The Distycha was originally a Latin collection of proverbs and sayings, in a two-line format, with a distinctly moral slant. It was the most popular Latin textbook of the Middle Ages, providing moral guidance for students as well as an effective way of learning Latin. It was first printed c.1465, appeared in over 150 editions and was translated into several languages. Caxton published an English translation in c.1476, and Chaucer refers to it in the Canterbury Tales (the Miller’s Tale). Its author was once assumed to be the historian Cato the Elder, or even the statesman Cato the Younger, but was later affirmed to be one Dionysius Cato on the basis of a 3rd or 4th century manuscript, now lost but considered authoritative at the time.

The printer Anton Sorg, who was a native of Augsburg, was among the first printers in Augsburg and one of the most prolific. He was known for printing a wide range of books with illustrations as well as a translator of texts into German.

This is an incunable, from the Latin incunabula (swaddling bands). This term is given to books ‘from the cradle of printing’, from 1455 when Johannes Gutenberg completed the Gutenberg Bible, the first handpress book printed with movable type, up to 1500. These books are from the first 45 years of printing.

Binding
Alum tawed pig skin over wooden boards; with 4 flexible sewing supports, head band secondary embroider end band. Type IV (Source: Szirman: The archaeology of medieval bookbinding), hook clasp fastening from the Netherlands around 1480, contemporary looks like alligator head. Bevelled board on fore-edge, heated stamp on head and tail, label on front board.