Association and Institute for East Bavarian Local History Research

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The Association and Institute for East Bavarian Local History Research were founded in Passau in 1926 and have their headquarters there to this day. Carl Sittler , Max Heuwieser and Rudolf Guby contributed significantly to its establishment .

As a regional historical research institute, the institute is primarily dedicated to the history and culture of the East Bavarian region (including the neighboring areas of Bohemia and Upper Austria). It is supported in many ways by the association. In 2008 the Institute for East Bavarian Local History was converted into an institute for cultural research in East Bavaria and the neighboring regions . However, this did not change anything about the cooperation with the association.

history

founding

Eastern Bavaria in 1619

The 1920s were a time of great love for the homeland, which spread throughout Central Europe , especially after the end of the First World War in 1918 . The Bavarian-Austrian-Bohemian border region was swept away by this, because it was here that the enthusiasm for home "found its natural and powerful hold in the revived consciousness of a tribal-based cultural community of the East Bavarians , founded over a thousand years of history . which was also unable to separate political borders. ”As early as 1920, consideration was given to founding a large local study group, which should have its headquarters in Passau . Following this line of thought, numerous homeland and history associations came together and the first Inn and Salzach association was formed, but in Braunau and not, as originally planned, in Passau. This association included the historical associations of Schärding , Ried , Braunau, Salzburg , Burghausen , Pfarrkirchen , Rotthalmünster and Passau. Many more should follow.

At around the same time, the idea of ​​setting up an institute at the local Philosophical-Theological University in Passau that would carry out well-founded, scientific local research and thus strengthen local history work in general was raised. First Rudolf Guby expressed this idea - and went on to say at the same time "a register of court to be written club to sponsor and promote [the Institute] to start." In Max Heuwieser and Mayor Carl Sittler he was energetic with this idea and find influential friends forever.

At the suggestion and instigation of these three personalities, eight personalities gathered on August 11, 1926 in the rooms of the Passauer Stadtsparkasse in Ludwigstrasse: The hour of birth of the association that was to be named "Association for East Bavarian Local Research". Logically, Passau was chosen as the seat of the association , from now on definitely one of the centers of local history work in Eastern Bavaria. An act of strength by the newly elected board of directors of the association - Carl Sittler, chairman; Max Heuwieser , Deputy Chairman; Max Zenker, Secretary; Thomas Bihler, Treasurer - it is thanks to us that we were able to quickly create a solid financial basis totaling 7200 Reichsmarks (4000 RM from the State of Bavaria , 2000 RM from the Lower Bavarian District Council, 700 RM from Berlin , 500 RM from the City of Passau) . This made it possible to found the institute originally intended, as its director Max Heuwieser.

Suspension and reconstitution

During the Second World War , the association was forced to stop its activities more and more. After the surrender in 1945, he was even temporarily suspended by order of the US military government . According to this order, the association should even have been dissolved, but this could be prevented by the "external inactivity [...] of its members" at the time.

After the end of the Second World War , both the institute and the association initially seemed almost as if swept from the scene. The institute started its work very slowly and in a very limited way. At the club, on the other hand, things looked even gloomier: it was only through the lectures on the medieval history of Passau that Josef Oswald put together in the winter semesters of 1946/47 and 1947/48 to breathe new life into it, so to speak. In order to show the association members that there is still an association, Oswald has sent them a small (Christmas) gift every year since 1946. The successful effect of these deeds was evident in 1949 at the latest, when it was finally possible to reconstitute the association. On February 8th of that year, at the first general meeting after the war, a new board was elected: Carl Sittler was confirmed as first chairman and Rector Otto Geyer was elected second chairman. The club and institute finally got through the difficult times of World War II and the first post-war years .

In addition to the "New Publications of the Institute for East Bavarian Homeland Research" (which had existed since 1951), Josef Oswald also succeeded in reissuing the " East Bavarian Border Marks " in 1957, thereby achieving one of his greatest goals, which he had been pursuing since 1945.

Nationalization of the institute

The great turning point in the history of the association and institute finally came in the first years of the 1960s. In 1960 the previously private institute was affiliated to the Philosophical-Theological University of Passau as a state institute. Since then, the association and the institute have actually been two independent institutions that are theoretically only linked by their common concerns. The background to the nationalization, especially promoted by Josef Oswald, was the goal of opening up the greatest possible financial resources for the institute - in other words: the "backing" of the institute's work by the Bavarian state . Both the association and the Philosophical-Theological College promoted Oswald's idea. Three years later the second major event, but this time in a tragic way: On February 22nd, 1963, the first chairman, Carl Sittler, dies after having largely determined the fate of the association for 37 years. Emil Brichta is elected as his successor . In 1978, with the establishment of the University of Passau , the university institute finally became an institution of the same. It is thus divided into the following different sections: Ancient History, Medieval History, Modern History, Church History, Legal History, Art History and Folklore. The professors of these chairs form the so-called institute conference.

Foundation of the Oswald Ring

In 1980, on the occasion of Josef Oswald's 80th birthday, the association donated the “Oswald-Ring” award. This ring is awarded for life and the wearer determines his worthy successor himself in his will. His first wearer, namesake Josef Oswald, is "with this unique honor [...] [for] the outstanding and immortal merits [...] in researching the past of the East Bavarian area ”. His successors as bearers of the Oswald-Ring are Emil Brichta (1984) and Franz Mader (1997). A side anecdote: Brichta initially had two other candidates to whom he wanted to bequeath the ring: August Leidl († 1994) and Gottfried Schäffer († 1984); However, Brichta survived both of them.

Overview of other events

Other events to be noted in the history of the association are the changes - and thus modernizations - of the original association statutes from 1926, among others in the years 1965, 1976 and 1987 by the general assembly. Since 1984/85 there has been a third chairman in addition to the two previous chairmen. The necessity of this post had been demonstrated with the death of Gottfried Schäffers. In 2003 the association also donated a “Young Talent Prize”, which has been awarded annually since then for scientific work with a regional historical focus. In 2005 the “ East Bavarian border stamps ” appear for the first time with their new name: “ Passauer Jahrbuch ”.

Membership development of the association

When the club in 1938 - the year of the connection of Austria to the German Reich - celebrated its twelve year anniversary, he counted 95 members. After the Second World War , an extremely difficult time for the club, it had 145 members. Then a rapid increase began: The starting value for 1938 had almost tripled by 1958. Under Brichta the association grew from 320 (1963) to 1090 (1980) members. Especially since the 80s, the association has also lost more and more members due to old age. After the peak in 1986/87 with 1169 members, the number of members fell almost every year and has leveled off at around the thousand mark since the beginning of the 1990s at the latest. Nevertheless, the Association for East Bavarian Local History Research calls itself Passau 's largest cultural association in terms of numbers.

Association chairman and institute director

The legacy of the first two board members of the association or the institute, Carl Sittler and Max Heuwieser, came to Emil Brichta in 1963 and Anton Mayer-Pfannholz in 1944; they in turn have been followed by several other board members to this day, as the graphic clearly shows. They were:

Work of the association and institute

Scientific and cultural engagement

The most important tasks of the institute are clearly outlined in the memorandum on the expansion of the same. There it says, among other things, that the institute must offer advice and help as well as the necessary training to all interested parties - scientists and laypeople alike. The institute performs this task (s) primarily in the form of scientific publications and lectures. How diverse the latter in particular are can be read , for example, in the Ostbairischen Grenzmarken VIII / 1966 (p. 312f.).

The association supports the institute in its commitment. Every year he offers two excursions and possibly art-historical tours that complement the institute's program of events in every respect. Similar to the institute, one of the greatest goals of the association is to impart knowledge about (regional) history and to arouse interest in this area. The association is therefore also a publisher - not only of the Passauer Jahrbuch (formerly East Bavarian border brands ). Here, too, he is working again with the institute, which acts as the publisher of the yearbook. In addition, the association takes part in home days, symposia and civic festivals and has been awarding a young talent award for a few years now. In order to fulfill its obligations as best as possible, the association is a member of both the Association of Bavarian History Associations and the entire association of German History and Antiquity Associations, Cologne .

An overview of the most important research findings

Apart from this scientific and cultural commitment, the institute also carries out its work as a research institution. All in all, the publications and thus the research of the institute cover a large period of time - topics are dealt with starting with the Roman era (or even earlier) up to the 20th century. So there are no limits in this regard. The only thing that all of the institute’s work has in common that can be discovered immediately is, of course, the restriction to the “East Bavaria” area with a concentration point around Passau . A strikingly large number of works deal with the Passau clergy and especially the (prince) bishops and the Passau bishopric . But at least it is "the task of the association [...] to also research the history of the city of Passau while integrating it into the overall history."

Two of the more important and also more recent research projects of the association therefore also deal with the topic of " Passau ":

First of all, the institute had been compiling a collection of medieval and early modern Passau inscriptions since 1988 , which until recently was available to the Inscription Commission in Munich for assessment and review. The basis for the project was the preliminary work that had already been done by Högg, who spent some time cataloging the inscriptions. All of the inscriptions of the Passau area (for example grave or building inscriptions as well as high water markings, etc.) from the 11th to the 17th century were recorded. This project, which was subsidized by the employment office, is about to be finalized and published in 2006 (after several delays).

Second, the related and already completed works “History of the City of Passau” and (as an addition) “Passau: Sources on City History” (both published by Pustet-Verlag Regensburg ). The two projects are current on the history of Passau, starting with the first traces of the Romans and early Christians in the region up to the founding of the university in 1972 and beyond. The exact planning of this large and long overdue project had been busy since 1993/94. The scope and main topics of the work were discussed at several institute conferences, after which the work was carried out until 1999 to create this work, which - as the first in a long time - deals again in detail with the city's history. Due to the great public reception, a second, updated edition followed in 2003 and the supplement “Sources on City History” in 2004. The employees of the institute have created something that (according to a brochure of the association) "should give those interested in history direct access to the testimonies of the past [...] and at the same time allow an insight into the work of the historian."

Publications

Passau yearbook

See: Passauer Jahrbuch .

New publications from the institute

The first publication in the series “New Publications of the Institute for East Bavarian Homeland Research” appeared in 1951. At that time, the association did not yet have a publication organ, because the “ East Bavarian border stamps ” were only brought back to life in 1957. Because of the lack of money, one could not think of monthly journals, yearbooks or other collections for the time being - and so they looked for an alternative to make the research results public. In the series, works from various disciplines with a regional focus were published. From 1957 on, the series can also be seen as a supplement to the “East Bavarian border stamps”. The current publications in this series are the “Ostbairischen Lebensbilder”, Volume 1 and Volume 2 (Dietmar Klinger Verlag, Passau).

swell

  1. ^ A b August Leidl: 50 years association and institute for East Bavarian local history research in Passau. In: East Bavarian border marks. Vol. 18, 1976, pp. 5-6.
  2. ^ Josef Oswald: 40 years association and institute for East Bavarian homeland research. In: East Bavarian border marks. Vol. 8, 1966, pp. 299-p. 306, here, p. 299.
  3. ^ Marianne Sporer: Prelate Professor Dr. Josef Oswald 80 years. In: East Bavarian border marks. Vol. 22, 1980, p. 159.
  4. ↑ Ingeborg Moosbauer: Chronicle 1992/1993. In: East Bavarian border marks. 35, 1993, p. 243ff.

literature

  • August Leidl: Prelate Professor Dr. theol. Josef Oswald 1900–1984. In: East Bavarian border marks. Vol. 26, 1984, ISSN  0078-6845 , pp. 5-15.
  • August Leidl: Even Berlin paid 700 Reichsmarks when it was founded. In: Passauer Neue Presse from August 5, 1991.
  • Memorandum about the expansion of the institute for Ostbair. Local research at the Phil.-Theol. University of Passau. In: East Bavarian border marks. Vol. 8, 1966, pp. 303-305.
  • Reinhold Plenk: History and local research in Passau. In: More beautiful home. Vol. 80, No. 2, 1991, ISSN  0177-4492 , pp. 91-92.
  • Marianne Sporer: Lord Mayor Dr. Emil Brichta 65 years. In: East Bavarian border marks. 12, 1980, pp. 159f.

Web links

Chairwoman of the Association for East Bavarian Local History Research

Carl Sittler  | Emil Brichta  | Gottfried Schäffer  | Emil Brichta  | Reinhold Plenk | Helmut Boehm

Directors of the Institute for Cultural Research in Eastern Bavaria and the neighboring regions

Franz-Reiner Erkens