29. A Csillagos Sz. Kereszt Congregatiojának...

... melly Császári Királlyi és más fő aszszonyságok vigasztalására Bétsben fel állítatott, eredete és vege. 
(28)+305+(2) hand-numbered, written pages.
On 2 February 1668, a fire broke out in the newly built Leopold Wing of the Hofburg Palace in Vienna. The conflagration destroyed almost the entire building. The court – including Empress Eleonora Magdalena Gonzaga, widow of Ferdinand III – had to flee in panic. Five days later, however, the Empress’s most cherished relic, the Starry Holy Cross, was found miraculously unharmed among the ruins. In commemoration, Eleonora founded the Congregation, later blessed by Pope Clement IX.
According to the supralibros (B: B: M: B: K: G:) on the front board, the volume was made for Baroness Mária Bánffy, wife of Baron Gergely Kemény. Translated into Hungarian for her in 1785, it contains the society’s history, rules, and prayers. The dedication refers to her late husband (†1769); the Baroness herself died in 1786 at the age of sixty-three.
Inscriptions on the flyleaf record: “Her Excellency Baroness Mária Bánffy, wife of the late Baron Gergely Kemény… translated into Hungarian in 1785,” and a note of gift from Farkas Kemény, her son, dated 1824.
Dated (1785), contemporary leather, with slightly worn, gilt centrepieces on both binding boards.
 
Starting price: 200 000,-