The Dürer Society (12.1911)

PREFACE.

It is hoped that this selection of Durer's minor drawings, for the most
part unpublished, will be acceptable to members of the Durer Society,
or at least to such of them as take a serious interest even in the
byways of the master's career. Except the sketches at Coburg
(Pl. II.) and Berlin (Pl. IV.), and the interesting studies of a symbolical
subject in the collection of Dr. Wilhelm Suida (Pl. X.), all the draw-
ings reproduced are in British collections, and the majority are gleanings
from the rich field of the Sloane collection in the British Museum.
Four of these (Pl. IX., XVIII., XX., XXIV.) are from that portion of
the Sloane drawings now preserved in the Department of Prints and
Drawings, being derived from the large folio volume lettered :—


TEECKENING
1637
The remainder are from the second, third, and fourth of the four
similar, but much smaller volumes in the Department of Manuscripts,
lettered:—


SCHRIFTEN
1637
These MSS. are much less rich in drawings of artistic, as apart from
scientific, interest, than the volume in the Dresden Library, of which
the complete contents have been published. In making this small
selection from them, I have avoided the studies and drafts for Durer's
literary works on Proportion, Measurement, Architecture, and Fortifi-
cation, which constitute the bulk of the MSS. Plate VII. forms a
solitary exception, justified by the fact that the drawing itself is of a
quite exceptional character, and stands on a detached sheet without
context. On the other hand, I have included almost every isolated
drawing of any interest to be found in the three volumes mentioned;
the first has not been touched, since it consists entirely of studies for
the work on human proportion.

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