Heinrich Vogtherr (1490-1556), Sebald Beham (1500-1550), and Jost Amman (1539-1591)

Heinrich Vogtherr (1490-1556), Sebald Beham (1500-1550), and Jost Amman (1539-1591)
Sammelband of artist's pattern books, Germany, 16th century
4 works in 1 volume, 4to (16.5 x 12.5cm), early-18th-century British binding of calf-backed marbled boards, spine gilt in compartments, top compartment with heraldic crest of Clan Swinton (boar statant chained to a tree), second and third with contrasting red and green labels (titled ‘Beham’s Draughts' and dated 1538), engraved 18th-century bookplate to front pastedown, 20th-century bookplate of Robert and Helen Kime to front free endpaper (largely earlier ownership inscription ending ‘Laing’). Contents comprise: 1. Vogtherr, Heinrich. Ein Frembds und wunderbars kunstbüchlin allen Molern, Bildshnitzern, Goldschmiden, Steinmetzen, Schreinern, Platnern, Waffen un Messerschmiden hochnutzlich zu[m] gebrauchen, Der gleich vor nie keins gesehen, oder inn den Truck kommen ist. Strassburg: Heinrich Vogtherr, 1538. A-G4, 27 ff., lacking D1, illustrated with twin woodcut medallion portraits of Heinrich Vogtherr the Elder and Younger on title page, 108 woodcut bust studies of men and women wearing various kinds of headgear, and some 600 further woodcut studies of hands, feet, helmets, body armour, weaponry, shields, moulded column capitals and bases, and candelabra. Moderate soiling, closely trimmed along fore edge frequently cropping text and images, small chip to head of A2-3, A3 with closed tear, A4 with shallow chips to lower margin, C1 and C3 possibly transposed, G4 (final leaf) torn with loss. [VD 16 V 2179; not in Adams].Second edition (first published in 1537) of what is commonly described as the first printed model-book for artists, a highly influential work which was reprinted several times into the 17th century, the rarity of surviving copies attesting to their heavy usage, with four copies traced in auction records in the last 100 years, including one of the 1538 edition, the remaining copies from later editions. In his preface, Vogtherr, himself a committed evangelical, presents the work as an attempt to preserve traditional artistic knowledge and craft practices among his German compatriots against the threat posed presumably by the iconoclastic tendencies of the Reformation. ‘Vogtherr probably trained with Hans Burgkmair in Augsburg. After working from c.1522 in Wimpfen, he moved to Strasbourg towards the end of 1525, where he worked as a painter and where he became a citizen in 1526. From 1536 he ran a printing business in Strasbourg, publishing medical works which he probably wrote himself, and a ’Kunstbüchlein' in 1537, a pattern book with designs for painters and decorative artists, to which his son Heinrich Vogtherr, who became a master in 1541, also contributed' (British Museum, online).[Bound after:]2. Beham, Sebald. Dises buchlein zeyget an und lernet ein maß oder proporcion der Ross nutzlich iungen gesellen malern und goltschmide[n]. Nuremberg: [Friedrich Peypus], 1528. A-E4 (-E4, blank or cancelled), 19 ff., lacking E2 (f. 18) and E4, illustrated with 14 woodcut and typographic diagrams depicting in stages the drawing of a horse, decorative woodcut initials. Closely trimmed along fore-edge frequently cropping text and images, damp-staining and general soiling, E3 torn with loss and misbound between D4 and E1.[Bartrum, German Renaissance Prints 1490-1550, 94; VD16 B 14873; not in Adams].First edition, a very rare piracy of a series of sketches on proportion by Albrecht Dürer, preceding their authorised publication in Vier Bücher von menschlicher Proportion later the same year. An accusation of plagiarism was brought by Dürer's widow Agnes and Nuremberg's city council ‘ordered Beham … not to publish any further copies of the treatise and not to sell those copies already printed’ (Smith, Nuremberg: A Renaissance City 1500-1683, 1983, 95). Beham appears to have fled the city as a result, moving first to Ingolstadt before settling in Frankfurt. Two copies traced in auction records (2018, in Germany, with 17 leaves only, and a complete copy at Sotheby's in 1933).[And before:]3. Beham, Sebald. [Kunst und Lehrbüchlin Malen und Reissen zu lernen, nach rechter Proportion, Maß und außtheilung dess Circkels. Angehenden Malern und Kunst-baren Werckleuten dienlich]. [?Frankfurt: Christian Egelnoffs Erben, 1582 or 1584]. 9 leaves only (of 27), i.e. A4 B-C4, woodcuts in text (mainly head studies and related diagrams), A1 torn with loss, B4 chipped at foot, cropping in fore margins.[Possibly VD16 B1480/1, running heads reading ‘Kunst und Lehr Büchlin', matching the orthography of the title in this edition, other editions reading ‘Kunst und Lere …’].First published in 1546.[And:]4. [Amman, Jost]. [Kunstbüchlin. Darinnen neben Furbildung vieler Geistlicher unnd Weltlicher Hohes und Niderstands Personen so dann auch der Turckischen Kayser]. [Frankfurt: durch Romanum Beatum, in Verlegung Johann Feyerabend, 1599]. 102 leaves only (of 152: extant leaves comprise 2 of 4 introductory text-leaves including title-page, and 100 leaves each with woodcut either side, i.e. 200 woodcuts in total), damp-staining and soiling, several chips and tears, one leaf (2D1?) largely torn away, 2L2-3 each with loss of upper third, contemporary and later manuscript captions in German and English;Often described as the most complete edition of Jost Amman's important pattern book for artists, first published in 1578 as Kunst und Lehrbüchlein, but expanded to such an extent as to be in effect a new work, complete copies having over 290 woodcuts, as opposed to 102 in the 1578 edition [Adams A969].