Historical-critical Edition of the Correspondence between Christian Wolff and Ernst Christoph Count of Manteuffel

• Applicant: Professor Dr. Jürgen Stolzenberg
• Subject Area: History of Philosophy ; Early Modern History ; History of Science
• Term: from 2010 to 2017
• Project identifier: Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG) - Project number 182659556

Christian Wolffs printed works have been edited by Jean Ecole (and others) since 1965 et seqq. (Georg Olms-publishing house, Hildesheim), which makes them easily accessible now for scholarly research. This however is not the case with the letters of Christian Wolff. On the contrary, Wolffs correspondence is still a terra incognita within Enlightenment-research. The projected critical edition of the Wolff-Manteuffel-correspondence, which is the most comprehensive of Wolffs entire correspondence, is meant to be a first step to explore the above-mentioned terra incognita.Wolffs correspondence with Ernst Christoph Count of Manteuffel comprises 488 letters, written between 1738 and 1748, and is preserved almost completely in the Library of the University of Leipzig. The exchange of letters between Wolff and Manteuffel gives a detailed insight into the late years of Wolff and into the political, philosophical, and theological debates in which Wolff and Manteuffel were involved. More importantly, since the Wolff-Manteuffel-correspondence is at the core of the Wolffian network and hence plays an important role for disseminating Wolffs statements and ideas in the 1730ies and 1740ies, Wolffs and Manteuffels letters help to understand how enligthened social, political, and scientifical networks functioned in the first half of the 18th century.

• DFG Programme: Research Grants
• Participating Person: Professor Dr. Detlef Döring