Samuel Engels's Bibliotheca Selectissima

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SAMUEL ENGELS’S BIBLIOTHECA SELECTISSIMA (1743). “RARITY ” AS A CRITERION OF KNOWLEDGE AND ITS CLASSIFICATION

Torsten Sander

Bern. In the preceding year a remarkable inventory of rare books was printed here in octavo, with the title Bibliotheca selectissima sive Catalogus librorum rarissimorum, quos nunc venum exponit Samuel Engel, Reip.[ublica]. Bernensis Bibliothecarius primarius. . . . The owner acquired these books gradually, at great cost, and wishes now to dispose of them either all together or, in the event no buyer is forthcoming, to sell them at auction in Holland.1 This advertisement, which appeared in the Göttingische Zeitungen von Gelehrten Sachen in February 1744, marked the sad high-point of an intense passion. Within the space of a few years, Samuel Engel of Bern (1702–1784) had succeeded in amassing a collection of more than 1,000 volumes of rare books printed between the fifteenth and seventeenth centuries, including 116 incunables as well as significant collections of works by Giordano Bruno, Bernardino Ochino, Pietro Pomponazzi, Robert Fludd, and Ulrich Zwingli.2 Engel, who had been head librarian at the city library of Bern since 1736, had gone to considerable trouble to purchase these books from throughout Europe, paying for them from his own pocket, originally with the expectation that the city council would take them over and make them part of the city library.3 But the city was only prepared to purchase a few titles; consequently, Engel was left with the great majority of the books. As a result of increasing financial difficulties, Engel was finally forced to sell the books elsewhere, preferably at auction in Holland or Leipzig. For this purpose he began to draw up an auction catalogue towards the end of 1742; although the manuscript was ready in June of 1743, the catalogue only appeared in print in January of 1744 owing to difficulties with the Faetscherin publishing house. Engel’s cousin, Albrecht von Haller—who

1 Göttingische Zeitungen von Gelehrten Sachen 14 (1744), 132–134: 133. 2 For details on the contents of the collection, see Hans Bloesch, Samuel Engel. Ein Berner Bibliophiler des 18. Jahrhunderts (Bern 1925), 49–66. 3 On Engel as a collector and on his collections, etc., see ibid., 30 und 32. Concerning the sale of the Bibliotheca selectissima and its takeover by Heinrich Count of Bünau, see ibid., 37–48.

© TORSTEN SANDER, 2013 | doi:10.1163/9789004243910_016 This is an open access chapter distributed under the terms of the CC BY-NC-ND 4.0 license.Torsten Sander - 9789004243910 Downloaded from Brill.com09/28/2021 05:48:38AM via free access 340 torsten sander

Fig. 1. Samuel Engel (1702–1784), Oil on cardboard, unknown artist (around 1760). Historisches Museum Bern, Inv. 50531.

Torsten Sander - 9789004243910 Downloaded from Brill.com09/28/2021 05:48:38AM via free access samuel engels’s bibliotheca selectissima (1743) 341 also composed the advertisement quoted above—took responsibility for publicising the book inventory entitled Bibliotheca selectissima sive Cata- logus Librorum in omni genere Scientiarum rarissimorum.4 As a result of this publication, Engel received an offer in April of 1744 from Heinrich Count of Bünau, who was interested in purchasing 800 selected works ahead of the planned auction. Bünau himself possessed a substantial library that is now considered the “most outstanding of all scholarly private libraries of the 18th Century”. The seven-volume catalogue of the books in this library set a standard for classification of library holdings.5 Engel declined this offer, however, as he did not want to see the total value of his collection depreciate. Instead, he continued his intensive preparations for an auction, which was to take place in Leipzig if possible. By June of 1744, 647 catalogues had already been sent out. Engel had procured general commission agents in 16 European cities who were to be responsible for transmitting offers from abroad.6 Meanwhile, the books to be auctioned had been packed in boxes and barrels and sent to Frankfurt am Main, from where they were to be transported further to the Saxon trade fair city.7 There, however, the planned auction process sud- denly ran into difficulties, with the result that Haller advised against the entire undertaking. Samuel Engel, however, needed to sell his books as rapidly as possible; consequently, he entered into negotiations with Count Bünau in August of 1744. The two men met in Frankfurt am Main, where

4 Samuel Engel, Bibliotheca selectissima sive Catalogus Librorum in omni genere Scien- tiarum rarissimorum. Quos maximis sumptibus, summoque Studio ac Cura, per plurimos Annos collegit, nunc vero Venum exponit Samuel Engel, in republica Helveto-Bernensi bibliothecarius primarius (Bern 1743), 3 parts, second part: Der auserlesenen Bibliothec Von seltenen Büchern Zweyter Theil, in sich haltend einiche Bücher Teutscher und Holländischer Sprach, third part: Spicilegium librorum rariorum, tum in Catalogo a Sam. Engel nuper evul- gato, omissorum, tum etiam eorum, quibus illa collectio usque adhuc aucta fuit. 5 Georg Leyh, ‘Die deutschen Bibliotheken von der Aufklärung bis zur Gegenwart’, in id. (ed.), Handbuch der Bibliothekswissenschaft, vol. III/2: Geschichte der Bibliotheken (Wiesbaden 1957), 1–491: 23. See also Torsten Sander, Ex Bibliotheca Bunaviana. Studien zu den institutionellen Bedingungen einer adligen Privatbibliothek im Zeitalter der Aufklärung (Dresden 2010). 6 See Engel 1743 (note 4), Bibliotheca selectissima, fol. 7: London, John Nourse; Amster- dam, Petrus Mortier, François Changuion; The Hague, Pieter Gosse; Leiden, Samuel Lucht- mann; Paris, Antonius Urban Coutelier, J. Briasson; Frankfurt/M., Ernst August Koch, Franz Varrentrapp; Hamburg, Christian Wilhelm Brand, Johann Carl Bohn, Christian Herold; Lübeck, Jonas Schmid; Altona, Frater Korte; Leipzig, Buchhandlung Grosse, Johann Friedrich Gleditsch; Berlin, Johann Andreas Rüdiger; Nuremberg, Johann Georg Lochner; Ulm, Daniel Bartholomäi & Sohn; Geneva, Heinrich Albert Gosse, Cramers Erben, Frater Philibert; Basle, Johann Jacob Emanuel Thurneisen; Zurich, Heidegger. 7 See Bloesch 1925 (note 2), 38.

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Fig. 2. Samuel Engel’s Bibliotheca selectissima (1743, title page), Bern University Library.

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Fig. 3. Heinrich Graf von Bünau (1697–1762), oil painting by Louis de Silvestre (1742). Gemäldegalerie Alte Meister, Staatliche Kunstsammlungen Dresden. Copyright SLUB Dresden / Deutsche Fotothek.

Torsten Sander - 9789004243910 Downloaded from Brill.com09/28/2021 05:48:38AM via free access 344 torsten sander they quickly came to agreement on a deal whereby Engel immediately received a sale price of 4,000 talers.8 With the purchase of the Bibliotheca selectissima, Bünau’s library incorporated a rare book collection that was unique in terms of its size; when the library was subsequently sold in 1764 to the Elector of Saxony, it became part of what is today the Sächsische Landesbibliothek—Staats- und Universitätsbibliothek Dresden (SLUB Dresden). The provenance “Ex Bibliotheca Bunaviana” has remained in many call number categories for the historical holdings in the Dresden library, if only owing to the remarkable bindings. However, the volumes that once belonged to the Biblio theca selectissima can only be distinguished with difficulty today or have disappeared entirely as a result of the sale of duplicates as well as wartime damage.9 Among the 707 incunables that Helmut Deckert found in the Sächsische Landesbibliothek Dresden in 1957, for example, only one could be verified as having belonged to Samuel Engel.10 Due to this history of circumstances, Samuel Engel’s book collection as well as his related ideas about books and libraries in association with the evaluation of rare books have not been given due attention in research since the work of Hans Bloesch (1925) and Paul Pulver (1937).11 A new focus on the personality of Engel as a scholarly collector, going beyond the history of libraries provided by these two authors, seems worthwhile. The Bibliotheca selectissima in particular constitutes a highly valuable historical source with respect to how scholars at the time dealt with what Julius Petzholdt has called “really rare books”.12 Engel’s catalogue of books presents us with a selection which, while it was made on the basis of two different aspects, was always determined solely by the criterion of rarity:

8 See ibid., 41. 9 See Torsten Sander, Die Auktion der Dubletten der kurfürstlichen Bibliothek Dresden 1775 bis 1777. Ein Beitrag zur Geschichte des Buchauktionswesens (Dresden 2006); Karl Ass- mann, ‘Die Sächsische Landesbibliothek von 1945 bis 1955. Zerstörung, Wiederaufbau und gegenwärtiger Stand der Arbeit’, in id. (ed.), Sächsische Landesbibliothek Dresden 1556–1956. Festschrift zum 400–jährigen Bestehen (Leipzig 1956), 29–85: 40. 10 Helmut Deckert, Katalog der Inkunabeln der Sächsischen Landesbibliothek zu Dres- den. Ein Bestandsverzeichnis nach den Kriegsverlusten des Jahres 1945 (Leipzig 1957), 154, no. 554. Although it is probable that the 14 incunables left from the holdings of the Bibli- otheca Bunaviana included some titles purchased by Engel, this cannot be clarified without doubt. 11 Bloesch 1925 (note 2); Paul Pulver, Samuel Engel. Ein Berner Patrizier aus dem Zeital- ter der Aufklärung 1702–1784 (Bern and Leipzig 1937), 24–52. 12 Julius Petzholdt, Bibliotheca Bibliographica. Kritisches Verzeichnis der das Gesamtge- biet der Bibliographie betreffenden Literatur des In- und Auslandes in systematischer Ord- nung (Leipzig 1866), 112.

Torsten Sander - 9789004243910 Downloaded from Brill.com09/28/2021 05:48:38AM via free access samuel engels’s bibliotheca selectissima (1743) 345 on the one hand, it represented the part of his extensive library that was designated for sale; on the other hand, it was a literally “select” collection of old printed works which were to be documented in bibliographical terms. This gives rise to a meta-level—independent of the commercially intended but temporally limited offer of collectors’ items—where knowledge about “rarity” in the scholarly world, accumulated by Engel simulta- neously with his library, is made permanently available. Hence the following discussion centres on questions of accessibility and evaluation, as well as questions about ways of transferring knowledge contained in books generally acknowledged as rare in the eighteenth century. Given the increasingly noticeable penchant for curiosities and rarities in the course of the European Enlightenment, the criteria used at that time to determine the rarity of a book are of primary interest.13 The Bibliotheca selectissima serves as a template for additional observations on contemporary theories about dealing with rare books which Engel referred to in detail in the preface to his catalogue. Interesting feedback loops become apparent, particularly between the “Axiomata historico-critica de raritate librorum” established by Engel, based on the work of Johannes Vogt (1732), and the way in which these asserted scientific principles were received in relation to comparable cataloguing projects. A further question to be explored is that of the relation of rarity to the literary canon, i.e. whether and to what degree the knowledge contained in rare books is itself subject to the criterion of rarity, and to what extent it may be at risk of falling into oblivion. Does the occurrence of individual printed works regarded as rare on the basis of external features correlate with editorial distribution of individual authors or texts? Here there is a need to consider, among other things, books of which few or no copies remain today and whose existence can be verified only by bibliographical evidence. In addition, prohibited books must not be overlooked.

13 On this phenomenon, see Caspar Friedrich Neickel, Museographia, oder Anleitung zum rechten Begriff und nützlicher Anlegung der Museorum oder Raritäten-Kammern. Mit einigen Zusätzen und dreyfachem Anhang vermehret von Johann Kanold (Leipzig and Breslau 1727), 232–405 (third part: ‘Von Bibliothequen’): “And because I did not initially want to deal with libraries in particular, by citing some of them I have at the same time already reported about rare books what I am now about to indicate here.” (240)

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The term “rarity” generally signifies the frequency with which an object or an event occurs. A thing is rare if it does not occur frequently or if it is unlikely to be encountered. With respect to books and printed writ- ings, the moment of rarity can certainly be counted among the “curious manipulations” to which bibliomania resorted “in order to grapple suc- cessfully with the mass of identical products spewed forth by the printing press”.14 But such control of a printed edition’s inherent seriality for the benefit of few copies of virtually unique character, to which Hermann Tiemann objected in a programmatic article in 1957, is an expression of a bibliophily strongly influenced by aesthetic criteria since the early nineteenth century.15 Tiemann’s assessment fails to recognise that the type of use still had a great influence on the singular value of a rare book in the eighteenth century. Moreover, the passion for rare books at this time was not as uncritical and general as, for instance, Holbrook Jackson seemed to believe in his epoch-making cultural history of bibliomania, The Anatomy of Bibliomania (1930).16 The opposite was the case. Indeed, it was in the eighteenth century in particular when the phenomenon of the rare book specifically aroused academic interest, coupled with the desire for systemisation.17 The designation “rare” [selten] or “uncommon” [seltsam], as understood at the time, was synonymous with “unusual” or “unorthodox”, i.e. something exceptional that deviated from the norm and which, if per- haps not explainable in every instance, was at least to be documented and, if possible, scientifically classified.18 The first verifiable monographic work to appear on this topic in the eighteenth century already made it clear how this phenomenon was to be approached in the future: Johann Christian Wendler’s Dissertationem de variis raritatis librorum impressorum causis (Jena 1711) attempted to dis-

14 Hermann Tiemann, ‘Sammeln und Lesen. Über Begriff und Ziel der Bibliophilie’, Philobiblon 1 (1957), 3–19: 11. 15 See Ursula Rautenberg, ‘Zwei Königskinder? Überlegungen zum Verhältnis von Bibliophilie und Literaturwissenschaft’, Philobiblon 36 (1992), 101–112: 106f. 16 Holbrook Jackson, The Anatomy of Bibliomania (reprint of New York 1950 edn., Urbana and Chicago 2001), 492: “This passion for rarity is so voracious, and often so uncritical, that it has not failed to attract the knowing publisher and bookseller, who see in it fair game for their merchandising arts.” 17 See Michael S. Batts, ‘The 18th-Century Concept of the Rare Book’, The Book Collector 24 (1975), 381–400: 384ff. 18 See ‘Selten, Seltsam, oder Seltzsam’, in Johann Heinrich Zedler (ed.), Grosses vollstän- diges Universal-Lexikon aller Wissenschaften und Künste (Leipzig 1743), vol. 36, col. 1721.

Torsten Sander - 9789004243910 Downloaded from Brill.com09/28/2021 05:48:38AM via free access samuel engels’s bibliotheca selectissima (1743) 347 tinguish between different types of rare books. Although the 26 examples treated in this work appear arbitrary by today’s standards, they nonetheless served as a model for determining rara in subsequent decades. The decisive factors were either that an edition was limited from the outset or that it was destroyed after printing, with the exception of a few copies.19 Estimates of the number of remaining copies world-wide based on these criteria assumed great importance in the future as a basis for determining the value of bibliophile rarities. Thus in 1723 Georg Serpilius answered the question “What qualifies as a rare book?” explicitly by pointing out that: in our eyes salvo aliorum judicio a rare book is one that is seldom found in bookshops or in many libraries, or is not found at all; one that most people have never seen and of which, for some scriptis, they even doubted whether it ever existed anywhere in the world.20 But neither Wendler’s scheme for the classification of rarity with desig- nations from “rara”, “rariora”, and “rarissimus” [rare, very rare, extremely rare] to “unicum” [unique] that was normally used in book auctions from the late seventeenth century was sufficient to satisfy the need for an enlightened and useful classification of knowledge. For: Although a book may be rare this does not necessarily characterise it as good. Rarity sometimes consists only in the fact that a book is not available.21 It gradually became apparent that there was a relation between the rarity of a book and its practical value. But in order to document this fact, there was a need for bibliographies that took account not only of a book’s occurrence but also of its usefulness for the scholarly world. An early bibliography of this type was provided by Christoph August Heumann in 1718 in his Conspectus reipublicae literariae sive via ad historiam literariam iuventuti studiosae aperta, which combined these two aspects in three evaluation categories: “rare and bad”, “rare with no particular value”, and “rare and good”.22 But a system of classification this simple could not prevail over time. Instead, there was a recognisable trend towards an increasingly the- oretical consideration of the term “rare”, which almost became an end in

19 See Johann Christian Wendler, Dissertationem de variis raritatis librorum impressorum causis (Jena 1711). 20 Georg Serpilius, Verzeichnis einiger Rarer Bücher (Frankfurt und Leipzig 1723), vol. 1, 6. 21 Johann Adam Bernhard, Kurtzgefaste Curieuse Historie derer Gelehrten (Frankfurt 1718), 659. 22 See Batts 1975 (note 17), 386.

Torsten Sander - 9789004243910 Downloaded from Brill.com09/28/2021 05:48:38AM via free access 348 torsten sander itself and only secondarily addressed the needs of scholarly practice with respect to dissemination of bibliographical knowledge. Indeed, the terms “rara”, “rariora” and “rarissima”, formulated by Joachim Ernst Berger in 1726 as binding for subsequent debate, were lacking in terms of themati- cally pertinent content.23 Johannes Vogt assumed a key role in the explication of Berger’s three- fold classification system with his Catalogus historico-critico librorum rariorum, which was first published in 1732 and appeared in numerous subsequent editions.24 The author implemented the historical and critical cataloguing technique announced in his title by postulating five “Axi- omata historico-critica de raritate librorum” in his preface to be applied in determining the degree of a book’s rarity. Here, too, the question of the number of existing copies of a book world-wide was of paramount importance: Rari & rariores Libri sunt illi, qui minus frequenter occurrunt, a paucissimis manibus teruntur, inventu quoque & paratu sunt difficiles.25 The primary decisive factor in this defining feature of rarity, originally proposed by Jacob Friedrich Reimmann in 1705, was a limited edition, which was usually the case above all with incunables, privately printed editions, and books published by minor publishers.26 In the course of time, however, printed works whose original and considerably large editions were confiscated and destroyed for various reasons—be it for dan- gerous content or defacing printing errors—became bibliophile treasures a well. Vogt also counted as rarities books printed in unusual type, as well as multivolume works appearing over a long period of time and, in some cases, remaining incomplete. By contrast, artistic design or provenance played no role in his historical assessment of printed works. An evaluation scale similar to Vogt’s axiomata was put forth several years later in Germany by Melchior Ludwig Widekind in his Ausführliches

23 See Christiane Lauterbach, ‘Rara, Rariora, Rarissima. Vom langen Weg zur Kenntnis des seltenen und kostbaren Buches’, Imprimatur NF 19 (2005), 9–28: 13f.; Joachim Ernst Berger, Diatribe de libris rarioribus horumque notis diagnosticis (Berlin 1726), 10: “Raritas vero non una eademque; dantur enim ejus gradus. Hic liber est rarus, ille rarior, iste rarissimus, quod ipsum infra, exemplo demonstrabo non obscuro.” 24 Johannes Vogt, Catalogus historico-critico librorum rariorum (Hamburg 1732, second edn. Hamburg 1738, third edn. Hamburg 1747, fourth edn. Leipzig 1793). 25 Vogt 1732 (note 24), fol. 6r (“Axiomata Historico-Critica de Raritate Librorum”). 26 See Jacob Friedrich Reimmann, ‘De libris raris’, Observationes selectae ad rem litterar- iam spectantes 10 (1705), 180–231: 181: “. . . adeoque per libros raros libros eiusmodi hoc loco intellegere, qui in Bibliopoliis & Bibliothecis non facile reperiri possunt.”

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Verzeichnis von Raren Büchern mit historischen und kritischen Anmer- kungen in alphabetischer Ordnung verfasst (Berlin 1753–1755). This work, however, was really the translation of a systemisation developed by David Clément in his Bibliothèque curieuse historique et critique, ou catalogue rai- sonné de livres dificiles à trouver (Göttingen, Hannover and Leipzig 1750– 1760). It was based essentially on a differentiation between absolute and relative rarity, involving a typological concentration of the occasionally quite complex criteria for rarity, most of which had already been introduced by Vogt. Yet regardless of various models of this type that were continually adapted up to the end of the eighteenth century, the availability of a book in libraries or bookshops long remained the determining criterion for its degree of rarity. Efforts were therefore made to gain a more comprehensive impression of the actual distribution of a book, reaching beyond the local characteristics of individual libraries. As early as 1723, Georg Serpilius had already expressed the wish that the more that rare books are held in esteem and the more seldom one sees them . . ., the more one wishes for adequate information about them or at least an alphabetical catalogue of all rare books. And although different people have attempted this task, no one has really succeeded.27 Ultimately, it was Johann Jacob Bauer’s Bibliotheca librorum rariorum universalis. Oder vollständiges Verzeichnis rarer Bücher (Nürnberg 1770–1791) that undertook a decisive step in this direction, marking the apogee of rare book bibliographies in the eighteenth century. The title alone clearly indicates the claim to universality made by this comparatively wide-ranging handbook, which consisted of four volumes and three supplements. Bauer’s aim was to finally achieve—after evaluating many listings of rare books, library catalogues, and bookshop inventories—a complete compilation of all previously verifiable rare books, including a designation of their rarity, that would be suitable above all for use in the realm of book publishing. The dimensions assumed by discussions about rare books in the second half of the eighteenth century can be gleaned from the very comprehensive “Collectio scriptorum, qui de libris rarioribus vel ex instituto egerunt” which preceded the catalogue.28 The real achievement of the Biblio theca librorum rariorum universalis accordingly consisted in its thorough compilation of bibliographic entries in other catalogues, which, by the

27 Serpilius 1723 (note 20), 7f. 28 Ibid., 9–40.

Torsten Sander - 9789004243910 Downloaded from Brill.com09/28/2021 05:48:38AM via free access 350 torsten sander assessments of later critics, was nonetheless inadequate.29 It remains noteworthy, however, as an earnest attempt to provide a comprehensive solution for the problems related to rare books and thus to bring together the distinctions between absolute and relative rarity, maintained since David Clément, on the basis of objective, i.e. bibliographical facts. In particular, this meant refraining from designing a discrete scale of rarity and, instead, simply reporting the evaluations contained in the various sources. By attempting to provide a universal bibliographical record of catalogue entries of rare books, Bauer’s compendium constituted an independent resolution of the underlying issue associated with the phenomenon of rare books: the question of the distribution of individual copies.

Most scholars are bibliomaniacs, though there are few scholars among actual bibliomaniacs.30 Just how much attention Samuel Engel devoted to these attempts at systemisation following the sale of his rare book collection may never be known. The intensity with which he intermittently followed the discussion, however, is amply documented in the preface to the Bibliotheca selectissima. In addition to Wendler, Heumann and Vogt, other key figures named here include Johann Georg Schelhorn and Georg Jacob Schwindel alias Theophil Sincerus, as well as Nicola Francesco Haym, who did ground- breaking work on bibliographies of Italian literature. Moreover, catalogues of the Krafft, Mencke, Uffenbach, and Reimmann collections played an equally important role in Engel’s work; their exemplary amplitude of bibliographical details could be used a basis for objective evaluation of a putatively rare book. By referring to these noted authorities in the field of scholarly knowledge of books, Samuel Engel was affirming his claim as a librarian to create a valid catalogue of books for more than just the

29 See Friedrich Adolf Ebert, Allgemeines bibliographisches Lexikon (Leipzig 1821), vol. 1, 147, no. 1772: “Overcompl.[ete] Coll.[ection] lacking selection a. bibliogr.[aphic] precis.[ion].” Petzholdt 1866 (note 12), 114: “Contains an alphabetical catalogue of books compiled without special selection and bibliographic accuracy and in respect to which the compilers and editors are far too free in the use of terms such as “raruss, rarissimus, albo corvo rarior, infrequentissimus, paucissimus incognitus” a.[nd] suchl.[ike] for their evaluation to be taken seriously.” 30 Alexander Košenina, Der gelehrte Narr. Gelehrtensatire seit der Aufklärung (second edn., Göttingen 2004), 134.

Torsten Sander - 9789004243910 Downloaded from Brill.com09/28/2021 05:48:38AM via free access samuel engels’s bibliotheca selectissima (1743) 351 auction. This catalogue is initially difficult to distinguish from what was normally prepared for auctions in the eighteenth century. It consisted of three separately paginated parts, the first of which was a 186–page list of Latin titles. All entries were arranged alphabetically according to author. There were no further sub-categories such as subject group or format. Entries contained the bibliographical information necessary for unequivo- cal identification of an edition: author, title, place and year of publication, as well as the edition and the format. Where an imprint page was lacking, Engel attempted to date the book in question and determine its geographic origin based on typographical or filigranological features.31 In most cases he complemented his entries with bibliographical evidence, combined with more or less comprehensive comments about the book’s rarity. We shall examine this in more detail below. Der auserlesenen Bibliothec Von seltenen Büchern Zweyter Theil consists of 40 pages of book titles in German and Dutch, followed by 62 pages of a comprehensive Spicilegium with books and manuscripts that Engel apparently decided to auction only during the printing of the catalogue, owing to his precarious economic situation; the afterword dates from 14 July 1744.32 The consignor actually seems to have speculated initially about selling only as much of his treasure trove of books as necessary to pay off his debts.33 Letters from Engel to Bünau’s librarian Johann Michael Francke, which were unknown to either Bloesch or Pulver, sug- gest that only a portion—although certainly the greatest portion—of the books originally intended for the city library of Bern were recorded in the Bibliotheca selectissima. Following the transfer of his collection to Count Bünau, Engel laid claim to a series of alleged duplicate and triplicate copies which were also contained in the boxes stored in Frankfurt and were inadvertently transported to Nöthnitz Castle, where the Bünau library was located. According to an agreement between Engel and Bünau which Engel reported by letter to Francke, Bünau had purchased exclusively the titles listed in Engel’s three-part catalogue. Engel thus requested that

31 See Bloesch 1925 (note 2), 61. 32 See Engel 1743 (note 4), Spicilegium, 59; as well as review of the same, dated 20 August 1744, Göttingische Zeitungen von Gelehrten Sachen 67 (1744), 581–582. 33 See the hand-written note in the copy in the SLUB Dresden (call number 41.8.336): “M. Fr. Gu. Noldius/Koenigs./1746./ Of the other part only few copies appeared, as a certain Count (Bünau) [added later in another handwriting; author’s note] purchased the entire library when it was still in press. Hence the 2nd part is even rarer than the first. See Göth- ing. Gel. Zeitung de ao 1744, p. 132. seqq.”

Torsten Sander - 9789004243910 Downloaded from Brill.com09/28/2021 05:48:38AM via free access 352 torsten sander non-catalogued books and any existing second copies be returned, so that he could sell them elsewhere: When I entered into negotiations with His Excellency regarding my collection, I had the honour to immediately declare to him that there were various books in the barrels and boxes that were not contained in the catalogue, particularly the one or other duplicate, all of which, along with Serveto, were reserved for me; to which His Excellency gave the following considered and reasoned answer: that it was completely natural that he purchase from me the books he saw listed in the catalogue, whereas those not listed he could neither evaluate nor purchase and wished to leave to my disposition. Now His Lordship refers to all those books, in different editions, although some are not to be found in the catalogue and His Excellency cannot have purchased and I cannot have sold them; e.g. Agrippo Opera apud Beringos, listed in my catalogue at the very low price of Rg 6; His Excellency reduced this very low price still further, to 4 to 5 Rg; thus for the second copy, of which he was unaware, he did not add the same amount in his calculations, nor did I take into consideration such a duplicate copy; so that His Excellency cannot have conceived of those books and copies of which he had not the slightest knowledge, let alone evaluate or purchase; I bring all this up here only to show for what reason I have reclaimed such copies as duplicates.34 Nevertheless, Heinrich Count of Bünau also made some claim to these volumes, as he detected among them books that were lacking in his collection. Out of particular respect for Bünau, Samuel Engel was fully prepared to make accommodations in these cases, even though his annoyance at a further financial loss can be detected in his letter to Francke. Bünau had, after all, already negotiated the sale price for the library downwards from 6,000 to 4,000 talers. One copy reclaimed by Engel—Michael Servetus’s De Trinitatis erroribus libri VII, published in Frankfurt in 1531—was, however, listed on page 52 of Engel’s Spicilegium, as Francke noted in a hand- written entry in the margin of the letter referred to here, and was thus rightfully purchased by Count Bünau, thereby invalidating the additional sale price of 60 talers proposed by Engel. After hesitating initially, the city librarian of Bern left the question of duplicate copies to the “disposition” of the purchaser of his library, allowing

34 ULB Sachsen-Anhalt, Halle a.d. Saale: Pon. Misc. 2°. 13. Sammlung von lateinischen deutschen und französischen Briefen verschiedner Gelehrten an den verstorbenen Chfstl. Sächßs. Geheimen Secretarium und Bibliothecarium vormahligen Gräfl. Bünauischen Bibliothecarium Johann Michael Franken. [A collection of letters in Latin, German, and French written by various scholars to the late Saxon Elector’s Privy Secretarium and Bib- liothecarium, previously the Comital Bünau Bibliothecarium, Johann Michael Franken.], no. 19, Samuel Engel to Johann Michael Francke, Bern, 30 January 1745. fol. 38–41: 38v ff.

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Bünau to choose works that he needed for his library. Because of the remaining duplicates, Engel asked that “timely notice be given about the auction, including communication of the catalogue, as Your Excellency has graciously promised to advertise my books with yours in the catalogue, and to auction them and account for the proceeds . . .”35 Engel also requested Bünau to send him a pertinent list so that he could set price limits for the books to be auctioned. From all appearances, it seems that Bünau intended to auction the duplicates in his library together with Engel’s. But there is no record of this process in terms of either a catalogue or an auction, nor any other evidence for this planned undertaking. This hitherto unknown side chapter in the history of Engel’s collection is an indication of the economic aspects of bibliophily, which are not insub- stantial. Rare books, after all, are acknowledged objects of value which one endeavours to preserve and increase and which should in no case be sold for less than they are worth. Samuel Engel was certainly aware of this, as revealed in an exchange of letters with Albrecht von Haller: I have to admit that I had the intention of describing our library. But I am utterly disheartened after having acquired rare books worth approximately 3,000 Rth and learning that there is no interest in including them in the library, not even in part, so that I will be forced to offer them elsewhere as I have already done in England but without success.36 Samuel Engel’s original intention was to sell his entire collection in one piece, as public auctions always involved certain risks. His concern with providing qualitative evaluations of the titles in the collection was thus by no means based solely on bibliographic interest, but also arose from his intention to highlight the special features of his collection for poten- tial purchasers. He cited the five criteria for rarity advanced by Johannes Vogt as the basis for his descriptions, complementing them with his own “Annotata ad Axiomata”.37 In doing so, Engel wished above all to make the established scale of “rarus—rarior—rarissimus” far more differentiated by linking it with typographical aspects as well as annotations on the history of the given editions. This approach to rare books was derived from his attention to the origins of the art of book printing, especially filigranology (the science of watermarks).38 Engel was one of the first to

35 Ibid., fol. 40r–41v. 36 Samuel Engel to Albrecht von Haller, Bern, 18 July 1742. Quoted by Bloesch 1925 (note 2), 33. 37 Engel 1743 (note 4), Bibliotheca selectissima, fol. 4v. 38 See Bloesch 1925 (note 2), 16.

Torsten Sander - 9789004243910 Downloaded from Brill.com09/28/2021 05:48:38AM via free access 354 torsten sander recognise the need for a careful description of all known watermarks, as he considered them to be important sources of historical classification and evaluation of old printed works: My observations on the subject are as follows 1. the markings on the paper were not always the same, nor did they remain so for long. For example, the famous ox’s head can indeed be found in various books, but in our library’s Bible, which I believe dates to around 1455, it is chracterised by a long line, while in other books the line is shorter; in some books the mark appears with the cross directly above the head and no line in between, and yet in others with a crown at the end of the line instead of the cross. Since these marks can be found in dated editions, this will help somewhat in determining the dates of the undated editions. The majority of fifteenth-century editions carry the mark of the rose; others are marked in such varied ways that it is hard to know what to make of them. 2. Admittedly, no definitive conclusions can be made concerning what follows; but as there are many wrong dates and editions that are believed to be older than they really are, one could rectify this by knowing and observing these marks. For instance, if one was to date a particular edition at around 1460 and one was to find a mark in an edition dating from 1480 without finding any trace of this mark in previous editions, one would have to assume that the edition is not as old as it was thought to be. Finally, I believe that it would be of great use if scholars helped to create an anthology of these marks.39 Engel advocated, for instance, that not only all incunables published up to 1500 be regarded as rare books—which was the generally accepted practice—but that this time frame be extended forward by at least 20 if not 40 years. Even though Engel was not yet familiar with the term “post-incunable”, his plea anticipated the consensus associated with this term today, according to which books published up to 1520 or 1540 (as in the Netherlands) are considered to constitute a unit in the history of printing.40 By taking this early period of printing into consideration, Engel hoped that not only works which were very influential in the European art of printing in the sixteenth century would be taken into account as bibliophile rarities—such as those produced by Manutius (Venice), Giunta (Lyon), and Stephanus (Paris)—but also, among others, works produced by Sebastian Gryphius (Lyon), Christoph Plantin (Antwerp) and the Basle

39 Samuel Engel to Albrecht von Haller, Bern, 4 October 1741. Quoted by Bloesch 1925 (note 2), 17f. 40 See C. Weismann, ‘Postinkunabeln’, in Severin Corsten, Stephan Füssel and Günther Pflug (eds.), Lexikon des gesamten Buchwesens (second completely revised edition, Stutt- gart 2003), vol. 6, 71.

Torsten Sander - 9789004243910 Downloaded from Brill.com09/28/2021 05:48:38AM via free access samuel engels’s bibliotheca selectissima (1743) 355 printers Johannes Oporin, Nicolaus Episcopius, and the Froben family.41 Works printed by these publishing houses are characterised not only by their outstanding typographical and artistic qualities but also by the fact that they were frequently the objects of censorship or targeted for destruction. This concept of printing history, which expanded the criteria for rarity advanced by Vogt, had two main results. First, Engel proposed—based on Heumann’s description of so-called “libri phoenices”—closer examination of books that were not necessarily considered rare but which were nonetheless seldom encountered [minus obvius].42 Thus in addition to the clas- sical units of evaluation, Engel also used individually tailored evaluations based on the knowledge of bibliography he had acquired, for instance: “Liber incognitus valde & perrarus”, “Editio perquam rara, Libri non minus rari” and “Liber in ipsa Helvetia perrarus & olim à Bibliothecariis nostris frustra quaesitus”.43 Secondly, he formulated three additional axioms for determining rarity which took account of both quantitative and qualitative aspects: Ax. I. Alii Libri rari sunt, quoad materiam, alii quoad formam, alii quoad utrumque. . . . Ax. II. Non omnes Libri, qui in plurimis Librariorum Tabernis non apparunt, sunt rari, e contra Liber cujus Titulus in unius vel alterius Biblipolae Cata- logo legitur, non statim hanc ob causam satis obvius nominandus est. . . . Ax. III. Libri sine die & consule editi fere omnes rari sunt.44 Engel’s expansion of the scientific criteria for rare books established by Vogt appeared, in turn, in the third edition of Vogt’s Catalogus historico- critico librorum rariorum published in 1747, which, at 735 pages and approximately 3,000 verified titles, had grown to be more than three times as long as the first edition of 1732, and for the first time contained the word “bibliophily” in its title. The intention was to highlight more clearly the demand for a pertinent handbook on questions of rarity for use by the literary public.45 Taking Engel’s explanatory notes into account, there was

41 See Engel 1743 (note 4), Bibliotheca selectissima, fol. 5v. 42 See ibid., fol. 4v (comment on Axiom II). 43 Engel 1743 (note 4), Bibliotheca selectissima, 9: “Aretii (Bened.) Commentarii in Pindarum. Ex Offic. le Preux, 1587. 4to.” Ibid., Spicilegium, 1: “Alexandri (Anglici) destruc- torium vitiorum, Norimberg. per Ant. Koberger, 1496. fol.” Ibid., 54: “Valdesii (Jacobi) de dignitate Regum Regnorumque Hispaniae, &c. Lib. Granatae, 1602. fol.” 44 Ibid., Bibliotheca selectissima, fol. 6r–6v. 45 Johannes Vogt, Catalogus historico-critico librorum rariorum, jam curis tertiis recognitus et copiosa accessione ex symbolis et collatione bibliophilorum per Germaniam doctissimorum

Torsten Sander - 9789004243910 Downloaded from Brill.com09/28/2021 05:48:38AM via free access 356 torsten sander now a differentiated system of six “Axiomata generalia” and 15 “Axiomata specialia” for determining the rarity of a book in both quantitative and qualitative terms.46 Even though the bibliographical value of this compendium received virtually no recognition as of the nineteenth century, the work of Johannes Vogt nonetheless bears testimony to early efforts to deal with the question of libri rari on a rational basis.47

III

For his bibliographical description Samuel Engel did not take account of book bindings and he noted provenance only in exceptional cases. But as fate would have it, a prominent copy of Gregorius’s Dialogi printed in 1473, which he attributed to Martin Luther and categorised as “Cimelium summae Raritatis”, has more recently been discovered to be a mistaken attribution.48 As a rule, however, Engel ignored such attributions and concerned himself with evaluating printed works based on objective criteria. He thus refrained from setting his books off against the inherent same- ness of all copies of an edition—“Auflagengleichgültigkeit ”, as Gustav Adolf Erich Bogeng put it—on the basis of external features.49 Count Heinrich of Bünau also subscribed to the same approach, having most of the books in his library, including a portion of the ones he had purchased from Engel, removed from their original bindings and bound in uniform leather or half-leather bindings. This ensured arrangement of the books according to their contents; however, it also had the effect that volumes from Bünau’s library later became sought-after collectors’ items—or, as

adauctus (Hamburg 1747). “Bibliophily” was first the object of a printed scientific work in Willem Salden’s treatise Bibliophilia sive de scribendis, legendis et aestimandis libris exerci- tatio paraenetica (Utrecht 1681). 46 Vogt 1747 (note 45), fol. 7–11. 47 See Friedrich Adolf Ebert, Allgemeines bibliographisches Lexikon (Leipzig 1830), vol. 2, 1063, no. 23859: “That this book, worthy for its earliest appearance (as the edition of 1753 was already to have had a very different form) is now only of historical interest and counts merely as a reflection of the preferences of Dutch-German collectors in the first third of the previous century but has no real scientific-bibliographic value, is a fact that should finally be more widely recognised in Germany than is unfortunately the case.” 48 Engel 1743 (note 4), Der auserlesenen Bibliothec, 18. See Deckert 1957 (note 10), 105, no. 338. 49 Gustav Adolf Erich Bogeng, ‘Der Begriff der Seltenheit beim Buche’, Monatsblätter für Bucheinbände und Handbindekunst 2 (1925/26), 10–20: 16. One exception is a copy of Battista Guarini’s Pastor fido (Amsterdam 1678), which Engel marked the comment “Editio & Ligatura nitidissima”. See Engel 1743 (note 4), Bibliotheca selectissima, 68.

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Bogeng put it, “rarities by virtue of quality” [Qualitätsseltenheiten].50 The provenance “Ex Bibliotheca Bunaviana” appeared to be an automatic con- firmation of the qualities that make a “good” book. For a scholar in the eighteenth century, a “good” book was one that “1) contained useful things, and was 2) thorough, 3) well-ordered, 4) clear, and 5) enjoyable in style.”51 Quite often, scholars also cited “rarity as the mark of a good book”.52 Already in 1708 Jacob Friedrich Reimmann had expressly emphasised the relation between “knowledge of books” as a constitutive term in literary history and the term “rarity”. Reimmann’s Versuch einer Einleitung in die Historiam Literariam so wohl insgemein als auch in die Historiam Literariam derer Teutschen insonderheit (Halle 1708), which later appeared in numerous editions, was concerned among other things with using a “guideline” to more clearly accentuate the generally acknowledged, although not usually further explained recommendation of scholars “to take note only of the principal examples among the immense number of books”, whereby The leading authors in the notitia librorum are those who have written 1) about a subject for the first time; 2) for the last time; 3) as the only ones; 4) in the most paradoxical and special way; 5) most excellently; and 6) are the least common and most rarely encountered of all.53 The aspects mentioned here were reiterated in exemplary fashion for the “Scriptores Historiae Ecclesiasticae N.T.”, with the following rare books cited in this section: (a) Sebastian Francken von Wörd’s Chronicon, (b) Hermanni Hamelmanni Renatum Evangelium, (c) Lubienjecii Historia Reformationis Poloniae, (d) Cas- paris Bruschii Opus de Omnibus Episcopatibus Germaniae, (e) Josephi Scaligeri Thesaurus Temporum, (f) Guilielmi Buddei Vita Alberti II, and (g) Nicolai Vedelii De Episcopatu Constantiini Magni, and other similar works that I do

50 Bogeng 1925/26 (note 49), 14. 51 See Gottlieb Stolle, Anleitung zur Historie der Gelahrheit (fourth edn., Jena 1736), 6: “§ VIII. What constitutes a good book?”. 52 Ibid., 9: “§ XVII: Many hold rarity to be the mark of a good book and pay little attention to one that can be had everywhere.” In other places, however, critical comments can be found according to which “the rarity of a book is more often a sign of little value rather than special value.” Vogt 1747 (note 45), fol. 8v. 53 Jacob Friedrich Reimmann, Versuch einer Einleitung in die Historiam Literariam so wohl insgemein als auch in die Historiam Literariam derer Teutschen insonderheit (Halle 1708), 196.

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not wish to meticulously note here as these books belong ad notitiam, librorum acroamaticam, mysticam & telesticam.54 It is noteworthy that for Reimmann familiarity with rare books was a type of clandestine knowledge that circulated only “among scholars . . . book sellers, book printers and book binders”, in short, everyone who dealt with books:55 The ancient pagan philosophers generally divided knowledge into two classes: acroamaticas & exotericas. They taught the exotericas to anyone who entrusted themselves to their teaching. The acroamaticas, however, they either kept entirely to themselves or shared only with those whom they had taken into their closest and most secret confidence. And thus it is today with the notitia librorum, which is also acroamatica & exoterica. The exoterica consists of books I know that are common and which we can find quite easily in bookshops and libraries. The acroamatica consists of printed and written books that I know are rare and which can seldom be found in bookshops and libraries.56 The characteristic of rare books that Reimmann introduced into debate by describing them as arcane objects excluded from the general scholarly canon, along with the related expression “uncommonly rare”, is also an indirect indication of the realm of prohibited literature.57 As the knowledge contained in prohibited books was not to be disseminated and thus was consigned to inevitable oblivion, these books also frequently became rare. This, in turn, had the effect of drawing greater attention to them. As a rule, the public burning of a prohibited book actually aroused general interest in it which it had not previously enjoyed. Certain publishers with a clever head for business took devious advantage of these circumstances “by having others arrange for or allow that the books they published be publicly condemned or confiscated and burned by the executioner so that they would subsequently be more avidly sought and thus bought at a higher price.”58 Five editions of the Index librorum prohibitorum or Index librorum expur- gatorum therefore occupy a special position within the well-represented genre of indexed titles in the Bibliotheca selectissima. These books not

54 Ibid., 198. 55 Ibid., 201. 56 Ibid., 199. 57 See the discussion of Engel’s Spicilegium in the Göttingische Zeitungen von Gelehrten Sachen 67 (1744), 581–582: 581, “and seven extraordinarily rare books of Petri Aretini”. 58 Georg Paul Hönn, Betrugs-Lexicon, worinnen die meisten Betrügereyen in allen Ständen nebst denen darwider guten Theils dienenden Mitteln entdecket (Coburg 1724), 88.

Torsten Sander - 9789004243910 Downloaded from Brill.com09/28/2021 05:48:38AM via free access samuel engels’s bibliotheca selectissima (1743) 359 only count among the libri rari themselves but above all provide a reliable compilation of titles that had become rare due to their prohibition and the resulting measures taken to destroy them. If, as in the case of Giordano Bruno, an entire literary corpus [opera omnia]—and thus also the knowledge documented in it—was prohibited, it seems obvious to ask about the relation of rarity to the literary canon.59 A fairly considerable effort in bibliographic research would yield a pattern of case studies within which the editorial distribution of individual texts could be verified. But this chronological description of a publication says nothing about contemporary awareness of an author and his work among the literary public. Already towards the end of the eighteenth century many books were regarded as worthy of becoming part of the collections of public libraries, thus being incorporated into collective memory “owing merely to their rarity”.60 However, Engel and his contemporaries were also aware that there were books in which no one was interested even though they were rare; consequently, they were not objects of (bibliographic) notice. Rarity and what is “of rare interest”, to use Nikolaus Wegmann’s term, thus characterise first of all nothing more than a “frame of reference” within which the reader’s interest was awakened in individual books that stood out for having the designation “rare”.61 In this way “rarity” became a question linked with the possibility of applying knowledge and learning something new. Samuel Engel, for instance, considered the Stern des Meschiah by Petrus Nigri, printed by Conrad Fyner in Esslingen on 20 December 1477, to be “stupendae raritatis” [of stupendous rarity].62 The edition was even considered rare to such a degree (inconceivably rare) that many people doubted it had been printed at all. The exceptional in this case expanded almost into the realm of the imaginary. What Engel took for unique exists today in the form of several copies, including those in the libraries of Göttin- gen, Gotha (fragment), Munich and Regensburg. Yet Engel’s astonishment

59 See Index librorum prohibitorum S[ancti]S[si].mi D[omini] n[ostri] Pii PP. XII. Sum. Pont. jussu editus (Civitas Vaticana 1948), 66: “Bruno, Giordano. Opera omnia. Decr. S. Off. 8. febr. 1600.” 60 Johann Georg Schelhorn, Anleitung für Bibliothekare und Archivare (Ulm 1788), vol. 1, 341: “These [i.e. rare books; author’s comment], even if they are noteworthy only for their rarity, merit being sought [sic!] for a reputable library and kept there. I am speaking of libraries that are devoted to public use, and hence the reason these books have earned a place there is easy to surmise.” 61 Nikolaus Wegmann, Bücherlabyrinthe. Suchen und Finden im alexandrinischen Zeit- alter (Köln 2000), 178. 62 Engel 1743 (note 4), Der auserlesenen Bibliothec, 33.

Torsten Sander - 9789004243910 Downloaded from Brill.com09/28/2021 05:48:38AM via free access 360 torsten sander at the rarity of this incunable—which he himself could not explain but which was nonetheless verifiable by the existence of one copy—points to the realm of lost and fictitious titles. Both are inseparably linked with the aura of the rare and have a long tradition. While Johann Albert Fab- ricius’s Bibliotheca Latina was based on bibliographic documentation of fragmentarily preserved or even completely vanished titles from antiquity, catalogues such as the Catalogus etlicher sehr alten Buecher, welche neulich in Irrland auff einem alten eroberten Schlosse in einer Bibliothec gefunden worden, Anno 1649, which contained among other things “Der H.[eiligen] drey Könige Reise-Gesangbuch” [The Three Wise Men’s Travel Songbook] belong to the realm of satire.63 But in both cases—as Nikolaus Wegmann stated—the term “rare” “served as a leading semantic category of distinc- tion among book collectors and bibliomaniacs.”64 Nevertheless, when the rarity of a title is exaggerated to a fictitious degree, the value to scholarship of the primacy of rarity as a category becomes questionable. For it is not infrequent that books in this category are “books whose existence is maintained in order to outsmart a public eager for learning and which has to know about everything without being able to read everything.”65 In this respect the rarity of a book, as determined on the basis of different qualities, always remains only one indication of its notice and its selection from among the great number of works in print. The efforts made in the eighteenth century to document the phenomenon in rational terms finally freed the libri rari from being per- ceived as exceptional and unobtainable objects. Documentation of titles in catalogues of collections and auctions culminated in lists of rare books: special bibliographies that give credible testimony to the existence of a printed work, thus making it seem available to the scholarly world. Even though Samuel Engel did not succeed in giving his collection a permanent institutional character in the form he intended, the bibliographical mate- rial collected in the Bibliotheca selectissima is still of great importance for historical evaluation of rare printed works of interest to bibliophiles.

63 Catalogus etlicher sehr alten Buecher, welche neulich in Irrland auff einem alten eroberten Schlosse in einer Bibliothec gefunden worden, Anno 1649 (reprint of the original edn. without place or date [ca. 1649], Hamburg 1925), fol. 3: Theologische Bücher, no. 11. 64 Wegmann 2000 (note 61), 179. 65 Manfred Pabst, ‘Das fiktive Buch. Kein Ende der Fiktionen’ [review of Christian Schäfer-Manz, Das fiktive Buch. Theorie—Geschichte—Wirkung, Verlag Mohr und Rup- recht, Tübingen, 1991)], NZZ-Folio 1 (1991), issue 12: Verführungen, 67. Unfortunately, the work elaborately presented by the reviewer as the “first monograph on this subject” with “the first reliable bibliography of fictitious writing” provided in the appendix, is only a fictional work as well.

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