Mundus symbolicus in emblematum universitate formatus, explicatus, (…) in Latinum traductus a R. D. Augustino Erath, (…)

Hermann Demen, Köln, 1687

With the often missing engraved title page by Johann Heinrich Löffler. Second edition in Latin translation.

Description: 2 parts in 1 vol. Contemporary pigskin over wooden boards, blind-panelled. Folio: 35 × 23 cm; pp. [52], 738 [i.e. 740] pp, [8], 276 [i.e. 268], [206]. With 1 engraved title page, 2 printer’s marks, 8 headpieces, 34 large emblematic engravings printed in text.

Ref.: Landwehr 483; VD17 23:000500R and 23:000501Y

Condition: Boards slightly bowed and somewhat stained, one clasp removed. Endpapers, first and last leaves wormed, with minor loss of text or illustrations. Occasionally lightly foxed and slightly waterstained. Underlining in the index ‘Authores e quibus emblemata …’ pp. [50–52]. Last blank of volume 2 missing. Otherwise complete and well-preserved.

Notes: With the Mundus Symbolicus, the Augustinian canon Filippo Picinelli (1604–1679) created the most comprehensive encyclopaedia of emblems of the 17th century. Picinelli believed that the world created by God could be read as a book of symbols. Guided by this belief, he began to collect and describe emblems. This evolved into his famous Book of Emblems, a work of over a thousand pages with encyclopaedic pretensions. It was first published in Milan in 1653 as Mondo Simbolico. But it was the Latin translation by Augustin Erath (Cologne 1681) that made it one of the most popular reference works among the intellectual elite and artists of the Baroque era.