Bayerische Staatsbibliothek München (Bavarian State Library Munich) - Cgm

art

German-language manuscripts

Grundsignatur (collection shelf mark) Cgm - Codices germanici monacenses

Cgm 125

Book of Prayers

The book of prayers was intended for private devotion and was created towards the end of the fifteenth century in Ratisbon. The 217 sheets of the manuscript on parchment display heavy marks of usage. The prayer texts are written in a single column of Gothic minuscule. The 68 historiated illuminated initials show scenes from the life of Christ and events from diverse acts of the saints. In addition, some of the scrolls are decorated with drolleries. For the year 1773, fol. 2r bears an owner’s mark "Bibliothecam S. Michaelis Archangelis in Metten 1773" (Library of St. Michael in Metten). It remains unclear how the small manuscript (12 x 0.9 cm) may have reached Metten.

Cgm 502 and 503

German Bible (Old Testament)

The two-volume Old Testament (German) was created by the scribe Georg Rorer in Ratisbon in 1463. It comprises in the first volume 222 and in the second volume 288 parchment sheets. The Old Testament of the Universitätsbibliothek Augsburg (University Library Augsburg, Cod. I.3.2° III/IV), also in two volumes, contains illuminations executed by Berthold Furtmeyr and was produced by the same scribe.

The miniatures in the first volume are executed as pen drawings but remain at least in part uncoloured. As in the first volume, each book of the Bible in the second volume starts with a historiated illuminated initial coloured with watercolours. Into the sequence of the Pentateuch (the five books of Moses) the scribe inserted after the book Leviticus the Gospel according to Matthew, based on his template, which he copied meticulously. This order is also observed in the first volume of the 1465 Old Testament by the hand of Rorer and illuminated by Furtmeyr, which is today in the British Library (MS Egerton 1895). All three illuminated manuscripts inscribed by Rorer served above all a representative purpose, which may be applied less to a reading but to a visual reception. The manuscript arrived from the property of the Upper-Bavarian Augustiner-Chorherrenstiftes in Rottenbuch (Augustinian monastery of Rottenbuch; Cgm 503, fol. 1r) during the age of secularisation in Munich.

Wolfgang Neiser, Regensburg

German Bible (Old Testament)

Volume 1: Genesis - Liber II Regum, Psalter

Writer: Georg Rorer of Ratisbon.
Illustrations: probably Ratisbon, shortly before Berthold Furtmeyr.

Ratisbon, around 1463.

Further information:
Handschriftenkurzbeschreibung nach Schmeller, 1866
Handschriftenkurzbeschreibung von Leidinger, 1912
Handschriftenbeschreibung von Schneider, 1978
BSB-Forschungsdokumentation Handschriften
Handschriftencensus: Cgm 502

German Bible (Old Testament)

Volume 2: Paralipomena - Malachias und einzelne Prologe

Writer: Georg Rorer of Ratisbon.
Illustrations: probably Ratisbon, shortly before Berthold Furtmeyr.


Ratisborn, around 1463.

Further Information:
Handschriftenkurzbeschreibung nach Schmeller, 1866
Handschriftenkurzbeschreibung von Leidinger, 1912
Handschriftenbeschreibung von Schneider, 1978
BSB-Forschungsdokumentation Handschriften
Handschriftencensus: Cgm 503

Cgm 8010a

Furtmeyr-Bible

The Old Testament illuminated by Berthold Furtmeyr contains the books of the Bible from Genesis to Ruth in the sequence of the Vulgata. The German translation of the Latin Bible, the use of which as household Bible may be understood on the one hand as an object of representation, on the other hand as an expression of an educated stratum of society with an interest in theology. It can be attributed, for reason of its central-Bavarian dialect, to the group of translations to which also belongs the Wenzelsbibel (Wenceslas Bible; Österreichische Nationalbibliothek [Austrian National Library], Cod. 2759–2764).

The typeface is arranged in two columns of 40 lines respectively. The text flows in a regular Gothic book face. The 388 parchment sheets have a size of 39.5 x 29.5 cm. The wooden cover measures 40.5 x 30 cm und was originally bound with a brown leather cover of which today only in a few small traces remain visible. The present light-brown leather binding with gold embossing can probably be dated to the seventeenth/eighteenth centuries. The illuminations included in the manuscript are executed in Gouache painting with the application of gold leaf. For the three full-page illuminations, 21 historiated illuminated initials, 332 miniatures and numerous flower or fruit scrolls, Furtmeyr used colour pigments based on minerals and plants. The materials of the manuscript mirror its value and costliness.

The manuscript was made in the years 1465-70 for the family of Ulrich von Stauff zu Ehrenfels and Clara Hofer von Lobenstein. It arrived during the so-called Löwlerkrieg (War of the Alliance of the Lion), probably during the capture of the Sünching manor in 1491, in the Court Library of Duke Albrecht IV (1447-1508) in Munich. In 1632, the Old Testament came into the possession of Duke Wilhelm von Saxe-Weimar (1598-1662) after the conquest of Munich and the pillaging of the Hofbibliothek (Court Library). Between 1640 and 1647, the book was taken to the library of Duke Ernst des Frommen (the Pius) von Saxe-Gotha-Altenburg (1601-1675) in Gotha. After WWI, the manuscript became part of the Landesbibliothek (regional library) of Gotha (decree of 1928). In 1945, the manuscript, together with other works of art, was transported to Coburg. Five years later, it was sold to the London antiquarian bookshop Sinelnikov. Via Stockholm and the US the manuscript finally arrived at the Zurich antiquarian bookshop of August Laube in 1959. The Bayerische Staatsbibliothek (Bavarian State Library) managed to purchase the book in 1960.

The manuscript’s time of creation is datable to 1465-1470. By comparison with a two-volume exemplar of the Old Testament now at the British Library but produced in Ratisbon in ca. 1465 (MS Egerton 1895/1896), a first benchmark for dating exists and by dint of the equally two-volume exemplar in the Universitätsbibliothek Augsburg (University Library Augsburg, Cod. I.3.2°III/IV), created in the years between 1470 and 1472 for the brother of the patron, Hans von Stauff zu Ehrenfels, exists a "terminus ante quem" . Such a dating period seems supported by the year of death of Ulrich von Stauff zu Ehrenfels in 1472.
The Munich Old Testament (Cgm 8010a) in contrast with the other two editions does not present a second volume and includes in its sequence no insertion of the first five chapters of the Gospel according to Matthew between the books Deuteronomy and Job.

Differently to the London exemplar, all miniatures are wrapped, into the text. The mostly monochrome and shaded frames of the miniatures fill at the end of the text the spaces of each line at the end in a somewhat unusual construction. Thereby, a close relationship between the image and the text is achieved. Image and text form an integral feature of the page layout. The small-format images, mostly in a square general orientation of a size of 0.6 x 0.6 cm, organise the text and create an optical focal point of the narrative. The miniatures’ design goes well beyond the mere illustration of the text. In their narrative structure, they visualise for the spectator the high point of the narrative as well as the dramatic turn of the subject matter. As regards the abundance of his miniatures, Furtmeyr takes up well-known iconographical patterns and templates. At the same time, however, he develops new depictions out of his precise knowledge of the biblical text.

An atmospheric condensation as connection between space and time, in which landscapes, the human body and the opulence of nature are integrated, particularly distinguishes Berthold Furtmeyr’s miniatures.

Each opening page of a biblical book is ornamented with an initial as well as with a lush floral scroll (Cgm 8010a, fol.184r). The depiction of flowers, fruits and of animals frolicking in the foliage and between the branches is oriented on nature (Cgm 8010a, fol.167r , fol. 174v) and does not yet display the almost surreal appearance of the scroll ornament of the Salzburg Missal (Bayerische Staatsbibliothek München [Bavarian State Library Munich], Clm 15708-15712).

Wolfgang Neiser, Ratisbon

German Bible (Old Testament)

Furtmeyr-Bibel

Volume1: Genesis - Ruth.

Illustrations: Berthold Furtmeyr (around 1435/40 - after 1501)

[Ratisbon], 15th century.

Further Information:
BSB-Forschungsdokumentation Handschriften