Ego-Documents: The Last Word?

This article examines the concept of ‘egocuments' from a historiographical perspective. It looks at its origins in the 1950s in the work of the Dutch historian Jacob Presser, at its revival in the work of Rudolf Dekker and his group from the 1970s onwards, and at the considerable expansion the notion was subjected to in the early 1990s by Winfried Schulze. The article argues that we should be aware of the noticeable differences between using the concept in twentieth-century history, as Presser did, and its usage in the context of early modern histor

"Oswald Myconius: Briefwechsel 1515-15522: Eine Würdigung

This short article surveys the recently published correspondence of Oswald Myconius (in the form of detailed regestae) from 1515 to the year of his death in 1552, edited by Rainer Henrich. Like the publications of Amy Nelson Burnett of the last three decades, it offers a view of Myconius’ activities at the head of Basel’s Reformed church from 1532, that differs from the older Basel historiography which portrayed him chiefly as the faithful custodian of Oecolampadius’ theological heritage. Instead, like Burnett, it shows that it was Myconius rather than his successor Simon Sulzer, who brought Basel’s official theology of the eucharist in line with Martin Bucer’s attempt to find a compromise between the Lutheran and Reformed positions. At the same time, it goes beyond Burnett in offering more detail, and in demonstrating the complexity of the struggle with Basel’s city council during the late 1530’s and early 1540’s about controlling the local church, not least due to highlighting the depth of the conflict between Myconius and Karlstadt that was entangled with this struggle

Paratexte der Bibel

Apart from the Greek and Latin text of the New Testament, Erasmus’ epochal edition contains a few well-known “editorial” paratexts, i. e. the paraclesis, the methodus, and the apologia. Much less known is that the edition, in its various versions, also contained a few Greek (and Latin) “traditional” paratexts, i. e. material taken from the manuscript sources, such as chapter lists, biographies of the evangelists and subscriptiones. The analysis of these small texts is promising for several reasons. Firstly, the Byzantine “dowry” of the New Testament on its way into early modern Europe becomes visible: some of those small texts were translated by Martin Luther or others along with the Biblical text. Some texts in the edition are important because they have not been critically edited since the initial publication (e. g. Eusebius’ canon tables). Secondly, these paratexts and their manuscript sources allow for a deeper understanding of the making of Erasmus’ edition. A good case in point is the only figurative image in the New Testament, i. e. the representation of the trinity in the edition of 1519. It can be traced back to the Corsendonck Codex, which in this instance served also as an iconographic Vorlage. The canon tables are another example for which it can be shown that the same Greek codex was used, but – maybe even more importantly – a Latin Bible printed by Froben in 1514 as well. Thirdly, the way in which Erasmus and his collaborators made use of Greek manuscripts can in many cases be better analysed on the basis of small paratextual material than on the basis of the (highly standardized) Biblical text itself