Sub-project: Virtual Manuscript Library of Switzerland
January 2008 - December 2011
Status: Completed
Financed by: e-lib.ch
Description: With the financial backing of e-lib.ch (the “Swiss Electronic Library”), a total of 100 manuscripts from various Swiss Libraries has been digitized by the end of the year 2011. e-lib.ch is a joint project of the Swiss University Conference, the ETH-Board (Board of the Swiss Federal Institutes of Technology) and the Federal Office for Professional Education and Technology (OPET). This subproject has been commissioned by the Swiss Academy of Humanities and Social Sciences (SAGW).
Steering Committee: Prof. Rudolf Gschwind and Prof. Dr. Lukas Rosenthaler, Imaging and Media Lab, Universität Basel; Barbara Roth PhD, Manuscript Conservator, Bibliothèque de Genève; Heidi Eisenhut PhD, Director of the Kantonsbibliothek Appenzell Ausserrhoden, Trogen.
All Libraries and Collections
Pontifical rites for Johannes Feierabend, Abbot of the Cloister at Muri from 1500 through 1508. On July 12, 1507 Pope Julius II conferred the pontifical upon Abbot Johannes Feierabend and his successors.
Online Since: 11/03/2009
The Osterspiel von Muri (Easter Play of Muri) is the oldest known rhyming dramatic piece in German. The author is unknown. Linguistic analyses lead to the conclusion that the work originated in the middle or western region of the area where high Alemannic was spoken. The surviving portion of the Osterspiel indicates a true spoken drama, without Latin or musical elements.
Online Since: 04/15/2010
Likely the oldest surviving exemplars of the Compendium theologicae veritatis by Hugo Argentinensis (Hugo Ripelin of Strasburg) and the Quaestiones super quatuor libros sententiarum by William Rothwell. Probably from the bequest of Rudolf Schwerz, Zurich choirmaster and pastor of Altdorf.
Online Since: 11/04/2010
A richly illustrated Swiss chronicle in three parts, or books. The newest and most comprehensive book (Part I) contains the origin and history of the Confederation up to the 14th century. The oldest book (Part II) contains a description of the Burgundian wars of the 15th century. The subsequent book (Part III) describes selected events from the history of the Confederation during the 15th and 16th centuries, such as the deposition of Hans Waldmann (1489) and the Battle of Marignano (1515), and contains an illustrated catalog of ordnance captured in the Swabian War of 1499.
Online Since: 11/03/2009
A richly illustrated Swiss chronicle in three parts, or books. The newest and most comprehensive book (Part I) contains the origin and history of the Confederation up to the 14th century. The oldest book (Part II) contains a description of the Burgundian wars of the 15th century. The subsequent book (Part III) describes selected events from the history of the Confederation during the 15th and 16th centuries, such as the deposition of Hans Waldmann (1489) and the Battle of Marignano (1515), and contains an illustrated catalog of ordnance captured in the Swabian War of 1499.
Online Since: 11/03/2009
A richly illustrated Swiss chronicle in three parts, or books. The newest and most comprehensive book (Part I) contains the origin and history of the Confederation up to the 14th century. The oldest book (Part II) contains a description of the Burgundian wars of the 15th century. The subsequent book (Part III) describes selected events from the history of the Confederation during the 15th and 16th centuries, such as the deposition of Hans Waldmann (1489) and the Battle of Marignano (1515), and contains an illustrated catalog of ordnance captured in the Swabian War of 1499.
Online Since: 11/03/2009
The first volume of the three-part so-called "Wettinger Graduale", made in Cologne for a cloister of Augustinian hermits, transferred from Zurich to the Cistercian cloister of Wettingen after the Reformation. The illuminated initials in this first volume are the work of the "Old Master of the Gradual" (Willehalm-Meister).
Online Since: 11/04/2010
The third volume of the three-part so-called "Wettinger Graduale", made in Cologne for a cloister of Augustinian hermits, transferred from Zurich to the Cistercian cloister of Wettingen after the Reformation. The illuminated initials in this third volume, like those in the second (MsWettFm 2) are the work of the "Younger Master of the Gradual".
Online Since: 11/04/2010
The Matriculation Register of the Basel Rectorate, recorded in manuscript form from 1460 to 2000, contains semester and annual information notices added by each successive rector as well as lists of enrolled students, thus providing an important resource for the history of the University of Basel. In addition, Vol. 1 contains records in illustrations and text of the opening of the university. The rich book decoration in the first three volumes is particularly notable. The work of 3 centuries, it is easily datable due to the chronogical order in which it was added and thus provides a welcome demonstration of the art of miniature painting in Basel.
Online Since: 12/21/2010
The Matriculation Register of the Basel Rectorate, recorded in manuscript form from 1460 to 2000, contains annual information notices added by each successive rector as well as lists of enrolled students. The rich book decoration in the first three volumes is particularly notable. The work of 3 centuries, it is easily datable due to the chronogical order in which it was added and thus provides a welcome demonstration of the art of miniature painting in Basel.
Online Since: 12/21/2010
The Matriculation Register of the Basel Rectorate, recorded in manuscript form from 1460 to 2000, contains annual information notices added by each successive rector as well as lists of enrolled students. The rich book decoration in the first three volumes is particularly notable. The work of 3 centuries, it is easily datable due to the chronogical order in which it was added and thus provides a welcome demonstration of the art of miniature painting in Basel.
Online Since: 12/21/2010
This incomplete liturgical psalter was made between 1335 and 1350 in Naples. The unusual decorations are the work of the artist Christoforo Orimina. Because the manuscript contains three different coats of arms, the original owner (a member of the Angevin court in Naples) can not be definitively named. After changing hands many times during the 19th and 20th centuries, the manuscript was acquired in 1968 by the owner of the collection "Comites Latentes" ("Hidden Friends") held by the Bibliothèque de Genève.
Online Since: 12/09/2008
A manuscript consistiting of three production units. The first two were copied in Paris, probably around the end of the 15th century, by the famous professor of Greek, Georgius Hermonymus of Sparta (†1511-1516). They contain prayers and liturgical pieces, particularly from the Abbey of Saint Denis in France, including an as yet apparently unpublished translation of a Mass formula for Saints Dionysius, Rusticus and Elutherius into Greek. The last part, an addition to the others, is the work of a single hand, very similar in appearance to that of Hermonymous, perhaps that of one of his pupils.
Online Since: 11/04/2010
The Beromünster cantatorium contains the solo sung parts of the mass with notation, and some tropes added during the 14th century. Among these are the Kyrie tropes Kyrie fons bonitatis and Cunctipotens. The examples of conductus are interesting. The codex is bound in a wooden case with two ivory panels from the 8th-9th century.
Online Since: 12/21/2009
The Epistolary is the oldest manuscript in the library at Beromunster; according to local tradition it was presented by a member of the patron family of Lenzburg, Count Ulrich († before 1050). The front cover, added later, is an ivory panel dating from the second half of, perhaps the end of, the 13th century.
Online Since: 12/21/2009
Mystic treatises in German: Mechthild of Magdeburg's The Flowing Light of Divinity ("Das fliessende Licht der Gottheit") and other mystic works (e.g. selections from Meister Eckhart). The manuscript was a gift, together with Cod. 278(1040), from Heinrich Rumersheim of Basel to the four sister convents in der Au near Einsiedeln at the behest of Margarete zum Goldenen Ring.
Online Since: 04/26/2007
Mystic Treatises in German: Rudolf von Biberach, Meister Eckhart, Johannes von Sterngassen, Albert the Great, etc. The manuscript was a gift, together with Cod. 277(1014), from Heinrich Rumersheim of Basel to the four sister convents in der Au near Einsiedeln at the behest of Margarete zum Goldenen Ring.
Online Since: 04/26/2007
This manuscript containing the Legenda aurea by Jacobus de Voragine is the second-oldest manuscript copy of this work, written within the lifetime of the author; it is dated 1288. The codex also contains the first known transmission of the so-called Provincia or Purgatory addendum. The proposal by A. Bruckner that the Abbey of Rheinau is the location of origin is not supported by any indications in the codex itself. It was most likely written in the southern German region (within the community of Augustinian hermits).
Online Since: 11/04/2010
Christus und die Minnende Seele ("Christ and the Courting (or wooing) Soul"); Henry Suso, life and works. This manuscript was a gift from a married couple, Ehlinger-von Kappel (Constance) to the Dominican convent of St. Peter in Constance, and from there it probably came to Einsiedeln via the Rheinau Abbey after its dissolution.
Online Since: 04/26/2007
Tract by the Engelberg Abbot Frowin (1143-1178) about free will, the De laude liberi arbitrii libri septem, from the 12th century. This as-yet unedited work is regarded as an important contribution from the perspective of monastic theology during the early scholastic period.
Online Since: 07/31/2007