Lussy, Melchior — Reißbuch gen Hierusalem · First Edition · Freiburg i.Ü. 1590 · Exceptional Condition · Capuchin Provenance Stamp
On Request
Melchior Lussy (1529–1606), eleven-time Landammann of Nidwalden and one of the most influential Catholic statesmen of sixteenth-century Switzerland, undertook a pilgrimage to Jerusalem in 1583, returning as a Knight of the Holy Sepulchre. This volume — his account of that journey, written in 1584 and published six years later — is among the rarest products of the earliest Swiss printing press outside the established centres of Basel and Zurich.
The printer, Abraham Gemperlin, had been brought to Freiburg im Üchtland in 1585 at the instigation of the Jesuit theologian Peter Canisius to establish the city's first press. His output was modest in quantity but remarkable in significance: his 1586 edition of Renward Cysat's report on Japan was the first printed European book on the subject. The Lussy pilgrimage account, issued four years later, bears the same distinctive woodcut printer's mark — a caduceus with the Senecan motto VIRTVTI FORTVNA COMES — confirming its origin beyond doubt.
Lussy, Cysat and Canisius formed the core of a deliberate Counter-Reformation network linking Stans, Lucerne and Freiburg. All three chose Gemperlin as their printer. That Lussy entrusted his most personal text to this press was not coincidence but a conscious act within that network. Lussy had been a personal friend of Cardinal Carlo Borromeo, Archbishop of Milan, had represented the Catholic cantons at the Council of Trent (1562–63), and had founded the Capuchin monastery at Stans in 1583 — the same year as his pilgrimage.
The present copy carries an eighteenth-century rectangular ownership stamp on the title page, currently read as FRANC JACOB / JOS [AV?] RTZ, identifying a member of a Capuchin community — most plausibly the convent at Stans, with which Lussy himself was directly associated as founder. A second copy of this edition is recorded in the Nidwalden Museum, Stans, bearing the stamp Bibliotheca Capucinorum Stantii. The stamp on the present copy is under ongoing investigation; UV examination is planned to clarify the full reading of the name.
The binding is an eighteenth-century blue paper wrapper, consistent with monastic library practice of the period. Condition is excellent: paper firm and bright, title page complete with printer's vignette and stamp, text block intact. No known auction record exists for any copy of this edition.
Provenance: Capuchin ownership, Stans (?), 18th century → private collection.
Reference: VD16 L 3269. Digitised copy: BCU Fribourg, e-rara.ch, DOI 10.3931/e-rara-23093.
Estimate on request.
The printer, Abraham Gemperlin, had been brought to Freiburg im Üchtland in 1585 at the instigation of the Jesuit theologian Peter Canisius to establish the city's first press. His output was modest in quantity but remarkable in significance: his 1586 edition of Renward Cysat's report on Japan was the first printed European book on the subject. The Lussy pilgrimage account, issued four years later, bears the same distinctive woodcut printer's mark — a caduceus with the Senecan motto VIRTVTI FORTVNA COMES — confirming its origin beyond doubt.
Lussy, Cysat and Canisius formed the core of a deliberate Counter-Reformation network linking Stans, Lucerne and Freiburg. All three chose Gemperlin as their printer. That Lussy entrusted his most personal text to this press was not coincidence but a conscious act within that network. Lussy had been a personal friend of Cardinal Carlo Borromeo, Archbishop of Milan, had represented the Catholic cantons at the Council of Trent (1562–63), and had founded the Capuchin monastery at Stans in 1583 — the same year as his pilgrimage.
The present copy carries an eighteenth-century rectangular ownership stamp on the title page, currently read as FRANC JACOB / JOS [AV?] RTZ, identifying a member of a Capuchin community — most plausibly the convent at Stans, with which Lussy himself was directly associated as founder. A second copy of this edition is recorded in the Nidwalden Museum, Stans, bearing the stamp Bibliotheca Capucinorum Stantii. The stamp on the present copy is under ongoing investigation; UV examination is planned to clarify the full reading of the name.
The binding is an eighteenth-century blue paper wrapper, consistent with monastic library practice of the period. Condition is excellent: paper firm and bright, title page complete with printer's vignette and stamp, text block intact. No known auction record exists for any copy of this edition.
Provenance: Capuchin ownership, Stans (?), 18th century → private collection.
Reference: VD16 L 3269. Digitised copy: BCU Fribourg, e-rara.ch, DOI 10.3931/e-rara-23093.
Estimate on request.