Early modern readers used the margins of their books for more than just writing notes. Pages of rare books are abundant with doodles and drawings by both adults and children.  Sometimes readers practiced their signatures or tried out their pens. The Nuremberg Chronicle was no exception to this, demonstrating that even a valuable and expensive book was regarded as an appropriate medium for scribbling.

“Five hunters with a dog, a lady on a horseback, and game – deer, hares, and birds”

This page of the Chronicle shows a hunting scene.  Someone has drawn five hunters with a dog, a lady on a horseback, and game – deer, hares, birds. A separately drawn male head was added in a different hand, probably before the rest of composition. The hunting scene bears no relation to the printed text of the page which narrates the history of the Lombards.

There are marginal notes in two different hands in this copy. At some point this Chronicle must have been owned by a Catholic, who wrote ‘Mendacium’ (‘Lie’) near the story of Pope Joan and a prayer ‘Canticum ad clerum Marianum’ in the blank pages. Other marginal notes were made in a 16th-century hand in Dutch. One of these owners may have been an artist.  There are stains throughout the book that suggest that the copy once resided in an artist’s workshop, including traces of pigment or water-based painting which are  sometimes smudged and sometimes impressed with a fingerprint.  

The doodles and marks on this copy of the Chronicle offer a glimpse into the book’s life as a material object in the early modern household.