bavarikon4UMartin Luther to the Archbishop of Mainz (Manuscript), Coburg 1530 (Stadtbibliothek Nürnberg, Solg. Ms. 8.4°, Bl. 2r-8v)
Archbishop Albrecht of Mainz (1490–1545, archbishop and elector 1514–1545) tried to reach a peaceful understanding with the Protestants between 1525 and 1535. Under the impression of this peaceful attitude, which was also evident at the Augsburg Diet in 1530, Martin Luther (1483–1546) wrote this letter on 6 July 1530.
Because he was under the imperial ban, was therefore unable to travel to Augsburg and had to stay put on the Veste Coburg (Coburg Fortress), Luther chose a special form of dissemination for this letter. The foreword declares that he did not send the text in handwritten form for fear of distortions and the possible inconveniences resulting from this for him and for the archbishop. Instead, he published it in print.
On 13 July, Martin Luther sent the artwork to Nuremberg, on 20 July, the city’s censorship commission approved the printing and on 30 July, the letter was available in the form printed by Johann Stüchs. Martin Luther’s intermediary in Nuremberg was Wenzeslaus Linck (1483–1547). He made sure that a printed copy as well as a letter sent with the original master copy was handed over to the archbishop.
The text of the epistle was reissued several times until 1630. Luther’s manuscript version presented here was not used as master copy, but represents an earlier stage of editing, which the author gave to Veit Dietrich (1506–1549), his assistant on the Veste Coburg, as a gift. Today, the draft is part of a composite manuscript (fols. 2r–8v) which contains further texts by Luther.