Various types of fish, leaf from an illustrated Hortus Sanitatis manuscript on paper, in Latin [Germany, sixteenth century]

Estimate

3,000 - 5,000 GBP

bidding is closed

Description

Paper

a leaf, 295mm. by 213mm., with four penwork illustrations of types of fish, including a scorpion and three carrion-eating fish tearing at the flesh of a dead horse, 40 lines in black ink in a loose cursive, spaces left for initials, slight ink-smudge in lower border, else good condition

Catalogue Note

This leaf is from an illustrated copy of one of the Hortus Sanitatus (Garden of Health) texts. These were anonymous popular compilations of information on natural history, horticulture and medicinal remedies, which grew out of the herbal and bestiary traditions. The text here discusses the Fastaleon (a fish known to the author here through Thomas of Cantimpré's reinterpretation of Aristotle's De animalibus), the Scorpion, the Gladius (a fish with a mouth resembling the point of a sword which it uses to pierce ships' hulls) and the Gobius (which is said to feed only off carrion, here a dead horse). The text cites a number of ancient authorities apart from Aristotle, including Dioscorides, Isidore of Seville and Pliny the Elder. This version was first printed in Mainz in 1491 by Jacob Meydenbach, and again in Strassburg by Johann Prüss in 1507.