Beschreibung:

TEUFEL ZU GUNDERSDORF, Album Amicorum with entries from 1590 to 1686 [Venice or Padua, c.1575-85] 161 x 115mm. 229 leaves (according to later foliation lacking leaves 83, 131, 137, 162, 173-7, 213 and 218) including 74 Turkish marbled or speckled papers, some differently marbled on each side, and FIFTY-EIGHT GOUACHE DRAWINGS OF ITALIAN COSTUME AND SCENES in colours, liquid gold and silver, most identified in Italian in an Italian cursive of the late 16th century, with verses and signatures in various cursive hands (light thumbing of outer edges, some inscriptions slightly cropped). German late 17th-century panelled morocco gilt, panel with flower-heads and foliage from a small urn and the central 'flower' with the Name of God in Hebrew characters within rays, spine gilt in five compartments with flower-head stamps (slightly worn, lacking clasps). PROVENANCE. 1.Teufel zu Gundersdorf family: inscriptions to Michael Teufel (d. circa 1617) and his wife Potentiana, his son Otto (d.1673) and Otto's son Otto Christoph (who signed it in 1659, f.209v) 2.Privy Councillor Hans Count Wilczek (mentioned in Schrauf, 1892) 3.Kreuzenstein: pictorial engraved bookplate by A. Cossman, early 20th-century AN INVALUABLE SOURCE FOR THE HISTORY OF THE REFORMATION IN AUSTRIA. According to C. Schrauf, 'der protestantische Adel aus Nieder- und Obersterrich scheint hier beinahe vollzhlig vertreten'. Of the 166 participants in the congregation on 3 October 1608 of the evangelical party in Austria (amongst whom were three barons von Teufel), no fewer than 25 have left inscriptions in the Teufel zu Gundersdorf album, making it an important reference point for the interconnections and tone of an influential milieu; amongst the earliest inscriptions in the album is one by the leader of the aristocratic Protestant faction Gotthard Herr von Starhemberg (1563-1624). The marked religious tendency of the album's milieu is reflected in the choice of sentiments, which eschew to a suprising extent the courtly romantic sentiments or academic allusions characteristic of contemporary albums: von Starhemberg's 'Gott gibt gnad' is representative. The Teufel zu Gundersdorf Album Amicorum contains approximately 650 signatures, most of them dated and with inscriptions and sentiments; contributors include representatives of six princely families (those of Anhalt, Holstein, Pfalz, Sachsen-Gotha und Althenburg, Sachsen-Lauenburg and Sweden-Poland) and ten with the status of Reichsgraf; the inscriptions are variously in German, French, Italian, Spanish, Latin, Greek, Polish, Turkish and Persian. The Album Amicorum is discussed at length, with an alphabetical list of signatories, in C. Schrauf, 'Das Gedenkbuch der Teufel zu Gundersdorf', Jahrbuch der k. k. heraldischen Gesellschaft "Adler", new series, vol.2, 1892. Somewhat at odds with the serious tone of the inscriptions are the charming illustrations of Italian characters, including several coquettish courtesans. The preponderance of Venetians or scenes of Venetian spectacle suggests that the drawings were made and acquired in that city. Such paintings were clearly popular purchases with travellers in the Veneto, and make a frequent appearance in Alba Amicorum of this period. The album of Bernhard Praetorius of 1596, for example, has very similar scenes, including muleback prelates and figures in a gondola: W. Taegert, Edler Schatzholden Erinnerns. Bilder in Stammbchern der Staatsbibliothek Bamberg aus vier Jahrhunderten (Bamberg 1995), pp.69 & 70. The standing figures displaying the dress of citizens of the Veneto, however, are neither as skillfully nor as vivaciously presented in other examples as they are in the Teufel von Gundersdorf book. The image of the Venetian blonde, in her embroidered stockings and tall pattens, sitting on a terrace combing her hair over a wide brim so that the sun can bleach it, is rich in genre detail (f.99). Although obviously related in type, these compositions appear to antedate printe