1493 SCHEDEL, H. - Register Des Buchs der Chronicken und geschichten mit figure...

FIRST EDITION IN GERMAN. The famous Nuremberg Chronicle, a history of the world, published the year that Columbus returned to Europe after discovering America. The text is a year-by-year account of notable events in world history from the creation down to the year of publication.
It is a mixture of fact and fantasy, recording events like the invention of printing, but also repeating stories from Herodotus. Even the world map is decorated with strange beings from the far reaches, including a cyclops and a four-eyed man.

645 woodcuts were used to illustrate the Chronicle, but many were used more than once, so there are a total of 1,809 illustrations, making it the most extensively illustrated book of the fifteenth century.
The cutters were Michael Wolgemut, his stepson, Wilhelm Pleydenwurff and their workshop. As Albrecht Dürer was the godson of Koberger and was apprenticed to Wolgemut from 1486 to 1489, it is likely that he was involved in the work.
The immense importance of the Nuremberg Chronicle, in respect to history, geography and topography, cannot be overemphasised. It is often quoted as being the most important book ever printed.

Contemp. marginal manuscript notes in Latin and Flemish. On inside cover plate : Kronijk of opmerkelijke geschiedenissen van het begin der wereld, tot den tijd dat dit boek gedrukt is; zijnde den 23 Dec: 1493. zoo als op de laatste bladzijde vermeldt wordt.

The general condition is very good, with large margins. Bound in a nice 16th cuntury Flemish vellum, with large blind-stamped arabesque ornament on center covers. The spine is renewed, lacking ties. Light marginal water staining throughout. Lacking the final blank, as usual. About 30 pages have a very small marginal tear who are repaired. Pages CI, CII and CIII have a repaired tear of about 3cm. Pages CCLXVIII has a larger tear of 18cm.
Title page and second page have a 4cm. re-installed lower margin. Title with a small worm trace in left margin, among some missing areas along left margin reinforced and the page laid down on very thin Japan paper for protective reason.
Last pages and Europe map with a few small worm holes. Europe map has small margins but complete. An example with good margins.

Two of the abundant illustrations are maps which typify well enough the range of old traditions and new information which characterizes the text itself. The world map is of Ptolemaic configurations, although without Ptolemy's scientific apparatus of latitudes, longitudes, scales, rich nomenclature, etc. The border contains twelve dour wind heads while the map is supported in three of its corners by the solemn figures of Ham, Shem and Japhet taken from the Old Testament.
What gives the map its present-day interest and attraction are the panels representing the outlandish creatures and beings that were thought to inhabit the further most parts of the earth. There are seven such scenes to the left of the map and a further fourteen on its reverse. Pliny, Pomponius Mela, Solinus and Herodotus' Fables have been the sources for many of these mythological creatures; others were doubtless born of medieval travelers' tales. Among the scenes are a six-armed man, possibly based on glimpses of a file of Hindu dancers so aligned that the front figure appears to have multiple arms; a six-fingered man, a centaur, a four-eyed man from a coastal tribe in Ethiopia; a dog-headed man from the Simien Mountains, a cyclops, one of the men whose heads grow beneath their shoulders, one of the crook-legged men who live in the desert and slide along instead of walking; a strange hermaphrodite, a man with one giant foot only (stated by Solinus to be used as a parasol but more likely an unfortunate sufferer from elephantisis), a man with a huge underlip (doubtless seen in Africa), a man with waist-length hanging ears, and other frightening and fanciful creatures of a world beyond.
Twelve winds are named as well as major place names. The source of this map is apparently the frontispiece of Pomponius Mela's Cosmographia printed by Ratdolt at Venice in 1488. [Northern Europe with Poland]. Map of Northern Europe and centered on Poland. First issue, with Latin text colophon and date on verso. The map is deemed to be the first printed map of Germany, even if it shows a larger area. W. B. Grinsberg characterized this map as the first modern map of northern and central Europe. The map ranges from the British Isles to Constantinople.
The designer has been identified as Hieronymus Münzer (1437-1508), who trained as a physician.
The Münzer map is one of the earliest to depict the Scandinavia peninsula.
Nordenskold credits the map of the north in the Zamoyski codes as the prototype for this map. The source for the central European portion is a manuscript map of 1460 of Germany by Cardinal Nicolas Cusanus (also Nicholas of Cusa), printed posthumously at Eichstätt in 1491.

Reference: Br.Museum, IC. 7458 (II 437).