Alchemical Hands in the Hypnerotomachia Poliphili

Why It Matters for the Hypnerotomachia

The HP uses signatures a-z (omitting j, u, w) then A-G, each gathering consisting of eight leaves. Russell references all folios by signature rather than page number, making the signature system the primary navigational framework for both the original book and this project's concordance pipeline.

Why It Matters in Scholarship

Russell (2014) adopts signature-based referencing throughout his thesis because the 1499 HP has no printed pagination. This practice, standard in incunabular bibliography, allows scholars to locate passages precisely across different copies regardless of later pagination schemes.

Key Passages / Evidence

• <!-- Page 201 --> Finally, it is noteworthy that Chigi, noted for his enthusiasm for inscriptions, paid remarkably little attention to the artificial inscriptions found throughout the HP. His... [Russell 2014 (PhD thesis)]
• <!-- Page 116 --> from later unrecorded owners. Stichel notes that these dots were a ‘usual sign of condemnation.’105 Yet even if Benedetto returned to the text to express disapproval, these... [Russell 2014 (PhD thesis)]
• ... manuscript, p. IX. 13 Ben Jonson, Works, eds C. H. Herford, Percy Simpson, and Evelyn Simpson (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1925-1953). --- <!-- Page 140 --> forgeries. In... [Russell 2014 (PhD thesis)]

Source Documents

Blunt 1937 (HP in French art); Gollnick (Apuleius dreamworld); HP primary text; Russell 2014 (PhD thesis); The_Narrative_Function_of_Hieroglyphs_in; Word_Image_1998_jan_vol_14_iss_1_2_Griggs_Tamara_Promoting_the_past_The_Hypnerot