Early prints
The SLUB not only houses precious first editions by Dürer, but also his personal manuscript for the first book of his proportion theory printed in Nuremberg in 1528, as well as a sketchbook contained inside it. The manuscript is from the library of Heinrich von Brühl (1700–1763), which was purchased for the Electoral Library in 1768.
Epitome In Divae Parthenices Mariae Historiam
Benedictus Chelidonius and Albrecht Dürer: Epitome In Divae Parthenices Mariae Historiam.
Nuremberg: Dürer, 1511.
Shelf mark: S.B.80
Between 1502 and 1505, and again in 1510, the painter, printmaker and art theorist Albrecht Dürer (1471–1528) created a total of 19 large wood carvings depicting scenes from the life of St Mary, which he then published independently in 1511, enhanced with a cover carving and Latin elegiac distiches by the humanist Benedict Chelidonius (Benedict Schwalbe, circa 1460–1521) on the back of the sheets. The Dresden copy is coloured splendidly, featuring hand-painted borders of multi-coloured twine and ancient mythical creatures. Of an equally high quality are the wood carvings of the affiliated Great Passion and Apocalypse. The precious volume is already recorded in the first catalogue of the Electoral Library for 1574.