Schedel, Hartmann: Liber Chronicarum

The Nuremberg chronicle of the physician and humanist Hartmann Schedel (1440 to 1514) was published by Anton Koberger in the year 1493 in a Latin and a German edition. The original edition of the chronicle contains more than 1,800 xylographs by way of illustration, which were crafted after drawings by Hans Pleydenwurff, Michael Wolgemut and possibly also Albrecht Dürer. The present German edition with the translation by Georg Alt was published in 1500 by Johann Schönsperger in Augsburg, and belongs to the abbreviated or simplified reprints, however which were complemented by approximately 350 xylographs. In comparison to the city views of the first edition, which frequently covered two pages, the small-scale xylographs of the reprint were much easier to handle from point of view of printing technique. This circumstance presumably rendered the production faster and less expensive.