Johannes Müller von Königsberg, better known as Regiomontanus, was a mathematician, astrologer and astronomer of the German Renaissance, active in Vienna, Buda and Nuremberg. His contributions were instrumental in the development of Copernican heliocentrism in the decades following his death.
This article is a list of the literary events and publications in the 15th century.
The Nuremberg Chronicle is an illustrated encyclopedia consisting of world historical accounts, as well as accounts told through biblical paraphrase. Subjects include human history in relation to the Bible, illustrated mythological creatures, and the histories of important Christian and secular cities from antiquity. Finished in 1493, it was originally written in Latin by Hartmann Schedel, and a German version was translated by Georg Alt. It is one of the best-documented early printed books—an incunabulum—and one of the first to successfully integrate illustrations and text.
Urs Graf was a Swiss Renaissance goldsmith, painter and printmaker, as well as a Swiss mercenary. He only produced two etchings, one of which dates from 1513 – the earliest known etching for which a date has been established. However, his woodcuts are considered of greater significance, particularly as he is attributed with the invention of the white-line woodcut technique, where white lines create the image on a black background. He also produced a few engravings, including copies of works by Martin Schongauer and Albrecht Dürer. He produced innovative drawings intended as finished works of art rather than just studies.
Block books or blockbooks, also called xylographica, are short books of up to 50 leaves, block printed in Europe in the second half of the 15th century as woodcuts with blocks carved to include both text (usually) and illustrations. The content of the books was nearly always religious, aimed at a popular audience, and a few titles were often reprinted in several editions using new woodcuts. Although many had believed that block books preceded Gutenberg's invention of movable type in the first part of the 1450s, it now is accepted that most of the surviving block books were printed in the 1460s or later, and that the earliest surviving examples may date to about 1451.
Peter Schöffer or Petrus Schoeffer was an early German printer, who studied in Paris and worked as a manuscript copyist in 1451 before apprenticing with Johannes Gutenberg and joining Johann Fust, a goldsmith, lawyer, and money lender.
Johann(es) Petreius was a German printer in Nuremberg.
Johann Haller or Jan Haller (1463–1525) is considered one of the first commercial printers in Poland.
Arnold Pannartz and Conrad Sweynheym were two printers of the 15th century, associated with Johannes Gutenberg and the use of his invention, the mechanical movable-type printing press.
The Speculum Humanae Salvationis or Mirror of Human Salvation was a bestselling, anonymously illustrated work of popular theology in the late Middle Ages, part of the genre of encyclopedic speculum literature, in this case concentrating on the medieval theory of typology, whereby the events of the Old Testament prefigured or foretold the events of the New Testament. The original version is in rhyming Latin verse, and contains a series of New Testament events each with three Old Testament ones that prefigure it. It is one of the most common books found as an illuminated manuscript, and also in early printing in both blockbook and incunabulum forms.
Colard Mansion was a 15th-century Flemish scribe and printer who worked together with William Caxton. He is known as the first printer of a book with copper engravings, and as the printer of the first books in English and French.
Johannes Mentelin, sometimes also spelled Mentlin, was a pioneering German book printer and bookseller active during the period during which incunabula were printed. In 1466, he published the first printed Bible in the German language, the Mentelin Bible.
The history of printing in Poland began in the late 15th century, when following the creation of the Gutenberg Bible in 1455, printers from Western Europe spread the new craft abroad.
Günther Zainer was the first printer in Augsburg, where he worked from 1468 until his death; he produced about 80 books including two German editions of the Bible and the first printed calendar. He came to Augsburg from Strassburg and printed in 1472–76 three large works of moral instruction. He also printed the first large illustrated book, Jacobus de Voragine's Legenda aurea in 2 volumes with 131 woodcuts, 1471–76. Johann Zainer, the first printer in Ulm, was probably his brother.
Tomás Pinpin was a printer, writer and publisher from Abucay, a municipality in the province of Bataan, Philippines, who was the first Philippine printer and is sometimes referred as the "Prince of the Filipino Printers."
The Lucidarius, an anonymous medieval book, was the first German language summa, written circa 1190–1195. It was based on different sources, the chief one being the Elucidarium and other texts by Honorius Augustodunensis. Other sources include De philosophia mundi by William of Conches and De divinis officiis by Rupert of Deutz. It has been preserved in 66 partial or complete manuscripts, and 85 printings in German. It is claimed to be the first original German language work in prose.
Johann Veldener, also known as Jan Veldener or Johan Veldenaer; was an early printer in Flanders. He worked as a punchcutter and printer in Cologne, together with William Caxton, who may have financed his first books. They both left for Flanders in 1472. Evidence indicates that Veldener assisted Caxton in setting up his printing office in Bruges and helped printing his first work there, the 1472-1473 Recuyell of the Historyes of Troye by Raoul Lefèvre. Afterwards, Veldener went to Leuven and set up his printing company there, becoming the second printer in Leuven after John of Westphalia, and the third or fourth in the Netherlands. He entered the Leuven University on 30 July 1473 in the faculty of Medicine.
Anna Rügerin, is considered to be the first female typographer to inscribe her name in the colophon of a book, in the 15th century. In 1484, Rügerin printed two books in the in-folio format, in a press she owned in the city of Augsburg (Germany). Her work appeared less than twenty years after the arrival of the movable-type printing press in that city.
Hayyim ben David Schwartz was an early Hebrew printer, typographer, and editor, known as the first Jewish printer of Hebrew books in Germany.
Heinrich Steinhöwel, alternatively Steinhäuel or Steinheil was a German doctor, humanist, translator and writer. From 1450 he settled in Ulm, from which most of his works were published.
