VISUAL INFORMATION AND HISTORIC KNOWLEDGE. THE SYSTEMATIC INTEGRATION BETWEEN TEXT AND IMAGE IN THE LIBER CHRONICARUM (1493)

Abstract

Upon joining the perspectives of analysis of the material history of the book and the history of historiography, this paper supports the thesis under which the historic knowledge presented in the Liber chronicarum (1493) results from the systematic integration between the text and visual elements of the printed page. In order to back such thesis, we analyze first the collective work of literate agents in the composition of the manuscript, the variations among the work editions and the form of graphic arrangement between texts and images in the Liber chronicarum. The second part of this paper highlights three aspects by means of which the integration of the system becomes effective in the chronicle, namely: the logic of page composition, the tensions arising in the xylographic representations between the obedience to the iconographic tradition and the expectation of viewing what it refers to, as well as the functions that one can assign to the visual information in the printed material.

Keywords:
Book history; Early Modern German historiography; image; Hartmann Schedel; chronicle