This study presents the ›Ritter vom Turn‹ (The Knight of the Tower) by Marquard von Stein (first edition Basel 1493) in the context of the history of its composition, printed editions and reception, as a product of ›cultural topography‹ that thanked its origin and circulation to a network of overlapping historical, political and cultural constellations and interests concentrated in the region of the Upper Rhine. Marquard was governer of the county of Montbéliard (Mömpelgard), holding the castle and township of Florimont (Blumenberg) in the Upper Alsace in fief from the Dukes of Austria, and found fertile ground for his work among the early humanist circles in Basel, a metropolis of printing. Michael Furter as a printer with a love of illustrations, (probably) Albrecht Dürer as an artist known for his innovative woodcuts, and Johann Bergmann von Olpe as a scholar and patron with a feeling for the taste of the contemporary public launched the publication project. Marquard can be seen to belong both politically and culturally to a circle of courts and persons in power in Austria and Württemberg who combined medieval courtly tradition with the impetus of early humanism, whilst maintaining links to the less humanistically orientated University of Basel. His interest in the French ›Chevalier de La Tour-Landry‹ reflects his socialisation among the aristocracy of the Franche-Comté and his activities in the bilingual culture of the region. At first sight the translation of the ›Chevalier‹ presents itself as the rendering of a traditional medieval didactic and moralising exempla collection. And yet, without aspiring to be a genuine cycle of novellas as conceived by Boccaccio and thus a humanist literary project in the Italian manner, the ›Ritter vom Turn‹ displays techniques of adaptation that bridge traditional and modern and which could appeal to early humanist urban and courtly circles, thus facilitating the cultural transfer for its readers, who constituted a wide audience of nobles and the (semi-)learned, urban laity.