According to the image caption, the French art historian Jean-Marie Clarke made this statement about a painting in Staufen's council chamber showing Joannes Faustus. The local savings bank bought the painting in 2010 and gave it to Staufen's town council as a permanent loan.
According to Clark, the painting instead shows Johannes Fust (1400 to 1466), an entrepreneur and lawyer from Mainz. However, when you look through Wikipedia articles about Faust in various languages, quite a number, including the French Wikipedia, still identify the above painting of Joannes Faustus as that of Dr. Johann Georg Faust, the Schwarzkünstler (master of dark arts). The latter died in Staufen in 1440 or 1441.
Johannes Fust supported his namesake Johannes Gutenberg's printing efforts by lending money. The result was that in 1455 Gutenberg finally printed 180 copies of his famous 42-line Bible. One year later, Fust wanted his 800 gilders back. Since Gutenberg could not pay, he had to hand over to Fust his print shop and half of the finished Bibles. When Fust smelled that publishing Bibles was lucrative, he simply pulled Gutenberg over the barrel. Subsequently, in 1462 Fust printed his own Bible, the Biblia Sacra Latina, which he proudly presents in the above picture.
How did the confusion between Fust and Faust come about? One of Fust's grandchildren apparently wrote a preface to a reprint of the Biblia Sacra Latina calling his grandfather Johan Fausten. The family liked Faust better than Fust and adopted the name. There was additional confusion when people used the label Schwarzkünstler not only for magicians but for printers too.
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Johannes Fust supported his namesake Johannes Gutenberg's printing efforts by lending money. The result was that in 1455 Gutenberg finally printed 180 copies of his famous 42-line Bible. One year later, Fust wanted his 800 gilders back. Since Gutenberg could not pay, he had to hand over to Fust his print shop and half of the finished Bibles. When Fust smelled that publishing Bibles was lucrative, he simply pulled Gutenberg over the barrel. Subsequently, in 1462 Fust printed his own Bible, the Biblia Sacra Latina, which he proudly presents in the above picture.
How did the confusion between Fust and Faust come about? One of Fust's grandchildren apparently wrote a preface to a reprint of the Biblia Sacra Latina calling his grandfather Johan Fausten. The family liked Faust better than Fust and adopted the name. There was additional confusion when people used the label Schwarzkünstler not only for magicians but for printers too.
Was the local savings bank taken for a ride when they bought the picture? Not at all, Jean-Marie Clarke said, "Staufen has acquired a painting of another historical person." I would like to add: that the Staufeners should make a marketing gag out of their mistake. After all, was it not Mephistopheles again who fooled them?
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