Block books are slim volumes, typically comprising 20 to 50 pages,
produced by cutting text and images into wooden blocks (a process known
as xylography). The production of block books reached its peak at a time
when printing with metal letters (moveable type) was already
established, around the 1460s–1470s. Worldwide only about 600 block book
copies have survived, and they are among the rarest and most precious
products of the printing press. The Bavarian State Library holds 40 of
these books and eight fragments.
Totentanz (The dance of death) covers a similar topic to the
Ars moriendi
(The art of dying): the sudden death that anybody can suffer,
irrespective of worldly rank. On each of the 24 images a personification
of Death dances with a person from a different social position, leading
the individual out of life. The series of victims starts with a pope
and an emperor, continues with an abbot, a nobleman and a farmer, and
finishes with a helpless child and his mother. Only two copies of the
block book version of the
Totentanz are known: this one at the
Bavarian State Library in Munich, and a volume in the library of the
University of Heidelberg. The two copies represent different editions,
and the images have many differences. The copy shown here has some
unique features. The text, which was originally placed below the
illustrations, was trimmed, the images were cut out and glued onto
larger sheets, and the text was reproduced by hand. Based on
codicological evidence, this was done in the third quarter of the 15th
century, shortly after the production of the book.
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