Abstract
Medieval manuscript collections in Teutonic Prussia have been particularly affected by numerous events in modern history, such as the Polish-Swedish wars and the turmoil after World War II. Still, the attempts to reconstruct the local collections may shed new light on the intellectual history of this historical region. To this date this kind of research was based mostly on surviving manuscripts with Prussian origin or provenance, that is, manuscripts produced or used in the territory of Prussia, supplemented by evidence on lost volumes derived from archival inventories. The article, taking as an example the history of collections of the city of Elbląg, discusses the potential of systematic studies of parchment waste used in bindings of manuscripts and printed books for reconstructing the intellectual landscape of the territory in question. It presents the range of provenance evidence that can link manuscript waste to the territory of Teutonic Prussia, including content, script, musical notation, binding and other material evidence.
Highlights
In such a situation, the study of manuscript fragments, those reused in the bindings of other books, can help recover part of the written cultural heritage and rebuild the intellectual landscape of the region
Conflicts between the Order and municipal authorities led to the Thirteen Years War, which ended with the Second Peace of Thorn in 1466, according to which the western part of the territory received the name of Royal Prussia and was subjected to the authority of Kingdom of Poland
This article aimed to use the preliminary results of research on medieval Elbląg to show the potential of studying manuscript fragments in bindings
Summary
The Scribe and Provenance of Otto F. Ege’s Choir Psalter from the Abbey of St. Stephen, Würzburg, Dated 1499 (Gwara, HL 42) 79–93 Scott Gwara and Timothy Bolton. The Medieval Provenance of Otto Ege’s “Chain of Psalms” (FOL 4) 95–99 David T. Fragments of Jerome's Epistolae (Mainz: Peter Schoeffer, 1470) in the Utrecht University Library 101–113 Estel van den Berg
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