Gabriel Rollenhagen, in his short lifetime (1583-1619), published two collections of Latin emblems:
Nucleus emblematum selectissimorum (1611) and
Emblematum centuria secunda (1613), which you can read online at the Herzog August Bibliothek online. Even more famous is the English version by George Wither (1588-1667),
A Collection of Emblemes, which combines the emblems from both of Rollenhagen's books. You can see page images from Wither at
Penn State and a digitized version, but without the images, at the
University of Virginia. Wither supplied the emblems with lengthy poems, along with "lotteries" of additional verse; I have only included here the English distich which accompanies each emblem.
Here is the Rollenhagen Emblem of the Day, with English verses by Wither; you can see a vocabulary list and notes by visiting the latest
Rollenhagen posts at this blog; for more information about Rollenhagen and also Wither, scroll down - meanwhile, you can also
get a copy of the widget for your own website or blog if you want! Ready for more? Check out the
Random Rollenhagen Emblem too! :-)
