Auch ein Todtentanz [Yet another Dance of Death]: P.14784-R

Titles

Auch ein Todtentanz [Yet another Dance of Death]

Maker(s)

Printmaker: Schmidt, Oskar; Steinbrecher, Gustav Richard; Gaber, August; Bürkner, Hugo
Publisher: Schlicke, Bernhard; Elischer, Balthasar
Draughtsman: Rethel, Alfred (After)

Entities

• Portfolio

Categories

• Portfolio
• Print

Description

Large presentation portfolio, three-quarter-bound in brown cloth with gold tooling and buff-coloured paper boards with lettering in black gothic script. On the front board: 'Auch ein Todtentanz. / Erfunden und gezeichnet / von / Alfred Rethel. / Leipzig, Verlag von Bernhard Schlicke / (Balthasar Elischer). / 1879'. The series was originally published in 1849 with the title: _Auch ein Todtentanz aus dem Jahre 1848_ [Yet another Dance of Death from the year 1848], but the title appears to have been modified in subsequent editions or formats in which the 'Auch' and/or 'aus dem Jahre 1848' are dropped. See P.14785-R. On the back board: [inside an oval-shaped design of scrolling lines] 'Leipzig, / Druck von Alexander Wiede'. There are the remains of a brown cotton ribbon tie threaded through a slit in the back board. Inside is a front endpaper of grey wove paper with graphite inscription at upper right corner: '4.50' and a bookseller's label at upper left: 'WALTHER & APOLANT / BUCHHANDLUNG BERLIN / MARKGRAFEN-STRASSE 60.'. The back endpaper is overlarge with flaps at upper, lower and right edges which are folded in, envelope-like, to contain the printed material; title page, printed foreward by Johannes Proelss, followed by six individual plates of tinted wood-engravings designed by Alfred Rethel with explanatory text printed below composed by Robert Reinick. All the plates are tinted in yellow, straw-coloured tones of varying hue. The wood-engravings in the first edition are untinted; see P.14786. This impressively presented portfolio, which includes a foreward by well-known German journalist and literary historian, Johannes Proelss, is the eleventh edition of Rethel's counter-revolutionary wood-engraved series, _Auch ein Todtentanz_ and was published on the 30th anniversary of the original publication of the series in 1849 and twenty years after Rethel's death in 1859; ff.1r-10v. f1r - Title page; one half of a large, folded sheet of white wove paper enclosing the foreward and plates; with lettering in gothic script, printed in black ink: 'Auch ein Todtentanz. / Erfunden und gezeichnet / von / Alfred Rethel. / Mit erklärendem Text / von / Robert Reinick. / Ausgeführt im akademischen Atelier für holzschneidekunst zu Dresden unter Leitung von Professor h. Bürkner. / 'Du Bürger und du Bauersmann ... Schaut her, wie es damit bestellt.' / Elfte Unflage. / Mit einem Vorwort von Johannes Proelss. / Leipzig, B. Schlicke's Verlag / (Balthasar Elischer). / 1879'. [Yet another Dance of Death / invented and drawn / by / Alfred Rethel. / with explanatory text / by / Robert Reinick. / made under the guidance of Professor H. Bürkner in his atelier at the Academy of Art in Dresden / 'You Citizen, you builder ...' (Prologue by Robert Reinick) / eleventh edition / with a foreward by Johannes Proelss / published in Leipzig by Bernhard Schlicke]. f2r - Foreward, 'Vorwort.'; the first page of a large folded sheet of white wove paper which is printed on all four sides; letterpress in gothic script, printed in black ink: 'Zum ersten Male aufgelegt und diesmal in einem des …'. The foreward was written by Johannes Proelss in Leipzig on July 1st, 1879. See f3v. f2v - Foreward, 'Vorwort.'; the second page of a large folded sheet of white wove paper which is printed on all four sides; letterpress in gothic script, printed in black ink: '... und Schmerzen zu stillen, konnte nicht den ..'. The foreward was written by Johannes Proelss, in Leipzig on July 1st, 1879. See f3v. f3r - Foreward, 'Vorwort.'; the third page of a large folded sheet of white wove paper which is printed on all four sides; letterpress in gothic script, printed in black ink: '... einer gewissen Zartheit und Schwäche des Körpers aus. ...'. The foreward was written by Johannes Proelss, in Leipzig on July 1st, 1879. See f3v. f3v - Foreward, 'Vorwort.'; the fourth page of a large folded sheet of white wove paper which is printed on all four sides; letterpress in gothic script, printed in black ink: '[Er]banung des Aachener Münsters, Ludwig's krönung zum könig ... Leipzig, den 1. Juli 1879 Johannes Proelss'. Johannes Proelss (born Dresden 1853, died 1911), was a German writer, translator, journalist and literary historian. Proelss's foreward begins by acknowledging the presentation of the 11th edition of Rethel's woodcuts on the 30th anniversary of their original publication in 1849: 'Zum ersten Male aufgelegt und diesmal in einem des kostbaren Inhalts würdigen Gewande, geht diese Sammlung von Rethel's Todtentanzbildern ...'. ['For the first time, and this time inside a cover worthy of it, this collection of Rethel's death-dance pictures are re-released thirty years after they were executed by the artist, acting under the fresh impulse of the bloody May Uprising at Dresden, and twenty years since the death of Rethel, whose memory we celebrate especially.] f10r - One half of a large, folded sheet of white wove paper which encloses the Foreward and plates. Epilogue of two verses composed by Robert Reinick, printed in letterpress in black ink: 'Als Leichen - ja! - da sind wir gleich ... So segne Gott das Vaterland!' [As corpses - yes - there we are equal ... So God bless the Fatherland!']. These verses appeared after the title page in the original publication. f10v - Printer's details at the centre in black ink, within an oval-shaped design of scrolling lines: 'Leipzig, / Druck von Alexander Wiede.'. The same design is also stamped onto the backboard. See individual records for the plates: f4r, f5r, f6r, f7r, f8r, f9r. f1v, f4v, f5v, f6v, f7v, f8v, and f9v are blank.

Legal notes

Given by Mr Philip J. Worsley, 1914-12