bavarikon4UTreasures in the Hofbibliothek Aschaffenburg
Some specimens of the small but important Aschaffenburg collection of manuscripts and incunabulum collection are presented with this selection in bavarikon. These include 33 cimelia in 35 volumes from the Hofbibliothek Aschaffenburg, which is located in Schloss Johannisburg.
Some of the Hofbibliothek Aschaffenburg's holdings date back to the Mainz cathedral library and the private collection of the Archbishop and Elector of Mainz, Friedrich Karl Joseph von Erthal (1774-1802). These include special pieces such as the Fulda feast day lectern (last third of the 10th century), the Mainz gospels (mid-13th century), the Missale Hallense (early 16th century) and a Gutenberg Bible (ca. 1452). The 58 manuscripts in total are partly from famous schools of art (Fulda, Mainz, Nuremberg, Florence, etc.), some of them were originally in the private possession of the Archbishop of Magdeburg and Mainz Cardinal Albrecht von Brandenburg (1490-1545). The 162 incunabula include 52 prints from Mainz, of which two can be attributed to Johannes Gutenberg (1394/99-1468) and 36 to Johann Fust (um 1400-1466) and Peter Schöffer (1435-1503).
In 1794 the valuable Mainz holdings were finally transferred to Schloss Johannisburg in Aschaffenburg before the advancing French revolutionary army. After changing ownership in 1803 and 1810, the library was incorporated into the Kingdom of Bavaria in 1814 and was already open to the public in 1818.
>> This collection is part of the holdings of the Hofbibliothek Aschaffenburg (Court Library Aschaffenburg).