The specialist
The specialist's passion for book art is focussed on a particular niche. One specialist only collects Venetian prints by Aldus Manutius; another has worked for decades to fill his private library with early editions of Horace and Cicero; yet another spends years searching for a particular work once housed in the collection of a royal library.
The historian
For the historian, antique books are a unique source of information and knowledge. From historical texts one can discover interesting details about wars, political events or simply the everyday life of an epoch. Through this type of research, it is sometimes astonishing to see that ancient sources often reveal that people today still have similar problems to those that troubled people living 500 years ago. For example,in Münster’s Cosmographia of the 16th Century, the reader is given a picture about the everyday life of women in “Lyffland" today’s Latvia and Estonia:
"Sie wollen nicht Weyber / sonder Frawen genannt werden. Mit Spinnen auch anderer Weyber arbeit bekümmern sie sich nicht / meynen es sey ihrem Adelichen herkommen unehr: aber des Winters im Schlitten / und des Sommers auff dem Wasser spacieren zu fahren / geht inen baß von der Hand dann das spinnen...“
(Which, roughly translated, means: They don’t want to be called “women” but “ladies.” Spinning and other women’s work is not their taste as they consider it ignoble. On the other hand, they are very skilled in sledding in winter and in going for a walk at the waterside in summer…)
The philologist
For the philologist, books are a fundamental object of research. Teofilo Folengo’s Opus Macaronicorum from the 16th Century is a rich source of information on historical linguistics and is especially important for experts on Latin and ancient Italian. In this work, Folengo created a strange hybrid language in which he mixed the Italian vernacular and the dialect of the Veneto with Latin inflection and prosody.
The investor
For the investor, the reason for acquiring antiquarian printed material is often not motivated by pure intellectual interest, but it is still a clever activity nonetheless since historical books can be an excellent investment. The value of a well-preserved incunabulumcan be as high as a five-digit figure. When a treasure like this is properly treated and stored, the value of it will continue to rise. A loss in value is rare. Early books were typically produced with a print run of only a few hundred copies. It is often difficult to find out how many exemplars of a certain edition are still extant because many of them have either been destroyed centuries ago by wars, fire or inappropriate handling, or they are hidden in a private collection.
And how much more exciting is it to own a volume of a beautiful and famous antiquarian book, the Nuremberg Chronicle (1493 A.D.), for example, than to only invest your money in stocks or mutual funds.
This list of the various types of antiquarian books and the people who collect them could of course go on and on.
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When, in the 15 th Century, the first books were printed, there were many sceptics who rejected this new technology. Despite such critics, however, book printing soon spread throughout the world and came to be recognized as one of the most significant developments in media history. More than 500 years later, the next media revolution came in the form of computers and the internet.
There are again sceptics who are in doubt about these new technologies. They would argue that the internet is not a medium of unlimited possibilities. However, it provides new ways for you, the book and art lover or collector, to benefit. Let us convince you of that!