Földvári Books

An Early Humanist Defense of Learning in Reformation-Era Erfurt

Hessus, Helius Eobanus

Dialogi Tres: Melaenus, Misologus, Fugitivi. Studiorum et veritatis causa nuper aediti. Lectori. [3 elegiac distichs]. Item [1 elegiac distich].

[Execussum Erphordie (Erfurt)]: [in officina Matthei Maler (Matthes Maler)], [Anno 1524]. First edition. Unbound, with remnants of old blue paper wrappers at the spine. 4º: A6, [3 (A2–A4 missigned Ai, Aij, Aiij) signed], B–C4, D3, 17 leaves (last blank not present). Wide-margined copy. Contemporary ink note on the verso of the title page; faint pencil annotations on the title page and final leaf. Light brown staining along the upper edge throughout. Worming to the margins, not affecting text. Otherwise a very good copy.

An early humanist satire by Hessus, defending classical learning at the height of the Erfurt Reformation crisis.

First edition of Hessus’s Three Dialogues, printed at Erfurt in early 1524, during the acute confessional and institutional crisis that followed the early Reformation. The work was issued by Matthes Maler and belongs to the small corpus of polemical prose produced by Hessus at a moment when his position at the university was under direct threat.

Helius Eobanus Hessus (born Eoban Koch, 1488–1540) was a German Neo-Latin poet and humanist closely associated with the early Reformation. Educated at the University of Erfurt, he rose to prominence as a Latin poet and lecturer and became an outspoken defender of humane studies at a moment of intense confessional conflict. Hessus aligned himself with Erasmus of Rotterdam and later openly supported Martin Luther, while rejecting radical anti-intellectual currents within evangelical preaching. After losing his position at Erfurt amid the university’s decline, he continued his career through humanist networks connected with Philip Melanchthon, and from 1536 served as professor of poetry and history at Marburg. He was widely regarded by contemporaries as one of the most accomplished Latin poets of his age, producing epigrams, occasional verse, biblical paraphrases, and polemical writings such as the Dialogi tres.

The Dialogi tres are structured after classical and Lucianic models and combine prose with frequent verse passages. Each dialogue targets a different figure emblematic of anti-humanist zeal: Melaenus (the maligner), Misologus (the hater of learning), and the Fugitivi (the “runaways,” presented as ignorant ex-monks turned agitators). The work defends the study of languages, rhetoric, medicine, and classical authors as necessary for education and theology. While sharply critical in tone, the book repeatedly insists that its attack is directed not against reform as such, but against ignorance, demagogy, and the destruction of learning.

The volume is dedicated to Peter Kemnitz, Cistercian abbot of Pforta. In the dedicatory epistle, Hessus emphasizes moderation, learning, and Christian piety, and presents the work as written rapidly and without malice, in defense of humane studies under urgent circumstances.

The Dialogi tres stands as a contemporary witness to early Reformation debates over education, authority, and the place of classical learning.

Copies are recorded in a limited number of institutional libraries, including Wolfenbüttel, Berlin, Leipzig, Göttingen, Heidelberg, Strasbourg, and Wrocław. RBH records a single sale of a copy, dated 2004.

USTC 650681; VD16 E 1531.

Literature: Vredeveld, H. (Ed.). (2016). The poetic works of Helius Eobanus Hessus (Vol. 4, Between Erasmus and Luther, 1518–1524). Brill. (The Renaissance Society of America Texts and Studies, Vol. 6).

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Price: €5,000.00