Albrecht Pfister
Albrecht Pfister (* around 1420 ; † before April 13, 1466 ) was a printer and publisher in Bamberg and the first printer outside of Mainz . He was the first to start using prints made with movable type with illustrations (woodcuts).
life and work
Little is known of Albrecht Pfister's life. He was a form cutter and letter printer before he learned to print and is documented with a first printing in Bamberg in 1462. In Bamberg he lived in what is now the Sonnenplätze 2 property . This property was later owned by Pankraz Wagner .
Comparisons of Pfister's typeset with earlier prints, however, lead to the assumption that he had already set up an office in Bamberg at the end of the 1450s . Pfister was a cleric in the service of the Bamberg diocese . Recent research suggests that he should be seen more as a publisher than a printer.
In 1462, the Four Histories , which were provided with illustrations, and a German Bible for the Poor , were published from Pfister's office . In 1464 the Belial was printed, the illustrated German edition of a Latin poem from 1382. Further works can be attributed to the workshop by comparing the printing types used. The printing of the collection of Aesopian fables, Der Edelstein , created by the Swiss Ulrich Boner around 1330, which was completed on February 14, 1461 in Bamberg , is considered the first printed book in German and is illustrated throughout with woodcuts. Thanks to the products from Albrecht Pfister's Offizin, the woodcuts were designed by two masters in their field, Bamberg is, alongside Mainz, the second important starting point for the further development of letterpress printing and a center for the production of German-language prints from the incunable period .
B36
Around 1460 a 36-line Biblia sacra vulgata was printed in Pfister's type set in Bamberg , which (like his other printed matter) resembled Gutenberg's in a number of letters . This later led to Pfister being considered the inventor of the printing press for a long time, and culminated in a dispute over the attribution of the Bamberg Bible in the 19th century, which was even reflected in encyclopedic articles such as the Allgemeine Deutsche Biographie . The Bamberg Biblia sacra , of which only a few copies have survived, was given the designation “B36”, corresponding to the famous “B42”, the Gutenberg Bible ; Their origin has not been clarified beyond any doubt.
literature
- Severin Corsten, in: Lexicon of the entire book system , 2nd edition, Volume 5 (1999), pp. 620–621.
- J. Braun: Pfister, Albrecht . In: Allgemeine Deutsche Biographie (ADB). Volume 25, Duncker & Humblot, Leipzig 1887, pp. 792-794.
- Karl Falkenstein: History of book printing in its development and training . Leipzig 1840; P. 150f.
- Fritz Funke: Book customer . Munich-Pullach 1969; P. 85.
- Ferdinand Geldner : Albrecht Pfister. In: Author's Lexicon . Volume VII, Col. 572-574.
- Häußermann, Sabine: The Bamberg Pfisterprints. Early incunabula illustration and media change. Berlin 2008 (New Research on German Art IX) ISBN 978-3-87157-219-7
Web links
- Prints by Albrecht Pfister in the complete catalog of incandescent prints
- Prints from Pfister in the ISTC
- Falko Klaes: The works of the Bamberg Offizin Pfister between handwriting and printing. May 18, 2018, accessed May 31, 2018 .
| personal data | |
|---|---|
| SURNAME | Pfister, Albrecht |
| BRIEF DESCRIPTION | German book printer |
| DATE OF BIRTH | around 1420 |
| DATE OF DEATH | before April 13, 1466 |