The brothers, Frederick and John of Saxony, were key figures in the early history of the Reformation. Frederick the Wise holds an established place in historiography as the founder of the University of Wittenberg and as Luther’s protector. His younger brother John the Constant is virtually unknown in comparison, although he was decisively influential in promoting the Evangelical cause at the…
For the first time, the research and edition project “Controversia et Confessio” systematically reappraises the theological controversies triggered by the Augsburg Interim and the Leipzig Alternative Draft of 1548, which could only be largely resolved by the large-scale theological unification of the Conoria Formula and the Konkordienbuch 1577/80. In these disputes, an early modern “culture of…
Medieval and early modern inscriptions crafted before 1650, in Latin and German language, situated in German-speaking areas are at the heart of this project. Inscriptions are significant and unique historical sources because they are often preserved in an authentic state and in their original setting. For the premodern era, script which was affixed to stone, wood, metal, glass as well as textiles…
During its existence (1308-1528), the double monastery of Königsfelden was one of the central clerical institutions of the Aargau region and continued to exert a great attraction on the people of the region and beyond for centuries afterwards. The project makes the rich tradition from the Middle Ages and early modern times accessible for research and interested non-experts in the form of a digital…
The letters of Philipp Jakob Spener (1635-1705), the founder of Lutheran Pietism, are not only first-rate sources for research on the beginnings of Pietism, the most important renewal movement of Protestantism since the Reformation, but also for the church and cultural history of the early modern period. Some of them are handwritten records and can be found in archives and libraries far beyond…
Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz (1646–1716) is said to be the last polymath. This is reflected by his diverse and mostly unpublished work. Until today, there is no complete edition which forced researchers to rely on deficient partial editions from the 19th century. The project aims at a complete edition of G. W. Leibniz’ writings and of his letters. The handwritten literary remains are to a large…
During the project period of six years, it is planned on the one hand to publish the complete edition of Albrecht von Haller's reviews (including more than 9'000 in the leading German-language review organ Göttingische Gelehrte Anzeigen) as a central, but still largely unknown part of his oeuvre. On the other hand, a well-founded selection of approximately 8,000 letters related to the content of…
Since 1898 the Law Sources Foundation of the Swiss Lawyers Society edits a collection of law sources which had been created on Swiss territory up to 1798, the Collection of Swiss Law Sources. The Collection contains materials from the early Middle Ages until early modern times (1798). Over 130 volumes, or more than 80'000 pages of source material and comments from all language regions of…
Three competing Reformation paradigms emerged in the city of Strasbourg, the duchy of Württemberg (with Tübingen university), and the Electoral Palatinate (with the university of Heidelberg) in the second half of the sixteenth century: an “upper German”, a Lutheran, and a Reformed model, respectively. Each of the three emphasized its distinctiveness, but was inevitably influenced by the other two.…