1523 Miscellany of Patristic Texts with 19th-Century Forged Luther Inscription
1523 Miscellany of Patristic Texts with 19th-Century Forged Luther Inscription
PBK.000190
Printed Book
1523
France
Latin and German
Printed on Paper
8.2 × 6.0 × 0.65 in. (21 × 15.3 × 1.65 cm)
Not on View
In 1523, Hieronymus Gebwiler, headmaster of the cathedral school in Strasbourg, compiled this booklet of extracts from Latin authors to help protect priests and educated lay persons from the spread of Protestant ideas in the Rhineland. Gebwiler selected a chapter from Isidore of Seville’s Etymologiae on the sects and names of heretics, a section from Augustine on faith and works, and two passages from Jerome on the virginity of Mary and venerating the relics of the saints. Gebwiler dedicated the work to Wilhelm von Hohnstein, who was both bishop of Strasbourg and count of Alsace. On the blank page facing the dedication is an inscription by Martin Luther dated 1526. The inscription is a nineteenth-century forgery, however, by the notorious forger Hermann Kyrieleis.
Printed in 1523 by Johann Grieninger in Strasbourg, France.[1] Acquired between about 1893 and 1896 by the forger Hermann Kyrieleis.[2] Acquired by 2009 by Gene Albert (Christian Heritage Museum), Hagerstown, Maryland; Privately purchased in 2009 by Green Collection, Oklahoma City, Oklahoma.
Notes: [1] At the end of the dedication, Gebwiler emphasized his argument by dating the essay, March 1, “Anno virgenei partus” (“In the year of the virgin birth” rather than in the “year of our Lord”) 1523. [2] Between 1893 and 1896, Kyrieleis produced at least 130 forgeries of dedication texts signed, “Martin Luther.” He was tried in Berlin in 1898 and found to be insane, so he was institutionalized. Max Herrmann gave a lecture about the forgeries, which was published in 1905 as “Ein feste Burg is unser Gott,” that included a list of the known forgeries in an appendix. This volume contains forgery number 64. See https://archive.org/details/EinFesteBurgIstUnserGott/page/n35/mode/2up?q=Kyrielis.
Published References:
Max Herrmann, “Ein feste Burg is unser Gott,” Vortrag gehalten von Max Herrmann in der Gesellschaft für deutsche Literatur zu Berlin und mit ihrer Unterstützung herausgegeben (B. Behr’s Verlag: Berlin, 1905).
Questions about our Collections?
To acquire permission to use this image, please visit our Rights and Reproduction page .
More From The Collections
_ABC Buchstabir und Lesebuch zum Gebrauch für Deutsche Schulen_ (ABC Spelling and Reading Book for Use in German Schools)