Draco mysticus, sive, Venatio

by Thomas Venatorius

Nuremberg: Johann Petreius, September 1530

[32] p. | 8vo | a-b^8 | 152 x 100 mm

First and only edition of this apocalyptic poem by the German theologian and mathematician, perhaps best known for preparing the 1544 editio princeps of the works of Archimedes. Venatorius here takes as his subject the seven-headed Red Dragon of the Apocalypse from Revelation, who tried (and failed) to massacre the Woman of the Apocalypse and her newborn son. Tradition long interpreted the allegory as Satan attacking the Virgin Mary and Baby Jesus. Venatorius, a Lutheran reformer, here casts the Red Dragon as the Roman Church, bent on destroying the righteous Protestant followers of Christ. Even well before Luther, the Red Dragon figured in calls for church reform. “In a letter sent from London, dated September 1410, [Richard] Wyche revealed to [Jan] Hus that he had heard how the Antichrist afflicted Christ’s loyal followers in Bohemia and how the red dragon of the Apocalypse was already preparing to devour the church” (Cermanová). ¶ Venatorius—we can hardly ignore the meaning of the author’s own surname, hunter—early on invokes Apollo and Diana, the great hunters of Roman mythology, who saturate the poem, especially the early pages before Venatorius introduces his Christian hunter. Christ and God themselves seem to marshal much of the action (leaf a6v: “Christ dispatches the council of wicked gods and rouses the hunters of the holy word to move courageously”; leaf a7v: “The voice of God encourages the hunters”). The hunt journeys across the Alps, into the Apennines and Trent—future site of the eponymous Council—and eventually to Rome, which the author describes in some detail and where the hunter finds his dragon, “called by many names in sacred scripture” (leaf b3r). Melanchthon himself casts the first blow (leaf b4r: Primus per medias acies), and he’s quickly joined by fellow reformers Justus Jonas, George Spalatin, Johannes Agricola, and Helius Eobanus Hessus. These Protestant soldiers vanquish the dragon’s seven heads: Truculentia, Discordia, Rabies, Ira, Furor, Violentia, and Bellum. We’re not sure this dragon would pass muster with Tolkien, but “some parts really show poetic momentum [Schwung], and one might gather from his description of the monuments of Rome that he saw the Eternal City himself” (Kolde). ¶ Venatorius seems to have tapped an inspiration that also moved D.H. Lawrence: “We do not care, vitally, about theories of the Apocalypse: what the Apocalypse means. What we care about is the release of the imagination. A real release of the imagination renews our strength and our vitality, makes us feel stronger and happier…What does the Apocalypse matter, unless in so far as it gives us imaginative release into another vital world?” Obviously Venatorius found himself in an age of vicious theological debate, and of course that influenced him, but his poem transcends mere theology. He released his imagination here. And we can only assume it renewed the strength and vitality of his Protestant readers. ¶ Includes a dedication to Adam Weiss, parochus at Crailsheim. We find two copies in North America (Harvard; University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign). Venatorius published no small amount of work, though he remains curiously scarce in the trade.

PROVENANCE: Removed from a larger sammelband, with handwritten foliation in the lower margins and offsetting from an old inscription opposite the title. ¶ Modern bookplates of legendary Florence bookseller Leo Olschki; Gino Sabattini, whose attractive wood-engraved plate romanticizes the art of hunting; and F. de Mattia, which also celebrates hunting with a handsome illustration of Diana.

CONDITION: Twentieth-century patterned boards. Last three leaves are blank. ¶ Title a bit dusty; light dampstaining in the upper margins of the last several leaves. Binding extremities darkened and a little worn.

REFERENCES: USTC 641212; VD16 G611 ¶ D. Theodor Kolde, “Thomas Venatorius, sein Leben und seine literarische Tätigkeit,” Beiträge zur bayerischen Kirchengeschichte (1907), v. 13, p. 166-167; D.H. Lawrence, “Introduction to The Dragon of the Apocalypse by Frederick Carter,” Apocalypse and the Writings on Revelation (Cambridge University, 2019); Pavlína Cermanová, “Constructing the Apocalypse: Connections between English and Bohemian Apocalyptic Thinking,” Europe After Wyclif (Fordham University, 2016), p. 68

Item #348