Johann Ulrich Surgantʼs Manuale curatorum predicandi as a product of medieval intellectual heritage in Basel libraries

Abstract

Manuale curatorum predicandi – the treatise on the art of preaching written by Basel scholar Johann Ulrich Surgant in 1502 – is usually classified as a humanist and nearly proto-reformation work. The paper disputes this classification; it provides several analytical textual probes to show the deep dependence of the Manuale curatorum on the older scholastic tradition. Following on from former research, a few relatively well-known high and late medieval artes praedicandi are identified as the main sources of Surgantʼs writing. Moreover, the study aims to trace specific manuscripts or early prints in Basel libraries, which could have been directly used by the author-compiler.