Among the titles held in the Penn Libraries’ Incunable Collection are two Latin works bound together in a single volume with the call number Inc A-1192: Auctoritates librorum Aristotelis (Paris: Pierre Le Dru, ca. 1495; ISTC ia01192000), a popular philosophical florilegium, and Albertano da Brescia’s Liber de Doctrina Dicendi et Tacendi (Lyon: Johann Neumeister for Gaspard Ortuin?, ca. 1488; ISTC ia00199500), a treatise on when and how to speak well. On the volume’s front pastedown one of its sixteenth-century owners has left his name twice: a dated autograph, “Peter Falck 1516”, in dark ink and the phrase “Petri Falck & Amicorum” [Peter Falck’s and friends’] in red ink, both struck through. The assertion of a book’s communal ownership by someone “and friends” is not unusual in the early modern period; G.D. Hobson writes that et amicorum is a “formula, invented or at all events vulgarized in the first third of the fifteenth century at Venice, and used for over 150 years by bookmen of half a dozen European countries” (99). It had a particular currency among Renaissance humanists, who “self-consciously formed themselves into a virtual community of likeminded scholar citizens” (Brockliss 71). Printing increased books’ accessibility to individuals, but building a scholarly library remained an expensive proposition; thus “it was natural for a generous spirit to wish that his fellow workers might profit by any rarities which he had the good fortune to possess. They belonged, not to himself alone, but to all his intellectual peers” (Hobson 95). Peter Falck—notary, soldier, diplomat, politician, pilgrim, humanist and bookman—was one such generous spirit, as his books still demonstrate five centuries later.
Peter Falck was born in Fribourg, Switzerland, around 1468. He came of bourgeois stock: his father Bernhard (d. 1482) and grandfather Peter (d. 1470) were both notaries who served as Fribourg’s Stadtschreiber (chancellery master). Falck, too, was fitted for a notary and took to his legal studies with enthusiasm, as witnessed by an extant “formulary, in which [he] collected a large number of model examples for the various types and cases of notarial business” [Formelbuch, worin [er] eine ganze Anzahl von Musterbeispielen für die verschiednsten Arten und Fälle des Notariatsgeschäftes sammelte], according to his biographer Josef Zimmermann (“Peter Falk” 8; Wagner Handschrift no. 7). Falck also showed sufficient intellectual promise that his local education was capped with two years’ study abroad in Colmar, Alsace, under the humanist Sebastian Murrho. A notable Hebraicist and friend of Johann Reuchlin and Conradus Leontorius, Murrho’s teaching had a lasting impact on Falck’s scholarly avocation as well as the library his vocation permitted him to amass.
In 1492 Falck returned to Fribourg and began a career in public service. His rise was steady, aided by marriage to Anna von Garmiswil (d. 1518), the daughter of a prominent Fribourg family; their only surviving child, Ursula, was born in 1498. The following year Falck served first as Feldschreiber [regimental secretary] and later as Kriegsrat [war councilor] in the troops raised by Fribourg for the Swabian War between the Swiss Confederacy and the Holy Roman Empire. A series of victories cemented the Confederacy’s functional independence within the Empire and Falck returned home to increasingly greater public responsibilities. He served as Gerichtsschreiber [court clerk] until 1505, as Vogt [bailiff] of the nearby municipality of Villarepos in 1503, and Schultheiss [mayor] of another municipality, Murten, from 1505 to 1510. He also began building his library: “Setting aside those few books that Peter Falck inherited from his forebears, the formation of his library occurs in a relatively very short time; we can say in the period from 1500 to 1518, although its growth in the first decade is still quite slight” [Jene weniger Bücher, die Peter Falck als Erbe von seinen Vorfahren überkommen hatte, abgerechnet, fällt die Bildung seiner Bibliothek in eine relativ sehr kurze Zeit; wir können sagen in den Zeitraum von 1500 bis 1518, obwohl auch da der Zuwachs im ersten Jahrzehnt noch recht schwach ist] (Wagner 10)]. To French translations of Cicero’s De Officiis and Werner Rolevink‘s history Fasciculus Temporum (Wagner nos. 54, 55), for example, he added works by Vergil and Heinrich Bebel (Wagner no. 214 and Nachtrage no. 1). “His residence in Murten permitted humanistic ideas previously absorbed in Alsace to awaken again in his leisure hours,” writes Wagner. “So we see the first modest beginnings of the systematic creation of his library” [Der Aufenthalt in Murten jedoch liess in ihm in mancher Mussestunden die vor Zeiten im Elsass aufgenommenen humanistischen Ideen wieder erstehen. So sehen wir denn auch hier die ersten, zwar noch recht schüchternen Anfänge zur systematischen Anlegung seiner Bücherei] (Wagner 10).
As the first decade of the sixteenth century wore into the second, the War of the League of Cambrai began scrambling European geopolitics: Pope Julius II first drew France, Spain and the Empire into a league against Venice, then combined with Venice, Spain, the Empire and England against France. The papal forces were aided in both configurations by Swiss mercenaries; as chief of Fribourg’s four Venner [bannerets], Falck took part in an abortive campaign against the French in 1510. Politically, he stood with his friend, fellow humanist, and soon-to-be cardinal Mathäus Schinner, Bishop of Sion, in support of the papacy and against Fribourg’s pro-French party led by former Schultheiss Franz Arsent. When Arsent connived at the escape from justice of Schinner’s double-dealing secretary, Georg Supersaxo, in the winter of 1510-1511, Falck led the push to see Arsent prosecuted and executed. With pro-papal forces in the ascendant in Fribourg, Falck was elected Bürgermeister and once again accompanied the city’s levy into the field, this time as a captain. The 1511-1512 campaign culminated in the taking of Pavia, where “Fribourg’s standard under Peter Falck, carried by Hans Heymo, was first over the wall” [das Freiburger Fähnlein unter Peter Falk, getragen von Hans Heymo, war das erste, das die Mauer überstieg] (Zimmermann, “Peter Falk” 37).
Falck had no sooner returned home in triumph than he was sent abroad again as Fribourg’s envoy to the papacy, arriving in Rome on 20 November 1512. From there he traveled to Venice on a joint Swiss-papal mission to discuss the possibility of peace in Italy. He and his companions made it as far as Rimini, where bad weather delayed them for several days; they finally pushed on by ship through stormy conditions and enemy territory to drop anchor in Venice on Christmas Eve. Busy waging war in Lombardy, the Venetian government first ignored the envoys, then assured them of its friendship, and after some further to-ing and fro-ing condescended to put that assurance in writing. Falck and his companions returned overland to Rimini, Falck having had his fill of sea travel: “God helped us get here on that unholy ship; but if I leave, I don’t want to take another such ship, because we were luckier than was right” [Gott hat uns geholfen, dass wir auf dem heillosen Schiffe hergekommen sind; wenn ich aber von dannen ziehe, so will ich kein solches Schiff mehr haben, denn wir haben mehr Glück gehabt, als recht war] (Zimmermann, “Peter Falk” 50). Arriving in Rome at the end of January, the envoys found Pope Julius indisposed and sinking. Falck’s diplomatic work was stymied while the Vatican awaited the outcome of the pope’s illness, so he moved to cheaper lodgings and cooled his heels impatiently, at one point writing, “If I could get home in trousers and coat, I would rather come home so than remain here longer” [Wenn ich in Hosen und Wams heimzukommen wüsste, so wollte ich lieber so heimkommen, als länger hier bleiben] (Zimmermann, “Peter Falk” 54).
Meanwhile he was acquiring books, seizing the opportunity afforded by visits to centers of both scholarship and printing “to examine the latest literature … and to buy what corresponded to his thirst for knowledge” [um sich … in neuester Literatur umzusehen und das seinem Wissensdurst Entsprechende einzukaufen] (Wagner 11). Falck’s collection began its exponential expansion during this trip; Wagner’s census of his library shows that “[f]rom [1512] to 1518, that is, in a period of barely six years, he acquired more than half of his books” [Von {1512} an bis 1518, also im Zeitraume von kaum sechs Jahren, erwarb er sich mehr als die Hälfte seiner Bücher] (ibid.). He bought them in Rimini, as a note in his copy of Thomas Ochsenbrunner’s Historia Illustrorum Romanorum (Rome: Etienne Guillery, 1510) testifies: “Traveling to Venice on an embassy which I was discharging for the distinguished League of the Swiss, I purchased this book in the city of Rimini with other histories in the year of the Lord 1512” [Transiens Venetiis in legatione, qua pro magnifica Liga Helvetiorum fungebar, hunc librum in civitate Ariminii emi cum aliis historiis anno domini M.D.XII] (Wagner no. 151). He bought locally printed copies of the works of Cicero (Wagner Ntr. nos. 7, 8) and Lactantius (Wagner Ntr. no. 15) “[i]n the most glorious city of the Venetians while I discharged an embassy there in 1513” [In gloriosissima Venetorum civitate dum ibi legatione fungebar 1513], as he noted in the latter. Venetian editions would eventually compose nearly twenty percent of Falck’s library. He left no record of buying books in Rome—the Roman editions with purchase notes in Wagner’s census (nos. 150, 151, 217) were procured in Rimini and Venice—but he doubtless shared both his thoughts and his books with others while marking time politically. The phrase Petri Falck & Amicorum “in several versions—’et amicorum’, ‘sibi et amicis’, ‘pro se et amicis’ and twice at least in Greek” shows up with increasing frequency in Falck’s library from 1512 onward (Hobson 98). His copy of the works of the Volaterran humanist Raffaele Maffei (Rome: Johann Besicken, 1506), bought in Venice in 1513, even includes it as part of the purchase note: “For himself and his friends Peter Falck of Fribourg of the distinguished Swiss masters, ambassador to the most illustrious domain of the Venetians, bought in the same … city” [Sibi et amicis Petrus Falck Fryburgensis Magnificorum Dominorum Helvetiorum apud Illustrissimum Dominium Venetorum in eadem … civitate emebat] (Wagner no. 217; ellipsis in original). In this inscription Falck also proclaims the duality of many a Renaissance humanist, a proud and partisan citizen “mak[ing] it clear … that he and his books belonged to the commonwealth of letters” (James and Kent 136).
Falck’s partisanship bore fruit at last in the spring of 1513. Supported by Mathäus Schinner, he was received by the new pope, the urbane and learned Leo X, whose eloquence left a lasting impression: “[H]e had never heard anyone speak lovelier Latin, as he said, than the pope used on this occasion” [von keinem Menschen hatte er, wie er sagte, je ein schöneres Latein sprechen hören, als es der Papst bei dieser Gelegenheit gebrauchte] (Zimmermann, “Peter Falk” 55). With Schinner’s help and Leo’s favor, Falck accomplished by mid-May all the goals set for his embassy and was finally able to bid farewell to Rome—a farewell so long delayed that his friends in Fribourg sent a messenger to inquire whether he had met with an accident. Falck’s hopes for a swift trip home, however, were dashed when he learned that the Swiss-supported Duke of Milan, Massimiliano Sforza, had been ousted by the French and that the retreating Swiss forces were besieged at Novara. Falck waited in Parma until word of the French defeat by the Swiss on 6 June arrived; he then hot-footed it to Vercelli, where Fribourg’s contingent was domiciled, and attached himself informally to them for the remainder of their deployment. During this time he may have met Ulrich Zwingli, not yet a reformer, who was serving as a military chaplain with the Swiss army. However they became acquainted, the two were to enjoy a fast friendship, exchanging letters and meeting often in Zurich when Falck attended the Tagsatzung (diet) there. Having profited intellectually by his time in Italy, he encouraged Zwingli to further his own education likewise, once offering his friend “his house in Pavia and his estates in Caselli … for two years as a residence” [sein Haus in Pavia und seine Besitzungen in Caselli … auf zwei Jahre zum Aufenthalt] if he chose to study at the University of Pavia (Zimmermann, “Peter Falk” 110).
After marching home in July 1513, Falck again barely had time to shelve his new books before he was sent back to Italy, this time as one of two Swiss ambassadors to the court of Milan. His feelings about undertaking another foreign mission so soon were mixed at best: “It seems to me, as you might well believe, that the last assignments used me in such a way that I had enough of them. I think that will continue to be the case. I get no rest at all with so much work; it gives me joy and pleasure, however, to serve and please you” [Wie mir scheint, dürft ihr wohl glauben, die letzten Boten haben mich dermassen und so gebraucht, dass ich genug von ihnen habe. Ich denke, es werde mir weiter auch so ergehen. Ich habe vor vielen Arbeiten gar keine Ruhe; es gereicht mir aber zur Freude und zur Lust, euch zu dienen und zu gefallen] (Zimmermann, “Peter Falk” 64). Fortunately he was well received in Milan: the reinstated Duke Massimiliano, conscious of the debt he owed the Swiss, rolled out the red carpet for their envoys, granting Falck the aforementioned properties in Pavia and Caselli as well as a title, Capitano della Martessana. Falck returned to Fribourg in the spring of 1514 in the evident hope that he had served his time abroad, but after receiving the report of his embassy the Tagsatzung renewed his commission for the rest of the year.
Saddled with managing the fractious Swiss troops propping up Massimiliano, he seems to have consoled himself with books: “In 1514, on the occasion of his second embassy to Milan … his library experienced another noticeable increase; he also again enters the location and the exact date of acquisition in several codices” [1514, anlässlich seiner zweiten Gesandschaft nach Mailand … erfährt seine Bücherei wiederum ein merklichen zuwachs; er trägt auch da wieder in mehrer Kodizes den Ort und das genaue Datum der Werbung ein] (Wagner 12). Falck’s collection grew chiefly by purchase: he bought books either “at the place of printing itself, or had them sent to him by his humanist friends, or acquired them directly or on order from a traveling book dealer, as the larger printing houses already had at that time” [am Druckorte selbst gekauft, oder liess sie durch seine humanistischen Freunde sich zukommen, oder erwarb sie direkt oder auf Bestellung durch einen reisenden Buchhändler, wie sie die grösseren Druckereien damals schon hatten] (Wagner 13). His copy of Petrarch’s Sonetti et Canzone (Milan: Antonio Zarotto, 1494), for instance, contains a by now familiar inscription: “For himself and friends Peter Falck bought in Milan in the month of June in the year of the Lord 1514” [Sibi et amicis Petrus Falck Mediolani emebat mense Junii anno Dni. M.D.XIIII] (Wagner no. 158).
But as his reputation in scholarly and diplomatic circles grew, “[i]n proper humanist fashion Falck’s library also increased through gifts” [In echt humanistischer Art mehrte sich Falcks Bibliothek auch durch Geschenke] (Wagner 14). “Distinguished Master Ambrogio del Maino, Knight of the Golden Spur, and Senator of ducal Milan” [Magnificus Dominus Ambrosius de Mayno, eques auratus, ducalisque Senator Mediolanensis] presented Falck with a biography of the first Sforza duke of Milan, Francesco (Milan: Antonio Zarotto, 1481 or 1482; imprint date from ISTC) “on the last day of November in the year 1513” [Die penultima mensis Novembris anno M.D.XIII] (Wagner no. 194). The gift was a shrewd one, as Falck recorded: the senator chose it “knowing that I was generally very devoted to the house of Sforza and delighted greatly in the boldest deeds” [sciens me domui Sforciadum dedicissimum fere multumque delectari in fortissimis gestis] (ibid.). Other presents were more personal, as a note in Falck’s hand in a copy of Erasmus’s Adagia (Basel: Johann Froben, 1513) attests: “By the gift and humanitas of Master Peter Girod, primary teacher of Fribourg, dearest friend, I own this book 1514″ [Dono et humanitate Domini Petri Riccardi ludimagistri Fryburgensis amici electissimi hunc possideo librum 1514] (Wagner no. 95). Falck sponsored Girod’s studies at the University of Pavia in 1514 and Girod’s own inscription on the verso of the title leaf expresses the gratitude of a client to his patron. “Peter Girod of Fribourg, governor of youth, to Peter Falck, a man learned in every respect, gives [this book] as a gift” [Petrus Riccardus Friburgensis moderator iuventutis, undecumque docto viro Petro Falconi dono dedit], he writes, followed by six lines of verse which begin: “Falck, you capstone, father, anchor of our fatherland / And the city’s greatest glory / Accept this trifling gift with tranquil mien …” [Falco, tu patrie columen, pater, anchora nostre / Urbis decusque summum / Accipias munus lenidense hoc fronte serena …] (ibid.). The following year another friend, the music theorist Heinrich Glarean, sent Falck a Swiss edition of Erasmus’s Parabolae (Strasbourg: Matthias Schürer, 1514) with the affectionate hyperbole of an equal: “To the eminent man Master Peter Falck, magistrate of the city of Fribourg and the borough of Murten, best of the best and singular friend, Heinrich Glarean, Swiss poet laureate, sent as a gift in the year 1515” [Praestantissimo viro Domino Petro Falconi Friburgensis urbis et Aventicensium coloniae Consuli, optimo optimati et amico singulari, Henricus Glareanus Helvetius poeta laureatus dono misit, Anno M.D. XV.] (Wagner no. 87). Not to be outdone in generosity by his fellows, Falck contributed tomes to their libraries, too, as one recipient recorded in a copy of Pliny the Younger’s letters (Rome: Eucharius Silber, 1490): “This little book Peter Falck, Knight of the Golden Spur, g[ave] to Ulrich von Garmiswil his brother-in-law [as a] g[ift] in the year of our redeemer 1513” [Hunc libellum Petrus Falco eques auratus Uldarico a Garmessvyll suo affini D.D. anno nostri redemptoris 1513] (Wagner no. 20). No doubt Falck considered his books a resource sibi et amicis both because “so long as scholars were keen and books were few, there was a certain mutual advantage in concord” (Hobson 95) and from a genuine desire to forward the intellectual development of friends like Zwingli and Girod as well as his own.
Falck turned the embassy in Milan over to new envoys in late 1514; his next journey abroad would be of his own design. On 11 April 1515 he declared to the Fribourg Rat his intention to make a pilgrimage to Jerusalem, and on 20 April Falck and his friend Hans Seitenmacher left for Venice. Among the companions who joined them along the way was Bernard Musy of Romont, whose report of the outbound journey recalls how it was smoothed by Falck’s connections, particularly the family of Mathäus Cardinal Schinner. When they reached Sion, for instance, “the brother of my lord the Cardinal of Sion made us very good cheer and covered all our expenses, without any payment, for love of the noble Peter Falck” [le frère de monseigneur le cardinal de Syon nous fist très bone chière et nous fit toute nostre despense, sans rien payer, por l’amour de noble Pierre Faulcon] (quoted in Diesbach 210). Schinner’s nephew Peter, a Knight Hospitaller traveling to Rhodes, met the company in Lodi and inspired a similarly generous response: “[T]he friends of my lord the aforesaid knight made us good cheer, without any payment, and gave us dinner and supper” [les amis de monseigneur le chevalier susdit nous firent bone chière, sans payé riens, et nous donnérent à diné et supper] (quoted in Diesbach 211). But Falck’s bad luck with ships struck again in Venice, where the party was delayed for a month and a half while one of the few galleys willing to take on pilgrims was readied for a voyage to Jaffa via Rhodes.
During this time Falck wrote to his daughter Ursula, now married to Petermann von Praroman, to ask her to pray for him and to give her a gift to aid her devotions:
So you will find among the Latin books at the top by the chimney a book, not too big, covered in white leather and a little burned on the back, in which I read at night at Murten, as you well know, it’s called a psalter and is in Latin, but in addition the psalter is also in German. And you will find that each psalm has its title before the psalm and why it was made, as well as for what purpose it is good to pray. It’s my fatherly desire for you, you should take it for yourself. In it you will find several psalms that are good to say for people who travel across the sea; act as a pious, loyal child and say with devotion one or two of the same psalms every day until I come home again or you learn whether I am living or dead, and read or speak humbly and fully understanding the words. [So findest du under den latinischen büchern zu obrist bi dem kemin ein buoch, ist nit zuo gross, mit wissem läder überzogen und ist am rucken ein wenig verbrent worden, da ich zuo Murten zuo nacht darin las, also du wol weist, das heisst ein psalter und ist in latin, aber danebent ist der psalter ouch zuo tütsch. Und findest du ob iedem psalmen sinen tittel vor dem psalmen gemacht hab und warumb er gemacht sie, ouch wartzuo er guot sie zuo bitten. Ist min vätterlich begeren an dir, du wellest das für dich nemen. Darin findest du etliche psalmen, die guot zuo sprechen sind den lüten, die über meer faren, tuo als ein from trüw kind und sprich mit andacht derselben psalmen einen oder zwen all tag, bis ich wider harheim kom mit gottes hilf, oder du vernämest, ob ich todt oder lebendig sig und liss oder sprich so bescheidenlich, und das du die wort wol verstandes.] (quoted in Zimmermann, “Peter Falk” 144-145)
In this letter we hear about a facet of Falck’s library less prominent in Wagner’s census than the scholarly texts mentioned thus far: works of popular piety. With his humanist amicis Falck shared the poetry of Horace and Petrarch (Wagner nos. 123 and 158), the histories of Tacitus and Procopius (Wagner nos. 199 and 175), the theology of John Chrysostom and Hugh of St. Cher (Wagner nos. 53 and 124-129), and the latest works from the pen of Erasmus (Wagner nos. 87, 95 and Ntr. no. 11). To the attention of his daughter, educated by the Cistercian nuns of Fraubrunnen Abbey, he commends his devotional books: “You will find in my library the lives of the saints and the fathers. So are the Granatapfel [by the popular German preacher Johann Geiler] and Die Vierundzwanzig Alten [by the Franciscan Otto von Passau] at hand, as well as the Seelenwurzgarten [produced at Comburg, a Benedictine abbey]; therein may it be well with your soul” [Du findest in miner libery der heiligen und der alten vätter läben. So ist der granatöpfel und die vierundzwentzig alten, ouch der seelenwurzgarten, darin lass diner seelen wol sin] (quoted in Zimmermann, “Peter Falk” 144). Of these only Die Vierundzwanzig Alten remained to be counted by Wagner (Handschrift no. 12), who speculates that the “German devotional and folk literature” [deutsche Erbauungs- und Volksliteratur] on Falck’s shelves “could be used and read again and again by later generations and so might be worn out or lost” [von den späteren Generationen immer wieder gebraucht und gelesen werden konnten und so verbraucht oder verloren würden] while less accessible scholarly works survived (140). Be that as it may, Falck’s piety undoubtedly shaped his library as it did his life. Having interrupted his cursus honorum to make a pilgrimage to the Holy Land, he not only invested in guides by Ludolf von Sudheim and Bernhard von Breydenbach (Wagner nos. 34 and 44), but also inscribed several of his other books (Wagner nos. 146, 164, 187, and Ntr. no. 11) with a monitory phrase taken from Jerome’s epistle 58: “Non solum Iherosolimis fuisse Sed Iherolsolimis Bene Vixisse Laudandum est” [It is not only to have been at Jerusalem but to have lived well at Jerusalem that is worthy of praise].
![[Jerusalem cross] Non solum Iherosolimis fuisse Sed Iherosolimis Bene Vixisse Laudandum est [half-wheel impaled by a sword]](https://uniqueatpenn.wordpress.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/05/747c1-falckprovenance-e1590670339928.jpg?w=1608&h=313)
As we can see in the photograph above, Penn’s volume contains this motto flanked by a Jerusalem cross (also found in Wagner nos. 43, 60, and 101) and a half-wheel impaled by a sword, a badge associated with St. Catherine of Alexandria (also found in Wagner nos. 60 and 101). Musy’s account of the pilgrimage ends with the company’s arrival in the Holy Land in mid-August, but the latter symbol reveals a stop on Falck’s subsequent travels. According to Jennifer R. Bray, pilgrims used “the whole wheel with sword as a sign that the wearer had made the pilgrimage to [St. Catherine’s shrine at Mount] Sinai, the half wheel with sword as evidence of a journey no further than the chapel of St. Katherine at Bethlehem, and for these distinguishing usages there is sixteenth-century support” (4). Beyond that, and a diploma dated 28 August recording the dubbing of Falck’s companion Humbert von Praroman a knight of the Holy Sepulchre, nothing is known of the pilgrims’ itinerary. They returned to Venice in the autumn of 1515, having fallen in at some point with two English pilgrims, John Watson (later Vice-Chancellor of Cambridge University; d. 1537) and John Reston (later Master of Jesus College, Cambridge; d. 1551). Watson was a correspondent of Erasmus and wrote to him the following summer, sketching a charming portrait of Falck as a seasoned but by no means jaded traveler:
Peter Falck the Swiss, whom we English called Peter the Great, I like particularly. He took very great pains to look after his fellow pilgrims, and at the same time was a most agreeable companion. He had in the ship a monkey with a long tail which was astonishingly clever, gesticulating, laughing, chattering, jumping about; it was full of tricks that made us die with laughing every day. Besides that, he is full of interest for novelties and new crafts and inventions; he often wore a pistol attached to his belt, he made careful notes of the position and names of towns and other places and marked up his book on the pilgrimage in red ink, and he used to talk to me of you and boasted that he had once had a letter from you. If you ever write to him, do please give him my greetings. (Erasmus 37)
Watson seems to have made less of an impression on Falck than Falck on him: Erasmus replied to Watson that “Peter Falck, a man of the highest standing among his own people, in what he wrote when he returned home had much to say of two Englishmen, whose names I suppose he had forgotten. Aha, thought I at once, this is my friend Watson; for I had heard of your setting out” (Erasmus 182). Falck’s own correspondence with Erasmus unfortunately has not survived. What has survived is a relic “said to be made out of particles from various Biblical sites known from the New Testament” [das aus Partikeln von den verschiedensten, biblisch bekannten Orten des neuen Testaments zusammengesetzt gewesen sein soll] which he acquired as a memorial of his journey (Zimmermann, “Peter Falk” 91) and portions of a painted wooden altarpiece he commissioned after returning to Fribourg in January 1516. Executed by the workshop of the sculptor Hans Geiler, it featured scenes from Christ’s Passion, including the Last Supper (now at Église St. Roch, Parcieux, France) and the Agony in the Garden (now at the Musée national du Moyen Âge, Paris) with Judas approaching (now at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York City). The altarpiece originally adorned a family chapel granted to Falck in 1515 in Fribourg’s Nikolauskirche—a reward for his Roman diplomacy (which, among other things, raised St. Nikolaus to the status of a collegiate church), a sign of his “standing among his own people,” and an expression of his faith.
His own people soon found more for Falck to do. A combined French and Venetian force assembled by the new king of France, François I, trounced the Swiss at Marignano on 14 September 1516 and took Milan, capturing and deposing Duke Massimiliano. Much of the fight had gone out of the Holy League after the election of Leo X; the militarily demoralized Swiss now found it wise to seek a rapprochement with the French. Despite his pro-papal background, Falck, who had been elected Schultheiss of Fribourg in June 1516, was tipped to escort the French ambassador, René of Savoy, to the conference in Fribourg that resulted in the signing of the Ewiger Friede (Perpetual Peace) on 29 November. Two envoys were required to convey the treaty to France to be sealed; Falck’s previous diplomatic successes made him an obvious choice: “His knowledge of the language, his diplomatic proficiency and flexibility, his manners, the whole elegance of his person, advantages that had already been decisive in his missions to Venice and Milan, must have been even more crucial to his selection now” [Seine Sprachkenntnis, seine diplomatische Tüchtigkeit und Geschmeidigkeit, seine Umgangsformen, die ganze Eleganz seines Wesens, Vorzüge, die schon bei seinen Sendungen nach Venedig und Mailand ausschlaggebend gewesen waren, mußten bei seiner jetzigen Wahl noch entscheidender ins Gewicht fallen] (Zimmermann, “Peter Falk” 97). Falck and fellow agent Hans Schwarzmurer of Zug set out for Paris in late January via Lyon; there with deliberate symmetry they were met by René of Savoy, who convoyed them the rest of the way. The Swiss were graciously received by King François who, magnanimous in victory, made no difficulties over the few points remaining to be settled, among them “the support of free places for Swiss students at the university in Paris” [die Erhaltung von Freiplätzen für schweizerische Studenten an der Universität in Paris] (Zimmermann, “Peter Falk” 98). This particular matter was near and dear to Falck’s heart since Heinrich Glarean planned to establish a Burse (residence) for those students and Peter Girod would be one of its first tenants. Mission accomplished, the envoys returned home at the end of March laden with gifts and, in Falck’s case, dubbed knight by François himself. His grateful countrymen rewarded him with ever more work: “Overall, even in confederation affairs, we find Falck alongside the representatives of the other cantons at the center of things. He is never at rest. He was barely back in Fribourg for a few days before he was sent off again on business, sometimes for Fribourg, sometimes for the confederation” [Überall, auch in eidgenössischen Angelegenheiten, finden wir Falk neben den Vertretern der übrigen Orte an der Spitze der Aktion. Nie ist er in Ruhe. Kaum war er wieder einige Tage in Freiburg, so wurde er von neuem weggesandt bald in freiburgischen, bald in eidgenössischen Geschäften] (Zimmermann, “Peter Falk” 101-102). Fittingly, the one contemporary portrait of him that survives (albeit in a seventeenth-century copy) treats him as an emblem of his rank: he was the model for the Schultheiss in a Totentanz (Dance of Death) painted from 1517-1519 by Niklaus Manuel for the Dominican convent in Bern.
But no matter how busy politics kept him, Falck still made time for his books. “Around twenty codices from the Falck library are editions of the year 1516,” notes Wagner. “This shows us how the library continued to grow” [Gegen zwanzig Kodizes aus der Falckbibliothek sind Druckwerke des Jahres 1516; das zeigt uns, wie die Bibliothek nach und nach anwuchs] (Wagner 13). Another twenty-two were printed in the previous two years, most at Strasbourg or Basel, second and distant third only to Venice as sources for Falck’s books. Twenty-two French editions (among them Penn’s), most printed in Paris in the second decade of the sixteenth century, suggest a bookshop crawl during his embassy to France. Falck also seems to have spent some time organizing his collection as well as enlarging it. In addition the one in Penn’s volume, an autograph dated 1516 appears in eight books in Wagner’s census, including two that were previously purchased: the Excellentium Imperatorum Vitae of Cornelius Nepos (Strasbourg: Matthias Schürer, 1506), bought in 1512 (Wagner no. 60), and the works of Lactantius bought in Venice in 1513 (Wagner Ntr. no. 15). The former has been bound with eight other works by authors ranging from Plutarch to Beatus Rhenanus, all printed between 1506 and 1510 at the Strasbourg presses of Matthias Schürer and Johann Grüninger (Wagner nos. 61-68). Penn’s Aristotle and Albertano da Brescia, the Nepos and its companions, and the Lactantius all likely received their current bindings during or not long before 1516.
Most of Falck’s books appear to have been bound in the same style as his psalter, in “wissem läder” [white leather]. “The book is firmly and permanently bound between two strong book covers and these are fully or half (half leather) covered with thick white pigskin,” enthuses Wagner.
This white leather surface must have really tempted an artist of the Renaissance period … to reproduce the best and finest of his precious designs here … In many cases, it is the simple but artistically balanced linear composition in the blocking that gives the cover of the Falck codex and thus the entire book an elegant character. The fields created by such networks of lines are almost entirely filled with rich ornamentation … In addition to the practical metal clasps, elaborated with special love and elegance, the bookbinder occasionally provided the covers with fine chased metal bosses to increase the decoration and at the same time to protect the raised blind-stamping. [Fest und dauerhaft ist das Buch zwischen zwei starke Buchendeckel eingebunden und diese entweder ganz oder zur Hälfte (Halbleder) mit weissem dicken Schweinsleder überzogen. Diese weisse lederne Fläche musste einen Künstler der Renaissance-Zeit … eigentlich reizen, das Beste und Feinste aus ihrem Formenschatze hier wiederzugeben … Vielfach ist es schon die einfache, aber kunstvoll abgewogene lineare Komposition in der Pressung, die dem Einband des Falckkodex und somit auch dem ganzen Buche einen vornehmen Charakter gibt. Die durch solche Liniennetze entstandenen Felder sind fast durchweg mit reicher Ornamentik ausgefüllt … Nebst den praktischen, mit besonderer Liebe und Eleganz ausgearbeiteten Metallschliessen, versah der Buchbinder die Deckel ab und zu mit feinen ziselierten Metall-Buckeln zur Erhöhung der Zierde und zugleich auch zum Schutze der erhabenen Blindpressung] (28-29, 31)
Penn’s volume is a typical example of such a binding: full blind-tooled pigskin over beveled-edge wooden boards with the remains of a single leather and metal clasp with metal catchplate attached to the fore-edges of the right and left boards, respectively. The decorations include both of Falck’s supralibros, the larger—a lozenge with “the Falck coat of arms with helmet, lambrequin and crest in a delicate strigose border finished on the inside with small round arches” [das Falck-Wappen mit Helm, Helmdecke und Helmzier in zierlich gestricheltem, nach innen mit kleinen Rundbogen abschliessendem Rahmen]—stamped three times on the front cover and once on the back, and the smaller—”the Falck coat of arms in a square frame, which rounds into a semicircle on all four sides” [das Falck-Wappen in viereckigem Rahmen, der an allen vier Seiten in einen Halbkreis ausgebuchtet ist]—twice on the back cover (Wagner 189). Wagner identifies these tools as belonging to the Fribourg workshop of Franciscan Rolet Stos (29-30, 189), whose signature appears on the binding of one volume of Jerome’s Opera Omnia (Basel: Johann Froben, 1516-1520; Wagner nos. 116-121). Like the texts themselves, bindings such as this were not cheap. Wagner surmises that many of Falck’s books were bound in their current state some time after he had acquired and read them, “as the marginal notes, often clipped and also running here and there into the gutter of the book, in Falck’s hand show” [wie die oft beschnittenen oder da und dort auch in den Bug des Buches verlaufenden Randglossen aus Falcks Hand zeigen] (31). Falck’s sturdy, decorative bindings are evidence of the value he placed on his library and the care he took of it. His beloved psalter might have gotten a little singed before he gave it to Ursula, but he was adamant that nothing in his library should be handled carelessly: “See that you lend my books out to no one,” he warned her, “nor take them but to my brother Sebold’s or my sister Antonia’s houses” [Luog, das du mine büecher niemands hinlichest noch tragest, dan in mines bruoders Sebolds oder miner Schwester Anthonyen hüser] (quoted in Zimmermann, “Peter Falk” 165).
The year 1518 began as an annus horribilis for Falck. Both his wife Anna—his “darling Annie” [herzliebes Ennelin] (quoted in Zimmermann, “Peter Falk” 142)—and his brother Hans died that spring. Falck’s friends offered what comfort they could: “These things must be left to Christ,” wrote Glarean, himself recently bereft of father and brother, “because the one who opposes his will storms heaven with the Titans” [Sed sunt haec Christo resignanda cuius voluntati qui repugnat caelum cum gigantibus oppugnat] (Zimmermann, “Sechs Unbekannte Schreiben” 102). At Falck’s request Glarean wrote an epitaph for Hans; when he was unable to do the same for Anna, Girod stepped in with characteristic enthusiasm and provided three, “although [he] confessed that he had not sufficiently perfected them” [wiewohl Giraud gestand, dieselben nicht genügend ausgearbeitet zu haben] (Zimmermann, “Peter Falk” 112). But even with the support of his family and friends, Falck’s constitution suffered and in July he traveled to Baden bei Zurich to take a cure. That same summer the humanist Joachim Vadianus, a friend of Zwingli, came to Zurich to consult with the well-traveled Falck about an edition of Pomponius Mela‘s geography De Situ Orbis Vadianus was preparing. “When he did not meet him in Zurich, however,” writes Zimmermann, “he sent the work where Falck was then staying for his health and asked him to read everything carefully according to his habit and to give an accurate judgment, so that he could make improvements and corrections to the new edition” [Als er ihn jedoch in Zürich nicht traf, so schickte er die Arbeit, wo Falk damals zur Kur weilte, und bat ihn, alles nach seiner Gewohnheit genau durchzulesen und darüber ein genaues Urteil abzugeben, damit er bei der Neuauflage seine Verbesserungen und Berichtigungen anbringen könne] (“Peter Falk” 117). Falck was pleased to do so, though his critique along with his cure was interrupted in late summer by a summons to the Tagsatzung in Zurich. The two men continued to correspond, however, contriving to meet at least once, and by early 1519 Falck was encouraging Vadianus to write a history of Switzerland. “Falck, however, not only wished to assist in such scholarly work,” observes Zimmermann, “but also to accomplish something of his own for his home country.”
Above all, geography appealed to him. He had spent much time on geographical projects before. We know that on his first trip to Jerusalem (1515) he worked on a travelogue in his leisure hours on the ship. He also had a mind to illustrate this work. Unfortunately it has not survived. Falck now planned to write a description of Switzerland. [Doch wollte Falk nicht nur bei solchen wissenschaftlichen Arbeiten als Helfer tätig sein, sondern er wünschte, für die Heimat auch etwas Selbständiges zu leisten. Die Geographie sagte ihm vor allem zu. Schon früher hatte er sich mit geographischen Arbeiten abgegeben. So wissen wir, dass er auf seiner ersten Jerusalemfahrt (1515) in seinen Mussestunden auf dem Schiffe an einer Reisebeschreibung arbeitete. Auch war in Aussicht genommen, dieses Werk zu illustrieren. Leider ist es uns nicht mehr erhalten. Jetzt plante Falk, eine Beschreibung der Schweiz zu verfassen.] (“Peter Falk” 118).
This joint project never came to fruition, but through Vadian Falck became acquainted with Jan Dantyszek (later Prince-Bishop of Warmia in Teutonic Prussia), who renewed his enthusiasm for pious travel. Falck first planned “a second pilgrimage to Syria, for which I will prepare myself (God willing) around Easter” [reiterata ad Syriam peregrinatio, ad quam circa pascatem (deo dante) me procingam], he told Vadian on 18 February 1519, and then to walk the Camino de Santiago: “For I hope, after a successful return from this my pilgrimage, I will go on in a little while to visit and travel the regions of Andalusia, Portugal and the whole of Spain. For the desire to see these places drives me, since otherwise when I stay home I become fat and as heavy as when you first knew me (having never seen me before)” [Spero enim felicem huius meae peregrinationis regressum, paulo post ad visitandas circueundasque regiones Baeticae, Lusitaniae universaeque Hispaniae profecturus. Trahit enim me voluptas locorum visendorum, cum alias in patria morans efficiar crassus et ita pinguis, qualem me (ante non visum) primum cognovisti] (Arbenz 26 (218)).
Falck’s departure for the Holy Land was delayed until after Easter by the Swiss conflict with the duchy of Savoy over Geneva, in which Fribourg (and therefore Falck) was much concerned. By mid-May, however, the immediate crisis had subsided and Falck could take up his staff and scrip. Nearly twenty others from Fribourg and its neighboring cantons joined him, including Wilhelm and Peter Arsent, sons of Falck’s erstwhile opponent Franz Arsent. The pilgrims were “happy to profit from the wisdom and the experience acquired by Falck” [heureux de profiter de la sagesse et de l’expérience accquise par Falck], electing him their leader (Diesbach 218). As before, the company’s route ran through Venice, but this time they were not unduly delayed there: having arrived on 3 June 1519, they sailed on 21 June via Candia (Crete) and Rhodes to Jaffa, making port on 27 July. Before disembarking they were addressed by the Franciscan Guardian of the Holy Sepulchre with a mixture of pious and practical exhortations. “You must all have a true, sincere, and firm faith,” he admonished them in terms Falck would have endorsed, “for he visits the Holy Land in vain who has no faith” [Vous devez tous avoir une foi vraie, sincère, et ferme; car c’est en vain qu’il visite la Terre-Sainte celui qui n’a pas la foi]. For the safety of both soul and body the pilgrims should put aside “your fine clothes, your jewelry and anything that could betray your wealth” [vos habits précieux, vos bijoux et toute chose qui pourrait trahir votre richesse], never go about alone, and “pay close attention to your belongings, for nothing is safe in this country” [exercez une grande attention sur vos effets, car rien n’est en sûreté dans ce pays]. Above all, they should conduct themselves with dignity and never stoop to vandalizing sacred sites for relics or scrawling memorial graffiti at shrines: “These childish tricks dishonor the temples dedicated to the Lord and they expose us to the ridicule of the Muslims” [Ces enfantillages déshonorent les temples consacrés au Seigneur et ils nous exposent à la risée des Musulmans] (Diesbach 222-223).
The pilgrims were also advised not to hire a local guide but did so anyway, “a Mameluk with a martial and friendly appearance who knew the Italian language well” [un mameluk à l’air martial et sympathique, qui connaissait bien la langue italienne] called Gamelin, with whose services they were so pleased “that at the time of their departure they gave him ten ducats instead of the five which had been promised to him” [qu’ils lui donnèrent au moment de leur départ dix ducats au lieu de cinq qui lui avaient été promis] (Diesbach 223-224). He conducted them to Jerusalem, where on 4 August they took lodgings in the hospital of Saint James in the Armenian quarter. From there they visited (and Falck revisited) the sacred sites of the city and of the surrounding area: Bethlehem, Jericho, the Dead Sea, and the Jordan River, where “they bathed in the holy waters … and in remembrance of the Savior’s baptism … performed among themselves the outward signs of this ceremony” [Ils prirent un bain dans les eaux saintes … et en mémoire du baptême du Sauveur … accomplirent entre eux les signes extérieurs de cette cérémonie] (Diesbach 224). Several members of the party were also created Knights of the Holy Sepulchre on Sunday 14 August, the vigil of the Assumption; the entire group left Jerusalem the following Thursday and, having remunerated their guide, took ship for home from Jaffa on 20 August.
At this point Falck’s meager sea-luck began to run out again. On 25-26 August the entire ship’s company was placed under arms to stand off pirates. Stores were insufficient to outfit everyone equally, so some of the defenders “took their mattresses and made a hole to put the head through, and presented themselves in this outfit which was to protect them from the arrows of the enemy” [prirent leurs matelas, y perçèrent un trou pour passer la tête, et se présentèrent dans cet accoutrement qui devait les protéger contre les flèches de l’on nemi] (Diesbach 225). Outnumbered four vessels to one, they put on a display of bravado: “The captain had wine brought to the deck, the trumpets played warlike tunes, passengers and sailors let songs from their country be heard” [Le patron avait fait apporter du vin sur le pont, les trompettes jouaient des airs guerriers, passagers et matelots faisaient entendre des chants de leur pays] (ibid.). The pirates fired warning shots, then retreated when their own show of force failed to cow their prey. The pilgrims’ ship dropped anchor at Cyprus on 27 August for a week’s respite, but once they were under way again any hope they had of a quick journey to Rhodes died with the winds. Becalmed and stifling, the ship became an incubator for “a contagious disease which attacked some of the travelers and caused the death of several of them” [une maladie contagieuse qui attaqua une partie des voyageurs et causa la mort de plusieurs d’entre eux], including Falck and his companion Melchior Zur Gilgen (Diesbach 226). Both men declined quickly: “Zur Gilgen and Falck experienced the first symptoms of the disease at the end of September. Falck took to his bed around 1 October; Melchior Zur Gilgen died on the fourth and Falck suffered the same fate two days later” [Zur Gilgen et Falck ressentirent les premiers symptômes du mal à la fin du mois de septembre. Falck se mit au lit vers le 1er octobre; Melchior Zur Gilgen mourut le 4 et Falck eut le même sort deux jours plus tard] (ibid.) Their bodies were placed in a boat and towed behind the ship to Rhodes, where Wilhelm Arsent helped see to it that Falck and Zur Gilgen received an honorable burial in the Franciscan church. The remaining pilgrims limped into Venice on 14 November to bring news of Falck’s death home to Fribourg.
Ursula von Praroman née Falck inherited most of her father’s books to shelve beside his psalter. Her descendants preserved them for several generations, after which they passed into the possession of the Capuchins of Fribourg. Although some have been lost, “more than 100 volumes from [Falck’s] library have come down to us,” notes Yann Dahhaoui, who curated an exhibition of Falck’s library at the Gutenberg Museum in Fribourg in 2018. “Most are kept at the Bibliothèque cantonale et universitaire de Fribourg. They came to it in 1982 after having spent three centuries in the Capuchin convent of the city” [plus de 100 volumes de sa bibliothèque sont parvenus jusqu’à nous. La plupart sont conservés à la Bibliothèque cantonale et universitaire de Fribourg. Ils y sont entrés en 1982 après avoir passé trois siècles dans le couvent des Capucins de la ville] (61). Alongside these holdings, the scattered portions of Falck’s library held at Penn and other institutions can today be virtually reassembled, a rich resource for students of humanism, history and bibliography. Peter Falck the scholar and patron of education should be well pleased with his legacy.
Works Cited
Arbenz, Emil, editor. Die Vadianische Briefsammlung der Stadtbibliothek St. Gallen. Volume 2. St. Gall: Fehr’sche Buchhandlung, 1894.
Bray, Jennifer R. “The Medieval Military Order of St. Katherine.” Bulletin of the Institute of Historical Research 56.133 (1983): 1–6.
Brockliss, Laurence. “Starting-Out, Getting-On, and Becoming Famous in the Eighteenth-Century Republic of Letters.” Scholars in Action: The Practice of Knowledge and the Figure of the Savant in the 18th Century. Volume 1. Edited by André Holenstein, Hubert Steinke, and Martin Stuber. Leiden: Brill, 2013. 71-100.
Dahhaoui, Yann. “Les Livres d’un Humaniste Fribourgeois.” BCU Info 77 (February 2018): 61-64.
Diesbach, Max de. “Les Pélerins Fribourgeois à Jérusalem (1436-1640): Étude Historique.” Archives de la Société d’Histoire du Canton de Fribourg 5 (1893): 189-282.
Erasmus, Desiderius. The Correspondence of Erasmus: Letters 446-593. Translated by R.A.B. Mynors and D.F.S. Thomson. Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1977.
Hobson, G.D. “‘Et Amicorum.’” The Library 4.2 (1949): 87–99.
James, Carolyn, and Bill Kent. “Renaissance Friendships: Traditional Truths, New and Dissenting Voices.” Friendship: A History. Edited by Barbara Caine. London: Routledge, 2014. 111-164.
Wagner, Adalbert. “Peter Falcks Bibliothek und Humanistische Bildung.” Freiburger Geschichtsblätter 28 (1925): XXV-XXXII, 1-221.
Zimmermann, Josef. “Peter Falk: Ein Freiburger Staatsmann und Heerführer.” Freiburger Geschichtsblätter 12 (1905): 1-151.
—. “Sechs Unbekannte Schreiben Glareans.” Freiburger Geschichtsblätter 9 (1902): 157-178.
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One response to “Peter Falck and Friends: A Renaissance Man and His Library”
6. Juni 2020
Sehr geehrte Frau Broadwell!
Der Einfachheit halber schreibe ich auf Deutsch: Herzlichen Glückwunsch zu dieser gelungenen Arbeit!
Gern würde ich Ihnen einen Hinweis auf einen möglichen Kontakt Falcks zu Nausea per E-Mail mitteilen. Ich bin darauf im Zusammenhang mit meinen Recherchen zu Johann Gusebel, genannt Longicampianus, gestoßen, der aus Mainz an Falck einen Brief geschrieben hat, in dem er ihm eine dichterische Bearbeitung seines Berichtes über die Schlacht von Marignano anbietet. Möglicherweise wegen Falcks Tod wurde das aber nicht realisiert.
Mit freundlichen Grüßen
Kurt Meyer