Gesta Hammaburgensis ecclesiae pontificum

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The Gesta Hammaburgensis ecclesiae pontificum (Latin: History of the Archdiocese of Hamburg ) represent one of the most important medieval historical and geographical works of northern Europe . It is possibly also the oldest written source on the discovery of America by the Europeans. The term gesta indicates the claim as a factual report.

The manuscript was probably between about 1070 and about 1076 from the Bremer Domscholaster Adam of Bremen written and supplements (up to about 1081/1085 Scholien provided). At the end of the 16th century a copy was discovered in Sorø Monastery (Denmark). The content was not reviewed until the 19th century.

Components

The work consists of five parts:

  • Liber I  - History of the Archdiocese of Hamburg-Bremen
  • Liber II  - History of the Archdiocese of Hamburg-Bremen
  • Liber III  - Biography of Archbishop Adalbert of Bremen
  • Descriptio insularum aquilonis  - Geography of Northern Europe
  • M. Adami epilogus ad Liemarum episcopum  - adedicatory poem writtenin hexameters to Bishop Liemar of Bremen

It is written in Middle Latin.

meaning

For North German historiography, the text is significant as a detailed description of the history of North Germany up to the 11th century. It presents the disputes between Saxony and Wenden in detail, as well as the disputes between Saxons and Danes (Vikings). One focus is the description of the life and reign of Archbishop Adalbert von Bremen . In addition, the text provides extensive information on the political geography of Northern Germany; he mentions numerous bishoprics and churches, for example Meldorf , Schenefeld , Verden , Pahlen , Ratzeburg . The text is also one of the earliest detailed sources for the Baltic Sea region. Mecklenburg , Oldenburg in Holstein and Jumne are mentioned.

The work is of international importance as the oldest detailed source on the geography of Northern Europe, especially Scandinavia. Adam von Bremen gives the Danish king Sven Estridsson as the source , from whom he was personally informed about the expeditions of the Vikings . The fourth part ( Descriptio insularum aquilonis ) shows the coasts and islands of Scandinavia as well as Greenland and America ( Vinland ).

Recent research

Today the Gesta Hammaburgensis ecclesiae pontificum, as a factual report, has shown considerable errors. The work did not fall into oblivion in the Middle Ages, as was often claimed. It was used by several chroniclers such as Helmold von Bosau and Saxo Grammaticus . Sometimes diplomats and historians assume that the writings are forgeries , the content of which cannot be taken seriously geographically and historically. Regardless of difficult questions about the different manuscripts , the components in all five parts can easily be recognized as fables . For example, Adam calls Skåne the most beautiful province in Denmark. Up there sit a pagan magical people who know such powerful sayings that they run huge whales onto the beach. The Baltic Sea got its name because it stretches like a belt through the Scythian countries to Greece . He turns Estonia into an island where people are sacrificed to dragons . He describes druids as a people of their own. Beyond Sweden you get to the country of women, this land of the Amazons lies between Finland and Estonia. Bearded women lived there with dog-headed children who, instead of speaking, barked. Greenland got its name because the people there looked dark green from the sea. Vinland is an island in the ocean behind which there is no longer any inhabited earth, only ice and night. There at the end of the world a terrible vortex yawned. Some information about the immediate vicinity of Hamburg and Bremen show that the author could not have come far and only rarely from Bremen. The place Hammaburg is praised in the highest tones, although at that time it was probably in ruins. Places are confused with remarkable frequency, for example Ireland with Scotland, Maastricht with Utrecht . Adam von Bremen also swaps Visurgis , the Weser , with Vistula , the Vistula .

According to the researchers, the three different source manuscripts appeared with the debates during the Reformation , in which current findings of this time such as the discovery of America and the astronomical certainties of Copernicus were included. The core message of the Gesta is the assertion that Hamburg had an early archbishopric position and the Archdiocese of Bremen was responsible for mission areas extending beyond the imperial borders, which, however, was controversial at the time of writing.

Tradition history and preserved fragments

Manuscripts and text history

The original manuscript by Adam von Bremen has not survived. There are a total of 22 different copies, the oldest of which is dated to around 1100.

The reconstructions used today are based on the editions of Georg Waitz and in particular Bernhard Schmeidler , whose division of the source manuscripts into versions A, B and C is still valid today. According to Schmeidler, there were three versions that came from Adam von Bremen himself: his working version (A), the work that he gave to Archbishop Liemar (a) and a copy (X) that he kept and in which he added additions ( scholia ) entered. None of the original versions have been preserved.

The most important manuscript - version A - is ÖNB Vienna, cod. 521 (A1), which is said to date from the first half of the 13th century and is kept in the Austrian National Library (formerly: Vienna Court Library). The Codex Vossianus Latinus, VLQ 123 - kept in the Leiden University Library - from around 1100 contains seven chapters of the second book as well as the fourth book including the Scholia. Important Version A manuscripts are the Copenhagen Codex and two copies in the Hamburg State Archives.

According to Schmeidler's text analyzes, the manuscripts of versions B and C are derived from version X, but contain different scholia. Version B includes Codex z, which was created in 1161/1162 in the Cistercian monastery Sorö (Zealand, Denmark) and which fell victim to a fire in the University Library of Copenhagen in 1728. Some copies of this codex have survived. Version C manuscripts are derived from another copy of Version X. The Copenhagen Royal Library has manuscripts C1 and C3. The latter, the fragment NKS 1463 2, a parchment waste , probably dates from the 14th century. It consists of a single sheet of parchment measuring 28.5 × 21.3 cm. It contains parts of the first book. This fragment was used as a cover sheet for bills from Nyborg Prefecture for 1628.

Print versions

The oldest printed text version - based on the now lost manuscript C2 - was printed by Erpold Lindenberg in 1595. Reprints were made in his Scriptores rerum septentrionalium in 1609 and 1630. Joachim Johannes Mader (Helmstedt) published a revised version in 1670, which was reprinted in 1706 by JA Fabricius in Hamburg. The fourth book was published by Johannes Messinus in Stockholm in 1615 and by Stephanus Johannes Stephanius in Leiden in 1629.

The oldest critical edition comes from Johann Martin Lappenberg from 1846. It is based on the manuscript A1 and was published in the MGH series Scriptores rerum Germanicarum . In 1876 Georg Waitz published a revision of the Lappenberg edition. The edition, which is still current today, comes from Bernhard Schmeidler and was first published in 1917 in the MGH series Scriptores rerum Germanicarum. Reprints followed in 1977 and 1993.

The oldest translation of a part of the text comes from Johan Fredrich Peringskiöld, who translated the fourth part into Swedish in the 18th century. Carsten Miesegaes published the first German translation in Bremen in 1825 .

Editions

Original Latin text

German translation

literature

  • Linda Kalhjundi: Waiting for the Barbarians: the imagery, dynamics and functions of the Other in Northern German missionary chronicles, 11th-early 13th centuries: the Gestae hammaburgensis ecclesiae pontificum of Adam of Bremen, Chronica Slavorum of Helmold of Bosau, Chronica Slavorum of Arnold of Lübeck, and Chronicon Livoniae of Henry of Livonia. PhD thesis, Tartu 2005 digitized

Web links

Remarks

  1. ^ Gerhard Theuerkauf: Forgery of documents of the Archdiocese of Hamburg-Bremen from the 9th to the 12th century . In: Lower Saxony Yearbook for State History . Vol. 60, 1988, ISSN  0078-0561 , pp. 71-140.
  2. ^ Michael Bellmann: Pöschendorf. The primeval Christian village in Holstein? , Itzehoe 2015, ISBN 978-3-00-047773-7
  3. ↑ Archive link ( Memento of the original from May 18, 2015 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.  @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www-user.uni-bremen.de
  4. ↑ Bernhard Schmeidler (Ed.): Scriptores rerum Germanicarum in usum scholarum separatim editi 2: Adam von Bremen, Hamburgische Kirchengeschichte (Magistri Adam Bremensis Gesta Hammaburgensis ecclesiae pontificum) . Hanover 1917 (Monumenta Germaniae Historica, digitized version)
  5. ↑ Volker Scior: The own and the foreign: Identity and foreignness in the chronicles of Adam von Bremen, Helmolds von Bosau and Arnolds von Lübeck ( Orbis Mediaevalis. Imaginary worlds of the Middle Ages , Volume 4), Akademie Verlag 2002, p. 36
  6. ↑ Linda Kalhjundi: Waiting for the Barbarians (PDF; 2.0 MB)
  7. ↑ Volker Scior: The own and the foreign: Identity and foreignness in the chronicles of Adam von Bremen, Helmolds von Bosau and Arnolds von Lübeck ( Orbis Mediaevalis. Imaginary worlds of the Middle Ages , Volume 4), Akademie Verlag 2002, p. 31
  8. ↑ List of the received manuscripts ( Memento of the original from December 22, 2011 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. @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / library.msstate.edu
  9. ^ Digitized by cod. 521 Austrian National Library
  10. ^ Information from the Austrian National Library
  11. ↑ Information on the fragment NKS 1463 2 ° and illustration of the Royal Library of Copenhagen