Anton Koberger[1] (c. 1440/1445 – 3 October 1513) was the German goldsmith, printer and publisher who printed and published the Nuremberg Chronicle, a landmark of incunabula, and was a successful bookseller of works from other printers. In 1470 he established the first printing house in Nuremberg. Koberger was the godfather of Albrecht Dürer, whose family lived on the same street.
Of Koberger’s many different printed editions which he produced from the late 15th century to the early 16th century, three stand out in particular. He printed an illustrated edition of the Bible in High German in 1483, complete with many remarkable woodcut illustrations. The text is from the first German Bible printed by Günther Zainer in the 1470s.
oberger also printed an edition of the Golden Legend by Jacobus de Voragine in German in 1488, also illustrated with woodcuts of saints and religious themes.[7] His most celebrated project is the so-called Nuremberg Chronicle of 1492, or Liber Chronicarum, probably the most extensively illustrated edition of the incunabula period, c. 1450–1500. Editions were produced in both Latin and German. The work was so popular, it is believed by scholars to have had one of the largest print-runs of the Incunabula Period. Because of the popularity, pirated editions appeared almost immediately after Koberger’s edition.[8]
Folio Page from “The Golden Legend” printed by Anton Koberger, 1488. The image depicts a saintly woman being anointed, possibly St. Mary or any number of other female saints.
A page from the Nuremberg Chronicle, leaf 25 (page 49) printed by Anton Koberger circa 1492.