bavarikon4UThe City of Amberg to Luther and Melanchthon; Amberg, 26 September 1544 (Stadtarchiv Amberg, KuRS 252 [Ref. 348])
Mayor and council of the city of Amberg announce that Andreas Hügel, who had been called to the city in 1538, had not been able to stay because of “devilish disruption [...]” of the church in Amberg. They also drew attention to those politically responsible. The behaviour of Elector Frederick II (1482–1556, elector 1544–1556) and of his brother, Count Palatine Wolfgang (1494–1558) as governor of the Upper Palatinate, had given the “devil so much space” that there was still no “Christian Reformation” in the Upper Palatinate. Therefore, the mayor and council stated that “nothing is allowed in the holy religion, nothing forbidden.”
Therefore, the writers of the letter ask the reformers as “Christian bishops” to provide them again with their “old” preacher Andreas Hügel and with Magister Johannes Monacensius. In addition, however, the “citizens of Amberg” also needed a schoolmaster for the Latin school near Saint Martin, after the former master, Magister Jodocus Aychhorn had been “requested” by the Count of Schwarzenburg.
At the end of the letter, the mayor and the council justify their urgent request by striving for their “whole communal salvation of the soul, bliss and promotion of the same”. Subsequently, its authors wish the recipients “blissful welfare for soul and body”. The letter ends with the date and naming of the senders.