Book of Hours, a devotional work that almost every ‘good’ house owned. Apart from texts, prayers, and psalms, these works contained a Calendar that listed important religious events such as the Easter Cycle, celebratory Saints days, and holy days (holidays), often in red. One entry for July in this late 15th century French manuscript is the ‘red-letter’ day of ‘Marie Magdalene’, usually observed on the 22nd of that month.]]> ___]]> Manuscripts]]> Indulgentie Ecclesiar[um] Urbis Rome in their pockets; a useful and early guidebook. This later printing of 1515 contains a description of the seven major churches in Rome and notable relics and granted indulgences. It is bound with Mirabilia Urbis Rome, a work that deals with ancient and Christian miracles in Rome. When Martin Luther travelled to Rome in 1511, he carried his own Mirabilia with him.]]> ___]]> Book]]> ___]]> Still image]]> Cosmography. Cochlaeus went on to receive his doctorate from the University of Ferrara in Italy in 1517 and was ordained as a priest in Rome in 1518. In 1528, he became the court chaplain to George, the Duke of Saxony – a staunch opponent of the Reformation. Over the course of his career, Cochlaeus would become the ‘most prolific and most acerbic of Catholic polemicists’ (Keen, 2002).]]> ___]]> Still image]]> Index Librorum Prohibitorum in 1559, a list of prohibited books considered a threat to the Catholic faith. In 1571, the Sacred Congregation of the Index was formed to investigate those writings that were denounced in Rome but which required corrections or purging. In this ‘Expurgatorius’ edition of 1586, works by Erasmus are listed. There is no mention of Luther.]]> ___]]> Books]]> ___]]> Print]]> ___]]> Magazine covers]]> ___]]> Magazine covers]]> Vulgate. It was this version that Johannes Gutenberg first printed in Mainz, Germany, c.1455. Prior to Luther’s own translation, there were some seventeen versions in High and Low German available to readers. One well-known ‘High German’ edition was completed by Anton Koberger, entrepreneurial printer and god-father to artist Albrecht Dürer, in 1483. The plague of locusts is but one of the many remarkable woodcut illustrations in the book.]]> ___]]> Incunabula]]> ___]]> Still image]]> Exsurge Domine that condemned Luther’s Protestant views as heretical. A year later, at the Diet of Worms, on 17th April 1521, Luther was summoned to either renounce or reaffirm his views. After much thought he stood firm, saying: ‘Unless I am convinced by proofs from Scriptures or by plain and clear reasons and arguments, I can and will not retract, for it is neither safe nor wise to do anything against conscience. Here I stand. I can do no other. God help me. Amen.’ On 25th May, Luther was officially an outlaw. Here is Bernard of Luxemburg’s popular Catalogue of Heretics that shows Luther on top of a ‘column of heresy’. Catholic iconography is evident: a demon blows ideas into Luther’s ear with a bellows; another drags him with a chain into the flames of hell.]]> [Bernard of Luxemburg]]]> Books]]> Reformatio Legum Ecclesiasticarum was drawn up in 1552 by a commission headed by Thomas Cranmer (1489–1556), Archbishop of Canterbury, and a leader of the English Reformation. First published in 1571, it had later additions and amendments by Matthew Parker, and John Foxe, the martyrologist. Not only did it codify, thus justify, Henry’s earlier divorce from Catherine of Aragon, but it also provided a foundation for the legalisation of divorce. It established that marriage was not a sacrament, and that an innocent person might again marry in the case of adultery, absolute desertion, protracted absence, mortal enmities, or, cruelty. The code was never ratified by Parliament. This is a later reprint (1640) of a book that is a fundamental work to the English Reformation.]]> [Church of England]]]> Books ]]> [Council of Trent]]]> Books ]]> Nuremberg Chronicle and was based on a Ptolemaic map of 1482. This ‘Second Age of the World’ contains Asia, Europe and Africa and places such as the Canaries (Isles of the Blessed), Scotia (Scotland), Scythia, and Hibernia (Ireland). It reinforced to readers the biblical tradition that all humankind was descended from Noah’s three sons: Shem, Ham, and Japheth. Despite Schedel’s attempt to dispel superstitious myths, the weird and wonderful remained: the ‘naked and hairy men who linger in rivers’ and ‘Apothami, who spend time in the water and are half man, half horse’. A huge success in its time, the Chronicle today bears witness to the intellectual climate in Europe about 1500.]]> [Hartmann Schedel]]]> Books]]> History of the Reformation appeared in 1679. As a Protestant Whig, his message was that Catholicism and Englishness were incompatible: Catholicism was tyranny, Protestantism liberation. The book was a huge success and greatly enhanced Burnet’s reputation. One critic, however, was Henry Wharton (1664-1694), who took the then fashionable attack of line-by-line analysis, picking up inconsistencies and errors, especially relating to manuscript sources used by Burnet. Wharton found 89 faults in a work that was trumpeted as perfect. Here is Wharton on the clergy misbehaving.]]> [Henry Wharton]]]> Books]]> Correctories to the text of Jerome’s Vulgate Bible (c. 4th cent), which had become corrupted over time through transcription and individual interpretation. Dominican friar and Hebrew scholar, Jacobus Magdalius (d. 1520), had his ‘version’ published in Cologne in 1508. This rare item is open to Magdalius’s corrections of the Book of Psalms – a topic that Luther lectured on in Wittenberg from 1513 to 1515. The words ‘Hieronymus’ and ‘Hiero’ appear often as Magdalius refers to Jerome and his Vulgate. Perhaps Luther made use of this printed edition to inform his lectures and interpretations of the Psalms.]]> [Jacobus Magdalius of Gouda, ed.]]]> Books]]> [James Stewart]]]> Books]]> [James Stewart]]]> Books ]]> [James Stewart]]]> Books]]> [James Stewart]]]> Books]]> [James Stewart]]]> Books]]> [James Stewart]]]> Books]]> [James Stewart]]]> Books]]> [James Stewart]]]> Books]]> First Century of Scandalous Malignant Priests (1643) earned him the nickname ‘Century White’. Robert Chestlin, a Royalist author and minister, attacked the purging, and in his Persecutio Undecima listed some of those unfortunates who were ‘sequestered, turned out, plundered, imprisoned, molested, abused,…and killed.’]]> [Robert Chestlin]]]> Books]]>