INCUNABULUM

(Latin: cradle,) plural incunabula any book printed before 1501, i.e., the earliest examples of the printer's art, completed at a time when some books were still being hand-copied. The end date for identifying a book as an incunabulum is convenient, but arbitrary, as it does not reflect any particular development in the printing process. The first attempt to publish a comprehensive list of incunabula was a five-volume work by Georg Wolfgang Panzer. This catalogue, entitled Annales Typographici ab Artis Inventae Origine ad Annum MD, was published in Nrnberg in 179397. It alphabetically listed various European printing centres and the titles printed at each place. As interest in book collecting grew, many other catalogues of this type were compiled. Late 20th-century estimates place the total number of incunabula at 35,000 or more. There is also evidence of a considerable amount of ephemeral literature (such as broadsides, cheap romances, ballads, and devotional tracts), which has either perished completely or exists only in fragments of waste lining bindings and in other hidden places.