The Ship of Fools. Engravings of Albrecht Dürer

Before you is one of the most famous books of the late Middle Ages, full of mockery and moral lessons, sharp comments and sincere regrets that came to the mind of its author — prominent German scholar-humanist, lawyer, and writer Sebastian Brant (1457–1521) — when he closely examined the society of his time. However, people do not change much: vices, base instincts, and weaknesses do not leave them over time, and thus the satires created in the 15th century remain relevant even today. This masterpiece of medieval literature was translated into Russian only in the second half of the 20th century, while out of 113 satires, only 52 were included in the publication.
This book, it seems, would not have been so popular and loved by the people if all the satires had not been accompanied by engravings, attributed to the young Albrecht Dürer, the great German painter and printmaker. In this volume, for the first time in a Russian-language edition, the engravings of Dürer for all the satires included in Brant's original text are published. Almost all images are preceded by tercets — metaphorical triplets that clarify the meaning of the engraving and the satire itself.
The publication is addressed to historians, philologists, cultural scientists, art historians, and specialists in other humanities, as well as to anyone interested in the Middle Ages and German humanism.