17TH-CENTURY BROADSIDE WITH EIGHT SEALS - OX TRADE
[Livestock]: [Incipit] Wir V[?] Lands-Hauptmann Lands-Vicedomb [Explicit]: Beschehen zu Clagenfurth unter unserem hiefürgestellten Ambts-fertigungen den 28 Februarij Anno 1695.
This unlocated and attractively-presented seventeenth-century broadside ordinance from Klagenfurt, Austria, pertains to the ox trade in Kärnten (Carinthia). It specifically mentions a Venetian ox-trader named Simon Milese, and concerns trade monopolies and price gouging. Particularly interesting is the complex ‘papered seal’ that can be found in the lower margin. It would have been created by placing a single strip of paper on top of warm wax, before stamping the eight seals in sequence for authorisation.
A broadside concerning similar issues was evidently produced in Klagenfurt a year later, a copy of which can be found in the Österreichische Akademie der Wissenschaften (Woldan Collection J0966-B). We also note, for comparison, a broadside on a different matter produced in Klagenfurt in 1711 and held by the Bayerische Staatsbibliothek (Einbl. XI,102). Interestingly, it appears to use the same decorative initial W, but does not have a papered seal.
Details
Broadside, 55.3 x 38.5 cms. Printed on one side only. One decorative initial, first three lines of text in larger type. An eight-part ‘papered seal’ at lower margin, using a single strip of paper. Contemporary annotation to reverse dated 30th[?] February 1695. Partially adhered to a black card mount, approx. 60 x 42 cms. Small tear at upper right-hand corner of mount, not affecting broadside.
Condition: browning to paper, some stains mainly from adhesive used for mounting, repair at central horizontal fold, small tear and hole at bisection of fold lines (affecting c.5 letters), small cracks to the strip of paper used in the papered seal, small tears to blank outer margins.
Although not in an Austrian context, the following discussion of ‘papered seals’ is instructive: Peter Beal, A Dictionary of English Manuscript Terminology 1450-2000 (Oxford, OUP, 2009), p. 281.