A selective bibliography. In general the newest books are the most reliable ones. There's an incredible lot of misinformation going around.....
...und der Nikolaikirche in Reval (Tallinn) - by Hartmut Freytag. This is by far the best and most thorough book about the subject - with more facts and less nonsense than any other book.
The book has nearly 500 pages and contains everything you wanted to know about the dance of death in Lübeck and more. The text from Lübeck and Tallinn is examined with annotations to almost every word. Articles about the stained glass windows, Copenhagen's dance of death, the clothes, the language and much, much more.
There are very nice colour pictures of the dance of death in Tallinn but - strangely - not from Lübeck! This painting is only reproduced as an 8-cm high concertina-style banner. You would think, that when a book is published with nearly 500 pages about a single painting, there would be room for a bigger picture!
This book measures 29 by 47 cm and is just as unhandy as the full title of the book: "Der Todtentanz in der Marienkirche zu Lübeck. Nach einer Zeichnung von C. J. Milde, mit erläuterndem Text von Professor W. Mantels. Neudruck der Ausgabe Lübeck: Rahtgens 1866. Mit einem Nachwort "Der Totentanz in der Marienkirche zu Lübeck und das Totentanz-Fragment in der Nikolaikirche zu Reval (Tallinn)" hrsg. von Hartmut Freytag, Lübeck 1989. Zweite, vermehrte und verbesserte Auflage 1993. Dritte, erneut vermehrte und verbesserte Auflage 1997."
This is a facsimile reprint of Wilhelm Mantels' book from 1866, where he lays the ground for all later research. It also contains the handsome colour lithographs by C. J. Milde from 1852 (8 plates).
Mantels was a pioneer, and pioneers tend to become outdated. On the other hand Mantels is still worth reading since he had access to the church records and almost counts as a primary source.
Freytag has added a section with the newest (137 years) research.
Separate offprint from Der Wagen, 1951 - 8 pages + a concertina-style banner. It's amazing how much has happened to the research since 1951: almost every "fact" in this pamphlet is wrong, and no - Nathanael Schlott is not spelled Natanael Schott.
A concertina-style banner (73 * 17 cm) with a nice colour reproduction af the dance of death fragment in Tallinn. There's a short text in Estonian and (High) German.
German book by Timothy Sodmann from 2001. This is a facsimile print of Dodendantz from 1520. The book also contains a transcript of the text, a complete glossary (Low German - High German) and a 30-page postscript about Lübeck's dances of death. Highly recommendable.
The book can be bought on the Internet by sending a mail to the publisher Rainer Heeke in English, German or Dutch (the price is 18 Euro + postage).
......nach den lübecker drucken von 1489 und 1496, Tübingen 1876, herausgegeben von Hermann Baethcke.
The only reprint of Des dodes dantz (for unknown reasons Baethcke has dropped a "t" in the title). The book doesn't contain any pictures, but features the entire text, plenty of footnotes and a glossary (Low German - High German).
Copenhagen's dance of death from 1536 reprinted in 1896 with introduction and annotations by Raphael Meyer.
....Die Deutschsprachigen Spätmittelalterlichen Totentänze unter besonderer Berücksichtigung der Inkunabel, Des dodes dantz, Lübeck 1489 by Brigitte Schulte.
Schulte compares the structure of 14 dances of death (13 of which are German). The last part of the book is a thorough and sound comparison of the text in Lübeck/Tallinn with Des dodes dantz and Dodendantz.
...by James M. Clark - Glasgow, 1950. This is one of the few available books in English, and there's a chapter about English dances of death.
...by Léonard P. Kurtz - 1937 reprinted in 1975. This book is too old - at any rate the "facts" about Lübeck are full of mistakes. The paragraphs about Danish and Swedish dances of death are ridiculous.
No pictures.
......mittelalterliche Totentänze / herausgegeben, eingeleitet und übersetzt von Gert Kaiser. - 351 pages, 4 colour plates:
Contains 5 printed dances, translated into modern High German (but none of them are from Lübeck).
Reinhold Hammerstein specialises in musical instruments used by Death and since there's very few musical instruments in Lübeck's dances of death, the chapter on Lübeck is very short with lots of nonsensical misinformation.
The picture section is impressive with 379 (!) black and white pictures of dances of death.
Dansk 
Lübeck's dance of death
Bibliography