Arnold Birckmann

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Arnold Birckmann (* in Hinsbeck ; † April 28, 1541 in Cologne ) was a German bookseller and - together with his brother Franz Birckmann  - the founder of a Cologne bookseller family at the time of humanism . He was acquainted with Erasmus from Rotterdam .

life and work

Arnold Birckmann has been in Cologne since 1508 : on December 29, 1510 he was enrolled in the law faculty of the University of Cologne . On December 29, 1511 Arnold and his older brother Franz Birckmann bought the Blankenburg house in Cologne, which was later named after the signet of the bookseller family ( sub pingui gallina = under the fat hen). The street where the family settled is still called Unter Fettenhennen today . Arnold was granted citizenship in Cologne as early as 1522.

The regional book trade was initially the responsibility of Arnold Birckmann, while Franz was responsible for international relations. In 1512 the company had trade relations with the Netherlands, France and England.

With their book trade, the Birckmanns opened up sales markets in north-western Europe in particular. Between 1515 and 1526 the family had a permanent branch in Antwerp . Book exports to England were established through this place, where the Birckmann family was one of the dominant booksellers in the time of Renaissance humanism .

Arnold was responsible for the family's London office between 1515 and 1518 and the head office in Cologne from 1519 to 1523. In 1525 he founded his own bookshop in Cologne, independent of his brother. In 1530, after the death of his brother, he succeeded in taking full ownership of the company. In 1535 Arnold Birckmann was on a business trip in London and witnessed the executions of Thomas More and John Fisher . When he died in 1541, as Hermann von Weinsberg notes, he was a wealthy man.

After his death his widow Agnes continued the business until 1561, where she continued the three shops in Cologne, Antwerp and London. From the beginning of the 50s, the company operated under the name "Arnold Birckmann's Erben" with the takeover of the business by Arnold Birckmann's sons: Arnold the Younger (born November 2, 1523) and Johann Birckmann (born February 9, 1527), who in one Released over 100 works over a period of 20 years. In 1585 the Birckmann name became extinct when the company passed to Arnold Mylius from Antwerp , a long-time employee of the house who was married into the Birckmann family.

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Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Oliver Duntze: Publishing book trade and distributing book trade from the invention of the printing press to 1700 . In: Ursula Rautenberg (Ed.): Book Studies in Germany. A manual . De Gruyter Saur, Berlin / New York 2010, pages 201-256. E-book ISBN 978-3-11-021192-4 , print edition ISBN 978-3-11-020036-2 , doi: 10.1515 / 9783110211924.201
  2. ^ Peter G Bietenholz, Thomas B. Deutscher: Contemporaries of Erasmus: a bibliographical register of the Renaissance and Reformation , Volumes 1–3. University of Toronto Press, Toronto / Buffalo / London 1985, reprint 1995, ISBN 0-8020-2507-2 . GoogleBooks
  3. ^ Friedrich Kapp: History of the German Book Trade Volume 1, p. 299 . Publishers of the German Publishers and Booksellers Association, Leipzig 1886. Full-text edition on Wikisource in DjVu format
  4. ^ Wolfgang Schmitz: The transmission of German texts in Cologne book printing of the 15th and 16th centuries . ( Memento of the original from July 1, 2007 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. (PDF) Philos. Faculty of the University of Cologne, 1990 (habilitation thesis) @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / kups.ub.uni-koeln.de
  5. ↑ on Johann see his biography in the New German Biography
  6. ↑ Rudolf Schmidt (1902–1908): German booksellers German book printers. Contributions to a company history of the German book industry. 1st to 6th vol . Berlin: Verlag der Buchdruckerei Franz Weber (later: Eberswalde: Verlag von Rudolf Schmidt)
personal data
SURNAME Birckmann, Arnold
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Birckman, Arnold; Birkmann, Arnold
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German bookseller and Renaissance humanist
DATE OF BIRTH 15th century or 16th century
PLACE OF BIRTH Hinsbeck
DATE OF DEATH April 28, 1541
Place of death Cologne