First edition of Martin Kromer's 1555 chronicle.

KROMER Marcin - [De origine et rebus gestis Polonorum Libri XXX. Adiecta est in fine, eiusdem autoris funebris Oratio, Sigismundi, Regis vitam compendiose complexa. Basileae 1555. ex officina Joannis Oporini]. folio, pp. [4], 702, [40]. Opr. 19th/20th c. psk. gilt.
E. 20, 280. Missing title page, missing last dedication page, final page with colophon only half preserved; glued margins of first pages, trace of dampness on lower part of pages, ink staining and small loss of one page (pp. 675/676. First edition of chronicle of Marcin Kromer (Polish: "O sprawach, dziejach i wszystkie inne potocznościach koronnych ksiąg XXX"). "Kromer described in the chronicle the history of Poland until the beginning of the reign of Sigismund the Old (1506). The work was aimed at foreign readers, to whom the author intended to bring Polish history closer. In 1580 the Sejm rewarded this work with a public acknowledgment. The author of the chronicle made critical use of the works of Jan Długosz and Maciej Miechowita. Kromer was also the first to express the supposition that the author of the 'Polish Chronicle' was a newcomer from France and called him Gallus. Kromer's work is divided into 30 books, each devoted to a specific era, limited by the reign of one or more rulers. Of a different nature is Book I, which has the style of a polemical treatise, in which the author tries to solve the problem of the origin of the Slavs and the various Slavic nations" (Wikipedia). At the end, from p. 676, Kromer's speech at the funeral of Sigismund I the Old preceded by a full-page woodcut with a portrait of the monarch (signed on the block with the monogram H. S.).