The Book of the Emperor Sigismund

[Pierre Tavlitzki]

At the end of their life, senior scholars of the Middle Ages told what they had seen. These texts from eyewitnesses are the most valuable sources for the events of their time before events are sanitized or embellished by historians.

Thus, Eberhard Windeck wrote the chronicle of Emperor Sigismund, powerful monarch and master of the Germanic territories, whose reign was troubled by the Hussite crisis. He devotes an extract to Joan of Arc, in remembrance of the return of a messenger between the Emperor and the Maid of Orleans.

It is a heavily illustrated manuscript, whose original edition is known in two copies. One is dated 1443. The other is on sale at Sotheby's in London on July 7 and estimated 1 million pounds. Its condition has some significant flaws.

It is a large book of over 300 sheets, 40 x 26 cm. The image is as important as the text: 174 illustrations, many in full page, show big and small events of the reign.

The publisher is known: Diebold Lauber, head at Hagenau (Haguenau) in Alsace of an important workshop of copyists and illustrators and thus a pioneer in profane publishing.

The Middle Ages will soon be finished. A few dozen miles away, Gutenberg is inventing the printing press.

[Pierre Tavlitzki]

Scarcity has prevailed, and the defects identified in the catalog did not contradict the estimate. This manuscript that can nearly be described as a historic document was sold £ 1.15 million including premium.