Saturday, May 13, 2006

Flaming Leopold







[click for larger versions]

This anonymous 1667 German festival book is online at the University of Bielefeld (the image quality after about page 60 is awful). The title is: 'Von Himmeln entzündete und durch allgemeinen Zuruff der Erde sich himmelwerts erschwingende Frolockungs-Flammen zu höchstfeyerli..' for which the translation is rather useless: 'From skies caught fire and by general Zuruff of the earth sky value erschwingende Frolockungs flames too more hoechstfeyerli..'

I am relatively confident it records the celebrations surrounding the first marriage in 1666 of Habsburg Emperor Leopold I of Austria/Hungary/Bohemia to his neice Margarite Theresa, daughter of King Phillip IV of Spain. A number of different hands were likely responsible for the engravings, which vary in quality through the work.
Posted by peacay at

2 comments:

  1. Napfisk14 May, 2006 00:22

    You seem to have got quite close. I'm not an expert in Middle German but this is what I come up with: "Flames of merriment for the wedding celebrations set alight by the heavens and swung to the skies by general cries from the earth".

    Love the blog!

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  2. peacay14 May, 2006 02:23

    Oh. The middle german explains why babelfish (not me) borked the translation. Thanks a lot napfisk!

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