Author: Helmold Von Bosau, 1125 - 1177
Title: Historiarum Liber, scriptus ante annos pené 400 & ab autore inscriptus Chronica Slavorum., quod continent historiam de conversione Slavorum seu Vuandalorum ad religionem Christianam, regionumq(ue); ac gentium ad mare Balticum situ ac rebus gestis, á tempore Caroli Magni, usq(ue) ad témpora Imp. Friderici Barbarossae, antehac nunquám editus. Insertae sunt et de Romanis imperatoribus memorabiles historiae, dignae cognitione. (hg. v. Sigismund Schorkel).
Title in English: The Book of Histories, Written Almost 400 Years Ago and Named the Slavic Chronicle by the Author, Because it Encompasses the Story of the Conversion into Christianity of the Slavs and Vandals, and Other Countries; and the Life and Wars of the Nations of the Baltic Sea, From the Reign of Charles the Great to the Times of Frederick Barbarossa, Never Before Published. Included Here Are Memorable Stories About Roman Emperors That Are Worthy of Knowing. (Published by Sigismund Schorkel).
Francoforti: apud Petrum Brubachium, 1556.
Format: Gr.-8vo. (8) lvs., 263 pp., (1) p., (l)leaf (blank).
Binding: a few woodcut initials. Contemporary blind-stamped pig-skin over wooden boards (rubbed - particularly comers, darkened, foxed, spine slightly cracked) with two original clasps.
Marginalia: first part of the book water-marked to upper margin.
First edition, rare. Written between c. 1167-1172 Helmold's (c. 1125 - after 1177) chronicle deals with the history of Christianization of the Slavs living near the South coast of the Baltic Sea. The chronicle is very important as a source for the politics of Heinrich der Loewe (Henry the Lion). Title with hand-written ownership entry, rear fly-leaf with an entry by the same hand. Slightly browned throughout, title and fly-leaves more intensively, in places foxed (end-papers, fly-leaves and some lvs. more heavily).
Reference: VD 16, H 1788; Adams H 192; Stoob S. 20 ff.; not in BMSTC (German Books).
The Slavic Chronicle by the German historian and priest Helmold von Bosau (~1125– after 1177) is a work on Saxonian expansion to the East from the lower Elbe and the Christianization of the Slavic Nations. The book also describes the neighbouring Western Baltic tribes. It covers historical events from the end of the 8th century to 1177. The chronicle was first published in 1566 by Sigismund Schorckel (†1573).
Reference: "The Collection of Lawyer Jaunius Gumbis: the Past Preserved in Books". Museum and Collector - 7. Vilnius: National Museum of Lithuania, 2018, p. 379.
Published: "The Collection of Lawyer Jaunius Gumbis: the Past Preserved in Books". Museum and Collector - 7. Vilnius: National Museum of Lithuania, 2018, p. 378-379.