Conferences

The interdisciplinary conference will focus on two formally similar, vividly illuminated manuscripts of the genre Biblia pauperum (Poor People's Bible) in the Gotha Research Library (Memb. I 54) and in the Thuringian University and State Library in Jena (Ms. El. f. 51b). The Jena copy, dated 1462, was produced in Lower Bavaria. The Gotha copy clearly arose in the same chronological and topographical context. Both belong to a group of 68 surviving manuscripts from the 14th and 15th centuries in which events from the Old and New Testaments are typologically related. 

Of course, these two manuscripts have not escaped the attention of researchers, but apart from being catalogued in the relevant manuscript catalogues, they have mostly only been touched upon. Central aspects such as the background to the production and the technical examination of the manuscripts, their location in late medieval book illumination, the sometimes strikingly different iconography in the two sister manuscripts, the script and the text versions have not yet been examined.

The conference will bring together experts in late medieval book culture and intellectual history who will discuss questions of provenance history, palaeography, text and art history as well as the history of the reception of this widespread book type.

Illustrations: ‘Birth of Christ’, flanked by the Old Testament scenes ‘Moses and the burning bush’, ‘Aaron and the greening rod’, ‘Prophets’