental innovations in communication and media, from the birth of the codex to the introduction of parchment and paper to the invention of the printing press, all took place in a milieu whose foundational assumptions included the possibility of prophetic communication.[4] From the perspective of the present, Johannes Gutenberg’s invention of printing with movable type is primarily a technological innovation that occupies a well-defined position with respect to prior and later technologies of textual reproduction. Gutenberg’s contemporaries in the fifteenth century, however, praised the printing press as no mere technical advance but a revolutionary innovation, even a gift from God. Concerning the history of technology, Ivan Illich has observed, “Instead of confirming the theory that tasks become possible when the tools to perform them become available, or the other which says that tools are created when tasks come to be socially desirable, . . . an eminently suitable and complex artificial device already available within a society will be turned into a tool for the performance of a task only at that historic moment when this task acquires symbolic significance.”[5] The same observation might apply to the printing press: the demand for texts had been growing for many decades before Gutenberg provided a solution in the 1450s, and yet his actual technological innovations seem to represent only slight advances over the tools European society already possessed.[6] Following Illich, we might ask, what symbolic significance did Gutenberg or his contemporaries recognize in the combination of texts and type?

Brian Stock has observed that the “changes in attitudes, perceptions, and thinking that literacy brought about are best observed in religion, the dimension of culture most accessible to the majority of people.”[7] Prophecy is a form of religious communication that seems especially promising for a media-historical study of the first century of printing. Roger Chartier and other scholars of the cultural history of books have raised fundamental questions about reading and writing from the Middle Ages to the present. Following that strand of scholarship, we might ask, what consequences does it have when an author claims to be merely a conduit for revealed wisdom? As the premises of modern book communication and intellectual property were being worked out, what was the contribution of a communicative model based on a prophetic dialogue that was only half visible to the reader? How was the figure of the prophet constructed in print, and how were readers’ reactions to prophecy channeled and guided? As a study of a media phenomenon, the precise message of the various prophetic works, often involving stock figures and a conventional set of disasters, is less important than how each work established its communicative framework. The principal aim of this study is to investigate how printed books communicated in the first century of their existence.

There is an intriguing similarity between the prophet’s claims and the press’s functioning. The prophet receives from one and broadcasts to many, usually through some form of oral preaching, because that is the essence of the calling. “For you shall go to all to whom I send you, and you shall speak whatever I command you,” God tells Jeremiah, and he then puts his words into the prophet’s mouth by touching divine hand to human tongue (Jeremiah 1:7–9, NRSV). Printers also could boast of exclusive access, perhaps to a unique manuscript that had never been printed and eventually to legal privilege as a precursor to modern copyright. Printing and prophecy are both strategies of textual reproduction: each copy of a printed book is intended to be identical to all others and as valid as the original, while receivers of the prophetic word hear not the voice of the prophet but the voice of God. In a tradition reaching at least from Isidore of Seville to the fifteenth-century compilation of the revelations of Birgitta of Sweden, readers of the prophetic word become immediate hearers of it, with the same responsibility to distribute the revelation to others as if God himself had spoken it to them directly. The prophet’s audience, like the readers of printed texts, accepts a second-generation copy as equivalent to the original. Reading the written word is also similar to hearing a prophet’s preaching in that readers perceive only the second half of the communication: the moment of inspiration, like the act of writing, remains hidden, and the reader can only reconstruct either of them from their textual residue. Although preaching is usually considered an oral medium, the sermon functioned by the Middle Ages as an oral means for the distribution of written texts.[8] The press also promoted distribution to a broad audience: given the significant initial investment in skilled labor, specialized equipment, and costly materials, the economics of print made addressing a large audience necessary. Thus in all acts of communication, in the reception, reproduction, and distribution of texts, the printing press has prophetic analogs. When the Oppenheim printer Jakob Köbel (1462–1533) wrote that he was “bringing to print and sending out into all the world” his edition of a sibylline collection in order to make comprehensible “the prophets’ and Sibyls’ proclamation and foretelling of the future miracles of Almighty God . . . for all prophets and prognosticators were accustomed to speak obscurely and revealed future things through hidden sayings and parables,” he claimed the same kind of authority as an interpreter and clarifier of prophetic obscurity that John of Rupescissa had claimed in the fourteenth century.[9]

The communicative structure of prophecy is reflected in the early modern history of the newspaper as a medium and, as Jan-Dirk Müller emphasizes, has implications for all forms of public communication since the invention of print.[10] Michael Giesecke notes that the “information that Christendom found worthy of lasting storage in a scriptographic medium is the result of proclamation and revelation.”[11] Yet differences remain: oral preaching accomplishes the communication of one to many under conditions of immediate personal presence, and European manuscript culture retained many of the assumptions of immediacy and acquaintance, even if in the form of a fictionalized authorial presence. The audience of printed works is dispersed and anonymous, however. Oral and manuscript communication are primarily a matter of transmitting ideas from one person to another, while books, for their printers, are primarily wares for sale.

If early printing had apparent similarities to prophecy, depictions of prophets, in turn, emphasized the association of prophecy with textual production and typographic publication, particularly in the monumental collections of Birgitta’s revelations that appeared in Latin and German between 1478 and 1521.[12] In the first Latin edition of Birgitta’s Revelations, printed by Bartholomaeus Ghotan in 1492, a series of full-page and smaller woodcut illustrations associates the saint’s reception of revelation with the creation of the printed book. Between preliminary material attesting Birgitta’s canonical status and the prologue to the Revelations, a sequence of three pages composed of woodcut and typographic panels illustrates the saint’s function in book production. In the first panel, Christ and Mary emanate divine communication whose content appears in columns of typographic text on either side. Mediating between heaven and earth, the Holy Spirit, in the form of a dove, focuses and transmits these emanations to Birgitta. At the same time, the saint also receives communication from the book before which she kneels. In the next two pages, the placement and function of the divine actors remain the same, but Birgitta is displaced to the left, while various clerical scribes take the corresponding position on the right. The divine emanations from the Holy Spirit thus appear to bless Birgitta, her scribes, and the communication between them. The scribes, in turn, have access to three sources, including divine inspiration, the saint’s words, and the book blessed by her presence.

Both the creation of books and their distribution are divinely sanctioned. Later in the Revelations, the same divine figures inspire the scene of Birgitta’s presentation of a book to a bishop. The text accompanying the image describes revelation as a process analogous to publication in which production, distribution, and reading are all potentially prophetic.

I am like a carpenter who cuts wood and carries it into the house, and makes a fine carving from it and decorates it with appendages and colors. When his friends saw that the image might be decorated with even finer colors, they also painted the carving with their colors. Thus in the forest of my godhood I, God, felled the words that I placed in your heart. But my friends gathered them into books according to the grace that was given them and adorned and decorated them. You should convey all the books of the revelation of these my words to my bishop the hermit so that they now might be agreeable to many tongues.[13]

The same association of prophecy and book creation is forcefully expressed in a number of full-page woodcuts. Following the prologue and before the first book of revelations, a woodcut depicts Birgitta as the mediator of revelation from Christ and Mary in heaven above to a tripartite medieval society, composed of secular rulers and ecclesiastical leaders to either side and kneeling men and women representing lower stations below. Birgitta is situated in the middle of the three groups, with her fingers crossing the image boundary into the typographic text below. The printed words are not Birgitta’s but Christ’s, spoken through her (see figure 6, in chapter 3). Later in the Revelations, the illustration of the section entitled “The Book of the Heavenly Emperor to the Kings” shows God enthroned on a rainbow, holding a sword and, in his left hand, a book. Below, the archangel Michael, armed with a sword and flanked by the sword of divine justice, contends with the devil, who is armed with a hooked staff. On the lowest level, the jaws of hell and a pit of flames consume unrepentant sinners. In the middle of the scene, Birgitta sits and bestows a book from either hand to a group of kneeling rulers on each side. The three books in the woodcut, the one held by God and the pair being extended by the saint, form a triad, with Birgitta as the mediator of God’s word to political rulers. But Birgitta has assumed an additional role in this woodcut that is not made explicit in the text: she is not merely the transmitter, like a manuscript copyist, but also the broad-caster, multiplier, and distributor, like the operator of a printing press (see figure 1). Another woodcut at the introduction of the Birgittine monastic rule gives Birgitta the same functions. She presents a book containing her rule to religious women to the left and to kneeling monks on the right.

The focus on prophecy as a phenomenon of communication and on its interaction with the medium of print explains some of what may seem glaring omissions in this book. Because this study is primarily concerned with publications for broad audiences, it will spend relatively little time on the theoretical treatises of university personnel and other members of the intellectual elite (as opposed to the very public disputes that rival scholars carried out in print). The print medium cannot exist without a mass audience, and so the key to the communicative function of print will here be sought not in what leading figures wrote but in what many people read. The focus on the print medium will likewise shift attention away from those who presented themselves as preachers of the prophetic word. An entire book could be written about Hieronymus Savonarola alone as a media phenomenon, and Savonarola was by no means the only prophetic voice in Europe before the Protestant Reformation, but what one finds more often north of the Alps are anonymous tracts that report the appearance of an unnamed prophet in France or Italy, in which a living prophet has been transformed into a literary trope. The Reformation was an occasion of particular controversy involving prophecy and astrology, but this study is also not primarily concerned with sectarian polemic. Both Luther and his followers, as well as his opponents, enlisted prophetic texts in their conflicts, but the traditions they draw on are older than the Reformation, and these traditions continue, often little changed, for many decades after. Exploring the role of prophetic communication at the center of early modern society also might excuse omission of the radical wing of the Reformation. Although prophecy achieved a preeminent role among various Anabaptist sects, these groups were forced to or beyond the boundaries of German society, and their visionary writers remained marginal in the history of printed prophecies. Those who claimed the prophetic mantle, like Melchior Hoffman, or who adopted the visionary’s voice, like Ursula Jost, were too controversial to be allowed success in print. None of Hoffman’s or Jost’s prophetic works appeared in more than a few editions, in contrast to the dozens of editions warranted by popular interest in some other prophecies. When Hoffman’s prophetic works were bound together in a single volume with other prognostic tracts, it was Hoffman’s earnest prophesying that was excised from the book, rather than the predictions of contemporary astrologers.[14] While medieval prophetic figures whose works were printed in numerous editions, such as Birgitta, will play a prominent role in the discussion here, prophets who never found their way into print will be largely ignored. A living prophet proves to be a very different phenomenon from prophecy in print.

The primary focus on the German-speaking regions is partially justified by the need to begin with Gutenberg in Mainz and by the similarly advanced state of German bibliographical indexing for both the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries. In addition, the history of prophetic and prognostic works in print largely follows national boundaries and can best be explained by regional concerns that were not identical in Italy, the Low Countries, or elsewhere in Europe. While there were editions of non-German authors by German printers, their numbers are very limited, especially from the late fifteenth century onward. Ottavia Niccoli’s studies of prophecy in Italy from 1500 to 1530 find some fifty broadside and small quarto editions, usually in verse and using materials of poor quality, with a notable decline in popularity after 1530.[15] This suggests a much different situation compared to the German-speaking regions, where a much larger number of prophetic tracts were produced by the largest and most capable printers, almost never consisting entirely of verse and showing no sign of lessening in popularity. Even pan-European events in the history of early modern printing, such as the booklets that addressed the prediction of flooding for 1524, display a particularly German articulation; a study of events on a continental scale must be built on studies of particular regions. Therefore such worthy topics as British editions of German astrologers and the reception of German prophetic compilations in Italy will be mentioned only in passing.

Although some fifteenth-century prophetic works enjoyed an active reception for centuries, with new editions well into the modern era, I will let the curtain fall, not entirely arbitrarily, in the year 1550. The even century since Gutenberg’s invention provides more than enough material, and it illustrates the essential continuity of prophetic works in print, while the following period has been ably treated in the works of Robin Barnes and others. The middle of the sixteenth century also marks the appearance of a new kind of prophetic anthology that begins to canonize not only texts but also prior printed editions. A century after Gutenberg, printed books became capable of acquiring the authenticity of antiquity.

Something that cannot be bracketed out is astrology. While the inspired prophet and the learned astrologer may seem to make communicative claims of a different order, prophecy and prognostication prove to be too closely intertwined in the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries to be entirely separated from each other, and many contemporaries perceived the two as complementary rather than contradictory.[16] Despite recurring complaints that science had no ally in the predictions of medieval prophets and that faith had no friend in heathen astrology, there were more than a few practitioners of both prognostic modes, and astrological and prophetic authorities were frequently called on by scholars in either field to legitimize works in the other field. The ties between astrology and prophecy also involve not only how texts were written but also how books were created and used. Those who printed, purchased, and read books were among the most stubborn defenders of the idea that prophecy and astrology belonged together.

In the first century of printing, the double-sided model of prophetic communication implies an act of reception at each part in the chain of communication: the prophet, the prophet’s audience, the printers, and the printers’ readers were all productive recipients of the text. To investigate the ways that books communicated, we need to consider not only the transmission of text from author to reader but also the multiple ways in which many people participated in the production and use of books. Readers perceived woodcuts even before they engaged with the typographic texts, but most authors were not artists, and illustration was usually determined by the publisher. Consequently, a significant element in the reception of any author was almost always outside of his or her control. This is equally true of titles, chapter divisions, colophons, and other typographic elements that guide a text’s reception, what Gérard Genette has termed “paratexts” or, following Genette’s original French title, “thresholds” by which readers access the enclosed text.

The study of language and literature will provide some methods of textual analysis, but the dialogic creation of meaning also involves nonlinguistic, culturally determined patterns of thought. What readers read and printers produce is not an abstract text but an assembly of materials that all contribute to the book’s significance. The physical composition of a book and its presentation of material through word and image affected readers’ understanding, which makes necessary the examination of early modern editions not only for the texts they contain but also for how the text was presented. Books have economic value, and printers and their customers negotiate books’ meaning through their decisions concerning what works to print, how to market them, and whether to buy them, even though these interactions take place long after the author has completed his or her contribution. The bare facts of bibliography, including edition history and the size and layout of a book’s pages, were the result of interactions in the early modern book economy and, as such, were an integral part of how books communicated. Textual interpretation should be productively informed by bibliographic data and an understanding of the economic context.

Compared to the expense of ink and paper and to the logistical problems of production and distribution, the financial interests of the author in an early printed edition may have amounted to a pittance, and for subsequent editions from other presses, it usually amounted to nothing at all. In the early sixteenth century, at a time when the Strasbourg printer Matthias Hupfuff had production and distribution deals worth thousands of gulden, his costs for acquiring the manuscript of an original work from a leading humanist amounted to just four gulden.[17] Based on those numbers alone, we might conclude that a faithful reproduction of the author’s intentions was not in fact Hupfuff’s overriding concern, however much he and other printers claimed fidelity to the original text. Instead of regarding printed books as witnesses of authorial intent in various states of corruption, books are assumed here to reflect the varying interests of many different people.

As commercial wares for a potentially broad audience, early printed books have different implications for the history of texts and the materiality of intellectual history from either manuscripts or modern works, so early editions must be cited using somewhat different conventions. For the first century of printing, books published in the German-speaking lands (hereafter referred to as “Germany” for the sake of brevity) are indexed in three partially overlapping databases with somewhat divergent goals. The Gesamtkatalog der Wiegendrucke (GW) and Incunabula Short Title Catalogue (ISTC) both aim to list all books printed in the fifteenth century, while the Verzeichnis der im deutschen Sprachbereich erschienenen Drucke des 16. Jahrhunderts (VD16) lists only titles printed in Germany in the sixteenth century. Although each census is actively updated, errors and gaps in coverage remain, so that information from each must be carefully weighed. In recent years, these and other bibliographic indices of fifteenth- and sixteenth-century printing have gone online, giving scholars convenient access to a wealth of information. The existence of an entry in a database is not always a sure sign that an edition of a given work was printed in the suggested year, however, or that current scholarly consensus agrees with a database entry. Relevant works were identified from all three indices, although there are some editions that do not yet appear in any of them. At times, different editions of the same work are not recognized as such or are attributed to different authors or to no author at all (such as a 1521 edition of Johannes Lichtenberger’s Prognosticatio previously identified as an anonymous work). Bibliographic research over the last century has usually identified the printers of unsigned editions, although attribution remains tentative in some cases. Many prophetic works appeared both as independent tracts and as appendices to other works, so that their edition histories often include both reprinting and recombination. In the following pages, early modern printed works will be cited by referencing the author and index of either the ISTC or VD16. Full bibliographical information and, for many editions cited here, links to digital facsimiles can be found using the online versions of each, while the appendix of this book provides much briefer information. For incunabula, comparing the ISTC to the GW census is always advisable. (As of December 2010, the online locations of the databases are http://www.bl.uk/catalogues/iste/, http://www.gesamtkatalogderwiegen-drucke.de/, and http://www.vd16.de/. More restricted use will be made of Verzeichnis der im deutschen Sprachbereich erschienenen Drucke des 17. Jahrhunderts [VD17], the equivalent project for seventeenth-century editions, whose online location is http://www.vd17.de/.) Unfoliated and unpaginated works (that is, the vast majority of all works under discussion here) will reference the signature, leaf, and side.

Many of the uncertainties that remain after consulting the indices of early printing can only be resolved by looking at the books directly, so that an essential part of the research for this project consisted of examining copies of printed prognostic and prophetic works. The cataloging of early printing, particularly for the sixteenth century, is far from complete, and undescribed editions of seemingly inconsequential booklets can still be discovered even in major research libraries, as a few hours spent thumbing through old card catalogs often found. Looking at old books forces one to confront the physical reality behind the bodiless abstractions of texts and editions. This is all the more necessary at a time when census and digitalization projects are making texts available as never before but are also making it easier to regard books only as ethereal images or numerical quantities. High-quality digital facsimiles of relevant works from the Bayerische Staatsbibliothek in Munich and the Herzog August Bibliothek in Wolfenbüttel as well as various other libraries were an invaluable addition to this project, and additional facsimiles are constantly becoming available. Even the best digitalization projects attenuate connections between works bound together in the same volume or preserved in the same collection, however. Texts and images formed the material basis of early modern book communication not as isolated pages but as parts of a materially integral whole, and even in a high-quality digital facsimile, the function of pages with respect to the whole book is often obscured.

Scholars since the late nineteenth century have contributed numerous studies of late medieval and early modern prophetic figures and their works, so that there are monograph treatments for many of them and at least some scholarly literature for most. Astrologers of the same period have less often been studied in comparable depth. The most influential treatment of late medieval prophecy remains the work of Marjorie Reeves, particularly The Influence of Prophecy in the Later Middle Ages, while the works of Bernard McGinn have more recently given decisive impulse to the study of apocalypticism. For the medium of print in Germany from 1450 to 1550, however, the primary works and authors are a somewhat different set than those treated most extensively by Reeves and McGinn. The most common medieval prophecies had to be digested into new compilations, adapted to a new audience, or presented in new ways before they became printable.

Johannes Lichtenberger will be a central figure in several of the following chapters. His Prognosticatio (first printed in 1488) combined both late medieval prophetic texts and contemporary astrology, and his work remained broadly influential for centuries. Lichtenberger was himself an author of one of the earliest known printed astrological prognostications, so he is a direct antecedent of the leading German astrologers of 1480–1550, including Wenzel Faber, Johannes Virdung, and Johann Carion. Lichtenberger’s prophetic authorities and sources include Birgitta (via the redaction of her work by Johann Tortsch known as the Onus mundi, or Burden of the World), sibylline texts, the prophecies attributed to Methodius, Antichrist legends, and prophecies in the tradition of Joachim of Fiore, including the collection of Telesphorus and an enigmatic figure referred to as “Brother Reinhart” or by variations on that name. Many of these prophetic texts circulated independently or in various combinations with each other or with other works. In addition to works used by Lichtenberger, numerous anonymous or pseudonymous prophetic tracts were printed in the early sixteenth century, including, among many others, the prophecies of “Alofresant,” “Jakob Pflaum,” “Dietrich von Zeng/Theodericus Croata,” “Brother Raimund” (the “Auffahrt Abend” prophecy), and “Samuel of Jerusalem.” Lichtenberger’s influence on prophecy in print can be found in the works of his younger contemporary Joseph Grünpeck, which appeared from 1496 to 1540, as well as in the publication programs of printers such as Jakob Köbel and Pamphilius Gengenbach. The strand of prophetic writing and publication extends from Lichtenberger through reformist-minded printers like Köbel and Gengenbach to firebrands like Johannes Copp and even to Martin Luther himself, who provided a preface for a new translation of Lichtenberger printed at Wittenberg in 1527. Lichtenberger’s contemporaries and later generations alike remarked on the woodcut images in the Prognosticatio, and engagement with prophetic texts via images provides a second path from Lichtenberger to the Reformation. The year 1527 also saw Andreas Osiander’s publication of two medieval prophetic works in the cause of Lutheran polemic, including a prophecy attributed to Hildegard of Bingen and, in cooperation with the Nuremberg poet Hans Sachs, an edition of papal prophetic images that ultimately derive from twelfth-century Byzantine oracles. The various strands of prophetic images culminate in the work of Paracelsus, who wrote commentaries on Lichtenberger’s illustrations and the papal images in the 1530s and wrote, at the same time, his own enigmatic prognostication based on another series of images. Writers continued to combine astrology and prophecy after Lichtenberger, including the astrologers Virdung and Carion (although Carion later vigorously denied doing so). Scholars since Gustav Hellmann have studied the expectation of disastrous flooding for the year 1524, in which Virdung and Carion were among the primary participants in a public controversy that led to numerous printed tracts. These tracts included practicas, a type of annual prognostic booklet that had developed a highly stereotyped format by the end of the fifteenth century and continued to enjoy popularity well into the seventeenth century. The study of prophetic communication and printed books in the century after Gutenberg must include Lichtenberger, his predecessors, and his successors, including both those who raised a prophetic voice of warning and those who promised nothing more than a sober reading of the stars.

But a study of printing and prophecy must begin at the first moment of the age of print, with what is perhaps the earliest known work from the press of Johannes Gutenberg and his associates in Mainz, the fragmentary Sibyl’s Prophecy. Like other specimens of the earliest printing, it is both primitive and forward looking, a product of an incompletely developed technology but also an expression of the potential of print that would not be fully exploited for decades to come. As with so much else about Gutenberg and his ventures, the historical context of the first edition of the Sibyl’s Prophecy is all but undocumented, leaving us to sift through the available evidence in search of plausible explanations.

1

THE SIBYL’S BOOK

GUTENBERG THE POET

To speak of Gutenberg’s literary contributions seems, at first glance, perverse, for he left behind no lyrical or prose compositions, if any ever existed. Instead, his life is known, all too incompletely, from official documents and from the products of his press.[1] The image of Gutenberg that has emerged from centuries of scrutinizing legal briefs and ink blots is a combination of technological innovator, calculating merchant, and legal ne’er-do-well. While studies of Gutenberg since Aloys Ruppel’s have yielded some new insights, none of the competing Gutenberg biographies have gained unreserved acceptance. The outlines of Gutenberg’s life are reasonably well established: his birth in Mainz near the turn of the fifteenth century; his first business ventures in Strasbourg in the 1430s and 1440s; and then his return to Mainz, where the enterprise of printing commenced in the early 1450s. What remains stubbornly unknown is how Gutenberg’s earlier life affected his invention, how early the first experiments with movable type began, and what thoughts inspired them.

While Gutenberg’s name has become synonymous with epoch-making inventions, it is not always possible to clearly separate Johannes Gutenberg the fifteenth-century citizen of Mainz, Gutenberg the eponymous figure-head of early printing, and Gutenberg, Inc., the consortium of financial, textual, and technological expertise that made the first printed works possible but whose individual members might also take one another to court. Here, “Gutenberg” will have to serve as shorthand for “almost certainly Johannes Gutenberg, undoubtedly acting in concert with one or more of his associates and assistants in the joint undertaking that produced the earliest printed books in Europe.”

After all the technical issues concerning early printing have been resolved or set aside, the question of Gutenberg’s thought processes and motivations remains. To what extent did Gutenberg comprehend, participate in, or respond to particular cultural impulses?[2] Gutenberg’s invention, a printing press using movable metal type, had wide-reaching influence on intellectual history, but what intellectual currents influenced his own invention? If Illich is correct that innovation is the result of understanding the potential and symbolic significance of existing tools, then there are implications for Gutenberg and his movable type: rather than either the press making printed books possible or the increased demand for books requiring the invention of printing, one would say that Johannes Gutenberg recognized in the constellation of letters, books, and the press a new potential that justified years of experimentation and thousands of gulden in debt. What potential might he have perceived? The lack of documents that could answer the question directly leaves historians in a highly unsatisfactory state of uncertainty. Scholars of literature, accustomed to treating fiction and narrative as sites of reflection on cultural and intellectual issues, might attempt a literary analysis, if there were any literary works authored by Gutenberg.

This is the point in the story where an inconspicuous piece of paper falls out of a file folder and into the hands of scholars. Or, rather, at the time the piece of paper was first noticed in 1892, it was a file folder, having served for centuries as an outer wrapper for archival records. On front and back were the remains of several lines of printed text, but the leaf had been trimmed so that lines were missing from the top and bottom of the page. When donated to the Gutenberg Museum in 1903, print historians recognized it as a rare specimen of Gutenberg’s earliest typeface, a font developed prior to the one used for the famous forty-two-line Bible of 1454–55. Upon close inspection, the type appeared to be from a very early stage of use, before the letters acquired signs of wear and damage and before a few letters were replaced by slightly different ones.[3] It was, by all appearances, a leaf from the oldest known printed book. But what book was it, and how old was it? As it had clearly been printed before another product of Gutenberg’s press known as the Astronomical Calendar for 1448, it was assigned to the years 1444–47, Gutenberg’s earliest years in Mainz. The German text on one side of the leaf exhorted the reader to faith and good works, while the other side described the Last Judgment, and thus Edward Schröder christened the text the “Fragment vom Weltgericht” (fragment of the Last Judgment).[4]

The name lasted for four years. In 1908, Karl Reuschel brought to Schröder’s attention that the text was, in fact, a section of the Sibyl’s Prophecy, a fourteenth-century poem of several hundred lines known in various versions from numerous fifteenth-century manuscripts.[5] In most versions, the poem begins with the legend of the wood of the Cross: Adam, on his deathbed, asks his son to return to paradise and retrieve a branch of the Tree of Life, which, according to an angel, will restore Adam’s health.[6] The son complies, but upon his return, Adam is already dead, and the son thinks his journey has been in vain. He plants the branch on Adam’s grave, where it grows into a majestic tree. There it remains until Solomon sends his workers to gather lumber for his building projects. The workers fell the tree and plane its trunk into a board, but they can find no use for it in the temple, and so it is used instead as a rough bridge across a brook to Solomon’s palace. The Sibyl, having heard of Solomon’s wisdom, comes to visit the king, and her explanation of the beam’s true significance and narration of future events comprise the bulk of the poem. In some manuscripts, the Sibyl’s Prophecy is divided into two sections and closes after around 750 lines with the text as found on the fragmentary leaf in Mainz, while other manuscripts add a third section.

The dating of the Sibyl’s Prophecy to the 1440s lasted four decades longer than the original name, until Carl Wehmer determined that the misnamed Astronomical Calendar for 1448, the terminus ante quem for dating Gutenberg’s edition of the Sibyl’s Prophecy, was actually a planetary table for lay astrologers and had been printed around 1458, a decade later than originally thought.[7] Over the course of the twentieth century, Gutenberg’s role in the invention of printing was questioned and reaffirmed, doubts about his association with the typeface used in the Sibyl’s Prophecy (known as the DK type, for other works printed with it, or the B 36 type, for a later Bible edition) surfaced and were rebutted, and the sequence of early prints was rearranged. The status of the Sibyl’s Prophecy as the oldest known work from Gutenberg’s press has been both reiterated and denied,[8] but there is no doubt that it is a very early product of Gutenberg and his associates, printed perhaps in 1452–53.

There is much that cannot be known with certainty about a book preserved in only a single fragmentary leaf: its complete length, whether it contained the entire text or only a portion of it, whether customers greeted it with enthusiasm or scorn, or what impulses motivated its setting in type. But it seems likely that the Sibyl’s Prophecy was the site of reflection on cultural issues not only for its anonymous fourteenth-century author but also for its fifteenth-century printer and that Johannes Gutenberg was committing an essentially literary act by putting it into print. In Mainz of the early 1450s, printing a German text was a bold undertaking.[9] The other works printed by Gutenberg and his associates in this earliest period of printing consist of three equally fragmentary editions of the elementary Latin grammar of Donatus. Although elementary grammars also reflect readers’ textual needs and capabilities—Neddermeyer refers to them, with conscious exaggeration, as “user’s manuals” for the new medium[10]—the Sibyl’s Prophecy could not be more different from a work with a clearly defined place in the world of Latin textuality and a well-understood set of customers in grammar school pupils. The Sibyl’s Prophecy is German rather than Latin, literary rather than utilitarian, narrative rather than didactic. Whether any of the existing Latin grammars were printed before the Sibyl’s Prophecy is uncertain, but the DK type had clearly been intended for printing Latin works, as the typeface lacked a majuscule W or Z, which occur rarely in Latin but very frequently in German.[11] This is not surprising for a time in which literacy in most cases still implied the ability to read Latin, but it does indicate that Gutenberg had some experience with printing by the time he published the Sibyl’s Prophecy and that its publication cut against the existing contours of literacy and the capabilities of his press. Publication in German also seems unusual considered against the other products of Gutenberg and his associates. Of sixty-three known editions printed with the types of the thirty-six-line and forty-two-line Bibles, only six are in German, and only one other of these vernacular works is dated earlier than 1456.

Whatever the particular circumstances of its origin may have been, we may assume that the choice to print the Sibyl’s Prophecy was reached only after careful deliberation. Like an author who hopes to publish a novel, Gutenberg had to know his audience, including their desires and needs for written material as well as their economic capacities. It is an axiom of book history that the financial context of printing is fundamentally different from the market for manuscript literature, even allowing for early efforts to produce multiple copies of a book by hand in anticipation of customer demand, such as the pecia system of copying by signatures in use at fourteenth-century universities or Diebold Lauber’s workshop for manuscript books.[12] A single manuscript might please the taste only of the copyist or a patron; a half-dozen copies that find no buyers constitute a cause for concern and a signal to produce no more for the present; but hundreds of unsold copies of a printed book might be (and, in fact, often were) an existence-threatening catastrophe for an early printer. The investments in trained labor and specialized materials required to set a work in type were incomparably higher than the requirements for writing a single copy of the same text by hand, even before the first quire had been printed. For Gutenberg, testing the uncharted waters of textual mass production, there was no prior experience from which to seek guidance. The entrepreneurial economics of early printing necessitated careful thought in advance about the text and its eventual readers.

Printing the Sibyl’s Prophecy also required reflection on the medium of print and its possibilities. The fragmentary leaf now in Mainz does not display the harmonious layout later achieved in the forty-two-line Bible or even that of the thirty-six-line Bible produced with the same DK typeface toward the end of the decade. Instead, the bases of each letter rise off the line or fall below it.[13] The printing process had not yet achieved the capability that it would reach within a few years. When the Sibyl’s Prophecy was printed, Gutenberg was still working on a solution for presenting texts by means of movable type. An awareness of the potential and current limitations of the medium stared back at him from every page.

READING FRAGMENTS

Situating the Sibyl’s Prophecy in its literary and cultural context requires us to come to grips with a fragmentary object. Incomplete texts and damaged manuscripts belong to medievalists’ stock-in-trade. They are the founding documents of their disciplines, from the Lay of Hildebrand to Beowulf. More than just manuscript witnesses of a once-whole work, the interpretation of fragments can demand the expenditure of considerable effort and also require straying from the relative safety of an established text. Interpreting a text that has largely disappeared will never entirely escape the realm of the probabilistic. The thirty lines of text preserved in Mainz will not serve here as philological evidence for determining affiliations among manuscripts and early print editions, a project still awaiting completion.[14] The fragment of Gutenberg’s Sibyl’s Prophecy instead forms the point of departure for discovering as much as can be said with some degree of certainty about the work’s situation in the intellectual and cultural context of early printing.

How far can we extend the fragment of the Sibyl’s Prophecy? On the most minimal graphic level, there are damaged letters, partial words, and incomplete lines of text for which the surviving portions provide clues about the missing segments, as does the comparison with other versions of the text. The third word of the first line, for example, has been trimmed away, leaving at the beginning only a row of five minims, the identical lower legs out of which are constructed letters such as m, u, i, or n. Based on familiarity with the typeface, the language, and the text, we can project the remaining letter bases upward and read the word as mußen (rather than, say, iiiiiße) with a very high degree of certainty. The bottom of the fragmentary leaf presents only a few hints of shafts, arches, and dashes, but it is enough to keep extending the text for one more line, as Frieder Schanze has done.[15]

It would be foolish to reconstruct specific letters or precise wording beyond this, but there remains much more that can be said about the work. Almost certainly, the original edition contained some version of the poem in its entirety, rather than a small portion of the text on a single leaf.[16] It is probable, however, that the fragment contains the original work’s last two pages. The fragment contains lines 703–19 on one side and 732–46 on the other, so that after the last line, there would have been just enough room to complete a two-section version of the Sibyl’s Prophecy. The preserved text also bears closer affinities to the two-section versions of 748 lines.[17] To print something like all or nearly all the lines would have required twelve to fourteen leaves, a technical undertaking well within Gutenberg’s capabilities, as the extent is identical to that of the Donatus editions printed at the same time. If we cannot quite fill our imagined pages with a precise sequence of words and letters, we can at least probabilistically fill them with the story as it is known in extant manuscripts of the two-section version of the Sibyl’s Prophecy.

Any reading of the Sibyl’s Prophecy must fit the context of Gutenberg’s early editions and the material evidence of contemporary manuscripts. On these grounds, one strand of interpretation has failed, although it found some support among well-known scholars and can still be found in reference works. Gutenberg biographer Albert Kapr and media and communications theoretician Michael Giesecke both accept, in whole or in part, the proposal of Gottfried Zedler that connected the original poem to fourteenth-century heretical movements and that linked Gutenberg’s edition to fifteenth-century German politics. According to Zedler, the author of the Sibyl’s Prophecy was a follower or associate of Konrad Schmid, leader and prophet of the Thuringian flagellants who were violently suppressed in 1369. The original Sibyl’s Prophecy had foreseen the glorious return of Frederick II (1220–50), and the legendary Emperor Frederick is, in this account, none other than the flagellant leader Schmid. Nadja Varbanec extended this line of reasoning further, arguing that Schmid himself was the author of the Sibyl’s Prophecy, and Kapr and Giesecke follow her attribution.[18] According to Zedler, Gutenberg’s choice to print the Sibyl’s Prophecy reflected his understanding of popular interests in heretical and anti-ecclesiastical ideas, while the long delay before a second edition appeared (in a longer, religiously unassailable version of the poem) was due to clerical resistance.

Kapr takes a somewhat different view, rejecting the notion that Gutenberg was associated with heretical movements and emphasizing instead that Gutenberg’s printing of the Sibyl’s Prophecy was a response to contemporary political events that was intended to capitalize on enthusiasm for Frederick III (1440–93) and concern over Turkish advances. Kapr further argues that disappointment with Frederick III after 1444 would have made publication of the Sibyl’s Prophecy after that year unlikely, so that it must have been printed between 1440 and 1444, while Gutenberg was still in Strasbourg.[19] Giesecke follows Kapr’s dating and sees Gutenberg’s publication of the Sibyl’s Prophecy as part of a tradition of reformist publishing.[20] As a manuscript text, in Giesecke’s view, the Sibyl’s Prophecy was the sacred text of a conspirative textual community, and Konrad Schmid was its authoritative interpreter; in the medium of print, the work lost much of its magical aura, and the public it created for itself was no longer a secretive conspiracy but a public political movement.[21]

Little, if anything, of the interpretive tradition from Zedler to Kapr to Giesecke has proved to be correct. The author and place of origin of the Sibyl’s Prophecy are still considered unknown. Schanze regards the attribution to Konrad Schmid and the Thuringian flagellants as a “fanciful combination.”[22] We can expect to find fifteenth-century attitudes toward the Sibyl’s Prophecy reflected in the other works with which it was collected, but Schanze’s study of the manuscript context of the Sibyl’s Prophecy finds not the least evidence for any heretical associations with the text. The frequency represented by the forty-four manuscripts preserving the work is far beyond what might be plausible for a heretical or subversive text, but it is quite believable for a popular vernacular work with religious and devotional elements. Not only is there no known connection between Gutenberg and heretical movements, but the other editions produced by Gutenberg and his associates are similarly lacking in heretical or reformist sentiment.[23] Kapr’s dating of Gutenberg’s edition to the early 1440s is unnecessary, as manuscript panegyrics comparing Frederick III to a prophesied emperor of the end times appeared in the 1450s, and Zedler cites a song comparing Frederick III to the emperor of the Sibyl’s Prophecy composed in 1474.[24] The publication of the Sibyl’s Prophecy is not necessarily a response to a specific event, such as Frederick’s coronation. In the text, the mythical Frederick does not play a central role, and any number of other points, equally or more prominent than a similarity to the reigning Holy Roman Emperor, could have attracted readers to the text in the mid-fifteenth century.[25] Kapr’s dating is also untenably early, as the Sibyl’s Prophecy fragment and the Turk Calendar of 1454–55 are very similar in their execution, by no means reflecting a decade of technical refinement between them. Schanze’s consideration of this evidence found that readers’ primary interest lay in the work’s various religious aspects via its similarities to saints’ legends, crucifixion accounts, and Christian eschatology.

Yet Gutenberg’s decision to print the Sibyl’s Prophecy has interpretive potential that is left unexplored by regarding it only as a popular religious work. While Schanze’s observation that the Sibyl’s Prophecy was a popular religious work that could be read in many ways is undoubtedly correct, why did Gutenberg print this work and not another? The printing of a vernacular literary text at a time when Gutenberg and his associates specialized in elementary Latin grammars, with their large and well-defined set of customers, suggests that something in addition to mercantile considerations motivated the edition. Regarding the printing of the Sibyl’s Prophecy as an act of literary creation seems particularly appropriate in light of how the text (as we may assume it once existed) appears to reflect on its own creation: Gutenberg, the first entrepreneurial printer, was forced to predict the future demand for his wares and the fortunes of his books in the hands of their readers; the work he chose to print was the Sibyl’s Prophecy, a prophetic work that comments, in its own way, on prophecy and reading. Since classical antiquity, the Sibyl has been a notably literate prophet whose wisdom, derived from signs she reads in the stars, allows her to interpret a series of letters as the names of several emperors in succession. What the Sibyl’s Prophecy and the Latin grammars printed around the same time have in common is a central concern with the power and potential of literacy. Can the Sibyl’s Prophecy be described, without straining credulity, as a book about printing, an inventor’s reflection on the nature of textuality in the galaxy he was creating, or an attempt to explain the possibilities of a new medium to the first mass audience in Europe? One way to address the question of what Gutenberg saw in the Sibyl’s Prophecy is to consider the question of what his contemporaries saw in it, as attested by the poem’s fifteenth-century manuscript context, and so I will next revisit the fifteenth-century context of the Sibyl’s Prophecy in manuscript and print.

MANUSCRIPT CONTEXT

A few of the manuscript witnesses might be considered precursors to the Sibyl’s Prophecy as a work that reflects on the nature of literacy. Without dismissing Schanze’s conclusion that the Sibyl’s Prophecy was read primarily out of devotional interest, a closer look at some of the evidence suggests that religious devotion does not entirely explain some strands of reception. In a number of manuscripts, the Sibyl’s Prophecy appears to be not just one of the collected texts but a narrative explanation or justification for the entire volume. The poem provides, in some cases, a context in sacred history for secular affairs and, in others, a narrative justification for prognostication, contexts that Schanze dismisses as essentially random or whimsical. Other manuscripts that place the Sibyl’s Prophecy in a clearly religious context suggest a more specific interest in communication and the transmission of knowledge.

The narrative function of the Sibyl’s Prophecy is most readily seen in its manuscript associations with historical chronicles. Schanze, who suggests that the Sibyl’s Prophecy might serve to mark the end of history, otherwise regards the association with chronicles as “proximity without relationship.”[26] But in addition to describing the end of the world and the completion of history, the Sibyl’s Prophecy places contemporary events of the Middle Ages, including the struggles for imperial succession, within the entire context of salvation history, from the Creation to the Crucifixion to the Second Coming.

One particularly striking example is a fifteenth-century manuscript (Nuremberg, Staatsarchiv, Reichsstadt Nürnberg Handschriften, no. 58) that is both a family chronicle of the Schürstabs of Nuremberg and an account of various battles, particularly Nuremberg’s fifteenth-century wars, and detailed plans for the city’s defense. The connection of urban politics and warfare with family history is not surprising, considering that the Schürstabs provided a mayor of Nuremberg and other leading city officials. The records of Nuremberg’s food stores, parish churches, and personnel for its fortifications are not just a matter of family or military history, however. The manuscript contains, at its core, two literary texts that provide a narrative framework for the manuscript’s analytical and tabular summary of information. One of these is an account of Charlemagne’s legendary victory over the heathens at Regensburg, which links the manuscript’s listing of Nuremberg’s defensive measures to other imperial cities and associates the manuscript’s military chronicles to the sacral warfare of the Holy Roman Emperors.[27] Following this, the Sibyl’s Prophecy places the emperors and their warfare in the context of salvation history. The inclusion of the two literary texts helps present the Schürstabs as defenders not just of a city but of the Holy Roman Empire and, in turn, of the whole Christian narrative.

One might also see the transmission of the Sibyl’s Prophecy at the interface of sacred and secular history in a manuscript from 1440 now in Bern (Burgerbibliothek Cod. 537), which preserves the Sibyl’s Prophecy along with a translation into German prose of a French poem on the destruction of Jerusalem by the Romans: the description of a secular event with sacral implications is followed by a rendition into verse of all salvation history in the form of the Sibyl’s Prophecy. In a late sixteenth-century manuscript (Aarau, Aargauer Kantonsbibliothek Ms WettF 33), the Sibyl’s Prophecy follows a rhymed account of the second Kappeler War of 1531, in which Ulrich Zwingli fell in battle against Catholic forces, a sacralized account of Europe’s first war of religion after the Reformation. The same manuscript contains both additional historical texts and another prophetic work in verse, the Nollhart of Pamphilus Gengenbach, in which the Sibyl and other prophetic figures admonish various listeners, including the pope.

In two manuscripts, both written in the mid-1450s, the Sibyl’s Prophecy appears to have a similar function of providing narrative contextualization, but, in these cases, for prognostic texts. One originally Swiss manuscript (now Munich, Bayerische Staatsbibliothek cgm 6351) begins with seventy leaves devoted to various ways to master time. Some of these are calendrical, describing methods to determine feast days of the liturgical year or to calculate leap years; other texts are astronomical, describing the calculation of moon phases, the zodiacal signs, or the nature and astrological significance of the seven planets; some texts are astromedical, prescribing rules and identifying bad days for bloodletting; and a number of texts are prognostic, describing lucky and unlucky days, weather prediction rules, the influence of each week day on nativities, a New Year’s prognostic, and “Daniel’s Prophecy,” actually a list of favorable and unfavorable activities for each day of the moon’s cycle. These prognostic texts are interspersed with short devotional extracts, and the conclusion is formed by the German Cato and the Sibyl’s Prophecy.

In a Bavarian manuscript (Nuremberg, Germanisches Nationalmuseum Hs 16007), the Sibyl’s Prophecy opens a codex otherwise containing prose texts on birth prognostics, days that were lucky or favorable for bloodletting, and descriptions of zodiacal signs and the planets, as well as other practical texts. For Schanze, the Sibyl’s Prophecy appears there as a “foreign body” in the context of prognostic practices,[28] as if there could be no connection between the Sibyl’s reading the future in the stars and fifteenth-century attempts to do the same. It rather seems more likely that the account of the Sibyl’s audience before Solomon in these manuscripts serves as a narrative contextualization and legitimization of the prognostic practices that they record, including the astrological reading of celestial signs. The association of sibylline and other prophetic material with astrology and prognostication is, in any case, found again in later printed works of the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries, so that the appearance of this association already in fifteenth-century manuscripts is not surprising.

The Sibyl’s Prophecy, with its thematic focus on reading, also appears to serve as a narrative contextualization and legitimization of literacy itself. An early fifteenth-century manuscript (Nuremberg, Stadtbibliothek Cent. VI, 43o), formerly owned by Katharina Tucher and then the St. Katherine cloister in Nuremberg, opens with the German Lucidarius, followed by various legends, exempla, and tracts, before closing with the Questions of the Astronomy Master to the Devil (Hort von der Astronomie) and the Sibyl’s Prophecy. Schanze notes that both the last two works contain the legend of the wood of the Cross, yet the manuscript as a whole not only preserves the Sibyl’s Prophecy in the context of religious devotion but, more specifically, addresses the limits and possibilities of communication and transmitting knowledge. The Lucidarius, the Questions of the Astronomy Master, and the Sibyl’s Prophecy, as well as the manuscript’s extract from Heinrich Seuse’s Book of Eternal Wisdom, are all dialogues in which knowledge is won from arcane sources. Several of the tracts on purgatory in the Tundalus tradition that follow the Lucidarius, while not dialogues, again focus thematically on the obtaining and distribution of knowledge. The power of the written word is also exemplified in another tract, which relates how a priest celebrating Mass discerns a devil writing on a cowhide. The priest asks the devil what he was doing, and the devil answers that he was compiling a list of sins committed by the communicants. The priest tells his congregation what he has seen, whereupon the people repent, and the words documenting their sins are erased from the cowhide. These and similar texts are found in association with the Sibyl’s Prophecy in other manuscripts as well: Chur, Staatsarchiv Graubünden Cod. B 1 (Lucidarius), Esztergom Franciscan convent Cod. 11 (Tundalus and Lucidarius), Munich, Bayerische Staatsbibliothek cgm 746 (Questions of the Astronomy Master to the Devil), Trier, Stadtbibliothek Hs. 1180/490 8o (Lucidarius).

While the association of the Sibyl’s Prophecy with the Lucidarius may seem accidental, the title page and illustrations of later Lucidarius editions suggests that the separation between the two works was perhaps not as wide as one might think. Fifteenth-century editions of the Lucidarius regularly open with a woodcut of a dialogue between a master and disciple against a background of stars, similar to the constellation of Solomon, the Sibyl, and a star used to illustrate several editions of the Sibyl’s Prophecy (see figure 2). The preface of the Lucidarius positions the work as prophetic revelation of arcane knowledge: it states that the Lucidarius contains teachings and wisdom that are hidden from other books; and it states that the author is the disciple who poses questions, while the answering teacher is the Holy Spirit. The preface of the Lucidarius even echoes the first line of the Sibyl’s Prophecy, “God who always was and is without end.”[29]

While the Questions of the Astronomy Master to the Devil shares the concern for knowledge and communication with the Sibyl’s Prophecy, the differences between the two works are instructive. The Sibyl’s prophesying is based on her reading of the stars, as well as her interpretation of acronymic letters, both of which affirm learning and literacy. The astronomer’s diabolical source and necromantic method must be considered dubious in a Christian context, and they represent not an affirmation of literacy but, rather, the limits of knowledge available from books. In a scene that later forms the opening of Goethe’s Faust, when the astronomer demands to know everything about earth, paradise, hell, and purgatory, the devil imprisoned in a jar snaps back that the astronomer could just as easily find everything he was looking for written in books. “I have read much of strange wonders that I barely understand,” the astronomer replies. “I want true knowledge of it from your mouth. Tell me of each thing in turn!”[30] Where the astronomer embodies the limitations of reading and the unreliability of writing, the Sibyl’s prophetic interpretation of signs attests a fundamentally positive view of reading that is also consistent with the economic interests of Gutenberg and his followers.

PRINT CONTEXT

While the manuscript evidence connecting the Sibyl’s Prophecy to prognostic texts is less common than appearances of the poem in devotional contexts, the connection is nevertheless present. In the context of the earliest vernacular printed works, the opposite holds true: while Gutenberg used his earliest typeface for several prognostic works, there are no known vernacular devotional works from him and his associates in Mainz. If printing the Sibyl’s Prophecy was meant to appeal to the market for devotional texts, the absence of additional examples of the genre from his press is curious. In contrast to the lack of printed devotional works, all known German works from Gutenberg’s press have thematic similarities with prognostic and prophetic works that appeared in print during the following century.

One can find intentionality not just in the arrangement of texts copied into a particular manuscript but also in the selection of works chosen for publication by a particular printer. No printer, not even the first one, could meet the expectations and requirements of all readers. To compete effectively against other printers or a still-healthy manuscript trade, specialization was necessary. A printer had to understand what works could be profitably manufactured considering the printer’s production capabilities and distribution networks and the customer expectations of a given market segment. Not every printer could produce the volumes appropriate for monastic institutions, for example, and not everyone who could produce them had the established business networks to sell the printed wares. To succeed and even to survive, printers had to know what formats they could produce, what price their customers were willing to pay, and what kinds of texts they were interested in reading.

Michael Clanchy categorized the works printed in the first decade of printing as belonging to sacred, learned, or bureaucratic literacy and identified vernacular literacy as a catchall fourth category with a broad audience outside the learned elite and peripheral to the enterprise of printing, although he did note a certain concern with prognostication common to a number of the works in the vernacular category.[31] Already in 1948, however, Carl Wehmer had recognized the thematic and typographic similarity of several early Mainz prints: “And so the content of the Astronomical Calendar fits satisfyingly into a group of Mainz editions in whose vicinity it also belongs typographically. These editions printed in the same typeface include the astrological-political poem about the Turkish threat in the guise of a calendar for 1455, the Sibyl’s Book that was printed due to its prophecy of an Emperor Frederick who would triumph over the heathen, a German Cisioianus, and the astrological bloodletting calendar for 1457. A German astrological planetary table fits into the series of astrological-calendrical publication in every way.”[32] The “astrological-political poem” Wehmer mentions here is the Turk Calendar of late 1454, the next known vernacular work printed after the Sibyl’s Prophecy.[33] Ottoman Turk and other Islamic invaders had been well-established figures of Christian end-time speculation since the early Middle Ages, and the fall of Constantinople in 1453 and further incursions into Christian Europe ensured that they continued to play that role for centuries to come. The Turk Calendar makes use of a contemporary literary genre of verse arranged by calendar month to exhort Christians to resist the Turks.[34] The Cisioianus, a series of verses to aid memorizing and calculating the dates of church feasts, was printed as a broadside around 1457. The “astrological bloodletting calendar,” often referred to as the Laxierkalendar or Aderlasskalender, another broadside print, was a calendar of propitious days for bloodletting and other purgative exercises and is the only Latin work among those mentioned here. The only vernacular edition of Gutenberg’s not mentioned by Wehmer is the German translation of Calixtus III’s papal bull against the Turks printed in 1456. Considering the inclusion of the Sibyl’s Prophecy and the Turk Calendar, both the German bull and its Latin original also fit easily into this group. In their typeface (in all cases except the papal bull) and language (in all cases except the Laxierkalendar), these works printed by Gutenberg and his associates in Mainz, both before and after their legal conflicts of 1455, constitute a recognizable print context for the Sibyl’s Prophecy that might be described as prognostic literacy.

Rather than being peripheral to print textuality or diverse members of a catchall category, the works of prognostic literacy are central to Gutenberg’s publication program. Of the sixty-five known editions in the type of the thirty-six-line or forty-two-line Bibles, fifty are editions, often fragmentary and undated, of the elementary Latin grammar of Donatus. If we set aside these editions, we are left with ten remaining Latin editions, compared to which the five vernacular editions no longer seem a mere afterthought. Latin is clearly the language of sacred literacy, with three Bible editions and three additional ecclesiastic texts. The remaining Latin texts, including the papal bull against the Turks and two editions of indulgences for those who take up the struggle against them, share a concern with Islamic invasion also found in editions of vernacular works.

The category of prognostic literacy includes various kinds of future chronologies, from propitious days for medicinal bleeding to end-time eschatology. The Turk Calendar provides a measure of unity to the group by connecting calendrical conventions to popular perception of the Turks as agents of the Antichrist in the end times, while the Sibyl’s Prophecy provides an overarching narrative framework that finds a place in salvation history for both the Antichrist and astrological prognostication based on observing the heavens. Among the various editions from Gutenberg’s workshop that address concerns with chronology and prognostication, it is the two literary works among them that connect astrological observation of the stars to all the traditional precursors of the Last Day within a coherent narrative. While there is no way to be certain how well Gutenberg’s edition of the Sibyl’s Prophecy sold, the repeated editions of vernacular prognostic works suggest that he met some success. There are various criteria by which one could classify the earliest printed editions, but by any measure, the Sibyl’s Prophecy is a central text of early printing.

Gutenberg proved prescient in anticipating the later popularity of prophetic tracts and prognostic booklets. These bibliographical cousins and descendants of the Sibyl’s Prophecy continually recombined prophetic utterance, astronomical observation, astrological prediction, and the Turks and other perceived minions of the Antichrist as signs of the end times. Consider, for example, the output of Conrad Zeninger’s press in Nuremberg in 1481, one of his earliest years of operation. In that year, Zeninger published in German the first edition of Birgitta’s Burden of the World, which included chapters attributed to Hildegard of Bingen, Joachim of Fiore, and a Sibyl. In addition to this prophetic compilation with a sibylline element, Zeninger also printed a broadside calendrical almanac; a tract on the end of the world ascribed to Vincent Ferrer; the Tract against the Turks, which cites Methodius and Birgitta, among other medieval prophets, as authorities for the Turks’ eventual downfall; and a Latin-German vocabulary for preachers compiled with the help of Jodocus Eichmann, whose own sibylline tract would eventually form the basis of the most popular German Sibyl collection of the sixteenth-century.[35] As in Gutenberg’s early works, prophecy, astrology, and literacy are near neighbors to each other in the early products of Conrad Zeninger.

The category of prognostic literacy might also encompass instructional manuals for casting lots, interpreting dreams, predicting the weather, or other forms of practical prognostication, which also frequently invoke the prophetic communicative framework: the medieval dream manuals that appear in print are attributed to the biblical prophets Daniel or Joseph (with at least forty-two editions between them before 1501), while another set of weather rules calls itself the “Revelation of Esdra the Prophet.”[36] The urgency of providing prophetic cover to practical fortune-telling is evident in one manuscript’s introduction to Esdra’s weather rules, which insists, “These things were all revealed to me by God, and I have added nothing of myself, but rather I received all things from God’s inspiration.”[37] Like predicting the weather by various rules of thumb or interpreting dreams by looking up items in a dream dictionary, casting lots to answer mundane questions would seem to lack any religious significance, yet the prophets were invoked even here. In an anonymous lot book printed in 1520, the user was to select answers to various questions, perhaps by drawing cards, while the path to the correct answer was organized according to thirty-six signs (the zodiac extended by additional animals), the four cardinal directions, the seven planets, twenty-two monarchs, and twenty-two prophets. Although the process seems to exemplify happenstance rather than revelation, the woodcuts that head each set of twenty-two verse answers depict the audience of a prophet before a monarch seated on a throne, just as the Sibyl appears before Solomon.[38]

The first printed works, including the works of prognostic literacy, were no doubt popular enough to assure Gutenberg of sufficient customers for his wares within the economic context of early printing. Yet one may still ask why Gutenberg chose prognostic works rather than equally promising devotional texts that would have been equally amenable to print. One explanation is that prognostication can function as a metaphor for print literacy. As Marie Christin and others have argued concerning the history of writing, prognostication is the one type of reading that is truly originary, requiring no preceding act of human writing.[39] The prognostic devices are imagined as screens, intermediaries, media on which the words of the gods may be discerned without human interference. That was also the promise (if not the reality) of print: books could now be produced without pen, stylus, or quill, unmarred by the failings of a copyist, with the printed book as the screen on which original words could appear without flaw in any copy.[40] The stars consulted by the Sibyl, like the alignment of planets consulted via print by readers of the Astronomical Calendar, are ostensibly prior to any act of human reading or writing, and so, too, it seemed, were the new books of the age of print, which were made available as never before and bypassed error-prone human copyists. Just as the Sibyl’s Prophecy appears to provide narrative context for history and prognostication in some manuscripts, one might also see in it a narrative explanation for print itself.

We expect a work of supreme cultural importance to look grander, more like Gutenberg’s forty-two-line Bible, which was, in some cases, printed on parchment and luxuriously illustrated. The Sibyl’s Prophecy remains a scrap of paper. Yet Gutenberg’s majestic Bible was merely a new way to supply texts to the traditional literate classes and luxury editions to wealthy patrons, while Gutenberg’s true accomplishment lay in providing the new urban readers with shorter literary works and pragmatic texts.[41] The Sibyl’s Prophecy is not a random, periphery product of early printing but a core component of Gutenberg’s publication program and a central document of a new typographic literacy.

READING LETTERS, READING THE HEAVENS

Ivan Illich and Barry Sanders have observed that the Sibyl marks the transition from orality to fully alphabetic literacy in the prognostic tradition of classical antiquity.[42] It is therefore apt that she appeared again to usher in the age of print. Already in Roman legend, the Sibyl wrote her prophecies in books, whose contents she offered for a price, unlike the oracles who dispensed wisdom through gnomic verbal utterance. The Sibyl’s essential literacy remains a part of the sibylline tradition of early modern Germany as found in the Prophecies of the Twelve Sibyls, a compilation of sibylline oracles that took form in the early sixteenth century and was reprinted throughout the next two centuries. The opening of the collection relates how a Sibyl offered nine books for sale to a Roman king. Her offer spurned, the Sibyl burns the books three at a time until the king meets her original price for the three remaining books, in which the king discovers the entire future of the Romans.[43] In the ekphrastic description of Jodocus Eichmann, this Sibyl holds one book on her knee with her left hand and holds an open book that contains “subtle things” in her right.[44] Perhaps not accidentally, the Cicero who returns to sixteenth-century Germany in Nikodemus Frischlin’s 1585 comedy Julius redivivus responds to a description of the workings of the printing press by saying, “You remind me strongly of the unusual things that one writes about the Sibyl’s book.”[45]

The route from Hellenic antiquity to Mainz in 1450 is long and convoluted, but the version of the Sibyl’s Prophecy known to and printed by Johannes Gutenberg retains the distinctly literate nature of the Sibyl. In the poem, the Sibyl derives her wisdom from reading the heavens, whose knowledge encompasses all of history from the Creation to the Last Judgment. When the Sibyl approaches Solomon’s palace and observes the beam that once grew on Adam’s grave, she honors it by wading through the brook instead of striding over it, and as a reward, her goose foot is healed to human form (one can safely regard the similarity between the Sibyl’s Gänsefuß and Gutenberg’s family name Gänsefleisch as mere coincidence). Solomon’s first question to the Sibyl concerns her reluctance to walk on the beam, to which the Sibyl replies that a man born from a virgin will die on it, which shall be a great help to all those who believe on him and his virginal mother. The rough wooden beam will form the cross on which Christ will be crucified and so restore health to Adam’s descendants in a way that his son had not understood. Solomon next asks the Sibyl about the source of her wisdom, and she answers that her source lies in the stars, which appear to be both astrological signifiers and a site of visionary revelation. “I saw a star in the heavens and a circle going around it. I saw within it a maid and a child and many future things that God has revealed to me,” she tells Solomon. In other passages, the Sibyl reiterates that the stars are signs that she can interpret: “I have seen in the stars what shall happen until the Last Day”; “I have seen in the stars what shall happen to the clergy.”[46]

The Sibyl’s prophetic reading of the stars is based on the same cosmology that makes astrological prediction possible. According to this view of the universe, the heavens are a book, and God is the author. The opening of the Gospel of John served as the biblical basis for this model of the cosmos: in the beginning, God created all things through the Word. The astrologer Bartholomeus Mangolt repeated this thought in his preface to his prognostication for 1530: “God, the Heavenly Father, through his immeasurable wisdom, in the beginning created the heavens and everything contained therein by the word.”[47] Mangolt’s colleague Matthias Brotbeihel turned to the Psalter for a similar idea, noting that David had written “that the heavens were made by the word of the Lord, and all their power (omnis virtus) by the spirit of his mouth [Psalms 33:6]. From these heavens, the whole of the earth is made temperate and agreement is made among all the works of nature, so that the lowest things follow the higher ones in order, and human works are led, governed, born, and destroyed again in their order by changes in the higher heavenly things.”[48] The stars were both the medium of God’s influence, and the verbal signs of God’s message. Another contemporary astrologer, Michael Krautwadel, called the stars “God’s translators.”[49] What can be spoken can also be written: a Scottish colleague, James Perillus, whose prognostications were twice translated into German, noted that God has set the stars in the heavens as a mirror of his power, or has “bound and written them as an open book, with beautiful shining stars like golden letters.”[50] Italian astrologers, including Giovanni Pontano, also equated celestial and alphabetical signs, as did Paracelsus.[51] A generation earlier, the idea is already an astrological commonplace. In his prognostication for 1493, Johannes Virdung cited the authority of both the Bible and Arabic astrologers: “God has written these things that he wants us to know in the heavens as if it were in a book. Master Albumasar also bears witness of this when he writes, ‘God has made the heaven like a parchment on which the forms and fortunes of the lowest things are written.’”[52] Other astrologers saw themselves as both interpreters and proclaimers of hidden wisdom. Simon Eyssenmann justified the publication of his practica for 1520 by writing in the preface, “Ptolemy also says in the same book that the fate of the entire world is subject to the heavens, in which is written the entire future of this earth according to the signs and stars; let him read from it who can. That is, he who knows and has learned the art of astronomy should proclaim it to the people.”[53]

A central moment in the Sibyl’s prognostication appears at first as the mere resolution of an abbreviation, yet it, too, shows the engagement of the Sibyl’s Prophecy with a particular moment in the spread from scholarly to vernacular readers of late medieval technologies of information access. One of the future events foreseen by the Sibyl is a sequence of emperors known only by their initials: “An A will come and smite another A to death, and if an H loses his life, he will be forgiven through God’s body; and an L and an F will war more than seven years for the empire, but the L must be victorious.” Solomon asks for an interpretation, and the Sibyl provides one: Albrecht (I) will smite Adolf (of Nassau), after which Heinrich (VII) will be murdered by Dominicans; Frederick (the Fair of Austria) and Ludwig (IV the Bavarian) will battle for the empire, and Ludwig will be victorious. Earlier strophic versions of the poem had predicted Frederick’s victory in 1321 after seven years of battle, but Ludwig was victorious in eight, in 1322. This was established fact at the time the Sibyl’s Prophecy reached its present form, presumably in the 1360s or 1370s.[54] While the letters and their interpretation might change over time, the sequence of kings in letter form was an element of sibylline prophecy from the beginning.[55]

Encoding the names of rulers as letters is a device that continued to be used in both prognostic and prophetic writing into the next century. To name but a few examples, a booklet printed in 1518 that purported to contain prophecies by Joachim of Fiore and Hildegard of Bingen attributes to “the old Joachim” a prophecy concerning menacing black birds, identified by the names A and H. These are then interpreted as “Agareni” and “Hismaelites,” or Turks and Sarracens.[56] The same type of acronymic encoding also appears outside of letter prophecies. Johannes Virdung’s judgment on a comet seen in 1531 was that it was an ill omen to five lords: “and therefore,” he wrote, “may an A, H, L and two Fs take care that this comet does not strike them.”[57] Also in the 1530s, Paracelsus invoked the Sibyl’s letter prophecy, although his own mode of prophetic writing is quite distinct. Beneath a woodcut showing a majuscule F resting on a rose that, in turn, sits upon a crown, Paracelsus writes, “Sibylla commemorated you when she said, ‘You, F, stand fittingly with the rose, for you are timely, and time has brought you.’ What Sibylla says about you will come to pass, and still more will be said about you.” Not just for sibylline material but also for other prophetic figures and even for professional astrologers, letters could function as ciphers for hidden knowledge. For Paracelsus, letters themselves were a revelation from God: “Who can discover how letters were invented, except through divine teaching?”[58]

Lurking behind the Sibyl’s alphabetic game is the concept of letters as ordering and indexing elements, which was always a potential use of the fixed alphabetic order but did not come into regular use until the Middle Ages.[59] In the sequence of abbreviated emperors in the Sibyl’s Prophecy, letters stand as indices of the sequence of real events. The Sibyl who can grasp the true significance of a wooden beam, in contrast to the limited understanding of Adam’s son, is an ideal reader who can reveal the full meaning of a mysterious letter sequence. Whether she is reading the word of God recorded in the heavens or interpreting a series of letters, the Sibyl models the proper function of literacy as a way to master textual information and to understand the order of the cosmos.

THE CROSS, THE PRESS, AND THE WORD

By incorporating the legendary origin of the Cross in the Tree of Life in paradise, the Sibyl’s Prophecy touches on medieval devotion to holy relics, as the True Cross was one of the first and most prominent of Christian relics. The Sibyl’s Prophecy, at the beginning of Gutenberg’s career as a printer, was not his first contact with relics in his entrepreneurial life, however. In the late 1430s and early 1440s, Gutenberg was involved in a number of technical commercial ventures in Strasbourg. One of the primary undertakings was a plan to manufacture pilgrims’ mirrors. Since the fourteenth century, many of those making a pilgrimage acquired metal pilgrim badges as signs of a completed pilgrimage that entitled the bearer to the protection and hospitality to which pilgrims were due. The pilgrim badges were also considered to be relics in themselves that were imbued with the aura of holiness from the saints and their shrines, and the badges found use in folk devotion and folk medicine.[60] The fifteenth century saw a further innovation with the addition of a mirror within the decorative metal frame of the pilgrim badge. The development of pilgrims’ mirrors was a response to the growth of pilgrimages into a mass phenomenon, with tens or hundreds of thousands of pilgrims pressing forward into the presence of the displayed relics. The sheer numbers forced pilgrimage sites to display relics on raised platforms or suspended from church walls or steeples, so that pilgrims could only glimpse them from a distance. Late medieval scenes of pilgrimage show members of the crowd raising mirrors above their heads, but not to aid their view. According to Kurt Köster, “The image, the radiance of the displayed relics, caught by the mirror and carried home, was intended to give duration in the sphere of the pilgrim’s daily life to the granting of mercy at the place of pilgrimage, and to let family members and friends participate in this grace.”[61] Gutenberg and his business associates in Strasbourg appear to have hatched a scheme to produce pilgrim’s mirrors in great quantities for an upcoming display of relics in Aachen (although, by all appearances, they mistook the year of the pilgrimage for 1439 rather than 1440, with unknown consequences). There is no evidence that Gutenberg was experimenting with printing already in Strasbourg or that his pilgrim mirrors were marked with letters or numbers, but Köster identified a number of ways that the enterprise with the pilgrim’s mirrors might be considered a technical precursor to the printing press, including the replacement of manual labor with a stamping process that may have used a press, experience with metallurgy and the properties of various metals, the division of labor in a process of mass production, the high initial investment required to cover the costs of skilled labor and materials, and the production of an unlimited number of copies from a single original.[62] The equivalence of copies and originals may have been a concept familiar to Gutenberg from his earliest days in Mainz, as he was likely familiar with the trades of gold-smithing, seal making, and coin stamping in Mainz, although there is no indication that he pursued any of these professions seriously.[63]

The precedents for the invention of print in Mainz that can be observed in the pilgrims’ mirror enterprise in Strasbourg include more than purely technical considerations. Hearing the spoken word and experiencing the sanctity of a holy man or woman are both forms of interaction that require immediate and personal presence. Relics preserve a saint’s aura and give it temporal durability, just as manuscripts preserved the spoken word in written form. What Gutenberg began in Strasbourg, however, was very much like the undertaking he brought to fruition in Mainz: with thousands of mass-produced mirrors, Gutenberg and his partners in Strasbourg hoped to make the aura of holiness reproducible, transportable—in a sense, a commercial good. That is just what Gutenberg achieved with respect to the spoken word through his invention of movable type in Mainz. The word became a reproducible, transportable, mass-produced commercial product on an unprecedented scale.[64] It is therefore appropriate—and perhaps no accident—that one of Gutenberg’s earliest works should include at its core the legend of the wood of the Cross, which concerns the originary relic of Christendom.

The next recorded edition of the Sibyl’s Prophecy after Gutenberg’s came around 1473, from Martin Flach in Basel. Six editions from five different German printers followed in 1491–93, including one edited by Jakob Köbel. Editions continued steadily after the turn of the century, with eight editions between 1513 and 1520. Prior to this, in the early 1480s, the Sibyllarum et prophetarum de Christo vaticinia, a set of twelve sibylline prophecies in Latin collected by Philippus de Barberiis along with a variety of other texts, had gone through three editions in Italy. Jodocus Eichmann’s German prose adaptation of these sibylline texts appeared in 1493 but lay dormant after that until 1516, when Jakob Köbel published a new kind of German Sibyl collection, the Prophecies of the Twelve Sibyls.[65] The collection consisted of Eichmann’s German text on the twelve Sibyls as well as a thirteenth sibylline text: a prose text, corresponding to the verse Sibyl’s Prophecy, that had previously appeared twice as an independent booklet.[66] The collections of Barberiis had offered not just a set of texts but also a series of woodcut illustrations of the Sibyls, and Köbel built on this example. The Prophecies of the Twelve Sibyls published by Köbel juxtaposed each Sibyl’s prophecy and full-page woodcuts based on Italian models with smaller woodcuts of Old Testament prophets and biblical verses. Later editions of the Prophecies of the Twelve Sibyls by Christian Egenolff in Frankfurt form the core of more extensive prophetic compilations. While later editions omit the Old Testament prophets, they otherwise follow the pattern Köbel created. Egenolff’s collections of sibylline and other prophetic works appeared in various configurations regularly in the 1530s and again at the end of the 1540s. Yet even then, a century after Gutenberg, the chain of influence from the verse Sibyl’s Prophecy through Köbel to Egenolff remains just a few steps.

2

PROPHETS IN PRINT

While the combination of astrology and prophecy had been debated by many and attempted by some for centuries, Johannes Lichtenberger’s Prognosticatio of 1488 was the first successful combination of both traditions in print. The secret of Lichtenberger’s success lay in the adaptation of prophecy and prognostication to the medium of print and, above all, in the creation of a new kind of prophetic author.

The Prognosticatio, published in Latin first and in German translation shortly thereafter, brings astrological prognostication and various prophetic authorities to bear on questions of German politics and foreign relations, the fortunes of ecclesiastical leaders and clerical reform, the depredations of Muslim invaders, failures of public and private morality, and the advent of a false prophet, and it also makes a number of predictions concerning the years from 1488 to 1567. The impetus for its appearance was the conjunction of Saturn and Mars in the year 1484, which the astrologer Paul of Middelburg had treated at some length in his twenty-year prognostication for 1484–1504. Rather than rendering his own judgment on the conjunction, Lichtenberger copied extensively from Middelburg’s work as well as from a comet tract printed in 1474 and other prophetic compilations.[1] While Lichtenberger cited numerous prophetic authorities, he identified none of his actual sources.

The first woodcut in the Prognosticatio is simultaneously a visual statement of authority, an encapsulation of the work’s contents and editorial program, and a recapitulation of the preceding four decades of print history (see figure 3). On the left, Ptolemy and Aristotle represent the inheritance of classical antiquity in astrology and astronomy, while Birgitta of Sweden and Brother Reinhart, depicted as a hermit with cowled robe and rosary beads, mediate Christian visionary prophecy in the tradition of Joachim of Fiore. Between them stands the Sibyl, both a pre-Christian observer of the heavens, like Ptolemy and Aristotle, and a foreteller of Christian salvation, like her religious colleagues. (The Sibyl’s dual role is apparent in versions of this woodcut in later editions, where the group is divided in two, placing the Sibyl together with Aristotle and Ptolemy in some cases, with Birgitta and Reinhart in others.) All five figures are illuminated in equal measure by divine emanations from above. The figures in the woodcut represent both Lichtenberger’s sources and also traditions that had become established in print since Gutenberg and his associates had printed the Sibyl’s Prophecy.

Astrology and prophecy share a halting early history in print. After the editions printed by Gutenberg and his associates, the first known broadside almanac was printed around 1462, and the first annual practicas began to appear in the 1470s. The broadside prognostication of “Theobertus of England,” which appeared in 1470, combined weather predictions along with disasters and political changes at the highest level in a manner reminiscent of the “Toledo Letter” and similar astrologically themed prophecies of the Middle Ages. While the potential complementarity of prophecy and astrology is apparent in the prognostication of “Theobertus” and in the earliest printing at Mainz, the combination of the two had long been a topic of debate. The cardinal and scholar Pierre d’Ailly (1350–1420), who anticipated the advent of the Antichrist in the year 1789, had combined astrological inquiry with the prophetic witness of Hildegard of Bingen, Joachim of Fiore, and pseudo-Methodius in several treatises written during and shortly after the Great Schism. Tracts by d’Ailly were first printed around 1480, while Erhard Ratdolt published d’Ailly’s Concordance of Astronomy with Theology along with two other of his astrological treatises in 1490. Other early printed works were less theoretical. Johannes von Lübeck’s Prognosticon concerning the Advent of the Antichrist and the Jews’ Messiah, known from a single edition of ca. 1474, appealed to astrology and medieval authorities, including the Sibyls, in predicting that the Antichrist would be at the height of his power in 1530.[2] In On the Future Triumph of the Christians against the Saracens, or A Gloss on the Apocalypse, Johannes Annius (Giovanni Nanni) of Viterbo (1432–1502) argued for the identification of the Antichrist not with a future being but with Mohammed and the rise of Islam. The first two sections in Annius’s work engage primarily in interpretation of Revelation, but the third and final section foretells the fate of the Turks according to astrological reasoning, which Annius claimed to repeat from a tract he had first read eight years previously in Genoa. Whether this earlier tract ever existed as such is uncertain, considering Annius’s reputation as a purveyor of forgeries, but Annius’s work proved popular and was published nine times between 1480 and 1507.[3]

The combination of astrology and prophecy met resistance, however. University theologians protested that astrological calculations of the Antichrist’s advent, such as that of Johannes von Lübeck, infringed on divine privilege. In Determination of the Time of the Antichrist’s Advent in ca. 1478, the Dominican Michael Francisci de Insulis, a doctor of theology in Cologne at the time, argued that knowledge about the Antichrist could come not via natural reason but only through scripture and the doctors of the church. In Settled Question against the Triple Error concerning the Revelation of the Antichrist, which appeared in two editions of ca. 1486, the Erfurt Augustinian hermit Johannes von Paltz assailed attempts to calculate the Last Day and, in the second quaestio, specifically criticized the work of Annius as a “certain printed tract” that claimed the Antichrist would not appear personally but was, rather, a reference to Mohammed.[4] The dim view taken by university theologians of combining eschatological speculation and astrology suggests that printing and distributing prognostic works required careful consideration of both popular tastes and official concerns and that negotiating the tension between them was a precarious undertaking.

Like other works that supplemented prophecy with astrology, Lichtenberger’s Prognosticatio was also condemned, by the theologians of Cologne in 1492, but without any detectable consequence for the work’s enduring popularity.[5] The clearest, if not the only, measure of success for an early modern printed book is the number of times it was reprinted. A book that sold well provided readers with material that matched their interests and provided competing publishers with a formula for success in terms of text selection, paper size, book format, graphic layout, and target audience. In the absence of legal protections and with several printers exploiting a proven success, a popular work could appear in many editions in various cities in a single year or over the course of several years, with little if any benefit accruing to the author or the first printer. In the context of the late fifteenth century, we can recognize Lichtenberger’s Prognosticatio as a popular work by the eleven editions that appeared between 1488 and 1501 in Germany, not to mention a half-dozen editions in Italy.

The first editions appeared in pairs. Heinrich Knoblochtzer printed the first Latin edition in 1488 and a German translation around 1490 using the same woodcuts.[6] In June and July 1492, Jakob Meydenbach of Mainz issued a Latin and German edition that reused the woodcuts from Knoblochtzer’s editions. Bartholomäus Kistler of Strasbourg then issued German editions in 1497, 1500, and 1501 and two Latin editions in 1500. Kistler’s editions used a smaller format and competed with reprintings in 1501 from his fellow Strasbourg printer Matthias Hupfuff and from Hans Schobser in Munich.[7] In addition, a booklet of extracts from the Prognosticatio and other sources, An Extract from Various Prophecies, went through twenty-one editions between 1516 and 1540. In 1521, Wolfgang Stöckel printed the first full edition of the Prognosticatio in Germany since 1501 (an edition not previously recognized as Lichtenberger’s work), which was followed by another sixteen editions of the full Prognosticatio by 1535, including a new German translation with a foreword by Martin Luther that was printed in Wittenberg and then Erfurt in 1527. In 1528, Heinrich Steiner, Peter Quentel, and Peter Schöffer printed a total of seven editions in one year. Three further editions followed before the mid-1540s, when the Prognosticatio began appearing in combination with other prognostic works or as part of prophetic collections.

As a popular compilation of prophecies in combination with astrology, Lichtenberger’s Prognosticatio had no equal.[8] Not only the several early editions but, particularly, the many later editions, retranslations, and recombinations with other works made the Prognosticatio the most successful prophetic compilation and the most influential combination of astrology and prophecy of the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries. But in a period that had discovered both mass media and official censorship, the question is not just why the Prognosticatio was popular but, rather, what kind of authorial identity made it printable.

JOHANNES LICHTENBERGER: CONSTRUCTING THE AUTHOR-PROPHET

As a historically attested human being, Lichtenberger remains a murky figure, and the contemporary evidence of his life already shows signs of spin and posturing. Thanks to the work of Dietrich Kurze, we know that Lichtenberger was born as Johannes Grümbach around the year 1440 near the town of Baumholder in southwestern Germany.[9] All that is known of his education is what can be deduced from his astrological-eschatological writings and from his role as parish priest during the last decades of his life. There is no record of how he gained his training or his qualification for office. The high point of Lichtenberger’s personal status appears to have come in the 1470s, a period in which he wrote horoscopes for several important noblemen. His first known work, written in 1468 while he was in Speyer, was a prognostication based on the observation of a comet, while the next was a horoscope for Duke Ludwig the Rich of Landshut-Bavaria in 1471. The publication in 1474 or 1475 of his astrological judgment on a conjunction of Saturn and Mars made Lichtenberger one of the earliest astrologers to appear in print, and a folk song dated to the 1470s described Lichtenberger as known throughout Germany.[10] Lichtenberger’s later manuscript prognostications of the 1470s address the geopolitical affairs of leading German cities and the fortunes of princes and kings. Twice in them, Lichtenberger describes himself as court astrologer to Emperor Frederick III. No contemporary source apart from his own self-description identifies Lichtenberger as the imperial court astrologer, however, at a time when the presence of other astrologers at court is well documented, and by the middle of the 1480s, another figure, Johannes Canter, was referring to himself as the imperial astrologer.[11] In 1481, the wife of Pfalzgraf Ludwig of Veldenz convinced her husband to install Lichtenberger as parish priest in Brambach, where he remained until his death in 1503. Lichtenberger wrote that there were those who “know that I have truly foretold to many spiteful people every single one of the great calamities that have come to pass in German lands for twenty years,”[12] which may accurately reflect his declining fortunes, as the twenty years between Lichtenberger’s first known astrological writing and the publication of the Prognosticatio correspond to the reduction in his circumstances from an astrological consultant to the nobility to a simple parish priest.

How the work’s publication affected Lichtenberger remains unknown, but the Prognosticatio did bring Lichtenberger lasting fame and influence on later writers. Wolfgang Aytinger cited Lichtenberger in the 1490s as a “certain learned mathematician” who had rendered his judgment on the 1484 conjunction of Saturn and Jupiter.[13] A few sixteenth-century astrologers identified themselves as Lichtenberger’s disciples, but only decades after his death, including Johannes de Indagine in 1522. Peter Creutzer implausibly referred to Lichtenberger with the academic title magister in 1525 and later; and in 1545, he called Lichtenberger an “astronomer famed far and wide.”[14]

Yet Wolfgang Panzer’s 1788 annals of German literature describe Lichtenberger not as a learned astrologer but as a hermit from Alsace. Already in 1689, Wilhelm Tentzel had written that the title woodcut of one edition portrayed the author so much like a hermit that one could believe Lichtenberger had been a hermit rather than a priest.[15] How did the former astrological consultant to German nobility turned parish priest come to be known as a holy man living in sylvan seclusion? The refashioning of Lichtenberger’s authorial identity from royal astrologer to prophetic hermit began already in the first edition of the Prognosticatio and was all but complete by the years 1515–21, but the primary shaper of the authorial identity that made the Prognosticatio printable was not Johannes Lichtenberger.

A printed book is less the expression of an author’s intentions than a commercial product made through a rational division of labor, in which the author provides only one of the inputs and in which the author’s interests are far from paramount. The original Latin text, the German translation, the woodcut images, and the paratexts (including the title page, image captions, and colophon) were most likely the responsibility of at least four different people. The author, corrector, translator, artist, and compositor who produced each of these four parts of the printed book could say very different things about what kind of person the author was. We may tentatively identify the Latin text with the author Johannes Lichtenberger, although even the text may suffer from editorial intervention. The other three planes of representation were, in most cases, entirely outside the author’s control.

The text of the Prognosticatio depicts its author as a prophet in its own way. There are three ways to predict the future, Lichtenberger explains in his introduction: through long experience with the world and its ways; by the stars and the influence of the upper planets on the lower spheres; and by divine revelation through dreams, visions, or angels. Lichtenberger states that he will draw on all three possibilities in order to raise a voice of warning to his readers.[16] Lichtenberger’s claim to astrological and experiential authority was certainly plausible, but Lichtenberger also claimed to be the conduit of divine revelation by virtue of his compilation of prophetic writings. Although Lichtenberger sought to cover his tracks regarding the immediate sources from which he copied, he is quite straightforward about his philological method. He writes in his conclusion that he would not trust himself to put three letters of the alphabet in a row were it not for his confidence in the wisdom and kindness of all good learned men; and in the introduction, he compares himself to Ruth, gleaning the fields of Boaz for remaining kernels of wisdom following the rich harvests of previous wise men and astrologers.[17] In this allusion to the double sense of Latin legere (shared by German lesen), which can refer both to reading and to harvesting, Lichtenberger acknowledges his method of compilation: what he has written consists of what he has read. Yet Lichtenberger claims for the philological compiler, no less than for the voice of aged wisdom or the learned astrologer, the title prophet. The introduction closes with the author’s prayer to God (in fact, borrowed almost verbatim from Middelburg): “I call unto you and humbly reach out my folded hands to you, reverently asking that you might reveal unto your servant Ruth with your mighty help the qualities, judgments, and influences of your stars, to illuminate his reason with the glory of your eternal clarity, and to guide him in the path of truth. Awaken my reason and move my tongue and show me the correct way to predict future things.”[18] Although the desired mode of inspiration is based on reason and astrological interpretation, Lichtenberger asks to be a prophet of the spoken word (“move my tongue”) no less than biblical prophets like Ezekiel or Jeremiah. Lichtenberger describes both scholarship and revelation as paths to wisdom via the same spirit and states that any true prediction, whether through experience or through reading the stars or through revelation, must come from the Holy Spirit, who teaches all knowledge. Thus, according to Lichtenberger, the astrologer draws on no lesser source than the biblical and medieval prophets did.[19]

The model of the philologist compiler, as a mode of prophecy that did not require the explicit invocation of visionary experience, was a useful model of authorship for later writers. In Sebastian Brant’s prognostic broadsides, Brant proposed to bring to light hidden meanings through a combination of philological expertise and experience, while also appealing to biblical prophetic figures. “Beneath the mantle of the prophet hides the poet and learned historian,” Jan-Dirk Müller summarizes.[20] The influence of Lichtenberger’s prophetic self-construction can be seen also in the work of Johannes Virdung, prince of the German astrologers, whose fifty-year career was just beginning when the Prognosticatio was published in 1488. In anticipation of the next conjunction of Saturn and Jupiter in 1504, Virdung composed a prognostic booklet concerning the advent of a false prophet similar to the mouthpiece of the Antichrist foreseen in Lichtenberger’s Prognosticatio. The text of Virdung’s work, printed in two editions of 1503, incorporated both eschatological themes and astrological reasoning like the Prognosticatio, and the woodcuts included both astrological diagrams and images based on the illustration program of the Prognosticatio. Virdung, like Lichtenberger, presented himself as a prophet of both the written and the spoken word. The close of Virdung’s dedicatory epistle to Pfalzgraf Phillip is reminiscent of Lichtenberger’s prefatory prayer in its appeal to God, “whom,” Virdung says, “I implore daily on bended knees with fervent prayer that he might inflame the coldness of my heart with the fire of his love and illuminate my blindness with the clarity of his presence and reveal to me the correct path in this art [of astrology].”[21] On the verso following Virdung’s dedicatory epistle, a woodcut depicts the author as a prophet kneeling and gazing upward to God among the heavens in precisely the same manner as that found in Lichtenberger’s Prognosticatio fifteen years earlier. Virdung also embraced the role of editorial compiler. His judgment of the comet of 1506, for example, defends his gloomy predictions by affirming that they were simply that which he had learned and compiled from masters of natural learning.[22] In these works of the early sixteenth century, Virdung’s authorial identity continued Lichtenberger’s combination of astrologer, editor, and prophet. Although Virdung’s other works are principally astrological, Virdung and Lichtenberger experienced a posthumous intersection decades later. Virdung’s forty-year prognostication for 1524–63 was popular when it first appeared in the early 1520s, but it achieved a new burst of popularity twenty years later, when it appeared as the Great Practica together with a condensed version of Lichtenberger’s Prognosticatio in five editions of 1543–45.

The closest imitator of the prophetic role created by Lichtenberger, however, was Joseph Grünpeck (1473–1532).[23] Grünpeck was a humanist and scholar of diverse talents and interests whose early published works included a collection of Latin comedies, an astrological prognostication that quoted extensively from Lichtenberger, and a popular tract on the origins and treatment of syphilis that went through seven editions before the end of the fifteenth century. Grünpeck experienced the peak of his social advancement as court chaplain and secretary to Holy Roman Emperor Maximilian I (1459–1519), for whom he wrote historical chronicles and provided astrological advice, but Grünpeck’s own infection with syphilis preceded his fall from grace and loss of position in 1501. After a second syphilis tract in 1503, Grünpeck’s later work adopted a consistently prophetic voice to warn against moral decay and catastrophes to come. Beginning with a pamphlet interpreting recent prodigies, including monstrous births, a comet, and a rain of crosses that appeared in 1507, Grünpeck enjoyed nearly three decades of considerable success in print as the author of prophetic tracts. For Grünpeck and for Lichtenberger before him, experience, in the form of knowledge of history and how the world works, is an essential complement to astrology and prophecy in plotting the course of the future. Grünpeck’s most influential prophetic work, the Speculum naturalis caelestis et propheticae visionis omnium calamitatum (Mirror of the Natural Heavens and Prophetic Visions of All Calamities), was published in Latin and German translation in 1508, followed by later German editions around 1510 and two more in 1522.[24] Although the Speculum did not borrow extensively from Lichtenberger, Grünpeck attributed the prediction of disorder in the church to a “pious, just, and wise man,” whom he does not name but by whom Lichtenberger was clearly meant, for Grünpeck followed Lichtenberger’s manner of predicting the future.[25] While Grünpeck focused on the reformation of personal morality rather than on politics, his preface to the Speculum ascribes prophetic knowledge to the same three sources used by Lichtenberger: experience of history and current affairs; expertise in astrology; and compilation of divine revelation, which, for Grünpeck, included biblical and contemporary prophets. What Grünpeck drew from Lichtenberger, in other words, was his self-construction as prophet.

Grünpeck and Lichtenberger became unwitting collaborators through the publication of a pamphlet, likely compiled in 1515 but with the earliest known edition in 1516, that included extracts from the Prognosticatio and Grünpeck’s Speculum. Just as Lichtenberger prepared his compilation without acknowledging his sources, the tract made no mention of Lichtenberger or Grünpeck and instead described itself as “an extract of various practicas and prophecies of Sibyl, Birgitta, Cyril, the Abbot Joachim, Methodius and Brother Reinhart, which will last several years yet and tells of wonderful things.”[26] Some ten editions appeared in the years 1516–18. Twelve further editions followed, including one in almost every year between 1523 and 1529 and two final editions in 1540. In 1530, the Extract of Various Prophecies began to appear in combination with other prognostic works, first of all with an astrological prognostication by Johann Carion, much to the astrologer’s dismay. Beginning in 1532, it appeared with the sibylline and prophetic collections of the printer Christian Egenolff of Frankfurt. For the 1532 compilation, Egenolff expanded the list of prophetic contributors on the title page to include Lichtenberger, suggesting that he attributed the Extract of Various Prophecies to Lichtenberger. He did not list Grünpeck as a prophetic contributor until 1537.

FROM PROPHETIC COMPILER TO FOREST HERMIT

Although Lichtenberger described his role as that of a compiler, the title page of the first edition of the Prognosticatio emphasized the work’s novelty. While Lichtenberger stated that he would draw on experience and prophetic visions as well as astrology, the title mentions only eclipses and conjunctions. In calling the work a “rare and never before heard prognostication that sets forth and declares many influences and the tendency of certain constellations of the great conjunction and eclipse that have occurred in these years, and what they portend for this world for good or evil at this time and in the future, and which shall last for many years,”[27] the title formulation narrows Lichtenberger’s prophetic function, misrepresents his work’s content, and distorts his methods and his relationship to the text.

But after the title page, the images and paratextual presentation of the Prognosticatio take the opposite approach. Where Lichtenberger had alluded to himself as a prophet, the printers, translators, and artists who ultimately controlled the work’s presentation depicted the author much more directly as a forest hermit similar to Brother Reinhart. The cowled robe, walking stick, and rosary borne by Reinhart in the first woodcut of the Prognosticatio belonged already to a stock figure known in contemporary sources as the Waldbruder, the Lollard, or the Nollhart, a prophetic forest hermit warning of impending catastrophe and admonishing repentance, who was embodied by living examples into the seventeenth century.[28] Following the first woodcut showing five of the work’s prophetic sources receiving divine wisdom, the second woodcut depicts the author of the Prognosticatio as a monk in immediate dialogue with God (see figure 4). The image’s title, originally intended as instructions to an artist or compositor but retained in the printed text, states: “The praying man with bended knees and clasped hands should be located here and pray as follows.” The author is shown with his eyes lifted to the same God that had inspired the five prophetic authorities in the previous woodcut.[29] Rather than a mere scene of prayer to correspond to the author’s textual plea for divine inspiration, the artist created a scene of dialogic revelation.

The final woodcut in a Strasbourg edition of the Prognosticatio depicts Lichtenberger as the central figure in the complete sequence of prophetic communication.[30] In it, a man is seated at a writing desk with his hands on an open book, but he looks back over his shoulder up to God in heaven. He listens while God raises his hands and points in the manner of speaking. Behind the writing desk, three men stand ready to receive the divine message from the prophet. The woodcut leaves ambiguous whether the man is writing his revelations into the book or receiving revelation through his reading of the book and whether the audience is expecting the prophet to tell them what he has heard or to give them the book he is writing.

Where Lichtenberger’s Latin text had compared the author to Ruth in rure, “in the countryside,” the German translation places him in der wiltnüß, “in the wilderness.”[31] After the author’s conclusion, the printer’s colophon refers to the author as “the pilgrim Ruth hidden in the forests, whose eyes have grown dark and whose stylus trembles under the weight of old age,” giving Lichtenberger both a woodland location and a religious calling.[32] The translator intervened even more directly in forming the author’s image by removing Lichtenberger’s name from the text entirely. In German versions until 1527, the author of the Prognosticatio appears solely as the “pilgrim Ruth,” with all connections to the historical Johannes Lichtenberger severed.

Lichtenberger’s vague gestures and the printer’s more direct measures tying him to the figure of a prophetic forest hermit had a lasting effect on Lichtenberger’s reputation. Around the same time that the first edition of the Extract of Various Prophecies appeared, the printer and dramatist Pamphilus Gengenbach of Basel wrote a Shrovetide play entitled Der Nollhart, which, according to the title page, was performed in Basel in 1515 and printed by Gengenbach himself in two 1517 editions. Gengenbach’s primary sources were Lichtenberger’s Prognosticatio and Aytinger’s tract on Methodius, and the play is staged as a series of confrontations between the cast of prophetic authorities known from Lichtenberger and a series of political leaders and threats to perceived order, including Turks, Jews, and Swiss separatists.[33] After Gengenbach’s two editions of his own work in 1517, three further editions in Augsburg and Erfurt followed by 1525, and Jakob Cammerlander published two more editions of a revised version known as The Old and New Brother Nollhart in 1544–45. While Gengenbach is a significant figure for Reformation drama, Karl Goedeke saw Der Nollhart as a heavy burden for any estimation of Gengenbach’s artistic achievement, and he felt himself ill prepared to comment on it.[34] In Gengenbach’s play, Nollhart is not only a figure in several dialogues but also speaks the opening monologue, next to which a woodcut depicts him as an aged man wearing a robe and holding a walking stick and rosary beads, much as Reinhart appeared in the Prognosticatio woodcuts. The woodcut illustrations of Nollhart’s confrontations later in the play add a cowl to his robe and a book to his iconic possessions. In the prologue, Nollhart mentions eclipses and the art of astronomy, decries the confusion of social order, and complains that his prophetic book of 1488 has been ignored. The reference to 1488 removes any doubt that Gengenbach identified Lichtenberger, as the author of the Prognosticatio, with Nollhart and Reinhart, the forest hermit.[35]

Alexander Seitz’s 1521 Warning of a Deluge, a tract that figured prominently in the controversy surrounding predicted flooding for 1524, cites “Brother Nollhart” as a credible witness of oncoming catastrophe.[36] In addition, an uncataloged prophetic tract of the early 1520s, a reworking of a prophecy dating to the 1460s, calls itself a revelation given to the “pious priest and hermit Gigebaldus in a forest.” These references to forest hermits attest the continued prominence of a stock figure to which the text and presentation of the Prognosticatio connected Lichtenberger. The culmination of the depiction of Lichtenberger as a forest hermit can be seen in the title woodcut of the 1521 edition of the Prognosticatio, in which the five prophetic authorities of all earlier and later editions are here joined by a sixth, a beardless man who shares the hooded cloak of the hermit Reinhart but who points to signs in the heavens in the typical astronomer’s pose. There can be little doubt that this is Lichtenberger himself, at last given a place in the pantheon of his own prophetic authorities.[37]

In the conclusion of the Prognosticatio, Lichtenberger takes his leave by excusing his inadequacies and asking for his readers’ goodwill, and he urges them to recognize the impending events so that they might be avoided or else so that readers might take the opportunity for humble repentance if disaster nevertheless befalls them. The following paragraph is the colophon, and the voice that describes the author in the third person as “the pilgrim Ruth who lies hidden in the forests” no longer belongs to the author. That this section was understood as the printer’s colophon rather than an authorial text seems apparent in the related 1500–1501 editions from Bartholomaeus Kistler, Matthias Hupfuff, and Hans Schobser, which all replaced it with a table of contents or the later printer’s own colophon. The tension between the author and the printed presentation of his work is particularly noticeable in two pages that followed the colophon in the first editions. The first page presents a version of the oak gall prophecy and a corresponding woodcut. According to this widespread prophecy, here attributed to an aptly named Silvanus, if one opens an oak gall (on a particular day of the year, in some versions) and finds a spider, mosquito, or worm, one can expect death, war, or a rich harvest, respectively.[38] Lichtenberger’s text had limited itself to compiling the work of the learned and the inspired, and nowhere did it suggest that readers should attempt to predict the future for themselves. Practical prognostic rules are found nowhere else in the Prognosticatio except on this page, and reading the future in oak galls bears little resemblance to Lichtenberger’s astrological and eschatological material.[39] Barbara Baert comments that Lichtenberger’s “prognosis for the layman ends on a playful note,”[40] but it had, in fact, already ended on the previous page. Talkenberger suggests that Lichtenberger claimed to have learned the prognostic rules from a forester named Silvanus,[41] but Lichtenberger was making no claims at all in these last few pages of the Prognosticatio, which follow the author’s closing statement. The compiler of the Prognosticatio had already said his final word, and the printer has taken over.

The oak gall prophecy is not the last word in the Prognosticatio. On the next page, one of Lichtenberger’s prophetic authorities returns. A woodcut shows Reinhart the Lollard in a hooded robe holding a rosary in his right hand, as in the illustration of prophetic authorities, while extending his left hand to two women, who are giving him coins. The Latin verse (recorded elsewhere as early as 1458) compares the Lollard’s dealings with women to Reinhard the Fox’s stalking of birds, while the German text states in verse: “Brother Lolhart is my name / among women I spread my fame. / To lighten their burden of money / is why I flatter with a voice of honey.”[42] Talkenberger, who notes that the discrepancy between the deceitful Lollard of the woodcut and the trusted prophetic authority earlier in the Prognosticatio could have been perceived to undermine the authority of Lichtenberger himself (as most later editions omit it or replace it with images that reinforced, rather than undermined, the work’s authority), suggests that the final Lollard page was meant as a warning against devious wandering preachers.[43]

But the woodcut does not owe its presence to Lichtenberger, whose text had already concluded. What we find on the last page of the Prognosticatio is yet another printer’s addition, an unsurprising one. What brought the oak gall prognostic and the Lollard verse into association with the Prognosticatio is the similarity of their author figures. The colophon had called Lichtenberger the “pilgrim Ruth, hidden in the forest,” and the German oak gall verse attributes it specifically to a forester, making explicit the woodland associations of the name Silvanus found in the Latin verse, just as the Brother Reinhart or Nollhart figure was associated with religious forest hermits. The similar woodland associations of all three presumptive authors motivated the association of the texts but makes it even more improbable that Lichtenberger was the instigator of their association, as mocking the Lollard as a defrauder of women undermined not just one of his sources but the one whose prophetic identity was nearest to his own.

Kurze and Talkenberger view the woodcut captions throughout the Prognosticatio as the instructions of Johannes Lichtenberger to the illustrator,[44] but woodcuts were usually the responsibility of the printer or publisher, not the author. The two final woodcuts are preceded by captions given in the form of instructions, like other captions in the Prognosticatio: “Here should stand the branch of an oak with leaves and upon the leaves oak apples”; “A Lollard should stand here and speak these words.”[45] If the deceitful Lollard undermined the authority of Lichtenberger’s sources or his own credibility, it is unlikely that these or any other woodcuts or captions reflected Lichtenberger’s instructions.

Undermining Lichtenberger’s authority did serve the printer’s interests, however. While the mixing of astrology and prophecy was the actual attraction of the Prognosticatio, it was also the source of greatest anxiety. Therefore it is striking that the opening and closing thresholds of the Prognosticatio minimize the association: the title emphasized only astrology, while the Lollard woodcut undermined popular prophecy. These two key places by which readers—including censors—might enter the text attempted to forestall official concerns, while the internal presentation exaggerated Lichtenberger’s prophetic identity, apparently with success: the 1492 condemnation of the Prognosticatio by the faculty of theology in Cologne had no apparent effect on the work’s popularity. While Lichtenberger had no reason to undermine the authority of his sources, the printer, with a much greater economic stake in avoiding censorship, had means, motive, and opportunity for ending the Prognosticatio with a weakening of the work’s message.

Lichtenberger compiled a text that was conveyed into the hands of a printer. Everything else in the Prognosticatio, including the title, woodcuts, captions, and colophon, is the creative contribution of someone primarily concerned not with writing but with printing and selling. The author-prophet compatible with the medium of print was created partly by Lichtenberger through his text but also, perhaps primarily, by illustrators, translators, and publishers.

PROPHETS AND PARATEXTS: JOHANN CARION

The construction of prophetic authorship takes place, to a large degree, through paratexts. Early modern authors could choose their words, and if they had particular good fortune, their words might be set on the printed page more or less accurately. What was largely outside their control, however, was whether or not a printer chose to present the author as a visionary, a scholar, a scoundrel, or a fool. A particularly interesting case among early modern astrologer-prophets is Johann Carion (1499–1537), who at one time or another was regarded as all of these. His posthumous scholarly reputation rested on his historical chronicle, which was revised and extended by Philipp Melanchthon and others, while his contemporaries knew Carion primarily as an astrologer. Hermann Wilken repeated in 1597 the charge of necromancy that Carion’s rival Andreas Perlach had first lodged in the 1530s, while Theodor Simitz’s prognostication for 1563–66 lauded Carion for having accurately predicted the Peasants’ War and all that happened from 1536 until 1554.[46] But later centuries remembered Carion mainly as the author of a prophetic vision. Johann Carion was moreover acutely aware of how title pages, dedicatory epistles, and association with other tracts affected the reception of his work, and his comments illustrate the relationship between texts and paratexts in the first half of the sixteenth century.

The dedicatory epistle of Carion’s first astrological practica, published in 1518 when he was not yet twenty, concedes that he could “barely be called a schoolboy in the art” of astrology, but the title page describes him already as an academic magister and astrologer for Prince-elector Joachim of Brandenburg. The structure of Carion’s first practica follows contemporary models in every respect, and Carion’s manner of prediction is scholarly and reserved. Carion’s next publication, his contribution to the controversy over the ominous conjunction of 1524, is an altogether different kind of work. It was both popular, with at least five editions in 1521–22, and controversial, attacking his fellow astrologer Alexander Seitz by name.[47] Carion’s Prognostication and Explanation of the Great Precipitation and Other Shocking Consequences is also explicitly prophetic. The work begins with eighty lines of German verse that allegorize the conjunctions of 1524 as a lord going hunting and visiting various houses or people, following which Carion explains the obscure meanings to his readers. Carion foresaw storms and flooding, although not the second deluge some had feared, but he also predicts insurrection, disunity, and persecution, eventually followed by secular and religious reformation. Carion furthermore embraced the prophetic tropes of a righteous and victorious emperor symbolized as an eagle and, citing Pierre d’Ailly, anticipated the birth of the Antichrist in 1693 and uproar and revolution in 1789.[48] Carion cited prophetic authorities in support of his predictions, including Methodius, Joachim of Fiore, and Hildegard of Bingen.

Carion’s next appearance in print came in 1526 with the Interpretation and Revelation of True Heavenly Influences, whose various editions exemplify printers’ ability to rapidly exploit the market opportunities of a popular work. Carion’s prognostication for the years 1527–40 became the most frequently reprinted astrological tract of the second quarter of the sixteenth century, with nearly thirty independent editions before 1550 and five further editions in which Carion’s work was combined with the prognostication of Salomon von Roermond. The earliest editions contain predictions for the years until 1540, while editions printed after 1530 extend the predictions to 1550.

In the Interpretation and Revelation, Carion appears to return to a scientific astrology based only on the observation of eclipses and planetary conjunctions, and he emphasized that any trained astrologer can confirm his predictions by repeating the observations. Carion opened his dedicatory epistle to Christoffel Rygler, a priest and relative, by surveying the state of astrological prognostication and publishing, in which Carion finds much amiss.

Reverent and worthy sir, in this our time, prophecies and predictions constantly appear everywhere, now by one author and then by another. Some are based on the intuition of the writer or prophet, while others are based on a theoretical foundation, but few of these have been seen up until now. Therefore I suppose that the printers themselves invent practicas, cast them among the people as new works, extol the prophecies, and give them such a striking and provocative title that the reader cannot hold back; he must buy one as soon as he sees it. But when he comes to the actual material, it is sealed by fresh curds, and often the prologue is longer than the whole work that the title applies to. Therefore, reverent sir, I am impelled to cast a prognostication according to true and fundamental heavenly influences lasting for several following years until one writes the year 1540 after the birth of Christ.[49]

Carion’s complaint assailed amateur astrologers who lacked a systematic understanding of the art, but it even more vehemently attacked publishers’ abuse of paratextual devices. The title pages of their booklets proclaimed the novelty of the material (even when this was not justified, as with Lichtenberger) and promised to reveal upcoming catastrophes, but their actual content was far more restrained. The substantive contributions of astrology were suffering, according to Carion, because printers could dispense with expertise grounded in a coherent theory of astrological prognostication and yet continue to sell their wares based on inflammatory title pages. In the tension between texts and their presentation, the paratexts seemed to be gaining the upper hand.

Following the dedication of the Interpretation and Revelation, Carion included a short excursus on the calling of biblical prophets, many of whose prophecies, according to Carion, were even then being fulfilled. Carion provided lengthy excerpts from the first two chapters of Habakkuk (with explicit comparison of the Babylonian king to the Turkish emperor) and the ninth chapter of Daniel, before closing the prefatory material with a call for unity directed at the nobility. This closing paragraph addressed to the “heads of Christendom” is difficult to reconcile with Carion’s earlier request to Christoffel Rygler, his dedicatee, not to publish the work but, rather, to keep it for his own use, as well as with Carion’s later complaint that the first editions of the Interpretation and Revelation had appeared without his permission.

Carion seems to have been especially aggravated by a 1530 reprint of his Interpretation and Revelation by Georg Rhau of Wittenberg, who printed Carion’s astrological work together with the Extract of Various Prophecies, drawn from Grünpeck and Lichtenberger.[50] Following Carion’s work and opposite a woodcut of Lichtenberger’s prophetic authorities, the standard title formulation of the Extract identifies only prophetic sources: Birgitta, Joachim of Fiore, the Sibyl, Cyril, and Methodius. The following year, Carion published the extended version of the Interpretation and Revelation with prognostications until 1550. In his dedication to Joachim, prince-elector of Brandenburg, Carion made clear his displeasure over Rhau’s edition—but the dedication also shows that authorship in the world of early printing is not nearly as simple as it may appear.

Illustrious, noble-born Lord and Prince, with my entire submissive obedience and dutiful service toward Your Princely Grace ever offered at all times. Your Grace, I refer to the general proverb “He who carries off his own goods causes no loss to another; but he who hides art and does not share it (like that which comes from the uppermost influences and tendencies to every person) is unjust to many.” I often observe and see that prophecies and practicas are published almost daily now in our time almost everywhere, first from one person and then from some other, and the majority (as I note) based only on the intuition of those soothsayers or would-be astronomers. There are also some based on a theoretical foundation, of which very few have been seen up until now, however. Therefore I believe that perhaps the printers or other people lacking experience in this art invent them on their own (as they maintain no proper order or method and they misuse technical terms) and cast them among the common people as new works, and they give these prophecies such a striking and provocative title that the reader cannot resist when he sees them; he must buy one. But when one then comes to the actual material (the master’s hammer) it is sealed (with what I don’t know). Therefore, My Grace, I was impelled again for Your Princely Grace’s honor and for the common good [to revise] my Prognostication that I made around four years ago (which nevertheless was published without my consent) and that now again has been printed behind my back with the attachment of various loose scraps from Lolhart, Birgitta, Methodius and so on, whom I have abhorred my whole life. And they take this step for no reason. I could have tolerated it if they had wanted to print my practica, if only they had left it with my own words, but they had no leave to add the dreams of monks, Lollards [Nolbrüder], or nuns. In order to refute all of this, I was motivated to improve and lengthen it until one will write the year 1550 after the birth of Christ. Whoever is living then may extend it further.[51]

The incongruities here are numerous. This is, first of all, only a slightly expanded version of the same dedication that had appeared in the earlier editions, but it is now addressed to an electoral prince rather than to a mere priest. The dedication further claims that the first editions (presumably including all twelve editions before 1531) were unauthorized. Carion objects to the inclusion of the Extract of Various Prophecies, based partly on Lichtenberger’s Prognosticatio, and yet Carion begins the dedication with a proverb comparing hiding treasure and hiding books, which Lichtenberger had also applied to prognostication in the opening sentence of the Prognosticatio.[52] Carion claims to have always been hostile toward the dreaming of monks and nuns like Birgitta and Methodius, yet his own 1521 Prognostication and Explanation of the Great Precipitation had cited Hildegard of Bingen, Joachim of Fiore, and Methodius himself.[53] Carion’s historical chronicle, also written in the early 1530s, regards some of the Sibyls as preachers of true patristic teachings (where others mixed Christian and heathen ideas or revealed diabolical inspiration), and he concludes with a note that affirms the connection of history, astrological prognostication, and the end times, just as it had appeared in his prognostication for 1524: “Let me remind the reader of Elijah’s words, touched on earlier, that the world shall remain for 6,000 years. Now this year after the birth of Christ 1532 is 5,474 years since the beginning of the world. Hopefully, therefore, we are not far from the end. One should note that we should be all the more cautious when we hear that the Last Day is here, for all writings, and even heaven itself, with terrible signs, eclipses, and conjunctions, warn that at the Last Day great dissension of the Christian Church and all governments will come.”[54] In later editions, Carion added additional borrowings from prophetic tracts, including a prophecy attributed to an old book found in Magdeburg that had first appeared in a prophetic compilation attributed to Jakob Pflaum.[55] Far from always having opposed prophecy or even having turned away from it, Carion’s work continued, until the end of his career, to combine astrological reasoning with apocalyptic chronology and a prophet’s warning voice.

Perhaps Carion’s complaint about the combination of his work with the Extract of Various Prophecies was heard, however, as publishers of his Interpretation and Revelation after 1531 did not again reprint his astrological prognostications together with extracts from late medieval prophets. Between 1539 and 1543, the title pages of Carion’s extended prognostications for the years 1540–50 (a total of eleven editions) explicitly disavow the inclusion of any extraneous material in their titles (“without any foreign addition or appendix”), even though publishers faced a yearly reduction in the work’s relevance, for which easy compensatory measures vanished following Carion’s untimely death in 1537.

If Carion objected to the association of his astrological work with discreditable prophecies, then his expanded version becomes all the more curious for closing with a short prophecy (referred to on title pages in 1531 and afterward as a “Hidden Prophecy”), the work that would come to define Carion’s reputation. The prophecy opens, “A sad eagle flew in much toil and trouble for a long time and set the nest for his young on a golden tower,” and it presents an allegory of the internal affairs and foreign relations of the Holy Roman Emperors beginning with Maximilian I. The identities of the various figures are revealed by heraldic allusions, which Johann Christoph Adelung held to represent historical reality until 1529 (and thus reveal the time of the prophecy’s composition).[56] The eagle had been a stock character in prophetic and apocalyptic writing already in biblical apocrypha, and contemporary prophetic texts include allegorical eagles without comment. Even Carion’s specific variety, a “sad eagle,” is already found in Lichtenberger’s Prognosticatio and attributed to Brother Reinhart.

The use of symbolic language similar to prophetic works that Carion claimed to despise is not the only incongruity concerning the “Hidden Prophecy.” Carion stated in his dedicatory introduction that he had extended the earlier version with prognostications for the years 1541–50, but he says nothing of adding a hidden prophecy, and the chronological horizons of the two sections differ. Carion assumed that those still living in 1550 would extend his work to later years, but the introduction to the “Hidden Prophecy” foresees events reaching to 1560.[57] After Carion’s first-person astrological prognostication for 1550 closes with a prayer for eternal peace and a final “Amen,” a third-person editorial voice intrudes to introduce the “Hidden Prophecy” as a work of “Master Johann Carion of Bütigeim,”[58] so that one can question whether Carion intended the two works to circulate together. Yet Carion never disavowed the prophecy during his lifetime, despite opportunities to do so, so it cannot be dismissed as a false attribution.

Carion states in the introduction to the “Hidden Prophecy” that he had long desired to write something to warn the pious and frighten scoundrels but that he had not been able to do so adequately. Nevertheless, at the end of the Interpretation and Revelation, Carion wanted to “append a little until I eventually become less busy and explain it more clearly in its own booklet.” The “Hidden Prophecy” was included in Carion’s Interpretation and Revelation from 1531 onward and was printed as an independent tract with an anonymous interpretation ten times from 1546 to 1548 and four more times in the second half of the sixteenth century. In 1542, Johannes Virdung’s prognostication for 1524–63 was reprinted four times with Carion’s “Hidden Prophecy” added as a concluding appendix. Five Strasbourg editions of 1543–49 combine the more openly apocalyptic prognostication of Salomon of Roermond with Carion’s Interpretation and Revelation and “Hidden Prophecy” as well as the prophecies of a Brother Raimund.[59] The “Hidden Prophecy” was also included in numerous prophetic collections of the later sixteenth, seventeenth, and even eighteenth centuries; Adelung refers in 1787 to contemporary editions.[60] The “Hidden Prophecy” proved to be Carion’s most enduring prognostic work, but it ensured him a place among the prophets that he so vigorously rejected. Editions of Carion’s Interpretation and Revelation grew progressively thinner as they dropped the predictions for each passing year, but in each case, they closed with the “Hidden Prophecy.” Soon it was all that remained of the Interpretation and Revelation. When Christian Egenolff began printing prophetic compilations in Frankfurt, the only contribution from the astrologer Johann Carion was the “Hidden Prophecy.” The appendix had outlived the text.

Just as the authorial identity of Johannes Lichtenberger in the text, in the paratextual presentation of the Prognosticatio, and from the known facts of the author’s biography are often contradictory, so it is with Carion and his work, with the added complication that Carion’s attitude toward prophecy is at odds with itself. Despite the appearance created in the dedicatory epistle to the electoral prince of Brandenburg in the expanded edition of his Interpretation and Revelation, Carion is not simply a proponent of a scientific astrology untainted by superstitious prophecy. He cannot even be regarded as a penitent ruing his prior dalliances with monks and nuns, for intersections with the prophetic continue in the Interpretation and Revelation. The “Hidden Prophecy” added to later editions underscores that the Interpretation and Revelation represents not a break with Carion’s earlier prophetic tone but a continuation of it by other means.

3

PROPHETS AND THEIR READERS

SILENCING READERS

The closer relative and nearer antecedent of Johannes Lichtenberger’s Prognosticatio was not any of the monumental editions of Birgitta of Sweden’s collected works but, rather, an early fifteenth-century compilation of revelations known as the Onus mundi, or Burden of the World, which appeared in five printed editions between 1481 and 1522.[1] The compiler, Johannes Tortsch (before 1400–1445), had included selections from additional prophetic authorities, including a Sibyl, Joachim of Fiore, and Hildegard of Bingen, so that Birgitta appeared in the Burden of the World as the preeminent prophetic authority of her time but also as one voice in a prophetic chorus, much as she appeared in the Prognosticatio. In the early 1430s, as Johannes Tortsch was preparing a fourth redaction of the Burden of the World, he added a preface that was soon translated into German and included in all printed editions until 1572 but that is only conceivable in the technological and social context of late medieval manuscript culture.

Tortsch began by giving precise instructions for how the work was to be transmitted.

Any person into whose hands this little book comes should preserve it diligently and make every effort that the things that are written in it should be made known to other people. And whoever has this book should not only lend it to other people, but should also lead people to it and tell them about it, so that he may receive a greater reward from God in the next life, for it is written: He who preaches me will have eternal life. Any person who wants to have this book copied, which is called the Burden of the World, should have it copied in such a size that it will be a small volume separate from other books, in order that it might more easily come to the attention of many people. For if this little book were to be combined with another large book, it would be all but lost and would not become so well known, especially since there are few people who read and diligently search the material of large books.[2]

Not only did Tortsch expect that readers of his compilation would participate in the production and distribution of additional copies and the proclamation of its contents, but he also believed that readers had an affirmative moral duty to do so. The seventeenth chapter pronounces blessings on each person who “works with good sense and according to his ability to make the prophecies known to the people.”[3] The eighteenth chapter equally admonishes both preachers and “all those to whom this revelation comes,” while the nineteenth chapter is addressed specifically to preachers. As God had appointed the prophet Ezekiel both a preacher to and watchman over the Jews, “it follows that a preacher, that is a watchman over the Christian people, who hears these things in his reading is obliged by God to proclaim these things to the same people, for thus speaks Isidore [Sententiae III.8.2]: ‘When we read, God speaks to us.’ And thus when any preacher reads the aforementioned words of Christ, he therefore hears them from Christ. And thus it follows that he is obliged to proclaim those words by the mandate of Christ to the people over whom he is a watchman.”[4] By Tortsch’s logic, readers of the word via the medium of the manuscript become immediate hearers of the spoken word, and hearers of the word are themselves prophets, with a prophet’s duty to proclaim the word aloud and in writing. Tortsch imagined Birgitta’s revelations spreading along a chain of reader-prophets who are both receivers and broadcasters of her revelations. In a similar fashion, an edition of the Sibyl’s Prophecy of the early 1490s placed above the title woodcut four lines of verse that commend the work not to readers who want to know the future but to those who want to say the future.[5]

Although Tortsch’s belief that readers should assume a prophet’s dual communicative function was preserved in printed editions of the Burden of the World until the late sixteenth century, the idea was very much rooted in the religious, educational, and media context that was already changing in the fifteenth century. Tortsch, a theologian and university rector in Leipzig, wrote in Latin; the popular German translations came quickly, but from another hand. At a time when literacy still largely implied the ability to read Latin and when schooling was still closely intertwined with ecclesiastical training, Tortsch could assume a close alignment of interests between preachers and the readers for whom he wrote. Moreover, the habits of learned reading, including the jotting of marginal notes and compilation of extracts, were themselves part of book production in a manuscript culture. Tortsch could reasonably believe that his readers would be willing and able to disseminate the Burden of the World in both oral and written form.

The printing press, invented not long after Tortsch’s death around 1445, would soon fundamentally alter those assumptions. An author’s reading public no longer primarily comprised those to whom he or she presented a manuscript and others within their close acquaintance; rather, it included an anonymous mass audience who were principally consumers of the written word with little role in the production or transmission of books. The manuscript-reading public of known individuals of a specific social class and educational background was replaced by the dispersed mass audience. Encouraging readers to take action, any action, became subject to more anxiety and official scrutiny.

While the relationship of books and readers from an earlier era could linger in fossilized form long after it had become anachronistic, awareness of a changed state of affairs can already be observed in the fifteenth century. One sees the difference quite clearly in how Lichtenberger’s Prognosticatio treats its readers. Over forty years after Tortsch’s death, Lichtenberger’s audience, whether by reading or by hearing, is all but commanded to remain silent. After Lichtenberger establishes his authority based on his long experience, careful reading of prophetic works, and expertise in astrology, he draws a stark contrast between experts and amateurs (in a passage borrowed from a 1472 comet tract attributed to Eberhard Schleusinger): “According to Aristotle, no one is a good judge of things that he does not know. . . . And the ignorant should keep their foolishness hidden instead of flapping their mouths, so that their ignorance is not revealed. And even if they are experienced and learned in many things, yet they are ignorant in the things that are described below, of which they cannot be judges and arbitrators.”[6] Even learned men in other fields are ignorant in the ways of astrology, Lichtenberger states, and the ignorant should keep their mouths shut. The relationship between text and audience in the Prognosticatio is, in contrast to the Burden of the World, one where readers are exclusively receivers of the prophetic word who should have no involvement in its dissemination. In the print context of the Prognosticatio, instructions on what size and format to use for new copies of the work, such as those provided by Johannes Tortsch, would have been pointless, as most readers had no access to the means of textual mass production. While writing and copying manuscripts remained common for centuries after the invention of print, it was already losing its validity as a form of publication by 1488.

The readers envisioned by Lichtenberger no longer participate in the communal transmission of the prophetic word. The proper effect on wise readers is quiet reflection, according to Lichtenberger, while oral reactions are consistently disdained as jaw-wagging libel or foolish gossip. In this, Lichtenberger differs from contemporary prophetic tracts but is in broad agreement with his astrologer colleagues. An anonymous Tract against the Turks that cited Methodius as well as Joachim of Fiore, Hildegard of Bingen, Birgitta of Sweden, and anonymous visions, known in four Latin and one German edition of 1474–86, had regarded prophecy as something given to the simple rather than the wise and by which the mighty would be confounded.[7] Joseph Grünpeck also regarded the reception and preaching of divine revelation as the province of the unlearned.[8] Contemporary astrologers, however, wished that critics might have their mouths restrained (Wenzel Faber in 1485), plugged (Johannes Virdung in 1525), or sewn shut (Christophorus de Glotz in 1496).[9] The alienation of the reader from prophetic speaking is affirmed by a caption that adorned the title page of Heinrich Steiner’s 1525 edition of the Prognosticatio, citing 1 Corinthians 2:14: “The natural man perceives nothing of the Spirit of God.”[10] Prophecy, by this account, is something for experts.

SELLING PROPHECY TO THE MASSES: PRINTING THE PROGNOSTICATIO

The printing press was not always or even primarily a tool of intellectual renaissance. “Far from reflecting a mood of optimism, often attributed to the revival of classical learning, this new technology expressed the deeply felt anxiety of Christian Europe,” including the internal threats represented by Jews and heretics (and, one might add, social unrest) and the external threat of Turkish invasion, as Ronnie Hsia has noted.[11] In addition to reflecting the concerns of European society, print itself became a focus of anxiety, as heretical books could find broad circulation and as error could be perpetuated in many copies. The press also promoted the distribution of theological works in vernacular translation to unlearned readers, with unwelcome consequences.[12] Due to the economics of print, the size of the audience had to be maximized in order to justify the initial investment and increase the potential profit. From the time of Gutenberg onward, the technology of print compelled publishers to expand their distribution beyond the literate elite to include the literate masses, particularly new urban classes including merchants, city officials, and skilled craftsmen. This audience was not yet composed of the reading peasants and milkmaids that so concerned the moralists of the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries, but it did represent an expansion of reading and market power compared to earlier generations. Each step taken to adapt literature to the needs and expectations of new readers, including use of the vernacular and inclusion of images, heightened the anxiety over its accessibility and, with that, the dilemma for printers: a booklet every cartwright clamors to read might bring in a nice profit, but rioting was bad for business. Official censorship could be just as ruinous, as Matthias Hupfuff discovered in 1504, when the city council of Strasbourg forbade him from selling six hundred already printed copies of a polemical pamphlet.[13] Rather than banning the book itself, the city council prevented him from recovering his expenses or making any form of profit from the book.

Prophetic and prognostic works represent a distillation of the primal hopes and fears of a society. Their contents, almost by definition, span all that might happen, for good or for ill, from ultimate victory to world-ending disaster. Astrologer Johannes Seger referred in the preface to his practica for 1518 to “much good for which one hopes and evil that one fears, which one might obtain by diligence, or forestall.”[14]

One of the frequently expressed fears is the threat of social disorder. The connection between end-time expectation and concerns about social turmoil was, of course, nothing new. Already Adso’s tenth-century Letter on the Antichrist begins by noting that there are many Antichrists, for anyone who disrupts the social fabric might be regarded as such: “Any layman, cleric, or monk who lives in a way contrary to justice, who attacks the rule of his order of life, and blasphemes the good, he is an Antichrist, a minister of Satan.”[15] In the late fifteenth century, prognostic and prophetic works often warned of social unrest. Leonhard Seybold, for example, argued that the governing influence of Mars with the aid of Mercury in the year 1485 would result in “recalcitrance of the people against their superiors and vengeance against those whom by all rights they should obey.”[16] The tract On the End of the World attributed to Vincent Ferrer and published in German translation together with the Tract against the Turks in 1486 foresaw that laymen would become so scornful of the learned that they would presume to do God a favor when they killed them and trampled them underfoot.[17] Predictions of disaster in the form of popular unrest continued in the sixteenth century, including in the tracts on the conjunction of 1524 by Johann Carion and Johannes Virdung. Anton Brelochs’s prognostication based on a comet observed in 1531 warned that the “greater part of the common people will work for unity, but some contentious and rebellious people will now and then attempt many secret attacks and oppose their rulers and be known as seditious, but such scoundrels will receive their reward in the end.”[18] Popular unrest remained in the standard inventory of future woes in the prophetic tracts attributed to Wilhelm Friess, which appeared in 1557 and later: “Among the common people, a great revolt against the lords will arise. The noblemen will discover the traitors and give them over to the sword and will take from them all their wealth and possessions and grant them no protection and peace.”[19]

Even when prophecy is enlisted in the cause of agitation for political reform, disorder is not treated sympathetically but remains a catastrophe to be avoided. A 1525 edition of the Extracts of Various Prophecies is notable for adding concluding remarks that call worldly rulers the true Turks and warn of their fall from power within a few years.[20] Yet even this radical appendix sees the recent Peasants’ War as a violation of the divine social order and regards its brutal suppression as a just punishment for rebellion. The anonymous redactor called for peasants to fulfill their divinely appointed roles as laborers for the sustenance of all. Whether speaking for institutional authority or radical reformers, the prophetic and prognostic works that expressed the hopes and fears of their age regarded social disorder as a fear-some event.

But prophecy in print did not just express anxieties. It was itself the focal point of concerns related to social structure and social disorder. Through print, as Müller observes, the danger of unrest grew exponentially.[21] According to Grünpeck, while prophecies and visions could warn wicked men to abandon their sinful ways and could fortify the devout in their virtue and good works, there are nevertheless those “evil and perverted men who through diabolical inspiration sow many seeds of hate, enmity, and violence among the people in the guise of prophecy, bringing a bountiful harvest of sacrilege, deceit, and murder, so that they might con-found the entire order of religion” (or, in the German editions, “all human and divine orders”).[22] Lichtenberger’s Prognosticatio itself attests the anxiety over prophecy and social unrest in its description of a future false prophet.

For when the man, wise and fair of speech, reaches the age of discernment, he will carefully consider the celestial motions and then cause commotion among the people. He will exhort the people and deceive them with flowery words, reinforce their feelings and strengthen inclinations and actions by predicting the people’s fortune and misfortune. From this they will take courage among themselves and make pacts and agreements to act according to the nature of the influences. For Aristotle says in De generatione that with similar objects, it is easy to bring one to the other [the Latin translates “passage is easier for those having the tokens”]. Thus when there is commotion among the people, it is easier to impel them when they hear that the influences of the stars and their own wishes are not entirely opposed. At that point one can preach to them, when desires are awakened and the people’s feelings are inflamed. Thus it is when coal has a little spark or fire, one blows upon it long enough until it is entirely burning. Thus will the aforementioned prophet arouse passions, sedition, joy and gladness, and war and other influences of the stars among the people. This man will have such understanding of the stars or inferred knowledge of future events or the likeness of knowledge that he will lead the people with his orations, predictions, and portents and convince them so thoroughly that they will proclaim him to be a prophet.[23]

Consequently, new sects will arise, the people will be plagued by unprecedented fear and murmur against political rulers, and a great rebellion will occur in Christendom. If such a calamity could ensue from one man preaching his words to impressionable laymen, what ominous potential must have been seen in the press—which was, after all, no less engaged in bringing privileged knowledge to the literate masses and no less entangled in their fears and aspirations. The astrologer Peter Creutzer, who proclaimed himself a disciple of Lichtenberger, interpreted the appearance of a “comet” in 1527, today understood as an aurora, as a portent of a false prophet with a modern media strategy. “In every region, he will preach astonishing sermons and work wondrous signs with his disciples and publish writings everywhere in the land, not just in one place but in many.”[24]

Popular interest in prophetic and prognostic works represented a ready market that printers could not ignore, but popular interest was a near neighbor of excess enthusiasm. Unease about disruptions to social order radiates from the background of printed prophetic works and sometimes erupts to the surface. As the Prognosticatio emphasized, it is a false prophet that causes commotion and amplifies seditious feeling through his predictions. The balancing of popular interest against economic considerations and magisterial concerns during the first century after Gutenberg therefore results in a print history of prophetic works that is, despite the instrumentalization of prophecy by all sides in Reformation-era sectarian conflicts, largely the story of the printing press as an agent of the status quo.

In view of the anxieties that the publication of prophetic works might evoke, it is significant that publishers of the Prognosticatio north of the Alps, whether in German or in Latin, were, without exception, specialized in the production and distribution of popular, vernacular literature (see table 1). The rise of multiple printers in one city or region and the distribution of books via regional or European trade networks brought increased competition, so that by the time the first editions of Lichtenberger’s Prognosticatio appeared at the end of the fifteenth century, successful printers were obliged to specialize in particular market segments and address particular target audiences. The first Latin edition of 1488 and a subsequent German edition were printed by Heinrich Knoblochtzer in Heidelberg. During a period when some three-quarters of all books published in the German language area were Latin works, over half of Knoblochtzer’s considerable output (147 editions) was in German.[25] Only twelve editions are known from Jacob Meydenbach of Mainz, including a Latin and German edition of the Prognosticatio, and seven of the remaining ten works are in the vernacular. Bartholomaeus Kistler of Strasbourg, more than 80 percent of whose editions (some forty-eight titles altogether) were German books, printed a German edition of the Prognosticatio in 1497 and then two Latin editions in ca. 1500, along with two somewhat condensed German editions in 1500–1501. Other printers who were likewise specialized in the printing of vernacular works soon imitated Kistler’s condensed edition, including one of the earliest works printed by Hans Schobser after his transition from Augsburg to Munich in late 1500.[26] Of the 245 editions attributed to Schobser, all but fourteen are German or bilingual German-Latin works. Another Strasbourg printer who published an edition based on Kistler’s, Matthias Hupfuff, contends with Schobser for the title of most prolific printer of German-language works of the early sixteenth century. Duntze lists 253 titles for the years 1497–1520. Some 70 percent of this voluminous output is comprised of German works.[27] Despite the much larger market for and far greater production of Latin works at the time, the printers of all eleven Prognosticatio editions in Germany between 1488 and 1501 were those who specialized in vernacular works, which comprised a majority of their production in each case. The early Prognosticatio printers, even those who printed Latin editions of Lichtenberger’s work, found most of their success in producing and distributing books for readers of German-language literature. With the sole exception of Knoblochtzer’s first editions, all the editions of the Prognosticatio appeared quite early after the founding of a press or, in the case of Schobser’s move to Munich, in a period of transition. The printers were, in other words, precisely those who were most acutely aware of changes in late medieval society that represented both an economic opportunity and a cause for unease, and they chose to print the Prognosticatio at times that were critical for their economic survival. Later sixteenth-century editions were also published by printers focusing on German-language works, most prominently the five editions from 1525–34 by Heinrich Steiner, the leading publisher of vernacular literature in Augsburg.[28] Apart from three Latin editions printed by Peter Quentel in Cologne in 1526–28, all full editions of the Prognosticatio in the sixteenth century are in the vernacular. For Lichtenberger’s Prognosticatio as for other prophetic and prognostic works, translation from Latin into German was just one of the steps in the work’s transition into the realm of vernacular literacy, which often had already begun with the printing of a Latin work by a printer who otherwise specialized in accommodating readers of vernacular literature.

In the context of early modern literacy, German and Latin were neither entirely separate spheres of communication nor merely interchangeable. Contemporary observers understood printing in German as a broadening of the audience beyond Latin literates to include both learned and unlearned, as the preface to the 1502 German edition of Birgitta’s collected revelations notes.[29] But the use of the vernacular also had implications for the intended mode of reading. In prognostic works, German translations retain predictions but often omit the astrological reasoning behind them. In a prognostication for the year 1527, Johannes Capistor described a number of future perils, “as anyone will surely hear or read in this German practica but rather will investigate in my Latin practica, where I have thoroughly proved all the described elements with the noble discipline of astrology.”[30] Johannes Virdung noted in his practica for 1497 that the appearance of lights in the atmosphere may be treated in the same way as comets, “as I have logically demonstrated in the Latin.”[31] The boundaries between Latin and vernacular texts, audiences, and reading practices were dynamic and highly permeable, however. When Georg Tannstetter identified Mercury and Mars as the most influential autumn planets in his prognostication for 1524, he added that one might “find the causes on which this conclusion rests in the Latin astrological judgment, which are omitted here for the sake of brevity.”[32] For some readers of Tannstetter’s German practica, the astrological reasoning found in the Latin volume was considered both relevant and accessible.

STRUCTURING SOCIETY

The society that Lichtenberger evoked, the society whose disruption the Prognosticatio warns against, was the traditional medieval order consisting of three estates. The clergy comprised the religious hierarchy, the nobility formed the political hierarchy, and everyone else was assigned to the subordinate lay peasantry. This tripartite social model never existed in undiluted form, and the growing power of cities, the rise of educated classes outside the clergy, and the accumulation of private wealth outside the nobility made it increasingly anachronistic from the High Middle Ages onward. The threefold distinction between nobility, clergy, and peasants corresponded not at all to the circumstances of the free citizens of Nuremberg or other printing centers of the late fifteenth century, who might recognize no lord except the emperor and whose lay piety was coming to assert its own validity.

Despite the anachronism of the medieval tripartite social model, Johannes Lichtenberger embedded it into the textual structure and communicative framework of the Prognosticatio. The close of Lichtenberger’s introduction explicitly makes the structure and reception of his prophetic compilation matters of social class.

So that I do not deafen the ears of the readers or become troublesome to their minds, I will divide this book into three parts and further divide the same into other parts if necessary, so that readers comprehend and hearers understand how these lower things in this world are ruled by the higher things. In the first part, in its various sections, I will teach how the little ship of holy St. Peter will suffer in the storms and troubles of this world: “You shall pray on bended knee for all Christian people.” In the second part the Holy Roman Empire is explained and what the condition of the secular authorities will be: “You should protect with an armored fist.” In the third part, which is further subdivided, the condition of the laity is revealed: “You should work so that you maintain the others.” And thus no one is left out.[33]

The spoken lines refer to a woodcut of Christ ruling over the three estates, where the commands are repeated (see figure 5).[34] In the first Latin edition, the woodcut immediately precedes the description of a tripartite social structure, while in the first German edition, the woodcut is found on the opposing page, ensuring simultaneous reception of Lichtenberger’s textual explanation with a visual depiction of a social order instituted and reigned over by Christ. From his throne upon a double rainbow with one foot rested on the globe of Earth, Christ, with arms outstretched, tasks each estate with their function in society. On the right, a group identified by crowns and scepters as nobility and led by the emperor is instructed to protect. On the left, a group of clerics led by a figure in papal garb are instructed to pray. In the foreground, two peasants till the soil. They are rendered somewhat smaller than the clerical and regal figures and at greater distance from the divine throne, and the caption above their heads instructs them to labor. In both word and image, the Prognosticatio expects each estate to preserve order in its sphere: the priests by maintaining correct liturgy and living a religious life, the nobility by defending against invasion and ensuring justice, and the peasants by making sure that everyone gets enough to eat.

While the division of society into clergy, nobility, and laity became only more anachronistic in the sixteenth century, adaptations of Lichtenberger’s work continued to incorporate it, make use of it, and affirm the value of social stability. The Extract of Various Prophecies published together with Carion’s Interpretation and Revelation in 1530 by Georg Rhau includes, as its final woodcut, an image of Christ giving the three estates the Latin commands as in the original Lichtenberger edition, with the clerics and rulers equally large and standing well in front of the ruling Christ, while the peasants are much smaller and in the background, perhaps directly beneath or in front of Christ. Above, six lines of verse explicate the image: “You, Pope, Bishop, and your confreres / Should express a heartfelt prayer. / You, Emperor, and all the knights / Protect, make peace with armored might. / You, Farmer, till the land. / God Father demands this of your hand.”[35]

In a preface to a new translation of the Prognosticatio first published in Wittenberg in 1527, Martin Luther suggested a somewhat different tripartite division of social hierarchy as the instruments of divine order, consisting of secular, ecclesiastic, and parental authorities. As in the Prognosticatio, Luther envisioned a scene of divine commission by spoken command. According to Luther, God could rule without the aid of men or angels, “yet he desires to do it through us.” Luther explained,

And so he appoints fathers or heads of households and says, “Be obedient to father and mother.” And he says to the father, “Beget children and teach them.” He could also maintain worldly rule, keep the peace, and punish the wicked without kings, princes, lords, and judges. But he does not desire that but, rather, delegates the sword [of secular rule] and says, “Punish the wicked, defend the pious, and maintain peace.” For he does the same through us, and we are only his masks behind which he hides himself and does all things in all places, as we Christians well know. In the same way, he himself does everything, teaches, comforts, and disciplines, and yet he externally commends the Word, church office, and service to the apostles, so that they should perform it. And thus he needs us people, both in material and spiritual leadership, to govern the world and all that is in it.[36]

On one level, Luther’s perspective is much different from Lichtenberger’s in that Luther conceives of his readers not as metaphorical serfs but as having a role in the divine government of the world. Yet, despite the replacement of peasants by parents, the evocation of God appointing a threefold human government over earthly affairs is nearly identical to the scene described in the Prognosticatio. Luther appears to have recognized that Lichtenberger’s prophetic compilation was fundamentally about the nature of society and how higher things rule over lower ones, and he seems to have adapted Lichtenberger’s model of society to his own concept of the family as the new social unit.

Affirmation of the traditional tripartite model of society and anxiety over its disruption are apparent in other printed prophetic works, beginning with the very first, the Sibyl’s Prophecy. God’s instruction to Adam at the expulsion from paradise is, of course, the same as that to Lichtenberger’s peasants: “Adam, go hoe and weed upon the earth!” Eve, for her part, is the archetype of the pregnant women depicted in the Prognosticatio, bearing children in sorrow and woe.[37] At the end of time, the depredations accompanying the Apocalypse are described as perversions of the threefold social order. After the Sibyl foretells the anarchy and moral decay that will plague Christendom, Solomon wants to know why the nobility would allow such a thing. The Sibyl informs him that knights and squires, “who are supposed to be protectors of each land,” will instead promote the interests of evildoers. The clergy will be divided by internal strife; enrich themselves with the cities, castles, and lands that rightfully belong to the nobility; and indulge in hypocritical sin and lustfulness. Agricultural production will decline by a third, and unprecedented famine will ensue.[38] Editions of Birgitta’s Revelations also preserve the traditional model of society. The 1492 edition illustrates the saint’s prophetic role by presenting her as a mediator of God’s word to nobility, clergy, and all other members of society in an arrangement quite similar to that found in Lichtenberger (see figure 6).

The woodcuts in Grünpeck’s Speculum of 1508 likewise depict the breakdown of society. The woodcut illustrating the first chapter shows a church turned upside down in which three men dressed as laborers pray at an altar or take part in a liturgical procession, while in the foreground outside, a tonsured monk and another cleric plough a field (see figure 7). To their left, two commoners appear to be enjoying the fruits of the clerics’ labor.[39] Later woodcuts depict upheaval as the fraying of social bonds in the face of greed, leading to wanton violence and deception. In a collage of four scenes that opens the fourth chapter, a wise man becomes the target of children’s stone throwing and of a woman’s emptying of a chamber pot onto his head, a monk robs a crippled man of his cloak, two men seal an agreement with a handshake while one stabs the other in the back, and one man appears to be stealing from another who is resting inattentively. The fifth chapter opens with a similar woodcut (also on the title page), in which armed men attack a woman and child, a kneeling bishop, unwary travelers, and each other; behind them, a church collapses in flames.[40] The eighth chapter accuses the Christian estates of idolatry: the peasants honor Baal in their gluttony; the nobility and civil servants honor many gods in the objects of their greed; the lower clergy worship Cupid, Adonis, and Venus in their lust; and the prelates idolize the sun by relying on their earthly powers and permitting sin within their subjects. A later woodcut shows monks being led from their cloister and battered by a crowned noble and another layman, followed in the next woodcut by a massacre of monks at the hands of turbaned soldiers with scimitars. In the final image, harmony is restored as kneeling laymen and crowned nobility show proper respect to a procession of bishops and monastic figures.[41] The anonymous compiler of the Extract of Various Prophecies, drawn from Grünpeck and Lichtenberger, recognized the social commentary of their works, for the booklet closes with fifty-four lines of verse on the inversion of social order and virtue: “Because all estates choose contradiction / The world is filled with sore affliction.”[42]

Already in Grünpeck’s 1508 Speculum, however, the tripartite social order has undergone changes. Grünpeck treats the higher and lower clergy as two separate estates, for a total of four. Grünpeck represents a step toward a threefold system of binary opposites in terms of religiosity, status, and gender, as can be seen, for example, in Pamphilus Gengenbach’s Nollhart of 1517. Nollhart, depicted, as in the Prognosticatio, as a bearded robed figure with a staff and rosary, begins by bemoaning the decay of all estates: “Now listen, my dear people, to what I will soon explain to you here concerning the several classes of this world, of which none is truly in proper order: clerical or worldly, knight or servant, and all the female sex as well.”[43] The Old and New Brother Nollhart, revised in and published by the workshop of Jakob Cammerlander three decades later, adds a new opening but finds the erosion of categorical differences in society just as ominous: “Greater and lesser have equal might in the kingdom of sin,” the prophetic narrator declares.[44]

THE PROPHET AND THE KING: READING, HEARING, AND OVERHEARING

From a contemporary perspective, books appear to convey the message of an author to his or her readers. While printers and publishers may alter or even reverse an author’s statements, printers rarely emphasize that the book, as a channel of communication, is anything but transparent. A characteristic of printed prognostic works, however, is the recasting of reading not as hearing the prophet’s voice but as overhearing a conversation between the prophet and the king. Jan-Dirk Müller’s study of Sebastian Brant as poet and prophet finds that Brant’s prognostic broadsides of the 1490s and later decades simulated dialogues in which prophets speak to monarchs while readers remain external witnesses of an event at a royal court from which they remain excluded. Thus distanced from the act of prophecy, the audience does not take part in affairs that concern princes and prelates.[45] But the framing of texts as dialogues between prophets and kings can be found prior to Brant throughout early modern prophecy in print from its beginning, including in Lichtenberger’s Prognosticatio, in his earlier Conjunction of Saturn and Mars, and at the beginning of print itself.

The reconfiguration of readers as eavesdroppers is already present in the Sibyl’s Prophecy. The work begins, in the typical manner, as a joint enterprise between narrator and hearers: after retelling the story of the Creation and Fall, the narrator says, “We’ll leave this story here by saying that Adam and Eve spent their lives with all manner of things on Earth. Now listen: Adam began to get old.”[46] The next hundred lines retell the True Cross legend in order to set up the meeting between the Sibyl and King Solomon. At the point when the subject turns from the past to the prophetic future, however, the communicative structure also changes. Rather than continuing as the narrator’s speech addressed to the reader, the Sibyl assumes the role of prophetic narrator, and Solomon steps in as the recipient of her words. On its face, the text is no longer addressed to the reader but, rather, represents the dialogue of a prophet with a monarch, who receives and legitimizes her words. Readers, formerly addressed directly by the text, now become overhearers of the conversation between the two, and their outsider status is maintained until the end of the world. Only at the conclusion, when the text returns from the future to the plane of moral teaching (and, incidentally, at the point that the fragment from Gutenberg’s press begins), do the readers again become the subjects of perception: they are enjoined to heed God’s judgments, recognize the signs of the times, and learn from scripture. The nature of the Sibyl’s Prophecy as a conversation between a prophet and a king to which the reader is permitted access can also be seen in the illustration on the title page of Heinrich Knoblochtzer’s 1492 edition (see figure 2, in chapter 1) and later editions into the late sixteenth century.[47] Rather than depicting future events or devotionally significant scenes, the title woodcut shows the Sibyl and Solomon in conversation beneath a sky with a single star. The star is the source of the Sibyl’s knowledge; as a prophetic figure, she is both the reader who discerns its meaning and the author who transmits its message to the king. In this configuration, the Sibyl is a reader who deciphers signs, while Solomon is the listening audience. People who happen to hold the Sibyl’s Prophecy in their hands become outside observers of the communication process.

The earliest known printed work of Johannes Lichtenberger, the Conjunction of Saturn and Mars printed around 1475 along with a horoscope concerning the 1474 siege of Neuss, is one of the earliest printed prognostications based on planetary conjunctions and one of the earliest astrological prognostications of any kind in print. As in the Sibyl’s Prophecy, the Conjunction of Saturn and Mars prominently frames its communication as a personal interaction between the astrologer and the emperor: the title block on the first leaf states that it was “presented by me, Johannes Lichtenberger, by my own hand to the Lord Emperor and the princes in the city of Strasbourg” in 1473, and the text begins with a vocative appeal directly to the emperor. The horoscope also is identified as something personally presented and spoken by Lichtenberger to Frederick III.[48] At a founding moment of astrology in print, readers are presented not with the message of an author directed at them but with the illusion of a stolen glimpse of an astrologer’s audience before the emperor. The text attempts to create a fictive presence, not of the author before the reader, but of the reader gazing onto the astrologer’s presentation to his royal patron.

A similar reformulation of reading as overhearing occurs in Lichtenberger’s Prognosticatio. Following the text’s claim to represent society in its totality with no exceptions, the woodcuts of nobles, clergy, and peasants necessarily become images of the work’s readers as well. The woodcuts identify not only what is being discussed but also who is being addressed. The text and its structure reinforce the notion that Lichtenberger is speaking to a particular group in each section, each of which begins with a woodcut reiterating Christ’s injunction to a particular estate. The first two sections also begin with a simulation of direct discourse. Following the woodcut of prelates gathered around a pope reading from a book, the first section, concerning ecclesiastic affairs, begins, “May the most holy father who steers the little ship of St. Peter at this time listen!” The second section, concerning the affairs of the Holy Roman Empire, opens with a woodcut of Christ directly addressing the emperor and other nobles as equal partners in conversation, eye to eye and on their same level; the text begins, “O, thou most unconquerable, it is decreed by nature that whoever would guard his existence [in German, ‘independence’] should strive to embrace unity.”[49] In various other passages, Lichtenberger addresses “you wisest of all men under the staff of St. Peter,” “you most worthy prince,” “you God-fearing men of Trier and wise men of Cologne,” “you young man in the land of the Lily,” “you illustrious duke” and also “all princes.”[50]

The Prognosticatio was not the only prophetic compilation to commend a differentiated reception according to the reader’s estate. Nearly a century later, Adam Walasser prefaced the second edition of his compilation of Birgitta’s Burden of the World, “Bruder Claus,” and other works with the instruction that if one wanted to “draw profit and utility from these tracts, then let everyone take note, whatever estate he belongs to, of what is said to him and not what is said to another. For if I as a layman would concern myself much with the clergy’s defects and failings and ignore what is said to me and my group, that would be backwards and I would have more injury than profit from it. Therefore let the clergy take note of their things and worldly people take note of theirs, and let each industriously fulfill his calling.”[51]

The prelates, noblemen, and peasants who populate the woodcuts of the Prognosticatio ostensibly represented Lichtenberger’s readers—which is, of course, pure fiction, to judge by the publication programs of the Prognosticatio printers. The woodcuts depict neither ideal nor intended readers but, rather, fictive readers. One function of fictive readers in literature is to distance real readers from the text and make them observers rather than direct participants in dialogue between the author and the audience—for example, if an author wishes to criticize his or her readers but only indirectly.[52] Lichtenberger’s fictive readers serve a different function: rather than helping the actual customers of printers like Knoblochtzer and Kistler identify themselves with the text, the fictive readers in the Prognosticatio hindered the real readers from doing so. To the extent that readers did identify with the text, they had to identify themselves (as nonnoblemen and nonclergy) with a subservient role in the existing political and ecclesiastic order. The printers of the Prognosticatio did not seek to turn peasants into readers but, instead, invited readers to imagine themselves as peasants. The alienation of readers from the prophetic text was accomplished in part by asking real readers of the Prognosticatio to accept the fiction that they were not the work’s intended readers but, rather, eavesdroppers allowed to overhear a privileged conversation meant for other ears.

In the woodcuts, the fulfillment of prophecy is reserved for kings and archbishops. Where the end times are inhabited by an Angelic Pope and a Last Emperor, laymen only appear in the woodcut illustrations as they go about their chores. In addition to excluding the laity from participation in the foretold events, the illustrations make prophetic dialogue exclusively an affair of the first two estates. Woodcuts in the Prognosticatio depict both clerics and nobles as receivers of revelation or partners in divine dialogue, but there is no equivalent woodcut for laymen, who appear only as audiences of inspired or diabolical preachers. Unlike the Burden of the World, which envisioned readers assuming a prophetic role in the dissemination of the visionary text, the Prognosticatio foresees no role at all for the lay reader except in passive reception of the prophetic dialogue to accompany an individual and interior participation in the prophetic vision.

Astrological prognostications frequently opened with dedicatory epistles that reinforced the existing political order and invoked a communicative framework where readers are allowed to listen in on the author’s address to a political ruler, similar to the Sibyl’s audience before Solomon and Lichtenberger’s audience before Frederick III. The ultimate roots of the practice may well lie in the activities of court astrologers and in manuscript invocation of the illusion of authorial presence, but the function of the communicative framework in a medium intended for a broad anonymous audience is a very different matter from its parallels or origins in other contexts. Prognostications often refer to information that is reserved for their addressee or frame themselves as something that only the addressee should read. “I will write nothing about the fortunes of your dominion, O most illustrious unconquerable prince, but I will report all things in particular by mouth,” Paul of Middelburg wrote in his practica for 1482.[53] Marcus Schynnagel’s practica for 1491 opens and concludes by addressing Maximillian I directly, and in the conclusion, Schynnagel emphasizes that opposition to astrological predictions among those ignorant of the art, particularly lawyers, compels him not to reveal some things to the common man but instead to send them secretly to Maximilian.[54] This may well correspond to the intentions and actions of Schynnagel, but as part of the presentation of a printed tract, it frames the reading of prognostic works as the interception of privileged communication. Like the Sibyl, reading the stars and reporting their interpretation to the king is precisely how Johannes Virdung presents his various tracts on comets and lunar phenomena. His comet tract of 1531 opens by positioning itself as a reduced version of something meant for the prince, not the common man: “Most illustrious prince, although I had not intended to publish the interpretation of the comet that was seen this year, which I made for your princely grace, yet I am compelled to do so and to bring forth an extract of my interpretation because of many ignorant people who have written falsely about the comet.”[55]

The conceptualization of reading as overhearing the conversation of prophets and kings is perhaps most concretely depicted in Pamphilus Gengenbach’s Nollhart, where the dialogues between various prophetic figures and a series of political and religious leaders (as well as a Turk, a soldier, a representative of the Swiss cantons, and a Jew) literally began as staged performances in Basel. Considering the several print editions, Gengenbach appears to have found an effective dramatic formula in the succession of prophetic dialogues. While the accusations and baleful proclamations delivered to some figures are arguably different from the narrative function of the Sibyl’s audience before Solomon, the audience of the Nollhart drama is even more clearly separated from events on the stage and transformed into observers of the action there. The woodcuts in the printed editions emphasize the dialogic and performative nature of the text by showing, in each case, a confrontation between Nollhart, Birgitta, the Sibyl, or Methodius and their interlocutors. The woodcuts used by Cammerlander in the mid-1540s in his editions of The Old and New Brother Nollhart are rudimentarily executed but based on the same pattern, and Cammerlander used them again as illustrations for a condensed version of Lichtenberger’s Prognosticatio that he printed at the same time along with Virdung’s prognostication for 1524–63, as the Great Practica. In these editions, images originally meant to represent a staged drama reinforce the communicative framework of the Prognosticatio as a series of dialogues between prophets and church prelates, secular rulers, and other figures.

For centuries after Gutenberg, most authors remained financially dependent on their patrons, so that the author’s primary intended audience was often a single powerful individual, and their interaction could often be conducted as effectively in manuscript or by the spoken word. Many printed books were thus, in the first instance, not messages from authors to readers but messages between the learned and the powerful that printers redirected as commercial wares to their customers. Printers preserved the illusion of a conversation between the author and a noble patron because it helped maintain the existing social order and secure the benevolence of the ruling powers. From the early sixteenth century onward, print publication began to involve a literal political affirmation in the form of printers’ imperial privilege, which promised protection against unauthorized reprinting, and approval by ecclesiastic authorities, so that books directly addressing the literate masses were explicitly condoned by the first and second estates. The depiction of reading as laymen’s overhearing of a conversation between a prophet and a king therefore succinctly expressed the structure of print communication in the first century after its invention. As the astrologers had long insisted, the higher things of this world rule over the lower ones.

4

VISIONS OF VISIONS:
FUNCTIONS OF THE IMAGE IN PRINTED PROPHECY

What do illustrations do? For those in late medieval and early modern printed books, Edgar Bierende identifies three basic functions: to delight, to teach in parallel to the text, and to help structure the reader’s memory of the text. In addition, Bierende finds a new ambiguity in images around the year 1500 where visual puzzles require textual interpretation, which formed the roots of the baroque emblem.[1] Prophecy, where vision and visuality have a particular significance, offers examples of all of these but also additional functions for printed images that complement and contradict assumptions about images and their functions.

From its first edition in 1488, Lichtenberger’s Prognosticatio had a distinctive graphic identity. Later publishers treated its illustrations as an essential element of the work in a way that was not true of other printed prophetic works. Only one of the four editions of Grünpeck’s Speculum after 1508 included the full image cycle, for example, rather than using very different motifs or no illustrations at all, and the woodcuts did not earn the Speculum a place in the prophetic retrospective printed by Egenolff forty years later.[2] In contrast, nearly all editions of Lichtenberger’s Prognosticatio through the mid-sixteenth century and beyond reproduced most or all images found in the first editions, even though acquiring the woodblocks represented an additional expense. The titles of some later editions of the Prognosticatio make special note of the illustrations, including Peter Schöffer’s 1528 edition (“printed again with its very unusual images”) and the 1550–55 editions of Hermann Gülfferich (“presented with fine illustrations”).[3] Although Martin Luther saw little of value in the astrologer’s art, he conceded in his preface to the 1527 edition that Lichtenberger’s predictions had partially come to pass: “He hit the mark in several things, and came especially near with the pictures and images, much more so than with the words.”[4]

TEXTUAL AND PARATEXTUAL FUNCTIONS

Images as indices. One might distinguish between an image’s textual and paratextual functions: where the first aims to visually render the text’s content, paratextual illustrations graphically represent the text’s structure. As we have seen, the Prognosticatio’s woodcut of the medieval tripartite class structure consisting of nobility, clergy, and peasants corresponds to the three sections of the text, which treat the affairs of and were ostensibly addressed to the clergy, the nobility, and the laity. The woodcut of society thus functions as a visual table of contents for Lichtenberger’s treatment of each estate’s affairs in succession, and the stereotyped images of cardinals, kings, and serfs that introduce each of the three sections serve as visual reminders of the work’s internal structure.

Images as microcosm. The Prognosticatio does not foresee any exceptions to its model of society, no matter how anachronistic it might be. It addresses clergy, nobility, and laity, “and thus no one is left out.”[5] In the clear subservience of the peasants who represent the laity and in the visual reminiscence of Christ’s rainbow throne to the concentric cosmic spheres, the woodcut of the three estates also illustrates how higher things rule over lower things by divine decree. The structure of the Prognosticatio attempted to accommodate the cognitive requirements of its readers by letting its structure mirror the social order, which, in turn, reflects the order of the cosmos, making the Prognosticatio a microcosm in the full sense of the term. Lichtenberger, his printers, and the illustrators all emphasized the same point: that higher things rule over lower things applies equally to the structure of texts, society, and the universe.

Mediation between various micro- and macrocosmic planes is also a function of the schematic astrological squares, which depict the twelve signs of the zodiac and the conjunctions of planets within them as a series of twelve triangles arranged around the four edges of a square.[6] One of the earliest uses in print of this image, which already had a long history in manuscript, was in Lichtenberger’s Conjunction of Saturn and Mars, printed around 1475, and it appears within several practicas of the 1480s before appearing on title pages in the 1490s.[7] In the practicas and other prognostications, astrological square woodcuts represent not just the configuration of the stars but also the fortunes of various segments of human society. Here again, an image composed of ink on paper represents the nexus of society and the stars.

Authority and source. The depictions of Lichtenberger’s prophetic sources, including its author, function somewhat like visual footnotes, or a graphic representation of the textual history of the Prognosticatio. The first two woodcuts, which depict the five prophetic authorities receiving divine inspiration and the author engaged in prophetic dialogue (see figures 3 and 4, in chapter 2), are supplemented by later images of Birgitta holding a book, a Sibyl observing a star, and an abbot receiving an inscribed tablet from an angel. Paul of Middelburg complained bitterly in his 1492 Invective that Lichtenberger’s wholesale borrowing from his work without even once mentioning his name was scarcely to be borne, and he particularly saw the images as the modus operandi of Lichtenberger’s intellectual theft: “He also added foolish pictures of women in labor, members of religious orders fighting and beating upon one another, crowing roosters, the Antichrist teaching, the emperor devastating Rome, and various other pictures of kings and princes, so that, having changed its appearance, he could usurp to himself our work and not appear to have only recited it.”[8] By obscuring the textual history of the Prognosticatio, the images help present Lichtenberger as a prophet equal to his sources.

A more direct appeal to authority via images can be found in the astrological squares. The practicas of Johannes Seger, known for the years 1512–18, regularly featured astrological squares on their title pages. In the preface to his practica for 1513, Seger referred to the woodcut of the astrological square as a proof of veracity, stating that he had placed the figure at the beginning of his work so that those who were educated in astrology and other arts would receive his opinion more willingly and not consider it a baseless fiction.[9] The astrological square became the preferred title woodcut for Carion’s Interpretation and Revelation, where it appeared in eleven editions from 1526 to 1534—that is, in all editions featuring title woodcuts after the first edition—usually with a scene of combat between two armies of pikemen at the center of the astrological diagram. A passage from Carion’s preface points to the significance of this image. It is not necessary to explicate every interpretation entirely, wrote Carion, but only to give the precise moment that each year begins: “On the basis of this, every halfway experienced astronomer can cast his diagram and see that my interpretations are not without justification.”[10] Carion had sharply criticized prognostications that lacked a theoretical basis, and the astrological square woodcut on the title page of his Interpretation and Revelation was a visual assertion that his prognostications were based on a foundation of reason and evidence.

GUIDES TO RECEPTION AND EMOTIONAL DAMPENING

The combination of printing, prophecy, and images was a particular focus of anxiety. As we have seen, Johann Carion was concerned that booklets with alarming images on the title page proved irresistible for many readers. Georg Tannstetter also criticized the combination of prognostication, booklet or broadside format, and images: “For in these times, one has circulated several large sheets and little booklets with many incredible and foolish pictures and predictions for 1524, which I do not regard as the work of a righteous learned man but, rather, as the fiction of a printer or vagabond.”[11] At the end of the sixteenth century, Hermann Wilken (who condemned Carion as a necromancer) assailed printed images as a source of unrest among the common people. He argued that “one finds in these days masters who publish books with figures and images” of witches riding through the air or consorting with one another and that putting “such abominable and ugly dreams and lies before the eyes of the ignorant common man” resulted in popular agitation against addled women and aid to the devil’s murderous work.[12] While printed words could lead to unrest among the common people, printed images were often regarded as many times more potent.

Anxiety over images and prognostication in print and the careful balancing of the demands of rulers, readers, and printers resulted in woodcut illustrations in Lichtenberger’s Prognosticatio that obscure, redirect, and dampen the emotional impact of its statements. While the Prognosticatio dramatically represents the perilous state of the church in woodcut form as the “Little Ship of St. Peter” tossed about on the waves, Lichtenberger’s criticism of clerical wantonness, greed, and luxury is paired with a woodcut that displaces the targets of his lament from the ecclesiastic hierarchy to a shamefaced Adam and Eve, who hold a miniature church while clutching bundles of fig leaves.[13] Bemoaning clerical and papal offenses was hardly unknown in the fifteenth century, and neither were calls for reform, yet the Prognosticatio shrinks from expressing that sentiment directly in illustration. In the Latin edition, the woodcut and its explanation are on facing pages, but the German edition distances the author’s clerical criticism even further from its visual expression by pushing nearly all of the text onto the verso. In addition, the German text is broken midway through into a second paragraph, introducing further ambiguity about clerical reform. The criticism of the clergy foretells the removal of an unworthy pope based on planetary conjunctions, but the new paragraph break in the German translation foregrounds the prophecies of Jeremiah and Birgitta of Sweden instead. As the leaf opposite the broken paragraph is dominated by a woodcut of Birgitta whose caption appears already at the bottom of the preceding page, the paratextual presentation helps push papal dethronement or clerical reform out of the astrological present and into the prophetic past. The other scene of clerical reform is a purely internal matter, as one monk disciplines another with a rod in the presence of three others. The monastic misbehavior itself is not shown.[14] Here, as in later sections, the most dramatic material (clerical licentiousness or the removal of a wicked pope) does not find expression in the woodcuts.

The avoidance of incendiary images even encompasses those whom the text demonizes. Although the Prognosticatio condemns Turks, Jews, and the French, these enemies of the Holy Roman Empire do not appear in the woodcuts except symbolically; Jews do not appear at all. Consistent with a foreseen mode of reading that aims for individual and interior reflection rather than external or communal action, the anti-Semitic, anti-Turkish, and anti-French sentiments of the text are not emphasized or even directly expressed in the woodcut images.[15] The woodcuts of the Prognosticatio do not enhance but, rather, blunt the emotional impact of the texts they illustrate. Rather than aiding the efforts of unskilled readers to understand the text’s meaning, the woodcuts often obscure it. The illustrations seem to evince an awareness of and wariness toward what Michael Curschmann has called the “ability of the visual medium to appeal directly to the emotions.”[16] It is as if the excitement of the popular imagination through images was feared even more than whatever threats Jews, Turks, and the French may have posed. In the Prognosticatio, it is the false prophet who amplifies passions and confirms the common people’s disruptive impulses through his predictions. The woodcuts that illustrate Lichtenberger’s text aim for the reverse effect.

The Prognosticatio regards women and the laity as particularly susceptible to the influences of the planets, and it appears, similarly, to share Luther’s view of the common people’s receptivity to images.[17] Certainly, the woodcut illustrations use considerable caution in depicting the lower classes. Although the first Prognosticatio editions had forty-five woodcuts, only three images are found in the section addressed to the common people. Of these three woodcuts, two reinforce gender-specific social roles. The first image, which functions as the visual section heading, shows two peasants working in a field or orchard, consistent with their charge to provide nourishment to the other social estates. The second woodcut depicts three pregnant women in apparent but unspecified discomfort. The text lauds women as “those upon whom society pins all its joy and the entire ornament of the house and whose faces God has adorned with the greatest joy like shining stars,” but following the pattern of juxtaposing traditional stereotypes with scenes of society-threatening disorder, the Prognosticatio warns of impending stillbirths and infant mortality.[18] Although the third section on the fates of the laity is filled with dire prophecies of moral decay, the woodcut that illustrates the rise of lustful depravity shows a nun who has fled her cloister but who looks back upon it with visible regret (see figure 8). Not only is this a lukewarm representation of depravity compared to the alternatives, but it is also, by definition, an act that laymen and lay-women could not emulate.[19]

Although the third section of the Prognosticatio foretells catastrophe and disruption, the image of peasants in the field is part of a concluding woodcut sequence in which the order of society is restored. Whether directly or symbolically, many of the preceding illustrations foretell disturbances to the current order, including disunity in the church, conflict between bishops or noblemen, and threats from the French and the Turks. The culmination of these woes is the advent of the false prophet who exerts diabolical influence over bishops and cardinals. But the woodcuts immediately following on the next five pages depict a restoration of order: lay and religious life is reformed, so that game boards and dice are burned, long hair is trimmed, and long points on shoes and other fashion excesses are done away with; Joachim of Fiore and Cyrillus (in the corresponding woodcut, the two are generalized as an abbot and a priest) receive silver tablets containing the whole of church history from an angel; the German emperor marches on Rome “with an armored hand” against token resistance, and the corrupt religious flee the city; a new, righteous pope preaches to the people; and then the peasants peaceably sow their fields and prune their vineyards.[20] While the text supplies a narrative with more troubling elements, the woodcuts emphasize the return of a righteous clergy, a militarily potent emperor, and a complaisant agricultural peasantry. The final two woodcuts, of pregnant women in distress and a nun hovering between flight from her cloister and return to it, suggest that the stability of social structure (here with respect to gender in particular) can be reclaimed but remains under threat.

FROM ILLUSTRATION TO INTERPRETATION

Illustration and distillation. If we classify images according to their function in the reception of a printed work, some are clearly graphical representations of the text, with minimal interpretive demands placed on the reader. These woodcuts depict events that have occurred or will occur, letting readers see what prophets have seen. The future preaching of an Angelic Pope in the Prognosticatio, for example, is represented with a woodcut of a preaching pope, with little interpretation permitted or required. While Lichtenberger may not have known that his text would appear together with illustrations and does not mention woodcuts in his preface, later authors and editors of prophetic works do record their thoughts on the function of images, and some describe illustrations as providing a visual equivalent of the text.

Sebastian Brant, whose Narrenschiff was perhaps the most influential compilation of word and image at the close of the fifteenth century, was closely involved in publishing an illustrated edition of the revelations of pseudo-Methodius, ostensibly a third-century bishop of Olympus. The revelations were, in fact, written in the eighth century in response to the rise of Islam and Arab expansion; the fall of Constantinople to the Ottoman Turks in 1453 gave them new relevance, and a first printed edition appeared in 1477.[21] This edition placed the revelations between two monastic tracts attributed to St. Bonaventura, hardly the setting to appeal to widespread anxiety about the threat of Islam, and no further edition followed for almost two decades. Hans Froschauer of Augsburg printed a new edition in 1496 along with marginal commentary and an explanatory tract by Wolfgang Aytinger. While the revelations of pseudo-Methodius had circulated throughout the Middle Ages, the challenge of selling them to early modern readers was ultimately mastered by a Basel printer, Michael Furter, who retained the marginalia and Aytinger’s commentary while adding numerous woodcut illustrations and an introduction from Sebastian Brant to six editions between 1498 and 1516.[22] The right packaging was able to turn an antiquarian curiosity into a minor best seller.

Brant’s preface to the work of Methodius opens with a note about images and audience. It describes the function of images, as in the Narrenschiff, with recourse to the famous dictum of Pope Gregory the Great that images were the book of the illiterate.

Dearest father [Johannes Meder, an observant Franciscan of Basel], you exhort me frequently and ask with incessant interruptions, how long I will refuse to compile the drawings, which are called revelations, of Methodius, the most holy prelate of Euboea, and of the blessed virgin Hildegard. Perhaps moved by reading the decree of Gregory (which records that a picture of deeds is necessary, for what scripture is to readers, the picture presents to discerning uneducated people, because the unlearned see in it what they ought to follow; in the picture, those who do not know letters are able to read; thus especially for the unlearned, a picture stands in place of reading) and by your request, O father beloved to God, and by your own persuasion of this which you see before you, I enter into the popular sphere. I have arranged for engraved pictures, so that this prediction by the spirit of prophecy might more easily become known to many.[23]

Like Isidore’s statement that we hear God’s voice when we read, the notion of illiterate reading via pictures made sense in Gregory’s time and context, but it can be misunderstood today, and it was already anachronistic in 1498. In our present understanding, reading is a process by which we acquire information, but for Gregory’s contemporaries and during most of the Middle Ages, reading was fundamentally a matter of memory: written texts remind readers of what they have already heard. Thus it was possible for a medieval illiterate to read an image as a literate would read a text, as both were thereby reminded of things they had heard many times before. But in the case of a text like the Revelations of pseudo-Methodius, published after nine centuries of intellectual, educational, and technical innovations since the time of Gregory, there was little chance that an illiterate reader who had not already committed the revelations to memory could glean much from the images alone. Moreover, the market for printed books expanded precisely because it offered readers novelties, texts that they had never seen before.

A decade after Brant’s preface to pseudo-Methodius appeared, Joseph Grünpeck published his Speculum, his most significant prophetic work. The first, Latin edition concluded with seven articles on the nature of prophecy that were omitted in the following, German editions. The final paragraph of Grünpeck’s appendix ends with a note about the function of the images that appear in his Speculum.

Although the pictures will perhaps vex some people, who might say that it is deserving of scorn and entirely unworthy of a serious man and priest, and that it indulges trivial and childish delights, I would readily respond that all studies of good arts have been reduced to such a despised state, so that not even clerics, enchained by luxury, greed, and drunkenness, grasp that which is lying before their feet; therefore unless it is so, who would read and reread such a long series of drawn-out words? It is worthwhile that the general tenor of the writings be expressed in the forms and figures of pictures, with which the mind tends to become occupied when it reads briefly so as to avoid fatigue. For if careless reading, whether from tedium or from negligence, bears scant fruit, then pictures protect from danger.[24]

Grünpeck here regards images not as aids for inexperienced readers but, rather, as an accommodation to the reading habits of the learned classes of his time. For Grünpeck, images helped readers to grasp the main point of the text by reinforcing it visually and by lending structure to otherwise unbroken passages. While Brant described images as equivalents of the text for the unlearned, Grünpeck described them as useful complements to the text for learned readers at a time which Grünpeck considered to be in a state of intellectual decay. The illustrations to Grünpeck’s Speculum and pseudo-Methodius share a basic conception of the image as a companion to the text for the benefit of readers with deficient literacy. They also share a relatively short life span as integral image cycles, each lasting no more than two decades. Other ways to access images were already competing for readers’ attention.

Visual interpretation. While some woodcuts in Lichtenberger’s Prognosticatio and most images in pseudo-Methodius and in Grünpeck’s Speculum permit the reader to see what a prophet has seen, other images ask readers to see as prophets see. This second type of image presents visual symbols that can be interpreted, inviting the reader to participate in the act of prophetic interpretation. While readers could also study the text, not all points of interpretation were to be found there. Other aspects were left up to the reader’s own judgment. In the Prognosticatio, future political affairs were encoded in a manner requiring not just familiarity with iconography but also considerable visual imagination.[25] A woodcut depicting a set of legs standing on a column, for example, illustrates neither past nor future events but, instead, a prophetic symbol from the vision that Daniel interpreted for Nebuchadnezzar. Readers do not behold in it the sense of the prophecy (namely, that contention will arise between the Holy Roman Empire and the heathen Turks) but, rather, are asked to repeat a process of prophetic visual interpretation. The prophetic-visionary woodcuts present readers with riddles on which imagination can work until, in the scanning of the following text, the answer is revealed. Rather than, for example, either showing Reinhart the Lollard in the moment of inspiration or directly depicting the warfare and conflict he predicts, the Prognosticatio shows the reader a standoff between a wolf and two eagles, letting the reader participate in visionary inspiration via visual interpretation. Readers first see an eagle hovering over three forests and lions that are either visible, half hidden, or entirely hidden. That the lion represents the king of Bavaria is made clear on the next page, while the differences in visibility are left uninterpreted. The image of sylvan lions itself represents the interpretation of an eclipse, whose awful portents for kings and princes the narrator calls almost too shocking for him to interpret.[26] Whereas Lichtenberger’s text discouraged inexpert readers from judging matters of which they were ignorant, particularly astrological concerns such as eclipses, the woodcut images allowed readers access to interpretation and permitted them to resolve textual ambiguities within certain boundaries. The Prognosticatio woodcuts offered readers a private and individual participation in the prophetic vision, which helped preserve the image sequence in later editions.

A contemporary witness of the role of images in prophetic communication and prophetic reading can be found in the Brother Claus tract, printed three times in the late 1480s. The tract presents an encounter between its author, an otherwise anonymous “honorable pilgrim” (now identified as Heinrich Gundelfingen), and the Swiss hermit Nikolaus von Flüe, as a series of dialogues between the two. In the fourth dialogue, the hermit says, “If it is not aggravating to you, I would like to let you see my book, in which I learn and seek the art of this doctrine.”[27] The “book” that the illiterate holy man brings forward is, in fact, a drawing of a wheel with six spokes, as a following woodcut depicts, for which Brother Claus then provides an interpretation. The unlettered hermit’s reading of the image is an act not of memory but of perception and imagination, and the illiterate visuality is, if anything, superior to the pilgrim’s literate textual competency. The hermit’s own interpretation is not the final word, however. The second and longer section of the tract consists of the visiting pilgrim’s own interpretation of the same image, beginning with a graphic elaboration of the schematic wheel with scenes from the life of Christ and signets for the four evangelists, as well as a series of woodcuts depicting a charitable work for each spoke of the wheel. In actual fact, the original meditative image was the more complex form, and the schematic wheel represents a simplification. In the model of prophetic reading presented in the Brother Claus tract, however, seeing what the hermit has seen is only the first step toward the reader’s own visual interpretation.

IMAGE AS PROPHECY: FROM LICHTENBERGER TO PARACELSUS

The use of images as illustrations, as graphic alternatives to the text for the sake of deficient readers, faced competition of a second type as well. Thirty years after Brant’s invocation of Gregory the Great and twenty years after Grünpeck defended the use of woodcuts, another illustrated prophetic work, this time with the intent of overturning the papacy, took Gregory’s dictum about images and stood it on its head. Since the late thirteenth century, a series of papal images and interpretations sometimes attributed to Joachim of Fiore and known as the Vaticinia de summis pontificibus had circulated in manuscript, and the first Italian editions were printed in the early sixteenth century. In 1527, the Reformation clergyman Andreas Osiander and Hans Sachs collaborated on a German version, with Osiander providing a preface and prose interpretations of the images and Sachs contributing barbed verse summaries (see figure 9). The Remarkable Prophecy about the Papacy of Osiander and Sachs ultimately went through four editions. The Nuremberg city council confiscated unsold copies of the first edition as a threat to public order but at least reimbursed the printer, Hans Guldenmund, for his expenses.[28] Like Luther at the same time, Osiander was disturbed that his Catholic opponents were taking comfort in Lichtenberger’s prophecies. The travail of the clergy had long been foretold, the worst was over, and now the forces of the Antichrist and his false prophet Martin Luther would now be defeated, they reasoned. To disabuse them of that notion, Luther contributed to an edition of Lichtenberger in 1527, and Osiander brought about the first edition of A Remarkable Prophecy about the Papacy.

Marshaling older orthodox work for the sake of Reformation polemic was not, in itself, new. Osiander had already provided a preface for a booklet known as Saint Hildegard’s Prophecy about the Papists and the So-called Clergy, which saw three editions in 1527.[29] The Remarkable Prophecy about the Papacy of Sachs and Osiander does mark a new moment in the relationship between word and image, however; the text is secondary, and allegorical images become synonymous with prophecy itself. Osiander wrote in the preface to the work,

As Peter says, this prophecy is not in word but only in image and made without all words, and it shows clearly and understandably how it will go with the papacy from the time that it became a tyranny until the end of the world. So that no one should think that this is a new invention, I let it be known to all that I have had two of these books, one from the Carthusian monastery and the other from the library of my lords of the worthy senate here in Nuremberg. Of these two, neither is so new, so that anyone who sees it must agree that it is around a hundred years old as far as the images and writing are concerned, as anyone who does not want to believe me can experience on this very day. In addition, it is shown in the same books how the original from which they were copied was made 250 years ago, in the year 1278. But few people have understood until now that it is the manner of all prophecies that they remain obscure until they take effect; therefore one person guessed and wrote down one thing, and another person something else. But as it is clear that the writing is newer than the illustrations and that the older part remained without any writing, I have omitted it, as it undoubtedly does not belong here. But an interpretation has been added for the sake of simple people, for intelligent people will certainly see what it is without any interpretation. And so I leave it to each one to accept the interpretation or to supply a better one for it, if he can.[30]

The traditional roles of word and image are here reversed: it is the unlearned who need the text to aid their understanding, while intelligent people, according to Osiander, will comprehend the images immediately.[31] The images are, moreover, not reminders of textual prophecies or summaries of their important points. Instead, the woodcuts themselves comprise the prophecies, while the text is suspect and dispensable. Martin Luther, in his nearly contemporary preface to Revelation, regarded prophecies consisting only of images as the most obscure and prone to misuse, as long as no interpretation was offered.[32] Osiander, however, expressed a much different attitude toward prophetic images. Whereas the allegorical, prophetic-visionary woodcuts in Lichtenberger’s Prognosticatio had given readers opportunity to participate in visual interpretation while pointing them into the text, Osiander held that the ideal reader of the Remarkable Prophecy about the Papacy would experience the prophetic moment in the viewing of the images alone.

The papal prophetic images were reprinted again around 1535, in two editions by Jakob Cammerlander in Strasbourg that also incorporated the Hildegardian prophecy published by Osiander, again in the service of antipapal polemic.[33] After a chronicle of papal usurpation and transgression, the Strasbourg editions repeat fifteen images from the Vaticinia de summis pontificibus series in somewhat smaller format, to which additional polemical details have been added. There is thus more space for Jakob Vielfeld’s textual explication of the images, which, on the whole, lacks Osiander’s wit and even such generosity as he could muster. While the sectarian outlook in Cammerlander’s editions may be antiorthodox, the attitude toward images is quite traditional, as the papal prophetic woodcuts are added for the sake of “those who otherwise cannot read very well.”[34] Just as the functional use of images does not know confessional boundaries, the appeal to Lichtenberger, Hildegard, or the prophetic papal images by both Lutheran and Catholic writers serves as a reminder that the Reformation is not a caesura in early modern prophecy.[35] While both sides attempted to enlist prophecy for their cause or attacked prognostic practices at various times, the Catholic and Protestant divide does not form a boundary in the creation or reception of prophetic and prognostic works, and there is a continuity of edition history both before and after the Reformation.

Engagement with the images of Lichtenberger’s Prognosticatio and polemical editions of the papal prophetic images influenced the visual-prophetic work of one of the most original and influential minds of the time, Theophrastus Bombastus von Hohenheim, known as Paracelsus (1493–1541). Paracelsus left behind a massive body of work in manuscript, most of which did not appear in print until decades after his death. The works that were printed during his lifetime consist primarily of prognostic and prophetic works, however (twenty-one of twenty-seven total editions before his death, compared to six printed medical works).[36] In or around 1530, Paracelsus’s engagement with Lichtenberger’s woodcuts and the papal image cycle published by Osiander led to two extensive treatises, but these works remained unpublished until decades after his death. As with Osiander before him, Paracelsus treated the woodcuts as authentic truths whose meaning was (to him) self-evident, while the text could be cast aside.[37] The same kind of engagement with prophetic images is evident in his Prognostication for Twenty-four Years, first published in German and in the Latin translation of Marcus Tatius in 1536.[38] This work consists of thirty-two single-page articles consisting of a woodcut followed by a textual response. The texts are not an interpretation of the image into tangible terms but, rather, an allusive judgment without explicit relationship to future events. So, for example, the foreground of one woodcut consists of several torn sheets, scrolls, and books, while the background landscape is marred by a dismembered head (see figure 10). The text underneath declares, “When a schoolchild comes to maturity, it is ashamed of its childish work and destroys it. The same will happen to you. If you write in such a form, your own work will be nothing. That will cause much labor to be done in vain and for naught, for time teaches and gives recognition that not everything that is advertised as a pearl is actually a pearl. Therefore a hand will fall over you that will tear you asunder like a scrap of cloth.”[39] While the relation between the destroyed writings and body of the text and woodcut is clear, the referent for “you” is never revealed, nor is it explained what this text and image might mean in the context of prognostication.[40]

Although some of the woodcuts appear to show recognizable figures or to make use of familiar allegorical symbols, Paracelsus wrote nothing about the source of the thirty-two pictures, and there is little agreement as to whether Paracelsus invented both the text and images, composed a text based on preexisting images, or provided only a text for which an artist provided illustrations. A further complication for any iconographic analysis is that Paracelsus did not describe his interpretive methods in any of his prognostic writings, although he sharply criticized the astrological reasoning of his time. In the Prognostication for Twenty-four Years, he offered his own concept of magica as the basis of interpretation. A later disciple defined Paracelsus’s magic as the “natural and lawful mother of true medicine and the hidden wisdom of nature, ever concealed and obscured in the center, with which if you apply only human reason you will find nothing but pure folly. It is truly the gift of God, with which he grants us knowledge of natural and supernatural things.”[41] Benzenhöfer sees magica in the context of the Prognostication for Twenty-four Years as the “personified act of signifying” that can be found not only in nature but also in human beings and in human works.[42]

What might contemporary readers, promised a prognostication for the years 1536–60 similar to the multiyear prognostications of Carion and Virdung, have found in the Prognostication for Twenty-four Years? Perhaps the Prognostication for Twenty-four Years offered readers the consistent implementation of an idea first seen in Osiander’s edition of the Remarkable Prophecy about the Papacy: the identification of the prophetic moment with the act of visual interpretation. The Prognostication for Twenty-four Years combined obscurely symbolic images with an allusive textual subscription. Readers met this text-image convolute and participated in its resolution to their own satisfaction (permitting, for example, at least one contemporary reader to read the work as an anti-Lutheran prophecy).[43] Benzenhöfer concludes that the “text (and thus also the text-image ensemble) will continue to present puzzles” for scholars, but that seems very close to its original purpose for contemporary readers, to whom it represented an opportunity to participate in prophetic visual interpretation. Paracelsus’s concluding “Explanation of the Prognostication” states only that each of the thirty-two articles is so profound as to require its own book for full explication and that a complete interpretation would cause much sorrow; so much is written in the hidden sense that it cannot easily be explained. “Others must comprehend it better than I, and understand to whom it applies,” Paracelsus wrote in the preface.[44] Paracelsus thus provided his readers an open text, with images as its entrance. Regarding the Prognostication for Twenty-four Years as an invitation to visual interpretation is at least consonant with the wish of Paracelsus that “every Christian might become an astronomer, view the signs in the heavens that God himself has made, consider that Christ has inscribed the sign, and seek the interpretation in the same place as his word, and then each one will find it in himself.”[45]

OLD BOOKS REDISCOVERED: CHRISTIAN EGENOLFF AND THE PROPHETIC CANON

This study limits its chronological focus to the first century following Gutenberg, although prognostic and prophetic works continued to be printed and reprinted well after 1550. Yet the boundary is not entirely arbitrary. In the late 1540s, the Frankfurt printer Christian Egenolff published a prophetic compilation that contained many of the popular prophetic works of the prior hundred years and that pointed the way to a new attitude toward printed texts. Egenolff had begun his career in Strasbourg in 1528 but moved his workshop to Frankfurt in 1530, where, as the city’s first printer (apart from the brief and limited operation of Beatus Murner in 1511–12), Egenolff published as many as five hundred editions over the next twenty-five years.[46] Egenolff’s compilation provides a concise list of prophetic authorities in the mid-sixteenth century in Lichtenberger’s wake, and it substantially contributed to the formation of a prophetic canon by providing the means by which several later writers rediscovered the prophetic works of the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries.

Egenolff had reprinted the Prophecies of the Twelve Sibyls, expanded to include a thirteenth Sibyl, for the first time in 1531. The next year, he printed a version without woodcuts but including the well-traveled excerpts from Lichtenberger and Grünpeck in the Extract of Various Prophecies, as well as Josephus’s apocryphal testimony of Christ, a short Antichrist tract, and the signs of the Last Day. The association of Josephus with the Sibyls is not surprising, as they all were regarded as non-Christian witnesses from classical antiquity for the truth of the Christian message, and the extract from Josephus already appeared alongside the Sibyls in Jakob Köbel’s edition of the Latin sibylline collection of Philippus de Barberiis around 1517. The association of Antichrist legends and signs of the Last Day is also to be expected, and both appeared already in the manuscript tradition of the Sibyl’s Prophecy.[47] Egenolff’s 1532 collection provided thirty-six signs of the Last Day, and similar lists with varying numbers of items are known from the same period.[48] This version of Egenolff’s compilation, still primarily a sibylline collection with some brief additions, was reprinted in 1575, and additional reprints of the same configuration appeared in ca. 1620, 1637, 1676, and 1700.

Egenolff expanded the collection in 1537 to include a tract by Filippo Cattaneo, cast as a prognostication for four years but principally a recounting of the tropes of an Angelic Pope and Last Emperor, and a work of the recently deceased Joseph Grünpeck. The work is not Grünpeck’s Speculum of 1508, however, or even the recent Prognosticum for 1532–40. It is, rather, a work otherwise unknown, “The Book of Master Joseph Grünpeck on the Reformation of Christendom and the Church,” which is missing from most lists of Grünpeck’s works.[49] After describing the turmoil to arise following the death of Frederick III (which had occurred in 1493), Grünpeck’s “Reformation” cites the motif of an “emperor of chaste countenance” who awakens from a deathly sleep. The “Reformation” narrates a series of scenes involving the emperor: “The prince is awakened from his sleep by the heavenly portents”; “Shocked by the variety of such miracles, he will arise to meet them”; and so on until he defeats all enemies and reforms Christendom. Each scene consists of similar mottoes followed by brief explanations, suggesting an illustrated work for which the illustrations were omitted in Egenolff’s collection. As Grünpeck had penned a number of illustrated panegyrics to Frederick III and Maximilian I in the guise of imperial history,[50] the attribution to Grünpeck of an illustrated panegyric in the guise of prophecy seems entirely plausible.

Egenolff’s final and most extensive expansion of his prophetic compilation came in the late 1540s, when he replaced Cattaneo’s tract with Carion’s “Hidden Prophecy” following Grünpeck’s “Reformation” and added as the first two works in the collection the Prognostication for Twenty-four Years of Paracelsus and Lichtenberger’s Prognosticatio, both illustrated with woodblocks acquired from Heinrich Steiner of Augsburg. The text of Lichtenberger’s Prognosticatio followed the older translation for the first thirty-seven leaves (most likely using the 1526 edition of Peter Schöffer, whose title page it shares) before adopting the modernized translation of Stephan Rodt, which had first appeared in the Wittenberg edition of 1527 (perhaps transmitted via one of Heinrich Steiner’s Augsburg editions of Rodt’s translation).[51] As Rodt’s translation numbered the chapters consecutively throughout rather than for each of the three sections, the fourth chapter of the Prognosticatio in Egenolff’s compilation is followed by the eighth.

The 1548 title page, which emphasized that Egenolff’s collection was illustrated, bears the identification “prophecies and predictions of past, present, and future things, histories and fortunes of all estates, to admonish and comfort the pious and to frighten and warn the evil, proclaiming until the end,” after which follows a list of the principal contents, arranged by author.[52] Barnes notes that Egenolff’s compilation was part of a resurgence of interest in prophecy following Luther’s death, but his description of most items in Egenolff’s compilation as “clearly anti-Roman in tone” seems wide of the mark, considering the generally anti-Lutheran stance of Paracelsus and the origin of most remaining sections of the compilation before 1517.[53]

What principle of selection informed Egenolff’s last prophetic compilation? There are numerous works that he could have chosen to include but did not. While the works of Birgitta of Sweden and pseudo-Methodius had appeared in fifteen and eleven editions, respectively, between 1475 and 1525, none of their works appear in Egenolff’s collection. Why did Egenolff include Lichtenberger’s Prognosticatio in its entirety but not Birgitta’s Burden of the World? The guiding principle of Egenolff’s collection seems to be grounded less in the characteristics of the prophetic texts than in a particularly visual approach to prophecy that made some works and their woodcut cycles indispensable and others less so. Paracelsus’s Prognostication for Twenty-four Years, the first work in the collection and the most prominently mentioned on the title page, is the ultimate expression of the notion of prophecy as visual interpretation that had first appeared in Lichtenberger’s Prognosticatio. Grünpeck’s Speculum and its textual-illustrative woodcuts were less amenable to the kind of symbolic interpretation and visual participation found in other works, and so Grünpeck is represented, instead, by the “Reformation of Christendom and the Churches.” While this short work lacked illustrations, it did not lack for visuality, as the interplay of scenic descriptions and their interpretation re-creates as text the process of visual interpretation, just as some editions of Lichtenberger’s Prognosticatio retained the captions but omitted the woodcuts.[54] For the purposes of Egenolff’s collection, a textual description of interpretable images was apparently superior to the actual but usually illustrative woodcuts found in the Speculum. In the same way, Carion’s “Hidden Prophecy” offered vivid, if stereotyped, prophetic imagery in a way that his Interpretation and Revelation did not. In addition to canonizing early modern prophets and prophetic works, Egenolff’s compilations established visual interpretation, rather than textual production, as the path for individual participation in prophecy.

The midcentury collections of Egenolff were instrumental in transmitting Lichtenberger and other elements of the prophetic canon from the sixteenth century to the seventeenth. In 1618, Wilhelm Neuheuser commented in a Lutheran polemical tract that “many prophecies and predictions of wise people are now being published and printed,” and the early years of the Thirty Years’ War did see another resurgence of interest in prophetic works, including a new edition of Birgitta’s Burden of the World in 1625 and, in 1620, a new edition of the Onus ecclesiae attributed to Berthold Pürstinger, bishop of Chiemsee from 1508–26.[55] (This compilation, first printed in eleven editions in 1524–31, included prophecies drawn from Birgitta, Hildegard of Bingen, Catherine of Siena, pseudo-Vincent Ferrer, pseudo-Methodius and Aytinger’s commentary on it, and, above all, Abbas Joachim magnus propheta, an edition of the prophecies of Telesphorus of Costenza and other Joachimite prophecies, printed in 1516 by Lazzaro Soardi in Venice.) Neuheuser identified ten recently published prophetic works, and the first three point to the influence of Egenolff’s collection: they are Grünpeck’s “Reformation,” found only there; Lichtenberger’s Prognosticatio; and the commentaries of Paracelsus on Lichtenberger and the prophetic papal images. In 1620, a new edition of Lichtenberger and other works appeared, and its title page, contents, and preface leave no doubt that it is a reprinting of Egenolff’s collection, although without the work of Paracelsus. The first title identifies it as the Affliction of the Entire World and Change of All Sovereignty and Government, while the next page specifies the contents as “prophecies and predictions of present and future things, histories and occurrences until the end of the world, namely: Johannes Lichtenberger, Johann Carion, Joseph Grünpeck, the Sibyls, and many others.”[56] A nearly identical edition appeared in the same year. If there was any need of confirmation that these editions were based on Egenolff’s collection, the preface to the Prognosticatio removes all doubt: the printer calls it an “extract from the practica of Master Johann Lichtenberger, which was printed without naming of the location in 1549,” just as Egenolff’s collection printed in that year had mentioned neither his own name nor the city of Frankfurt, but only the date of printing. This 1620 edition was, according to the title page, “faithfully reprinted from old copies.” This was to be the only reprinting of a work by Grünpeck in the seventeenth century, as three later editions in 1633 and one more in 1664 preserve the title Affliction of the Entire World but include with it only the extracts from Lichtenberger.

The claims of seventeenth-century editions to faithfully represent sixteenth-century books suggest that a new stage had been reached in attitudes toward antiquity and authenticity. The claim that a prophecy had been found in an old book was so common in the first half of the sixteenth century that Johannes Virdung mocked it in his practica for 1537, complaining that many practicas were being published, “one made long before the birth of Christ and found in an old book, another made long before the birth of Christ and found in a stone column in Rome, the third revealed through the unknown voice of an invisible spirit, and similar foolish practicas, which are made only for the profit of printers and contrary to true astronomy.”[57] During the transition from the unique manuscript to the limitlessly copied and distributed printed book, reference to the older medium or to the specificity of a given place attested a printed work’s authenticity. The massive authoritative collections of Birgitta’s revelations are careful to distance themselves from contemporary editions of the Burden of the World not only through the affidavits of ecclesiastical worthies but also by claiming a manuscript in the saint’s own cloister as their exemplar; any revelation claiming to be Birgitta’s but not found in the collection, they assert, should be rejected as inauthentic.[58] The same kind of claim could be made by less credible texts, of course. Some claimed to be “verses found in an old wall in the Church of the Holy Sepulchre in Jerusalem” or “found in a certain old book in Rome,” precisely in the manner that Virdung had derided.[59] Others merely claimed to have been discovered in old books, with no attempt to locate their source. For some prophetic tracts that assert antiquity, their claim rests on the specific physicality of writing by hand, such as Osiander’s claim that anyone who saw the exemplar of his papal prophecies would agree that the illustrations and writing were a hundred years old.[60] The anonymous Prophecy and Secret of Old Hidden Writings described its sources as an old text, “written with old letters.”[61] Other prophecies appealed to linguistic authenticity, such as a “prophecy found in Magdeburg truly written several hundred years ago in Latin”; the Tract against the Turks of 1486 cited a prophecy concerning the fall of Islam found in a book written in Arabic.[62]

The prophetic tract attributed to Jakob Pflaum was first printed around 1522, but it claimed to have been originally made in 1500. The source to which it obliquely refers for its veneer of authenticity is a scientific work, the astronomical almanac of Johannes Stöffler and (the authentic) Jakob Pflaum, which had been printed in 1499. A reprint of the “Jakob Pflaum” booklet in 1532 adds a preface that states explicitly that the alleged original had been printed in 1500.[63] While the prophetic tract’s (admittedly spurious) claim to authority is based more on scientific respectability than on antiquity, the tract of “Jakob Pflaum” does represent a case where prophetic authenticity rests on fidelity not to an old manuscript but to a printed book.

The prophetic compilations of Christian Egenolff represent a new status accorded to printed media. Egenolff’s canonization entails not just an enshrinement of particular authors but also a new attitude toward the integrity of their works. In the compilations of Egenolff, the prophetic work was no longer only a source of authoritative text to be cited and extracted, as it had been for Lichtenberger; for the Burden of the World, Onus ecclesiae, and Extract of Various Prophecies; or in such contemporary collections as Wolfgang Lazius’s Prophetic Fragments, published in 1547 in Vienna, or Melchior Ambach’s On the End of the World and the Coming of the Antichrist.[64] Rather than citing texts, Egenolff’s compilations anthologized entire prophetic works, including their illustrations. As elements incorporated into Egenolff’s collection, books were not containers for text but integral units that could not so easily be divided. Lichtenberger’s Prognosticatio retained a distinct title page even as the second item in the collection. Sixty years after the first edition of Lichtenberger, Egenolff’s collections helped establish a canon that was based not on the prophetic word but on the prophetic work. Egenolff’s collection was in this way a precursor to the prophetic compilations published by Adam Walasser in Dillingen in 1569 and 1573, where each tract retained its own title page. Unlike earlier discoverers of old prophecies, the linguistic proof of antiquity in Walasser’s collection is not the use of Latin but the use of an opaque and archaic German.[65] Where the invention of print had once accentuated the contrasts between the old manuscript and the new book, printed books a century after Gutenberg had become capable of acquiring prophetic antiquity.

5

PRACTICA TEÜTSCH

THEORY AND PRACTICE: THE PROTOTYPICAL PRACTICA

It should now be clear why works of popular astrology must be included in a study of prophecy in early modern society: the ties between the two fields are too numerous, the reciprocal influence too pervasive, and the number of common actors too high to ignore. Lichtenberger, a pioneer of astrology in print in 1475, became a compiler of prophetic works in 1488; the astrologer Johann Carion became synonymous with a “Hidden Prophecy” formulated in prophetic metaphors; astrologers’ addressing their predictions to noblemen recapitulated the audience of the Sibyl before Solomon and other scenes of prophetic dialogue.

Previous chapters have mentioned the practicas of various astrologers, referring to these works as prognostic booklets pertaining to a single year. As their name implies, practicas were not theoretical treatises: the title practica was applied in the fifteenth century to works on law, medicine, music, and astrology that gave specific application to bodies of theoretical knowledge. The existence of a theoretical basis was important to the authors of practicas, for it allowed them to differentiate their prognostications from the unfounded claims of unlearned charlatans or inventive printers. Wenzel Faber of Budweis frequently emphasized both the brevity and the theoretical foundation of these booklets, as he did in the closing lines of his practica for 1494: “Therefore these things that have been most briefly declared in this prognostication are taken and collected from the rules of the philosophers and experience in the science of astrology.”[1] Practicas claimed to apply the principles of Greek and Arabic authorities to the configuration of the heavens in a particular year, including planetary conjunctions and eclipses, and therefore they were printed annually. This distinguishes practicas from the occasional tracts that responded after the fact to comets, auroras, and other unusual phenomena, but astrologers perceived a qualitative difference as well. As Carion explained to his patron in the introduction to a comet interpretation, “One cannot prognosticate as effectively with comets and such unusual signs as with planets, which have their certain and orderly motion and effect.”[2] Practicas were also interpretive works that provided more than the minimal and factual information usually found on broadside almanacs and calendars. Sigismund Fabri’s broadside almanac for 1493, for example, calls itself an “extract from the practica for Cologne of Master Sigmund.” Johannes Canter’s almanac for 1488 referred readers to his practica for information about agricultural fertility, the configuration of the heavens, and the fortunes of human estates.[3] There are rare examples of broadside practicas, and prognostication can be found in some broadside almanacs, but almanacs, theoretical treatises, and practicas differ in their core functions: an almanac can be thought of as providing the astronomical input; the theoretical treatise as supplying the system of interpretive rules; and the practica as the system’s output, the word of the astrologer to his audience. From its origin as one type of application of systematic knowledge, the term practica became synonymous with the term prediction in the first half of the sixteenth century.

Practicas also represented an annually updated response to gradual changes and periodic crises in early modern society. As the principal customers and readers of practicas, the literate urban classes could not indefinitely be subsumed under the category of lay peasants, as they appeared in Lichtenberger’s Prognosticatio, and printed practicas dealt with the changing nature of society in new ways. Like other prophetic and prognostic works, practicas were “expressions of a crisis situation” whose ultimate causes included the introduction of print.[4]

In a compilation of prophetic and prognostic texts published in 1584, Johann Rasch wrote that there are three kinds of prognostication: there are, first of all, prophecies for no specific year, perhaps dealing with the end times, but most of them are mere dreams; then there are prognostications based on conjunctions and eclipses that treat multiple years, but most of them are mere fantasies; and then there are the prognostications for a single year, called practicas, of which there are so many that no one gains much honor from them, and most are held (for good reason) to be full of false-hood. Rasch states that the practicas include, first of all, the astrologers’ reasoning based on equinoxes, eclipses, and ruling planets, followed by six sections: first, agricultural fertility; second, illness; third, war and peace; fourth, the good and ill fortunes of human estates; fifth, the good and ill fortune of lands and cities; and sixth, the weather of each season and moon phase (although, Rasch observes, this is now commonly placed in the calendar rather than in the practica).[5] There is much that can be learned about prognostication in print at the end of the sixteenth century from Rasch’s statement, including the distinctions between practicas and other types of prognostic booklets. Although Rasch had observed recent changes, the practica that he described reflects a format that had remained quite stable for ninety years. There are German practicas from the 1490s and in every following decade that meet Rasch’s description in every respect, but there are no such practicas from the 1480s.

The existence of a prototypical form becomes apparent upon inspection of many individual practicas, which tend to share many features. Although the practicas of each author reflect an individual style that usually remained stable from year to year, the accretion of changes over several years often led to an increasing resemblance to the prototype, which thus becomes visible as an attractor to which disparate authors were drawn. For example, the first known practica of Michael Krautwadel, for 1528, has a structure consisting of eighteen chapters that had not been current since the late fifteenth century, but Krautwadel’s last known practica, for 1536, followed the prototype exactly. Anti-astrological or merely humorous parodies point to an awareness of a prototype when they mock or distort it. A fool’s practica for 1527, for example, consists of a title page with woodcut followed by an introduction and then chapters parodying the ruling planets, “waters,” agriculture, illness, war, various cities, the seasons, and the months.[6] Such parodies depend for their comedic effect on subverting genre conventions, and thus can serve as a reliable indicator of contemporary perceptions of a conventional form.

Positing a prototypical form allows us to deal not only with the broad similarity between many practicas but also with the many variations. If the prototype is defined by multiple characteristics—some near the core, some more marginal, but none entirely definitive by itself—then we can differentiate typical practicas from the experimental efforts of some authors, from idiosyncratic or archaic practicas, or from prognostic booklets that have nothing in common with practicas except their titles. The characteristics of the prototypical practica, at least for the years 1501–50, include the following:

1.  The name practica (or some variant) in the title was nearly universal, occurring in over 280 of the 306 German-language practicas known from this time period. Not everything that called itself a practica actually was one, however. Various editions of prophetic works, including the Extract of Various Prophecies, Lichtenberger’s Prognosticatio, the booklet of “Jakob Pflaum,” and a broadside edition of “Theodericus Croata/Dietrich von Zeng,” called themselves practicas.

2.  After parity between the number of German and Latin editions was reached by 1490, German quickly became the predominant language (see figure 11, later in this chapter). Compared to 306 practicas in German (including Low German) in the first half of the sixteenth century, we find only 55 in Latin. Almost two-thirds of German practicas mention the language in the title, which most frequently began with the phrase practica teütsch (or teutsch, deutsch, dütsch, or another of the numerous orthographic or dialectal variations on that word), even after German had become the language of choice in over 90 percent of editions.

3.  Practicas were prose works. The few verse practicas (including Marcus Schynnagel’s verse practica for 1491, an anonymous broadside for 1500, Johannes Stabius’s practica for 1503–4 and Sebastian Brant’s broadside for 1504)[7] are so different from the typical practica in so many additional ways that it is doubtful that they should be counted as practicas at all (much as the verse Turk Calendar printed by Gutenberg was a calendar only in form but not in primary function).

4.  Title pages for German practicas, which had been uncommon in the 1480s, were all but universal by the beginning of the sixteenth century, paralleling the development of title pages as a constitutive feature of printed books.[8] Italian practicas rarely had separate title pages or woodcuts on title pages before 1520, however.[9]

5.  The layout of practicas’ title pages followed a set pattern, with the title formulation at the top of the page followed by a woodcut that usually represented the ruling planet or planets for the year according to a standardized anthropomorphic iconography: Mars as an armored man, Mercury as a scholar with a caduceus, and so on. The imprint information and an assertion of privilege against reprinting (either real or merely claimed) often followed the woodcut. Practicas without woodcuts on the title page were all but unknown from 1501 to 1530, and only 24 out of 303 practicas before 1551 found in VD16 clearly lack them. Later practicas tended to replace the single illustrations of the ruling planets with scenes composed of multiple smaller woodcuts, which could be remixed in different configurations each year. Illustrations after the title page are uncommon (occurring in 49 editions, compared to 241 editions with only title woodcuts).

6.  The title formulation always identified the author. The only sixteenth-century anonymous practicas are fragments whose title page has been lost. Identification of the person to whom the practica was dedicated was also very common, while several practicas specify a city for which they were prepared. Georg Tannstetter warned his readers not to “buy any broadside, practica, or booklet unless it has printed on it who made it, and at the back who printed it, and where, and when; thus one may avoid falsely invented practicas made by unlearned and ignorant people and other shameful booklets.”[10]

7.  The predominant format in the first half of the sixteenth century was two small quarto signatures of four leaves each. Single gatherings of eight leaves were uncommon after the fifteenth century. Fully 174 of the 278 editions between 1501 and 1550 for which format is recorded consist of eight leaves, and another 43 consist of six or seven leaves. Only 25 editions reached a length of twelve leaves or longer.[11] More extensive practicas became more common only in the second half of the sixteenth century. For practicas before 1551, the leaves were almost never paginated or foliated.[12]

8.  Practicas were made for just a single year and were presumed to appear annually.[13] Apart from works addressing the conjunctions of 1524 and a limited number of highly popular works by Virdung, Carion, Paracelsus, and Salomon von Roermond, there were perhaps no more than ten true multiyear practicas.

9.  Practicas opened usually with a dedicatory epistle and less commonly with an introduction addressed to the reader, which often defended astrology by citing Greek and Arabic authorities and provided a biblical justification for astrological prognostication, while anticipating criticism that its predictions diminished the free will of God or human beings by disavowing such intentions. The typical argument held that God was above the planets and controlled their influences, while the righteous, who were not controlled by their bodies, could resist the influence of the planets.

10. The practica proper consisted of around seven chapters, often in the sequence found in Rasch’s description previously mentioned. The chapter divisions were meant to make the material more easily comprehensible to readers, as Virdung stated in his practicas for 1495 and 1510 and as Anton Brelochs affirmed in his practicas for 1538 and 1543. Italian practicas tended to retain the older form of many short chapters and to have a greater emphasis on political predictions.[14]

11. The first chapter (sometimes split into two) identified significant astronomical occurrences during the year, including conjunctions and eclipses, and the ruling planet or planets as determined by the location of the sun at the beginning of the year or of each season of the year. “It is the invariable custom of the masters of the stars to select lords of the coming year at the beginning of their practicas,” wrote a critic of astrology, “Faithful Eckhart,” in his contrapractica for 1533.[15] But practicas by different authors differ considerably in their selection of ruling planets.[16] Practicas were not merely interpretive works but also argumentative and persuasive ones.

12. The sequence of the next three chapters on agricultural fertility, illness, and war may vary, but this trio can be found already in medieval astrological treatises, and it persists into the seventeenth century and later, even when other sections are omitted.

13. The next chapter treated human fortunes by allotting occupational classes to one of the seven planets. Soldiers, smiths, and others who work with fire were assigned to Mars, for example, while women, entertainers, and those ruled by lust were assigned to Venus. This seven-way planetary model mostly displaced other competing models of society beginning in the 1490s, including tripartite divisions according to religion or estate, but some authors persisted in use of older models or experimented with new ones.

14. The following chapter typically dealt with the fortunes of lands or cities. Some later practica authors introduced tables of geographic locations governed by particular zodiacal signs. Other topics, such as the mining of various metals, are found in fifteenth-century practicas but disappeared almost entirely in the sixteenth century.

15. The final chapter or two, sometimes treated as a second section unto itself, provided a calendar of moon phases and weather and sometimes other kinds of propitious days, according to each month and season. “All practica writers until now have written earnestly about the new and full moons of the twelve months, first cold or warm, then wet and damp in another, as if it were true and certain,” the pseudonymous “Faithful Eckhart” explained.[17] In the practicas of the 1480s from Wenzel Faber and others, the calendrical treatment of weather had often comprised the second or third chapter, but Faber and nearly all others abandoned this early placement after 1490.[18] A brief conclusion was also common.

While none of these features were by themselves unique or essential, all of them together comprise a set of features that identified the practica genre to customers and guided readers’ expectations of what they might find within the booklet. Not only the text but also the title pages and their woodcuts and other features influenced how practicas were perceived.

As small booklets that were often sold together with calendars, the practicas were suited better to cursory examination in combination with multiple texts than to intensive study. Georg Tannstetter’s German practica for 1524 both referred readers to the Latin version for a fuller astrological argument and encouraged readers to compare his reasoning with that found in other practicas, just as Johann Carion would later encourage the dedicatee of his Interpretation and Revelation to compare the work with other prognostications.[19] Berchthold Eipelius was not so encouraging; he complained in his practica for 1545 about the mean-spirited habit of those who did not understand the art of astrology who “buy up as many practicas as they can and compare them to each other, often finding that one predicts rain, the other snow, the third humidity, and so on.”[20]

The German practicas were long associated with New Year’s greetings. The chapter on foolish superstitions in Brant’s Narrenschiff that mentioned practicas also mocked the belief that those who do not receive New Year’s gifts from friends will suffer ill fortune during the upcoming year.[21] One of the first practicas with an illustrated title page, that of Johannes Angelus for 1488, featured not planets but the Christ child and the wish “May the new-born child that Mary bore give us a good and blessed New Year.”[22] In 1510, one Antwerp printer intercepted a copy of the practica of Jasper Laet for 1511, hastily reprinted it by letting his associates work on Christmas Day, and thus ruined the New Year’s Day business of a competitor.[23] Johann Carion’s dedication of his practica for 1531 states that he had prepared it so that he could present his benefactor, the electoral prince of Brandenburg, “with a small gift for a blessed New Year.”[24] Balthasar Wilhelm’s Lutheran contrapractica of 1524 states that it was drawn from scripture rather than from the unreliable art of Ptolemy and other astrologers and was intended as a Christmas gift for his dedicatee. The preface of the 1525 edition, however, recasts the work as a New Year’s greeting: “I find in traditional use that a good friend always honors another at New Year’s with the wish for a good year. Therefore I wish all people a good New Year and a good new life in Christ, and in addition to read this practica.”[25] The contrapractica of Faithful Eckhart also begins with wishes for a happy New Year.[26] One further notes that Luther’s sermon for New Year’s Day published in 1524 includes a spiritual interpretation of astronomical signs, while the Lutheran preacher Johannes Züntel made astrological prognostication the topic for his New Year’s Day sermon in 1607. In addition to urging the rejection of astrological predictions, Züntel reprints with his sermon the entire revelation of “Brother Raimund” (the “Auffahrt Abend” prophecy). The connection of practicas to New Year’s Day and the likelihood of their printing close to that day makes it more useful to cite practicas according to the year of their relevance rather than the year of their printing. It is assumed that most practicas for the new year were printed shortly before the end of the old year, particularly from the beginning of the sixteenth century onward.

THE PRINT HISTORY OF THE GERMAN PRACTICA

A prototype based on multiple characteristics helps to untangle some problems in the early history of printed practicas. Often mentioned as the earliest printed practica is the practica for 1470–78 of Theobertus of England, attributed to the press of Günther Zainer of Augsburg around 1470.[27] But this broadside is not a practica in the technical sense of the term. It is, rather, a series of predictions for subsequent years that glide from weather and pestilence to the fates of kings and empires, and it is more closely related to the “Toledo Letter” and similar astrologically themed political prophecies.[28] It is an important document in the history of astrology and prophecy in print, as it shows the early intersection of the two fields and attests an early use of practizieren in the sense of “prognosticate,” but this list of predictions shares little with later practicas. Other examples of early astrological editions can be seen, at best, as precursors of the practica, such as Lichtenberger’s Conjunction of Saturn and Mars or the several comet tracts printed around 1472.

The earliest practicas in print began to appear nearly simultaneously across Europe in the mid-1470s. The earliest attestations of annual prognostic booklets are from Franciscus Guasconus (beginning 1474) and Hieronymus de Manfredis (1475) in Italy, followed soon thereafter by those from Petrus Advogarius (1477) and Paul of Middelburg (1478); Johannes Laet (1476) in the Low Countries and France; and Johannes (Schelling) of Glogau in Germany (1479).[29] There are other early practicas, but these are fragmentary, isolated, or anonymous. A fragment in German dated 1474–78 may represent an earlier German practica author than Johannes of Glogau, but it illustrates, above all, the problematic state of preservation of early ephemeral works.[30]

Among the first generation of German practica authors, Wenzel Faber of Budweis towers above all the rest, with fifty-six incunable editions (and one more in 1506, in addition to some thirty almanacs), including practicas for every year between 1482 and 1501. Faber’s practicas were printed primarily by Martin Landsberg and other Leipzig printers, but there were also twelve Nuremberg editions and several more in other German cities. Among German astrologers published during the 1480s, Johannes of Glogau and Martin Polich reached only fourteen and sixteen editions, respectively. Even compared to foreign contemporaries, Faber finds no equal: there are twenty-eight known practicas from Petrus Advogarius, twenty-three from Hieronymus de Manfredis, seventeen from Marcus Scribanarius, twelve annual practicas from Paul of Middelburg (thus not including his popular Prognostication for 20 Years), and nine known practicas from Johannes Laet.

The structure of Faber’s earliest practica illustrates how radically the German practicas changed between the 1480s and the 1490s and why Faber, for all his early dominance, must be considered the grandfather, rather than the father, of the genre. Compared to later prototypical practicas, Faber’s earliest known practica, a German prognostication for 1482, is an exercise in chaos. Following the introduction, the practica is divided into “words” (verba in Faber’s early Latin practicas). The chapter and subsection headings in larger type (however inconsistently applied) establish the following structure:

1.  “On great events and the course of the circuit of the heavens” (discussing the scale of astrological prediction);

2.  “On the planets and lords of this year”;

3.  “On the general events of this year according to the four qualities” (that is, hot, cold, wet, and dry);

4.  “On the nature of the four seasons”;

5.  “On moon phases and the propitious days of the entire year”;

6.  “On the three estates, namely Jews, Christians, and heathens”;

7.  “On the state of fruits in general” (including agricultural produce, domesticated animals, and fish);

8.  “On pestilence”;

9.  “On illness”;

10. “On war and peace”;

11. “On messages and letters”;

12. “On the highest human estate” (including the pope, cardinals, kings, and princes);

13. “On various kingdoms and lands” (including Meissen, Italy, Bohemia, Hungary, Austria, Moravia, Bavaria, Poland, Little Poland, Silesia, Franconia, England and Flanders, France and Burgundy, and Prussia, Lithuania, Saxony, Brandenburg, Norway, and Sweden)

14. “On various cities” (discussing Leipzig, the women of Leipzig, Prague, Cracow, Würzburg, Nuremberg, and Breslau);

15. “On officials, clerics, and other worthy people”:

a.  “On the estate of knights and soldiers” (including princely servants, knights, squires, surgeons, goldsmiths, barbers, bottle makers, bathers, and smiths of all types);

b.  “On students and learned people” (including masters of the liberal arts, astronomers, astrologers, logicians, physicists, grammarians, copyists, alchemists, poets, all masters of the arts, and all clever people);

c.  “On virgins and women” (including virgins, women, singers, painters, lyre players and their masters, adulterers, and the unchaste);

d.  “On merchants” (also including retailers);

e.  “On clerics” (including monks, Carthusians, and all who lead a solitary life, who, in addition, share their fate with farmers, sailors, poor people, craftsmen, cobblers, tanners, other hand workers, and all animals that walk or fly by night);

16. “On ores and metals” (including gold, silver, lead, tin, iron, and copper)

17. “On the common people.”

One senses a profusion of competing organizational principles, particularly with regard to human beings, who are addressed in four different and non-contiguous chapters. Friedrich Creussner began issuing practicas in 1485 with an offering from Faber that is, if anything, even more chaotic in its organization, with three chapters divided into multiple “words.” The calendrical material forms the second chapter, the three religions are in the first chapter, and other human fates are in the last. The contemporary and earlier practicas of Johannes of Glogau, for their part, have even more chapters in a similarly complex arrangement.

During the later 1480s, Faber rationalized the arrangement of chapters in a number of ways that anticipate the prototypical form. By the time Creussner printed Faber’s practica for 1487, Faber had found an arrangement that would subsequently change very little. The general disposition of the year, the four seasons, and the moon phases and propitious days of each month were moved to the end of the practica, forming a calendrical section. The chapters on minerals and messengers were dropped entirely. The remaining chapters of the first section resemble the arrangement of the prototypical practicas, although human affairs were treated over the course of eight chapters, hindering identification with particular planets, and the three religions were still treated in a separate section. Faber’s fame and his association with practicas can be seen in the title page of an anonymous practica for 1499, which declares that it is “in the form of Master Wenzel of Budweis.”[31]

Johannes Virdung (died ca. 1539), Faber’s younger colleague and fellow citizen of Leipzig from 1487–91, began publishing practicas in 1489 or 1490, launching a career that would, over the next half century, surpass even Faber’s accomplishments.[32] Virdung’s earliest practicas closely followed Faber’s model; in fact, confusion between Virdung and Faber seems to have been intentional. Friedrich Creussner’s edition of Virdung’s Latin practica for 1492 begins with the title “Judicium Liptzense. W. Cracoviensis” and identifies the author only as “ego iohannes W. cracoviensis,” who follows in the footsteps of other astrologers.[33] Another edition replaced Virdung’s name with Faber’s altogether.[34]

Beginning with Creussner’s edition of Virdung’s German practica for 1493, however (and corresponding to Virdung’s move from Leipzig to Heidelberg), innovations appeared that become fixed elements of practicas for many decades to come. Where Virdung’s Latin practica for 1493 still retained a chapter on minerals, his German practica for that year ignored them, as did his later practicas in both languages. The fates of lands and cities, which Faber had treated in two chapters, were now combined in one chapter. Faber had distinguished pestilences from illnesses and treated each separately; Virdung likewise combined them in a single chapter. Beginning with the German practica for 1493, Virdung began bringing all human affairs into the scope of one chapter and a single system of classification based on ruling planets. While Faber persisted with eighteen total chapters until his final published practica, Virdung reduced the number of chapters to nine or ten in his German practicas in the mid-1490s and in his Latin practicas somewhat later, then to seven or eight chapters from the early sixteenth century until issuing his last practica for 1538. Virdung’s German practica for 1493 from Creussner’s press had a title page with a woodcut illustration of the ruling planet (in this case, a nude Venus). Practicas with similar title pages had appeared as early as a practica for 1487, itself a product of competition with Wenzel Faber in his home market of Leipzig,[35] but woodcut illustration became a continuing feature of practica title pages only after Virdung’s practica for 1493. The prototypical composition of the title page became standard first in German practicas and only later in Latin ones.

The earliest practicas of the 1470s and 1480s printed in Germany and elsewhere attest much experimentation with basic structure, so that none of Virdung’s innovations are entirely unprecedented. There were earlier attempts to rationalize the structure of the practicas, and Paul of Middelburg’s practica for 1482 has an arrangement in nine chapters that resembles the format Virdung standardized, but Middelburg’s practica for 1486 returned to an eighteen-chapter format, most of which addressed the fortunes of particular Italian sovereigns.[36] Only through Johannes Virdung’s practicas can one find a continuous tradition connecting the end of the fifteenth century to the prototypical practica described by Rasch near the end of the sixteenth. Virdung’s German practica for 1493 from the press of Friedrich Creussner is so similar to the sixteenth-century prototype as to be all but indistinguishable from it. Evidence of Virdung’s influence can be seen in the over one hundred editions of his works published before 1545, including eighteen editions of tracts addressing comets or other sporadic phenomena, fourteen editions of a multiyear practica based on the great conjunction of 1524 that was combined with Lichtenberger’s Prognosticatio in another five editions, two editions of a multiyear apocalyptic practica for the great conjunction of 1504, and sixty-two annual practicas. In his practica for 1521, Konrad von Spiegelberg called himself Virdung’s disciple, while printer Jakob Köbel, in the title of his practica for 1523, called Virdung his master.[37] But the clearest indication of Virdung’s influence is his use already in the 1490s of the prototypical structure that came to define the genre. The list of practica authors who followed Virdung’s prototype at various times is lengthy, including Georg Leimbach, Endres von Weinmer, Philadelphus von Rietheim, Anton Brelochs, Bartholomaeus Mangolt, Michael Krautwadel, Johann Wolmar, Dionysius Sibenbürger, Philipp Melhofer, Walther Hermann Ryff, and Peter Creutzer. Others, including Christoph Statmion, Matthias Brotbeihel, Nikolaus Prueckner, Mads Hack, Aegidius Camillus, Johannes Schöner, and Johann Carion, preferred slight variations on Virdung’s arrangement. Gustav Hellmann observed the widespread conformity of practicas and considered it an inheritance from manuscript prognostications or a development of the last quarter of the fifteenth century,[38] but the typical format he describes has a more specific origin. While Klaus Matthäus believed that the homogeneous structure of printed practicas had been present from the beginning,[39] it was, in fact, an innovation that can be traced to the German practicas of Johannes Virdung printed by Friedrich Creussner in the early 1490s.

While practicas often identified a particular city for which they were intended, they were also exported to other regions (where their predictions were less certain, as Dionysius Sibenbürger complained in his practica for 1535).[40] Peter Apian appears to have targeted a national market in 1541, for he stated that he strove to find a median for all of Germany.[41] But practicas, as a genre and as a commercial ware, were limited by national boundaries. In the fifteenth century, practicas were rare outside of Germany, Italy, and, to a lesser extent, the Netherlands, and German and Italian practicas differed significantly in form and content.[42] Reprinting of Italian or Dutch practicas in Germany or their translation into German were all but unknown, amounting to only ten editions from 1470 to 1550.[43]

The number of practicas published in the German language area in each decade shows a rise during the 1480s and 1490s,[44] followed by a substantial contraction in the market in the first decade of the sixteenth century (see figure 11). This statement requires two cautionary notes, however. For ephemera such as practicas, one assumes a certain number of lost editions, particularly in view of the many editions known from a single copy or even from a single leaf. Also, the border between 1500 and 1501 marks the bibliographic divide between incunables and postincunables, which occasionally entails a declining diligence in library cataloging. Yet, however one looks at the data, the same picture emerges of a market crash in the early 1500s. Steady initial growth in the publication of practicas after 1480 was followed by a precipitous decline, and their publication only approached its previous heights in the 1520s. Another way to characterize the German practica market is by the diversity of authors that the market could sustain: that is, for any give year, how many authors could find publishers (and thus customers) for their practicas? Again we find that the 1490s had significantly more regularly publishing astrologers, up to nine each year, than the next decade, which had three or fewer in most years, and that the market did not support a similar diversity of astrologers until the 1520s.

Comparing the publishing careers of practica authors provides a truly revelatory view of the market and of Virdung’s significance. Let us assume for the moment that each astrologer composed a practica each year. Tannstetter wrote in 1523 that he had authored practicas for the last nineteen years,[45] and the earliest known practica by him was probably published in 1504, although we are missing practicas from eight intervening years. Christoph Statmion claimed to have authored practicas beginning in 1540, although the earliest known practica from him is for 1543 (and the earliest known according to VD16 is for 1547).[46] If we use the earliest and latest known practicas to measure the duration of astrologers’ careers, we find that with the exception of Johannes Virdung, every German astrologer publishing practicas before 1500 had exited the field by 1510. Virdung’s career overlapped with every single earlier German astrologer in print and with some younger colleagues who were still publishing after 1560. Of the three astrologers publishing in the years just before 1510, Conrad Tockler’s career did not reach 1520, and Georg Tannstetter’s career as an author of practicas ended in 1525. Virdung’s practicas established the prototype thanks in no small part to Virdung’s enduring presence.

Even Virdung’s record in the first decade of the sixteenth century is spotty, however. His judgments on the great conjunction of 1504 and a comet of 1506 each went through multiple editions, but the only practicas extant from Virdung are those for the years 1503 and two editions for 1510, although Virdung is known to have composed an annual practica for 1504.[47]

The practica for 1503 was printed by Hermann Bungart in Cologne, who had printed no works by Virdung or practicas from any other author before and would never do so again, and the form of the practica for 1503 differs considerably from Virdung’s typical arrangement, while the practicas for 1510 follow the prototypical form. Even the prince of the German astrologers (as one contemporary referred to him in 1525)[48] would appear to have had a difficult decade at the start of the sixteenth century.

STARS, SOCIETY, AND THE MICROCOSMIC PRACTICA

Perhaps Virdung’s most significant innovation with respect to Faber’s earlier practicas is the rigorous subjection of all other models of society to the sevenfold system of “planet children,” in which various occupations are assigned to one of the seven planets known to medieval astronomy. This was not Virdung’s invention but, rather, an inheritance from Arabic astrologers that was being popularized for German urban audiences as early as 1430.[49] Martin Polich had used it as the sole system for classifying people in his practica for 1488 (before omitting the human estates entirely in his practica for the following year),[50] while Faber had used it alongside other systems. Virdung, however, made it the categorical system that subsumed all others. Virdung’s first step only brought the traditional categories together into one chapter, as in his practica for 1493, but by 1495, human beings of all religions and estates were explicitly subdivided according to one of the seven planets. The fifth chapter of Virdung’s Latin practica for 1495, “on the state of diverse peoples,” classifies people as follows:

(Saturn) Jews, monks, the aged and infirm, cobblers, and craftsmen;

(Jupiter) the pope, cardinals, bishops, and priests;

(Mars) Turks, Tatars, knights, cavalrymen, soldiers, doctors, and surgeons;

(Sun) kings and princes;

(Venus) women, girls, singers, and musicians;

(Mercury) scholars, students, merchants, alchemists, sorcerers, and other lovers of the liberal arts;

(Moon) the common people, travelers, and servants.[51]

Where Wenzel Faber’s practicas had used overlapping categories for human beings that included a religious division between Christians, Jews, and Muslims, Virdung found a place for the religions among the planets. Practica authors providing detailed categorizing of social classes according to occupation often spent as much or more effort sorting out who belonged where as they did on actual prognostication, which suggests that for many of these authors, predicting society’s future was less important than determining its present composition.

The sevenfold planetary system proved flexible enough to accommodate new urban classes and an early modern society in which lay piety, middle-class prosperity, and new opportunities for women were obscuring traditional social patterns. Other occupations found in an early modern city or other human characteristics could easily be added by analogy, although that assignment was not always stable. Most authors, including Michael Krautwadel and Dionysius Sibenbürger, considered book printers to be intellectuals under the sign of Mercury, while Christoph Hochstetter’s practicas after 1519 moved printers from Mercury to the company of entertainers ruled by Venus.[52] The Tract against the Turks of 1486 had seen what it called the “sin against nature,” next to unworthy handling of the Eucharist, as one of the two great transgressions that had brought down the Turks on Christianity as punishment, just as they had once brought about the Flood of Noah.[53] The practicas, however, deal with those whom they call “effeminate men” as just one of the many classes of people in early modern society by delegating them to the sphere of Venus. (The practica for 1481 of Julianus de Blanchis lists eunuchi between “virgins” and cantores organiste citariste and other musicians, rather than among the adulteri fornicatores and other lust-driven sinners, while Virdung’s practica for 1528 lists the weybisch menner between virgins and singers. However, Gregor Salzmann’s practica for 1544 explicitly includes “effeminate men” along with wooers in the list of “all those who make use of bodily lust.”)[54]

The categorization of all strata of society under the seven planets is all the more remarkable in light of the considerable anxiety with which astrologers addressed human affairs or their omission of the topic altogether. Jeremias Brotbeihel noted in his practica for 1530, “Writing about all the estates, or lands and cities, is tiresome and uncertain and often causes envy, hate, and repugnance, and therefore I will leave it be for this year.” More than a few practica authors, perhaps with increasing frequency over the course of the sixteenth century, followed a maxim of Georg Tannstetter: “Learned and wise men never write anything publicly about the fate of the emperor and great princes.”[55]

Even when astrologers omitted the fortunes of all human estates, practicas addressed the structure of early modern society in other ways. Title formulations often named the nobleman to whom a practica was dedicated, which was an affirmation of the existing political order, while illustrations of the ruling planets for the year also evoked a particular model of social structure. Georg Tannstetter’s Latin practica for 1512 makes the celestial and terrestrial social order explicitly parallel; while the title woodcuts in the two editions are different, the motto above each woodcut is the same: “Jupiter rules all things in the heavens, the emperor rules all things on earth.”[56] If the practicas reflect the order of the cosmos and of human society, the representations of the ruling planets on the title page, usually reinforced by a first chapter on the same celestial lords of the year, served as reminders that higher things rule over lower ones.

The dedicatory epistle that typically followed the title page also addressed both stars and social relationships. While some dedications are addressed to the reader, most shift the communicative framework to a prognosticator in private communication with a political ruler, like the Sibyl’s audience before Solomon, by addressing a noble patron. Conclusions that again address the dedicatee reinforce the staging of practicas as a private conversation. Nikolaus Prueckner, in the dedicatory epistle of his multiyear practica for 1538–45, saw the dedication of written works as a way to mediate relationships between rulers and their subjects.

From the ancients until today, whenever learned men desire to publish their work and labor, it has always been the belief and practice (not without good cause) that they particularly dedicate these works to respected and leading persons such as kings, princes, and rulers before any others. For from time immemorial such honor and respect have ever been given to the arts, either from the necessity of protection and defense against the unlearned and despisers of the same who revile and condemn generally, or because it is the right of princes and authorities to inquire what will be presented to the common people and their subjects, so that the iniquity and wantonness of many unlearned people can be avoided. I, too, did not want to depart from this practice but, rather, prefer to commend my work, although trivial, beforehand to your princely grace as a particularly informed person and let it be examined, as I have recently promised your princely grace, in the hope that my work might have more defense and protection and also more regard and respect, because of your princely grace, than if it were published without it.[57]

This dedication communicated to its readers that the work had been presented to the prince by the astrologer and that the prince had granted both his approval and his protection. A modern observer might call this process censorship, and Georg Tannstetter uses the same term, censieren, for what he asks the cardinal of Gurk to do with respect to the practica dedicated to him in 1518.[58] The prefatory dedication not only situated the reader with respect to the text or the author but also (perhaps primarily) reaffirmed the place of both author and reader within the existing social order. “Astrological patronage,” as Steven Vanden Broecke has recognized, “publicly unveiled the prince’s control over future events,” and its products were “public tokens of princely power.”[59]

The function of dedicatory epistles can also be seen in the consequences that follow the omission of a dedication. Johannes Copp was an early and devoted follower of Martin Luther, to whom he dedicated a practica for the year 1521.[60] Copp appears to have brought considerable difficulty on himself in 1522 by predicting uprisings against the Catholic clergy in his tract of that year on the ominous conjunction of 1524. (The edition of Heinrich Steiner in Augsburg is a classic example of diverging intentions between woodcuts on title pages and prognostic texts. In the final section, Copp explains that the stars foretell not a world-ending deluge but only severe flooding and other troubles, which earnest prayers may yet induce God to turn aside. The title woodcut, however, repeated just before Copp’s consoling judgment, shows a dramatic scene of deluge, with pounding rain falling on hills and mountains; some houses and church towers collapse, others are covered to their roofs in water, and people float amid the houses and raise their arms in a last call for aid.) Compared to other astrologers’ caution, Copp’s prediction of social unrest against the clergy is unusually direct. The booklet opens with eighteen lines of verse addressed to the clergy, claiming that Copp bore them no ill will and was merely interpreting the stars. Nevertheless, Copp wrote, “Heaven shows you that an awful plague is in store for you. Watch out, for it will damage your body, honor, and life.” Copp made similarly dire predictions in later sections, writing, for example, “But I think that the eclipse [of 1523] will mean much evil, such as great war, much spilling of blood, burning, disunity and uproar between the common man and the clergy. One also fears an uprising of the common people against the authorities and particularly against the bishops and all priests.”[61] Copp distanced himself from overt support for an uprising, instead encouraging peasants to avoid such actions. But even his admonition to the peasants left Copp far over the line of acceptable predictions. To judge by Copp’s next publication, few people failed to recognize the threat against the clergy from an ardent supporter of the Protestant Reformation. In 1523, Copp returned to the conjunction of 1524, in a judgment that was, according to its title, intended to be “described more clearly than a year ago.” The principal attempt at clarification came in the dedication, a notably self-abasing specimen of a notoriously obsequious genre, in which Copp emphasized his submission to the political and heavenly order. Copp proclaimed himself the servant of Prince-elector Frederick III of Saxony.

Illustrious, highborn prince, most gracious lord, may my poor submissive service be ever before your princely grace, etc. A year ago, after I had published a trivial little interpretation of the influence of the constellations and other prophecies that affect the year 1524 without a patron, most gracious prince and lord, I was attacked by several powerful individuals because of it, just as if I had done it out of envy and enmity toward the supposed priests or as if I had wanted to cause or incite an uprising against the authorities (may Christ turn such far from me!). . . . Why would I want to turn against such firm statements of the Holy Ghost and incite uproar against the princes, who are God’s servants? May such be far from me! I also hope that it may be found nowhere in that little book that I have caused any sedition. Rather, I only intended to show the rebellions that the prophecies and constellations indicate are in the future, as far as it was in my power to make them loathsome to the common man. God well knows that I did not write out of envy towards the clergy, for I am no enemy of theirs. . . . Now, with more than your princely grace, I submissively ask that your princely grace overlook the disarray of the words but, rather, see only the heart and meaning along with my goodwill, and that your princely grace will be my most gracious and gracious lord.

What Copp lacked in 1522 was a noble patron, and what his booklet lacked was a dedication to reaffirm the political order to balance its predictions of rebellion and unrest. Given the chance to clarify matters in 1523, Copp did all in his power to deny any seditious intention. But in the end, Copp insisted that his predictions were accurate: “One also sees daily the great uproar of the common people against the authorities and especially those called clergy, as in Salzburg and elsewhere, which I all predicted.”[62] Disarray of words, like misalignment of the planets, is not without consequence, and Copp had left Saxony for Bohemia by 1524.

When Johannes Carion complained about astrological prognostications with provocative title pages and lengthy introductions, he was remarking on two parts of the practicas that addressed the relationship between reader, book, and society. Carion’s complaint about the ridiculous length of prefaces in astrological booklets came at nearly the same time that Johannes Copp was demonstrating their necessity, but that very length, often two pages or more in what was typically only a sixteen-page booklet, indicates just how indispensable they were, as does Carion’s own frequent composition of lengthy prefaces; the preliminaries to his Interpretation and Revelation comprise nearly one-quarter of the entire work. The title (inasmuch as it contains a dedication), the title page (through the woodcut representations of particular classes or their cosmic representatives), and the dedication and conclusion (as a framing of the work as, first of all, a conversation between a prophet and a king) all reaffirm the existing order. Practicas and printed prophetic tracts were the opposite of revolutionary. With few exceptions, they sustained the existing political and religious hierarchies, at least in the form of an ideal Last Emperor, Angelic Pope, or Christian unity, but often enough in the form of the current mortal bearer of the papal or imperial crown. While prophetic and prognostic tracts could be enlisted by firebrands or revolutionaries, such contributions are infrequent and exceptional. The case of Johann Copp, who even disavowed any disruptive intent, illustrates the real limits on the revolutionary potential of the practica genre or, for that matter, the medium of print.

The title woodcut for Wenzel Faber’s practica for 1490 placed the Earth at the center of a planetary wheel (so that it might be turned upside down but never moved from its place with respect to the cosmos) and, in so doing, captured the essential outlook of practicas.[63] Various planets might rise and fall, so that Mars bears both a sword and a sovereign’s crown and orb as the year’s ruling planet. But this state was temporary; the angel turning the wheel does not rest from exercising God’s ultimate control over planetary motion. A woodcut from the title page of a practica published over fifty years later repeats the motif, in which a divine arm holds a wheel bearing four eclipses. The accompanying verse states, “I hold the wheel of fortune in my hand and turn it according to my will.”[64] Title pages into the late sixteenth century continue to evoke the same notion of a perpetual interchange of various planets—and thus also of social classes—by using two or three smaller, simpler, and inherently interchangeable woodcuts from year to year. The cosmic hierarchy was as clearly expressed in practicas as in Lichtenberger’s Prognosticatio. “For God in his goodness has given power to the highest things to rule the earthly and lowest bodies and has made the world subject to the stars of the heavens,” Virdung wrote in the prologue to his practica for 1493.[65] Practicas were annual reminders that periodic waxing and waning of fortunes did not affect the continuing rule of greater things over lesser ones.

If early modern society was considered a microcosm of the heavenly constellation, then the practicas, which were meant to reflect the relationship between the configuration of the heavens and social structures, were microcosms in print. Practicas explained how the planets would affect various aspects of the world and human affairs, which imposed on the practicas an organizational structure that mirrored, in miniature, both society and the cosmos, so that the seven planets govern seven occupational classes and seven sections on human affairs in a printed practica. The essential difference between the practicas and the astrological prognostic broadsides is the difference in structure: the printed broadside distributed information, while the physical structure of booklets, the minimal example of the codex, imposed a structure on the information.[66] Any number of chapters or sections would have been possible, and fifteenth-century formats varied widely. But as authors and printers rationalized the practica and popularized Virdung’s prototype, the eight leaves of the practicas were usually matched with a similar number of chapters, and the two quires were often matched by a division into two sections. There is nothing magical about the seven planets, seven occupational classes, seven or eight chapters, and eight printed leaves, but neither is their similarity accidental. Already in the 1480s, Paul of Middelburg let the order of the cosmos bring structure to his twenty-year prognostication: “For indeed we shall divide it in headings after the fashion of the seven planets.”[67] The structure of practicas reflected the orderly procession of the heavens and an orderly system of knowledge about the cosmos. Practicas were, above all else, about order, and their order extended from the heavenly spheres to human society, to chapter organization, to the way paper is cut and folded in making books. The evolution of the practica reflects real changes in society, new ways of imagining society, and new ways of representing knowledge in print.

6

FEAR, FLOODS, AND THE PARADOX OF THE PRACTICA TEÜTSCH

CRISES OF LEGITIMACY AND KNOWLEDGE

As works that emphasized their foundation on scientific principles and that were intended to explain the workings of the world for a broad audience, practicas reflected anxieties over the shifting foundations of knowledge in early modern Germany. While astrology was always controversial, what appears today as pure superstition once enjoyed nearly universal acceptance of some of its basic principles, even by its detractors. In response to critics, astrologers could appeal to generally acknowledged facts, as Johannes Schöner did in 1537: planets quite clearly affected events on earth, he argued, as everyone can see in the ocean’s tides and in the fatal effect of moonlight on horses if it shines on their wounds.[1] The discoveries of Nicolas Copernicus had barely begun to affect popular astrological booklets by 1550, but other epistemological crises, arising in no small part from the invention of printing itself, made themselves felt much earlier.

Detractors of astrological prognostication often made the accusation that it lacked coherent logical principles, as Otto Brunfels argued in his Everlasting Almanac / German and Christian Practica of 1526.[2] The pseudonymous Faithful Eckhart lodged the same charge in a contrapractica for 1533.[3] This led to a sharp reply from Johannes Schöner in his practica for 1534, calling the pseudonymous critic an ignorant abuser of scripture in the same manner as the Anabaptist enthusiasts.[4] A related accusation was that astrology owed whatever predictive power it possessed to necromancy. Whether Johannes Virdung in 1537, Nikolaus Prueckner in 1538, or Anton Brelochs in 1548, a practica author responded to the charge of necromancy by pointing to the facts in the sky as described in the first chapter of his practica.[5] In the eyes of its proponents, astrology was a matter of principle and observation.

Rivalries between astrologers frequently took the form of back-and-forth accusations that the other’s practicas lacked a scientific basis. Recrimination as a part of astrological booklets appeared already in Middelburg’s practica for 1481, which begins by attacking discrepancies in the calculations of his colleague Julianus de Blanchis and ends by answering math problems with which Middelburg had baited other Italian astrologers in his practica of the previous year. The practica of Johannes Barbus for 1483 fired back a critique directed against the work of a “certain very clever and malicious Paul” for doing great injury to the art of astrology,[6] while Middelburg responded with his own refutation of Barbus’s attack the next year.

The controversy among German astrologers over an expected deluge for 1524 unleashed a series of acrimonious disputes that lasted into the 1530s. In 1521, Alexander Seitz had published a booklet on the conjunction and on lights in the sky, probably auroras, seen in 1520 above Vienna. In his booklet, Seitz acclaimed Virdung for correctly predicting the deaths of Phillip of Burgundy and Maximilian I (although whether Virdung had actually done so is quite another matter; the same prediction was also attributed to Tannstetter).[7] Carion’s tract on the conjunctions published in 1521 mocked the extremity of Seitz’s predictions (referring to otherwise unknown broadsides, but describing wheels and animals quite similar to those in the woodcut on the title page of Seitz’s tract), stating that Seitz’s prognostication lacked all basis and foundation. Carion speculated that Seitz, as a surgeon out of his depth in the art of astrology, had “rummaged around in the Alphonsine tables or in the works of other men learned in this art” rather than performing his own calculations.[8] Although barely past the age of twenty, Carion disparaged knowledge gained from books rather than won through training and experience.

Virdung published his tract on the lights above Vienna, which he described as precursors of the ominous conjunction of 1524, but in a tone of caution rather than with Seitz’s unrestrained alarm. Virdung refrained from pointing to a specific year for the appearance of the disasters heralded by the lights in the sky, as he did not witness them himself.[9] While Georg Tannstetter did not mention Virdung by name in his anticatastrophic Libellus consolatorius of 1523, he did attack predictions of flooding in 1524 as “fictions of a printer or vagabond” rather than the work of a “learned righteous man,” for “a wise man does not write of signs and wonders that he has not seen, not to mention his glaring and juvenile mistakes in the preface.”[10] After Virdung’s publication of his popular prognostication on the conjunction of 1524 that included dire predictions for the years 1524–63, the controversy gained an international dimension when Cornelis Schepper published a lengthy treatise with Virdung as one of its primary targets. As might be expected, Virdung, in the dedicatory epistle to his practica for 1525, saw his own predictions as confirmed, rejecting Schepper’s accusations as baseless.[11]

While Tannstetter’s contribution to the controversy had been meant to calm widespread concern about the planetary conjunction, it generated no small amount of professional enmity. Johannes Stöffler, whose 1499 almanac had first brought the attention of the conjunctions to a broader public, felt himself attacked by Tannstetter’s booklet and therefore countered it with his own Expurgatio directed at Tannstetter, who is named in the title. Tannstetter responded to his critics in his practica for 1524, stating that its publication would disprove the rumor that Tannstetter was going to renounce his Libellus consolatorius. Tannstetter also rejected the accusation that he was unable to produce practicas until he had read the work of others, to which he responded by asking readers to compare the scientific foundation of his practicas with those of other astrologers; and he blamed the delayed publication of his practicas on the “unspeakable greed” of the printers, who lazily reprinted his practicas, even, at times, with false and fantastic titles.[12] Here again, Tannstetter makes reliance on the work of others a hallmark of astrological incompetence, and printers bear some of the blame.

Georg Tannstetter’s Libellus consolatorius had cited the generous assistance of Andreas Perlach (1490–1551), a fellow Austrian astronomer, and Perlach came to the defense of his teacher in an appendix to Tannstetter’s final practica for 1525. Perlach engaged in a lengthy and detailed critique of Stöffler’s planetary ephemerides but professed respect for the aged and asked his readers to judge carefully whether it was Perlach, in his youth-fulness, or Stöffler, of such renown in mathematics, who had more hideously been led astray by fantasies. Perlach concluded with a more direct threat, informing Stöffler that if he continued his provocations, Perlach and Tannstetter would forget their sense of modesty and respect for the elderly.[13]

Perlach’s next public dispute followed in 1529, when he attacked the dire predictions for Austria in Carion’s Interpretation and Revelation. In a replay of the flood panic of 1524, Perlach’s intent and method were those of his master Tannstetter: to allay the concerns of the common people by attacking the astrological basis of the predictions.[14] Then, in 1530, Perlach published a prognostication based on eclipses of the prior year adjoined to ephemerides for 1531. Carion jabbed at Perlach’s work in the extended version of his Interpretation and Revelation, which appeared in 1531: “Master Fixfax in Vienna, Andreas Perlach, gave me an awful fright when he said that eclipses mean nothing bad, but he cannot deduce when they will reveal their meaning. . . . I am entirely convinced the almanac of Stöffler and Pflaum will pop up from behind his work. There are many dimwits who make almanacs and other things, but when the ephemerides reach their end, as is happening now in 1531, they will last as long as butter in the hot sun.”[15] Perlach responded in the same year with a five-page attack on Carion in the preface to a comet tract. Ironically, Perlach accused Carion of insulting Stöffler, cast doubt on Carion’s ability to read Latin, and sent the accusation of copying out of Stöffler’s almanac back at Carion. Perlach additionally accused Carion of dabbling in diabolical arts, as Carion’s predictions had no foundation in astrology but nevertheless came to pass: “It seems entirely to me that he has taken his prognostication from the books of Magistri Pelagi heremite in regno maioricarum on the conjuring of spirits.” Perlach claimed to have seen with his own eyes such a book that had been copied in Berlin (where Carion was active) and brought to Austria.[16] That scholars and academics regarded Carion as the greatest astrologer of their time (which, to the modern observer, seems a likely source of Perlach’s jealousy) is, for Perlach, a symptom of the universities’ decline. Carion responded to Perlach’s charges in his German practica for 1533 and in greater detail in his Latin practica for the same year, rejecting all accusations but adopting a more temperate tone, apparently in hopes of settling the conflict.

The charges and allegations made at and between astrologers reflect two complementary concerns. There was, first of all, disagreement about the basis and logic of astrological argument, resulting in accusations that an astrologer was using the principles of the art incorrectly or that the astrologer lacked principles altogether. The second type of accusation was that an astrologer was abusing the availability of astronomical data in printed ephemerides. Tannstetter and Carion shared a disdain for practicas written by amateurs, especially by printers. These controversies represent crises of knowledge aggravated or even caused by the invention of print, as the foundations on which prognostications could be based had multiplied and become available to a much broader set of users. At the turn of the century, Sebastian Brant had sensed the loss in status and control over information that print imposed on intellectuals who were still trying to establish their position with respect to nobility and clergy.[17] For Nikolaus Prueckner, the multiplication of practicas was a consequence of destabilized orders of knowledge: if not for the disdain and decay of the natural arts, Prueckner wrote in the preface to his comet tract of 1532, then “not everyone with unwashed hands would rummage about in, and spew their poison on, and write and talk off the top of their heads about things in which they had never learned so much as a single letter, as many practica authors do in our time.”[18]

The epistemological crisis of print in the sphere of astrology had its origins in the 1480s, when Erhard Ratdolt began publishing astrological treatises and astronomical reference works, first in Venice and then, from 1486 onward, in Augsburg. While Ratdolt seems to have enjoyed substantial commercial success with these works, competitors rarely challenged him by reprinting them or comparable works. Ratdolt’s editions of astronomical treatises used large formats, much larger than the slight quartos commonly used for practicas, and could extend to several hundred leaves, which required the investment of significant amounts of paper and ink. They were also technically demanding works, often including extensive tables or detailed illustrations for a professional audience, requiring considerable technical expertise to produce and a distribution network that reached widespread European intellectual circles to market profitably. Ratdolt’s innovations in print techniques, including the first printing of mathematical formulas, appear to have secured him a considerable market advantage and created significant barriers for his competitors for the better part of a decade. After beginning the early 1480s with reprints of earlier editions, Ratdolt achieved a near monopoly during that decade for many astronomical and astrological works, including for twelve standard works whose first printed editions (and, for eight of them, only incunable editions) were published by Ratdolt, including Albumasar’s De magnis coniunctionibus, Ptolemy’s Quadripartitum, and the Liber in iudiciis astrorum of Haly Abenragel (Albohazen). Ratdolt’s continued printing of these astronomical works over the decade from 1481 to 1492, despite their often complex layout and illustration, suggests that he was able to produce and profitably distribute even works that appeared in a single edition. The vast majority of books printed in the fifteenth century have disappeared, with the median number of surviving copies around four and with an arithmetic mean around fourteen.[19] In comparison, thirteen of the Ratdolt editions are found today in over one hundred copies that are spread across Europe. Erhard Ratdolt recognized the potential of the professional market for Latin treatises on astronomy and astrology, and he dominated it throughout Europe for over ten years. While the astronomical reference works and astrological treatises printed by Ratdolt were intended for scholarly and professional use, they lowered the barriers to prognostication from specialized academic training to nothing more than book ownership, with eventual profound effect on the field of astrology. Christoph Statmion wrote in the preface to his practica for 1544, “Almost every idiot and uneducated person attempts to make a calendar these days. . . . If the ephemerides—that is the books that contain the course of the heavens for several future years—were not so common, the greater part of those who consider themselves great astronomers would have to die among the idiots and not attempt to make practicas.”[20]

ARGUMENT AND SOCIAl FUNCTION OF THE PRACTICA TEÜTSCH

Prognostic booklets are sometimes considered to have provided their readers with knowledge of the future (albeit in vague terms, while carefully skirting political and religious controversy, particularly concerning God’s free will, and hedging their bets with respect to actual events in the upcoming year). Yet the pseudoscience of astrology is entirely incapable of making any meaningful statement about the future. Despite the impossibility of their alleged purpose, practicas remained popular well into the seventeenth century. If practicas could not provide knowledge of the future, what explains the perennial demand for them? The answer is that practicas responded to readers’ desires for knowledge of the future not by satisfying it but by giving readers ways to think about and things to do with their hopes and fears. If practicas could not actually say anything about the future, they could still channel readers’ anxieties in a socially useful fashion. William Bouwsma has identified early modernity as a period shaped by a pervasive anxiety that was rooted in changing social conditions, which in turn undermined medieval conceptual categories.[21] The function of practicas in early modern German society was not only the stabilization of order by evoking cosmic orderliness. Practicas also confronted readers with the possibility of disruption and invited them to restore order by conforming to their place within existing hierarchies. What mattered was not the particular set of ruling planets (about which different astrologers might offer varying opinions in the same year) or even predictions of fortune or misfortune for a particular group or activity (in which a printer’s carelessness might lead to opposite predictions in different editions of a single practica).[22] Rather, the practicas evangelized an orderliness in human affairs that persisted beyond the rise or fall of a particular class in a given year. Practicas promoted stability by instrumentalizing fear.

Observers from the early 1480s onward regularly accused the practicas of promoting and instilling fear, by only predicting disaster and never good fortune. In 1523, Middelburg, like Stöffler, emerged from retirement to write a tract against the popular predictions of an approaching deluge, which was reprinted in Augsburg in both Latin and German translation. Middelburg found little good to say of his former colleagues, complaining that they “never proclaim anything good for us, first the deluge, then war and pestilence, then famine, then uproar in cities, and other similar evils. Although such does not come to pass, for they fail quite obviously, yet the fearful anticipation torments us. Therefore there is nothing better than not desiring to know future things.”[23] The pseudonymous Faithful Eckhart attacked the promotion of fear in his criticism of practicas: “It seems foolish to me that we should be so fearful when there is nothing to fear or be terrified of the things that the practicas show us.”[24] Johannes Rasch also noted the predisposition to dire predictions.[25] But Johannes Vögelin, author of practicas for the years 1531–35 as well as a comet tract, argued that dire predictions better suited the times in which he wrote: “Although many authors of annual prognostications reasonably and prudently console the people, and cast out the fear of dangers, those who frankly point out the perils and evil omens of the heavens seem more fitting to this present age, at least in my opinion, even if they sometimes magnify those things.” A less bitter medicine, wrote Vögelin, would not be as effective.[26]

The purpose of this fear was to bring about social stability through the alignment of the reader’s desires, in the form of prayer, with the political and religious hierarchies. As Coote observes concerning English political prophecies, the audience must support their rulers if they are to receive the promised reward and avoid threatened consequences.[27] The preface to Virdung’s multiyear practica on the conjunction of 1524 stated its purpose as enabling people to prevent “such misfortune and wailing,” for all of the disasters Virdung predicts “might be prevented by the power and kindness of God, if we repent of our great sins and obtain his grace that such evil not be imposed on us, as happened to the people of Niniveh who repented and were preserved by the Lord. . . . If that however does not happen, then it is to be feared that all these things that are shown in this prognostication and many greater and more terrible things will wash over us.”[28] Virdung concluded, on a similar note, with hope that the effects of the conjunction might be moderated and, thus, that “a great part of the sorrow that has been poured into our hearts by the reading of this prognostication would be taken from us. . . . Therefore let us call on God Almighty . . . that he might turn aside the evil influence of this conjunction.”[29] Johannes Seger affirmed in his practica for 1512 that the failure of a prediction lay not in the art or the practitioner but in God’s rewarding people according to their merits.[30] Carion’s first annual prognostication in his Interpretation and Revelation states that if the predictions are fulfilled, then one sees a great secret of nature; if not, then one sees how God can make things better or worse according to the sin or repentance of the people.[31] From the earliest appearance of practicas in print, the astrologer-authors insist that they are not predicting exactly what will come to pass but, rather, merely observing tendencies and influences mediated by the stars. Rather than insisting on the accuracy of their predictions of future calamity, astrologers express the hope that their predictions of disaster will fail. “May God grant that I am always wrong when I predict sorrow,” Johann Carion wrote in his practica for 1533.[32] It is the rare practica that does not explicitly note that God rules all things and that the stars may influence earthly affairs but that the events they foretell are not inevitable. The wise and pious reader may prepare and pray that God will avert the worst, while foolish and sinful readers are enjoined to heed the practica’s warning.

Rather than providing astrologers an escape clause or an evasive acknowledgment that predicting human events from the course of the stars is impossible, the instruction to pray is a central component in the rhetorical function of the practicas. The prognostic booklets confront their readers with oncoming disasters and invite them to aid in the turning aside of those disasters through prayer. If even an unbelieving heathen like Ptolemy could recognize that the wise man rules over the stars, Andreas Perlach noted, “how much more might a godly Christian rule the stars and their influence with his prayer to God?”[33] The function of promoting social order and obedience can be seen in the agreement of both astrologers and their critics on this point. The pseudonymous Faithful Eckhart calls on his readers not only to reject astrology but also to avoid disaster through obedience: “If we obey, then no misfortune will come upon us, but if not, then God has these following plagues to utterly consume us.”[34] Lutheran authors of contrapracticas such as Heinrich Kettenbach were as committed to preserving social order as the practica authors themselves.[35] The function of practicas and contrapracticas alike was not to tell readers what the future held but to bring about the orderly alignment of the reader’s will with the cosmic and social order. What Jan-Dirk Müller observes about the prognostic broadsides of Sebastian Brant is broadly true of practicas and other early modern prognostic and prophetic texts: they invite readers to “carry out that which God has written in nature, or what the leaders of Christendom have decided: they explicitly ask for joining in, for imitation, or for obedience.”[36]

THE FLOOD PANIC OF 1524: CLARIFYING THE CONTROVERSY

An acute moment of crisis arose in the years leading up to February 1524, when planetary conjunctions in the sign of Pisces were interpreted as omens of a world-ending deluge, which led to numerous printed tracts about the controversial prediction. While great conjunctions of Saturn and Jupiter recur every twenty years, Johannes Stöffler and Jakob Pflaum’s 1499 planetary ephemerides had already drawn attention to the great conjunction of 1524 as one of twenty greater and lesser conjunctions that would occur that year, sixteen of them in “watery signs.” Although their almanac covered the years 1499–1531, including another great conjunction in 1504, Stöffler and Pflaum made particular mention only of the conjunctions of 1524 amid what is otherwise many pages of tabular data. While they did not mention flooding, they did remark that the conjunctions undoubtedly signified “change, variation, and alteration” in all places to a degree that neither the aged nor historians had ever seen, and they concluded by citing the apocalyptic chapter 21 of Luke, “Therefore lift up your heads, ye Christian men.”[37] By 1519, the announcement of numerous conjunctions had mutated in popular imagination into the prediction of a calamitous flood—by some accounts, a deluge to rival or even surpass that of Noah.

The predictions led to everything from panic and contrition to carnivalistic mocking (as shown for Italy by the work of Ottavia Niccoli and for the German language area by Dirk Mentgen) and to numerous printed works addressing the controversy over the conjunctions—above all, prognostic tracts of various kinds. These booklets have been closely studied for nearly a century, and they remain the primary body of evidence for widespread public concern. Gustav Hellmann identified nearly 135 printed tracts addressing the controversy, while later scholars have expanded the list to over 160 booklets printed throughout Europe. For the flood pamphlets as occasional tracts concerning a specific event, annual practicas provide the background rhetoric of astrological argument for a popular audience.

Gerd Mentgen confirmed the earlier view of Gustav Hellmann and Lynn Thorndike that the public debate in print began only in 1519 with the publication of works by Albert Pigghe and Agostino Nifo, contrary to Zambelli’s view that the panic was slowly and gradually set in motion from the early 1500s onward.[38] The works of Pigghe and Nifo both argued against the prediction of a second deluge, which Nifo described as a widely held opinion that had arisen from Stöffler and Pflaum.[39] In Nifo’s account, popular imagination was the only intermediary between Stöffler and Pflaum’s planetary ephemerides and the current excitement.

If the beginning of the controversy needs clarification, so does its end, for the focus on February 1524 is too narrow. While popular opinion may have expected a deluge at a specific time, the astrological pamphlets did not typically make predictions for a specific day, month, or year, during which they must either be fulfilled or disproved. Prognostications for twenty or forty years based on a single conjunction were written by Paul of Middelburg for 1484, Leonhard Reynmann for 1504, and Johannes Virdung for 1504 and 1524. Practica authors also regarded long-past conjunctions as still effective. Wenzel Faber’s practica for 1498 refers back to the great conjunction of 1484 in its analysis of the heavens.[40] While some astrologers may have seen February 1524 as a time of particular peril, the absence of rains or flooding during any single day or month would have done little or nothing to damage an astrologer’s reputation. Talkenberger calls Albrecht Dürer’s dream vision of a world-ending deluge in 1525 evidence of the flood predictions’ lasting influence,[41] but Dürer’s experience also suggests that the passage of February 1524 without a deluge had no effect on the credibility of the predictions. Mentgen notes that the diverse European climate meant that some areas did experience heavy rains and record flooding. Even if fulfillment in early 1524 were essential, some astrologers could point to timely and literal (if local) confirmation of the feared prediction.[42]

While the planetary conjunctions of 1524 could be observed throughout Europe, the flood of booklets was a phenomenon that manifested itself in widely varying forms in different parts of Europe and that is best explained by local conditions. Germany and Italy saw many editions, while other parts of Europe saw few or no printed tracts. In Hellman’s tabulation of editions, Germany leads all other lands, with Italy close behind and Spain a distant third. There is a further linguistic divide. While the Italian astronomers were primarily printed in the Latin of learned discourse, editions in the German language area were predominantly in the vernacular.[43] Relatively few foreign astrologers were translated into German or reprinted in Germany, and their works differ in form and content from most German contributions.[44] For this reason, the flood controversy needs to be considered within particular national contexts. While there were certainly points of contact between Germany and Italy, the printed responses to the controversy were so different that a print historical treatment must respect linguistic borders.[45]

A contemporary observer, the Spaniard Pedro Cirvelo, broadly distinguished the tenor of Italian astrologers from their German and Spanish colleagues. The German and Spanish astrologers were predicting severe rains and terrible flooding, according to Cirvelo, while the Italians declared that fair weather was in store. In Cirvelo’s opinion, the German astrologers were the more experienced and more correct, although they exaggerated their predictions of disaster. Cirvelo rejected as the most mistaken of all a third view, namely, that the eclipse of 1523 would have a far greater effect than the conjunction of 1524. Cirvelo identified this view alternately with Nifo and Pigghe, and Tannstetter, who cited Nifo and Pigghe as his sources, also promoted eclipses as a far more reliable basis of prognostication.[46]

Writing in 1588, Johann Rasch identified Nifo and Tannstetter as opponents of Stöffler, Seitz, and Virdung, yet the division into proponents and opponents of the flood prediction is not at all as clear as one might expect, despite several efforts at classification.[47] Cirvelo is just one example of how difficult it is to neatly distinguish pro from contra. He believed that the conjunction would bring barely a tenth as much water as the alarmists were predicting, and he spoke out against panicked overreaction, but he also rejected the reassurances of the pacifists and the failure to prepare for future difficulties. Barnes proposes a tripartite division between humanist court astrologers, urban amateurs (including physicians), and evangelical religious writers, in which Tannstetter, Stöffler, and Virdung are all made members of the humanist contingent.[48] Zambelli proposes a different three-way division between the “comforters who are loyal to the Emperor and papacy, the magisterial Evangelicals, and the radical Reformers.”[49] In Talkenberger’s extensive and detailed study of the standpoints of German contributions to the flood debate, it is difficult to find a truly calamitous deluge proposed among the alarmists, rather than merely flooding as one of many possible disasters and changes associated with the conjunction.[50] Among the pacifists opposed to the flood prediction, it is difficult to find any who do not warn of troubles of other kinds. The clearest warning of an impending deluge came from Alexander Seitz, but he remained a lone voice in the wilderness. Most authors took a position similar to Johann Carion, who mocked Seitz and rejected the prediction of a catastrophic flood, but who also warned that the conjunctions would bring the worst flooding in centuries (with particular danger for valleys and coastal regions), along with violence, disorder, and other disasters.[51] While Virdung more strongly affirmed the threat of a deluge as one of several calamities, Talkenberger regards Virdung as sharing with Nifo an “ambivalent rhetoric that vacillates between threat and consolation.”[52] Tannstetter was the most prominent of the pacifists, but he also warned of God’s punishments for rebellion against authorities. Only his Viennese colleague Aegidius Camillus was adamant that the coming year would bring not a flood but good fortune and fair weather. While there are sharp disagreements about the relative influence of conjunctions and eclipses or of the authority of Arabic and Greek astronomers, the vast majority of tracts from all authors warned of disasters but not world-ending catastrophe and promoted obedience and repentance as ways to avert the worst troubles.

BROADENING THE CONTEXT

The numerous booklets addressing the predicted deluge are merely one part of an outpouring of pamphlets of all kinds in the decade following the year 1517 that has been described in the work of Hans-Joachim Köhler.[53] The rise in flood-related editions clearly parallels the rise in booklet printing. While publication of flood-related booklets is often considered to slow to a trickle and then cease after February 1524, this is only true if one considers flood tracts as an isolated phenomenon, instead of as one phase in a long tradition of prophecy in print. Expanding the material under consideration will necessarily broaden the root causes of the flood controversy to include larger and more durable issues than a conjunction of the planets.

Considering the prophetic tone and eschatological material found in many flood tracts, such as Carion’s discussion of the Antichrist’s advent, contemporary prophetic tracts that use prognostication to engage with social changes must be considered part of the same event, even if they do not mention flooding. The anonymous Prophecy to Gigebaldus, for example, foretells a broad range of destruction for the years 1522–24, including strife between social classes, moral decay, Turkish invasion, and peasant rebellion.[54] The two woodcut representations of Mars and the Sun on the title page suggest a conscious imitation of astrological booklets. While the oncoming disasters did not include flooding, the thematic similarity suggests that the edition of Gigebaldus belongs to the same larger phenomenon as the flood tracts. The anonymous Prophecy and Secret of Old Hidden Writings is another brief compilation of various prophecies, most of them for the years 1524 and earlier, although it also reproduces all of Stöffler and Pflaum’s note for the year 1524 in addition to prophesying a deluge for that year. Another prophetic booklet that clearly belongs to the same event is the tract attributed to Pflaum himself. In 1522 and six more times by 1534, Pflaum’s name appeared on a prophetic tract supposedly first printed in 1500 but referring primarily to the years from 1520 onward.[55] The booklet contains an unorganized mishmash of politicized end-time tropes drawn from pseudo-Methodius and other sources, including victorious German emperors, false emperors and popes, the Last Emperor and Angelic Pope, and the advent of the Antichrist. While the booklet does not predict a flood for 1524, its first edition of ca. 1522 and its emphasis on the same religious and political crises—not to mention the alleged author—suggest that it, too, belongs among the printed works that responded to the same crisis.

Broadening the scope from the strictly astrological to include the booklet of “Jakob Pflaum” and similar prophetic tracts would also bring within consideration the Alofresant material, for example, with its several editions of 1519–20 and later.[56] According to the Alofresant tract, the author was a Turkish astrologer of Rhodes and cousin or nephew of the sultan’s own court astrologer who was baptized a Christian at the age of one hundred. Alofresant’s prophecy foresaw the fortunes of four descendants of John II, duke of Burgundy, with the most glorious future predicted for Charles, the fourth descendant of John, who was elected German king as Charles V in 1519, the year of the earliest Alofresant editions. Halbronn sees the origin of the Alofresant tract as political propaganda in the costly campaign for election between Charles and Francis I of France around the year 1517.[57] Another wave of publication followed when Charles was crowned as Holy Roman Emperor in 1530. Likewise, a prophecy attributed to a Theodericus, Franciscan friar and bishop in 1420 (in either “Zug” or “Zeng” in Croatia or Granada, depending on the edition), saw six editions (out of eleven total) in 1520–23.[58] These were preceded by a 1503 broadside and a 1512 booklet and followed by editions as late as 1542, but the editions of 1520 belong to the body of prognostic booklets for which the German reading public had an interest as the flood panic was getting under way.

Kurze suggested that the absence of flooding in 1524 motivated the replacement of flood-related prognostications with a resurgence of interest in prophetic compilations—above all, the Prognosticatio of Johannes Lichtenberger.[59] But an edition of the Prognosticatio printed by Wolfgang Stöckel in Leipzig in 1521 (and unknown to Kurze) indicates that renewed interest in Lichtenberger arose simultaneously to the flood controversy rather than subsequent to it. Stöckel’s edition of Grünpeck’s Speculum the following year indicates that his printing of prophetic works met with some success. Certainly the Extract of Various Prophecies from Lichtenberger and Grünpeck was popular both before and after 1524, and an edition of ca. 1523, which illustrates the title page with a woodcut of Venus and Saturn surrounding the sign of Pisces while rain descends onto a flooded landscape where people float among inundated houses and cities, suggests that it preserved its relevance during the flood debate.

Talkenberger sees practicas after 1524 avoiding engagement with end-time themes, in contrast to the flood tracts—a divorce of Mercury and eschatology.[60] Yet overt reference to apocalyptic themes continued with similar frequency after 1524 to the years before 1519. The practica for 1547 of Mads Hack, for example, proclaimed that the time Christ had warned of, when signs would appear in the heavens foretelling his advent, was then at hand.[61] Edition histories provide a different perspective on where popular interests lay after 1524, and here one finds Carion’s astrological Interpretation and Revelation joined to the Extract of Various Prophecies, Lichtenberger joined to Virdung in the Great Practica, the appearance in 1525 of Virdung’s “Antichrist” practica,[62] and several editions in the 1540s of Salomon von Roermond’s more overtly apocalyptic prognostications. The neat separation of astrology and prophecy cannot be sustained, either before or after 1524. Flood booklets and prophetic works need to be seen as different aspects of the same phenomenon during these years, even where a deluge is not specifically mentioned.

RETHINKING 1524

The anticipation followed by the absence of calamitous flooding in 1524 has often been treated as a failed prophecy from the seventeenth century onward.[63] Yet the absence of a deluge in 1524 did not hinder public confidence in the validity of astrology, nor were the conjunctions of February 1524 discredited as a basis for prognostication. Both proponents and opponents of the prediction argued at first that events had vindicated their positions, but the marketplace and the court of public opinion reached their own judgments over the next several years. Leonhard Reynmann’s prophetic judgment on the conjunctions (citing, among others, the well-known constellation of “Sibilla, Birgitta, Cirillus, Abbot Joachim, Methodius, Lulhardus, and Merlin”) was reprinted almost unaltered in 1526. The preface referred to the conjunctions of the preceding year rather than the upcoming year, and a triple sun replaced the sign of Pisces in the title woodcut, but otherwise the work was little changed. Grünpeck’s final tract, the brief Prognosticum, foresaw that many lands would be tormented by misfortune and disaster as the astronomical events “which occurred on February 19, 1524, exert their significance.”[64] Grünpeck reached back to older tropes found in the “Toledo Letter” and similar astrologically themed prophecies in his prediction of flooding and other disasters, final victory of the Christians over their enemies, and the conjunction in 1540 of all seven planets in the sign of Pisces, concluding that then “all hidden judgments of God will be revealed until all prophecies are fulfilled that I have drawn in part from natural causes and in part from divine revelations.”[65] Despite grossly contradicting the actual course of the heavens in 1540 (Czerny thought it “impossible to read anything more lacking in intelligence” than this booklet), Grünpeck’s last work was immediately printed nine times in six different cities.[66] Even among practicing astrologers, the conjunction of 1524 did not fall into disrepute. “What shall I say about the conjunction in the year 1524?” wrote Nikolaus Prueckner in the preface to his prognostication for 1538–45. “I think it has clearly shown its effect in almost every land and still has not come to an end.”[67] Johannes Schöner’s practica for 1537 regards the conjunction of 1524 as still having a dominant effect.[68] Writing in 1568 and later, Theodor Graminaeus used the conjunctions of 1524 to mark the beginning of the crisis-plagued present age.[69]

Rather than losing credibility after 1524, astrologers who had warned of impending disaster enjoyed continued popularity. While Alexander Seitz published no further prognostications after 1521, his astromedical tract on bloodletting, including propitious days and times, went through five editions between 1527 and 1530. Virdung’s career as an author of printed astrological tracts, already in its fourth decade, continued unhindered after 1524, with the appearance of annual practicas for each year until 1538.[70] His multiyear prognostication on the conjunction of 1524, even illustrated with woodcuts that emphasized flooding, enjoyed a resurgence of popularity in the 1540s, when it was reprinted nine times in combination with Lichtenberger’s Prognosticatio or Carion’s “Hidden Prophecy.” Carion’s own judgment of the conjunctions, which disavowed a second deluge but foresaw localized flooding and other disasters, also led to a highly successful career in print, as his Interpretation and Revelation became the most frequently reprinted astrological tract of the second quarter of the sixteenth century following its publication in 1526. Even after their deaths in the late 1530s, the prognostic writings of both Virdung and Carion were reprinted into the late 1540s. After the almanac of Johannes Stöffler had been used as the source for so many alarming predictions, Stöffler brought forth a new astronomical almanac for thirty years in 1531.

Georg Tannstetter, the most prominent and widely published among the pacifists, did not enjoy such good fortune. Although he had published prognostic tracts annually since 1504, his Latin practica for 1525 was his last, and no later work of popular astrology by him is known.[71] It seems, instead, that it was the skeptic Tannstetter who lost credibility after 1524, rather than his alarmist competitors. Tannstetter’s complaint in 1523 that his practicas appeared later than others because of printers’ greed is but another way of saying that printers regarded Tannstetter’s original work as less marketable than reprints of practicas from other authors. After 1524, his standing with the public does not appear to have recovered. Where had Tannstetter gone wrong?

The flood tracts often have much more to say about unrest and social change than they do about flooding. Virdung’s multiyear prognostication threatens that “unimportant people of vulgar ancestry will rise up against the monarchs and mighty rulers and attempt to drive them from their rule and woefully persecute them.”[72] Leonhard Reynmann foresaw a similar alliance between peasants and commoners so grasping and avaricious that “little difference will be seen between the rich and the poor.” He argued that nothing would prevail against the change of all things until the clergy and nobility united against the third estate and gave them their due reward.[73] Carion’s tract predicted that the nobility would be oppressed and that a man of low birth would rise up as leader of the common people and attack the higher clergy. He closed with the injunction to both laity and clergy to fall on their knees and ask that God might be merciful.[74] Sebastian Ransmar also saw the conjunctions of 1524 as omens of change in all estates, and he called on his readers to devote themselves to God’s will and pray that the divine will be done on earth.[75] The greatest anxiety of the authors appears focused less on flooding than on the “change, variation, and alteration” in all things that Stöffler and Pflaum had predicted already in 1499.

If we understand the deluge of 1524 as a stand-in for a host of societal and epistemological anxieties, it becomes clear why Tannstetter lost credibility while Virdung and Carion went on to greater fame and publishing success. The flood panic and its consequences should be seen less as a prognostication and its fulfillment (or failure) than as the expression of widespread anxieties about society. To his credit, Tannstetter did recognize the crisis of the moment. He opened his consolatory tract by situating the panic he perceived in the context of internal and external threats to the existing order. With Turks invading, Christianity split against itself and Christian kingdoms at war with one another, and the death of Holy Roman Emperor Maximilian I in 1519, the fear of impending flood, according to Tannstetter, was leading to disruption as formulated by Nifo and repeated by others: people were selling their property, avoiding marriage or other alliances, putting off taking holy orders, and becoming slack in their labors.[76] But despite Tannstetter’s recognition of the broader context, his dismissal of catastrophic predictions proved shortsighted. Whatever the weather was like in February 1524 in the various regions of Europe, the second half of the 1520s proved to be a period where the institutions of European society were severely battered, with the Protestant Reformation taking hold in German cities, peasant rebellions flaring up across southern and eastern Germany in 1525, the Turkish victory at Mohacs in 1526 and siege of Vienna in 1529, and the 1527 sack of Rome by soldiers of the Holy Roman Emperor. Readers in 1530 of Virdung’s alarming judgment of the conjunctions of 1524 could—and did—look back at recent events as confirmation of Virdung’s predictions, as marginal annotations in one copy attest.[77] In view of these future developments, affirming the perils of the current and coming years would have better suited the second half of the decade. Aegidius Camillus, the most optimistic of prognosticators, had mocked the prediction of a flood in his practica for 1524: “I am entirely ignorant from what motions or causes many believe that a deluge or even great changes are in store for this year, and would gladly learn from where and by what art they have it, perhaps from the Gospels or from revelations of the Holy Ghost. For such cannot be attested with certainty by any art of the stars.”[78] The next year, Camillus saw himself vindicated and wrote that the predictions of disaster had come to nothing.[79] But at the end of the decade, Camillus recognized that wrenching changes such as Stöffler and Pflaum had predicted had indeed come to pass, and he could only protest the limits of his art: “But in our times there are such significant and notable changes in all places and in all things, as everyone sees before their eyes. It is very difficult to discover and show the causes of all of them from the noble art of astrology.”[80]

Not only was Tannstetter’s prediction mistaken, but his argument was doomed to failure. His insistence that the significance of astronomical phenomena for “lands, cities, and people . . . does not belong in public but, rather, is to be discussed on a higher level” reinforced the perceived exclusivity of the alarmist tracts that he was arguing so vehemently against.[81] Tannstetter and others dismissed the flood prediction by attacking its theoretical foundations in the theory of conjunctions and arguing that the “fantasies of Albumasar and his followers” should be rejected while the “rigorous doctrine of Ptolemy” should be promoted.[82] But the problem was, at heart, not a fear of flooding but anxiety over institutions and systems of knowledge that had grown unstable. Albumasar had been one of the authorities cited by astrologers in the prefaces of their practicas from the beginning, and so Tannstetter’s attack on one of the foundations of early modern astrology only further destabilized knowledge about the cosmos. Rather than restoring certainty, confronting readers with competing theoretical foundations only heightened anxiety.

But the astrological booklets that affirmed the threat represented by the conjunctions of 1524 were also unsuited to preserving order. In the face of the threats to European society, astrological practicas and occasional booklets were printed in great numbers in order to aid stability in their usual manner, by confronting readers with the specter of disaster and calling for unity to avoid it, but practicas and similar booklets were an entirely unsuitable tool with which to treat an outbreak of anxiety. The fundamental problem in the deluge controversy of 1524 was that astrologers were trying to fight fear with fear, a strategy that was doomed to only worsen the situation. Fear of disorder can be invoked to solidify political order, but it is no antidote to itself.

This is why the controversy over the flood predictions was a crisis of print. The almanac of planetary ephemerides that led to charges of incompetence between Carion and Perlach and to complaints about practicas authored by untrained and ignorant printers also provided the seed of the flood panic. Stöffler and Pflaum’s note about the conjunctions of 1524 had appeared in a reference work meant for their professional colleagues, but the broadening of access to information via print changed the educational requirements of astrologers and provided a much broader audience with access to the tools of prognostication. Tannstetter’s arguments against the conjunction theory represented a similar problem. For the first time, a broad reading public was being exposed to the kinds of competing narratives that scholars had long dealt with, but the public did not have the scholarly training and tools to make sense of them. What prompted the flood tract of “Johannes Gereon” (a pseudonym for the Benedictine monk Veit Bild) was the “diversity and discord” that he observed; his own contribution, of course, merely increased the cacophony.[83] The printing press sowed “prophetic confusion.”[84]

Understanding the flood panic as an expression of societal anxieties also leads to the reversal of cause and effect between prognostication and its consequences. While Warburg cites the “literature for the masses that caused the flood panic of 1524,” Hammerstein writes of the “horrifying impact of the predictions conveyed by means of pamphlets,” and Müller cites the anticipation of flooding in 1524 as an example of mass hysteria caused by unfavorable interpretations.[85] Zambelli notes how the observation of conjunctions began to “occasion widespread collective fear.”[86] But a dire prediction, even in conjunction with an astronomic event, is not a sufficient explanation for panic. Alarming prophecies are a constant of medieval and early modern astrology, so their mere existence cannot be seen as the cause for any particular panic. Rather than a unique feature of 1524, dire predictions were a common response to conjunctions, and flooding belonged to the standard repertoire of eschatological and astrological disaster. Severe flooding is already invoked as one of the end-time cataclysms in the Sibyl’s Prophecy, where it is a consequence of sin as rebellion against God.[87] Already in 1474, Johannes von Lübeck’s Prognostication on the Advent of the Antichrist and the Messiah of the Jews connected the conjunction of Saturn and Jupiter to a “flood of fire.”[88] Wenzel Faber’s practicas for 1492, 1495, and 1496 predicted flooding, and the title pages of these practicas feature title woodcuts as alarming in their depictions of deluge as those appearing in the flood tracts prior to 1524. Leonhard Reynmann’s prognostication for the conjunction of 1504 foresaw rains and flooding as a consequence. Yet all of these predictions, even when accompanied by conjunctions and other astronomical events, did not lead to an equivalent reaction in daily life or in print. Just as prophecies do not cause rebellion, as Keith Thomas recognized, the prediction of a flood did not cause panic.[89] Rather, anxiety about destabilized institutions and systems of knowledge became tangible in the form of a deluge. Panic, by creating a receptive market for dire astrological forecasts, led to predictions.

CONCLUSION:
THE PROPHETIC READER

In the first centuries after Gutenberg, prophecy in its many forms provided a significant segment of the print market, a model of the social and semiotic interactions of authors with their audiences, and a metaphor for literacy and printing itself. The Sibyl’s book is always fragmentary, however. Whether in the remaining volumes saved from destruction by the emperor’s belated purchase in the traditional story, or in the single remaining leaf of Gutenberg’s edition of the Sibyl’s Prophecy that is the focus of chapter 1, reading the Sibyl or her prophetic colleagues requires readers to invest incomplete texts with their own imagination. Without it, much of the earliest printed literature must seem like a foolish waste of time.

Seen from a limited perspective, Johannes Lichtenberger must appear, much as Paul of Middelburg charged in his 1492 Invective, as a talentless and unscrupulous plagiarist. Those who were influenced by Lichtenberger, including Josef Grünpeck and others examined in chapter 2, appear in an even worse light as deceived imitators. In similar fashion, several important early printers, including many of those examined in chapter 3 who pioneered the publication of popular vernacular works, would seem tarnished by their association with such nonsense. Those who reprinted extracts from Lichtenberger’s Prognosticatio into the late sixteenth, seventeenth, and eighteenth centuries, long after the time Lichtenberger had foreseen, must seem as utterly naive or disingenuous as those who rewrote and updated medieval prophecies to suit their present moment. The “assumption of false identity, the prediction of events that had already happened, the introduction of meaninglessness, and the resort to plagiarism” are, according to Robert Lerner, the characteristic deceptions of medieval prophecy and the hallmarks of its self-righteous pious frauds.[1] The preceding chapters have certainly found numerous examples during the early modern period as well. The readers of prophetic works in print would therefore seem no better than passive receptors of the prophet’s words and dutiful objects of the prince’s actions as in the asymmetric relationship between prophet, prince, and populace discerned by Jan-Dirk Müller.[2] To the extent that readers did actively construct the meaning of early modern prophetic works, Ottavia Niccoli sees a “severely distorted, partial reading”: “The recent invention of printing, which threw on the market a mass of texts composed in very different epochs, had suddenly torn texts out of their cultural and historical contexts. . . . Present concerns invaded a text (that was usually deliberately ambiguous), overwhelmed it, and constrained the reader to a noticeably distorted reading of what it contained.”[3]

We need to “grapple with the minds of the past on their own terms,” however, as Robin Barnes has emphasized. “While we may see strong elements of naïveté in that picture of the world, we risk missing a great deal if we too quickly assume the condescending attitude of the enlightened analyst.”[4] The strategies employed by printers to confine and dampen readers’ reactions, as described in chapter 3, were never perfectly effective, and visual access to prophecy, as discussed in chapter 4, was a possibility that appealed to many readers. Rather than being only passive receptors, readers could resist the text’s claims, as, for example, the reader who inscribed a warning against “this heretical and false prophet” on the title page of Johannes von Lübeck’s Prognostication of the Advent of the Antichrist and the Messiah of the Jews.[5] Concerning Wolfgang Aytinger’s interpretation, which saw a final destruction of Turkish power in the prophecies of pseudo-Methodius, one reader twice noted that daily experience taught just the opposite.[6]

Beyond acts of resistance, readers could engage with prophetic texts in mutual acts of creating meaning. The annotations left in many prophetic and prognostic works are evidence of readers who connected the prophet’s message to the world as they observed it. In one copy of Lichtenberger’s Prognosticatio, two different readers saw predictions concerning imperial succession and the rise of a false prophet in Charles V and Hieronymous Savonarola (or a prophet rumored to have arisen in 1508 in Persia or, perhaps, Martin Luther). Plagues predicted for the turn of the sixteenth century found fulfillment, in one reader’s view, in the sudden appearance of syphilis and a swarm of locusts.[7] Even when Lichtenberger was reprinted after four decades and read a century later, readers could still find the predictions timely. The Prognosticatio foresaw that a struggle over ecclesiastical power would lead to unbelievable devastation. During the Thirty Years’ War, a reader twice affirmed, “Thus it unfortunately happens now in 162 [. . .] in Germany. Indeed, unfortunately much more this year in 1630.”[8] Readers of practicas, the annual astrological prognostic booklets described in chapter 5, engaged in the same kind of creative engagement. One reader noted in the practica of Petrus Advogarius for 1495, for example, next to the astrologer’s warning that King Alfonso should be particularly careful in the months of October and November, that the king had died in November (when, in fact, Alfonso II of Naples died in December 1495).[9] Confronted with a description of astral influences, the reader chose to interpret the world in a way that was consistent with them, reading not to falsify but to fulfill. Readers’ resistance to editorial control and their willingness to invest their reading with imagination form one reason that the practicas and other booklets addressing the controversial prediction of a second deluge for 1524 failed to have their desired effect, as described in chapter 6. While the authors of most of the pamphlets intended their use of astrology and other prophetic modes of writing to restore equilibrium to a society threatening to come unraveled, prophetic reading could turn a scholarly admonition into a foretelling of imminent doom. In the manuscript media context of the early fifteenth century, Johannes Tortsch had envisioned a prophetic mode of reading that broke down the distinction between author and reader, as both would receive and transmit the divine message. With the invention of print, that model of participation in textual transmission became impossible for most audience members, but the possibility remained for prophetic reading as a creative act of reception that interpreted texts in the same ways as prophetic authorship.

Prophecy, as we have seen, entailed assumptions about texts and time. Rather than merely a prediction of the future, prophecy resituates the present moment in a narrative that includes the past and the future, such as the location of fourteenth-century imperial succession in a narrative that reached from the Creation to the Last Judgment in the Sibyl’s Prophecy. The prophet, as the guiding interpreter of a textual community, could place the present moment in a new relationship to a foundational narrative. In a similar fashion, prophetic readers could map a vision of the future onto the present moment and find contemporary relevance in the prophet’s rereading of ancient texts. The most shameless prophecy ex eventu could become a true foretelling of a distant future when readers found in it a true description of their present circumstances. Prophecy cannot fail; it can only fail to find the right readers.

The same kind of prophetic reading was not limited to consumers of prophetic or prognostic works but can also be found among printers who updated a prophecy’s dates of ostensible relevance or in authors who found contemporary significance in old books. Martin Luther enlisted the possibilities of prophetic reading in the cause of Protestant polemic by rereading the vision of Brother Claus as an antipapal prophecy. Luther wrote that he had once ignored Brother Claus as irrelevant but now recognized in the vision a sign of warning given to the pope.[10] Rather than a glimpse into the future, prophecy more often entails a reinterpretation of the present moment with respect to older texts. As Luther wrote in 1522, it is the “disposition and nature of prophecies that they are first fulfilled and then understood.”[11]

The nature of prophetic reading is evocatively expressed in the culmination of history foreseen in the visions attributed to Wilhelm Friess: “For every person will be filled with virtue, and everyone will have understanding and wisdom like the apostles at the beginning of the Apostolic Church. They will be illuminated by the Spirit of God in Holy Scripture, which had previously long been dark. They will also understand all prophecies and predictions that have been prophesied and foretold by the prophets. There will also be many who will not only understand the prophets but will themselves also proclaim future things by the Holy Spirit.”[12] The right kind of readers, according to Friess, can write the future and reset ecclesiastical history to its moment of origin. By projecting the present day into the text and applying imagination to its images, prophetic reading could collapse distinctions between past and present, text and interpretation, and author and audience.

APPENDIX:
PROPHECY AND PROGNOSTICATION IN PRINT, 1450–1550

This appendix is intended to be complete with respect to prophetic works and practicas cited in the text or printed in the German language area until 1550. Editions printed outside of Germany or after 1550 and other kinds of prognostication, such as comet tracts by authors otherwise not mentioned here, are only rarely listed. This appendix furthermore aspires to completeness only with respect to the primary bibliographic censuses used (ISTC, GW, and VD16, in which full titles, copy locations, and links to facsimiles can be found) as well as copies not recorded in those indices that have either been personally observed or discussed in recent scholarly literature. Where an edition is found in both ISTC and GW, only an ISTC number is given. Where an early sixteenth-century edition is included in both VD16 and an incunable census, only the VD16 entry appears. Because older indices, including those of Zinner and Hellmann as well as older incunable censuses, are not reliable in all cases, several works appear in those sources that do not appear here. Intensive searching in libraries and archives would undoubtedly discover many additional editions.

Titles are given in shortened form and are given in English translation first if they appear in translation in the chapters of this book. For editions lacking imprint information, the secondary literature often provides two or more attributions and considerable uncertainty regarding dates, which is only rarely noted here. Editions that could be consulted in the original or in facsimile are identified with an asterisk. Works are listed in alphabetical order according to their author or by title if no author is known. “Anonymous prophetic tracts” with few editions and “anonymous practicas” are listed together under those headings. For authors with few published practicas before 1550 but many after that date, most practicas after 1550 have been omitted with the exception of the latest, with a corresponding note in the entry. For practicas, the year given in all cases is the year for which the practica was authored, not the year of its publication, and no attempt is made to distinguish signed from unsigned dates.

Advogarius, Petrus Bonus

Practicas

Rome: Eucharius Silber, for 1494 (Latin). ISTC ia00057095*

[Rome: Johann Besicken], for 1495 (Latin). ISTC ia00057200*

[Rome: Petrus de Turre?], for 1498 (Latin). ISTC ia00057560*

[Rome: Johann Besicken], for 1499 (Latin). ISTC ia00057700*

[24 further practicas, for 1477–1501, omitted]

Alofresant

Antwerp: Pierre Snoeps, 1519 (French). Halbronn, Le texte prophétique, 2:490

Basel: Pamphilus Gengenbach, 1519 (Latin). VD16 A 1927*

[Basel: n.p., 1519] (Latin). VD16 A 1926

Munich: Hans Schobser, for Johann Haselberg, 1519 (German). VD16 A 1928*

[Cologne: Arnd von Aich, 1520] (German). VD16 A 1930*

Strasbourg: [Martin Flach, 1525] (German). VD16 A 1932

Antwerp: Guillaume Vorsterman, [1528] (French). Jungmayr, “Alofresant von Rhodos,” 215

Antwerp: Guillaume Vorsterman, [1528] (Dutch). Jungmayr, “Alofresant von Rhodos,” 216

[Augsburg: Heinrich Steiner, 1530] (German). VD16 A 1929*

[Dresden]: Wolfgang Stöckel, [1530] (German). VD16 A 1931

[Nuremberg: Kunigunde Hergot or Georg Wachter, 1530] (German). VD16 A 1933*

Nuremberg: Georg Wachter, 1530 (German). VD16 A 1935*

[Speyer: Anastasius Nolt, 1530] (German). VD16 ZV 25574

Antwerp: Ian von Ghelen, [1540] (Dutch). Jungmayr, “Alofresant von Rhodos,” 216

Imperial Practica and Prognostication. Kaiserliche Practica.

[n.p.: n.p., 1530] (German). VD16 A 1934*

[n.p.: n.p.], 1530 (German). VD16 ZV 415*

[Strasbourg: Jakob Cammerlander], 1535 (German). VD16 A 1936*

[n.p.: n.p.], 1535 (German). VD16 ZV 416*

Ambach, Melchior

On the End of the World and Advent of the Antichrist. Vom Ende der Welt und zukunfft des Endtchrists.

Frankfurt: Hermann Gülfferich, [1545]. VD16 A 2161

Ancient Prophecy of Emperor Karl. Vaticinium de Imperatore Karolo pervetustum.

Rostock: Ludwig Dietz, 1519 (German). VD16 P 5063

[Cologne: Peter Quentel], 1527 (Latin). VD16 K 340*

[Cologne: Peter Quentel, 1527] (Latin). VD16 N 1066

Dresden: Wolfgang Stöckel, 1528 (German). VD16 K 342

[Augsburg: Heinrich Steiner], 1532 (German). VD16 E 3913*

Angelus (Engel), Johannes

Comet tract

[Memmingen: Albrecht Kunne, 1490] (Latin). ISTC ia00709000*

Practicas

[Strasbourg: Johann (Reinhard) Grüninger, ca. 1485?] (German). ISTC ia00712100

Nuremberg: Marx Ayrer, for 1488 (German). ISTC ia00712300*

[Ingolstadt?: n.p.], for 1496 (German). GW 1903a

Ingolstadt: Georg Wirffel and Marx Ayrer, for 1497 (German). ISTC ia00712400*

Annius, Johannes (Giovanni Nanni)

On the Future Triumph of the Christians against the Saracens. De futuris Christianorum triumphis in Saracenos.

Genoa: Baptista Cavalus, 1480 (Latin). ISTC ia00750000

Leipzig: [Marcus Brandis], 1481 (Latin). ISTC ia00751000*

Louvain: Johannes de Westfalia, [1481–83] (Latin). ISTC ia00754000

Cologne: [Heinrich Quentell], 1482 (Latin). ISTC ia00753000*

[Gouda: Gerard Leeu, 1482–83] (Latin). ISTC ia00752000

Nuremberg: [Peter Wagner, 1485] (Latin). ISTC ia00755000*

Cologne: Retro Minores, 1497 (Latin). ISTC ia00757000

Paris: Etienne Jehannot, [1499] (Latin). ISTC ia00757200*

Cologne: Martin von Werden, 1507 (Latin). VD16 N 75*

Nuremberg: Valentin Neuber, 1560 (Latin). VD16 N 77

Anonymous practicas

[Nuremberg: Johann Sensenschmidt, ca. 1474–78] (German). ISTC ip00948800*

[Cologne: Nicolaus Götz], for 1479 (Latin). ISTC ip01005800

[Rostock: Fratres Domus Horti Viridis ad S. Michaelem], for 1479 (German). ISTC ip00949500

[Leipzig: Marcus Brandis, ca. 1481–85] (German). ISTC ip00949530

[Mainz: Printer of the “Darmstadt” Prognostication], for 1482 (Latin). ISTC ip01005820

[Mainz: Printer of the “Darmstadt” Prognostication], for 1482 (German). ISTC ip00949550

[Augsburg: Erhard Ratdolt, for 1486] (German). ISTC ip00949580*

[Strasbourg: Johann (Reinhard) Grüninger], for 1487 (Latin). ISTC ip01005880

[Augsburg: Johann Schönsperger], for 1487 (German). ISTC ip00950500*

[Paulus Eck?] [Leipzig: Conrad Kachelofen], for 1487 (Latin). ISTC ip01005870*

[Reutlingen: Johann Otmar], for 1489 (German). ISTC ip00949600

[Leipzig: Martin Landsberg], for 1490 (Latin). ISTC ip01005910

[Bamberg?: Marx Ayrer?], for 1492 (German). ISTC ip00949700

[Magdeburg: Simon Koch (Mentzer)], for 1493 (German). ISTC ip00949770

[Ulm: Conrad Dinckmut], for 1494 (German). ISTC ip00949800

[Ulm: Johann Reger], for 1495 (German). ISTC ip01005947*

[Mainz: Jacob Meydenbach], for 1495 (German). ISTC ip01005948

[Cologne: Johann Koelhoff the Younger], for 1496 (Latin). ISTC ic00214000

[Magdeburg: Moritz Brandis, ca. 1498–1500] (German). ISTC ip01005985

[Ingolstadt: Johann Kachelofen], for 1499 (German). Unrecorded (Pascher, Praktiken des 15. und 16. Jahrhunderts, 63–70)*

[Leipzig: Jacobus Thanner], for 1499 (Latin). ISTC ip01005630

[Strasbourg]: Bartholomaeus Kistler, for 1500 (German). ISTC il00214410*

[Leipzig: Melchior Lotter, ca. 1500?] (German). Not in VD16/ISTC (Pascher, Praktiken des 15. und 16. Jahrhunderts, 107–10)*

[Nuremberg: Kaspar Hochfederer Nachfolger(?)], for 1504 (German). Not in VD16 (Bamberg SB Inc typ M IV 13)*

Lübeck: Anna Richolff, for 1517 (German). VD16 P 4539

Anonymous prophetic tracts

Letter and Transcript of Francis I. Der brieff vnd abschrifft so der Christlich Künig Franciscus von Franckreych mit seyner eygner handt geschrieben. . . . Item auch etliche mirackel vnd Prophecey so zu Rom uber alles Gold Silber Edelgestein enthalten und itzund newlich erfunden. . . .

[Erfurt: Wolfgang Stürmer], 1526 (German). VD16 ZV 25929

Letter Concerning a New Prophet in Lyon

[Nuremberg: Hieronymus Höltzel, 1502] (Latin). VD16 E 1707*

[Nuremberg: Hieronymus Höltzel, 1502] (German). VD16 E 1708*

Practica of the Masters of Chaldea and Babylonia. Practica auff das jar nach Cristi gepurt M.ccccc. und zwai jar. . . . gemacht worden durch groß maister der sternseher von Caldea aus babilonia.

[Munich: Hans Schobser], 1502 (German). VD16 P 4538*

Practica of the Masters of the School of Athens. Practica der hochgelerten maister der schul Athenis.

[Munich: Hans Schobser, 1501] (German). VD16 P 4550*

[n.p.: n.p., 1501] (German). VD16 P 4549

Prophecia simplicis Militia ad status ecclesie simplici sed non imperita distione deprompta

Basel: [Nikolaus Lamparter], 1521 (Latin). VD16 F 547*

A Prophecy and Secret. Ain Prophecey Item haymligkayt alter verborgner geschrifft von zerstörung der grossen Künigreich und von grossen schlachten vnd blůtvergiessung.

[Augsburg: Erhard Oeglin, 1522] (German). VD16 P 5062*

Prophecy of Gigebaldus. Ain brophecya Oder weisagung Jetz lauffende Jar betreffendt geoffenbart ainen fromben briester mit namen Gigebaldus Ain ainsidel gewesen in ainem wald mit namen in der hard bey winshaim Im Franckenland Gewonet hat Geschechen Im. 12.93. Jaren.

[n.p.: n.p., 1522?] (German). Not in VD16 (Augsburg StSB 4o LR 249)*

Prophecy of Wonderful Future Things. Prophecey Wunderbarlicher zůkünftiger ding die sich jtzundt gewißlich erneüwen und bis nach ende des Endtchrists erscheynen und nach seiner sichtigklichen uffart unnd nit ehe ir ende erreichen werden.

Oppenheim: [Jakob Köbel, 1522] (German). VD16 P 5064*

Anschau, Johannes

Vision of an Enraptured Woman in Childbed. Wundergeschicht Offenbarung unnd Gesichte einer entzuckten Kindbetterin.

[n.p.: n.p., 1569] (German). VD16 ZV 23763

Augsburg: Hans Zimmermann, [1570] (German). VD16 A 2905*

Apian, Peter

Practicas

[Landshut: Johann Weißenburger], for 1524 (German). VD16 A 3101*

[n.p.: n.p.], for 1524 (German). Not in VD16 (Talkenberger, Sintflut, 434)

Landshut: Johann Weißenburger, for 1525 (German). VD16 A 3102

[Augsburg: Heinrich Steiner], for 1526 (German). VD16 A 3104*

[Landshut: Johann Weißenburger], for 1526 (German). VD16 A 3103

Landshut: Georg Apian, for 1532 (German). VD16 A 3105

Landshut: Georg Apian, for 1539 (German). VD16 A 3106*

[Nuremberg: Hieronymus Andreae], for 1541 (German). VD16 A 3107*

Nuremberg: Hieronymus Andreae, for 1541 (German). VD16 ZV 660

Nuremberg: Hieronymus Andreae, for 1543 (German). VD16 A 3108*

Nuremberg: Hieronymus Andreae, for 1544 (German). VD16 A 3109*

Auffahrt Abend

Visio fratris Johannis. Revelation of Brother Raimund. Offenbarung und Gesicht. (see also Johann Züntel)

[Leipzig: Valentin Schumann, 1520] (German). VD16 O 509*

[Leipzig: Valentin Schumann, 1520] (German). VD16 O 510

[Leipzig: Valentin Schumann, 1520] (German). VD16 O 511

[Leipzig: Valentin Schumann, 1520] (German). VD16 ZV 21833

[Strasbourg: Johann Knobloch the Elder, 1520] (German). VD16 O 512*

[Strasbourg: Johann Prüß the Younger, 1520] (German). VD16 ZV 11956

[Leipzig: Wolfgang Stöckel], 1521 (German). VD16 O 513 (with the Reformation Sigismundi)

[Speyer: Jakob Schmidt], 1527 (German). VD16 O 514*

[Nuremberg: Johann Stuchs, 1530] (German). VD16 ZV 11957*

[Augsburg: Heinrich Steiner], 1532 (German). VD16 ZV 11958* (with selections from the Extract of Various Prophecies)

Aurifaber (Goldschmid), Andreas

Practica

Danzig: Franz Rhode, for 1541 (German). VD16 G 2563*

Barberiis, Philippus de

Prophecies of the Sibyls and Prophets about Christ. Sibyllarum et prophetarum de Christo vaticinia.

Rome: Johannes Philippus de Lignamine, 1481 (Latin). ISTC ib00118000

Rome: Johannes Philippus de Lignamine, 1481 (Latin). ISTC ib00119000

[Rome: Georgius Teutonicus (Herolt or Lauer) and] Sixtus Riessinger, [1482] (Latin). ISTC ib00120000*

Braunschweig: Hans Dorn, 1516 (Latin). VD16 F 566

Oppenheim: [Jakob Köbel, 1517] (Latin). VD16 P 2454*

Venice: Bernardinus Benalius, [1520] (Latin). ISTC ib00121000

Barbus, Johannes

Practica

[Padua: Matthaeus Cerdonis], for 1483 (Latin). ISTC ib00122500*

Bernardus de Cracovia

Practica

[Leipzig: Conrad Kachelofen], for 1489 (Latin). ISTC ib00446600*

Birgitta

Revelations

[Lübeck: Lucas Brandis, 1478] (German). ISTC ib00689000

Lübeck: Bartholomaeus Ghotan, [1485] (German). ISTC ib00689500

[Lübeck]: Bartholomaeus Ghotan, [for Vadstena Monastery], 1492 (Latin). ISTC ib00687000*

Lübeck: Mohnkopfdruckerei, 1496 (German). ISTC ib00690000

Nuremberg: Anton Koberger for Florian Waldauf, 1500 (Latin). ISTC ib00688000*

Nuremberg: Anton Koberger for Florian Waldauf, 1502 (German). VD16 B 5596*

Nuremberg: Anton Koberger the Younger, 1521 (Latin). VD16 ZV 25691*

Dillingen: Sebald Mayer, 1572 (German). VD16 B 5600 (extracts)

Burden of the World. Onus mundi (ed. Johann Tortsch). (see also Adam Walasser)

Nuremberg: Conrad Zeninger, 1481 (German). ISTC ib00676000*

[Augsburg: Anton Sorg, 14]82 (German). ISTC ib00676100*

Rome: Eucharius Silber, 1485 (Latin). ISTC ib00675000*

Augsburg: Lucas Zeissenmair, 1502 (German). VD16 B 5595*

Augsburg: Hans Froschauer, 1504 (German). VD16 B 5597*

[Augsburg]: Johann Schönsperger the Younger, 1510 (German). VD16 B 5598

Augsburg: Johann Schönsperger the Younger, 1522 (German). VD16 B 5599

Neisse: Johann Schubart, 1625 (German). Montag, Das Werk der heiligen Birgitta, 176

Blanchis, Julianus de

Practicas

[Rome: Eucharius Silber], for 1482 (Latin). ISTC ib00696100*

Passau: [Benedictus Mayr], for 1483 (Latin). ISTC ib00696300*

Passau: [Benedictus Mayr], for 1483 (Latin). ISTC ib00696400*

[Rome: Eucharius Silber], for 1483 (Latin). ISTC ib00696200*

[Rome: Eucharius Silber], for 1483–84 (Latin). ISTC ib00696500

[Rome: Georg und Sixtus Riessinger Lauer], for 1484–85 (Latin). ISTC ib00696600

Borgbirius, Johannes

Practica

[Leipzig: Martin Landsberg], for 1516 (Latin). VD16 B 6708*

Bouelles, Charles de (see also Bruder Claus)

A Vision of Bruder Claus

[Nuremberg: Johann Stuchs, 1528] (German). VD16 B 6826

Wittenberg: Nickel Schirlentz, 1528 (German). VD16 B 6827*

Brant, Sebastian

Verse practica broadside

[Pforzheim: Thomas Anshelm], for 1504 (German). Not in VD16. (Munich BSB Einbl. I, 44)*

Braune, Kaspar

Practica

[n.p.: n.p.], for 1502 (German). VD16 B 7228

Brelochs, Anton

Comet interpretation

[Nuremberg: Jobst Gutknecht], 1531 (German). VD16 B 7425*

Practicas

[n.p.: n.p.], for 1528 (German). VD16 B 7415*

[Zwickau: Gabriel Kantz], for 1530 (German). VD16 ZV 2418*

[n.p.: n.p.], for 1531 (German). VD16 B 7416*

[n.p.: n.p.], for 1533 (German). Not in VD16 (Nuremberg GNM Postinc 8o Nw 2871 [1533])*

[n.p.: n.p.], for 1534 (German). Not in VD16 (Nuremberg GNM Postinc 8o Nw 2871 [1534])*

Augsburg: Philipp Ulhart the Elder, for 1535 (German). VD16 B 7417*

Nuremberg: Jobst Gutknecht, for 1538 (German). VD16 ZV 2417*

[Schwäbisch Hall: Peter Braubach], for 1539 (German). VD16 B 7418

[n.p.: n.p.], for 1540 (German). Not in VD16 (Nuremberg GNM Postinc 8o Nw 2871 [1540])*

Augsburg: Heinrich Steiner, for 1542 (German). VD16 B 7419

Nuremberg: Jobst Gutknecht, for 1542 (German). VD16 B 7420

Nuremberg: Christoph Gutknecht, for 1543 (German). VD16 ZV 15793*

[Nuremberg]: Christoph Gutknecht, for 1544 (German). VD16 ZV 15794*

Nuremberg: Christoph Gutknecht, for 1545 (German). VD16 ZV 2415*

Nuremberg: Christoph Gutknecht, for 1546 (German). Not in VD16 (Nuremberg GNM Postinc 8o Nw 2871 [1546])*

Nuremberg: Christoph Gutknecht, for 1547 (German). VD16 B 7421

Nuremberg: Christoph Gutknecht, for 1548 (German). VD16 ZV 2416*

Schwäbisch Hall: Thomas Biber, for 1553 (German). VD16 B 7422

Nuremberg: Valentin Geißler, for 1556 (German). Not in VD16 (Würzburg UB H.p.q. 429)*

Nuremberg: Valentin Geißler, for 1558 (German). VD16 B 7423

Nuremberg: Valentin Geißler, for 1559 (German). VD16 B 7424*

Brotbeihel, Jeremias

Practicas

[n.p.: n.p.], for 1529 (German). Not in VD16 (Augsburg StSB 4o LR 249)*

[Augsburg: Heinrich Steiner], for 1530 (German). VD16 B 8396

Frankfurt: Cyriacus Jacob, for 1549 (German). VD16 B 8397

[n.p.: n.p.], for 1551 (German). VD16 B 8398

Dortmund: Philipp Maurer, for 1552 (German). VD16 B 8399

Dillingen: Sebald Mayer, for 1560 (German). VD16 B 8400

[n.p.: n.p.], for 1561 (German). VD16 B 8401

[n.p.: n.p.], for 1561 (German). VD16 B 8402

Dillingen: Sebald Mayer, for 1562 (German). VD16 ZV 25774

Dillingen: Sebald Mayer, for 1563 (German). VD16 B 8403

Brotbeihel, Matthias

Practicas

[n.p.: n.p.], for 1527 (German). VD16 ZV 23331*

[Augsburg: Philipp Ulhart the Elder], for 1528 (German). VD16 ZV 25790*

[Bamberg: Georg Erlinger], for 1528 (German). VD16 B 8413*

[n.p.: n.p.], for 1528 (German). VD16 B 8414

[n.p.: n.p.], for 1528 (German). VD16 B 8415*

Augsburg: Philipp Ulhart the Elder, for 1531 (German). VD16 B 8416

Augsburg: Philipp Ulhart the Elder, for 1533 (German). Not in VD16 (Nuremberg GNM Postinc 8o Nw 2869 [1533])*

Nuremberg: Kunigunde Hergot, for 1533 (German). VD16 B 8417

[Cologne: n.p.], for 1536 (German). VD16 B 8418

[Nuremberg]: Hans Guldenmund, for 1536 (German). VD16 B 8419*

[n.p.: n.p.], for 1536 (German). Not in VD16 (Nuremberg GNM Postinc 8o Nw 2869 [1536])*

[n.p.: n.p.], for 1537 (German). VD16 ZV 23116*

[n.p.: n.p.], for 1537 (German). VD16 ZV 24654

[Augsburg: Heinrich Steiner], for 1538 (German). VD16 ZV 25083

[Nuremberg: Hans Guldenmund], for 1538 (German). VD16 B 8420

[Augsburg: Heinrich Steiner], for 1539 (German). VD16 B 8421*

[n.p.: n.p.], for 1541 (German). Not in VD16 (Nuremberg GNM Postinc 8o Nw 2869 [1541])*

Augsburg: Heinrich Steiner, for 1542 (German). VD16 B 8423

Nuremberg: Georg Wachter, for 1543 (German). VD16 ZV 16165*

[n.p.: n.p.], for 1544 (German). VD16 B 8424*

[Zurich: Eustachius Froschauer], for 1546 (German). VD16 ZV 2546

[n.p.: n.p.], for 1546 (German). VD16 B 8425

[n.p.: n.p.], for 1548 (German). VD16 B 8426

[n.p.: n.p.], for 1548 (German). Not in VD16 (Erlangen UB Trew S 96)*

[n.p.: n.p.], for 1551 (German). VD16 B 8398

Bruder Claus (see also Charles de Bouelles, Adam Walasser)

Augsburg: Peter Berger, [1487] (German). ISTC ic00708900*

Nuremberg: Marx Ayrer, [14]88 (German). ISTC ic00709000*

[Nuremberg: Peter Wagner, 1489] (German). ISTC ic00709100*

Brunfels, Otto

The Christians’ Practica

Nuremberg: Hans Guldenmund, [1545] (German). VD16 ZV 16166

Strasbourg: Jakob Cammerlander, 1545 (German). VD16 B 8482

Nuremberg: Hans Daubman, 1548 (German). VD16 B 8483*

Nuremberg: Hans Daubman, [1548] (German). VD16 B 8484

Nuremberg: Hans Daubman, [1548] (German). VD16 ZV 2560

Nuremberg: Hans Daubman, [1550] (German). VD16 ZV 16167

Erfurt: Georg Baumann the Elder, 1578 (German). VD16 B 8485

Mühlhausen: Georg Hantzsch, 1582 (German). VD16 B 8486

Everlasting Almanac

[Strasbourg: Johann Prüß the Younger], 1526 (German). VD16 B 8462*

Augsburg: Valentin Otmar, [1541] (German). VD16 B 8463

Strasbourg: Johann Prüß the Younger, [1541] (German). VD16 B 8464

[Augsburg: Heinrich Steiner], 1544 (German). VD16 B 8465

A Practica from the Holiest and Oldest Books of Astronomy

[Magdeburg: Heinrich Öttinger, 1528] (German). VD16 B 8551

[Rostock: Ludwig Dietz, 1528] (German). VD16 B 8550

Bülow, Johannes

Practica

[Rostock: Ludwig Dietz], for 1525 (German). VD16 B 9139

Butzlin, Valentin

Practicas

Zurich: Eustachius Froschauer, for 1550 (German). VD16 B 9225

Zurich: Eustachius Froschauer, for 1550 (German). VD16 ZV 2683

Zurich: Eustachius Froschauer, for 1551 (German). VD16 ZV 2684

[practicas for intervening years omitted]

[Zurich: Christoph Froschauer the Younger], for 1568 (German). VD16 ZV 2682

Camillus, Aegidius

Practicas

[Augsburg: Jörg Nadler], for 1521 (German). VD16 C 588*

[Nuremberg: Jobst Gutknecht], for 1523 (German). VD16 C 589*

[Nuremberg: Jobst Gutknecht], for 1523 (German). VD16 C 590*

[Augsburg: Heinrich Steiner], for 1524 (German). VD16 C 591

[Augsburg: Heinrich Steiner], for 1524 (German). VD16 C 593*

[Regensburg: Paul Kohl], for 1524 (German). VD16 C 592

[Nuremberg: Jobst Gutknecht], for 1525 (German). VD16 C 594*

[n.p.: n.p.], for 1525 (German). Not in VD16 (Nuremberg GNM Postinc 8o Nw 2867 [1525], Augsburg StSB 4o Kult 186–128)*

[n.p.: n.p.], for 1526 (German). Not in VD16 (Nuremberg GNM Postinc 8o Nw 2867 [1526])*

Vienna: Hieronymus Vietor, for 1531 (German). Not in VD16 (Augsburg StSB 4o Math 516)*

[n.p.: n.p.], for 1531 (German). VD16 ZV 24784

Canter, Johannes

Almanacs

Nuremberg: Friedrich Creussner, for 1488 (Latin). ISTC ic00103700

[Nuremberg: Friedrich Creussner], for 1488 (German). ISTC ic00103720*

Practicas

Nuremberg: Friedrich Creussner, for 1488 (Latin). ISTC ic00103800*

[Rome: Stephan Plannck], for 1490 (Latin). ISTC ic00104500*

Capistor, Johannes

Practicas

[Nuremberg: Hans Hergot], for 1527 (German). VD16 C 807*

[Erfurt: Johann Loersfeld], for 1527 (German). VD16 C 808

Nuremberg: Kunigunde Hergot or Georg Wachter, for 1531 (German). VD16 C 809

Capiteyn, Petrus

Practica

[Rostock?: Ludwig Dietz?], for 1547 (German). VD16 C 811

Carion, Johann

Annual practicas

[Augsburg: Johann Miller], for 1519 (German). VD16 ZV 24181*

Wittenberg: Georg Rhau, for 1531 (German). VD16 ZV 17957*

Nuremberg: Johann Petreius, for 1532 (German). VD16 C 1023

[Dresden: Wolfgang Stöckel], for 1533 (German). VD16 ZV 2941

[Wittenberg: Hans Weiß], for 1533 (Latin). VD16 C 1021*

[Wittenberg: Georg Rhau], for 1533 (German). VD16 C 1024*

Wittenberg: [n.p.], for 1535 (German). VD16 C 1025*

Wittenberg: Hans Lufft, for 1537 (German). VD16 ZV 17959*

Prognostication for 1524

[Leipzig: Martin Landsberg, 1521] (German). VD16 C 1030*

[Leipzig: Martin Landsberg, 1521] (German). VD16 C 1031

[Augsburg: Erhard Oeglin heirs, 1522] (German). VD16 C 1032

Leipzig: Wolfgang Stöckel, 1522 (German). VD16 C 1033

Leipzig: Wolfgang Stöckel, 1522 (German). VD16 C 1034*

[n.p.: n.p., 1524] (German). VD16 C 1022 [This edition, entitled Practica Deutsch Johannis Carionis Philesophi auff das Jar 1524, is known only from Weller’s 1864 Repertorium Typographicum, which cites an 1846 auction catalog and may be identical to one of the other editions of the prognostication for 1524 rather than an independent edition.]

Interpretation and Revelation. Bedeütnus und Offenbarung.

[Augsburg: Heinrich Steiner], 1526 (German). VD16 C 961*

[Augsburg: Philipp Ulhart the Elder], 1526 (German). VD16 C 962*

[Augsburg: Philipp Ulhart the Elder], 1526 (German). VD16 C 963*

[Nuremberg: Jobst Gutknecht, 1526] (German). VD16 C 964*

[Augsburg: Heinrich Steiner, 1527] (German). VD16 C 966*

[Leipzig: Nickel Schmidt, 1527] (German). VD16 C 965*

Leipzig: Nickel Schmidt, 1528 (German). VD16 C 967*

[Nuremberg: Kunigunde Hergot or Georg Wachter], 1529 (German). VD16 C 968*

[Nuremberg: Kunigunde Hergot or Georg Wachter], 1530 (German). VD16 C 969

[Regensburg: Paul Kohl, 1530] (German). VD16 C 970*

Wittenberg: Georg Rhau, 1530 (German). VD16 ZV 17958* (with the Extract of Various Prophecies)

Strasbourg: Johann Prüß the Younger, 1533 (German). VD16 C 971

Nuremberg: Leonhard Milchtaler, 1539 (German). VD16 C 976

Interpretation and Revelation. Bedeütnus und Offenbarung. (extended to 1550, with “Hidden Prophecy”)

[Augsburg: Heinrich Steiner], 1531 (German). VD16 C 972*

[Augsburg: Heinrich Steiner], 1531 (German). VD16 ZV 25789*

Nuremberg: Friderich Peypus, 1531 (German). VD16 C 973*

[Augsburg: Heinrich Steiner], 1534 (German). VD16 C 974*

[Augsburg?: Heinrich Steiner?], 1534 (German). Not in VD16 (Augsburg StSB 4o Kult 104a)*

[Augsburg: Heinrich Steiner], 1536 (German). VD16 C 975

Nuremberg: Georg Wachter, [1539] (German). VD16 C 977

Nuremberg: Georg Wachter, [1539] (German). VD16 ZV 2940

[Augsburg: Melchior Kriegstein, 1540] (German). VD16 C 978

[Augsburg: Melchior Kriegstein, 1540] (German). VD16 C 982

Nuremberg: Leonhard Milchtaler, 1540 (German). VD16 C 979*

Nuremberg: Leonhard Milchtaler, 1540 (German). VD16 C 980

Nuremberg: Georg Wachter, [1540] (German). VD16 C 981*

Nuremberg: Margareth Milchtalerin, 1541 (German). Not in VD16 (Erlangen UB Trew X 608)*

Nuremberg: Johann Günther, 1543 (German). VD16 ZV 2944

Strasbourg: Johann Grimm, 1543 (German). VD16 C 983

[n.p.: n.p.], 1548 (German). VD16 C 984

Interpretation and Revelation. Bedeütnus und Offenbarung. (extended to 1550, with “Hidden Prophecy” and prognostication of Salomon von Roermond)

Strasbourg: Jakob Cammerlander, 1543 (German). VD16 C 1026*

Strasbourg: Jakob Cammerlander, 1544 (German). VD16 ZV 2945

Strasbourg: Jakob Cammerlander, 1545 (German). VD16 C 1027

Strasbourg: Jakob Cammerlander, 1548 (German). VD16 C 958

Strasbourg: Wendelin Rihel the Elder, 1549 (German). VD16 C 959*

Comet interpretation

Wittenberg: [Georg Rhau], 1533 (German). VD16 C 1036*

Wittenberg: [n.p.], 1533 (German). VD16 ZV 17960

Interpretation of the Hidden Prophecy (see also Johannes Virdung)

[Augsburg: Valentin Otmar], 1546 (German). VD16 C 952*

Erfurt: Melchior Sachse the Elder, 1546 (German). VD16 C 954

Erfurt: Wolfgang Stürmer, 1546 (German). VD16 C 955

Erfurt: Wolfgang Stürmer, 1546 (German). VD16 ZV 25304

[Nuremberg: Hans Guldenmund, 1546] (German). VD16 C 953 (with Theodericus Croata)

Nuremberg: Wolfgang Heußler, 1546 (German). VD16 C 956*

[n.p.: n.p.], 1546 (German). VD16 C 951

[n.p.: n.p.], 1546 (German). VD16 ZV 2946

Nuremberg: Wolfgang Heußler, 1547 (German). VD16 ZV 21897

[n.p.: n.p.], 1547 (German). VD16 C 957*

Erfurt: Merten von Dolgen, 1567 (German). VD16 C 1037

[n.p.: n.p. (“Middelburg” [Eisleben?]: “Johann Schoner”), 15]93 (German). VD16 ZV 2951*

[n.p.: n.p. (“Middelburg” [Eisleben?]: “Johann Schoner”), 15]93 (German). VD16 ZV 24440

Eisleben: Urban Gaubisch [“Middelburg: Johann Schoner”], 1594 (German). VD16 C 960*

Cattaneo, Filippo

Practica for 1531–35. Judicium . . . Anno 1531 auf die nechstvolgenden vier jar. (see also Prophecies of the Twelve Sibyls)

[Nuremberg: Johann Petreius], 1535 (German). VD16 C 1725*

Cirvelo, Pedro Sanchez

Prognostication for 1524

[Nuremberg: Friderich Peypus, 1523] (Latin). VD16 C 3939

Nuremberg: Friderich Peypus, [1524] (German). VD16 C 3940*

Clauser, Christoph

Practica

[Zurich: Christoph Froschauer the Elder], for 1543 (German). VD16 C 4051

Copp, Johannes

Practicas

Leipzig: Wolfgang Stöckel, for 1521 (Latin). VD16 C 5020

Leipzig: Wolfgang Stöckel, for 1521 (German). VD16 ZV 3859

Leipzig: Wolfgang Stöckel, for 1522 (German). VD16 C 5022*

Prognostication for 1523–24

[Augsburg: Heinrich Steiner, 1522] (German). VD16 C 5026*

[Erfurt: Matthes Maler], 1522 (German). VD16 C 5027

Leipzig: Wolfgang Stöckel, [1522] (German). VD16 C 5028

[Vienna: Johann Singriener the Elder], 1522 (German). VD16 C 5025

Prognostication for 1524, Clearer than the Year Before

[Augsburg: Heinrich Steiner], 1523 (German). VD16 C 5023*

Erfurt: [Matthes Maler], 1523 (German). VD16 C 5024

Zwickau: [Johann Schönsperger the Younger, 1523] (German). VD16 ZV 24182

Creutzer, Peter

Comet tracts

[Nuremberg: Friderich Peypus, 1527] (German). VD16 ZV 22438

[Strasbourg: Johann Prüß the Younger, 1527] (German). VD16 C 5804

[Worms: Peter Schöffer the Younger, 1527] (German). VD16 C 5803

[Nuremberg: Kunigunde Hergot or Georg Wachter, 1528] (German). VD16 C 5801*

Nuremberg: Georg Wachter, [1528] (German). VD16 C 5802*

Horoscope manual

Cologne: [n.p.], 1517 (German). VD16 C 5807

[Worms: Peter Schöffer the Younger, 1525] (German). VD16 C 5808

[Worms: Peter Schöffer the Younger, 1525] (German). VD16 C 5809

Nuremberg: Kunigunde Hergot / Georg Wachter, 1528 (German). VD16 ZV 25802

[Strasbourg: Christian Egenolff, 1528 (German). VD16 C 5810*

[Augsburg: Heinrich Steiner, 1530] (German). VD16 C 5811

[Strasbourg: Christian Egenolff, 1530] (German). VD16 C 5812*

Practicas

[n.p.: n.p.], for 1530 (German). VD16 C 5805

Nuremberg: Kunigunde Hergot, for 1531 (German). VD16 ZV 3996

Frankfurt: Hermann Gülfferich, for 1545 (German). VD16 C 5806*

Dobschitz, Leonardus de

Practicas

[Leipzig: Wolfgang Stöckel], for 1499 (German). ISTC id00298100

[Leipzig: Wolfgang Stöckel], for 1500 (Latin). ISTC id00298300

[Leipzig: Wolfgang Stöckel], for 1500 (German). ISTC id00298600

[Leipzig: Wolfgang Stöckel], for 1501 (Latin). ISTC id00298700

Eck, Paulus

Practicas

[Hamburg: Johann and Thomas Borchard], for 1488 (Latin). ISTC ie00012995

[Leipzig: Marcus Brandis], for 1488 (German). ISTC ie00012990

[Basel: Michael Furter?], for 1489 (Latin). ISTC ie00013600

Response to the Invective of Wenzel Faber

[Leipzig: Conrad Kachelofen, 1488] (Latin). ISTC ie00013550*

Eckhart, Der treue

Contrapracticas

[Simmern: Hieronymus Rodler, 1532] (German). VD16 P 4543*

[Zwickau: Wolfgang Meyerpeck the Elder, 1533] (German). VD16 ZV 21001

[Augsburg: Heinrich Steiner, 1535] (German). VD16 T 1876

[n.p.: n.p.], 1535 (German). Not in VD16 (Nuremberg GNM Postinc 8o Nw 2881b)*

Eckstein, Adam

Practicas

[Strasbourg: Matthias Hupfuff], for 1500 (German). ISTC ie00013870

[Ulm: Johann Zainer], for 1500 (German). ISTC ie00013865

Egenolff, Christian

Compilations (see also Johannes Lichtenberger, Affliction of the Entire World; Prophecies of the Twelve Sibyls)

[Frankfurt: Christian Egenolff, 1548] (German). VD16 P 5065*

[Frankfurt: Christian Egenolff], 1549 (German). VD16 P 5066*

Strasbourg: Wendelin Rihel the Elder, 1549 (German). VD16 P 5067

[Frankfurt: Christian Egenolff, 1550] (German). VD16 P 5068*

Eichmann, Judocus

Sibille Weyssagung

Heidelberg: Heinrich Knoblochtzer, 1493 (German). ISTC ie00019500

[Augsburg: Melchior Ramminger, 1525] (German). VD16 E 649*

Eipelius, Berchthold Johannes

Practica

Erfurt: Wolfgang Stürmer, for 1545 (German). VD16 ZV 1277*

Eißlinger, Balthasar, the Elder

Eclipse tract

Speyer: [Anastasius Nolt, 1539] (German). VD16 ZV 7982

Practicas

Speyer: [Anastasius Nolt], for 1537 (German). VD16 ZV 8211

Speyer: [Anastasius Nolt], for 1539 (German). VD16 ZV 4949

Speyer: [Anastasius Nolt], for 1540 (German). VD16 E 899

Speyer: Anastasius Nolt, for 1541 (German). VD16 ZV 4950

Speyer: [Anastasius Nolt?], for 1549 (German). VD16 E 900

Endres von Weinmer

Practica

[Nuremberg: Adam Dyon], for 1513 (German). VD16 ZV 596*

Erndorffer, Lukas

Practica

[Nuremberg: n.p.], for 1548 (German). VD16 E 3796

Esdra (pseudonym)

Practica

Strasbourg: Jakob Cammerlander, for 1544 (German). VD16 E 3966*

Extract of Various Prophecies. Ein Auszug etlicher Prophezeiungen (from Lichtenberger and Grünpeck). (see also Christian Egenolff compilations, Johann Carion, Auffahrt Abend)

Augsburg: [Hans Froschauer], 1516 (German). VD16 A 4435

[Augsburg: Erhard Oeglin, 1516] (German). VD16 A 4441

Erfurt: Matthes Maler, 1516 (German). VD16 A 4436*

Leipzig: Martin Landsberg, 1516 (German). VD16 ZV 936

[Nuremberg: Adam Dyon, 1516] (German). VD16 A 4440*

[Nuremberg: Jobst Gutknecht, 1516] (German). VD16 ZV 21328

Cologne: [Arnd von Aich, 1517] (German). VD16 A 4447

[Nuremberg: Jobst Gutknecht, 1517] (German). VD16 A 4438*

[Nuremberg: Jobst Gutknecht, 1517] (German). VD16 ZV 934

[Strasbourg: Reinhard Beck the Elder, 1518] (German). VD16 A 4439*

[Würzburg: Johann Lobmeyer, 1523] (German). VD16 P 4545*

Speyer: Jakob Schmidt, [1524] (German). VD16 P 4546

Speyer: [Jakob Schmidt, 1524] (German). VD16 P 4547

Nuremberg: Hans Hergot, 1525 (German). VD16 A 4443*

[Leipzig: Nickel Schmidt], 1526 (German). VD16 A 4444*

[Augsburg: Heinrich Steiner, 1527] (German). VD16 A 4442

[Bamberg: Georg Erlinger, 1527] (German). VD16 ZV 935

[Leipzig: Nickel Schmidt], 1527 (German). VD16 A 4432

[Leipzig: Nickel Schmidt, 1529] (German). VD16 A 4446

[Nuremberg: Georg Wachter, 1540] (German). VD16 A 4433

[Nuremberg: Georg Wachter, 1540] (German). VD16 A 4434

Eyssenmann, Simon

Practicas

[Augsburg: Johann Schönsperger the Younger], for 1514 (German). VD16 E 4757*

Lübeck: Georg Richolff the Elder, for 1514 (German). VD16 E 4758

[n.p.: n.p.], for 1514 (Latin). VD16 E 4756*

[Landshut: Johann Weißenburger], for 1516 (German). VD16 E 4760

[Nuremberg: Jobst Gutknecht], for 1516 (German). VD16 E 4761

[n.p.: n.p.], for 1516 (Latin). VD16 E 4759*

Leipzig: Wolfgang Stöckel, for 1517 (German). VD16 E 4762*

[Leipzig: Jakob Thanner], for 1518 (Latin). VD16 ZV 5648

[n.p.: n.p.], for 1518 (German). VD16 E 4763

Leipzig: Wolfgang Stöckel, for 1519 (German). VD16 E 4764*

[Augsburg: Erhard Oeglin], for 1520 (German). VD16 E 4765*

[Nuremberg: Jobst Gutknecht], for 1520 (German). VD16 E 4766

Faber, Wenzel, von Budweis

Practicas

[Leipzig: Marcus Brandis], for 1482 (German). ISTC if00005050*

[Leipzig: Marcus Brandis], for 1483 (Latin). ISTC if00005100

[Leipzig: Marcus Brandis], for 1483 (German). ISTC if00005110

[Leipzig: Marcus Brandis], for 1484 (Latin). ISTC if00005120

[Leipzig: Marcus Brandis], for 1484 (Latin). ISTC if00005140

[Leipzig: Marcus Brandis], for 1484 (German). ISTC if00005160

[Leipzig: Marcus Brandis], for 1485 (Latin). ISTC if00005180

[Nuremberg]: Friedrich Creussner, for 1485 (German). ISTC if00005200*

[Leipzig: Printer of Capotius (Martin Landsberg or Andreas Frisner)], for 1486 (Latin). ISTC if00005220

[Mainz: Peter Schoeffer], for 1486 (German). ISTC if00005240

[Nuremberg: Peter Wagner], for 1486 (German). ISTC if00005260

[Augsburg: Anton Sorg], for 1487 (German). ISTC if00005340

[Leipzig: Moritz Brandis], for 1487 (Latin). ISTC if00005280

[Leipzig: Printer of Capotius (Martin Landsberg or Andreas Frisner)], for 1487 (Latin). ISTC if00005300

[Leipzig: Printer of Capotius (Martin Landsberg or Andreas Frisner)], for 1487 (German). ISTC if00005410

[Nuremberg: Friedrich Creussner], for 1487 (Latin). ISTC if00005320*

[Nuremberg: Friedrich Creussner], for 1487 (German). ISTC if00005350*

[Passau: Johann Petri], for 1487 (German). ISTC if00005360*

[Leipzig: Printer of Capotius (Martin Landsberg or Andreas Frisner)], for 1488 (Latin). ISTC if00005380*

[Leipzig: Printer of Capotius (Martin Landsberg or Andreas Frisner)], for 1489 (Latin). ISTC if00005400*

[Leipzig: Martin Landsberg], for 1490 (Latin). ISTC if00005420

[Nuremberg: Friedrich Creussner], for 1490 (Latin). ISTC if00005440*

[Nuremberg: Friedrich Creussner], for 1490 (German). ISTC if00005460

[Leipzig: Martin Landsberg], for 1491 (Latin). GW 09597

[Magdeburg: Simon Koch (Mentzer)], for 1491 (German). ISTC if00005480

[Leipzig: Gregorius Böttiger (Werman)], for 1492 (German). ISTC if00006000

[Leipzig: Martin Landsberg], for 1492 (Latin). ISTC if00005500*

[Leipzig: Martin Landsberg], for 1492 (Latin). ISTC if00005520

[Leipzig: Martin Landsberg], for 1492 (German). ISTC if00006200*

[n.p.: n.p.], for 1492 (Latin). GW 09600

[Leipzig: Martin Landsberg], for 1493 (Latin). ISTC if00006250

[Leipzig: Martin Landsberg], for 1493 (Latin). ISTC if00006300

[Leipzig: Martin Landsberg], for 1493 (German). ISTC if00006400*

[Leipzig: Marcus Brandis], for 1494 (Latin). ISTC if00002650

[Leipzig: Martin Landsberg], for 1494 (Latin). ISTC if00007000*

[Leipzig: Martin Landsberg], for 1494 (German). ISTC if00008000*

Nuremberg: Peter Wagner, for 1494 (German). ISTC if00008100

[Leipzig: Martin Landsberg], for 1495 (Latin). ISTC if00008200*

[Nuremberg: Friedrich Creussner], for 1495 (German). ISTC if00008300

[Nuremberg: Anton Koberger], for 1495 (German). ISTC if00008500

[Leipzig: Martin Landsberg], for 1496 (Latin). ISTC if00008520

[Leipzig: Martin Landsberg], for 1496 (Latin). ISTC if00008540*

[Leipzig: Martin Landsberg], for 1496 (German). ISTC if00008560

[Nuremberg: Friedrich Creussner], for 1496 (German). ISTC if00008580

[Nuremberg: Peter Wagner], for 1496 (German). ISTC if00008600

[Leipzig: Martin Landsberg], for 1497 (Latin). ISTC if00008620*

[Leipzig: Martin Landsberg], for 1497 (German). ISTC if00008640*

[Magdeburg: Moritz Brandis], for 1497 (German). ISTC if00008660

[Erfurt: Heidericus and Marx Ayrer], for 1498 (German). ISTC if00008720

[Leipzig: Martin Landsberg], for 1498 (Latin). ISTC if00008680

[Leipzig: Martin Landsberg], for 1498 (Latin). ISTC if00008700*

[Leipzig: Martin Landsberg], for 1498 (German). ISTC if00008740

[Nuremberg: Peter Wagner], for 1498 (German). ISTC if00008760

[Leipzig?: Conrad Kachelofen?], for 1499 (German). ISTC if00008800

[Leipzig: Martin Landsberg], for 1499 (Latin). ISTC if00008780

[Leipzig: Martin Landsberg], for 1500 (Latin). ISTC if00008820

[Leipzig: Martin Landsberg], for 1501 (Latin). ISTC if00008840

[Leipzig: Martin Landsberg], for 1506 (German). VD16 F 127*

Fabri, Sigismund, von Prustat

Almanac

[Ingolstadt: Johann Kachelofen], for 1493. ISTC if00026100*

Practicas

[Nuremberg: Peter Wagner], for 1493 (German). ISTC if00026200

[Prague: Printer of Koranda (Beneda?)], for 1493 (Czech). ISTC if00026300

Reutlingen: Johann Otmar, for 1493 (German). ISTC if00026250

[Nuremberg: Peter Wagner], for 1496 (German). ISTC if00026400

[Ulm: Johann Schäffler], for 1496 (German). ISTC if00026500*

[Ulm: Conrad Dinckmut], for 1496 (German). ISTC if00026600*

Falkener, Michael, Vratislaviensis

Practicas

[Leipzig: Arnoldus de Colonia], for 1494 (Latin). ISTC im00564240*

[n.p.: n.p.], for 1494 (Latin). GW M23313

[Leipzig]: Gregorius Böttiger (Werman), for 1495 (German). ISTC im00564100

[Leipzig: Arnoldus de Colonia], for 1495 (Latin). ISTC im00564260

[Leipzig: Arnoldus de Colonia], for 1495 (German). GW M23318

Ferrer, pseudo-Vincent

On the End of the World. De fine mundi.

[Treviso: Gerardus de Lisa, de Flandria] 1475 (Latin). ISTC if00120500

[Treviso: Hermannus Liechtenstein], 1477 (Latin). ISTC if00121000

[Germany?: Printer of Pseudo-Ferrerius], 1479 (Latin). ISTC if00121500

[Nuremberg]: Conrad Zeninger, [1481] (Latin). ISTC if00122000*

[Nuremberg: Fratres Ordinis Praedicatorum], 1483 (Latin). ISTC if00123000

[Speyer]: Johann and Conrad Hist, [1485] (Latin). ISTC if00123500

[Augsburg: Anton Sorg, 14]86 (German). ISTC if00125000* (with Tract against the Turks)

[Augsburg: Hans Froschauer, 1503] (Latin). VD16 V 1207*

[Augsburg: Hans Froschauer, 1503] (Latin). VD16 ZV 24705*

Leipzig: [Jakob Thanner], 1524 (German). VD16 V 1209

Cologne: Peter Quentel, 1529 (Latin). VD16 ZV 20103

[Munich: Andreas Schobser, 1540] (German). VD16 V 1210

[n.p.: n.p., 1550] (Latin). VD16 V 1208

[n.p.: n.p., 1550] (German). VD16 ZV 15545

Munich: Adam Berg, [1582] (German). VD16 V 1211*

Francisci, Michael, de Insulis

Determination of the Time of the Antichrist’s Advent. Determinatio de tempore adventus Antichristi.

[Cologne: Arnold Ther Hoernen, not before 1478] (Latin). ISTC if00294900*

[Cologne: Arnold Ther Hoernen, not before 1478] (Latin). ISTC if00295000*

Freund, Johannes

Practica

Nuremberg: Georg Wachter, for 1544 (German). VD16 F 2668*

Fries, Lorenz

A Comforting Proof That the Last Day Will Not Come for Many Years. Ein trostliche bewerung das der jüngst tag noch in vil jaren nitt kume.

[Strasbourg: Johann Grüninger?, 1523] (German). VD16 F 2885

The Jew’s Practica. Der Juden practica.

[Hagenau: Amandus Farckall], 1525 (German). VD16 F 2855

Judgment on the conjunction of 1524. Ein zů samen gelesen vrteyl auß den alten erfarnen meistern der Astrology über die großen zů samen kunfft Saturni vnd Jouis in dem M.D.xxiiij.iar. . . .

[Strasbourg: Johann Grüninger, 1523] (German). VD16 F 2888

Practicas

[Hagenau: Amandus Farckall], for 1525 (German). VD16 F 2866

[Strasbourg: Johann Grüninger], for 1526 (German). VD16 F 2867

Cologne: Hero Fuchs, for 1529 (Latin). VD16 F 2865

[Cologne]: Servas Kruffter, for 1529 (Latin). VD16 F 2864

Strasbourg: Johann Knobloch the Younger, for 1530 (German). VD16 F 2868

[Strasbourg: Johann Grüninger], for 1531 (German). VD16 F 2869

Strasbourg: Johann Knobloch the Younger, for 1531 (German). VD16 F 2870

A Short Defense of Astrology. Ein kurtze schirmred der kunst Astrologie.

Strasbourg: Johann Grüninger, 1520 (German). VD16 F 2861*

Strasbourg: Johann Grüninger, 1520 (German). VD16 ZV 21779

Friess, Wilhelm

Several Unusual Prophecies. Etliche seltzame Propheceiung.

Nuremberg: Georg Kreydlein, [1558] (German). VD16 F 2841* (with prognostication for 1559–65 of Nicolaus Caesareus, VD16 C 84)

Nuremberg: Georg Kreydlein, [1558] (German). VD16 F 2843*

Nuremberg: Georg Kreydlein, [1558] (German). VD16 ZV 6208

Nuremberg: Georg Kreydlein, [1558] (German). VD16 ZV 6209

Nuremberg: Georg Kreydlein, [1558] (German). Not in BD16 (Erlangen UB Trew S 99)*

[n.p.: n.p., 1558] (German). VD16 F 2842

[n.p.: n.p., 1558] (German). VD16 ZV 6206

[n.p.: n.p., 1558] (German). VD16 ZV 6207*

[n.p.: n.p.], 1558 (German). VD16 ZV 17899

[n.p.: n.p.], 1558 (German). VD16 ZV 21922

[n.p.: n.p.], 1558 (German). VD16 ZV 21923

[n.p.: n.p.], 1558 (German). Not in VD16 (Görres-Gymnasium, Düsseldorf)

[n.p.: n.p., 1559] (German). VD16 ZV 26091*

[Lübeck: Johann Balhorn the Elder, 1560] (German). VD16 F 2844*

Strasbourg: Christian Müller the Elder, [1562] (German). VD16 F 2846* (actually an extract from the prognostication of Nicolaus Caesareus, together with the practica of Theodor Simitz, VD16 S 6494)

[Lübeck: Johann Balhorn the Elder], 1568 (German). VD16 F 2845*

Terrible and Shocking Prophecy. Grausame und erschreckliche Prophezeiung.

Basel: Samuel Apiarius, 1577 (German). VD16 F 2835*

Basel: Samuel Apiarius, 1577 (German). VD16 F 2836

[n.p.: n.p.], 1577 (German). VD16 ZV 6210

[n.p.: n.p.], 1577 (German). VD16 ZV 17636

[n.p.: n.p.], 1577 (German). VD16 ZV 21921

Basel: Samuel Apiarius, 1578 (German). VD16 ZV 6211

Basel: Samuel Apiarius, 1578 (German). VD16 ZV 6212*

Basel: Samuel Apiarius, 1579 (German). VD16 F 2837

[n.p.: n.p.], 1579 (German). VD16 ZV 25029*

[n.p.: n.p., 1580] (German). VD16 F 2838*

Basel: Samuel Apiarius, 1583 (German). VD16 ZV 21920

Basel: Samuel Apiarius, 1586 (German). VD16 F 2839*

Basel: Samuel Apiarius, 1586 (German). VD16 ZV 18206

Erfurt: Johann Beck, 1586 (German). VD16 ZV 16200*

Basel: Samuel Apiarius, 1587 (German). VD16 F 2840*

Basel: Samuel Apiarius, 1587 (German). VD16 N 807

Basel: Samuel Apiarius, [1587] (German). VD16 ZV 6205

Cologne: Nikolaus Schreiber, [1587] (German). Not in VD16 (Vienna, Austrian National Library 35.Q.124 Alt Prunk)

[n.p.: n.p.], 1587 (German). VD16 N 806

Amsterdam: Cornelius Claesz, [1588] (Dutch). Den Haag, Koninklijke Bibliotheek pflt 856

[n.p.: n.p.], 1639 (German). VD17 39:140281T*

Gallianus, Konrad

Prognostication for 1522–24

Strasbourg: Johann Schott, 1521 (Latin). VD16 G 223*

Strasbourg: Johann Schott, [1521] (German). VD16 G 224*

Prognostication for 1524

[Basel: Pamphilus Gengenbach, 1523] (German). VD16 ZV 23332*

Gamaleon

[Strasbourg: Johann Prüß the Younger], 1538 (German). VD16 O 508*

Gasser, Achilles

Comet tracts

[Zurich: Christoph Froschauer the Elder, 1532] (German). VD16 G 489*

[Strasbourg: Jakob Frölich, 1533] (German). VD16 G 496

[n.p.: n.p., 1534] (German). VD16 G 497

[Augsburg: Silvan Otmar, 1538] (German). VD16 G 506

Eclipse tract

Nuremberg: Johann Petreius, [1544] (German). VD16 G 492

Practicas

Nuremberg: Johann Petreius, for 1544 (Latin). VD16 G 500*

Nuremberg: Johann Petreius, for 1544 (German). VD16 G 501*

Nuremberg: Johann Petreius, for 1545 (German). VD16 G 498

Nuremberg: Johann Petreius, for 1545 (Latin). VD16 ZV 18209

Nuremberg: Johann Petreius, for 1546 (Latin). VD16 G 502*

Nuremberg: Johann Petreius, for 1546 (German). Not in VD16 (Galileo, Galileana, 8)

Zurich: Eustachius Froschauer, for 1547 (German). VD16 G 499

Gaurico, Luca

Prognostication for 1524

[Augsburg: Silvan Otmar, 1522] (Latin). VD16 G 556*

Basel: Pamphilus Gengenbach, 1522 (Latin). VD16 G 557

Gengenbach, Pamphilus

Contrapractica

[Basel: Pamphilus Gengenbach, 1523] (German). VD16 G 1174*

Der Nollhart

[Basel: Pamphilus Gengenbach, 1517] (German). VD16 G 1205*

[Basel: Pamphilus Gengenbach, 1517] (German). VD16 ZV 6498

[Augsburg: Johann Schönsperger the Younger, 1520] (German). VD16 G 1206*

[Augsburg: Johann Schönsperger the Younger], 1522 (German). VD16 G 1207*

[Erfurt: Johann Loersfeld], 1525 (German). VD16 G 1208

The Old and New Brother Nollhart. Der alt und neu Bruder Nolhard.

[Strasbourg: Jakob Cammerlander], 1544 (German). VD16 G 1209

[Strasbourg: Jakob Cammerlander, 1545] (German). VD16 G 1210*

Parody practicas

[Strasbourg: Martin Flach, 1515] (German). VD16 G 1213*

[Munich: Hans Schobser, 1515] (German). VD16 G 1214*

Viennese prodigies broadside

Basel: Pamphilus Gengenbach, 1520 (German). Not in VD16 (Talkenberger, Sintflut, 173–77)

Gereon, Johannes (Veit Bild, pseudonym)

Practicas

[Munich: Hans Schobser], for 1524 (German). VD16 G 1480*

[n.p.: n.p.], for 1524 (German). VD16 G 1481

Geroch, Vitus

Practicas

[Reutlingen: Johann Otmar], for 1482 (Latin). ISTC ig00182800

[Reutlingen: Johann Otmar], for 1483 (Latin). ISTC ig00182900*

[Eichstätt: Michael Reyser], for 1484 (German). ISTC ig00183100*

[Rome]: Eucharius Silber, for 1488 (Latin). ISTC ig00183000*

[Reutlingen: Johann Otmar], for 1492 (Latin). ISTC ig00183200

Glogoviensis (“aus Glogau”), Johannes (Schelling)

Practicas

[Merseburg: Printer of Isidorus, “Soliloquia” (Marcus Brandis)], for 1479 (Latin). ISTC ij00334650*

[Merseburg: Printer of Isidorus, “Soliloquia” (Marcus Brandis)], for 1480 (Latin). ISTC ij00334660*

[Leipzig: Marcus Brandis], for 1481 (Latin). ISTC ij00334670*

[Leipzig: Marcus Brandis], for 1481 (German). ISTC ij00334680

[Vienna: Johann Winterburg], for 1498 (Latin). ISTC ij00334580

[Vienna: Johann Winterburg], for 1498 (German). ISTC ij00334585

[Venice: Johannes and Gregorius de Gregoriis, de Forlivio], for 1499 (Latin). ISTC ij00334600

[Leipzig: Martin Landsberg], for 1500 (German). ISTC ij00334550

[Leipzig: Martin Landsberg], for 1500 (Latin). ISTC ij00334555

[Leipzig: Martin Landsberg], for 1501 (German). ISTC ij00334560

[Lübeck: Steffen Arndes or Georg Richolff the Elder], for 1501 (German). ISTC ij00334530

[Lübeck: Lucas Brandis?], for 1501 (German). ISTC ij00334520

[Leipzig: Martin Landsberg], for 1503 (Latin). VD16 J 594*

Lübeck: Georg Richolff the Elder, for 1503 (German). VD16 J 595

Glotz, Christophorus de

Practicas

[Nuremberg: Peter Wagner], for 1491 (Latin). ISTC ic00473900*

[Nuremberg: Peter Wagner], for 1491 (German). ISTC ic00474000

[Bamberg: Johann Pfeyl], for 1496 (German). ISTC ic00474150

[Nuremberg: Friedrich Creussner], for 1496 (German). ISTC ic00474100*

[Nuremberg: Peter Wagner], for 1496 (German). ISTC ic00474050

[Speyer: Conrad Hist?], for 1496 (German). ISTC ic00474200

Goetz, Johannes

Practica

[Augsburg: Anton Sorg], for 1486 (German). ISTC ig00319000

Gorlicz, Wenzel

Practica

[Bamberg: Heinrich Petzensteiner and Johann Pfeyl], for 1494 (German). ISTC ig00321800

Gracius, Ortwin

Practicas

[Cologne: Martin von Werden], for 1517 (Latin). VD16 G 1108*

[Cologne: n.p.], for 1517 (Latin). VD16 ZV 6486

Grill, Bentz (pseudonym)

Parody practicas

[n.p.: n.p., 1501] (German). VD16 P 4551

[Nuremberg: Ambrosius Huber, 1501] (German). VD16 P 4552

[n.p.: n.p.], 1526 (German). Not in VD16 (Erlangen UB Thl V 90 #18)*

[n.p.: n.p., 15]40 (German). VD16 ZV 24562

[n.p.: n.p., 1550] (German). VD16 L 609

Grünpeck, Joseph (see also Johannes Lichtenberger, Christian Egenolff compilations, Extract of Various Prophecies)

Prognosticon

Vienna: Johann Winterburg, 1496 (Latin). ISTC ig00514000

[Vienna: Johann Winterburg, 1496] (German). ISTC ig00514100

A New Interpretation of the Unusual Signs. Ein newe außlegung der seltzamen wunderzaichen.

[Augsburg: Erhard Oeglin, 1507] (German). VD16 G 3631*

[Nuremberg: Friderich Peypus, 1515] (German). VD16 G 3632*

Speculum naturalis caelestis et propheticae visionis omnium calamitatum

Nuremberg: Georg Stuchs, 1508 (Latin). VD16 G 3641*

Nuremberg: Georg Stuchs, 1508 (German). VD16 G 3642*

Augsburg: Johann Schönsperger the Younger, [1510] (German). VD16 G 3643*

Augsburg: Johann Schönsperger the Younger, 1522 (German). VD16 G 3644*

Leipzig: Wolfgang Stöckel, 1522 (German). VD16 G 3645*

Strasbourg: Jakob Cammerlander (German), [1540]. VD16 G 3633*

To the Most Serene Princes. Ad reverendissimos principles.

[Landshut: Johann Weißenburger], 1515 (Latin). VD16 G 3626*

Dialogue of the Turkish Emperor’s Astronomer and the Egyptian Sultan’s Adviser

Landshut: Johann Weißenburger, 1522 (German). VD16 G 3627*

Landshut: Johann Weißenburger, [1522] (Latin). VD16 G 3628

Judgment on the Conjunction of the Planets in Pisces. Entlicher beschluss uber die kunfftigen zůsamenfügung der planeten jm Fisch.

[n.p.: n.p., 1523] (German). VD16 G 3629*

Warning concerning the year 1524. Warnunge auf das xxiiii. Jar.

[Regensburg: Hans Kohl, 1523] (German). VD16 G 3646

Prognosticum

[Augsburg: Heinrich Steiner], 1532 (German). VD16 G 3637*

Cologne: [Johann von Aich], 1532 (German). VD16 G 3635

[Leipzig: Valentin Schumann, 1532] (German). VD16 ZV 7115

[Nuremberg: Kunigunde Hergot or Georg Wachter, 1532] (German). VD16 G 3638

Nuremberg: Kunigunde Hergot, [1532] (German). VD16 G 3639*

Regensburg: Hans Kohl, 1532 (Latin). VD16 G 3636*

Regensburg: Hans Kohl, 1532 (Latin). VD16 ZV 23147

[Wittenberg: Georg Rhau, 1532] (German). VD16 G 3640*

[n.p.: n.p., 1532] (Latin). VD16 G 3634

Hack, Mads

Eclipse tract

Nuremberg: Johann Petreius, for 1538 (Latin). VD16 H 92

Practicas

Augsburg: Heinrich Steiner, for 1547 (German). VD16 H 93*

[Cologne: Martin Gymnich], for 1548 (Latin). VD16 ZV 7210

Heller, Joachim

Practicas

Nuremberg: Johann VomBerg and Ulrich Neuber, for 1548 (German). VD16 ZV 18213

Nuremberg: Johann VomBerg and Ulrich Neuber, for 1549 (German). VD16 H 1690*

Nuremberg: Johann VomBerg and Ulrich Neuber, for 1551 (German). VD16 ZV 18214

Nuremberg: Joachim Heller, for 1555 (German). Not in VD16 (Würzburg UB H.p.q. 429)*

[n.p.: n.p.], for 1556 (German). Not in VD16 (Würzburg UB H.p.q. 429)*

[intervening years omitted]

Leipzig: Nikolaus Nerlich, for 1580 (German). VD16 H 1703

Hermanni, Johannes

Practica

[Ulm: Hans Zainer], for 1515 (German). VD16 ZV 7783

Heuring, Simon

Practicas

[n.p.: n.p.], for 1548 (German). VD16 H 3288

[Augsburg: Narziß Ramminger], for 1548 (German). VD16 H 3290

Augsburg: Hans Zimmermann, for 1549 (German). VD16 H 3292*

Nuremberg: Christoph Gutknecht, for 1549 (German). VD16 H 3291

Nuremberg: Hans Daubman, for 1550 (German). Not in VD16 (Würzburg UB H.p.q. 429)*

Augsburg: Valentin Otmar, for 1551 (German). VD16 H 3293

[intervening years omitted]

Nuremberg: Friedrich Gutknecht, for 1576 (German). VD16 H 3301*

Augsburg: Michael Manger, for 1577 (German). Not in VD16 (Erlangen UB Trew S 113)*

Augsburg: Michael Manger, for 1578 (German). Not in VD16 (Erlangen UB Trew S 119)*

Augsburg: Michael Manger, for 1579 (German). VD16 H 3302

Augsburg: Michael Manger, for 1582 (German). VD16 H 3303

Hildegard of Bingen

De praesenti clericorum tribulation

Hagenau: Wilhelm Seltz, 1529 (Latin). VD16 H 3628*

Ein Prophecey S. Hildegardis von dem Bettelorden

[Cologne: Johann von Aich, 1532] (German). VD16 I 359

Prophecy about the Papists (ed. Andreas Osiander)

[Nuremberg: Hieronymus Andreae], 1527 (German). VD16 H 3631

[Wittenberg: Georg Rhau, 1527] (German). VD16 H 3632*

[Zwickau: Gabriel Kantz, 1527] (German). VD16 H 3633*

Prophetia S. Hildegards

[Magdeburg: Michael Lotter, 1550] (Latin). VD16 P 5061

Hildegard of Bingen and Joachim of Fiore

Two Famous Revelations. Zwei namhafte Offenbarungen.

[Munich: Hans Schobser, 1518] (German). VD16 N 63*

Hochstetter, Christoph

Practicas

[Landshut: Johann Weißenburger], for 1519 (German). VD16 ZV 24179*

[Nuremberg: Friderich Peypus], for 1522 (German). VD16 H 4000

[Augsburg: Melchior Ramminger], for 1523 (German). VD16 H 4001*

[n.p.: n.p.], for 1523 (German). Not in VD16 (Nuremberg GNM Postinc 8o Nw 2860 [1523])*

[Augsburg: Philipp Ulhart the Elder], for 1528 (German). VD16 H 4002

[Augsburg: Philipp Ulhart the Elder], for 1528 (German). VD16 ZV 23333*

[n.p.: n.p.], for 1528 (German). Not in VD16 (Augsburg StSB 4o LR 249)*

[Bamberg: Georg Erlinger], for 1529 (German). VD16 H 4003*

Hösch, Eustachius

Practica

[n.p.: n.p.], for 1523 (German). VD16 H 4094

Hugo de Novo Castro

De victoria Christi contra Antichristum. (With Nicolaus de Cusa, De ultimis diebus mundi)

[Nuremberg: Johann Sensenschmidt], 1471 (Latin). ISTC ih00502000*

Jeremias von Paris

Practica

[Augsburg: Melchior Ramminger, 1530] (German). VD16 J 231

Joachim of Fiore

Abbas Ioachim magnus propheta.

Venice: Lazzaro Soardi, 1516. Censimento nazionale delle cinquecentine presenti, Nr. 31998.

Köbel, Jacob

Practicas

[Nuremberg: Friderich Peypus], for 1522 (German). VD16 K 1668

Oppenheim: [Jakob Köbel], for 1523 (German). VD16 ZV 20964

Kobylina, Andrzej

Practica

[n.p.: n.p.], for 1542 (German). VD16 K 1498

Krautwadel, Michael

Comet tract

[Augsburg: Heinrich Steiner], 1531 (German). VD16 K 2311*

Practicas

[n.p.: n.p.], for 1528 (German). VD16 ZV 23334*

[n.p.: n.p.], for 1529 (German). Not in VD16 (Augsburg StSB 4o LR 249)*

[n.p.: n.p.], for 1530 (German). Not in VD16 (Augsburg StSB 4o Math 516)*

[Augsburg: Heinrich Steiner], for 1531 (German). VD16 K 2312*

[n.p.: n.p.], for 1536 (German). Not in VD16 (Nuremberg GNM Postinc 8o Nw 2872 [1536])*

Künast, Jörg

Practica

[Augsburg: Hans Schobser], for 1489 (German). ISTC ik00040850*

Laet, Jasper

Practicas

[Lübeck: Stephan Arndes], for 1494 (Dutch). ISTC il00022010

[Cologne: Arnd von Aich], for 1517 (German). VD16 L 88

Laet, Johannes

Practicas

Cologne: Johann Guldenschaff, for 1479 (Latin). ISTC il00022140

[Speyer: Johann and Conrad Hist], for 1484 (Latin). GW M1665730

[Cologne: Heinrich Quentell], for 1485 (Latin). ISTC il00022190

[Mainz: Peter Schoeffer], for 1487 (Latin). ISTC il00022500

Lazius, Wolfgang

Fragmentum vaticinii.

Vienna: Johann Singriener the Elder heirs, 1547 (Latin). VD16 ZV 9507*

Leimbach, Georg

Practicas

[Leipzig: Wolfgang Stöckel], for 1498 (Latin). ISTC il00126190*

[Leipzig: Jacobus Thanner], for 1499 (Latin). ISTC il00126194

[Leipzig: Jacobus Thanner], for 1499 (German). ISTC il00126197

[Leipzig: Melchior Lotter], for 1500 (Latin). ISTC il00126200

[Leipzig: Melchior Lotter], for 1500 (German). ISTC il00126250

[n.p.: n.p.], for 1502 (Latin). VD16 L 1007

[Leipzig: Martin Landsberg], for 1506 (German). VD16 L 1009

[n.p.: n.p.], for 1508 (Latin). VD16 L 1008*

Lentulus, Publius

Epistola Lentuli (including “Esdra” weather prognostic rules)

Nuremberg: Johann Weißenburger, 1512. VD16 L 1186*

Lichtenberger, Johannes (see also Extract of Various Prophecies)

Conjunction of Saturn and Mars. Conjunctio Saturni et Martis 1473.

[Lübeck: Lucas Brandis, 1475] (Latin). ISTC il00203000*

Prognosticatio (see also Christian Egenolff compilations)

[Heidelberg: Heinrich Knoblochtzer, 1488] (Latin). ISTC il00204000*

[Heidelberg: Heinrich Knoblochtzer, 1490] (German). ISTC il00210000*

Mainz: [Jacob Meydenbach], 1492 (Latin). ISTC il00205000

Mainz: [Jacob Meydenbach], 1492 (German). ISTC il00205500*

[Strasbourg: Bartholomaeus Kistler], 1497 (German). ISTC il00209000*

[Munich: Hans Schobser, 1500] (German). ISTC ip00950200

Strasbourg: [Bartholomaeus Kistler, 1500] (Latin). ISTC il00206000*

Strasbourg: [Bartholomaeus Kistler, 1500] (Latin). ISTC il00210500*

Strasbourg: [Bartholomaeus Kistler], 1500 (German). ISTC ip00950000*

Strasbourg: Matthias Hupfuff, 1501 (German). VD16 D 1454*

Strasbourg: Bartholomaeus Kistler, 1501 (German). VD16 D 1455*

Leipzig: Wolfgang Stöckel, 1521 (German). VD16 W 4641*

[Augsburg: Heinrich Steiner, 1525] (German). VD16 D 1456*

[Augsburg: Heinrich Steiner], 1526 (German). VD16 L 1594*

Cologne: Peter Quentel, 1526 (Latin). VD16 L 1591*

[Cologne: Peter Quentel], 1526 (Latin). VD16 L 1592*

[Worms: Peter Schöffer the Younger], 1526 (German). VD16 L 1595*

Erfurt: Melchior Sachse the Elder, 1527 (German). VD16 L 1596

Wittenberg: Hans Lufft, 1527 (German). VD16 L 1597*

[Augsburg: Heinrich Steiner], 1528 (German). VD16 L 1598

Cologne: Peter Quentel, 1528 (Latin). VD16 L 1593

Cologne: Peter Quentel, 1528 (German). VD16 L 1599*

Cologne: Peter Quentel, 1528 (German). VD16 L 1609

Worms: [Peter Schöffer the Younger], 1528 (German). VD16 L 1600

[Augsburg: Heinrich Steiner], 1530 (German). VD16 L 1601

[Augsburg: Heinrich Steiner], 1534 (German). VD16 ZV 17889

[Strasbourg: Balthasar Beck], 1534 (German). VD16 L 1602

Strasbourg: [Jakob Frölich, 1535] (German). VD16 L 1603

Frankfurt: Hermann Gülfferich, 1550 (German). VD16 L 1604*

Frankfurt: Hermann Gülfferich, 1551 (German). VD16 L 1605

Frankfurt: Hermann Gülfferich heirs, 1555 (German). VD16 ZV 9653

Frankfurt: Weigand Han, 1557 (German). VD16 L 1606*

Cologne: Jakob Alard, 1585 (German). VD16 L 1607

[n.p.: n.p.], 1587 (German). VD16 L 1608*

Great Practica. Große Practica. (Prognosticatio and Virdung’s prognostication for 1524–63)

[n.p.: n.p.], 1543. VD16 L 1611

Strasbourg: Jakob Cammerlander, [1544] (German). VD16 L 1612*

[n.p.: n.p.], 1544. VD16 ZV 4218

Strasbourg: Jakob Cammerlander, [1545] (German). VD16 L 1613

Strasbourg: Jakob Cammerlander, 1545 (German). VD16 ZV 9652

Affliction of the Entire World. Trübsal Der gantzen Welt.

[n.p.: n.p.], 1620 (German). VD17 39:124868B

[n.p.: n.p.], 1621 (German). VD17 32:630061B

[n.p.: n.p.], 1633 (German). VD17 3:651569A*

[n.p.: n.p.], 1633 (German). VD17 23:250801D*

[n.p.: n.p.], 1633 (German). VD17 39:148885R

[n.p.: n.p.], 1664 (German). VD17 23:683359B

Lübeck, Johannes von

Prognostication of the Advent of the Antichrist and the Messiah of the Jews. Prognosticon super Antichristi adventu Judaeorumque Messiae.

[Padua]: Bartholomaeus de Valdezoccho, [1474] (Latin). ISTC ij00376000*

Lutz, Bernhard

Practicas

Augsburg: [Johann Otmar], for 1512 (German). VD16 L 7648

[Augsburg: Hans Froschauer], for 1513 (German). VD16 L 7649*

Mangolt, Bartholomaeus

Practicas

[Cologne: Servas Kruffter], for 1530 (German). VD16 M 571

[n.p.: n.p.], for 1530 (German). Not in VD16 (Augsburg StSB 4o Math 516)*

[n.p.: n.p.], for 1530 (German). Not in VD16 (Nuremberg GNM Postinc 8o Nw 2877 [1530])*

[Nuremberg: Kunigunde Hergot or Georg Wachter], for 1531 (German). VD16 M 572*

[n.p.: n.p.], for 1531 (German). Not in VD16 (Augsburg StSB 4o Math 516)*

[n.p.: n.p.], for 1531 (German). Not in VD16 (Nuremberg GNM Postinc 8o Nw 2877 [1531])*

[Augsburg: Heinrich Steiner], for 1532 (German). VD16 ZV 10337

Basel: Thomas Wolff, for 1532 (German). VD16 M 573

Nuremberg: Kunigunde Hergot, for 1532 (German). VD16 ZV 10338*

[Cologne: Servas Kruffter], for 1533 (German). VD16 M 575

[n.p.: n.p.], for 1533 (German). VD16 M 574

Melhoffer, Philipp

Practica

Augsburg: Philipp Ulhart the Elder, for 1536 (German). VD16 M4451*

Methodius, pseudo-

Revelations

[Cologne: Ulrich Zel, 1477] (Latin). ISTC ib00970000*

[Augsburg]: Hans Froschauer, 1496 (Latin). ISTC im00522000*

Memmingen: [Albrecht Kunne], 1497 (German). ISTC im00526000*

Basel: Michael Furter, 1498 (Latin). ISTC im00524000*

Paris: Guy Marchant for Denis Roce, 1498 (Latin). GW M23069

[Memmingen: Albrecht Kunne, 1499] (Latin). ISTC im00523000*

Basel: Michael Furter, 1500 (Latin). ISTC im00525000*

Basel: Michael Furter, 1504 (Latin). VD16 M 4934*

Basel: Michael Furter, [1504] (German). VD16 M 4936* (ISTC im00526200)

Basel: Michael Furter, 1515 (Latin). VD16 M 4935*

Basel: Michael Furter, 1516 (Latin). VD16 ZV 10902*

Middelburg, Paul of

Practicas

[Bologna: Ugo Rugerius], for 1479 (Latin). ISTC ip00184650

[Rome: Georgius Lauer], for 1480 (Latin). ISTC ip00184750

[Venice: Adam de Rottweil], for 1480 (Latin). ISTC ip00184700

[Venice: Johannes Persan Dauvome], for 1481 (Latin). ISTC ip00184800*

[Perugia: Johannes Vydenast?], for 1482 (Latin). ISTC ip00185100

[Venice: Erhard Ratdolt], for 1482 (Latin). ISTC ip00185000*

[Perugia: Johannes Vydenast], for 1483 (Latin). ISTC ip00185200

[Antwerp: Mathias van der Goes], for 1485 (Latin). ISTC ip00185300

[Louvain: Aegidius van der Heerstraten], for 1486 (Latin). ISTC ip00185450

[Venice: Johannes and Gregorius de Gregoriis], for 1486 (Latin). ISTC ip00185400*

[Louvain: Johann Veldener, 1486?] (Dutch). ISTC ip00185700

Prognostication for Twenty Years

Antwerp: Gerard Leeu, 1484 (Latin). ISTC ip00185950

Antwerp: Gerard Leeu, 1484 (Latin). ISTC ip00186000

[Augsburg: Hermann Kästlin, 1484] (Latin). ISTC ip00187200*

Cologne: Johann Koelhoff the Elder, 1484 (Latin). ISTC ip00186500

Louvain: Johannes de Westfalia, 1484 (Latin). ISTC ip00187550*

[Bologna: Heinrich von Haarlem, 1486] (Latin). ISTC ip00187000

[Venice: Thomas de Blavis, de Alexandria, 1488] (Latin). ISTC ip00188100

Leipzig: [Martin Landsberg, 1492] (Latin). ISTC ip00188300

Invective Against a Certain Superstitious Astrologer and Fortune Teller (with the Prognostication for Twenty Years)

[Antwerp: Gerard Leeu, 1492] (Latin). ISTC ip00184600*

[Venice: Manfredus de Bonellis, 1492] (Latin). GW M30190

Tract on the flood panic

[Augsburg: Simprecht Ruff], 1524 (Latin). VD16 P 1063*

[Augsburg: Simprecht Ruff], 1524 (German). VD16 P 1064*

Mithoff, Burkhard

Practicas

[Wittenberg: Georg Rhau], for 1540 (German). VD16 M 5664

Erfurt: Wolfgang Stürmer, for 1543 (German). VD16 ZV 11036*

Erfurt: Wolfgang Stürmer, for 1544 (German). VD16 M 5665*

Erfurt: Wolfgang Stürmer, for 1545 (German). VD16 ZV 11037*

Erfurt: Gervasius Stürmer, for 1548 (German). VD16 M 5666

Mönch, Bernhard

Practicas

[Lübeck: Stephan Arndes], for 1514 (German). VD16 M 5843

Lübeck: Georg Richolff the Younger, for 1519 (German). VD16 M 5844

Leipzig: Wolfgang Stöckel, for 1526 (German). VD16 M 5845

Münster, Sebastian

Practica

Basel: Heinrich Petri, for 1533 (German). VD16 M 6727

Muntz, Johannes

Practicas

[Reutlingen: Johann Otmar], for 1492 (German). ISTC im00875350

Vienna: Johann Winterburg, for 1495 (German). ISTC im00875370

Vienna: Johann Winterburg, for 1502 (Latin). VD16 M 6795

Neuheuser, Wilhelm Eon

Universal Victory of True Christians. Victoria Christianorum verissimorum universalis.

Friedwegen: Samuel Ehehafft, 1618 (German). VD17 14:006751M*

Friedwegen: Samuel Ehehafft, 1618 (German). VD17 14:006754K

Friedwegen: Samuel Ehehafft, 1621 (German). VD17 23:254345A

Nifo, Agostino

On the False Prognostication for 1524

Augsburg: Sigmund Grimm and Marx Wirsung, 1520 (Latin). VD16 N 1716*

Ob ains an wirdigkait mag komen

Landshut: [Johann Weißenburger, 1520].VD16 L 2679*

Oberling, Hanns

Practicas

Augsburg: [Johann Otmar], for 1514 (German). VD16 O 53*

[Augsburg: Johann Schönsperger the Elder], for 1514 (German). VD16 O 54*

[Cologne: Heinrich von Neuß], for 1514 (Latin). VD16 ZV 11904

[Munich: Hans Schobser], for 1514 (German). VD16 O 55

Osiander, Andreas, and Hans Sachs

A Remarkable Prophecy about the Papacy. Ein wunderliche Weissagung von dem Papsttum. (see also Jakob Vielfeld)

[Nuremberg]: Hans Guldenmund, 1527 (German). VD16 W 4642*

[Wittenberg: Hans Weiß], 1527 (German). VD16 W 4643*

[Wittenberg: Hans Weiß], 1527 (German). VD16 W 4644*

[Zwickau: Gabriel Kantz], 1527 (German). VD16 W 4645*

Paltz, Johannes von

Settled Question against the Triple Error concerning the Revelation of the Antichrist. Quaestio determinata contra triplicem errorem de Antichristi revelatione.

[Erfurt: Printer of Bollanus, 1486] (Latin). ISTC ia00771000*

Memmingen: [Albrecht Kunne, 1486] (Latin). ISTC ia00772000

Paracelsus, Theophrastus

Practica auf Europen

Augsburg: Alexander Weißenhorn, 1529 (German). VD16 P 534*

Nuremberg: Friderich Peypus, 1529 (German). VD16 P 535

Nuremberg: Friderich Peypus, 1529 (German). VD16 ZV 12158*

Augsburg: Alexander Weißenhorn, 1530 (German). VD16 P 536

Augsburg: Alexander Weißenhorn, 1530 (German). VD16 P 537

Strasbourg: Christian Egenolff, 1530 (German). VD16 P 538

Vienna: Hieronymus Vietor, 1530 (German). VD16 P 540

[Zwickau: Wolfgang Meyerpeck the Elder], 1530 (German). VD16 P 539*

Practicas

[Nuremberg: Johann Stuchs], for 1530 (German). VD16 P 542

[n.p.: n.p.], for 1530 (German). VD16 P 541

[Augsburg: Heinrich Steiner], for 1535 (German). VD16 P 532*

[n.p.: n.p.], for 1537 (German). VD16 P 533

[Augsburg: Heinrich Steiner], for 1538 (German). VD16 ZV 25084

Comet interpretations

[Konstanz: Jörg Spitzenberg, 1531] (German). VD16 P 406

[Zurich: Christoph Froschauer the Elder], 1531 (German). VD16 P 411

[Konstanz: Jörg Spitzenberg], 1532 (German). VD16 P 412

Prognostic works

Auslegung des Fridbogens. [Konstanz: Jörg Spitzenberg, 1531 (German)]. VD16 P 410

Von den wunderbarlichen ubernatürlichen Zeichen (German). [Augsburg: Heinrich Steiner], 1534. VD16 P 636

Prognostication for Twenty-four Years. Prognostication auf xxiiii jar. (see also Christian Egenolff compilations)

Augsburg: Heinrich Steiner, 1536 (German). VD16 P 543*

Augsburg: Heinrich Steiner, 1536 (Latin). VD16 P 544*

Augsburg: Heinrich Steiner, 1536 (Latin). VD16 P 545*

Posthumous editions

Astronomica et astrologica. Cologne: Gerhard Virendunck, 1567. VD16 P 402*

Auslegung der Figuren so zu Nürenberg gefunden. [Basel: Peter Perna], 1569. VD16 P 407*

Auslegung der Figuren so zu Nürenberg gefunden. [Basel: Peter Perna], 1572. VD16 P 408

Expositio vera harum imaginum olim Nurenbergae repertarum. [n.p.: n.p.], 1570. VD16 P 409

Pastoris, Heinrich

Contrapracticas

[Augsburg: Johann Schönsperger the Younger, 1523] (German). VD16 P 900*

Erfurt: Michel Buchfürer, 1523 (German). VD16 P 901*

[Zwickau: Jörg Gastel, 1523] (German). VD16 P 902*

Perillus, James

Practicas

[Augsburg: Philipp Ulhart the Elder], for 1545 (German). VD16 P 1384

[Augsburg: Philipp Ulhart the Elder], for 1546 (German). VD16 P 1385*

Perlach, Andreas

Comet tract

[Nuremberg: Johann Stuchs, 1531] (German) VD16 P 1448*

Eclipse tract

[Vienna: Johann Singriener the Elder, 1531] (German). VD16 P 1447

Ephemerides

[Vienna: Hieronymus Vietor, 1530] (Latin). VD16 P 1446

Pflaum, pseudo-Jakob

Etliche Weissagungen

[Speyer: Johann Eckhart, 1522] (German). VD16 P 2398*

[Augsburg: Heinrich Steiner], 1527 (German). VD16 P 2399

[Nuremberg: Kunigunde Hergot or Georg Wachter], 1532 (German). VD16 P 2402

Nuremberg: Kunigunde Hergot, 1532 (German). VD16 ZV 12431*

Wittenberg: Nickel Schirlentz, 1532 (German). VD16 P 2400

Wittenberg: Nickel Schirlentz, 1532 (German). VD16 P 2401*

[Ulm: Hans Varnier], 1534 (German). VD16 P 2403

Polich, Martin, von Mellerstadt

Practicas

[Magdeburg: Bartholomaeus Ghotan], for 1483 (German). ISTC ip00884800

[Leipzig: Marcus Brandis], for 1484 (Latin). ISTC ip00884850

[Leipzig: Marcus Brandis], for 1484 (German). ISTC ip00884860

[Cologne: Heinrich Quentel], for 1486 (Latin). GW M34688

[Leipzig: Moritz Brandis], for 1486 (Latin). ISTC ip00884950

[Leipzig: Conrad Kachelofen], for 1486 (German). ISTC ip00884650

[Leipzig: Conrad Kachelofen], for 1486 (Latin). ISTC ip00884900

[Magdeburg: Albrecht Ravenstein and Joachim Westphal], for 1486 (German). ISTC ip00884600

[Nuremberg: Friedrich Creussner], for 1486 (German). ISTC ip00884630*

[Leipzig: Printer of Capotius (Martin Landsberg or Andreas Frisner)], for 1487 (Latin). ISTC ip00884953

[Leipzig: Printer of Capotius (Martin Landsberg or Andreas Frisner)], for 1487 (German). ISTC ip00884955

[Nuremberg: Friedrich Creussner], for 1488 (Latin). ISTC ip00884680*

[Nuremberg: Friedrich Creussner], for 1489 (Latin). ISTC ip00884690*

[Leipzig: Martin Landsberg], for 1490 (German). ISTC ip00885010

[Lübeck: Stephan Arndes], for 1490 (German). ISTC ip00885000

[Magdeburg: Simon Koch], for 1490 (German). ISTC ip00884700

Poppe, Heinrich

Practica

Erfurt: [Melchior Sachse the Elder], for 1542 (German). VD16 ZV 22216

Prophecies of the Twelve Sibyls (see also Christian Egenolff compilations)

Oppenheim: Jakob Köbel, 1516 (German). VD16 ZV 11992*

Frankfurt: [Christian Egenolff], 1531 (German). VD16 Z 941*

Frankfurt: Christian Egenolff, 1532 (German). VD16 Z 942*

Frankfurt: Christian Egenolff, 1534 (German). VD16 Z 943

Frankfurt: Christian Egenolff, 1535 (German). VD16 Z 944

Frankfurt: Christian Egenolff, 1537 (German). VD16 Z 945

[Strasbourg: Jakob Frölich, 1550] (German). VD16 Z 947

[n.p.: n.p.], 1550 (German). VD16 Z 946

Frankfurt: Martin Lechler, 1565 (German). VD16 Z 948

Nuremberg: Valentin Fuhrmann, [1575] (German). VD16 Z 949*

Leipzig: Zacharias Bärwald, 1594 (German). VD16 Z 950

Hamburg: [Hermann Möller], 1600 (German). VD16 Z 951

Magdeburg: Johann Francke, [1620] (German).VD17 3:306523C

Erfurt: Tobias Fritzsche, 1637 (German).VD17 23:296526C

Nuremberg: Michael and Johann Friedrich Endter, 1676 (German).VD17 7:665622X

[n.p.: n.p., 1700] (German).VD17 3:652783H*

Prueckner, Nikolaus

Comet tracts

Strasbourg: Johann Albrecht, 1532 (German). VD16 P 5167*

[Strasbourg: Johann Albrecht, 1533] (German). VD16 ZV 12860

Eclipse tracts

Strasbourg: Johann Schott, [1539] (German). VD16 P 5158

Strasbourg: Jakob Cammerlander, 1547 (German). VD16 P 5166

Practica for 1538–45

Strasbourg: Johann Knobloch the Younger, 1538 (German). VD16 P 5161*

Practicas

[Strasbourg: Johann Knobloch the Younger], for 1533 (German). VD16 P 5165*

[Strasbourg: Florian Schott], for 1543 (German). VD16 P 5160

Strasbourg: Jakob Cammerlander, for 1548 (German). VD16 P 5162

Strasbourg: Johann Knobloch the Younger, for 1549 (German). VD16 P 5163

Pürstinger, Berthold

Onus ecclesie

Landshut: Johann Weißenburger, 1524 (Latin). VD16 P 2927

[Landshut: Johann Weißenburger], 1524 (Latin). VD16 P 2928

[Landshut: Johann Weißenburger], 1524 (Latin). VD16 P 2929

Augsburg: Alexander Weißenhorn, 1531 (Latin). VD16 P 2930

[Augsburg: Alexander Weißenhorn], 1531 (Latin). VD16 P 2931*

Cologne: Peter Quentel, 1531 (Latin). VD16 P 2932

Cologne: Peter Quentel, 1531 (Latin). VD16 P 2933*

Cologne: Peter Quentel, 1531 (Latin). VD16 P 2934

Cologne: Peter Quentel, 1531 (Latin). VD16 P 2935*

Cologne: Peter Quentel, 1531 (Latin). VD16 ZV 12498*

Cologne: Peter Quentel, 1531 (Latin). VD16 ZV 12499

[n.p.: n.p.], 1620 (Latin). VD17 23:240615B

Randersacker, Jacobus (Jakobus Schönheintz)

Practicas

[Nuremberg: Ambrosius Huber], for 1498 (German). ISTC ir00028400

[Nuremberg: Ambrosius Huber], for 1498 (Latin). ISTC ir00028300*

Ransmar, Sebastian

Interpretation of the Great Constellation of February 1524. Anzaygung und Auszlegung der grossen constellacion und anderer aspectten so sych in dem 1524 jar in dem Februario erheben werden.

Augsburg: Melchior Ramminger, 1523 (German). VD16 R 210* (see also Johannes Virdung)

Rasch, Johann

Practicas

Graz: Georg Widmanstetter, for 1588 (German). VD16 R 318

Munich: Adam Berg, for 1588 (German). VD16 R 319*

Prophetic Compilation “contra Mysocacum”

Munich: Adam Berg, 1584 (German). VD16 R 302*

Munich: Adam Berg, 1584 (German). VD16 R 303

Munich: Adam Berg, 1584 (German). VD16 R 304

Munich: Adam Berg, 1584 (German). VD16 R 320*

[n.p.: n.p., 1584] (Latin). VD16 R 323

Munich: Adam Berg, 1588 (German). VD16 R 305

Weissag der Zeit

[Munich: Adam Berg, 1597] (German). VD16 R 326

[Munich: Adam Berg, 1598] (German). VD16 R 327

Rengart, Conradus

Practicas

[Augsburg: Christmann Heyny], for 1483 (Latin). ISTC ir00145600*

Augsburg: Hermann Kästlin, for 1483 (German). ISTC ir00145610*

Reynmann, Leonhard

Prognostication on the conjunctions of 1504

[Augsburg: Johann Schönsperger the Elder, 1504] (German). VD16 ZV 25567*

Prognostication on the conjunctions of 1524

Nuremberg: Hieronymus Höltzel, 1523 (German). VD16 R 1620*

Nuremberg: Hieronymus Höltzel, 1523 (German). VD16 R 1621*

[Leipzig]: Wolfgang Stöckel, [1526] (German). VD16 R 1622*

Rheticus, Georg Joachim

Practica

Leipzig: Valentin Bapst the Elder, for 1551 (German). VD16 J 279

Rietheim, Philadelphus von

Practica

[Augsburg: Hans Froschauer], for 1519 (German). VD16 ZV 3873*

Ritter, Der liebgehabte

Viennese signs. Auslegung der fünff zaichen so zů wien in österreych am hymel gesehen seind worden jm tausentt fünffhundert.vnnd .XX.Jar bewert durch etlich warhafftig propheceyen vnd alt historien.

[Augsburg: Melchior Ramminger, 1520] (German). VD16 A 4378*

Rosinus, Stephan

Practicas

[Nuremberg: Friedrich Creussner (successor)], for 1504 (German). VD16 R 2876*

[n.p.: n.p.], for 1504 (Latin). VD16 R 2875

Lübeck: Georg Richolff the Elder, for 1507 (German). VD16 R 2879

[Munich: Hans Schobser], for 1507 (German). VD16 R 2878

[n.p.: n.p.], for 1507 (German). VD16 R 2877

Rozonus, Marcus Antonius

Compendium of Foolish Prophecies. Compendium de levitate vaticinantium futuros rerum eventus et vanitate prognosticatium diluvium.

Nuremberg: Friderich Peypus, 1524 (Latin). VD16 ZV 23335

Ruf, Jacob

Practicas

[Zurich: Christoph Froschauer the Elder], for 1544 (German). VD16 R 3565

Zurich: Eustachius Froschauer, for 1544 (German). VD16 R 3567

Zurich: Eustachius Froschauer, for 1545 (German). VD16 R 3568

Zurich: Eustachius Froschauer, for 1546 (German). VD16 R 3569

Zurich: Christoph Froschauer the Younger, for 1556 (German). VD16 R 3572

Zurich: Christoph Froschauer the Younger, for 1558 (German). VD16 R 3574

Ryff, Walther Hermann

Practicas

[Frankfurt: Hermann Gülfferich], for 1544 (German). VD16 R 3986*

Frankfurt: Hermann Gülfferich, for 1544 (German). VD16 ZV 13475

Frankfurt: Hermann Gülfferich, for 1545 (German). Not in VD16 (Zwickau Ratsschulbibliothek 22. 9.15.[32])*

Salomon von Roermond

New Prognostication with Wonderful Prophecies. Ein Newe Prognostication mit wunderlichen Propheceyen. (see also Johann Carion)

[Nuremberg: Georg Wachter, 1540] (German). VD16 S 1466*

Nuremberg: Georg Wachter, [1540] (German). VD16 S 1467

Nuremberg: Georg Wachter, [1540] (German).VD16 S 1468*

Nuremberg: Georg Wachter, [1541] (German). VD16 S 1469*

Augsburg: Valentin Otmar, 1542 (German). VD16 S 1471

[Augsburg: Heinrich Steiner, 1542] (German). VD16 S 1470*

Strasbourg: Jakob Cammerlander, 1542 (German). VD16 S 1472*

Salzmann, Gregor

Practicas

Augsburg: Philipp Ulhart the Elder, for 1543 (German). VD16 S 1499

Augsburg: Philipp Ulhart the Elder, for 1544 (German). VD16 S 1500*

Samuel Hierosolymitanus

Verses Found in Jerusalem. Versus reperti Hierosolymis.

[Italy: n.p., 1492] (Latin). ISTC is00118600

[Memmingen: Albrecht Kunne, 1492] (Latin). ISTC is00118650*

[Augsburg: Erhard Ratdolt, 1492] (Latin). ISTC is00118690*

[Augsburg: Johann Froschauer, 1492] (Latin). ISTC is00118670*

[Augsburg: Johann Schaur, 1495] (German). ISTC is00118710*

[Augsburg: Hans Schobser, 1499] (German). ISTC is00118720

Sastrow, Johannes

Practica

Wittenberg: Josef Klug, for 1538 (Latin). VD16 S 1850

Schepper, Cornelis

Against the Astrologers. Assertionis fidei adversus astrologos, sive de significationibus coniunctionum superiorum planetarum anni millesimi quingentesimi Vicesimi quarti.

Antwerp: Symon Cock and Gerardus Nicolaus, 1523 (Latin). VD16 ZV 15223*

Cologne: widow of Arnold Birckmann the Elder, 1548 (Latin). VD16 S 2648*

Scherenmüller, Bartholomaeus

Practica

Reutlingen: Michael Greyff, for 1491 (German). ISTC is00314000

Schleusinger, Eberhard, or Konrad Heingarter(?)

De cometis

[Beromünster: Helias Heliae, 1472]. ISTC ic00784000*

[Venice?]: Hans Aurl, 1474. ISTC ic00785000

Schnellenberg, Tarquinius

Practicas

Erfurt: Melchior Sachse the Elder, for 1541 (German). VD16 S 3266

Erfurt: Melchior Sachse the Elder, for 1543 (German). VD16 S 3267

Erfurt: Melchior Sachse the Elder, for 1545 (German). VD16 S 3268

Erfurt: Melchior Sachse the Elder, for 1548 (German). VD16 S 3269

Erfurt: Melchior Sachse the Elder, for 1548 (German). VD16 S 3270

Erfurt: Melchior Sachse the Elder, for 1549 (German). VD16 S 3271

Schoder, Georg

Practica

Würzburg: Johann Müller, for 1551 (German). VD16 ZV 18246

Schöner, Johannes

Comet tracts

Leipzig: Michael Blum, 1531 (German). VD16 S 3471*

Magdeburg: Heinrich Öttinger, [1531] (German). VD16 S 3472

Nuremberg: Friderich Peypus, [1531] (German). VD16 S 3473*

Zwickau: Wolfgang Meyerpeck the Elder, [1531] (German). VD16 S 3474

Eclipse tract

Nuremberg: Friderich Peypus, [1534] (German). VD16 ZV 22709

Practicas

Nuremberg: Kunigunde Hergot, for 1534 (German). VD16 S 3491*

Nuremberg: Kunigunde Hergot, for 1534 (German). VD16 S 3492

Nuremberg: Kunigunde Hergot, for 1535 (German). VD16 S 3493*

Nuremberg: Kunigunde Hergot, for 1536 (German). VD16 S 3494

Augsburg: Philipp Ulhart the Elder, for 1537 (German). VD16 S 3495*

Nuremberg: Kunigunde Hergot, for 1538 (German). VD16 S 3496

Nuremberg: Kunigunde Hergot, for 1539 (German). VD16 S 3497

Nuremberg: Kunigunde Hergot, for 1540 (German). VD16 S 3498

Nuremberg: Georg Wachter, for 1542 (German). VD16 S 3499

Nuremberg: Georg Wachter, for 1543 (German). Not in VD16 (Zwickau Ratsschulbibliothek 22. 9.15.[17])*

Nuremberg: Johann VomBerg and Ulrich Neuber, for 1547 (German). VD16 S 3500

Nuremberg: Johann VomBerg and Ulrich Neuber, for 1547 (Latin). VD16 S 3501

Schrotbanck, Hans

Practica broadside

[Kirchheim in Elsass: Marcus Reinhart], for 1490 (German). ISTC is00330490*

Practica for Twenty-Six Years

[Strasbourg: Bartholomaeus Kistler], 1501 (German). VD16 S 4314*

Strasbourg: Matthias Hupfuff, [1502] (German). VD16 S 4315

Schynnagel, Marcus

Practicas

[Ulm: Johann Zainer the Elder], for 1489 (German). ISTC is00334900*

Basel: Michael Furter, for 1490 (German). ISTC is00335000

[Ulm: Johann Zainer the Elder], for 1490 (German). GW M4084330

[Basel: Johann Amerbach], for 1491 (Latin). ISTC is00335500

[Basel: Michael Furter], for 1491 (German). ISTC is00335600*

[Ulm: Johann Zainer the Elder], for 1491 (German). ISTC is00336000*

[Leipzig: Martin Landsberg], for 1493 (Latin). ISTC is00336100*

[Vienna: Johann Winterburg], for 1493 (Latin). ISTC is00336059

[Strasbourg: Johann Grüninger], for 1500 (German). ISTC is00336290

[Ulm: Johann Zainer the Younger], for 1500 (German). ISTC is00336300*

Scultetus, Johannes

Practicas

[Magdeburg: Moritz Brandis], for 1502 (Latin). VD16 S 5176*

[Leipzig: Wolfgang Stöckel], for 1505 (Latin). VD16 S 5174

[Leipzig: Wolfgang Stöckel], for 1506 (Latin). VD16 S 5175*

Seger, Johannes

Practicas

Augsburg: Erhard Oeglin, for 1512 (German). VD16 S 5304*

Augsburg: [Erhard Oeglin], for 1513 (German). VD16 S 5305*

Cologne: [Hermann Gutschaiff], for 1514 (German). VD16 S 5306

[Munich: Hans Schobser], for 1517 (German). VD16 S 5307

Augsburg: Silvan Otmar, for 1518 (German). VD16 S 5308*

Seitz, Alexander

A Warning Concerning the Deluge. Ein warnung des Sundtflus.

[Augsburg: Erhard Oeglin heirs, 1521] (German). VD16 S 5396

[Augsburg: Erhard Oeglin heirs, 1521] (German). VD16 S 5397*

[Erfurt: Matthes Maler, 1521] (German). VD16 S 5398

Leipzig: Wolfgang Stöckel, 1521 (German). VD16 S 5399*

[Speyer: Johann Eckhart, 1521] (German). VD16 S 5400*

Seybold, Leonhard

Practicas

[Augsburg: Johann Blaubirer], for 1485 (German). ISTC is00485700*

[Eichstätt: Michael Reyser], for 1485 (Latin). ISTC is00485730*

Sibenbürger, Dionysius

Practicas

[Augsburg: Heinrich Steiner], for 1535 (German). VD16 S 6184*

[n.p.: n.p.], for 1535 (German). Not in VD16 (Zwickau Ratsschulbibliothek 22. 9.15.[31])*

[n.p.: n.p.], for 1540 (German). VD16 S 6185

Augsburg: Heinrich Steiner, for 1542 (German). VD16 S 6186

Nuremberg: Hans Guldenmund, for 1542 (German). VD16 S 6187

[Augsburg: Philipp Ulhart the Elder], for 1545 (German). VD16 S 6188

[Cologne]: Servas Kruffter, for 1545 (German). VD16 ZV 14390

Nuremberg: Christoph Gutknecht, for 1546 (German). Not in VD16 (Nuremberg GNM Postinc 8o Nw 2139i)*

Nuremberg: Christoph Gutknecht, for 1547 (German). VD16 S 6189

[Nuremberg: Wolfgang Heußler], for 1548 (German). VD16 S 6190

[n.p.: n.p.], for 1548 (German). Not in VD16 (Erlangen UB Trew S 95)*

Nuremberg: Friedrich Gutknecht, for 1550 (German). VD16 ZV 14391

Augsburg: Valentin Otmar, for 1551 (German). Not in VD16 (Erlangen UB Trew S 98)*

Nuremberg: Friedrich Gutknecht, for 1553 (German). VD16 ZV 18249

Sibyl’s Prophecy

[Mainz: Type of the 36-line Bible (Johannes Gutenberg), 1452–53] (German). ISTC is00492500*

[Basel: Martin Flach, 1472–74] (German). ISTC is00492550

Bamberg: [Hans Sporer], 1491 (German). ISTC is00492610

Bamberg: Marx Ayrer, 1492 (German). ISTC is00492620*

[Heidelberg]: Heinrich Knoblochtzer, [1492] (German). ISTC is00492630*

Ulm: Johann Schäffler, 1492 (German). ISTC is00492640

[Cologne: Johann Koelhoff the Elder, 1493] (German). ISTC is00492600

Erfurt: Wolfgang Schenck, [1501–5] (German). VD16 V 2728

Strasbourg: Matthias Hupfuff, 1507 (German). VD16 V 2729*

[Augsburg: Hans Froschauer, 1510–15] (German). VD16 ZV 18259

Cologne: [Heinrich von Neuß], 1513 (German). VD16 V 2735

Cologne: [Heinrich von Neuß], 1515 (German). VD16 V 2736

[Nuremberg: Jobst Gutknecht, 1515] (German). VD16 V 2731

Leipzig: Martin Landsberg, 1516 (German). VD16 V 2730

Nuremberg: Jobst Gutknecht, 1517 (German). VD16 ZV 5390

Cologne: Arnd von Aich, 1520 (German). VD16 V 2737

[Cologne]: Servas Kruffter, [1520] (German). VD16 V 2738

Cologne: [Gottfried Hittorp, 1530] (German). VD16 V 2739

[Augsburg: n.p., 1540] (German). Not in VD16 (Schanze, “Fragment vom Weltgericht,” 60)

Cologne: Johann von Aich, [1540] (German). VD16 V 2740

Strasbourg: Jakob Frölich, [1545] (German). VD16 ZV 15311

Strasbourg: Jakob Frölich, [1550] (German). VD16 V 2732

[n.p.: n.p.], 1554 (German). VD16 ZV 12189

[Strasbourg: Jakob Frölich, 1555] (German). VD16 ZV 16584

Marburg: [Andreas Kolbe], 1562 (German). VD16 V 2733

Magdeburg: [n.p., 1565] (German). VD16 ZV 23238

Basel: Samuel Apiarius, 1574 (German). VD16 ZV 23239

Erfurt: Johann Beck, 1580 (German). VD16 ZV 23240

Nuremberg: Valentin Fuhrmann, [1580] (German). V 2734

Magdeburg: [n.p.], 1583 (German). VD16 ZV 23241

Erfurt: Johann Beck, 1606 (German).VD17 7:685258X

[n.p.: n.p.], 1614 (German). VD17 3:651567L*

[Hamburg: Jakob Rebenlein], 1635 (German). Not in VD17 (Schanze, “Fragment vom Weltgericht,” 62)

[n.p.: n.p.], 1684 (German). Not in VD17 (Schanze, “Fragment vom Weltgericht,” 62)

Sibyl’s Prophecy lyric. Ein Newer Bergkrey Von Sybilla weyssagung.

Augsburg: Melchior Ramminger, [1530] (German). VD16 I 120

Somnia Danielis (many editions omitted)

[Vienna: Johann Winterburger, 1501] (Latin) VD16 S 7004*

Augsburg: Johann Schönsperger the Younger, 1511 (German). VD16 ZV 926*

Strasbourg: Matthias Hupfuff, 1511 (German). VD16 ZV 927*

[Augsburg: Hans Froschauer], 1515 (Latin). VD16 S 7006*

Spiegelberg, Konrad von

Practica

Oppenheim: [Jakob Köbel, 1522] (German). VD16 S 8320

Stabius, Johannes

Practicas

[Bamberg: Johann Pfeyl], for 1498 (Latin). ISTC is00688350

[Ulm: Johann Zainer], for 1501 (German). ISTC is00688400

Nuremberg: Johann Weißenburger, for 1503–4 (Latin). VD16 ZV 23196*

Statmion, Christoph

Practicas

Nuremberg: Johann and Nueber, Ulrich von Berg, for 1543 (German). Not in VD16 (Zwickau Ratsschulbibliothek 22. 9.15.[20])*

Nuremberg: Johann and Nueber, Ulrich von Berg, for 1544 (German). Not in VD16 (Zwickau Ratsschulbibliothek 22. 9.15.[23])*

Nuremberg: Hieronymus Andreae, for 1547 (German). VD16 S 8647*

Nuremberg: Hieronymus Andreae, for 1551 (German). VD16 S 8648

Augsburg: Matthaeus Franck, for 1564 (German). VD16 S 8654*

Augsburg: Matthaeus Franck, for 1565 (German). VD16 S 8655*

Nuremberg: Valentin Neuber, for 1565 (German). VD16 S 8656

Augsburg: Michael Manger, for 1577 (German). Not in VD16 (Erlangen UB Trew S 114)*

Augsburg: Michael Manger, for 1578 (German). Not in VD16 (Erlangen UB Trew S 117)*

[many practicas from intervening years omitted]

Nuremberg: Friedrich Gutknecht, for 1584 (German). VD16 S 8664

Stigel, Johann

Practica

Wittenberg: Georg Rhau, for 1537 (Latin). VD16 S 9116

Stöffler, Johannes

Expurgation. Expurgatio adversus divinationum XXIIII anni suspitiones, a quibuscumque indigne sibi offusas, nominatim autem a Georgio Tanastetter Collimitio Lycoripensi, Medico et Mathematico, in eo libello quem ipse consolatorium inscripsit.

Tübingen: [Ulrich Morhart the Elder], 1523 (Latin). VD16 S 9203*

Stöffler, Johannes, and Jakob Pflaum

Ephemerides. Almanach nova in annos 1499–1531.

Ulm: Johann Reger, 1499 (Latin). ISTC is00791000*

Sturznagel, Markus

Practicas

[Ulm: Johann Zainer], for 1506 (German). VD16 S 10059

[Ulm: Johann Zainer], for 1508 (German). VD16 S 10060*

Tannstetter, Georg

Practicas

[n.p.: n.p.], for 1505 (Latin). VD16 ZV 14859*

[Nuremberg: Wolfgang Huber], for 1506 (German). VD16 T 170

[Nuremberg: Georg Stuchs], for 1506 (Latin). VD16 T 173

[n.p.: n.p.], for 1506 (German). VD16 ZV 14861

[Nuremberg: Wolfgang Huber], for 1511 (German). VD16 T 168*

Cologne: Heinrich von Neuß, for 1512 (Latin). VD16 T 161*

Nuremberg: Wolfgang Huber, for 1512 (Latin). VD16 T 162*

Nuremberg: Wolfgang Huber, for 1513 (Latin). VD16 T 163*

Vienna: Hieronymus Vietor, for 1515 (German). VD16 T 169

Vienna: Johann Singriener the Elder, for 1517 (Latin). VD16 T 164

Vienna: Johann Singriener the Elder, for 1519 (Latin). VD16 T 165

Vienna: Johann Singriener the Elder, for 1519 (German). VD16 ZV 13593*

Vienna: Johann Singriener the Elder, for 1520 (Latin). VD16 T 166

[Landshut: Johann Weißenburger], for 1522 (Latin). VD16 T 156

Vienna: Johann Singriener the Elder, for 1523 (Latin). VD16 ZV 14860

[Augsburg: Melchior Ramminger], for 1524 (German). VD16 T 171*

Vienna: Johann Singriener the Elder, for 1524 (German). VD16 T 172

Vienna: Johann Singriener the Elder, for 1524 (Latin). VD16 ZV 17139

Vienna: Johann Singriener the Elder, for 1525 (Latin). VD16 ZV 24183*

Tröstbuchlein. Libellus consolatorius.

Vienna: Johann Singriener the Elder, 1523 (Latin). VD16 T 159*

Vienna: Johann Singriener the Elder, 1523 (German). VD16 T 160*

Theobertus von England

Practica for 1470–78

[Augsburg: Günther Zainer, 1470] (German). ISTC it00142500*

Theodericus Croata / Dietrich von Zeng (see also Johann Carion, Interpretation of the Hidden Prophecy)

[Augsburg: Johann Froschauer, 1503] (German). ISTC it00146420*

[Munich: Hans Schobser, 1512] (German). VD16 T 732*

[Augsburg: Erhard Oeglin, 1520] (German). VD16 T 735

[Cologne: Hermann Bungart, 1520] (German). VD16 T 733

[Munich: Hans Schobser, 1520] (German). VD16 T 734

[Strasbourg: Johann Grüninger, 1520] (German). VD16 ZV 21002

[Augsburg: Heinrich Steiner, 1530] (German). VD16 T 736*

[Nuremberg: Hieronymus Andreae], 1536 (German). VD16 T 737

[n.p.: n.p.], 1542 (German). VD16 T 738

Prophecy Found in Austria. Dise prophecy ist funden worden in Osterreich uff einem Schloß das heißt Altenburg. Ist gemacht von einem Münich Carmeliten ordens von Prag. Da man zalt nach der geburt Christi Vierhundert Zweyundsechtzig Jare.

Freiburg/Breisgau: [Johann Wörlin, 1522] (German). VD16 D 1458*

[Speyer: Jakob Schmidt, 1523] (German). VD16 D 1457

Thirteenth Sibyl (see also Prophecies of the Twelve Sibyls and Christian Egenolff compilations)

Augsburg: Johann Schönsperger the Younger, [1515] (German). VD16 S 6274*

Strasbourg: [Martin Flach, 1518] (German). VD16 S 6275

Tockler, Conrad

Practicas

[Leipzig: Martin Landsberg], for 1504 (Latin). VD16 T 1446

[Leipzig: Martin Landsberg], for 1505 (German). VD16 T 1450

[Leipzig: Martin Landsberg], for 1507 (Latin). VD16 T 1447*

[Leipzig: Martin Landsberg], for 1509 (Latin). VD16 T 1448*

[Leipzig: Martin Landsberg], for 1509 (German). VD16 T 1449*

[Leipzig: Martin Landsberg], for 1511 (German). VD16 T 1451*

[Leipzig: Martin Landsberg], for 1512 (German). VD16 T 1452*

[Leipzig: Martin Landsberg], for 1514 (German). VD16 T 1453*

[Augsburg: Johann Miller], for 1515 (German). VD16 T 1454

[Augsburg: Johann Schönsperger the Younger], for 1515 (German). VD16 T 1455*

Torquatus, Antonius

Prognosticon de eversione Europae

[Nuremberg: Friderich Peypus], 1534 (Latin). VD16 T 1578*

[Wittenberg: Hans Lufft], 1534 (Latin). VD16 T 1579

[Erfurt: Matthes Maler], 1535 (German). VD16 T 1581

[Nuremberg: Johann Petreius], 1535 (German). VD16 T 1582

[Vienna: Johann Singriener the Elder], 1535 (German). VD16 ZV 25351*

Worms: Sebastian Wagner, 1536 (German). VD16 T 1583

Frankfurt: Christian Egenolff heirs, 1558 (German). VD16 T 1584

Frankfurt: Christian Egenolff heirs, 1561 (German). VD16 T 1585

[n.p.: n.p.], 1575 (Latin). VD16 T 1580

Leipzig: Zacharias Bärwald, 1594 (German). VD16 T 1586*

Tract against the Turks. Tractatus quidam de Turcis. (see also pseudo-Vincent Ferrer)

[Rome: Johannes Schurener, de Bopardia, 1474] (Latin). ISTC it00501000*

[Nuremberg: Anton Koberger?, 1477] (Latin). ISTC it00502000*

Nuremberg: Conrad Zeninger, 1481 (Latin). ISTC it00503000*

[Strasbourg: Heinrich Knoblochtzer], 1481 (Latin). ISTC it00502500

Valentin von Grünberg

Practicas

[Leipzig: Gregorius Böttiger (Werman)], for 1495 (Latin). ISTC iv00010600

[Leipzig: Gregorius Böttiger (Werman)], for 1495 (German). ISTC iv00010650

[Lübeck: Stephan Arndes], for 1496 (German). GW M49085

[Ingolstadt: Georg Wirffel and Marx Ayrer], for 1497 (German). GW M49088

[Leipzig: Gregorius Böttiger (Werman)], for 1497 (German). ISTC iv00010760*

[Nuremberg: Peter Wagner], for 1497 (German). ISTC iv00010770*

[Reutlingen: Michael Greyff], for 1497 (German). ISTC iv00010800

[Strasbourg: Johann Prüss?], for 1497 (Latin). ISTC iv00010700

[Strasbourg: Johann Prüss?], for 1497 (German). ISTC iv00010750

[Ulm: Johann Schäffler], for 1497 (German). ISTC iv00010850

[n.p.: n.p.], for 1497 (German). GW M49087

Vielfeld, Jakob

Practica der Pfaffen (see also Andreas Osiander and Hans Sachs)

[Strasbourg: Jakob Cammerlander, 1535] (German). VD16 C 604*

[Strasbourg: Jakob Cammerlander, 1535] (German). VD16 ZV 2887*

Virdung, Johannes

Practicas

[Stendal: Joachim Westphal], for 1489 (German). ISTC iv00302020

[Leipzig: Conrad Kachelofen], for 1490 (Latin). ISTC iv00302035

[Hamburg: Johann Borchard], for 1491 (German). ISTC ip00949750

[Leipzig: Conrad Kachelofen], for 1491 (Latin). ISTC iv00302060

[Mainz: Jacob Meydenbach], for 1491 (German). ISTC iv00302050

[Leipzig: Conrad Kachelofen], for 1492 (Latin). ISTC iv00302100*

[Leipzig: Conrad Kachelofen], for 1492 (German). ISTC iv00302160

[Leipzig?: n.p.], for 1492 (Latin). ISTC iv00302140

[Lübeck: Stephan Arndes], for 1492 (German). ISTC iv00302190

[Lübeck: Bartholomaeus Ghotan], for 1492 (German). ISTC iv00302200*

[Nuremberg: Friedrich Creussner], for 1492 (Latin). ISTC iv00302120*

[Nuremberg: Friedrich Creussner], for 1492 (German). ISTC iv00302180

[Leipzig: Conrad Kachelofen], for 1493 (Latin). ISTC iv00302217

[Nuremberg: Friedrich Creussner], for 1493 (German). ISTC iv00302210*

[Nuremberg: Friedrich Creussner], for 1493 (Latin). ISTC iv00302215*

[Magdeburg: Moritz Brandis], for 1494 (German). ISTC iv00302225

[Heidelberg: Heinrich Knoblochtzer], for 1495 (German). ISTC iv00302235

[Leipzig: Conrad Kachelofen], for 1495 (German). ISTC iv00302237

Leipzig: Conrad Kachelofen, for 1495 (Latin). ISTC iv00302240*

[Heidelberg: Heinrich Knoblochtzer], for 1496 (Latin). ISTC iv00302256

[Leipzig: Conrad Kachelofen], for 1497 (Latin). ISTC iv00302257*

[Nuremberg: Peter Wagner], for 1497 (German). ISTC iv00302259*

[Leipzig: Conrad Kachelofen], for 1498 (Latin). ISTC iv00302264*

[Lübeck: Stephan Arndes], for 1498 (German). ISTC iv00302262

[Leipzig: Conrad Kachelofen], for 1499 (German). ISTC iv00302267

[Heidelberg: Heinrich Knoblochtzer], for 1500 (German). ISTC iv00302280

Oppenheim: [Jacob Köbel], for 1500 (German). ISTC iv00302270

[Strasbourg: Matthias Hupfuff], for 1500 (German). ISTC iv00302283

[Cologne: Hermann Bungart], for 1503 (German). Not in VD16 (Pascher, Praktiken des 15. und 16. Jahrhunderts, 111–18)*

Mainz: Johann Schöffer, for 1510 (Latin). VD16 V 1269

[Nuremberg: Johann Weißenburger], for 1510 (German). VD16 V 1270*

[Augsburg: Johann Sittich], for 1511 (German). VD16 V 1273

[Nuremberg: Adam Dyon], for 1511 (German). VD16 V 1272*

[Nuremberg: Johann Weißenburger], for 1511 (Latin). VD16 V 1271

[n.p.: n.p.], for 1511 (German). VD16 ZV 15221*

[Nuremberg: Johann Weißenburger], for 1512 (German). VD16 V 1274

[Strasbourg: Johann Grüninger], for 1513 (German). VD16 V 1275

[Speyer: Jakob Schmidt], for 1517 (German). VD16 V 1276

[Speyer: Jakob Schmidt], for 1518 (Latin). VD16 V 1277

[Speyer: Jakob Schmidt], for 1518 (German). Not in VD16 (Claus, “Astrologische Flugschriften von Johannes Virdung,” 131)

[Speyer: Jakob Schmidt], for 1519 (Latin). VD16 V 1278*

[Speyer: Jakob Schmidt], for 1520 (German). VD16 V 1279

[Augsburg: Jörg Nadler], for 1521 (German). VD16 ZV 21865

[Speyer: Johann Eckhart], for 1523 (German). VD16 V 1280*

[Speyer: Anastasius Nolt], for 1524 (German). VD16 V 1281*

[Speyer: Anastasius Nolt], for 1525 (German). VD16 V 1283*

[Speyer: Anastasius Nolt], for 1526 (German). VD16 V 1284*

[Speyer: Jakob Schmidt], for 1527 (German). VD16 V 1285*

[Speyer: Anastasius Nolt], for 1528 (German). VD16 V 1286*

[Speyer: Jakob Schmidt], for 1529 (German). VD16 V 1287*

Speyer: Jakob Schmidt, for 1530 (German). VD16 V 1289*

[n.p.: n.p.], for 1530 (German). VD16 V 1288

Speyer: Jakob Schmidt, for 1531 (German). VD16 V 1290*

Speyer: [n.p.], for 1532 (German). VD16 ZV 21004

Speyer: [Jakob Schmidt], for 1533 (German). VD16 V 1291

Speyer: [Anastasius Nolt], for 1534 (German). VD16 V 1292*

Speyer: [Anastasius Nolt], for 1535 (German). VD16 V 1293*

Speyer: [Anastasius Nolt], for 1537 (German). VD16 V 1294*

Speyer: [n.p.], for 1537 (German). VD16 ZV 21005

Speyer: [n.p.], for 1538 (German). VD16 ZV 21006

Speyer: Anastasius Nolt, [n.d.] (German). Not in VD16 (Harthausen, “Ein Druck von Anastasius Nolt,” 1418–19)

Prognostication of a new prophet on the conjunction of 1504

Oppenheim: [Jakob Köbel], 1503 (German). VD16 V 1295

Strasbourg: Matthias Hupfuff, 1503 (German). VD16 V 1296*

Comet tracts

[Augsburg: Hans Froschauer], 1506 (German). VD16 V 1259*

Braunschweig: [Hans Dorn, 1506] (German). VD16 ZV 15222

[Nuremberg: Johann Weißenburger, 1506] (German). VD16 V 1260*

Oppenheim: [Jacob Köbel, 1506] (Latin). VD16 V 1257

Oppenheim: [Jakob Köbel, 1506] (German). VD16 V 1261

[Strasbourg: Matthias Hupfuff, 1506] (Latin). VD16 V 1258

[Speyer: Anastasius Nolt, 1531] (German). VD16 V 1255*

Speyer: [Anastasius Nolt, 1532] (German). VD16 V 1254*

Invective against the practica of Lucas of Persia

Heidelberg: [Jakob Stadelberger], 1512 (Latin). VD16 V 1265

Heidelberg: Jakob Stadelberger, [1512] (German). VD16 V 1266

Eclipse prognostications

Heidelberg: Jakob Stadelberger, 1513 (Latin). VD16 V 1317*

Heidelberg: Jakob Stadelberger, 1513 (German). VD16 V 1318

Oppenheim: [Jakob Köbel], 1519 (Latin). VD16 V 1315

Oppenheim: [Jakob Köbel], for 1519 (German). VD16 V 1316

Speyer: Anastasius Nolt, [1523] (German). VD16 V 1297

Speyer: Jakob Schmidt, [1530] (German). VD16 V 1319*

Lunar signs tract

[Augsburg: Erhard Oeglin, 1514] (German). VD16 V 1263*

[Speyer: Jakob Schmidt, 1514] (Latin). VD16 V 1262

Speyer: Jakob Schmidt, [1514] (German). VD16 V 1264*

Rainbow interpretation

[Speyer: Jakob Schmidt], 1514 (Latin). Not in VD16 (Benzing, “Jakob Schmidt,” 120)

Viennese signs

Oppenheim: [Jakob Köbel, 1520] (German). VD16 V 1256*

Prognostication on the conjunctions of 1524 (see also Johannes Lichtenberger, Great Practica)

[Landshut: Johann Weißenburger, 1521] (Latin). VD16 V 1303*

Oppenheim: [Jakob Köbel, 1521] (Latin). VD16 V 1304*

Cracow: Hieronymus Vietor, 1522 (Latin). Not in VD16 (Munich, BSB Rar. 4096#Beibd.7)*

Oppenheim: [Jakob Köbel, 1522] (German). VD16 V 1305

[Augsburg: Melchior Ramminger], 1523 (German). VD16 V 1306 (with the prognostication of Sebastian Ransmar)

[Landshut: Johann Weißenburger, 1523] (German). VD16 V 1307* (a different translation)

[Landshut: Johann Weißenburger, 1523] (German). VD16 V 1308

Oppenheim: [Jakob Köbel, 1523] (German). VD16 V 1309*

Oppenheim: [Jakob Köbel, 1523] (German). VD16 V 1310*

[Cologne: Arnd von Aich, 1524] (German). VD16 V 1314

Prognostication on the conjunctions of 1524 (with “Hidden Prophecy” of Johann Carion)

Augsburg: Valentin Otmar, 1542 (German). VD16 V 1298*

Augsburg: Valentin Otmar, 1542 (German). VD16 V 1299

[Augsburg: Heinrich Steiner, 1542] (German). VD16 V 1300

Strasbourg: Jakob Cammerlander, 1542 (German). VD16 V 1301*

Antichrist practica. Practica von dem Entcrist.

[Speyer: Anastasius Nolt, 1525] (German). VD16 V 1302*

Vögelin, Johannes

Comet tracts

Vienna: Johann Singriener the Elder, 1533 (Latin). VD16 V 2039

[Vienna: Johann Singriener the Elder, 1533] (German). VD16 V 2040

Practicas

Vienna: Johann Singriener the Elder, for 1531 (Latin). VD16 V 2035*

Vienna: Johann Singriener the Elder, for 1534 (Latin). VD16 V 2036

Vienna: Johann Singriener the Elder, for 1534 (German). VD16 V 2037

Vienna: Johann Singriener the Elder, for 1535 (German). VD16 V 2038

Volmar, Johannes

Practicas

[Leipzig: Martin Landsberg], for 1519 (German). VD16 V 2297*

[Nuremberg: Jobst Gutknecht], for 1520 (German). VD16 V 2298*

[Cologne: Heinrich von Neuß], for 1522 (Latin). VD16 V 2302

[Nuremberg: Jobst Gutknecht], for 1522 (German). VD16 V 2299*

[n.p.: n.p.], for 1524 (German). VD16 V 2300

Leipzig: Nickel Schmidt, for 1525 (German). VD16 V 2301

Walasser, Adam

Compilations

Dillingen: Sebald Mayer, 1569 (German). VD16 ZV 15402

Dillingen: Sebald Mayer, 1573 (German). VD16 W 793*

Werve, Hermann van dem

Practicas

[Magdeburg: Hans Walther], for 1551 (German). VD16 W 2104

[Magdeburg: Hans Walther], for 1553 (German). VD16 W 2102

[Magdeburg: Hans Walther], for 1557 (German). VD16 W 2105

Wilhelm, Balthasar

Contrapracticas

[Erfurt: Wolfgang Stürmer], 1524 (German). VD16 W 3090*

[Zwickau: Johann Schönsperger the Younger, 1525] (German). VD16 W 3091*

[Zwickau: Johann Schönsperger the Younger, 1525] (German). VD16 ZV 12398*

Wolmar, Johann

Practica for 1541–44

[Nuremberg: Johann Petreius, 1540] (German). VD16 W 4348*

[Nuremberg: Johann Petreius], 1540 (German). VD16 W 4349*

Magdeburg: Hans Walther, for 1542 (German). VD16 W 4344

Practicas

[Cologne: Arnd von Aich], for 1529 (German). VD16 W 4346

Cologne: [Johann von Aich], for 1533 (German). VD16 W 4345

Cologne: [Johann von Aich], for 1534 (German). VD16 W 4347*

Zegers, Thomas

Practicas

Marburg: [Franz Rhode], for 1531 (Latin). VD16 Z 219

Rostock: Ludwig Dietz, for 1545 (Latin). VD16 Z 220*

Züntel, Johann

Christliche unnd einfeltig Newe Jahrs Predigt (with Auffahrt Abend)

Nuremberg: Abraham Wagenmann, 1607. VD17 23:326634D

NOTES

INTRODUCTION

1. Stark, “Theory of Revelations,” 289; Joyce, “Revelation”; Calès, “Prophecy.”

2. New York, Pierpont Morgan Library, M. 739, fol. 17r: “Hie sprah got zv samuele. sage saul er en suln nicht me chunig sin.” On this manuscript, see Harrsen, Cursus Sanctae Mariae, and Stolz, “Das Experiment einer volkssprachigen Bilderbibel.”

3. Luther, Die Propheten alle Deudsch (VD16 ZV 18373), fol. 2v: “Das es gewislich nicht anders ist / die Propheten lesen oder hören / denn lesen und hören / wie Gott drewet und tröstet.” In the following transcriptions of printed texts, abbreviations are expanded silently, umlauted vowels appear using modern orthography, and u/v and i/j are distinguished according to their vocalic or consonantal quality. Unless otherwise noted, all translations are my own.

4. See Southern, “History as Prophecy,” 49.

5. Illich, In the Vineyard of the Text, 72.

6. On the rising demand for texts since ca. 1370, see Neddermeyer, Von der Handschrift zum gedruckten Buch, especially 1:217–22; on Gutenberg’s technological innovations, see Corsten, “Erfindung des Buchdrucks.”

7. Stock, Listening for the Text, 123.

8. Stock, Listening for the Text, 131.

9. Citations of prophetic and prognostic works will provide an author or, for anonymous works, a title, followed by an index number from one of the censuses of early printed books, so that the precise edition can be sought in the appendix. The edition cited here is Prophecies of the Twelve Sibyls, VD16 ZV 11992, fols. 2r, 4v: “DIe weil diß bůchlin melt und ußweist der propheten und Sibillen verkündung und weissagung künfftiger wunderwerck / von Got dem almechtigen / seiner werden mutter Marie und andern dingen die uff diesser Erde geschehen sein / und noch geschehen sollen / Mustu dein trachten nit setzen / uff die unverstentlichen heimlichen verborgenen wort / und synn / darin begriffen / Dan gemeinlich alle propheten und weissager / haben in gebrauch gehabt dunckel zu reden / und die künfftige ding / Durch verborgene spruch vnd geleichniß offenbart.” On Rupescissa, see Lerner, Powers of Prophecy, 137.

10. Müller, “Poet, Prophet, Politiker,” 102–3.

11. Giesecke, Buchdruck, 579–86, here 579: “Diejenigen Informationen, die das Christentum einer dauerhaften Speicherung im skriptographischen Medium für wert hält, sind das Ergebnis von Verkündigung und Offenbarung.” Giesecke’s system-theoretical model of perception restricts revelation to communication via the “inner eye” as opposed to any of the physical senses and is based on the Annunciation, which is not, in fact, broadly applicable: the Holy Spirit’s action on Mary is absolutely without parallel, and Mary, although a recipient of divine communication, is a model of contemplation rather than prophetic proclamation. For a critique of Giesecke, see Schanze, “Der Buchdruck eine Medienrevolution?”

12. On the print editions of Birgitta’s work, see Montag, Birgitta von Schweden, 102–23.

13. Birgitta, VD16 B 5596, s2a: “Ich bin gleich einem zymmerman der da abhawt die höltzer und tregt sy in das hawss / unnd macht darauß ein schones pild unnd zierdt das mit farben und glidmassen / des freundt so sy sahen das pildt das es mit noch schönern farben gezierdt möcht werden / do haben auch sy darzu getan ir farben / das pildt malende. Also hab ich gott abgehawen von dem waldt meyner gottheyt meyne wort die ich hab gelegt in dein hertz. Aber meyn freundt haben die bracht in bücher nach der gnad inen gegeben / und haben die gemalt und gezierdt. Darumb das sy yetz manichen zungen bequemlich seyen: sollt du alle bücher der offembarungen der selben meiner wort / ubergeben meinem Bischoff dem eynsidel.”

14. Augsburg StSB 4o Math 516. The works in question are Hoffman, WEissagung usz heiliger götlicher geschrifft (VD16 H 4228) and (most likely) PRophecey oder weissagung uß warer heiliger götlicher schrifft (VD16 H 4222). The text block has been neatly excised from each leaf of these two tracts in the volume.

15. Niccoli, Prophecy and People, 5.

16. Southern, “History as Prophecy,” 57; Matthäus, “Geschichte des Nürnberger Kalenderwesens,” 1227; cf. Kurze, Johannes Lichtenberger, 40–43.

17. Duntze, Matthias Hupfuff, 16.

CHAPTER 1

1. Geldner’s “Der junge Johannes Gutenberg” offers an extensive account of all that is unknown and unknowable about Gutenberg’s life.

2. This question has been raised by, among others, Füssel (“Gutenberg-Forschung,” 25–26). On Gutenberg’s influence on intellectual history, see Flasch, “Ideen und Medien.”

3. See Schröder, Zedler, and Wallau, Mainzer Fragment vom Weltgericht. Dresler’s “Gutenberg-Studien III” offers an overview of the history of scholarly opinion on the Mainz fragments. It now appears clear that Johannes Gutenberg was personally involved in the early prints before the Bible edition of 1454–55, contrary to the suggestion that only the financier Johann Fust or one of Gutenberg’s anonymous assistants took part. See Painter, “Gutenberg and the B 36 Group.”

4. Sibyl’s Prophecy ISTC is00492500; now Mainz, Gutenberg Museum, GM Inc. 100.

5. Schröder, Mainzer Fragment vom Weltgericht, 1–2.

6. Baert (Heritage of Holy Wood, 289–349) examines the legend and its development during the Middle Ages in detail.

7. Wehmer, Mainzer Probedrucke, 31–39.

8. For the Sibyl’s precedent, see Painter, “Gutenberg and the B 36 Group,” 305; for Donatus, Zedler, Gutenbergs älteste Type, 24. On these debates, see Geldner, “Alte und neue Wege,” 18.

9. Cf. Zedler, Gutenbergs älteste Type, 31.

10. Neddermeyer, Von der Handschrift zum gedruckten Buch, 1:504.

11. Zedler, Gutenbergs älteste Type, 30; Schanze, “Fragment vom Weltgericht,” 42 n. 5.

12. Rautenberg, “Buchhändlerische Organisationsformen,” 339.

13. Painter, “Gutenberg and the B 36 Group,” 304–5.

14. Principal contributions on the text of the Sibyl’s Prophecy include Neske, Spätmittelalterliche deutsche Sibyllenweissagung; Darnedde, Deutsche Sibyllen-Weissagung; and Vogt, “Ueber Sibyllen weissagung”; for an overview of scholarship, see Schnell and Palmer, “Sibyllenweissagungen.”

15. Schanze, “Fragment vom Weltgericht,” 42 n. 4.

16. Schröder, Mainzer Fragment vom Weltgericht, 6–7.

17. Contrary to Schröder, Mainzer Fragment vom Weltgericht, 8, as shown by Zedler (Gutenbergs älteste Type, 33).

18. See Zedler, “Sibyllenweissagung,” 36–40; Giesecke, Buchdruck, 267; Kapr, “Kaiser-Friedrich-Legende,” 108.

19. Kapr, “Kaiser-Friedrich-Legende,” 110.

20. Giesecke, Buchdruck, 269–75.

21. Giesecke, Buchdruck, 289–92.

22. Schnell and Palmer, “Sibyllenweissagungen,” 1148; Schanze, “Fragment vom Weltgericht,” 45 n. 12: “eine phantasievolle Kombination.” Varbanec’s work, still available only in Russian, has not found acceptance except by Kapr, and Schnell and Palmer similarly regard it as wide of the mark.

23. Schanze, “Fragment vom Weltgericht,” 46.

24. Zedler, “Sibyllenweissagung,” 35; Schanze, “Der Buchdruck eine Medienrevolution?” 297.

25. Schanze, “Fragment vom Weltgericht,” 54–55. Scholarly consensus (see Füssel, “Gutenberg-Forschung,” 11) has come down firmly on the side of Schanze.

26. Schanze, “Fragment vom Weltgericht,” 54: “beziehungslose Nachbarschaft.”

27. An edition of this work printed in 1485 is Carolus Magnus, Legende seines Streits vor Regensburg (ISTC ic00202000).

28. Schanze, “Fragment vom Weltgericht,” 53: “wie ein Fremdkörper.”

29. Lucidarius (ISTC il00332200), a1r: “An disem bůch findet man manige grosse lere die anderen büchern verborgen seind das underweiset unß diß bůch. . . . Got der ye wz und ymmer ist on ennd. . . . der meyster und der junger redent miteinander. der diß bůch schreybet der ist der frager der heylig geyst ist der lerer.”

30. For the Questions of the Astronomy Master to the Devil, see Siebert, “Meistergesänge astronomischen Inhalts,” 200–235, here 200–201: “umb daz du mich alhie gefragst, du hetest sin wol rat, daz du vil da von sagst, nu vinstuz doch geschriben in den buochen. der meister sprach: ich han gelesen vil der fremden wunder, der ich mich halber nicht verstan; von dinem munt wil ichs ein ware urkund han, ieglichez soltu sagen mir besunder.”

31. Clanchy, “Invention of Printing,” 11–12. Clanchy, following Stillwell’s Beginning of the World of Books, included Mentelin’s Strasbourg edition of the Ackermann aus Böhmen (now attributed to around the year 1463) and did not include the German translation of the bull against the Turks. For an updated list of the earliest printed works, see Schanze, “Der Buchdruck eine Medienrevolution?” 302–11.

32. Wehmer, Mainzer Probedrucke, 37: “Damit ordnet sich der A[stronomische] K[alender] auf befriedigende Weise inhaltlich in eine Gruppe von Mainzer Drucken ein, in deren Nachbarschaft er auch typographisch gehört. In gleicher Type sind das in die Form eines Kalenders für 1455 gekleidete astrologisch-politische Gedicht über die Türkengefahr . . . , das wegen seiner Prophetie eines über die Ungläubigen siegreichen Kaisers Freidrich gedruckte Sibyllenbuch . . . , ein deutscher Cisionianus . . . und der astrologische Aderlaß- und Laxierkalender für 1457 . . . gedruckt. In die Linie dieser astrologisch-kalendarischen Verlagsproduktion paßt eine deutsche astrologische Planetentafel durchaus.”

33. These works are the Aderlasskalender (ISTC ia00051700), Die Bulla widder die Turcken (ic00060100), the Cisioanus (ic00699680), the Astronomical Calendar for 1448 (ip00749500), the Sibyl’s Prophecy (is00492500), and the Türken-Kalender (it00503500).

34. Simon, Türkenkalender, 79; on the Turk Calendar and the bull against the Turks, see Geldner, “Bemerkungen zum Text des ‘Türkenschreis.’”

35. The editions are ISTC ib00676000 (Birgitta), if00122000 (Ferrer), it00503000 (Tract against the Turks), ia00501820, and im00460000.

36. Printed with the Epistola Lentuli and other short texts in VD16 L 1186, c5v–c6r. On Esdras and similar prognostic rules, see Weisser, “Neujahrsprognosen.”

37. Nürnberg, Germanisches Nationalmuseum Hs. 6285 (second half of the fifteenth century), fol. 1r: “dise ding sindt mir alle geoffenbartt von got vnnd habe auch nicht durch mich dar zw gethann Sünder Ich habe alle ding van got Inflůß Entpfangenn etc.”

38. This edition is Ob ains an wirdigkait mag komen, VD16 L 2679.

39. See Christin, “Lectures/Écritures,” 308–9; Christin, History of Writing, 10–12 (and the chapters by Durand and Vandermeersch referenced there); Christin, L’image écrite (more extensively).

40. See Widmann, “Der Buchdruck als Gottesgeschenk,” 259–61.

41. Schmitt, “Fragment vom Weltgericht,” 18.

42. Illich and Sanders, Alphabetization of the Popular Mind, 13.

43. Egenolff, VD16 P 5068, fol. 107r–v; on this incident, see also Manguel, History of Reading, 201–2.

44. Eichmann, VD16 E 649, b1r. On Eichmann, see Worstbrock, “Eichmann.”

45. Koppitz, “Das Trucken,” 161: “Du manst mich schier an den bossen / Wie man von Sybyllae buch schreibt.”

46. Neske, Spätmittelalterliche deutsche Sibyllenweissagung, 263, 265, 272.

47. Bartholomeus Mangolt, practica for 1530 (not in VD16; Augsburg StSB 4o Math 516#15), a2r: “Got der Hymlische Vatter durch sein unermeßne weyßheit hat im anfang auß nicht erschaffenn / durch das wort die hymel und alles das darinn beschlossen wirt.”

48. Matthias Brotbeihel, VD16 ZV 16165, a2v: “David spricht in seynem soliloquio / am zwey und dreyssigsten Psalm / Das die himel durch das wort des Herren gemacht seyen / und alle ire krafft (omnis virtus) durch den geyst seynes munds / von welchen hymeln / die gantz menge der welt gemessiget / und allen wercken der natur handreichung beschicht / das die untersten ding / in ordnung nachfolgen den öbern / und die menschliche werck / durch verenderung der hohen himlischen dinge / ordenlich gelait / geregirt / geborn und wider umb zerstört werden.”

49. Michael Krautwadel, practica for 1530 (not in VD16; Augsburg StSB 4o Math 516), a2r: “durch Influentz der stern / wölche Gottes dolmetscher seynd.”

50. Perillus, VD16 P 1385, a2r: “des Gestirns / von Got eingegossen / verborgne kreft und würckung / so der wunderbarlich Werckmaister / Uns zů ainem spiegel / warnung und erkandtnuß / seiner macht und gwalt / an das Firmament / als in ain offen bůch/ mit schönen leichtenden Stern / als mit guldin bůchstaben / beschriben und gehefft hat.”

51. Grafton, Cardano’s Cosmos, 6–8; Weidmann, “Paracelsus propheta,” 38–39.

52. Virdung, ISTC iv00302210, a1v: “Dieße dingk die got uns wissende wollen hat er geschriben yn den hymel alß in ein bůche. Welchem auch bezügnuß gibt der meister Albumasar yn dem so er sprechende ist. Got hat gemacht den himel als ein haudt yn welcher die gestalt und geschick der understen beschriben sendt.”

53. Eyssenmann, VD16 E 4765, a2r: “auch spricht der Ptolomeus in dem selbigen bůch die geschicklikayt der gantzen welt ist underworfen dem himel an welchem geschriben stat ale zů kunfft auf diser erd nach den zaychen und gestirn darvon wer lessen kan der mag lessen das ist wer die kunst der Astromei kan und hats gelernet der sols verkünden den menschen.”

54. Schnell and Palmer, “Sibyllenweissagungen,” 1143–44; Neske, Spätmittelalterliche deutsche Sibyllenweissagung, 43, 268.

55. See Holdenried, Sibyl and Her Scribes, xvii.

56. Hildegard, VD16 N 63; see Embach, “Hildegard von Bingen,” 668.

57. Virdung, VD16 V 1255, a2v: “und diser Comet so ich sagen dörfft ist fünff herren vast bekümmern durch mancherley anfechtung / deß halben hüt sich ein. A. h. l. unnd zwey .f. das sie dieser Comet nit dreff.”

58. Paracelsus, VD16 P 543, d4r: “Die Sibilla hat dein gedacht / da sie sagt / du F. und billich / stehest yetz inn der rosen / dann du bist zeytig / unnd die zeit hat dich gebracht / Was die Sibilla von dir sagt / das wirt vollendt vnd noch mehr wirt von dir gesagt werden.” Paracelsus, VD16 P 543, a2r, “Wer kan nur ergründen / wie die bůchstaben erfunden sindt worden / dann alleyn durch göttliche underrichtung?”

59. Rouse and Rouse, Authentic Witnesses, 240–41.

60. Köster, Gutenberg in Strassburg, 23–29. See also Köster, “Gutenbergs Straßburger Aachenspiegel-Unternehmen”; Schmiedt, “Gutenbergs Pilgerspiegel-Manufaktur.”

61. Köster, Gutenberg in Strassburg, 33: “Das Bild, die Strahlung der gezeigten Heiligtümer sollten, vom Spiegel eingefangen und mit nach Hause getragen, im alltäglichen Lebenskreise des Pilgers dem Gnadenerweis des Wallfahrtsortes Dauer geben und Verwandte und Freunde an dieser Gnade teilnehmen lassen.”

62. Köster, Gutenberg in Strassburg, 77; Köster, “Gutenbergs Straßburger Aachenspiegel-Unternehmen,” 44.

63. Geldner, “Der junge Johannes Gutenberg,” 71.

64. For the outlines of this comparison, I am indebted to Peter Strohschneider. See also Scribner, Sake of Simple Folk, 4–5; Koppitz, “Zum Erfolg Verurteilt,” 67–69 makes a similar observation about Gutenberg’s enterprises in Strasbourg and Mainz.

65. On the sibylline collections of de Barberiis and Eychmann, see De Clercq, “Les Sibylles,” 99–101.

66. Bühler, “Sibylla Weissagung,” 119–20.

CHAPTER 2

1. Kurze, “Lichtenberger,” 774; Kurze, Johannes Lichtenberger, 33–38.

2. Johannes von Lübeck, ISTC ij00376000, fol. 8v: “Anno millesimo quingentesimo tricesimo. Hic antechristus in summa sua potentia erit et gloria.” See Thorndike, “Three Astrological Predictions,” 345–47.

3. The ISTC (ia00748000) notes that the collection known as the Auctores vetustissimi is a “collection of spurious fragments purporting to be the work of Myrsilus Lesbius, Cato, Archilochus, Metasthenes, Xenophon (De aequivocis), Berosus, Manetho, and other Greek and Roman writers, but probably fabricated by Annius (Giovanni Nanni).”

4. Michael Francisci de Insulis, ISTC, if00295000, a1r: “Secundo suppono quod de antichristo per rationem naturalem nihil scire possumus. sed solum ex sacra scriptura et sanctis doctoribus.” On the Quaestio determinata of Johannes von Paltz, see Hamm, “Johann von Paltz,” 700.

5. Kurze, Johannes Lichtenberger, 10.

6. The attribution of both editions to Knoblochtzer was made by Voulliéme (“Zur Bibliographie Heinrich Knoblochtzers,” 148). On the dating of the German edition, see Talkenberger, Sintflut, 58 n. 19.

7. Kurze (Johannes Lichtenberger, 81–87) lists the Kistler edition of 1500 and the Schobser edition as extracts of the Prognosticatio, but these and the 1501 editions (unknown to Kurze), while shortened somewhat, contain nearly all sections from the original, reorganized into twelve chapters, and should be counted with the complete editions of the Prognosticatio. On these editions of 1500–1501, see Schmitt, “Text und Bild.” In Kurze’s list of Prognosticatio editions, the second and third items are identical, both referring to Knoblochtzer’s German edition. For the editions from Italian printers (three in 1492, another three in 1500, and several more in 1511 and later), see Fava, “La fortuna del pronostico di Giovanni Lichtenberger”; see also Niccoli, Prophecy and People, 136–39. For French reception of Lichtenberger in the sixteenth century, see Britnell and Stubbs, “Mirabilis Liber,” 129, 135.

8. Despite the argument of Zambelli, “Gustav-Hellmann-Renaissance,” 421, the Prognostico de eversione Europae attributed to Antonio Torquatus is a much slighter work than the Prognosticatio, and it went through only six editions in Germany between 1534–36 and four more before 1600—a quite respectable figure for a prognostic work, but nowhere near the degree of popularity enjoyed by Lichtenberger. On the prognostication of Torquatus (probably composed around 1527 and attributed to an Italian astrologer of the late fifteenth century), see Barnes, Prophecy and Gnosis, 80, 160–61; Reeves, Prophecy in the Later Middle Ages, 363–64.

9. On Lichtenberger’s biography and further literature, see Kurze, Johannes Lichtenberger, 7–12; Kurze, “Lichtenberger,” 770–71. Kurze’s book-length study remains the standard treatment of Lichtenberger, although Talkenberger’s Sintflut (55–110) treats some aspects of Lichtenberger’s life and work in greater detail.

10. Liliencron, Die historischen Volkslieder, 2:42–58.

11. Mentgen (Astrologie und Öffentlichkeit, 227–35) examines the slim evidence for Lichtenberger’s activity at the court of the emperor and other German noblemen.

12. Lichtenberger, ISTC il00204000, a3v: “SEd quid externa adduco suffragia sunt qui sciunt me sigillatim omnia que in hoc Reniviagio nec non alemanie partibus per grandia mala obvenerunt invidentibus nonnullis recte divinatus sum viginti quasi annis iam transactis.” Reniviagio, like the location “in vico umbroso subtus quercum Carpentuli” in the colophon, proved difficult for both contemporary and modern translators. The first German edition renders these passages as “an dem Rynströme und dütschen landen” and “In der fenstern gaßen underm gespeneten eychbaům.” The 1527 translation of Stephan Roth renders the first phrase also as “so an disem Reinstram / und auch an andern orten des Teuschen landes” but omitted the second passage, along with the rest of the original colophon. Thorndike (History of Magic, 4:474–75) reads “Remnagio (?)” and renders the phrase “in this Remagen (?) and in Swabian parts,” while confessing a failure to make sense of Carpentuli.

13. Pseudo-Methodius, ISTC im00522000, f1r: “sicut iam cernimus hec optime predixisse Johannem liechtenberger quendam mathematicum virum eruditum ex calculatione influentie teterrime coniunctis.” On Aytinger, see Zoepfl, “Wolfgang Aytinger.”

14. Kurze, Johannes Lichtenberger, 48–49; Creutzer, VD16 C 5806, a1r: “Practica Peter Creutzers / etwan des weit und hoch berhümpten Astronomus / meister Johann Liechtenbergers discipel / auff das M. D. XLvj. Jar gemacht.”

15. Panzer, Annalen, 229; Kurze, Johannes Lichtenberger, 33 n. 199.

16. Lichtenberger, ISTC il00210000, a1v–a2r. Except where noted, citations of the Prognosticatio will refer to the first German edition.

17. Lichtenberger, ISTC il00210000, h2v; Lichtenberger, ISTC il00204000, a3r: “Ego igitur innominabilis timens iram demonis exurgens in rure ut miser Ruth sequens boaz ac messores Antecessores Philosophos astrorum iudices in agro multarum fatigationum colligens grana spicasque diversarum scripturarum astrorum iudicum sentencias atque experientias quod ponderosa coniunctio superiorum planetarum portendat. quidne eclipsatio ac passio regis stellarum huic mundo predicet iusto astrorum iudicio in presens paginolum brevi stilo compegi ut legentibus patebit.”

18. Lichtenberger, ISTC il00210000, a5r: “ich ruff dich an. demütiglichen recken ich myn gefalten hende zů dir mit forcht bittende dü wullest mit dyner gewaltigen hulff dyner stern eigenschafft und örteil ire hefftigen inflüße uffenbaren dynen knecht Růth syn vernůnfft mit dem glantz dyner ewigen clarheit erluchten und richten in den weg der warheit erwecke myn vernünfft und verstentnůß bewege myn tzünge und ertzegye mir die rechte forme war zů sagen zůknfftige dynge.” Cf. Middelburg, ISTC ip00187550, a5r.

19. Lichtenberger, ISTC il00210000, a3r.

20. Müller, “Poet, Prophet, Politiker,” 112–15 and 118, here 115: “Im Gewande des Propheten steckt der Poet und gelehrte Historiker.” See also Wuttke, “Sebastian Brants Verhältnis zu Wunderdeutung und Astrologie.”

21. Virdung, VD16 V 1296, a2r–v: “welche ich teglich mit gebognen knyen mit inniclichen gebet bit dz er entzunde die kelt mynes hertzen. mit dem feüwer syner liebe. und erleücht myn blintheyt mit der clarheyt syner gegenwertigkeit. und geb mir zü erkennen den rech[t]en weg diser kunst.” On the Strasbourg edition, see Duntze, Matthias Hupfuff, 102.

22. Virdung, VD16 V 1259, a4v.

23. The most detailed treatment of Grünpeck is Talkenberger, Sintflut, 110–45. On Grünpeck’s prophetic self-construction, see Müller, “Poet, Prophet, Politiker,” 116. See also Czerny, “Humanist und Historiograph”; Russell, “Astrology as Popular Propaganda.”

24. Jakob Cammerlander published another edition around 1540 (VD16 G 3633) that lacked the twelfth and final chapter. Czerny (“Humanist und Historiograph,” 341, followed by Talkenberger, Sintflut, 114) and Russell (“Astrology as Popular Propaganda,” 188) incorrectly identify this as a separate work of Grünpeck.

25. Grünpeck, VD16 G 3642, a6r: “von dannen ist außgeflossen das geschray von der verwüstung der kirchen / und betrübung der gaystlichen / welcher gemeynen sag ursacher oder erdichter ist gewesen / ein frummer gerechter weyser man / eines gerechten hertzens / eines lawttern gewissen / und einer brinnenden liebe in got / der auß den selbigen dreyen abnemungen der künfftigen ding / das geschray hat lassen also außgeen in die gemeyn / welches fußstapfen nachvolgen wil ich in ordnung nach einander / und durch dreyerlay bewerungen anzaygen / was die selbigen ungefel sein werden.”

26. “Eyn auszug etlicher Practica und Prophiceyen. Sibille. Brigitte / Cirilli / Joachim des Abts / Methodij / vnd bruder Reinhartz / wirt weren noch etlich jar / vnd sagt von wunderlichen dingen.” The most extensive treatment of this work is Talkenberger, Sintflut, 145–53. Hammerstein and Talkenberger both refer to this tract as the “anonymous practica,” which is misleading, as the work is but one of many anonymous prophetic and prognostic works of the period, and, despite its own title, it bears little resemblance to a typical practica.

27. Lichtenberger, ISTC il00204000, a1r: “Pronosticatio in Latino. Rara et prius non audita que exponit et declarat non nullos celi influxus et inclinationem certarum constellacionum magne videlicet coniunctionis et eclipsis que fuerant istis annis quid boni malive hoc tempore et in futurum huic mundo portendant durabitque pluribus annis.”

28. See Jäggi, “Waldbruder, Prophet, Astrologe,” 173–74; Kurze, “Reinhard der Lollarde,” 1177–78.

29. Lichtenberger, ISTC il00210000, a4v. For detailed readings of this and other woodcuts in Lichtenberger’s Prognosticatio, see Talkenberger, Sintflut, 82–110. See also Baert, “Iconographical Notes to the Pronosticatio”; Kurze, Johannes Lichtenberger, 29–33.

30. Lichtenberger, ISTC il00206000, h4r. See Talkenberger, Sintflut, 106; this woodcut was originally used to represent Job in the Büchlein von dem heiligen Job, ISTC ij00221000. Weigand Han’s 1557 edition of the Prognosticatio (Lichtenberger, VD16 L 1606, a8v) identifies Lichtenberger with yet another Old Testament figure: the woodcut that, according to the title, should show the author praying with clasped hands and on bended knee shows King David with a crowned head and a lyre at his feet, raising his hands to heaven from within his bedchamber. As psalmist, David is not without all prophetic significance, of course, and an anonymous prophetic tract of 1522 predicts a “change in all things by the power of the most high, according to the prophecy of David” (Anonymous prophetic tracts, VD16 P 5062, a3v).

31. Lichtenberger, ISTC il00210000, a3r.

32. Lichtenberger, ISTC il00204000, f6r: “per peregrinum Ruth in nemoribus latitantem. Cuius oculi caligaverunt stilus tremet senio oppressus.”

33. On Nollhart, see Werren-Uffer, Der Nollhart von Pamphilus Gengenbach. On Gengenbach, see Prietzel, “Pamphilus Gengenbach.”

34. Goedeke, Pamphilus Gengenbach, 605–10.

35. The attribution in Barnes’s Prophecy and Gnosis (25) of 1503 as Brother Reinhard’s year of death appears to rest on a similar confusion of Lichtenberger and his source.

36. Seitz, VD16 S 5400, b1r: “Bruder Nolhard groß glawbens wirdig saget / wann Saturnus vnd Mars durch den großmechtigen leon krieg.”

37. Lichtenberger, VD16 W 4641; Zwickau Ratsschulbibliothek 24.8.18.(4).

38. Eis, Wahrsagetexte des Spätmittelalters, 69.

39. This is not to say that practical prognostic methods such as this could not be given prophetic significance, of course. In a 1570 Vision and Revelation of an Enraptured Woman in Childbed (Anschau, VD16 A 2905, fol. 4v), part of the woman’s vision includes opening oak galls and discovering large spiders within.

40. Baert, “Iconographical Notes to the Pronosticatio,” 160.

41. Talkenberger, Sintflut, 102: “Diese Regel will Lichtenberger durch den ‘waltsmid’ (H3a) namens Silvanus gelernt haben.”

42. Lichtenberger, ISTC il00210000, h3v: “Bruder Lolhart byn ich genant / den frauwen mach ich mich gern bekant. / Das ich die phennige von yne erkryege / dar umb ich zytlich smeichel und dryege.” See Kurze Die festländischen Lollarden,” 56.

43. Talkenberger, Sintflut, 96–97: “Das Bild mag dabei als Mahnung gemeint sein, wandernden Predigern gegenüber Vorsicht an den Tag zu legen und sich nicht betrügen zu lassen.” Hupfuff’s edition replaces the oak gall and Lollard woodcuts with the image of the Sibyl observing a star, for example, while the 1527 Wittenberg edition simply omits the Lollard woodcut. Other editions include the Lollard woodcut but omit the verse. A curious case is an edition of 1585 (VD16 L 1607) that retains the verse and caption for the Lollard but replaces the woodcut with the one showing all five of Lichtenberger’s prophetic authorities.

44. Cf. Kurze, Johannes Lichtenberger, 32:“Der Pronosticator hat die Zeichnungen zwar nicht selbst aufgeführt, aber die Anweisungen, die bei jedem Bild stehen und meist beginnen mit: hic debet stare . . . stammen wohl aus seiner Feder”; Talkenberger, Sintflut, 82: “Die Bilder der ‘Pronosticatio’ sind mit Überschriften versehen, durch die der Autor recht detaillierte Anweisungen zur Gestaltung der Holzschnitte gibt;” Friedrich, Astrologie und Reformation, 57: “Natürlich hatte Lichtenberger auch Sorge getragen, durch Holzschnitte die einzelnen Paragraphen bezeichnend genug zu illustriren, so daß die Schrift auch auf jene, welche sie nicht lesen konnten, den entsprchenden Eindruck zu machen geeignet war.” For examples of publishers’ control of column titles, see Rolle, “Titel und Überschrift,” 291–92.

45. Lichtenberger, ISTC il00204000, f6v–f7r: “Hic debet stare ramus querci cum foliis et super foliis poma querci,” “Hic debet stare lulhardus et dicere versus sequentes”; ISTC il00210000, h3r–v: “Hie nach sal sten eyn eychenbaüm ast myt synen blyddern und driien eycheppffeln,” “Hie sal sten eyn lolhart und sal sprechen dyeße wort.”

46. Wilken, Christlich bedencken (VD16 W 2917), p. 28; Wilken (see Stievermann, “Lercheimer”) had been a student of Melanchthon, whose opinion of Carion had been much higher than Wilken’s. Simitz, VD16 S 6494 (= Friess, VD16 F 2846), a2r: “Gleicher gestalt ist auch bey unsern zeiten ein fürtrefflicher Mann gewesen / nemlich / Johannes Carion genandt / welcher auch etliche Jar zůvor die erschröckliche Empörung / so sich / wie jederman im Reich weyß / zůgetragen hat / verkündigt / Und was er in seiner Practica (welche außgangen ist / im 1536. Jar / unnd hat gewerdt biß in das 1554. Jar) beschriben hat / ist eigentlich also ergangen.” On Carion, see Reisinger, Historische Horoskopie; Kuhlow, “Johannes Carion”; Fürst and Hamel, Johann Carion; Strobel, Miscellaneen literarischen Inhalts, 141–208 (here 141); the essays in Osterloh, Himmelszeichen und Erdenwege. On the success of Carion’s chronicle, see Lerner, Powers of Prophecy, 170–71.

47. On this tract, see Fricke-Hilgers, “Sintflutprognose des Johann Carion.” The Leipzig printer Wolfgang Stöckel used a woodcut from his 1522 edition of Grünpeck’s Speculum as a title illustration for his editions in the same year of Carion’s prognostication (VD16 C 1033–34). This woodcut is based on and shows a scene identical to the title woodcuts of the first Speculum editions, with a church suffering bombardment by stones and fire from the heavens and collapsing in flames in the background, while in the foreground, armed men deceitfully attack various peaceful members of society from behind—a man and woman kneeling together at prayer (with the woman perhaps holding an infant), a kneeling bishop, and a mother and child; only a merchant or scholar has drawn a dagger to defend himself, although, by all appearances, he is reacting too late.

48. On d’Ailly’s prediction of the Antichrist’s advent in 1789, see Smoller, History, Prophecy, and the Stars, 105–6.

49. Carion, VD16 C 966, a2r: “ANdächtiger und wirdiger Herr / Es geen hyn und wider / jha allenthalben in disen unnsern Jarenn Propheceyen und weyssagung auß / yetz vonn dysem / dann von jhenem. Etlich auß aygnem gůt duncken / der selbigen schreyber oder propheten. Auch ettlich auß einem grund / der doch byß anher wenig gesehen sein Deßhalben ich es darfür hab / dz sie die Bůchtrucker selb etwann erdichten / also under dz volck für Newe mer außgiessen und blasen solche propheceyen hoch auff / und geben inen ein solchen waydelichen und tapffern Titel / dz der leser so er dye ansichtig wirt nit wol underlassen kan / můß eyne kauffen. Und so er dann in die Materi kumpt / ist es mit einem quarck versiglet / und etwann die vorred lenger / dann dz gantze werck / davon der titel lautent ist. Derhalben Andächtiger herr ich bewegt wirt / Ein Prognostication / nach warer und gründtlicher himlischer Influxion / zů practiciern / mit vil nachvolgenden jaren werende biß man schreyben wirt nach der gepurt Christi fünfftzehenhundert und viertzig jar.”

50. Carion, VD16 ZV 17958. Carion’s aggravation did not prevent Rhau from printing the first edition of Carion’s Chronica in 1532.

51. Carion, VD16 C 973, a2r–v: “DUrchleuchtiger hochgeborner Fürst und Herr / mit erbietung meiner gantz unterthenigen gehorsamen und pflichtigen diensten gegen E.F.G. zu allen zeyten zuvoran / Gnediger Herr / nach dem und / ich / in betrachtung des gemeinen sprüchworts / Welcher das sein verbringt / der thůt keinem andern abbruch / wer aber kůnst verhelet / und nicht mitteylet (wie einem yeden menschen beforder die auß den öbersten einflüssen / und zuneygungen herkummen) der selb thůt vilen vnrecht. Dieweyl ich dann fasther spüre und siehe / das yetz teglich hin und wider / ia garnahe allenthalben / in disen unsern zeyten Propheceyhen und Practiken außgehen / yetz von disem dann von yhenem / unnd der merertheyl (als ich merck) auß eygnem gůtduncken der selben warsager oder vermeinten Astronomis / Etlich auch auß einem grundt / der doch biß anher gantz wenig gefunden seyhen. Der halben ich es dafür acht / das die etwa die Bůchtrücker/ oder andere unerfarne inn diser kunst von inen selb erdichten (dieweyl kein recht ordnung oder proceß in den selben gehalten / Brauchen auch der kunst terminos und namen nicht recht) und also unter das gemein volck für newe mehr außgiessen / unnd darzu geben sie solchen Prophezeyhen einen solchen weydlichen und dapffern tittel / das der leser so er die ansichtig wird nicht wol unterlassen kan / muß eine kauffen / und so man dann in die materi (der maister hemmerlein) kumpt / ist es (weyß nit womit) versigelt. Der wegen gnediger Herr / würdt ich auff [2v] das newe bewegt zu ehren E.F.G. unnd nutz sunst aller menschen mein Prognostication so ich ungefar vor vier iaren gemacht (die dannocht one mein willen in den trůck kam) und yetz auff das new hinder meinen růck getrůckt / mit anhang etlicher loser fratzen / Lolhartz / Brigiti / Methodii etc. denen ich all mein leben gram gewesen / Und darzu gehen sie auß keinem grundt / hette derhalben wol mögen leyden so sie ye mein Practik trücken hetten wöllen / das sie es bey meinen worten bleyben hetten lassen / dörfften mir weder Mönch / Nolbrüder oder Nonnen träum hinein schreyben. Diß alles zu confutiern würd ich gereytzt / die zuverbessern unnd verlengen / biß man schreyben würdt nach der geburt Christi Fünftzehenhundert / unnd Fünfftzig Jar / wer als denn leben würdt / mag die weyter erstrecken.”

52. Lichtenberger, ISTC il00210000 and il00204000, a3r.

53. The chronology of these editions is problematic. The dedication in the earliest editions of the Interpretation and Revelation is dated the Saturday after St. Catherine, or December 1, 1526. Carion’s dedication to Joachim I is dated the Feast of Holy Innocents, or December 28, 1529, which would be three years, rather than four, after the first edition. Also in his dedication to Joachim I, Carion refers to an edition combining his work with the Extract of Various Prophecies; Rhau’s edition, the only such edition known, bears the year 1530. Either Carion’s revision has been dated incorrectly to 1529, when a date of 1530 would comport better with the appearance of Rhau’s edition and the passage of four years since the composition of the Interpretation and Revelation in 1526, or an edition similar to Rhau’s had appeared already in 1529; the delay between 1529 and the first editions of the extended version in 1531 raises further questions.

54. Carion, Chronica fol. 169 r-v: “Und wil hie den leser widderumb verinnern / des spruchs Eliae droben gesatzt / das die welt sol 6 tausent jar bleiben / Nu sind inn diesem jar nach der geburt Christi 1532 ongeferlich 5474 jar nach anfang der welt / Derhalben zu hoffen / wir sind nu nicht fern vom Ende / Dabey ist zu mercken / das wir deste fursichtiger sein sollen / so wir hören / das die letzte zeit da sey / Denn alle schrifft drewet / Ja auch der himel selb mit schrecklichen zeichen / Finsternus und Coniunction / das zur letzten zeit grosse zerruttung der Christlichen Kirchen und aller Regiment komen werde.”

55. Lerner, Powers of Prophecy, 167–72. Phillip Melanchthon was heavily involved with the publication of Carion’s chronicle, and it is difficult to separate the contributions of Carion and Melanchthon with complete certainty. See Bauer, “Chronica Carionis.”

56. See Reisinger, Historische Horoskopie, 253–54; Adelung, Geschichte der menschlichen Narrheit, 3:123.

57. Carion, VD16 C 973, g2v: “Und sage / das nachvolgende wort sich nicht lenger erstrecken / dann ungefar biß in das .1560. Jar / Darumb wer oren hab der hör etc.”

58. Carion, VD16 C 973, g2r: “Hernach volgt ein Prophecey oder weyssagung Magistri Johannis Carionis Buetickeymensis.”

59. The prophecy of Brother Raimund in the mid-sixteenth century is, in fact, the “Auffahrt Abend” prophecy that had been included with the Reformation of Kaiser Sigismund in the mid-fifteenth century, which is, in turn, none other than the thirteenth-century Visio fratris Johannis. See Kelly, “Visio fratris Johannis,” for the earliest history of this prophecy; see Deane, “Auffahrtabend Prophecy,” for its late fourteenth-century adaptation into German.

60. Adelung, Geschichte der menschlichen Narrheit, 3:119.

CHAPTER 3

1. On the Burden of the World in relation to Birgitta’s revelations and its manuscript and print transmission, see Montag, Birgitta von Schweden, 151–96, which also provides a complete Latin and German edition.

2. Montag, Birgitta von Schweden, 253: “Ein yeczlicher mensch, in des hende diß büchlein kumpt, der sol das bewarn mit fleiß und dornoch arbaiten, das dise dinck, die hie ynnen geschriben sein andern leüten offenbar werden. Und wer diß büchlein hat, der sol das nicht allayn leihen andern leüten, sunder er sol sie auch dorzu ziehen und yn es ein sprechen, auf daz er bey got in dem zukünftigen leben dester grösern lon enpfohen müg, wann do geschriben stet: Wer mich offenbar macht, der würt haben das ewig leben. Ein yeczlicher mensch, der do wil lasen aus schreiben das büchlein, das genant ist die bürde der werlt, der sol das lasen schreiben in sülcherley mose, als das es an ym selbs ein büchlein sey gesundert von andern büchern, auff das es müg dester bas in bekantniß vil leüth kumen. Wann wer es, daz diß büchlein gemengt würd unter ein ander gros buch, so wer es vil noch verlorn und möcht auch niht als offenbar werden, seintenmol daz nun gar wennig lewt sein, die durchgen und durchforschen mit fleiß die materia der grosen bücher.”

3. Montag, Birgitta von Schweden, 303: “Ab der wol selig ist, der do list oder hört die wort diser prophecey, als oben geschriben ist an dem xij capitel, doch ist der vil selliger, der do lieb hat zu den seln und zu der ere gotes, und arbait noch seinem vermügen mit vernunft dornoch, daz die prophecien den leüten offenbar werden.”

4. Montag, Birgitta von Schweden, 308. “Ex quo patere potest, quod predicator, id est speculator populi christiani, audiens hec in lectione a deo tenetur hec annunciare populo eidem, quia sicut dicit Isidorus: Cum legimus, deus nobiscum loquitur. Et ideo cum hec verba Christi predicta quis predicator legit, sequitur, quod illa a Christo audit. Et sic per consequens sequitur, quod ea ex mandato Christi tenetur annunciare populo, cuius est speculator.” The German translation rearranges these sentences but retains the basic sense.

5. Sibyl’s Prophecy, ISTC is00492630, a1r: “WIltu warlich kunfftig ding sagen / So soltu diß buch im sinn tragen / Und ermessen zeit. land. leut. und zeichen / Wirstu gewiß die warheit erreichen.”

6. Lichtenberger, ISTC il00210000, a3r–v: “NIemant ist eyn gůt richter der dynge die er nyt en weiß spricht Aristoteles aber die erfarn syn in viilen sachen und künsten und die Philosophii handeln sprechen das alle naturliche geschicht auch etwan viil von eygen willen werden angefangen und vollenfurt durch die Influße der hymelschen corper Als auch Aristoteles spricht das diße welt sii glich nach der obersten bewegůng der hymel das alle yr crafft von den selben regert werde. Und dar sullen die unwißen ire dörheit heymlich halten nyt hynderclaffen das yr unwißenheit nyt in tag kome. Und ab sye erfarn und gelert weren in etlichen dyngen so syn sye doch unwißen in den dyngen die unden bemelt werden der sye nyt mochten richter und urteiler syn.” Cf. Eberhard Schleusinger or Konrad Heingarter(?), ISTC ic00784000, fol. 1r. On Schleusinger, see Brévart, “Schleusinger.”

7. Tract against the Turks (printed with pseudo–Vincent Ferrer, On the End of the World, ISTC if0012500), fol. 49v.

8. Grünpeck, VD16 G 3641 (Latin), a6v; VD16 G 3642 (German), a6r.

9. Faber, ISTC if00005200, a1r; Glotz, ISTC ic00474100, a2v; Virdung, VD16 V 1284, a2r.

10. Lichtenberger, VD16 D 1456. Below the title woodcut of the struggle between an aged Saturn with scythe and crutch and a lunar peasant who grasps the horns of an ox while the sign of the scorpion hovers behind them, the caption reads, “Der Natürlich mensch vernympt nichts vom gayst Gotes .i. Cor. ii.”

11. Hsia, Trent 1475, 56; see also Flasch, “Ideen und Medien,” 33.

12. Widmann, “Buchdruck als Gottesgeschenk,” 270; Geldner, “Gutachten über den Druck,” 86–88.

13. For this incident concerning Hupfuff and his plans to print Thomas Murner’s satirical Geuchmatt in Strasbourg, see Duntze, Matthias Hupfuff, 14–17.

14. Seger, VD16 S 5308, a1r: “vil gůts des man hoffet und arges so man sorget durch vor verkündung alls mit fleyß erlangen als fürkommen mag.”

15. McGinn, Visions of the End, 84.

16. Seybold, ISTC is00485700, a4r: “wann mars und mercurius seynd die menschen bewegen zů krieg hader und widerspennung des volckes wider ir obergisten und rachnung wyder die den sy von gerechtikeit wegen gehorsam seyn solten.”

17. Ferrer, ISTC if00125000, fol. 22v: “Die layen werdent also unwürß wyder die gelerten das sy mainen sy thůenn gott eyn dienst. wenn syß tötten und zertreten.” On Ferrer and this tract, see Honemann, “Ferrer.”

18. Brelochs, VD16 B 7425, b1r–v: “Das gemain volck wirdt den merern teyl arbeyten umb einigkeyt Aber etlich zenckische und widerspennige menschen / werden hin und wider vil heymliche anschlege versuchen / entgegen sein irer Obrigkeyt / und auffrürisch vermerkt / Aber solche buben werden zu dem letsten iren lone empfangen.”

19. Wilhelm Friess, VD16 ZV 6207, a3r: “Unter der Gemein soll ein grosser auffrůhr wider die Herren entstehn / die Edelleüt werden die verräther außkündigen / und zum Schwerd uberantworten / werden inen nemmen alle ir Gůt und Reichtumb / unnd in keinem schutz oder fride hinfort zůhaben zůlassen.”

20. Talkenberger (Sintflut, 150–52) discusses this edition (VD16 A 4443) at length.

21. Müller, “Poet, Prophet, Politiker,” 107: “Durch den Druck potenziert sich die Gefahr.”

22. Grünpeck, VD16 G 3641, b1r: “Et homines iniqui et perversi: diabolorum suggestione: pleraque odii discordiae et proeliorum semina: sub prophetiarum forma in vulgum effundunt: ut inde sacrilegii: furtorum et cedium segetes excrescentes: universum religionis ordinem confundant”; VD16 G 3642, a6r: “damit alle menschliche und götliche ordnungen zerrüttet werden / und die laster die gantzen welt ubergeen.”

23. Lichtenberger, ISTC il00204000, f1v–f2r (cf. ISTC il00210000 [Latin], e2r): “Dan wan der wise man und wol reddende zů synen erkentlichen iaren kompt wirt er vermircken die bewegüng der hymel und als dan ym folck bewegüng anfahen er wirt das folck ermanen und yme mit zerlichen redden anlygen und in mancherley geberden das gemůde des folcks stricken und wirt die neigüng und bewegüng bestedigen vorsagen nůtz und schaden dem folck kommen wirt da von sie under sich gestircket werden und machen eynüng und pact sich in iren wercken zů halten nach der gestalt der inflüße. dan Arestotiles spricht in dem buch von der gebort das in den glichen dyngen ist lychtlich eyns yns ander zü brengen. Wan nün also bewegüng ym folck ist so ist es destabeßer dar zů zübrengen so es vernymmet das neygüng der stern und ire beger nyt fast von eyn ist dan mag man yne lycht predigen so gereide erweckt und entzůndet ist das gemůde des folcks als wan eyn kale enwenig funckelges und fuers hat so bleset man so lange das er gantz bornende wirt. Also wirt der obgemelt prophet uff wecken die sele uff rore freude und frolichkeit und kriege und ander an inflůße der stern ym folck. Dießer man. wirt er han erkentniß ym gestirn oder der zůkünfftigen dynge ander wißenheit dürch glychniß figüren oder byldüng wirt er das folck anfuren mit synen zerlichen worten künsten und behenden zeichgyn unnd sie also leyten und uberkommen das sie werden yne ußruffen vor eyn propheten unnd sich flißen sinen gesetzen anhangen als sie sere gotlich syn und das von forcht und liebe.”

24. Creutzer, VD16 C 5802, a3v: “In den lendern wirt er mit sein discipeln wunderbarliche sermones predigen und zeichen thůn / schrifft lassen außgeen allenthalben im land nit an eym / sonder an vil enden.”

25. These and the following percentages are based on data from ISTC, VD16, and Duntze, Matthias Hupfuff, 87.

26. Ohly and Sack, Inkunabelkatalog, no. 2409; GW M35182. This edition is not recorded in bibliographies of Schobser’s editions, including Schottenloher, Hans Schobser; Geldner, “Unbekannte Drucke Hans Schobsers”; and Lang, “Ein Almanach auf 1501.” The data is according to ISTC and VD16.

27. Duntze, Matthias Hupfuff, 87–89.

28. Künast, Getruckt zu Augspurg, 240–42.

29. Birgitta, VD16 B 5596, [1]2r: “das es nit allein denen / die der lateinischen sprach erkantnuss haben / sonder auch allen andernn durch deütsche sprach verstentdlich und in lateinischer und deütscher sprach getruckt würde”; [1]2v, “dardurch dises göttlich puch nach dem waren rechten Original in latein und deütsch gerecht getruckt / und den gelerten und ungelerten zu erkantnuss und verstendtnuss bracht.”

30. Capistor, VD16 C 807, a1v: “als ein yegklicher wol wirdt hören und lesen in diser teütschen Practica / und vil mer erforschen wirdt in meiner latinischen Practica / da ich alle beschribne stück mit der edeln schrifft Astrologey bewert hab gründtlichen.”

31. Virdung, ISTC iv00302259, b2r: “Diß iare entscheinen vil lichte corper in der lufft und in etlichen stetten die gleich gefunden werden den stern dy man nennet Cometen als ich dann bezeigt han ursachlich in dem latein.”

32. Tannstetter, VD16 T 171, a2v: “ursach darauß sollichs befunden wirt / find man in dem lateinischen Judicio / seynd hye von kurtz wegen außgelassen.”

33. Lichtenberger, ISTC il00210000, b1r: “DAs ich die leser nyt teube und irem gemüde nyt verdrießliche werde wil ich dißs buch deylen in drii deil und furter die selben in ander deil ob es die nöt erfordern wurde das die leser begriffen und die hörer versten mögen wie diße understen dinge in dißer welt von den obersten regert werden. In dem ersten deyl lern wie das schifflin des heilgen sant Peters in der ungestymigkeit und betrubniß dißer welt lyden wirt mit synen stucken Und das du salt flelichen bitten vor alles cristen volck. In dem andern deil wirt ercleret das heilige Riche und wie die weltlichen sich haben werden das důt Du salt beschirmen mit gewapenter hant. Im dritten wirt uffenbart der leyen staet. der furter gedeilt wirt das wil Dü salt arbeyten das dü die andern enthaldest Und also wirt nyemant ußgeschloßen.”

34. On the motif of tripartite society, see Kemp, “Du aber arbeite”; for an extensive discussion of this woodcut in the various editions of Lichtenberger’s Prognosticatio, see Talkenberger, Sintflut, 88–91, and, at somewhat greater length, Talkenberger, “Der ‘Stände-Holzschnitt.’”

35. Carion, VD16 ZV 17958, f3v: “Du Bapst / Bischoff / sampt ewrn stenden / Solt hertzlich gebet fur wenden / Du Keyser sampt der Ritterschafft / Beschütz / mach fried mit heeres krafft. / Du bawer deiner arbeit wart / Das fordert Gott der vater hart.” The same verse has been added by hand opposite the woodcut of the three estates in a copy of Hans Lufft’s 1527 edition (Coburg Landesbibliothek Cas. A 1659, d2v).

36. Lichtenberger, VD16 L 1597, a2v: “Hat er doch zu sich genomen / beyde seine Engel und uns menschen / durch wilche er wil regiren / das wir mit yhm / und er mit uns wircke / Denn wie wol er kundte / weib und kind / haus und hof / on uns regiren / neeren und beschirmen / so wil ers doch durch uns thun / und setzet ein den vater odder hausherrn und spricht / Sey vater und mutter gehorsam. Und zum vater / Zeuch und lere deine kinder. Item also kundt er auch wol on könige / fursten / herrn und richter / weltlich regiren / fride halten und die bösen straffen / Er wil aber nicht / sondern teilet das schwerd aus und spricht / straffe die bösen / schutze die frumen und handthabe den friden. Wie wol ers doch selbs durch uns thut / und wir nur seine larven sind / unter wilcher er sich verbirget und alles ynn allen wirckt / wie wir Christen das wol wissen. Gleich wie er auch ym geistlichen regiment seiner Christen / selbs alles thut / leret / trostet / straffet / und doch den Aposteln das wort / ampt und dienst eusserlich befilhet das sie es thun sollen. Also braucht er uns menschen / beyde ynn leiblichem und geistlichem regiment / die wellt und alles was drynnen ist / zu regiren.” Luther’s entire preface is published in Warburg, Heidnisch-antike Weissagung, 81–86.

37. Neske, Spätmittelalterliche deutsche Sibyllenweissagung, 255.

38. Neske, Spätmittelalterliche deutsche Sibyllenweissagung, 266–67, 270, 272–73.

39. Grünpeck, VD16 G 3642, a3a (German); VD 16 G 3641, a3b (Latin). On the woodcuts in Grünpeck’s Speculum, see also Talkenberger, Sintflut, 126–42. For this woodcut specifically, see Scribner, Sake of Simple Folk, 168.

40. Grünpeck, VD16 G 3642, a6v, a7v.

41. Grünpeck, VD16 G 3642, b6r.

42. Extract of Various Prophecies, VD16 A 4436, b3v–b4r: “Alle stendt der welt haben sich verkert / Darumb wirt mit plagen sie groß gemert.”

43. Gengenbach, VD16 G 1205, a1v: “Nun hören zů mein lieben leüt / Was ich eüch kürtzlich hie bedeüt / Von ettlichen stenden dyser wält / Der sich doch keiner me recht helt. / Geistlich / wältlich / ritter / knecht / Und dar zů als fröwisch gschlecht.”

44. Gengenbach, VD16 G 1210, a1v: “Ober und under seint all gleich / gewaltig in der sünden reich.” On the later version, see Werren-Uffer, Der Nollhart von Pamphilus Gengenbach, 172–84.

45. Müller, “Poet, Prophet, Politiker,” 122–23.

46. Neske, Spätmittelalterliche deutsche Sibyllenweissagung, 256: “Dise red lan wir vnterwegen / vnd sagen, wy sy vertriben yr leben / mit mancher hande sach uf erden—/ nu hort: do Adam begont alt warden.”

47. Sibyl’s Prophecy, ISTC is00492630; see the title illustrations in Schanze, “Fragment vom Weltgericht,” 58–61. The king and the prophet also form the title illustration of two early sixteenth-century editions of the Somnia Danielis dictionary of dream interpretation (VD16 S 7004, 7006), where Daniel, as the interpreter of dreams, expounds before a kneeling Nebuchadnezzar. Melchior Ramminger used a woodcut with the same configuration to illustrate the title page of his 1525 edition of Jodocus Eichmann’s sibylline compilation (VD16 E 649). Jakob Köbel’s earlier 1516 edition of Eichmann’s work (Prophecies of the Twelve Sibyls, VD16 ZV 11992) expanded the constellation of figures in a composed woodcut following the introductory verse, where a scholar or cleric on the left is paired with a king on the right who look in on the Sibyl.

48. Lichtenberger, ISTC il00203000, fols. 1r, 2v–3r. The title block is on fol. 1r: “per me iohannem lichtenberg In urbe argentina. Domino imperatori et principibus manu mea propria presentata” (GW M18213). On this edition, see Kurze, “Lichtenberger,” 772.

49. Lichtenberger, ISTC il00210000, b3r.

50. Lichtenberger, ISTC il00210000, c5r, c4r, d1r, d3r, e1v.

51. Walasser, VD16 W 793, fol. 4r: “Will man aber frucht unnd nutz auß disen Büchlin schöpffen / so merck ein jeder / weß standes er ist / was ihm gesagt sey / und nit / was eim andern gesagt ist. Dann so ich / als ein Lay / mich vil bekümmern wolt umb der Geistlichen mängel und gebrechen / und aber deß nit achten / was mir und meinem hauffen gesagt ist / so were das hinder herfür kört / und ich wurd mehr schaden dann nutz davon bringen Darumb mercken die Geistlichen auff das ir / und die Weltlichen auff das ir / und komb ein jeder seinem berüff fleißig nach.”

52. Goetsch, “Leserfiguren,” 204.

53. Middelburg, ISTC ip00184800, a2r: “De fatis tue Illustrissime dominationis princeps invictissime nihil scribam: sed ore omnia particulariter referam.”

54. Schynnagel, ISTC is00335600, c6v: “Solch rumor halb / ich vermiden / yetzmals / vil mer nott durfftiger naturlicher loff zebetutten: und sunder ettlich verhalt hie zebeschriben dem gehaim euwer kunglich maiestat allain zu komen werde: dem gemainen man uß miltigkait / nit als bald geoffenbart.”

55. Virdung, VD16 V 1255, a1v: “Durchleuchtigister Hochgeborner Churfürst / wiewol ich nit willens gewest bin meyn außlegung Die ich ewern Churfürstlichen gnaden gemacht habe uber den Cometen der diß jare gesehen worden ist in druck zůgeben. Doch bin ich bewegt worden solchs zůthun und an tag kommen lassen / eyns außzügs meiner außlegung / von wegen etzlicher unverstendigen menschen die auch felschlich uber den Cometen geschriben haben.”

CHAPTER 4

1. Bierende, “Warnung vor dem Bilde,” 275–77.

2. The exception is Grünpeck, VD16 G 3645. Cammerlander’s abbreviated edition (VD16 G 3633) has two woodcuts recognizably based on the original editions, but the rest of the images are taken from editions of Lichtenberger, other prognostic works, or other sources.

3. Lichtenberger, VD16 L 1605–6 (“mit seinen vil seltzamen figuren”), ZV 9653 (“mit Schönen Figuren zugericht”). The woodcuts in the Prognosticatio have been analyzed by Kurze (Johannes Lichtenberger, 29–31), Baert (“Iconographical Notes to the Pronosticatio,” 142–43, largely following Kurze), and Talkenberger (Sintflut, 83, 108–9). The interrelationship between image and prophecy finds a unique expression in the person of Hans Schrotbanck, who was both the artist who provided woodcut illustrations for Schobser’s editions of Lichtenberger and an author of two practicas in his own right. Known works by Schrotbanck include a broadside Practica auf das Jahr 1490 and two editions of a highly idiosyncratic practica for the years 1502 and following with illustrations by Schrotbanck himself. On Schrotbanck, about whom little is known, see Duntze, Matthias Hupfuff, 101–2.

4. Lichtenberger, VD16 L 1597, fol. 2v: “Darumb ist zu sehen / ob die selbige kunst auch etwas vermüge und könne zutreffen / denn ich selbs diesen Lichtenberger nicht weis an allen orten zuverachten / Hat auch etliche ding eben troffen / sonderlich mit den bilden und figuren nahe hin zu geschossen / schier mehr denn mit den worten.”

5. Lichtenberger, ISTC il00210000, b1r.

6. On the form and use of this schematic, see Grafton, Cardano’s Cosmos, 22–37.

7. Although there are undoubtedly earlier examples, the earliest example known to me of the astrological square as a title illustration is in Christophorus de Glotz’s practica for 1496, ISTC ic00474100.

8. Middelburg, ISTC ip00184600, a1v, a2r: “Addidit preterea picturas quasdam inanes mulierum parturiensium religiosorum altercantium immo se invicem parcutientium gallorum kokkizantium antichristi quoque docentis ac imperatoris romam populantis. aliasque diversas regum et principum picturas immiscuit. ut mutato vultu laborem nostrum sibi possit usurpare. et ne nostra solum recitasse videretur preter ea que de future propheta minore conscripsimus novi aliquid afferre conatus”; “Sed quod nulla immutatione facta seriem verborum et ordinem furatus sibi usurpaverit nulla unquam de me facta mentione haudquaquam ferendum putavi.” On woodcuts as source attributions, see also Talkenberger, Sintflut, 82–87.

9. Seger, VD16 S 5305, b4v: “Darumb das auch die hochgelerten diser und andrer künsten dest baß meiner fürgenommen mainung bericht empfahen / und mir sonderliche dichtung nit zůgemessen werde / so hab ich die figur des hymels anfangs diß jars eingang / des Sonnen in wider hievor gesetzt.”

10. Carion, VD16 C 962, b1r: “Was aber himlische Influxion anzaigen / auch was die alten weysen durch ir Experientz oder erfarung haben / will ich eröffnen / und damit ich solchs dester kürtzer beschreybe ist nit von nötten zů yedem bedeütnuß sein ursach setzen / Aber des jars anfang auff stund und minuten anzaigen / Welchem nach / ain yeder halberfarner in Astronomia alweg sein Figur machen mag / und meine bedeütnussen nit on ainen grund sehen wirt / und ainem yeden der mich fragen wirt / allen beschaid gern sagen.”

11. Tannstetter, VD16 T 160, a2r: “Den dise iar hat man etlich größ zetel und büchel mit vilen wunderlichen und öden gemelen / auch vorsagung auf das .xxiiii. jar / umbgefürt / die ich nit für ains gelerten rechtgeschaffnen man arbait achte / sonder für ein gedicht eines trückers oder landtfarers.”

12. Wilken, Christlich bedencken (VD16 W 2917), 122: “Nich desto weniger findet man zůzeit meister / die bucher lassen außgehen mit figuren und gemälen / wie die hexen von teufeln durch die lufft auff pferden / böcken gefürt werden: wie sie mit einander bancketieren / tantzen / bulen. Stellen also dem gemeinen unverstendigen man dermassen abscheuliche / heßliche treume und lügen fur augen / damit er desto mehr wider solche aberwitzige unselige weiber verbittert und angehetzet werde. Damit sie zwar dem teufel ein angenemmen dinst thun: helffen im seine mord fördern.”

13. Lichtenberger, ISTC il00210000 (German), b1v–b3r; cf. ISTC il00204000 (Latin), b1r–b2r.

14. Lichtenberger, ISTC il00210000 (German), d1r; ISTC il00204000 (Latin), f4v.

15. Talkenberger, Sintflut, 107.

16. Curschmann, “Epistemological Perspectives,” 5.

17. Talkenberger, Sintflut, 74–76; Scribner, Sake of Simple Folk, 244.

18. Lichtenberger, ISTC il00210000 (German), g3v–g4r: “an den hangt die gantz freude der geselschafft und die gantz getzierde des hüßes und die glich als die claren stern die da schynen in den größten freude got in yren angesichten getziret hat”; cf. ISTC il00204000 (Latin), f2v–f3r.

19. Lichtenberger, ISTC il00210000 (German), g4v; ISTC il00204000 (Latin), f3r.

20. Lichtenberger, ISTC il00210000 (German), f6v–g2v; ISTC il00204000 (Latin), e5v–f1v.

21. On pseudo-Methodius, see Möhring, Weltkaiser der Endzeit, 54–104; Kmosko, “Rätsel des Pseudomethodius”; McGinn, Visions of the End, 70–76; Stöllinger-Löser, “Pseudo-Methodius.”

22. On the identity of the Furter editions ISTC im00526200 (“[after 1500?]”) and VD16 M 4936 (“[1504]”), cf. Günthart, Deutschsprachige Literatur im frühen Basler Buchdruck, 351–53. On the images in Furter’s editions, see also Kurze, Johannes Lichtenberger, 49–50. On Brant as editor of Methodius, see Ludwig, “Eine unbekannte Variante,” 275–99.

23. Pseudo-Methodius, ISTC im00524000, a1v: “Hortaris me crebro: interpella-cionibus quoque assiduis efflagitas amantisime pater: quatenus Methodii Euboici presulis sanctissimi: beateque hildegardis virginis revelationes quas vocant: in picturatas redigere non dedigner tabellas. Motus fortassis gregoriane constitutionis lectione: qua scriptum reliquit. picturam rerum gestarum esse necessariam: Nam quod legentibus scriptura. hoc et idiotis prestat pictura cernentibus quia in ipsa ignorantes vident quid sequi debeant. in ipsa legunt qui litteras nesciunt Unde et precipue imperitis pro lectione pictura est. Tuo igitur iussu deo amabilis pater: tuoque suasu hanc quam coram cernis popularem subii provinciam. Tabulas utcumque sculpendas ordinavi: quo facilius spiritus prophetici multis innotescat vaticinium.” On Brant’s citation of Gregory in the Narrenschiff, see Rosenfeld, “Sebastian Brant und Albrecht Dürer,” 328.

24. Grünpeck, VD16 G 3641, c6r: “nisi forte non nullos picture afflixerint. quorum sermo esse posset: viro gravi et sacerdoti indignum omnimo esse et ludibriosum: his levibus et puerilibus oblectamentis indulgere. his facile respondebo. cum omnia bonarum artium studia ad tantum contemptum redacta sunt: quod ne ante pedes quidem iacentes clerici: luxu avaricia et crapula prepediti tollerent: quid quam longa pertractos serie sermones lectitare deberent. opereprecium est: scripturarum tenor: picturarum formis et figuris exprimatur: quibus occupatus animus non tamdiu quemadmodum in legendo fieri solet defatigetur. Et si lectio vel tedio vel negligentia pretermissa: parum fructus attulerit: picture a periculis conservent.”

25. Kurze (“Popular Astrology and Prophecy,” 192) remarks on the visual ambiguity of the woodcuts in the Prognosticatio.

26. Lichtenberger, ISTC il00210000, e3r, b5r, e1r.

27. Bruder Claus, ISTC ic00708900, a4v: “UNd er hůb widerumb an cůz reden und sprach czů mir. ob mich nitt verdruß ich wolt dich auch sehen lassen. mein půch darinn ich lern unnd sůch die kunst diser lere Und er trůg mir her verzaichnet ein figur in der geleichnus als ein rad mit sechs spaichen. in diser gestalt als hernach volget.” Stirnimann (Der Gottesgelehrte Niklaus von Flüe, 141–93, 300–31) edits and comments extensively on the tract; see also Huber, Der göttliche Spiegel, 17–59, which treats the differences between the fictive image and the actual meditative image owned by Nikolaus von Flüe.

28. The fundamental work on the papal prophecies is Grundmann, “Die Papstprophetien des Mittelalters.” The most extensive treatment of the history of the image cycle is Heffner, “Eyn Wunderliche Weyssagung,” with further literature; on the incident of censorship, see 108–9; see also Stöllinger-Löser, “Vaticinia de summis pontificibus.” On the edition of Osiander and Sachs, see also Heffner, “Regnum vs. Sacerdotium in a Reformation Pamphlet.” Weidmann’s “Die Vaticinia Pontificum” focuses specifically on the reaction of Paracelsus to Osiander and Sachs.

29. On the Hildegardian editions, see Embach, “Hildegard von Bingen,” 668–69. In at least two cases, Coburg Landesbibliothek R II 8 11 and Zwickau Ratsschulbibliothek 22.9.4, the Wittenberg editions of Lichtenberger, Hildegard, and the papal prophetic images are the first three works in bound collections of contemporary tracts, suggesting that these three may have been distributed as a unit or regarded as such by some readers.

30. Osiander and Sachs, VD16 W 4644, a2r–v: “Wie Petrus saget . Es ist aber diese Prophecey / nicht ynn wort / sondern allein ynn bilde / on alle wort gestellet / Und zeyget klerlich und greifflich an / wie es mit dem Babstumb von der zeit an / da es ein Tyranney ist worden / bis an das ende der welt ergehen sol. Damit aber niemand dafür halte / es sey ein new gedicht / las ich yderman wissen / das ich dieser bücher zwey gehabt / Eins aus dem Cartheuser kloster / Das ander / aus meiner Herrn eines Erbarn Rhats / hie zu Nürmberg / liberey / Deren keines so new ist / es mus ein yeder / der es ansihet / bekennen / das es ungeferlich bey hundert jaren / von gemelde und schrifft / alt sey / Wie das ein yeder / der mir nicht gleuben wil / heutigs tags wol erfaren kan / Darzu wird ynn der selbigen Büchern eynem angezeigt / wie das ursprüngklich / darvon die abgemalet / wol vor drithalb hundert jaren / Nemlich / da man hat geschriben .1.2.78. jar / gemacht sey worden / Es habens aber bisher wenig leute verstanden / wie aller weissagung art ist / das sie finster bleiben / bis sie yns werck komen / Darumb einer dis / der ander das geradten / und zum teyl dazu verzeichnet hatte / Weil es aber offenbar ward / das die selbige schrifft newer ist / denn das gemelde / darzu das eltere on alle schrifft geblieben war / Hab ichs faren lassen / als die on zweiffel nicht darzu gehöret / Doch ist ein auslegung darzu gesetzt / umb der einfeltigen willen / Denn vernünfftig leut / sehen on alle auslegung wol / was es ist / Damit sey einem yeden heymgesetzt / die auslegung an zu nemen / odder ein bessere herfür zubringen / ob er mag.”

31. See also Scribner, Sake of Simple Folk, 143–47; Heffner (“Eyn Wunderliche Weyssagung,” 74–77) remarks also on Osiander’s reversal but holds it to be purely a rhetorical device.

32. Barnes, Prophecy and Gnosis, 41–42.

33. On Cammerlander’s editions (which were later translated into English), see Heffner, “Eyn Wunderliche Weyssagung,” 127–31; Wenzel, Cammerlander und Vielfeld, 24–28.

34. Vielfeld, VD16 C 604, b3v: “denen so sunst schrifften nit lesen können zů gůt.”

35. Scribner, Sake of Simple Folk, 147.

36. The data is based on VD16. Sudhoff (Versuch einer Kritik, 1:3–39) identifies twenty-three extant editions known in 1898, of which fifteen were prognostic works. See also Benzenhöfer and Pfister, “Die zu Lebzeiten erschienenen Praktiken und Prognostikationen”; Weidmann, “Paracelsus propheta,” 11.

37. Weidmann, “Paracelsus propheta,” 42; see also Weidmann, “Sterne, Zeichen, Zukunft,” 49–54. The treatise on Lichtenberger is Paracelsus, Sämtliche Werke, 7:455–530. On the papal prophecies, see Paracelsus, Sämtliche Werke, 12:509–85; Paracelsus, VD16 P 407–9. See also Paracelsus, VD16 P 402, p. 158. On Paracelsus’s engagement with Lichtenberger, see Kurze, Johannes Lichtenberger, 62–65; Kurze, “Prophecy and History,” 74–78. On Paracelsus’s engagement with the papal prophetic images, see Heffner, “Eyn Wunderliche Weyssagung,” 122–27; Weidmann, “Die Vaticinia Pontificum” (more extensively). Reeves (Prophecy in the Later Middle Ages, 454 n. 2) mentions editions of Paracelsus’s critique of Osiander’s work appearing in 1530 and 1532, but these are nothing more than speculations on the part of Sudhoff (Versuch einer Kritik, 1:38–39).

38. Paracelsus, VD16 P 543–45. The most recent extensive treatment of the Prognostication for Twenty-four Years is Weidmann, “Paracelsus propheta,” 19–30.

39. Paracelsus, VD16 P 543, c3r: “Ein kind das gen schůl geht / und lernet / so es kompt zů seim alter / so schempt es sich seiner kindischen arbeit / vernichts / also wirt dir auch geschehen / so du schreibst in solcher gestalt / so wirt dein eigen arbeit nichts / dz wirt ein ursach sein / dz vil umb sunst und vergebens gearbeit wirt / dann die zeit lernet und gibt erkantnus / daß nit alles ein pärlin ist / das für ein pärlin fürgeben wirt / darumb wirt inn dich fallen ein hand / die dich zerreissen wirt wie ein fetzen.”

40. Benzenhöfer, “Die prognostischen und mantischen Schriften,” 197; see also Benzenhofer and Pfister, “Die zu Lebzeiten erschienenen Praktiken und Prognostikationen,” 241.

41. Dorn, Dictionarium Theophrasti Paracelsi (VD16 D 2404), 62: “Magia . . . est naturalis et licita materque verae medicinae, et est occulta naturae sapientia, in centrum usque latens et abdita, cum qua si humanam rationem conferas, nihil praeter meram stultitiam in hac reperies. Vere donum est Dei, cum quo rerum supernaturalium nobis, et naturalium cognitionem exhibet.”

42. Benzenhöfer, “Die prognostischen und mantischen Schriften,” 196–97: “‘Magica’ ist hier also die personifizierte Signiertätigkeit, die für das Wirken Gottes nicht nur in der Natur, sondern auch im Menschen und in menschlichen Werken steht”; “Der Text (und damit auch das Text-Bild-Ensemble) wird also weiter Rätsel aufgeben.” An extensive treatment of Paracelsus’s concept of magic is Goldammer, “Paracelsus und die Magie.”

43. Weidmann, “Paracelsus propheta,” 19.

44. Paracelsus, VD16 P 543, a3r: “andere müssens baß erkennen dann ich / auch verstehen wen sie berüren.”

45. Paracelsus, VD16 P 411, as quoted in Paracelsus, Sämtliche Werke, 9:385: “das ein ietlicher des namens Christi sich selbs in ein astronomum mache, und bsehe das zeichen im himel, das got selbs gemacht hat, und gedenke das Christus das zeichen gemelt hat, und die uslegung such an dem selbigen ort sines worts, so wirts ein ietlicher in im selbs finden.”

46. Reske and Benzing, Buchdrucker des 16. und 17. Jahrhunderts, 224–36, 881–82. See also Kulturvereinigung Hadamar, Christian Egenolff.

47. Neske, Spätmittelalterliche deutsche Sibyllenweissaung, 23–29.

48. Barnes (Prophecy and Gnosis, 83–84) attributes the list of thirty-six signs to Sebastian Franck, as does Peuckert, “Zwölff Sybillen Weissagungen,” 219, 237–56.

49. In Egenolff’s compilation (VD16 P 5068, fol. 97r), the work appears as “Das Bůch M. Josephs Grünpeck / Von der Reformation der Christenheyt und der Kirchen.” For lists of Grünpeck’s works, see Talkenberger, Sintflut, 112–14; Czerny, “Humanist und Historiograph,” 331–54; Russell, “Astrology as Popular Propaganda,” 193–95. Czerny does not mention the “Reformation der Christenheit und der Kirchen,” while Russell lists the title and 1549 as the year of publication for the work, ostensibly printed in Dillingen; the shelf mark Russell cites from the Austrian National Library is, in fact, for a copy of the Egenolff compilation printed in Frankfurt, and the date assigned to Grünpeck’s work, 1494, is Russell’s speculation.

50. See Hollegger, “Erwachen vnd aufsten als ein starcker stryter”; Müller, “Kaiser Maximilian I,” 214–15.

51. The editor of the Weimar edition of Luther’s works first noted the discrepant sources of Egenolff’s edition; see Luther, Martin Luthers Werke, 23:4.

52. Egenolff, VD16 P 5065, a1r: “Propheceien vnd Weissagungen. Vergangne / Gegenwertige / und Künfftige Sachen / Geschicht unnd Zůfäll / Hoher unnd Niderer Stände/ Den frommen zů ermanung und trost / Den bösen zum schrecken und warnung / biß zum end / verkündende. . . . Inhalt vorgestelten Registers / Außgelegt / und durch Figurn angezeygt.”

53. Barnes, Prophecy and Gnosis, 145.

54. As in the editions of 1521 and 1587, VD16 W 4641 and L 1608.

55. Neuheuser, VD 17 14:006751M, p. 30: “Welcher Weiser Leuthe Vaticinia oder geweissagte Sprüche dann auch viel nunmehr an Tag und in Truck kommen seynd.” On the Onus ecclesiae, see Werner, Die Flugschrift “onus ecclesiae,” 53–59; see also Reeves, Prophecy in the Later Middle Ages, 467–68. On the 1625 edition of Birgitta’s Burden of the World, see Montag, Birgitta von Schweden, 176.

56. Lichtenberger, VD17 39:124868B, a1r–v: “Trübsal Der gantzen Welt auch Veränderung vieler Herrschafft und Regimenten: Propheceyen Und Weissagungen jetzt gegenwertig und künfftige sachen / Geschicht und Zufäll / biß zum Ende der Welt ankündend. Als nemblich: M. Johann Liechtenbergers / Johann Carionis / M. Josephi Grumpeck / Der Sibyllen / und vil anderer. Den Frommen zur Ermahnung und Trost: fürnämblich aber den bösen zum Schrecken und Warnung / ohne alle Partheyligkeit / zusamen getragen / und auß den alten Exemplaren getrewlich nachgetrucket.”

57. Virdung, VD16 V 1294, b3v: “Also enden sich allhie dise zůkunfftige ding / genommen auß dem waren grundt der Astronomei / und nit nach der welt lauff / und sage wie dann vil Practica auß gehn / eyne gefunden in eynem alten bůch practicirt lang vor Christi gepurt / Die andern zů Rome gefunden in einer steynen Seul / lang vor Christi gepurt practicirt / Die dritt die eynem geoffenbart ist durch ein unbekandte stym eynes unsichtbarlichen geysts / und dergleichen vil ander Nerrisch practica / die dann alleyn gemacht werden zů Nůtz den Bůchdruckern / und zů wyder der waren Astronomei.”

58. Birgitta, VD16 B 5596, hh7r.

59. Samuel Hierosolymitanus, ISTC is00118650, a1r, a4r.

60. Osiander and Sachs, VD16 W 4642, a2v: “es mus ein yeder / der es ansihet / bekennen / das es ungeferlich bey hundert jaren / von gemelde / und schrifft / alt sey.”

61. Anonymous prophetic tracts, VD16 P 5062, a2r: “Im jar nach Christi geburt Tausent fünff hundert am fünfzehenden tag des Monats Septembris hat gezaygt der wirdig vater Doctor Johannes Fridringer / Official Curie castrensis / die alt gefunden geschrifft N. Namerberger Vicari mit alten bůchstaben geschriben gesechen und selbs gezaygt.”

62. Pflaum, VD16 ZV 12431, b2r: “Ein Prophecey / vor etlich hundert jaren warhafftig geschriben zů Latein / gefunden zů Magdeburg”; Ferrer, ISTC if00125000, fol. 72r.

63. Pflaum, VD16 ZV 12431, a1v: “DIeweyl sich zů diser zeyt mancherley weyssagung finden / und etliche fast zůtreffen / das es scheynet / wie Gott der Herr solche verenderung der welt auch hie durch Balaams Esel verkündiget hat / haben wirs für gt angesehen / auch dise weissagung Jacobs Pflaumen / so vorhin auch gedrückt / und außgangen ist im 1500. jar / widerumb aus zů lassen.”

64. On Lazius, see Lerner, Powers of Prophecy, 172–73; Reeves, Prophecy in the Later Middle Ages, 369–72; Jaspers, “Die deutschen Textfragmente.” On Ambach, see Barnes, Prophecy and Gnosis, 77–78. On the beginnings of antiquarian interest in printed books more generally, see Needham, “Late Use of Incunables,” 55–59.

65. Walasser, VD16 W 793, 3r: “Hab also dise Büchlin von newem durchlesen / und dem alten Teutschen / wa es so unverstendlich / nach meinem besten vermögen geholffen.”

CHAPTER 5

1. Faber, ISTC if00007000, b4v: “Hec ergo brevissime in prognostico dicta ex philosophorum regulis atque experimentatis sciencie astrologice accepta sunt et collecta.”

2. Carion, VD16 C 1036, a1v: “Denn E.C.F.G. wissen das man von Cometen / und solchen ungewönlichen zeichen nicht so eigentlich judicirn kan / als von Planeten / die yhre ordenliche gewisse motus und wirckung haben.”

3. Canter, ISTC ic00103800; Fabri, ISTC if00026100: “Eyn auszug aus der practica von Coln Mayster Sygmund von prustat und gedruckt zu Ingolstat.”

4. Müller, “Poet, Prophet, Politiker,” 105: “Ausdruck einer Krisensituation.” The specifically German Practica teütsch and, in particular, its development from the late fifteenth into the sixteenth centuries is in need of further study. We face the unusual situation where practica parodies have been far more thoroughly studied, in Silvia Pfister’s Parodien astrologisch-prophetischen Schrifttums, than the genre being parodied. Juntke’s “Eine satirische astrologische Praktik” provides a brief but quite usable account of astrological practicas. Hammerstein’s “Battle of the Booklets” focuses on Lutheran anti-astrological practicas and treats various prophetic and flood-related tracts but not the annual practicas. Bauer (“Sprüche in Prognostiken,” 167–68) has concisely identified some elements of their typical form, while Amelung (“Eine Ulmer Praktik,” 211–12) has offered a concise overview of the form of practicas and the bibliographic puzzles they often pose. Barnes’s “Hope and Despair” is quite useful but primarily concerned with Lutheran practica authors from the latter part of the sixteenth century; Dixon’s “Popular Astrology and Lutheran Propaganda” treats the same period and several of the same figures. Practicas have also been extensively studied for their role in the rise of scientific astronomy and Copernicanism by Richard Kremer (“Copernicus among the Astrologers”), Karl Heinz Burmeister (“Mit subtilen fündlein und sinnreichen speculierungen . . .”), and Dennis Danielson (“Achilles Gasser”). Darin Hayton’s dissertation, “Astrologers and Astrology in Vienna during the Era of Emperor Maximilian I,” provides a thorough study of Viennese astrology before 1520. Among the most detailed studies of practicas are those of Klaus Matthäus (“Geschichte des Nürnberger Kalenderwesens”) and Josef Seethaler (“Wiener Kalenderwesen”), but each limits their scope to the printers and practitioners of a single city (Nuremberg and Vienna, respectively), and their longer chronological scale, continuing into the seventeenth century, overlooks the development of the typical form in the late fifteenth century. Talkenberger’s Sintflut profits from comparing flood booklets to annual practicas but examines only the years 1519–28. The most complete study of practicas remains Gustav Hellmann’s pioneering work, although his primary interest lay in the history of meteorology. Much more remains to be discovered about the earliest history of practicas in print, particularly concerning previous manuscript practice and the influences between national traditions.

5. Rasch, VD16 R 302, c4r–v: “Dreyerley Prognostic / wer recht darauff mercket / kommen den Leuten für: Erstlich seind Prophecey oder Weissag in den tag hinein / die kein gewisse Zeit oder Jar bestimmen / man kan auch darauß nicht abnemen / auff welchen Kayser oder Bapst solch Warsag recht zu deuten sein / villeicht am besten auff die letzte Zeit der Welt / wie in Doctor Lazii libellis Vaticiniorum wol zu lesen und zu sehen ist / es seind aber die meisten / in der warheit zusagen / nur Träum. Die andern Prognostic seind warsag auff etlich mehr Jar in einer Summ / dergleichen auff diese jetzt folgenden 84. 85. 86. 87. 88. etc. als auff lange zeit der Orbes, grosser Conjunction / Cometens und Finsternuß wehrungen außgangen seind / solche aber seind mehrers Fantasey und Fantasterey / wohn und beduncken. Die dritte Prognostic seind Practic oder Iudicium aines jars allein / welche numehr so gemein / uberflüssig unnd unbescheiden werden / daß wenig Practicanten oder Calenderer ein ehr damit auffheben / und nur für Lügenbüchel (zwar nit umb sunst) gehalten werden. Die fürnembsten Puncten / davon unsere Astrologi in järlichen Prognostic oder Practic oder Iudiciis handlen / seind dise: Erstlich / Ob das Jar gut oder böß / fruchtbar oder schaurig / Die Erdgewächß / Getraid / Frücht / Nahrung / Proviant auff oder abschlagen / wolfailer oder theurer / wol oder ubel gerathen / süß oder sawr / gesund oder siech sein werden. Zum andern / Ob und was Kranckheit / Siechthumb / Gebresten / Leibsgefahr oder Sterbenslauff / unter Menschen oder Viech / umbgehn und regieren werden oder nit. 3. Ob Fried oder Unfried / und wo / in welchem Land / Krieg / Auffrhur / Rumor, Mord / Brand / Rauberey / Verrätherey und Gefahr sein möchten. 4. Welche Menschen / Ständ / Secten und Handthierungen glückselig oder unglückhafft sein werden / und jedes zu welcher zeit im jar. 5. Urthail von wol oder ubelstand / gefahr oder sicherheit jedes Lands oder Stat / jedes Fürsten oder Künigs in sunderheit / als diß also zu practiciren etlich Astrologi im brauch haben. 6. Von Witterung jedlichs Mons Vierteil / und auch jedes Jars Vierteil / diß aber die maisten Calenderer in den Calender zu allen Vierteiln und Monaten / und nit in die Practic / setzen. Solches dann / die fürnembsten Artickel oder Capitel / davon in Calendarischen Practic järlich judiciret und prognosticiret wird / voran zuwissen und voran zusagen / wöllen alle Astrologi ihr Mainung ergründen / und ihr Urtheil schöpffen / am ersten auß aequinoctii figura, dann auß Finsternuß und Regenten des Jars / etc.” On Rasch, see Schottenloher, “Untergang des Hauses Habsburg,” 132; Hellmann, Versuch einer Geschichte der Wettervorhersage, 5; Barnes, Prophecy and Gnosis, 161.

6. Grill, Erlangen UB Thl V 90 #18.

7. Schynnagel’s German verse practica is ISTC is00336000; on this edition, see Goff, “Some Undescribed Ephemera,” 100–101; Amelung, “Eine Ulmer Praktik,” 219. Stabius’s Latin verse prognostication is VD16 ZV 23196. The anonymous verse practica broadside is ISTC il00214410. Brant’s broadside is Munich BSB Einbl. I, 44 (not recorded in VD16).

8. On the development of the title page, see Rautenberg, “Entstehung und Entwicklung des Buchtitelblatts.”

9. Hellmann, Versuch einer Geschichte der Wettervorhersage, 6, 21; Hellmann, Die Wettervorhersage im ausgehenden Mittelalter, 206; Grafton, Cardano’s Cosmos, 43.

10. Tannstetter, VD16 ZV 13593, b4r: “Zw lest will ich aber mals all unnd yetlich warnen / das kainer kain zedel: practicam oder ainerlay puchel kauffen thu / allain es sey darauf getruckt wer sollichs gemacht habe / unnd hinden daran von wem wo und wan es getruckt worden sey: also mag man allein felschlich erdicht practiken die etwa durch ungelert unnd unverstendig gemacht worden send / auch ander schendtpuechlen furkomen / dan wo ainer etwas dem gemeinen menschen zu nutz und im zu er auß gen lassen will: wirdt seinen namen und anders obgemelt pillich und gern darzu setzen.”

11. Cf. Matthäus, “Geschichte des Nürnberger Kalenderwesens,” 1199. Hellmann’s description of the typical physical format (Versuch einer Geschichte der Wettervorhersage, 37) is quite accurate. See also Hellmann, Die Wettervorhersage im ausgehenden Mittelalter, 209.

12. Two exceptions are Matthias Brotbeihel, VD16 B 8419, and Kaspar Braune, VD16 B 7228.

13. Hellmann, Versuch einer Geschichte der Wettervorhersage, 23–24; Hellmann, Die Wettervorhersage im ausgehenden Mittelalter, 223.

14. Hellmann, Versuch einer Geschichte der Wettervorhersage, 21.

15. Der treue Eckhart, VD16 P 4543, a2v: “ES pflegen die Maister deß gestirnns alweg im anfang ihrer Practic / Herren deß künfftigen jars.” In several songs of the 1540s and 1550s by Hans Sachs, Eckhart appears as a Waldbruder, a forest hermit with words of reproof for the German nation. See, among others, Sachs, Ein Klagred Teütschen landts / mit dem treüwen Eckhart; Der klagent waldtbrůder uber alle Stend auff erden; Ein Gesprech mit einem Waldbruder / wie Frau Treu gestorben sey (VD16 S 312, 406, 426).

16. Hellmann, Versuch einer Geschichte der Wettervorhersage, 5–6.

17. Der treue Eckhart, VD16 P 4543, b2r: “ALle Practicirer haben bißher von dem newen unnd vollen der zwölff Monaten dapffer / als ob es etwas wars und gewiß were / geschrieben / in dem kalt / da warm / da naß / in dem feucht.”

18. Cf. Juntke, “Über eine satirische astrologische Praktik,” 193.

19. Tannstetter, VD16 T 171, a1r: “Du frummer leser ermiß mein ursachen und geschrifften so ich allweg darzů setz und erkenn was für gleychnus ander Practickenn mit den meinen haben”; Carion, VD16 C 962, a2r–v: “Solcher maß wölt ir auch diß bewaren / fleyssig bittend / solchs neben andern Prognostication anzůsehen / und die warhait / dem der sy verdient zůzeschreiben.”

20. Eipelius, VD16 ZV 1277, b4v: “Und dieweil ich weis / das viel seind die alle Practiken so sie bekomen können zu hauff keuffen / und gegen einander halten / darinn sie denn offt finden / das einer regen setzet / der ander schnee / der dritte feuchte lufft etc.”

21. Brant, Narrenschiff, 234 (chap. 65, “Von Beobachtung des Gestirns”). On the distribution of calendars and almanacs and the association with New Year’s gifts and greetings, see Simon, Türkenkalender, 80.

22. Johannes Angelus, ISTC ia00712300, a1r: “Ein guetes seliges newes iare Geb uns das newgeborn kindlein das maria gepare Amen.”

23. Verheyden, “De Antwerpsche boekdrukker Henrick Ekkert,” 103–6.

24. Carion, VD16 ZV 17957, a2r: “. . . damit E.C.F.G. mit meiner kleinen gab / zu einem newen seligen jar zubegaben.”

25. Wilhelm, VD16 ZV 12398, a2r: “ich befinde inn hergebrachtem gebrauch das ye eyn gůt freünd / inn zůkommen des newen jars / dem andern mit wunsch eynes gůten jars vereeret / der halb wünsch ich B. W. allen menschen für eyn gůts news jar / eyn gůt new leben in Ch[r]isto / unnd darneben zůlesen dyse Practica.”

26. Der treue Eckhart, VD16 P 4543, a2v.

27. See, for example, Amelung, “Eine Ulmer Praktik,” 211. Hellmann (Die Wettervorhersage im ausgehenden Mittelalter, 214, 222–23) attributes a practica of 1470 to Guasconus based on the incunable census of Hain, but no such work is currently known, and current incunable censuses know no practica from Guasconus earlier than 1474.

28. See Lerner, Powers of Prophecy, 6; Mentgen, Astrologie und Öffentlichkeit, 107–8 n. 427.

29. On Johannes of Glogau, astronomer and scholar in Cracow, see Walsh, “Von Italien nach Krakau,” 293–97.

30. Anonymous practica, ISTC ip00948800.

31. Pascher, Praktiken des 15. und 16. Jahrhunderts, 15; for the quote, see 63–70: “Practica Teutsch auf di form Magistri bentzlai von budbeisz.”

32. On Virdung, see Steinmetz, “Johann Virdung”; Claus, “Astrologische Flugschriften von Johannes Virdung”; Brévart, “Virdung.” Steinmetz (“Johann Virdung,” 198) refers to a prognostication for 1487, based on the bibliography of Zinner, who, in turn, cites Hellmann (Die Wettervorhersage im ausgehenden Mittelalter, 208, 219), who ascribes a copy to the holdings of the Universität Helmstedt that were transferred to the Herzog August Bibliothek in Wolfenbüttel. The earliest practica currently held is for 1490, however.

33. Virdung, ISTC iv00302120, a1r: “Quorum quidem vestigia (ego iohannes W. cracoviensis) imitaturus deliberaui.” See Bruckner, “Faber von Budweis oder Virdung” (1969), 139–40; Bruckner, “Noch einmal.”

34. Bruckner, “Faber von Budweis oder Virdung” (1969), 138–39.

35. Anonymous practica, ISTC ip01005870. The ISTC connects the letters “DPSE” at the end of this practica to “Dr Paulus Eck of Sulzbach.” Paulus Eck’s earliest published Leipzig almanac is for 1486, and Eck and Faber issued printed invectives against one another (or their printers) concerning practicas later in the 1480s. See Haebler, “Paulus Eck gegen Wenzel Faber.”

36. Cf. the organization of Middelburg’s practica for 1481 (ISTC ip00184800), in seven particula of multiple chapters each, with the simplified arrangement of the practica for 1482 (ISTC ip00185000) and the eighteen-chapter organization of the practica for 1486 (ISTC ip00185400). Middelburg abandoned the field of popular astrology by the late 1480s, around the time he became abbot of a Benedictine abbey, and he became bishop of Fossombrone in 1494. He wrote later that he had “thought of better things to do” than write practicas (Middelburg, VD16 P 1064, a3r: “Ich hab mich von etlichen Jaren her enthalten hailigister vater / von den practicken zůbeschreiben / wie ich vor malen gethon hab / auß ursach das mir mein sinn zů besseren übungen gestanden ist”). One should not, however, understate Middelburg’s influence on the development of astrology in print, both via his adaption in Lichtenberger and directly through Middelburg’s twenty-year prognostication on the great conjunction of Saturn and Jupiter of 1484. Virdung imitated this format for 1504 and 1524, and others in the sixteenth century followed his example. An edition of Middelburg’s twenty-year prognostication also featured a woodcut of Saturn and Jupiter as anthropomorphic beings (not on its title page, but on its last leaf; cf. Warburg, Heidnisch-antike Weissagung, 37) that was the precursor to the similar woodcut in Lichtenberger’s Prognosticatio and to the representation of planets on practicas’ title pages.

37. Spiegelberg, VD16 S 8320, a1r; Köbel, VD16 K 1668, a1r.

38. Hellmann, Versuch einer Geschichte der Wettervorhersage, 5; Hellmann, Die Wettervorhersage im ausgehenden Mittelalter, 206.

39. Matthäus, “Geschichte des Nürnberger Kalenderwesens,” 1205 n. 1399: “Den Praktiken war von Anfang an eine gleichbleibende, schematische Kaptieleinteilung zu eigen.”

40. Sibenbürger, VD16 S 6184, c4r.

41. Apian, VD16 A 3107, b4r: “dann ich mich allenthalben / ein mittel durchs gantze Deutsche Land zu treffen beflissen habe.”

42. See Hellmann, Die Wettervorhersage im ausgehenden Mittelalter, 221, 223.

43. Julianus de Blanchis had two practicas published in Passau, while Johannes and Jasper Laet have a total of six practicas published in Germany, one of them in Dutch. To these eight might be added two practicas of James Perillus of Scotland.

44. Nickel (“Almanache und Prognostika,” 128) also sees market expansion beginning in the 1480s.

45. Tannstetter, VD16 T 160, a2r: “wiewol ich bey .xix. jarn in meinen Judiciis von sunderlichen berurung der künig / fürsten / und stet mich enthalten / damit ich nyemant erschreck oder beweg.”

46. Statmion, VD16 S 8647, a2r: “als lang ich gepracticiert hab / von dem 40. Jar bißher / da ich erstlich anhebet / zu Ingolstatt.”

47. Steinmetz, “Johann Virdung,” 199.

48. Steinmetz, “Johann Virdung,” 209.

49. Blume, Regenten des Himmels, 158–76; see also Brévart and Keil, “Planetentraktate.”

50. On Polich and his practicas, see Eis, “Martin Pollichs Vorhersage für 1490.”

51. Virdung, ISTC iv00302240, a3v–a4v.

52. Hochstetter, VD16 H 4001, a4r; VD16 ZV 23333, b1r. Cf. Hochstetter’s practica for 1519, VD16 ZV 24179; Sibenbürger, VD16 S 6184.

53. Tract against the Turks (printed with pseudo-Vincent Ferrer, On the End of the World, ISTC if00125000), fols. 58r–v, 59v: “Darumb seind zwů die größten und schwärsten sünd. die da yecz gemeinklich durch die ganczen welt geschehen. das ist die sünd wyder die natur und die unwirdig handlung des sacraments cristi ihesu die da in der täglichen meßhaltung geleych on zal getan. und volpracht wirt. Dises seind die zwů aller schwärest sünd die da so gar vast in der ganczen welt überhand haben genommen.”

54. Julianus de Blanchis, ISTC ib00696100, a3v; Virdung, VD16 V 1286, a4r; Salzmann, VD16 S 1500, b1r: “alle so leibs lust gebrauchen / Bůler / weibische männer / auch alle so himmelfarb / oder weiß von natur lieben.”

55. Jeremias Brotbeihel, VD16 B 8396, b1v: “Von allen Stenden zeschreiben / der gleichen vonn Landen vnd Stetten / will gantz müsam und ungewyß seyn / bringt etwann neyd / haß / und widerwillen denselben nach / wil ichs auf diß jar růwen lassen”; Apian, VD16 A 3101, b4v; Tannstetter, VD16 T 159, c4v: “De fato Imperatoris et maximorum principum, viri docti et prudentes nihil unquam scribendum duxerunt publice.”

56. Tannstetter, VD16 T 161–62, a1r: “Juppiter in celis Cesar regit omnia terris.”

57. Prueckner, VD16 P 5161, a2r.

58. Tannstetter, VD16 ZV 13593, a1v: “Ist deshalb an E.F.G. mein gantz undtertenig fleissig bet. welle solich mein erzaygen genedicklich annemen. und censieren. das auch durch dermassen genedig annemung. bey andern allen dest annemlicher machen.”

59. Vanden Broecke, Limits of Influence, 38 (emphasis in original).

60. On Copp and his publications, see Walde, “Doktor Johann Copp”; Talkenberger, Sintflut, 224–35.

61. Copp, VD16 C 5026, a1v, b1r.

62. Copp, VD16 C 5023, a1r, a2r–a3r, a4r.

63. On the cyclic nature of history in the practicas, see Barnes, “Hope and Despair,” 460; Matthäus, “Geschichte des Nürnberger Kalenderwesens,” 1228–29.

64. Matthias Brotbeihel, VD16 B 8424, a1r: “Ich bin der alle ding regiert / Mich imm Regiment niemands irrt / Das glückrad hab ich in meiner händ / Nach meinem willen ich das wänd.”

65. Virdung, ISTC iv00302210, a1v. On astrology and microcosmic models more generally, see Barnes, Prophecy and Gnosis, 176–77.

66. Frank, Die Textgestalt als Zeichen, 89.

67. Middelburg, ISTC ip00187550, a5r: “Nunc ergo ad incepti negocii ordinem cum dei laude accedamus. quod quidem planetarum instar septem distinguemus capittulis.”

CHAPTER 6

1. Schöner, VD16 S 3495, a1v: “Das aber das liecht und schein der himelischen cörper / als Sonn / Mon und der andern stern bey uns etwas wircken / ist der vernunfft wol kundt / das auch die influentz oder einflüß etwas thůn / hatt uns die manigfeltige erfarnuß vnd vernunfft gelernt / Dann so der scheyn des Mons bey nacht durch ain riß oder loch ainer wand in ain stadel auf die wunden aines Pferds etlich zeytlang fellt / erwürgt er dasselbig pferd / Auch so solcher scheyn des Mons bey nacht ains menschen arm oder cörper erraicht / machts in Flegmatisch und schleymig etc.”

2. Brunfels, VD16 B 8462, a1v.

3. Der treue Eckhart, VD16 P 4543, a2v.

4. Schöner, VD16 S 3491, a1v: “Auß solchen ungelerten menschen / nennet sich eyner / den getrewen Eckart / hat seynen rechten namen nit dörffen anzeygen / hat ein Practica auff das 33. jar außgeehen lassen / darinnen er vermeynt / nach der Schwirmer art / solche natürliche edle kunst Astrologiam / zu vertilgen / praucht darzu die heiligen Götlichen schrifft / nach seinem tollen verstand.”

5. Virdung, VD16 V 1294, a1v; Prueckner, VD16 P 5161, a2r–a3r; Brelochs, VD16 ZV 2416, a1v. In 1530, Virdung had tried a different approach, stating that anyone who wanted to see the justifications for his practica could come to him in person and observe them at leisure (VD16 V 1289, a2r).

6. Barbus, ISTC ib00122500, a1r: “Astutissimi ac maliciosissimi cuiusdam Pauli in astronomia commentum neque enim iudicium magnam astrorum sapiencie faciens iniuriam dicendum est.”

7. Seitz, Sämtliche Schriften, 2:63–64 (VD16 S 5396–5400); Stuhlhofer, “Georg Tannstetter,” 44–48.

8. Carion, VD16 C 1030, b1r–v: “Ist wol ab tzunemen das er in den tafeln Alfontii / oder ander gelarten diser kunst / Rumpelt / und die grösten / grosen / und mittlen conjunctiones nicht wol erforschet hat.”

9. Virdung, VD16 V 1256, e4r.

10. Tannstetter, VD16 T 160, a2r: “die ich nit für ains gelerten rechtgeschaffnen man arbait achte / sonder für ein gedicht eines trückers oder landtfarers / dann ein weyser man schreibt nit von wunderzaichen / die er nit gesehen / ich geschweig das er in seiner vorredt in der kunst weyt und kyndisch irret.” Talkenberger (Sintflut, 243) speculates that Tannstetter was referring to Seitz’s tract, but Tannstetter’s reference seems to point clearly toward Virdung’s admission of not having seen the lights himself.

11. Virdung, VD16 V 1283, a2r.

12. Tannstetter, VD16 T 171, a2r.

13. Tannstetter, VD16 ZV 24183, b4r–v.

14. Hayton, “Astrologers and Astrology in Vienna,” 261–62, 269–77.

15. Carion VD16 C 973, f1r: “Es hat aber mich maister fixfax von Wien / Andreas Perlach / schier erschreckt / in dem als er sagt / Die finsternus bedeuten nichts arges / aber wenn sie ir bedeutnus öffnen / findt fürwar er in seiner vernunfft nicht. Also wolt ich auch sagen / coniunctio maxima bedeute nichts / darumb das sie nicht eben auff den tag do sie erschiene etwas treffenlichs würckte / Er weyß aber nit das ir yeglichs sein eygne direction hat. Ich hab es dafür und glaub es gentzlich / das des Stöfflers unnd Pflaumen Almanach mit seiner kunst werde auff fliegen / Es seyhen der hümpler mer die do Almanach machen und ander ding / wenn aber die Ephemerides endt nemen / als yetz in dem .31. jar beschicht / werden sie bestehen wie büther in der Sonnen.”

16. Perlach, VD16 P 1448, a3v: “Die weyl aber sein Juditia / bey solcher unwissenhait nichts dester weniger zůtreten / und sich also begeben / und er den rechten grundt der Astrologey nit kan / welcher wil also unnverstendig sein / und sprechen / er habs auß der natürlichen kunst Astrologia / muß auch von nöten folgen / dz er seine Juditia / auß einer andern kunst nympt / und vermaint es sein auff allen universiteten lauter narren / man wür sein unwissenhait und unverstandt in der kunst Astrologia nit spürn / oder auß nemen / Mich dunckt auch gentzlich er hab sein Juditia genommen / auß den püchern magistri Pelagi heremite in regno maioricarum von der beschwerung der geyst / dann ein solchs zů Perlin abgeschriben ist worden / unnd mit aller zů gehörung gen Osterreich pracht / das ich mit meinen augen gesehen hab.”

17. Müller, “Poet, Prophet, Politiker,” 119–20.

18. Prueckner, VD16 P 5167, a2r: “Es würde auch nit ein jetlicher mit ungeweschen henden darein rumpeln / und seinen geyffer darauff speyen / und nach duncken und gerodt wol von solchem schreiben und reden / von welchem er doch keinen bůchstaben nie gelernt hat / wie dann zů unsern zeiten vil practicanten thůn.”

19. The data is based on ISTC. See also Neddermeyer, Von der Handschrift zum gedruckten Buch, 1:119–22.

20. Christoph Statmion, practica for 1543 (not in VD 16; Zwickau Ratsschulbibliothek 22. 9.15.[20]), a1v: “Widerumb aber daucht es mich ein schlechte ehr sein / dieweil erstlich sich yetzunder schir ein yeder Idiot und ungelerter unterwindt Kalender zů machen . . . Darneben auch gar gering ist / einem ein gedicht lied nachzůsingen / wo aber die Ephemerides / das sein die bücher / die des Himels leuffe auff etlich Jar lang künfftig beschliessen / nicht also gemein weren / wurd der merer theil / so sich yetzt groß Astronoms duncken / bey den Idioten ersterben müssen / und sich in keinen weg Practica zů machen unterstehn.” See Zinner, Geschichte und Bibliographie der astronomischen Literatur, 21–22, for examples from the later sixteenth century.

21. See Bouwsma, “Anxiety and the Formation of Early Modern Culture.”

22. See Bruckner, “Faber von Budweis oder Virdung” (1969), 131–33.

23. Middelburg, VD16 P 1064, a2r: “Dabey zůmercken was wir unseren warsagern zů lon schuldig seind / die unns nimmer nichts gůts verkünden / yetz den Sindtfluß / yetz krieg und pestilentz / yetz theurung / yetz aufrůr in stetten / und ander übel der geleichen / wa sollichs schon nit also ergeet / dann sie hierinnen mercklchen fälen / ye doch peinigt uns die ängstlich fürsorg / Darumb nichts bessers ist dann künfftige ding nit begeren zwissen.”

24. Der treue Eckhart, contrapractica of 1535 (not in VD16, Nuremberg GNM Postine 8o Nw 2881b), a2r: “So dunckt mich nun nerrisch / das wir uns also förchten / da doch keyn forcht ist / und gar erschrecken vor den dingen die uns die Practicen anzeygen.”

25. Barnes, “Hope and Despair,” 455.

26. Johannes Vögelin, VD16 V 2035, a1v: “Quanquam multi annuorum Prognosticorum authores et prudenter et humaniter populum consolantur, et timorem periculorum excutiunt, aptiores tamen, mea quidem sententia, videntur huic saeculo, qui pericula et coeli minas libere ostendunt, interdum etiam ea amplificantes. Talia enim sunt quasi fortia collyria quibus caligo nostrae mentis amoveri potest.”

27. Coote, Prophecy and Public Affairs, 28.

28. Virdung, VD16 V 1307, a1v: “Wiewol das alles verhindert mag werden durch die macht unnd güetigkait gottes / so fern wir uns abkern von unsern grossen sunden / und umb sein gnad erwerben / das solh übel nit über uns verhengkt wer / Als dann geschach den Ninyfiethern / die bueß würckten / und behalten wurden von dem herrn / dann bald wir uns kern zů got / wendet er sich zů uns und legt hinwegk sein zorn / nymbt uns genediglich in seinen schütz / Wo das aber nit wirt geschehen / ist zůbesorgen / das alle diese ding angezaigt in der Prognostication / und vil grosser vnd erschröcklicher über uns ergeen werde.”

29. Virdung, VD16 V 1309, e4r: “So würdt auch von unß hinweg genummen eyn grosses teyl der traurigkeit die eingegossen ist unsern hertzen durch das lesen dieser Prognostication: Darumb so wirdt zů hoffen das diese ding durch diese Coniunction bezeyget / nit also hefftig werden / alß sie dann vonn mir beschrieben seind: Darumb so rüffen wir Got den almechtigen an . . . das er diesen bösen einfluß dieser Coniunction von unß abwende.”

30. Seger, VD16 S 5304, a2r. Hellmann (Versuch einer Geschichte der Wettervorhersage, 36) also remarks on the sincerity of belief in God’s willingness to turn aside the disasters that the stars foretell.

31. Carion, VD16 C 962, b1r.

32. Carion, VD16 C 1024, a2v: “und wolt Gott / ich fehlet allezeit / wo ich von unglück sage.”

33. Perlach, VD16 P 1448, a2v: “Dann als Ptho. der Haydnisch maister / und ein unglaubiger schreibt / Der weyß herschet über dz gestirn / vil mer ein götlicher Christenlicher mensch / mit seinem gepet gegen Got über dz gestirn und seinem einfluß herschen mag.”

34. Der treue Eckhart, VD16 P 4543, a2v: “Gehorchen wir nun / so wirt keyn unglück über uns kommen / wo nit / so hat Got diese nachfolgende plagen / uns biß uff den grund außzůsauffen.”

35. Hammerstein, “Battle of the Booklets,” 144.

36. Müller, “Poet, Prophet, Politiker,” 123: “Die Flugblätter laden dazu ein, das zu vollziehen, was durch Gott in der Natur vorgezeichnet ist, oder was die Häupter der Christenheit vorentschieden haben: ausdrücklich fordern sie zum Beitritt, zur Nachfolge oder auch zum Gehorsam auf.”

37. Stöffler and Pflaum, ISTC is00791000, fol. 387r: “Hoc anno nec Solis nec Lune eclipsim conspicabimur. Sed presenti anno errantium siderum habitudines miratu dignissime accident. In mense enim Februario 20 coniunctiones cum minime mediocres tum magne accident. quarum 16 signum aqueum possidebunt. que universo fere orbi climatibus regnis provinciis statibus dignitatibus brutis belvis marinis cunctisque terre nascentibus indubitatam mutationem variationem ac alterationem significabunt. talem profecto qualem a pluribus seculis ab historiographis. aut natu maioribus vix percepimus Levate igitur viri christianissimi capita vestra.” The phrase “levate capita vestra” is found in the Vulgate only in Luke 21:28.

38. Mentgen, Astrologie und Öffentlichkeit, 116–20; on the flood panic, see also Scribner, Sake of Simple Folk, 123–25.

39. Nifo, VD16 N 1716, a2r–a3r.

40. Faber, ISTC if00008680, a2v.

41. Talkenberger, Sintflut, 337–38.

42. Mentgen, Astrologie und Öffentlichkeit, 149–53.

43. Hellmann, Beiträge zur Geschichte der Meteorologie, 23; Barnes, “Flood Panic,” 146.

44. Talkenberger, Sintflut, 277.

45. Cf. Mentgen, Astrologie und Öffentlichkeit, 141.

46. Cirvelo, VD16 C 3940, a2r–a3v. See Thorndike, History of Magic, 5:210; Zambelli, “Introduction,” 23–24.

47. Rasch, VD16 R 305, a3v; cf. Mentgen, Astrologie und Öffentlichkeit, 136.

48. Barnes, “Flood Panic,” 153–57. That Barnes’s categorization is both perceptive and unworkable indicates the very difficulty of the problem.

49. Zambelli, “Introduction,” 12.

50. See Talkenberg, Sintflut, 184–262.

51. Carion, VD16 C 1030, b2r.

52. Talkenberger, Sintflut, 207: “eine ambivalente Argumentationsweise, die zwischen Drohung und Beruhigung schwankt.” One must also distinguish astrologers’ judgments on the flood controversy from those writers who used the controversy and the literary form of astrological prognostication to further their own ends, including the political reformist agenda of Leonhard Reynmann and the religious agitation of Johannes Copp, both of whom are difficult to label as either simple proponents or opponents of the flood prediction.

53. Köhler, “Flugschriften and Their Importance in Religious Debate,” 167.

54. Lazius, VD16 ZV 9507, g3v–g4v, h4r, reprints nearly the entire tract under the name of “Sigeboldus,” although this is different from the text known as the “Bruder Sigwalt” prophecy, on which see Arnold, “Bruder Sigwalt.” See also Haupt, Oberrheinischer Revolutionär, 200–201 n. 3. Courtney Kneupper’s forthcoming dissertation (Northwestern University) examines the fifteenth-century manuscript history of “Gigebaldus” and related prophecies in detail.

55. On these tracts, see Lerner, Powers of Prophecy, 159–62; Rohr, “Die Prophetie im letzten Jahrhundert vor der Reformation,” 50–52; Bezold, “Zur deutschen Kaisersage,” 574 n. 1. Brévart (“Pflaum,” 580) refers to these tracts as the practicas of the astronomer Pflaum.

56. Jungmayr (“Alofresant von Rhodos”) provides an overview of printed editions. Veenstra (Magic and Divination, 357–71) reproduces a French manuscript version of the Alofresant prophecy from the mid-sixteenth century. The earliest French-language edition published in Antwerp and two Latin editions of 1519, including one from Pamphilus Gengenbach in Basel, were followed by two different German translations. The German Cologne edition of 1520 has two prophecies, including the “emperor of pure face” and a “prognostication sent to the king of France” that were also included with the Antwerp edition, perhaps indicating the source of the translation. However, the translation of 1519, printed by Hans Schobser for Johann Haselberg, became the source for all later German editions. On Haselberg, see Roth, “Johann Haselberg.” Around 1530–35, an anonymous redactor expanded the work into an Imperial Practica and Prognostication by adding several other prophetic excerpts, all of which supported the Holy Roman Emperor as the central figure in reforming the clergy, uniting Christian monarchs, and driving back the Turks. None of these editions are dated, and only one edition has an identified printer, Jakob Cammerlander. The redactor cited an impressive list of additional prophetic sources—“The Sibyls, John of Rupescissa, Gamaleon, Birgitta, Reinhart, Hildegard, and Johannes Lichtenberger”—but apart from some brief Latin texts at the conclusion (one attributed to Rupescissa, another allegedly discovered in Rome, and one supposedly copied down in 1498 by Matternus Hatten), all the additions are borrowings from Lichtenberger’s Prognosticatio. The excerpts (often altered to yield a pro-Reformation sense) from Lichtenberger (cf. ISTC il00210000) are as follows: citation of Cyrillus, g1r–v; Sibyl Cumea, b5v–b6r; exhortation to unity in support of the emperor, b3v–b4r; sad eagle, b4v–b5r; Methodius, e5v (either highly compressed or taken from another source); wolf hunting an eagle, b5v–b6r.

57. Halbronn, Le texte prophétique en France, 2:490–92.

58. For the scarce literature on this prophecy, see Schmitt, “Bruder Dietrich (von Zengg).” Two editions of what is clearly the same work, VD16 D 1457 and D 1458, do not identify Dietrich as the author but instead claim to have been written in the year 462 by a Carmelite monk.

59. Kurze, “Popular Astrology and Prophecy,” 190.

60. Talkenberger, Sintflut, 351.

61. Mads Hack, VD16 H 93, a2r: “DIe zeyt ist gewißlich jetzt vorhanden davon unser lieber herr und seligmacher Jesus Christus gesagt / und unns trewlich gewarnet hat mit solchen worten / Es werden zaichen geschehen an dem Sonn und Mond / und Sternen / und auf erden würt den leüten bange sein / und werden zagen / und das meer / und die wasserbögen werden brausen / und die menschen werden verschmachten vor forchte / und warten der zůkünfftigen dinge auff erden / dann auch der himmel kreffte sich bewegen werden / und als dann werden sie sehen des menschen son kommen in den wolcken / mit grosser krafft und herrlichait / wenn aber dieses anfacht zů geschehen / so hebet ewer heüpter auf / darumb das ewer erlösung nahet.” On the increasingly apocalyptic tone of Lutheran practica authors in the second half of the sixteenth century, see Barnes, “Hope and Despair.”

62. Talkenberger (Sintflut, 342 n. 19) suggests that this work was written somewhat earlier than 1525.

63. Thorndike, History of Magic and Experimental Science, 5:231; Hellmann, Beiträge zur Geschichte der Meteorologie, 20.

64. Grünpeck, VD16 G 3639, a3r–v: “Im sechs und dreyssigsten jar / werden die bedeutungen / aller gleych herab scheynenden glentzen / die sich im vier und zweyntzigsten jar / des neünzehenden tags Februarii begeben haben / ire bedeutung (sag ich) auß strecken im mancherley lender / welche mit mancherley unglück / geferligkeyt / und schaden gequelt werden.”

65. Grünpeck, VD16 G 3639, a4r: “Im Viertzigsten jar / da dann aller Planeten eingang wirt in dem Visch werden / da werden die Oppositiones ire würckung erfüllen / und ein gemeyne finsternus der Sonnen / wirdt alle örter uberschatten / So wirt als dann der Adler auff den aller höchsten berg steygen werden / und wirt sich in der finsternus verbergen / das in keyn vogel anrüren wirt künden / welchem / so sich der son der verderbnus understehen wirt nach zů folgenn / wirt er von den vögeln des hymels zerstrewet werden / Nach welches verderbung wirt sich der Adler und Fenix bey dem gra[b] des gecreutzigten vereynigen. Nach disen geschichten wirdt die Monarchei der gantzen welt / gar außreüten werden der Nazarener Secten / welche die letzt unter allen Secten genent wirt / Dieweil werden alle verborgne urdeyl Gottes offenbaret werden / so lang biß alle Propheceyen erfüllet werden / Welchs alles ich zum teyl auß den natürlichen ursachen / zum teil aber auß Götlichen weissagungen genummen hab.” Shank (“Academic Consulting in Fifteenth-Century Vienna,” 256) notes a case from over a century earlier when Johannes von Gmunden had excoriated the prediction of a conjunction of all planets for the year 1432 as being not the writing of a learned or wise man but a fable written either foolishly or to deceive the people.

66. Czerny, “Humanist und Historiograph,” 341: “Es ist unmöglich, etwas Geistloseres zu lesen als dieses Werk Grünpeck’s.”

67. Prueckner, VD16 P 5161, a3v: “Was sol ich sagen von der Coniunction im jar M.D.xxiiii. Ich mein ja / sie hab ire wirckung redlich erzeygt / bey nah in allen landen / unnd hat noch kein end.” See also Grafton, Cardano’s Cosmos, 40, 45.

68. Schöner, VD16 S 3495, a2v: “Uber all obangezaigte configurationes und aspect / sein auch noch wol zů mercken die grosse Coniunctiones oder zůsamfgunge der planeten / so geschehen sein in Vischen des jars Christi 1524.”

69. Weichenhan, “Ergo perit coelum,” 516 n. 153.

70. Cf. Steinmetz, “Johann Virdung,” 210.

71. Hayton (“Astrologers and Astrology in Vienna,” 366) attributes Tannstetter’s disappearance from the field to changing fashions and a shift in readers’ interests in favor of multiyear prognostications, but this seems unlikely. Annual practicas only increased in popularity in the decade following 1524, while most multiyear prognostications were the work of just a few authors.

72. Virdung, VD16 V 1309, b3v: “Und die geringen menschen / schnödes gesclechts / werden sich erhöhen wider die Künig unnd großmechtige / sie undtersteen zů vertreiben aus iren gwalt / und jämerlich vervolgen.”

73. Reynmann, VD16 R 1620, b3v: “die pawern / und dz gemayn volck von vil orten werden verpündtnuß machen / sich zůsamen thůn und erheben uber und wider ire Köning / Fürsten und Herschafften / gaistlicher und weltlicher Stende / allenthalben zůgreiffen / rauben / und nemen was in werden mag / gar niemands verschonen / also daß zwischen den reichen und armen wenig underschaydt gesehen / und wirt dafür nit helffen schützen noch beschirmen / weder pley / wachs / schaff / noch kelber hewt / so lanng und vil / biß ain yedes ding ain verkerung / endrung und verwandlung wol empfunden hatt / erst wirt die not Solem und Jovem mit aynander veraynigen / durch die und ire zůgewandten werden die Tyrannisierer und kinder Lune und Saturni iren wirdigen lon empfahen / und půß annemen.”

74. Carion, VD16 C 1030, a4r, b2v, b4r.

75. Ransmar, VD16 R 210, a6v: “darum sollen wir uns dem Götlichen willen allain befelhen / diemütigklich bitten / dz sein götlicher will geschech / als in himel / also auch auff erdtrich.”

76. Tannstetter, VD16 T 160, a1v.

77. Virdung, VD16 V 1304 (Nuremberg GNM Postinc 8o Nw 2855). Although the annotations from ca. 1530 reject the prediction of damage to the Christian faith ascribed to Haly Abenragel (“Impia et non ferenda docet hic delirus senex”), several other marginal notes map events of the 1520s onto Virdung’s warnings.

78. Camillus, VD16 C 593, a2v–a3r: “Auß was bewegung oder ursachen / ir vil glauben ditz Jars ayn sündfluß / oder gar grosse verenderung zůkunfftig sein / bin ich unwissent / und wölt gern erlernen von wann und auß was kunst sie solchs hetten / auß dem Evangeli villeicht / oder auß offenbarung des hailigen gaist. Wann von kainem diser kunst des gestirns mag solchs für gewiß bezeügt werden.”

79. Talkenberger, Sintflut, 341.

80. Camillus, practica for 1531 (not in VD16; Augsburg StSB 4o Math 516), a2v: “So sind doch zů unsern zeyten / an allen orten / so treffenlich und mercklich verandrung / in allen dingen welche dan ain yetlicher vor augen siecht. Deren aller ursach zůergründen und anzaigen / auß der edl khunst Astrologey gantz schwär ist.”

81. Tannstetter, VD16 T 160, a2v: “Dan was solich schein Landen / Steten / Leüten. und andern so aus den elementen zůsamen gemacht bedeütte / gehört nit offenlich / sonder höher zudisputirn / weil deren ausganng (wie Damascenus von den Cometen sagt) allain in gottes gewalt ist.”

82. Tanstetter, VD16 T 160, b3v. On this enduring controversy in early modern astrology, see Zambelli, “Introduction,” 24–27.

83. Gereon, VD16 G 1480, a1v; Talkenberger, Sintflut, 255–57; Zambelli, “Introduction,” 6–8.

84. Barnes, Prophecy and Gnosis, 75.

85. Warburg, Heidnisch-antike Weissagung, 31: “jene Massenliteratur . . . , die die Sündflutpanik von 1524 hervorrief”; Hammerstein, “Battle of the Booklets,” 129; Müller, “Poet, Prophet, Politiker,” 106: “Ungünstigen Auslegungen—etwa die einer gefährlichen Planetenkonstellation 1524–, die eine allgemeine Hysterie hervorrufen könnten, sucht die Obrigkeit daher mit beruhigenden Gegenprognostiken die Wirkung zu nehmen.”

86. Zambelli, “Many Ends for the World,” 239.

87. Neske, Spätmittelalterliche deutsche Sibyllenweissagung, 269–70.

88. Johannes von Lübeck, ISTC ij00376000, b3r.

89. Thomas, Religion and the Decline of Magic, 425.

CONCLUSION

1. Lerner, Powers of Prophecy, 188.

2. Müller, “Poet, Prophet, Politiker,” 103: “Die Formel impliziert eine extrem ‘asymmetrische’ Kommunikationssituation. Es gibt eine Instanz, die, im Namen einer noch höheren, Wahrheit kündet, und das Volk, das die Kunde empfängt. Vornehmlich richtet sich diese an seine Führer und Könige, die danach zu handeln haben, während das Volk davon nur betroffen ist, sie passiv hinnehmen muß.”

3. Niccoli, Prophecy and People, 4.

4. Barnes, Prophecy and Gnosis, 10–11.

5. Johannes von Lübeck, ISTC ij00376000 (Bamberg SB Inc. typ. M. IV. 13#6), a1r: “Cave ab hoc hae<re>tico, et falso p<ro>pheta.”

6. Pseudo-Methodius, VD16 M 4935 (Bamberg SB Inc. typ. Ic. I. 29#2), i1r: “NB. Falsitatem harum expositionum sive praedictioneum ipsa jam experientia detegit edocetque”; i5b: “Experientia hodie contrarium testatur.”

7. Lichtenberger, ISTC il00204000 (Bamberg SB Inc. typ. Ic. II. 2#2), d6v: “Karolus filius primogeniti maximiliani rex hispaniorum electuus est”; e2r: “Videtur . . . propheta de quo modo rumor est in persia Anno . . . 1508 vel fuit frater iereimus . . . florencie combustus qui se pro propheta gerabat . . . vel d.M.l”; f4v: “varie passiones accedent hominibus quas medici curare nequentur. Ecce malafrantzos”; f5r: “Videtur michi quod multitudo locustarum qui sunt 1504 per hoc significitur.”

8. Lichtenberger, VD16 L 1598 (Bamberg SB JH. H. bell. f. 1#2), c5r: “Also geschieht es Layder an itzo in Teutschland 162[. . .] Ja Layder Viel mehr In disem 1630 Jar.”

9. Advogarius, ISTC ia00057200 (Munich BSB 4 Inc.c.a. 1188), a2r: “mense nouembri die xvii profluuio veneris periit.”

10. Charles de Boulles, VD16 B 6827, a2r: “Denn ich bin durch streiche witzig worden / den sachen nach zu dencken. Für war Christus gibt dem Bapstum viel zeichen.” On Luther’s use of Brother Claus’s prophecy, see Scribner, Sake of Simple Folk, 137–40.

11. Luther, Vom mißbrauch der Messen (VD16 L 3621), n3r: “und wie den der propheceyen art vnd natur ist / das sie erfült / dann verstanden werden.”

12. Wilhelm Friess, VD16 ZV 6207, b2v–b3r: “Denn ein yeder Mensch wirt erfullet werden mit tugenden / Alsdenn wirt ein yeder verstandt und weyßhait haben / gleich den Aposteln imm anfang der Apostolischen Kirchen. Sie sollen durch Gottes Geyst / inn der heyligen Schrifft / erleüchtet werden / die zůvor sehr lang verfinstert ist gewesen. Sie sollen auch verstehn alle Propheceyung oder Weyssagung / so zůvor von den Propheten geweyssaget unnd beschriben seind. Es werden auch vil sein / die nicht allein die Propheten verstehn werden / sonder sollen auch selbst durch den heyligen Geist zukommene ding verkündigen.” The biblical allusion is to Joel 2:28: “Then afterwards I will pour out my spirit on all flesh; your sons and your daughters shall prophesy, your old men shall dream dreams, and your young men shall see visions” (NSRV). On Friess, see Barnes, Prophecy and Gnosis, 81.

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INDEX

Italic page numbers indicate figures.

1524: flood predictions and conjunctions of, 9, 14, 52, 55–56, 71, 88, 113, 115–16, 126–28, 132–34, 137–50 (see also Camillus, Aegidius); Carion, Johann, prognostication for 1524; Copp, Johannes; Ransmar, Sebastian; Seitz, Alexander; Tannstetter, Georg; Virdung, Johannes, Prognostication on the conjunctions of 1524

Abenragel, Haly (Albohazen), 135–36, 241n77

Adelung, Johann Christoph, 60

Adso Dervensis, 66

Advogarius, Petrus, 117, 153

Albumasar, 34, 135, 148

Alfonso II (king of Naples), 153

Alofresant, 13, 143–44, 239n56

Ambach, Melchior, 108

Anabaptists, 8, 132

Angelic Pope, 82, 92, 103, 128, 143

Angelus (Engel), Johannes, 115

Annius, Johannes (Giovanni Nanni), 40–42, 210n3

Antichrist, 13, 30, 40–42, 47, 56, 66, 87, 98, 103, 108, 143. See also Lübeck, Johannes von

antiquarianism, 9, 102–8

Antwerp, 115–16

Apian, Peter, 121

Aristotle, 40, 41, 64, 68

“Auffahrt Abend” prophecy (“Bruder Raimund,” Visio fratris Johannis), 13, 60, 116, 217n59

Augsburg, 69–70

Aytinger, Wolfgang, 44, 51, 92–93, 106, 152

Barberiis, Philippus de, 37–38, 103

Barbus, Johannes, 132

Basel, 51, 83, 93

Bingen, Hildegard of. See Hildegard of Bingen

Birgitta of Sweden, 3, 7, 8, 30, 65, 76, 83, 105, 239n56; Burden of the World (Onus mundi), 3, 13, 30, 62–65, 81–82, 105, 107; in the Extract of Various Prophecies, 48, 57–58, 145; in Johannes Lichtenberger’s Prognosticatio, 13, 87, 89, 40, 41; Revelations, 4–6, 7, 62, 71, 75, 76, 107

Blanchis, Julianus de, 124–25, 132, 233n43

Bonaventura, Saint, 92

Brant, Sebastian, 46, 79, 92–94, 96, 112, 115, 135, 139

Braune, Kaspar, 231n12

Brelochs, Anton, 67, 114, 121, 132

Brotbeihel, Jeremias, 125

Brotbeihel, Matthias, 33–34, 121, 231n12

“Bruder Claus,” 81, 95–96, 154, 225n27

“Bruder Raimund.” See “Auffahrt Abend” prophecy

“Bruder Sigwalt,” 239n54

Brunfels, Otto, 131

Camillus, Aegidius, 121, 142, 148

Cammerlander, Jakob (printer of Strasbourg), 51, 77, 83, 99, 222n2, 239n56 Canter, Johannes, 44, 110

Capistor, Johannes, 71

Carion, Johann, 13, 55–61, 110, 215n46; chronicle, 55, 59, 217n55; dispute with Andreas Perlach, 55, 134, 149; “Hidden Prophecy,” 55, 59–61, 104, 105, 109, 146; influence of prophecy on, 14, 55–56, 57, 58–59, 61; Interpretation and Revelation, 56–61, 87–88, 102, 105, 113, 115, 128, 134–35, 138, 144, 146–47; Interpretation and Revelation, editions, 48, 56, 57–58, 59, 60–61, 74, 144, 216n53; practicas, 55, 116, 121, 134, 138; prognostication for 1524, 14, 55–56, 58–59, 67, 132, 142–43, 147, 215n47

Catherine of Siena, Saint, 106

Cato, German, 25

Cattaneo, Filippo, 103–4

censorship, 43, 54, 66, 126

Charles V (Holy Roman Emperor), 143–44, 147, 152

Cirvelo, Pedro, 141

Cologne, 42, 54, 110

comets: prognostications on, 35, 39, 47, 48, 64, 67, 68, 71, 83, 110, 117, 120, 122, 134, 135, 137

communication, prophet model of. See prophecy, communicative models of

Copernicus, Nicolas, 131, 229–30n4

Copp, Johannes, 13, 126–28, 238–39n52

Creussner, Friedrich (printer of Nuremberg), 119–20, 121

Creutzer, Peter, 44–45, 68–69, 121

Cross: legend of wood, 17, 25, 33, 36, 37, 79

d’Ailly, Pierre, 40, 56

Daniel, Prophecy of (Somnia Danielis, dream book), 31, 221n47

dedicatory epistles, 47, 55–58, 60, 61, 82, 113, 116, 125–28, 133, 216n53

Der Nollhart, 24, 51–52, 77, 83

Der treue Eckhart. See Eckhart, Faithful, pseudonym

Dietrich von Zengg. See “Theodericus Croata”

Dürer, Albrecht, 140

Eck, Paulus, 233n35

Eckhart, Faithful (pseud.), 114–16, 131, 137, 139, 231n15

Egenolff, Christian (printer of Frankfurt), 38, 48–49, 61, 85, 102–8

Eichmann, Jodocus, 31, 32–33, 37–38

Eipelius, Berchthold, 115

Engel, Johannes. See Angelus (Engel), Johannes

ephemerides: printed, 133, 134–35, 136. See also Stöffler, Johannes

Erfurt, 42, 43, 51

“Esdra the Prophet, Revelation of” (weather rules), 31

Extract of Various Prophecies (of Johannes Lichtenberger and Joseph Grünpeck), 43, 48–49, 51, 57, 67, 77, 103, 107, 112, 144, 213n26; printed with Johann Carion’s Interpretation and Revelation, 57–58, 59, 74

Eyssenmann, Simon, 34

Faber, Wenzel, 13, 65, 109–10, 115, 117–20, 123–24, 129, 140, 150

Fabri, Sigismund, 110

false prophets, 39, 46–47, 68–69, 89–90, 97–98, 152–53

Ferrer, Vincent (pseud.), On the End of the World, 30, 67, 106

Flach, Martin (printer of Basel), 37

France, 6, 89, 90, 117, 118, 144, 239n56

Francisci de Insulis, Michael, 42

Francis I (king of France), 144

Frankfurt, 61, 103, 106

Frederick II (Holy Roman Emperor), 21

Frederick III (Holy Roman Emperor), 21–22, 44, 80, 82, 104

Frederick III (Prince-elector of Saxony), 127

Friess, Wilhelm, 67, 154, 219n19

Frischlin, Nikodemus: Julius redivivus, 33

Froschauer, Hans (printer of Augsburg), 92

Furter, Michael (printer of Basel), 93

“Gamaleon,” 239n56

gender and sexuality, 90, 124–25

Gengenbach, Pamphilus, 13, 24, 239n56

Gereon, Johannes (pseud. Veit Bild), 149

Gigebaldus, Prophecy to, 52, 143

Glogoviensis, Johannes Schelling (from Glogau), 117, 119

Glotz, Christophorus de, 65, 223n7

Goethe, Johann Wolfgang: Faust, 26

Graminaeus, Theodor, 145–46

Gregory I (pope), 93, 96

Grünpeck, Joseph, 13, 47–49, 65, 106, 151; Prognosticon, 103, 145; “Reformation of Christendom and the Churches,” 103–6; Speculum, 48, 67–68, 77, 78, 85, 103, 105, 144, 212–13n24; Speculum, images in, 75–77, 78, 94, 96, 105, 215n47, 222n2. See also Extract of Various Prophecies

Guasconus, Franciscus, 117, 232n27

Guldenmund, Hans (printer of Nuremberg), 96

Gülfferich, Hermann (printer of Frankfurt), 86

Gundelfingen, Heinrich, 95

Gutenberg, Johannes, 2–3, 8, 14, 15–23, 28–33, 36–38, 40, 66, 207n3; Astronomical Calendar for 1448, 16–17, 29, 32; Bible editions, 16, 17, 18, 19, 29–30, 32, 207n3; Cisioianus, 29; Donatus, Latin grammar, 18, 20, 30; indulgences, 30; Laxierkalendar/Aderlasskalender, 29; papal bull against the Turks, 29–30, 208n31; Sibyl’s Prophecy, 14, 16–23, 28–33, 36–38, 40, 79, 151; Turk Calendar, 22, 29–30, 112

Hack, Mads, 121, 144

Haselberg, Johann, 239n56

Hatten, Matternus, 239n56

Heidelberg, 69, 120

Hildegard of Bingen, 13, 30, 35, 40, 56, 59, 62, 65, 93, 98, 99, 225n29, 239n56 Hochstetter, Christoph, 124

Hoffman, Melchior, 8

“Hort von der Astronomie.” See “Questions of the Astronomy Master to the Devil”

Hupfuff, Matthias, 10, 43, 52, 66, 70

images, printed, 13, 45, 47, 57, 74, 83, 85–108, 143, 144; in practicas, 112–13, 125, 126–27, 128, 129, 150, 223n7, 233n36; in Sibyl’s Prophecy and sibylline texts, 80, 221–22n47. See also Grünpeck, Joseph, Speculum, images in; Lichtenberger, Johannes, Prognosticatgio, images in; Vaticinia de summis pontificibus

Indagine, Johannes de, 44

Isidore of Seville, Sententiae, 3, 63, 93

Islam, 29, 39, 42, 92, 107, 124. See also Turks, Ottoman

Italy and Italian prognostications, 6, 8–9, 34, 37–38, 43, 96, 112, 114, 117, 118, 120–21, 132, 140, 141

Jewish figures and anti-Semitism, 51, 65, 83, 89, 124

Joachim I (prince-elector of Brandenburg), 55, 57, 61

Joachim of Fiore, 13, 30, 35, 40, 48, 56, 57, 59, 62, 65, 90, 96, 106, 145

Johannes von Lübeck, 40, 42, 149–50, 152

Johannes von Paltz, 42

John II (duke of Burgundy), 143

Joseph, Prophecy of (dream book), 31

Josephus, 103

Jost, Ursula, 8

Kettenbach, Heinrich, 139

Kistler, Bartholomäus (printer of Strasbourg), 43, 52, 69–70, 81

Knoblochtzer, Heinrich (printer of Heidelberg), 27, 43, 69, 70, 80, 81

Köbel, Jakob (printer of Oppenheim), 4, 13, 37–38, 103, 121

Krautwadel, Michael, 34, 111, 121, 124

Laet, Jasper, 116, 233n43

Laet, Johannes, 117,233n43

Landsberg, Martin (printer of Leipzig), 117

Last Day: signs of, 30, 103

Last Emperor, 82, 103, 128, 143, 239n56

Lazius, Wolfgang, 108, 230n5

Leimbach, Georg, 121

Leipzig, 64, 117, 118, 119, 120

Lichtenberger, Johannes, 43–45, 68, 109, 151. See also Extract of Various Prophecies

Conjunction of Saturn and Mars, 13, 44, 79–80, 87, 109, 117

Prognosticatio, 39, 42, 44, 45, 47, 51, 54, 58, 60, 64–65, 68–69, 71–75, 79, 80–82, 109, 110, 112, 129, 152–53, 233n36

authorial identity in, 45, 49–55, 61, 87

editions, 43, 69–70

1488, 43, 49, 52, 57, 211n6

1492, 43, 69

1497, 43

1500–1501, 51, 211n7, 214n43, 220n26, 222–23n3

1521, 11, 43, 52, 144, 228n54; later editions, 151

1525–34: Augsburg, 65, 70, 104

1526, 104

1527, 13, 74, 98, 104, 211–12n12, 214n43, 220–21n35, 225n29. See also Luther, Martin, preface to Prognosticatio of Johannes Lichtenberger

1543–45: in Great Practica with Virdung’s prognostication for 1524, 47, 83, 121, 144, 146

1548–50: in Christian Egenolff’s compilations, 104–6, 108, 227n51

1557, 213n30

1585, 214n43

1587, 228n54

Italian, 211n7

seventeenth century, 105–6

images in, 13, 39–40, 41, 43, 47, 49–54, 57, 72, 73, 81–82, 85–92, 94, 95, 99–100, 105, 213n30, 214n43, 218n10, 222n2, 233n36

influence of, 13, 43, 44, 46–48, 51–52, 77, 100, 103, 151, 239n56

sources, 13, 39–40, 41, 45–46, 62

Lollard: figure of, 49, 53–54, 58, 83, 95, 145, 214n43. See also Gengenbach, Pamphilus, Der Nollhart; Reinhart, Brother; Waldbruder, forest hermit figure

Lucidarius: German literary work, 25, 26

Luther, Martin, 2, 8, 90, 96, 99, 102, 104, 116, 126, 153, 154; preface to Prognosticatio of Johannes Lichtenberger, 13, 43, 74–75, 86, 98

Magdeburg, 59, 107

Mainz, 8, 14, 15, 17, 18, 19, 28, 29, 33, 37, 40, 43

Manfredis, Hieronymus de, 117

Mangolt, Bartholomeus, 33, 121

Maximilian I (Holy Roman Emperor), 47, 59, 82, 104, 132, 147

Meder, Johannes, 93

Melanchthon, Philipp, 55, 215n46, 217n55

Melhofer, Philipp, 121

Methodius (pseud.), 13, 30, 40, 48, 51, 56, 57, 58–59, 65, 83, 92–94, 104–5, 106, 143, 145, 152, 224n22, 239n56

Meydenbach, Jakob (printer of Mainz), 43, 69, 70

Middelburg, Paul of: Invective Against a Certain Superstitious Astrologer, 87, 151; practicas, 82, 132, 117, 120, 233n36;Prognostication for Twenty Years, 39, 46, 130, 140, 233n36;tract on the flood panic, 137, 233n36

Munich, 43, 69, 70

Murner, Beatus, 103

Murner, Thomas, 218n13

necromancy: accusations of, 55, 132, 134

Netherlands, 121

Neuheuser, Wilhelm Eon, 105–6

New Year’s Day: associations with practicas and prognostication, 25, 115–16

Nifo, Agostino, 140, 141, 142, 147

Nikolaus von Flüe, 95. See also “Bruder Claus”

Nuremberg, 13, 23–24, 25, 72, 96, 98, 117, 118, 229n4

“Oak gall prophecy,” 53–54, 214n39

Osiander, Andreas, 13, 96–100, 102, 107

Paracelsus, Theophrastus, 13, 34, 35, 99–102, 104–6, 113

paratexts, 10, 45, 49, 54–61, 86–89, 102, 112–15, 125, 127–28, 133, 214n44

Peasants’ War of 1525, 55, 67, 147

Perillus, James, 34, 233n43

Perlach, Andreas, 55, 133–34, 138–39, 149

Pflaum, Jakob, 107, 134, 139–40, 143, 147, 148, 149

“Pflaum, Jakob”: pseudonymous prophecy, 13, 59, 107, 112, 143

Phillip IV (Duke of Burgundy), 132

Phillip (elector palatine), 47

Pigghe, Albert, 140, 141

planetary tables. See ephemerides, printed

planet children: sevenfold description of society, 114, 120, 123–24

Polich, Martin, 117, 123

Pontano, Giovanni, 34

practicas, 14, 34, 40, 55, 56, 58, 66, 71, 82–83, 87, 106, 109–40, 144–46, 148–50, 153, 233n26; parody and anti-astrological practicas, 111, 139, 229–30n4. See also Eckhart, Faithful, pseudonym

printing: economics of, 18–19, 28, 42–43, 45, 54, 66, 69–70, 121–22, 123, 135

Prophecies of the Twelve Sibyls, 32, 37–38, 103, 221–22n47

prophecy: communicative models of, 1–4, 9, 31, 63, 79–84, 152, 153

Prophecy and Secret of Old Hidden Writings, 107, 143

Prueckner, Nikolaus, 121, 125, 132, 135, 145

Ptolemy, 34, 40, 41, 116, 135, 138, 148

Pürstinger, Berthold: Onus ecclesiae, 105, 107

Quentel, Peter (printer of Cologne), 43, 70

“Questions of the Astronomy Master to the Devil,” 25–28

“Raimund, Brother.” See “Auffahrt Abend” prophecy

Ransmar, Sebastian, 147

Rasch, Johannes, 110–11, 114, 120, 137, 141

Ratdolt, Erhard (printer of Venice and Augsburg), 40, 135–36

Reformation, Protestant, and prophecy, 2, 7–8, 51, 69, 96–99, 102, 104, 126–28, 147. See also Luther, Martin

Reinhart, Brother, 13, 40, 41, 48, 49, 52–54, 60, 95, 239n56. See also Lollard, figure of

relics, 36–37

Reynmann, Leonhard, 140, 145, 146–47, 150, 238–39n52

Rhau, Georg (printer of Wittenberg), 57, 74, 215n50

Rietheim, Philadelphus von, 121

Rodt, Stephan, 104

Rome, 87, 92, 106, 107, 147

Rupescissa, John of, 4, 239n56

Ruth (pilgrim, pseud.), 46, 51, 52, 54

Ryff, Walther Hermann, 121

Sachs, Hans, 13, 96–98

Salomon von Roermond, 56, 60, 113, 144

Salzburg, 128

Salzmann, Gregor, 125

Samuel of Jerusalem: prophecy, 13

Savonarola, Hieronymus, 6, 152

Schelling, Johannes, of Glogau. See Glogoviensis, Johannes Schelling

Schepper, Cornelis, 133

Schleusinger, Eberhard, 64

Schmid, Karl, 21

Schobser, Hans (printer of Munich), 43, 52, 69, 70, 211n7, 220n26, 222–23n3, 239n56

Schöffer, Peter (printer of Worms), 43, 86, 104

Schöner, Johannes, 121, 131–32, 145

Schrotbanck, Hans, 222–23n3

Schürstab family (of Nuremberg), 23–24

Schynnagel, Marcus, 82, 112

Scribanarius, Marcus, 117

Seger, Johannes, 66, 87, 138

Seitz, Alexander, 52, 55, 132, 141, 142, 146, 235–36n10

Seuse, Heinrich, 25

Seybold, Leonhard, 66–67

Sibenbürger, Dionysius, 121, 124

sibyls and sibylline prophecies, 4, 13, 30–33, 37–38, 40, 41, 48, 57–58, 59, 62, 83, 87, 103, 106, 145, 151, 221–22n47, 239n56. See also Prophecies of the Twelve Sibyls

Sibyl’s Prophecy, 14, 16–38, 63, 75, 79–80, 103, 149, 151, 153. See also Gutenberg, Johannes, Sibyl’s Prophecy; Simitz, Theodor, 55

Soardi, Lazzaro (printer of Venice), 106

society: tripartite, 5–6, 67, 71–79, 73, 80–82, 86, 110, 114

Solomon: conversation with Sibyl, 17, 25–26, 27, 31, 33, 34, 75, 79–80, 82, 83, 109, 125

Spiegelberg, Konrad von, 121

Stabius, Johannes, 112

Statmion, Christoph, 121, 122, 136

Steiner, Heinrich (printer of Augsburg), 43, 65, 70, 104, 126

Stöckel, Wolfgang (printer of Leipzig), 43, 144, 215n47

Stöffler, Johannes, 107, 133–34, 137, 139–40, 141–42, 143, 146, 147, 148, 149

Strasbourg, 15, 21, 36–37, 43, 66, 80, 103

Tannstetter, Georg, 122, 125, 126, 132, 135, 146–47, 241n71; writings on the conjunctions of 1524, 71, 88, 113, 115, 132–34, 141, 142, 148–49, 235–36n10

Tatius, Marcus, 100

Telesphorus of Costenza, 13, 106

Theobertus of England, 40, 116

“Theodericus Croata” (“Dietrich von Zengg”), 13, 112, 144, 239–40n58

Thirty Years’ War, 105, 153

Tockler, Conrad, 122

“Toledo Letter”: prophecy, 40, 116, 145

Torquatus, Antonius, 211n8

Tortsch, Johannes, 13, 62–65, 153. See also Birgitta of Sweden, Burden of the World

Tract against the Turks, 30, 65, 67, 107, 124

Tucher, Katharina, 25

Tundalus, 25–26

Turks, Ottoman, and Turkish figures, 21, 29–30, 35, 42, 51, 57, 65, 67, 83, 89, 90, 92, 95, 124, 143, 147, 152, 239n56. See also Alofresant; Tract against the Turks

Vaticinia de summis pontificibus, 13, 96–100, 97, 102, 225n29

vernacular, use of: compared to Latin, 18, 22, 28–30, 34, 64, 66, 69–71, 70, 112, 120, 134, 141

Vielfeld, Jakob, 99

Vienna, 108, 132, 134, 147, 229n4

Virdung, Johannes, 13, 14, 35, 46–47, 65, 83, 107, 132–33, 144; practicas, 34, 71, 106–7, 114, 119–24, 125, 129, 132, 133, 146, 147, 232n32, 235n5; prognostication on the conjunctions of 1524, 47, 60, 67, 83, 102, 113, 133, 138, 140, 141–42, 146, 147, 233n36. See also Lichtenberger, Johannes, Prognosticatio, editions, 1543–45, in Great Practica with Virdung’s prognostication for 1524

Visio fratris Johannis. See “Auffahrt Abend” prophecy

Visio Tnugdali. See Tundalus

Vögelin, Johannes, 137

Walasser, Adam, 81, 108

Waldbruder (forest hermit figure), 49–54, 231n15. See also Lollard, figure of

Weinmer, Endres von, 121

Wilhelm, Balthasar, 116

Wilken (alias Witekind), Hermann (Augustin Lercheimer, pseud.), 55, 88, 215n46

Wittenberg, 13, 43, 74, 104

Wolmar, Johann, 121

woodcuts. See images, printed

Zainer, Günther (printer of Augsburg), 116

Zeninger, Conrad (printer of Nuremberg), 30–31

Züntel, Johannes, 116