History Told With a Quill: Manuscripts, Fragments and Charters of the Humboldt University Library
Describing Medieval Manuscripts, fragments and Charters
In an international summer course at the Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin, students discover codices, fragments and charters in the historical collections of the University Library. The aim is to gain access to the original materials, examine their provenance, and transcribe and identify the texts. In a second step, the results will be registered in the specialized platforms Handschriftenportal and Monasterium.
An important subject of the course is the Deed collection of the University Library, comprising over 150 preserved charters, assembled for palaeographic and diplomatic studies, a collection which dates back to a donation by the archivist and lawyer Friedrich Kopp in1820 to the Prussian king. This teaching collection is being used in the summer school in accordance with its original purpose.
In addition to the Deed collection, which has already been well documented, the students will also examine and identify a number of objects that have not yet been described, particularly fragments and in-situ fragments bound into early prints.
21. -25. september 2026
Räume
Charters
Charters may not look as beautiful as famous illuminated manuscripts, but they provide us with a great deal of important information about administration and everyday life in the past. They include letters, records of transactions, changes of ownership, confirmations and many other. In this room, we want to show you examples of such documents, which may seem ordinary at first glance but can bring us closer to understanding life in the past.