Wickiana

The Wickiana is recognized as one of the most significant collections of news reports and documents pertaining to current events dating from the 16th century in the form of single-leaf and illustrated broadsheets, pamphlets, prints, handwritten texts and drawings.

He assembled and arranged contemporary news documents chronologically between 1559 and 1588, also integrating further material from the period running approximately from 1505 until 1559 into his collection.

In pictures and texts, the documents bear witness to contemporary life, reporting on such phenomena as natural occurrences – comets, earthquakes and floods, physical deformities in animals and humans, sensational crimes and political events of the time.

The collection can be regarded as manifesting the climate of crisis at a time of religious and political turmoil: Huldrych Zwingli (died 1531) had recently predicted the end of the world.

In 1925, these illustrated broadsheets were removed from Johann Jakob Wick's manuscript volumes and archived separately in the Department of Prints and Drawings of the Zentralbibliothek Zürich (Graphische Sammlung).