As part of the research project Reception of Antiquities and Late Humanistically Enlightened Connoisseurship: Georg Friedrich Brandes as a Collector of Prints from the Publications Office of the Venetian Aldus Manutius, a team led by the German Professor Dr. Detlef Haberland has been examining the 263 Aldines in the State Library in Oldenburg, Lower Saxony, for the first time since October 2020. While they were researching, a very special treasure fell into their hands.
Aldines are the names given to the manuscripts of the Venetian printer Aldus Manutius (1449-1515), who became particularly famous for printing Greek texts from antiquity, which significantly contributed to the humanistic rediscovery of Greek literature during the Renaissance.
Even in Nuremberg, far away from Venice, scholars devoted themselves to the humanistic pursuits of their time. One of them was Willibald Pirckheimer (1470-1530), who had Greek books sent to him to be translated into Latin, 'more precisely between 1502 and 1505', as Professor Dr. Haberland said in a press release from the State Library, explaining why he considers it likely that this book with an interesting discovery was acquired by Pirckheimer from Aldus Manutius at this time.
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Pirckheimer's circle of friends and acquaintances included indeed Albrecht Dürer (1471-1528), who illustrated the title pages of Pirckheimer's books, including this Aldine, which has now been examined in Oldenburg. The polychrome miniature contained therein, measuring approximately 16 x 6.5 cm, shows two putti riding on dolphins, flanking a coat of arms - Pirckheimer's coat of arms in fact. After Pirckheimer's death, his heirs sold his book collection in 1634. 14 volumes, including the Oldenburg Dürer copy - the design of which was explicitly described at the time - went to a Dutch collector.
The Aldine was then lost until it reappeared in the library of the Amsterdam clergyman Hieronymus de Wilhelm in the mid-18th century, as recent research has shown. In 1769 it was bought at auction in The Hague by the Hanoverian official Georg Friedrich Brandes (1719-1791). After Brandes' death, Duke Peter Friedrich Ludwig von Oldenburg bought his collection, from which most of the Oldenburg Aldines come, and had them brought to the new public library, where today's state library was born.
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The definitive art-historical examination of the rediscovered miniature has yet to be carried out in full, but the research is pointing to a work by the great Albrecht Dürer.
Anyone who would like to see the Dürer miniature with their own eyes has the opportunity to do so in the current exhibition Book Treasures of the Venetian Renaissance from Aldus Manutius's shop at the Oldenburg State Library. The exhibition is open until July 16 and then again from September 15 to October 15.
