Digitisation and cataloging of the parchment manuscripts of the Heilsbronn monastery library

• Applicant: Konstanze Söllner
• Subject Area: History of Science
• Term: from 2021 to 2024
• Project identifier: Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG) - Project number 462491249

In the 24-month project, 238 of the 265 remaining volumes of parchment manuscripts of the Heilsbronn monastery library are to be indexed bibliographically and in terms of content and structure. Furthermore, they are to be digitised according to the respective conservation requirements and in accordance with the DFG's rules of practice on high-resolution camera-based scanning systems of the university library.Heilsbronn is the rare case of an almost completely preserved monastery library, which shaped the spiritual life in the Franconian region for centuries and, after secularisation, still served as a princely school for the young civil servants of the Hohenzollern margraviates of Bayreuth and Ansbach. The collection consists of 413 Latin parchment manuscripts, 168 Latin paper manuscripts as well as 5 German parchment manuscripts and 8 German paper manuscripts. Among the manuscripts planned for the project are patristic literature, philosophical works, treatises on scholasticism, sermons, including many by Bernhard of Clairvaux, homiletics, manuscripts on canonical and secular law, ancient classics, works on grammar, historical writings, legends of saints and biographies as well as medical or scientific manuscripts and own works of Heilsbronn monks.By the end of the project, the digitised titles will be referenced both in the central manuscript portal and via the Bavarian Union Catalogue with the Gateway Bayern portal and the local catalogue of the University Library Erlangen-Nürnberg. They will also be visualised via the OAI interface in the DFG Viewer and referenced in the DDB and the Europeana. The descriptions available in older catalogues are checked for each individual manuscript and revised on the basis of the available research documentation. This information, which is updated using the inventory list procedure and in accordance with DFG guidelines for cataloguing manuscripts, forms the basis for the short catalogue recordings to be produced in the library catalogues and is also made available to the scientific community via OAI interfaces in the standardised formats MARCxml, METS/TEI and IIIF for subsequent use.

• DFG Programme: Cataloguing and Digitisation (Scientific Library Services and Information Systems)
• Co-Investigator: Jutta Faust