Workshop of the Giant Mainz Bible
The so-called workshop of the Mainz Giant Bible is an emergency name for a workshop primarily for book illumination , which worked between around 1465 and 1500 on the Middle Rhine in Mainz or Heidelberg and adorned numerous manuscripts and early prints ( incunabula ) with ornamental and figurative book illumination, including the eponymous one Giant Mainz Bible . The operation was in close connection with the printing house of Peter Schöffer in Mainz.
Master and staff
The workshop has employed a larger number of employees over the years, although it is not always clear when they belonged to the workshop network and who might have been its head. Nothing is known about the status of master or journeyman. After initial contact with the printing house of Johannes Fust until his death in 1466, cooperation with the printing house of Peter Schöffer on a larger scale began in 1470. First, individual printed copies of the Jerome's letters from 1470 are provided with illumination under the direction of the publisher. Now figurative book illumination also plays an increasingly important role in the workshop.
A distinction is made between the following illuminators:
- The so-called Fust master , who worked with the printer Johannes Fust in Mainz from the late 1450s to 1466 (Durandus from 1459) and was still responsible for the ornaments in the giant Bible by Volpert von Ders around 1470.
Works (selection)
- Mainz, Gutenberg Museum , Cicero, De Officiis (1465)
- Hieronymus letters, illumination of individual copies, printed in Mainz by Peter Schöffer in 1470
- Decretum Gratiani, illumination of individual copies, printed in Mainz by Peter Schöffer in 1472, including the copy for Berthold von Henneberg (Bayerische Staatsbibliothek München, 2 L. imp. Membr. 1a) digitized
- Aschaffenburg, Pontificale Archbishop Adolph von Nassau (Ms 12) (around 1466–1475) (Aschaffenburg, State Gallery in Johannisburg Castle, Castle Library Ms. 12)
- Würzburg, Bible of Volpert von Ders (around 1466–1469) (University Library Würzburg (Mpth.fm11))
- Rome, Vaticana, Virgil (Pal.lat. 1632) (1473/74)
- Berlin, KKB, Simmern Prayer Book (Hs 78 B 4) (around 1481/82)
- Collaboration on the so-called medieval house book (around 1483)
- Mainz, UB , Adalbert-Brevier (ms 33) (1482–1484)
literature
- Elgin Vaassen: The workshop of the Giant Mainz Bible in Würzburg and its surroundings. In: Archives for the history of the book industry. 13, 1972, columns 1121-1428.
- Eberhard König: Illumination in Mainz at the time of Gutenberg, Fust and Schöffer. In: Wolfgang Dobras (Ed.): Gutenberg. event and art. From secret company to the first media revolution. Mainz 2000, pp. 572-583.