German manuscripts at the Bayerische Staatsbibliothek (Bavarian State Library) – Cgm

In the Bayerische Staatsbibliothek, the German (Codex) manuscripts are marked with the signature Cgm. Cgm stands for Codices germanici monacenses. The collection comprises around 13,000 manuscripts from the 9th century to the present day, making it the second largest collection of manuscripts after the Latin-language manuscripts (Clm).

Medieval manuscripts

The approx. 1,450 medieval manuscripts pass on an important selection from the spectrum of intellectual history, religion and literature. The Old High German texts are highly significant. One outstanding example is the "Evangelienharmonie" (Gospel Harmony) by Otfried von Weißenburg (Cgm 14, written at the beginning of the 10th century in Freising). The Bible poem "Heliand" (Cgm 25, written in the middle of the 9th century in Corvey) is an important work from the Old Low German and Old Saxon language areas.

Another focus is on the Middle High German courtly epic. Mention should be made here of Wolfram von Eschenbach's "Parzival" (Cgm 19, c. 1240-1250) and Gottfried von Strassburg's "Tristan" (Cgm 51, c. 1240-1250) or Ulrich Füetrer's "Buch der Abenteuer der Ritter von der Tafelrunde" (Book of the Adventures of the Knights of the Round Table) (Cgm 1) manuscripts. Manuscript A of the "Nibelungenlied" (The Song of the Nibelungs) (Cgm 34, last quarter of the 13th century) and the "Ottheinrich-Bibel" (Ottheinrich Bible) from the 15th century (Cgm 8010) are also famous.

Modern manuscripts

The majority of the manuscripts, a good 80 percent, originate from modern times, i.e. from around 1525 onwards. The "Bayerische Chronik" (Bavarian Chronicle) by Johannes Turmair, called Aventin (1477-1534) (Cgm 1566), the father of Bavarian historiography, was written, for example, during the transitional period.
Among the modern manuscripts are autographs of well-known personalities such as Adalbert Stifter ("Der Nachsommer" ("Indian Summer"), Cgm 8072), Jean Paul ("Selina oder über die Unsterblichkeit der Seele" (Selina, or on the immortality of the soul), Cgm 4831) or Ernst Toller ("Eine Jugend in Deutschland" (A youth in Germany)- Cgm 9192). In addition to manuscripts of his works, it is above all bundles of letters, for example by Carl Spitzweg to Annamaria and Marianna Bronberger and others (Cgm 7946) or the correspondence between Johann Wolfgang von Goethe (1749-1832) and Johann Christian von Mannlich (1740-1822) (Cgm 8524), which have been classified under the Cgm signatures, others can be found in estate subjects or under autograph signatures.

One special feature are the anthologies by the "Zwanglose Gesellschaft" (Cgm 8026), an association of Late Romanticism and Biedermeier Munich poets and scholars, which are mostly illustrated with hand-painted caricatures by Franz Graf von Pocci.

• The German manuscripts at the Bayerische Staatsbibliothek available on bavarikon

>> This collection is part of the holdings of the Bayerische Staatsbibliothek (Bavarian State Library).

To the collections by signature group of the Bayerische Staatsbibliothek