Tractatus racionis et conscienscie de sumpc[i]one pabuli salutiferi cor[por]is d[omi]ni nostri ihu [christ]i.

Accession number: 
PML 65848
Author: 
Mateusz, z Krakowa, Cardinal, approximately 1330-1410.
Published: 
[Mainz]: [Printer of the 'Catholicon' (Johann Gutenberg?)] [approximately 1469, or not before 1469]
Description: 
[22] leaves ; 20.5 cm (4to)
Credit Line: 
Gift of William H. Scheide, 1974.
Notes: 

Title from explicit, leaf [2]/12r.
"Two issues, A on paper manufactured about 1460 and B manufactured 1465-69, but with identical typesetting, are distinguished by Th. Gerardy in [Gutenberg Jahrbuch] 1980 pp.30-37 and P. Needham in BSA 76 (1982) pp.411-417. On this, and on the printer, see the articles "zur Catholicon-Forschung" in Wolfenbütteler Notizen zur Buchgeschichte 13 (1988) pp.105-232, and L. Hellinga in [Gutenberg Jahrbuch] 1989 pp.47-96 and in the Book Collector (Spring 1992) pp. 28-54."--ISTC. By Needham's account (1982), the type, cast as 2-line slugs, was used for two separate printings, in about 1460 and again in 1469, corresponding to the first two (of three) printings of the similarly printed Catholicon, and likewise of the Catholicon printer's two printings of his edition of Thomas Aquinas, De articulis fidei. By Hellinga's account (1992) this work, the Catholicon, and De articulis fidei were all first printed in 1469; to this Needham responded in support of his original conclusion, in Bulletin du bibliophile, 1992 no. 2, pages 257-304 (not noted by ISTC).
Printed in two-line slugs of type 1:84G.
Collation: [1¹⁰ 2¹²]: 22 leaves.
Paper format: Chancery quarto in half-sheets.
PML copy is issue B.
PML copy leaf dimensions: 17.5 x 12.5 cm.

Binding: 
19th-century gilt-tooled red morocco over paper boards (18 x 13 cm.), sewn on 3 supports by Zaehnsdorf (with gold stamp on rear pastedown). Plain paper pastedowns and endleaves; decorative endbands.
Variant Title: 

Title in ISTC: Dialogus rationis et conscientiae de frequenti usu Communionis

Inscriptions/Markings: 

Hand decoration: Contemporary German rubrication, red initial (with faded filigree, leaf [1]/1r), paragraph marks (C-type with extended upper stroke), and capital strokes. Names of dialogue participants, Conscientia and Ratio, written in red. Annotations: No marginal notations in text. 16th-century inscriptions (leaf [2]/12v).

Provenance: 
Nicholas Beathe, of Augsburg, inscription: "Item Nicolas beathe in Aug. sub ano [14]94" (leaf [2]/12v); unidentified German bookdealers, inscriptions/price codes (rear pastedown); H.P. Kraus, July 1970; Pierpont Morgan Library, gift of William H. Scheide, 1974.
Classification: 
Department: