LECTURE: Prof. Dr. Helmut Reimitz (Princeton University), Authenticity and Appropriation: Manuscripts and the Creation of a Common Past in the Latin Middle Ages, Centre for the Study of Manuscript Cultures (Room 1), Warburgstraße 26, Hamburg, Thursday, 19 June 2014 at 6 pm.
In this lecture the scholar will present some observations on the study of history in the manuscript culture of the early Middle Ages with the help of a case study: the monastery of Lorsch. By the year 800 the monastery was one of the most important cultural centers of the Carolingian reform movement often labelled as the “Carolingian Renaissance”. But Lorsch did not belong to one of the old and venerable monasteries of the Frankish world. Only founded in the 760ies it became one of most important and wealthiest monasteries of the Frankish kingdoms in less than a generation due to its close connections to the Carolingian rulers. What makes the study of Lorsch particularly exciting is the fact that with several ninth century catalogues and over 300 extant Carolingian manuscripts we can observe the rapid rise of the monastery to one of the great Ivy League schools (or Exzellenz Universitäten) of the Carolingian world through the work of its scriptorium and the growth of its library.
A closer look at the copying and production of historical texts at Lorsch in the last decade of the eighth century shows a striking intensification of the study of late Antique patristic sources and histories of Christianity and the Christian church. It looks as if the “Carolingian Research Council” had just published its new “Framework Programme”. But the paper will not focus on the question of why this intensification happened. The scholar will rather use the extant manuscripts to explore the study of history itself in a manuscript culture. How were older histories acquired, collected, corrected and edited in a scholarly milieu in which scribes and scholars were well aware that each exemplar was an original? How were older histories used to write new ones and what were the strategies with which copyists, compilers and authors tried to convey the authority of their own copies and histories? The paper will only be able to offer some observations rather than conclusive answers. Possibly, the case study of Lorsch will provide a base line for a comparison of the study and meaning of history in different manuscript cultures.