The rare Liturgy of Johan III, ”The Red Book”, 1576

Liturgia Svecanae Ecclesiae Catholicae & orthodoxae conformis.

(Colophon:) Stocholmiæ, excudebat Torbernus Tidemanni, 1576. Folio. (27,5 x 19 cms.) [3] + 76 leaves. Without final blank in the preliminaries. Title within wide historiated border by Georg Lemberger, the same woodcut as in the first Swedish Bible, 1540-41. Text in Latin and Swedish. Pages 45v and 46r printed upside down.

An attractive, wide-margined copy with no cropping of the printed marginal notes. Near-contemporary full calf decorated in blind, restored by S. Wiklander, spine and endpapers renewed, three first leaves probably supplied from another copy and strengthened in outer margin, occasional small stains. In a solander box with leather spine. Facsimile of ”Wi underschreffne biscopar” bound at end (i.e. the priesthood’s acceptance of the liturgy, printed 1577, 4 pp.).

Provenance: Melcher Wernstedt (1602-1655), with annotaion on first text leaf (book acquired in 1643 ”from a priest in Uleborg” in Swedish Finland); Per Hierta (1907); Thore Virgin (1932, J. V. Johansson, Från Gutenbergbibeln till Gösta Berlings saga. Vandringar i Bibliotheca Qvarnforsiana, 1952, p. 120); Nils Bonnier (Lindberg: Nils Bonniers boksamling, 2 (1987), pp. 43, and sale catalogue 1997, no 53); Svante Svedlin (1997).
Collijn, 2, pp. 457-61.
King Johan III:s Liturgy of 1576, the so-called ”Red Book” which re-introduced a number of Catholic customs in Sweden, where the Lutheran Reformation had taken place in the 1520s. The liturgy caused ”The Liturgical Struggle” 1574-1593, which ended with the Lutheran confession of faith at the Uppsala Synod in 1593. Since the book was used for such a short period of time, and quickly became obsolete, it has become a great rarity.

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