From Women The Elisabeth manuscript is the most valuable and beautiful manuscript in the museum! Made in a south-west German convent and illuminat by one of the best book illustrators! of the time, it has suffer a vari fate! just like Saint Elisabeth, whose life the text! and images are about.
Elisabeth manuscript, double page fol. 108v and 190r! miniature by Sibilla von Bondorf (Elisabeth and the children leave the castle), photo: DNB
Since the focus of the Klemm! collection was on print books, the stock of mieval manuscripts in the German Museum of Books and Writing! has never been very large. The most valuable piece among these just over 100 manuscripts and fragments is undoubtly the so-call Elisabeth manuscript.
In addition to a From Women hagiographic biography of Saint
Elizabeth of Thuringia, the volume contains other handwritten texts that relate to the Elizabeth legend. The text was written in 1481 in the Poor Clares monastery in Freiburg im Breisgau by Elisabeth Vogtin. 14 color miniatures, paint by Sibilla von Bondorf, buy phone number list illustrate the stages of the saint’s life.
After the monastery was dissolv in the course of the Josephinian reforms in 1782, all trace of the manuscript was lost for the next 50 years. The next owner’s entry is from Karl Wilhelm Justi and is dat August 2, 1834. The manuscript remain in the scholar’s family for more than 140 years, most recently with Adelheid Justi, who was appoint as the heir of Ludwig Justi, who di in 1957.
Elisabeth manuscript, From Women fol. 13v and 14r, miniature
(Elisabeth with crucifix) by Sibilla von Bondorf and beginning of the text of the legend of St. Elisabeth, photo: DNB
The fate of the manuscript after Adelheid Justi’s death remains unclear. There are various versions of how it came to be, ranging from confiscation of ownership to donation and later voluntary sale by the recipient. Ultimately, the manuscript was put up for sale in spin – an effective method for increasing sales the GDR’s Central Antiquarian Bookstore in 1976 for 70,000 East German marks. The museum acquir it in good faith and without questioning its provenance. After it had already been recogniz as a special treasure in a publication in 1984 to mark the museum’s 100th anniversary 1 , the classical philologist Rainer Kößling present the manuscript to a wider public in 1997 2 .
The Justi family now demands that the manuscript be return and hong kong data ultimately takes legal action. After lengthy negotiations, the German National Library is able to reach a settlement with the heirs in 2003. Initially loan to the community of heirs, the manuscript is transferr to the museum as a gift after ten years, now legally secur.
Since then, the manuscript has been fully describ scientifically, digitiz and shown in several exhibitions. A record with description and digital copy can be found in the manuscript portal 3 . A fully digitiz copy is also available via the portal of the German National Library 4 . The miniatures, which once serv as a model for the pious retreat of the Poor Clares with their depiction of the holy life of Elisabeth of Thuringia and which still touch us today with their beauty and cheerful certainty of faith, are still as fresh as ever.