The Nuremberg Chronicle was truly a Nuremberg community project. The patrons and publishers, Sebald Schreyer (1446-1520) and his brother-in-law Sebastian Kammermaister (1446-1503), were both wealthy Nuremberg businessmen. Schreyer in particular was widely involved in the city's economic and cultural affairs. He was, for example, "personally responsible for financing the library of St. Sebald's and ensuring that Nuremberg's elite bequeathed books from their estates."² Schreyer was also the guiding force behind the 1488 publication of the Chronica Neronpergensium ('Chronicle of the City of Nuremberg'). It seems, then, that the idea for publishing a new world history with lavish illustrations was principally his own.