Decorative woodcut headpiece featuring symmetrical acanthus leaf scrollwork and floral motifs.

To the Most Reverend & Illustrious

Prince and Lord,

LORD FRANZ

BISHOP OF WÜRZBURG

AND DUKE OF EASTERN FRANCE,

&c.

Large historiated woodcut initial S decorated with dense, intertwining vine and floral patterns.

Most Reverend and Illustrious Prince, good subjects, compelled by a natural feeling of gratitude, are accustomed to offer their newly elected Princes, when they first assume the steering-oar of their Empire, rare, unusual, and gathered treasures original: "κειμήλια", or precious gifts, as a token and symbol of their love, in order to testify to their loyalty and obedience toward him. Which gifts, among such a variety of gifts offered, befit a Prince primarily, the most ingenious of poets, Homer, expresses in these words: "It is fitting to give gifts to kings" original: "δῶρα παρ. λ.", meaning precious stones, a gift worthy only of a princely man. Persuaded by this impulse, so that I might also demonstrate in some way my due respect toward Your Highness, I have deemed a stone worthy to be offered among other gifts. But what stone, you will say? Perhaps some excellent jasper unearthed from the stone-quarries of the Caucasian mountain, or a chrysolite brought from the Potosí mine original: "μεταλλοσκοπείω" over a long stretch of lands and seas? By no means. Do not expect the most shining carbuncles once sent as a gift to Cyrus, King of the Persians; not a stone of inestimable price such as Solinus describes as once offered as a gift to Pyrrhus, King of the Epirotes. Not some prodigious pearl sent to Cleopatra, Queen of the Egyptians, as Pliny testifies,