154 - HOFFER, Johannes. *Icones Catecheseos, et virtutum ac vitiorum illustratæ numeris*.

HOFFER, Johannes. *Icones Catecheseos, et virtutum ac vitiorum illustratæ numeris*. A valuable first edition of this rare Lutheran pocket catechism, adorned with fine woodcuts and preserved in a Jansenist binding by Masson-Debonnelle. Vitebergæ (Wittenberg), Printed by the Heirs of Georg Rhaw, 1557. Small 12mo, full red Jansenist morocco, spine with fine raised bands, gilt inner roulette, double gilt fillet at the cuts, guilloché headbands, gilt edges. Binding signed Masson-Debonnelle. 36 leaves (880 x 470 mm, quires A through E), publisher’s vignette, 51 woodcuts, one initial, end-piece illustrations. Minimal scuffing on the corners and lower cap. A rare first edition of this Lutheran visual catechism, published in Wittenberg, the cradle of the Protestant Reformation. Johannes Hoffer (c. 1529–c. 1583), professor of law and advisor at the court of Weimar, follows here in the pure tradition of emblem books and visual catechisms initiated by Philip Melanchthon. [Brunet, Supplement A–M, 645]. The series includes finely carved woodcuts attributed to the Wittenberg school and to workshops associated with Lucas Cranach the Younger. The biblical scenes and the personifications of the Virtues and Vices (notably the striking figure of Superbia at the mirror) are teeming with rich details on costumes, furnishings, and German customs of the mid-16th century. The printing press of the Heirs of Georg Rhaw, the official printer of Martin Luther’s writings, produced a layout of remarkable typographic clarity. Preceded by a dedicatory epistle to Johann Schwertel, the work faithfully reproduces Martin Luther’s Small Catechism: the Divine Law (Decalogus) leads into salvation (Evangelium, Symbolum, Precatio, Resurrectio), prayer (Oratio Domini), the liturgy (Baptismi, Eucharistia), and daily piety (Precatio ad mensam). It concludes with a spiritual battle between Vices and Virtues (Fides, Spes, Caritas), capped off by M. G. Vida’s *Verba Christi* and the elegy *De Lauro*. A fine copy in a full binding by Masson-Debonnelle, a Parisian workshop from the late 19th century.