Das Neue Gebetbuch Kaiser Maximilians I. in seiner Entstehung
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Awarded the Third Prize of the 19th ILAB Breslauer Prize for Bibliography (2026). The jury praised Heidrun Lange-Krach for describing all ten surviving copies "to the highest bibliographical and codicological standard" and for her convincing case that the Prayer Book was never meant for the Emperor's private devotion, but as a model for the liturgy of the Order of Saint George.
Maximilian I's prayer book, printed in Augsburg in 1513, contains drawings by the most famous German Renaissance artists: Albrecht Dürer, Hans Burgkmair, Lukas Cranach, Hans Baldung called Grien, Albrecht Altdorfer and Jörg Breu were commissioned by the emperor to decorate a printed liturgical text with filigree marginal illustrations. Only one of ten surviving copies contains these pen and ink drawings, whose function - whether preparatory drawings for woodcuts or autonomous drawings - has long divided art history. A second edition with woodcuts by Hans Schäufelin was produced at the same time. This study records the surviving inventory of the prayer books and traces the history of their creation.