Norm und Diversität. Ästhetisches Aushandeln in der Vormoderne

Edited by Sarah Dessì Schmid and Sandra Linden
De Gruyter | 2026 [in print]
Andere Ästhetik – Koordinaten 4

Abstract: The volume considers pre-modern phenomena of norm and deviation as dynamic negotiations of the aesthetic and as an aesthetic negotiation. Although every norm aims to be generally valid and applicable, there is always a plurality of norms and their claim to validity is reflected in diverse practices and repeatedly opened up to debate. The contributions document discussions from the intersectional sub-project ‘Norm and Diversity’ of the Tübingen CRC 1391 Different Aesthetics.

Link: about the book on the publisher’s page

Theorie als Kunstpraxis. Asger Jorns ‚Andere Ästhetik‘

Klaus Müller-Wille
Edited by Annette Gerok-Reiter and Stefanie Gropper
Tübingen University Press | 2026
Special Lectures – Andere Ästhetik 4

Abstract: In his analysis of the work of Danish artist Asger Jorn (1914–1973), Klaus Müller-Wille explores various aspects of a praxeological aesthetics in the production and reflection of 20th-century art. In doing so, Müller-Wille builds on the research programme of the Collaborative Research Centre Different Aesthetics, revealing points of contact between premodern and modern approaches. One key aspect of this is how Jorn translates his theoretical positions directly into his aesthetic practices, by using a resolutely material approach of writing, designing and printing to create his artistic book-artefacts. The special lectures of the Collaborative Research Centre 1391 Different Aesthetics serve as a basis for discussing aesthetic questions. The lectures correlate to and confront the centre’s research programme with current disciplinary and interdisciplinary approaches to and debates on art and aesthetics. In doing so, they prompt the development of further, critical or new perspectives from a wide variety of angles.

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Curare und Delectare. Studien zu Quellen der Bade- und Kurmusik im deutschsprachigen Raum der Frühen Neuzeit (1450–1750)

Lorenz Adamer
De Gruyter | 2025
Andere Ästhetik – Studien 9

Abstract: This volume explores balneo-musical spaces of communication and interaction in the early modern era (1450–1750), examining performative and reflective aspects of music in a bathing context. The study will begin with bath and spa music as a social practice (heterological dimension), reflecting on its implementation between applied dietetics, artistic practice, social communication and theory. Subsequently, it will observe the inherent musical logic (autological dimension) by presenting forms, genres and institutional manifestations of bath and spa music within the dynamic interplay of curare and delectare, narratio and moralisatio. An analysis of textual and musical sources from the German-speaking world of the early modern era reveals a new interdisciplinary understanding of bath and spa music in its functional implementation as well as its aesthetic potential.

Link: about the book on the publisher’s page

Bade- und Kurmusik. Musicobalneologische Streiflichter

Edited by Lorenz Adamer, Claudius Hille and Thomas Schipperges
De Gruyter | 2025
Andere Ästhetik – Studien 8

Abstract: In the context of bathing, music can be made and listened to, highly valued or outright banned. Used in applied diatetics, artistic practice, social communication and theoretical reflection, bath and spa music spans the realms of entertainment (musica homines laetificat), therapy (musica aegrotos sanat) and even spiritual salvation (spiritual bathing songs) and Vanitas assemblages (e.g. about jesters making music). This volume casts light on forms, genres, institutional manifestations and artistic reflections of bath and spa music. As such, it represents the first comprehensive collection of research on musico-balneology. It traces the development of bath and spa music from the medieval period up until around 1800, with a specific focus on the 16^th to 18^th centuries. This overview is enhanced by an outlook into the modern era.

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singen unde sagen. Qualitative und quantitative Studien zum ästhetischen Wortschatz der Vormoderne

Edited by Manuel Braun, Marion Darilek and Annette Gerok-Reiter
De Gruyter | 2025
Andere Ästhetik – Studien 10

Abstract: The vocabulary with which premodern texts seek to describe the contexts of their origin, composition, or reception is key to understanding the aesthetic from a historical perspective. In accordance with the research programme of the CRC Different Aesthetics, the articles of this volume investigate how aesthetic semantics in medieval and early modern texts engage with both the autological, formative and the heterological, pragmatic dimensions of acts and artefacts. The hypothesis is that this connection may reveal the distinctive character of the premodern aesthetic lexicon. This assumption will be tested in case studies that offer new perspectives in two ways: firstly, the historical-semantic explorations of aesthetic vocabulary are carried out across a broad spectrum of sources, including non-literary, informational texts. Secondly, methodologically oriented studies consider how approaches in the Digital Humanities can advance the discovery of an aesthetic lexicon. Thus, qualitative and quantitative approaches to the premodern aesthetic lexicon come together in a productive way.

Link: about the book on the publisher’s page

The Poetics of Greek Ekphrasis. From the Hellenistic Period to Late Antiquity

Edited by Matthew Chaldekas and Irmgard Männlein
De Gruyter | 2025
Trends in Classics. Supplementary Volume 194

Abstract: This volume examines the literary figure of ekphrasis with a particular focus on its role in an overarching poetic or artistic design. As a literary phenomenon with roots in the earliest Greek poetry, ekphrasis has been traditionally defined as Kunstbeschreibung (‘art description’). Recent scholarship has challenged this definition and broadened it to extend beyond descriptions of artworks and beyond poetic contexts. Nevertheless, ekphrasis retains the basic outline of a sensory, especially visual, experience translated into words. As such it invites an audience to engage with a real or imagined object and to reflect on the text-as-object and its artistic construction. The sensory element of ancient ekphrasis allows this literary device to raise questions of perception and cognition, as well as materiality, spatiality, and aesthetics. The papers in this volume engage with a variety of texts and objects which shed new light on the special relationship between ekphrasis and poetry, ekphrasis and art. The material covered here ranges from the Hellenistic period, where ekphrasis experienced its great efflorescence, to Late Antiquity, and it will be of interest to literary scholars, art historians, and archaeologists.

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Textualität, Medialität, Performativität. Zur ästhetischen Energie mittelalterlicher Lyrik. Beiträge zum Festcolloquium für Annette Gerok-Reiter am 28. Mai 2022 in Tübingen

Edited by Marion Darilek, Jan Stellmann and Isabell Väth
De Gruyter | 2025
Andere Ästhetik – Studien 17

Abstract: Textuality, mediality and performativity are central parameters for researching medieval lyricism. This volume unites them as measures of ‘aesthetic energy’, thus furthering a concept developed by Annette Gerok-Reiter, in conjunction with her 60^th birthday. Susanne Köbele, Almut Suerbaum, Franz-Josef Holznagel and Alexander Rudolph / Tristan Marqruardt explore the aesthetic energy of medieval lyricism in their nuanced analyses.

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Plinius Oggi – Heute – Aujourd’hui

Edited by Eva Falaschi, Stefania Cecere, Valérie Naas, Gianfranco Adornato and Anja Wolkenhauer
Villa Vigoni Editore | 2025

Abstract: This multilingual anthology emerged from the international conference cycle Pliny the Elder, Nature and Us: Transmit, Preserve, Admire (2023–2025) in Villa Vigoni. It introduces rich and readable passages from the most extensive surviving natural history collection from antiquity. Pliny is currently celebrating his 2000^th birthday, but his observations on humans and nature remain as inspiring as ever.

Reine Sprache? Privatbriefe als Quellen des Französischen im 17. Jahrhundert

Katharina Fezer
De Gruyter | 2025
Andere Ästhetik – Studien 13

Abstract: The history of language is often written solely on the basis of the testimonies from population groups holding political and literary power. In seventeenth-century France, for example, it was the writings of courtly literary circles that survived and are therefore easily accessible today. As these circles were involved in debates about linguistic purism, their works almost entirely conform to the linguistic norms of their time. This study, for the first time, takes into account additional sources produced by other social groups that can be classified as conceptually oral. It examines the language of handwritten private letters from various archives that have not yet been analysed linguistically. Additionally, it draws upon model letters from guides to letter writing. Particular focus is given to the linguistic features mentioned in language-standardising works of the period, such as grammars and remarques (linguistic commentaries). This reveals the extent to which linguistic theory coincides with linguistic practice. Furthermore, it considers the influence of factors unrelated to language, such as the writers' level of education. By doing so, the study provides a more nuanced portrayal of linguistic reality in seventeenth-century France.

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Transformationsästhetiken. Über die verwandelnde Kraft von Kunst

Erika Fischer-Lichte
Edited by Annette Gerok-Reiter and Anna Pawlak
Tübingen University Press | 2025
Special Lectures – Andere Ästhetik 3

Abstract: Drawing on European and non-European performative acts with reference to relevant theoretical concepts, this article by Erika Fischer pursues ‘aesthetics of transformation’ and their potential to form identity and impact society. Upon this basis, she uses a literary and dramaturgical perspective to argue for a modified understanding of the ‘aesthetic’ – one which closely connects to the praxeological model of the CRC 1391 Different Aesthetics.

Link: about the book on the publisher’s page

Zwischen Hexenhammer und Faustbuch. Religiöses Wissen und ästhetische Reflexion in der deutschen Literatur der Frühen Neuzeit

Paula Furrer
De Gruyter | 2025
Andere Ästhetik – Studien 18

Abstract: The demonological literature that arises during the early modern witch trials systematises religious knowledge of various origins and condenses it into short stories with an exemplary function. This study firstly enquires into how demonological treatises adopt narrative methods and literary forms. Secondly, it examines the extent to which literary texts integrate religious knowledge from demonologies into their narration. The aesthetic potential of demonic illusion is of central importance in this study. This potential is negotiated within demonology and literary texts in both discursive and narrative ways. Beginning with the Malleus Maleficarum (1486/87), this work traces the topic over a period of one hundred years through exemplary texts from Hans Sachs, Johann Weyer, Jean Bodin and Johann Fischart, among others, and following D. Johann Fausten’s Historia (1587) as a structuring reference. The literary studies perspective shows the significance of formal knowledge for early modern discourse on demonology and outlines a different history of aesthetic illusion which is presented not through its inherently self-reflexive, artistic dimension but rather based on its demonic origins.

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Ästhetik und Gebrauchstexte. Über die ‚Leimrute‘ des Autonomie-Paradigmas

Annette Gerok-Reiter
Chronos | 2025
Mediävistische Perspektiven 18

Abstract: In academic discourse, there has been a prevailing consensus that categories derived from aesthetic autonomy are not adequately informative when it comes to describing and evaluating pre-modern acts and artefacts, which are clearly embedded in contexts of everyday life. If, however, criteria often associated with paradigms of aesthetic autonomy – such as an awareness of fictionality, auto-referentiality, and self-reflection or independence from external provisions – are not effective in judging an object’s aesthetic value (or not predominantly so), what alternative criteria are to be adopted? Informational, nonliterary texts (Gebrauchstexte), which are anchored in contexts of practical use and take on pragmatic functions, can aid in the search for answers to this question. Such texts lead to precisely that neuralgic area which scholarship has long sought to integrate into its research of aesthetics, and which is difficult to capture methodologically: the field of interaction between an artefact and the lived world. Additionally, dealing with informational texts may help reveal persistent misunderstandings in the discussion about aesthetic autonomy or heteronomy. Finally, the issue of informational texts can help trace the contribution German Medieval studies has historically made to this discussion, and to develop it further.

Different Aesthetics. Principles – Questions – Perspectives

Edited by Annette Gerok-Reiter, Jörg Robert, Matthias Bauer and Anna Pawlak, translated by David B. Dollenmayer
De Gruyter | 2025
Andere Ästhetik – Koordinaten 1E

Abstract: What is art? What does art offer? Why does art move us? The CRC Different Aesthetics pursues these questions. In doing so, and by directing its attention towards the 2000-year history of European culture and art before the 18th century, it aims to transform perspectives within aesthetic discussions. This volume introduces the research undertaken by the CRC 1391. It outlines the benefits of concentrating on the pre-modern period, lays out the subsequent adjustments to analytical tools and methods, and presents the resulting consequences for the study of aesthetics. The contributions, which range from philology and literary studies, art history, archaeology, and musicology to historical science, theology, and the digital humanities offer concrete examples of this approach.

Link: about the book on the publisher’s page

Dämonie der Illusion – L’illusion et le démoniaque. Semantik, Episteme, Performanz – Sémantique, épistémè, performance

Edited by Susanne Goumegou and Jörg Robert
De Gruyter | 2025
Andere Ästhetik – Studien 12

Abstract: Between 1570 and 1630, at the historical peak of European witch hunts, numerous demonological treatises were written, particularly in France and Germany, which reflected on the power of the devil and the work of witches and wizards. The focus was often on demonic deception: The devil and his accomplices gain control over people by playing tricks on their imagination, blinding their perceptions with praestigiae (i.e. ‘Gaukelwerk’ or ‘hoodwinking’). This publication deals with the early modern concept of illusio daemoniaca, exploring how demonic deception, as it appears in witch treatises as well as in contemporary European literature, can transform into aesthetic illusion. It analyses the conceptual history of demonic illusion (semantics), along with epistemic connections to other intellectual formations (such as contemporary philosophy) as well as the aesthetic performance of the demonic – not only in the treatises, but also in narrative texts and on stage. In line with the CRC 1391 Different Aesthetics, the volume aims to reconstruct a ‘different’ genealogy of the aesthetic concepts ‘appearance’ (Schein) and ‘illusion’.

Link: about the book on the publisher’s page

Colour Schemes in Roman Architecture. Aesthetics, Semantics, and Regional Appropriation

Edited by Matthias Grawehr and Johannes Lipps
Ludwig Reichert Verlag | 2025
Material Appropriation Processes In Antiquity 4

Abstract: Roman architecture was characterised by a rich palette of colours, achieved through the use of natural coloured stones and painting. Evaluating the use of colour in Roman architecture addresses an important part of the built environment. Unlike black-and-white photographs or line-art reconstruction drawings, architecture was conceived, perceived and experienced in colour. Although such statements are accepted by most archaeologists and architectural historians today, details about functional, chronological, and regional variation in Roman architectural polychromy remain to be discovered. This conference volume is the first book entirely dedicated to the polychromy of architectural orders in the Roman provinces. Its objectives are to present new data on raw materials, painting techniques, and traces of paint on architectural orders, to explore the visual effects for which colour was used on architectural elements and to collate initial observations on the functional, chronological and regional variation of the applied colour scheme in the various areas of the Roman Empire. The volume brings together the contributions of twenty-five archaeologists, ancient historians, art historians and chemists. The collected essays encompass a wide chronological frame from the 2nd century BC to the 3rd century AD and cover a vast geographical range from modern Spain, France, Switzerland, Italy, and Austria to Turkey, Cyprus, Lebanon, and Libya.

Multiple Authorship. Aesthetics of Co-Creativity in the Pre-Modern Era

Edited by Stefanie Gropper, Anna Pawlak, Anja Wolkenhauer and Angelika Zirker, translated by Alexander Wilson
De Gruyter | 2025
Andere Ästhetik – Koordinaten 2E

Abstract: The cover of this book shows a closely-knit community of artists and craftsmen which was portrayed in 1615 by the Augsburg painter Anton Mozart. It is representative of the general aesthetic practice during the pre-modern period of creating artefacts collaboratively – and suggests that such collaboration was the norm rather than the exception. The notion of creativity hence was vastly different from the highly influential narrative of aesthetic autonomy that emerged later. The present volume is linked to the interdisciplinary work at the Collaborative Research Center 1391 Different Aesthetics and presents a first systematic approach to the complex cultural-historical phenomenon of multiple authorship.

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Narrative Voices. Options and Limitations in Saga Literature

Edited by Anna Katharina Heiniger
University of Oldenburg Press | 2025
Beiträge zur mittelalterlichen Erzählforschung. Themenheft 18

Abstract: The special issue explores the diverse and creative ways in which narrative voice(s) curate the Old Norse sagas. In terms of narratology, saga literature is characterised by the presence of several narrative voices at different narrative levels. Because of the different qualities of the individual voices, ambiguities are created, suspense is evoked, and the narrative voices sometimes undermine each other's authority. The overall narrative is therefore only revealed through the interplay of the voices. To fully comprehend the narrative complexity of the sagas, it remains the task of the audience to engage with the narrative. The ways in which voices are used can be found across genres. Thus, there seems to be an implicit framework for the acceptability of narrative options in saga literature, which, however, leaves plenty of room and flexibility for creative storytelling.

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Kunst / Macht. Rubens’ Medici-Zyklus und der gedruckte Kanon

Edited by Ariane Koller and Anna Pawlak
Museum der Universität Tübingen | 2025

Abstract: This exhibition catalogue celebrates the 400^th anniversary of the completion of Peter Paul Rubens’ famous Medici Cycle (1621–1625). For the first time, it offers monographic focus on the artistically ambitious transfer of the cycle into the medium of graphic print and the texts associated with it. The Gallerie du Palais du Luxembourg, created by multiple authors and published in Paris in 1710, not only contributed greatly to the international popularisation and canonisation of the ensemble of paintings, which was dynastically controversial and only accessible to a limited extent at the time of its creation. Rather, the prestigious gallery work, which was realised with enormous journalistic effort, served as a central aesthetic interface for discourse in art theory, art history and not least art politics, well into the 19^th century. 

Sylloge Nummorum Graecorum Deutschland. Münzsammlung der Universität Tübingen. Bd. 7: Ägypten. Alexandria und Gaumünzen. Augustus – Diocletianus

Edited by Stephan Krmnicek and Eren-Can Meral
Propylaeum | 2025
Sylloge Nummorum Graecorum Deutschland 7

Abstract: The 7^th volume of the Tübingen SNG (Sylloge Nummorum Graecorum Deutschland) series publishes the Roman provincial coinage from Egypt in the Tübingen collection of the Institute of Classical Archaeology. The catalog comprises 1170 coins – from Augustus to Diocletian from Alexandria and the nomes –, which are presented according to the latest scientific standards.

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Storyworlds and Worldbuilding in Old Norse-Icelandic Literature

Edited by Rebecca Merkelbach
Brepols | 2025
Medieval Texts and Cultures of Northern Europe 38

Abstract: The storyworlds of Old Norse-Icelandic literature are multifaceted and variable, ranging from the worlds of heroic poetry and popular romance to the recognizable narrative universe built by the Sagas of Icelanders. Despite this, they have rarely been explored, and narratological theories of storyworlds or fantasy scholarship have had little impact on the field. Yet given that every story creates its own storyworld, it can be assumed that Old Norse-Icelandic literary texts, too, build worlds — and these worlds are diverse and complex, as shown by the contributors in this volume: they constantly engage with one another, exploring, shaping, and expanding, while also entering into a dialogue with the primary world from which they draw. This volume brings together scholars from different areas of Old Norse-Icelandic studies to explore questions related to not only the storyworlds of medieval Icelandic literature, but also those of legal and learned texts, and to the way that they are built. Together they inquire into the nature of these worlds, into their preservation and transmission in manuscripts, their transmediality, transnarrativity, and reception. In doing so, these inquiries showcase the breadth of new perspectives on medieval Icelandic literature made possible by the application of narratological theory in its study.

Spracharbeit und Literaturreform (1617–1650). Fürst Ludwigs von Anhalt-Köthen Petrarca-Übersetzung und das Sprachprojekt der Fruchtbringenden Gesellschaft

Bernhard Pattis
De Gruyter | 2025
Andere Ästhetik – Studien 14

Abstract: In the first half of the 17^th century, members of the Fruitbearing Society under Prince Louis I of Anhalt-Köthen fervently pursued the goal of regulating the German language, systematising it and developing it to a linguistic variety capable of competing on a European level. This study examines translation in the Fruitbearing Society as a form of ‘language work’ and specifically focusses on Prince Louis’ translational activities. With his translation of Petrarch’s Triumphs as an example, the study investigates preconditions, mechanisms and implications of the Fruitbearing Society’s translations in the context of intercultural transfer and transformation in the early modern period.

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Abschied vom Ich. Über die Ästhetik des Allgemeinen in der Digitalmodernen / Farewell to the Self. On the Aesthetics of the Universal in Digital Modernity

Hanno Rauterberg
Edited by Annette Gerok-Reiter and Jan Stellmann
Tübingen University Press | 2025
Special Lectures – Andere Ästhetik 2

Abstract: Hanno Rauterberg enquires into the effects that automatic image generators have on daily art practices in the age of digital modernity. He determines that AI-generated art leads to the dismissal of older aesthetic concepts such as singularity and originality. With the ‘dismissal of the I’, a new aesthetics of the collective and the popular emerges which bears fascinating as well as dystopian potential. Rauterberg investigates such potential in his complex essay, which juggles multiple perspectives. The fact that artistic standards of philosophical aesthetics become obsolete justifies the relevance of Rauterberg’s essay for contemporary aesthetic discourse – and for the Collaborative Research Centre 1391 Different Aesthetics.

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Co-Creative Communication in George Herbert and John Donne

Sara Rogalski
De Gruyter | 2025
Andere Ästhetik – Studien 11

Abstract: This study examines the co-creative relationship between speakers, hearers, and God in poetry and prose by George Herbert and John Donne. Through analyses of communicative situations, communicative interactions, and reflections on communication, models of communication are established that underlie the texts selected. In particular, the activity of hearing is shown to be considered essential to the constitution of a meaningful utterance. In this way, a key function of communication becomes apparent: it can yield a range of creative products – from the conversation itself to a literary artefact and its extratextual effects. This study thus offers a new reading of the texts of George Herbert and John Donne, and provides a clear perspective on how early modern religious texts regarded communication and co-creativity as connected concepts.

Ästhetische Akte der Weltordnung. Maarten van Heemskercks „Kreislauf des menschlichen Daseins“ und die Antwerpener Festkultur im 16. Jahrhundert

Sophie Rüth
De Gruyter | 2025
Andere Ästhetik – Studien 16

Abstract: Through its examination Maarten van Heemskerck’s Cycle of the Vicissitudes of Human Affairs (1564), this study investigates the reciprocal relationship between allegorical graphic print cycles and Dutch festival culture in the early modern period. Such series of prints visualise models of epistemology and history in a complex way, across confessional borders. They programmatically connect heterogenous bodies of knowledge with concepts of collective identity formation as well as modes of aesthetic reflection and artistic self-positioning. They also serve as printed manifestations of ephemeral representations. As the dissertation argues, it is by way of this unique status and with the help of sequential image concepts which themselves create performativity in the process of reception that the print cycles have creatively appropriated the reality-generating function of performative acts. Therefore, within a context of increasingly escalating political, social and above all religious crises, the sequences functioned as socio-culturally effective images and counter-images of a world that changes over the course of history – a world whose perfectly imperfect ordering structure is repeatedly reconstituted aesthetically in processes of perceiving and handling the prints.

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The Menorah and the Seven-branched Candelabrum. Jewish and Christian Manifestations in the Medieval and Early Modern Periods

Edited by Andrea Worm and Maria Streicher
De Gruyter | 2025
Andere Ästhetik – Studien 15

Abstract: For both Judaism and Christianity, the Menorah is an iconic artefact. It played a crucial role as an implement of the Tabernacle in the desert and the Temple in Jerusalem. After the destruction of the Temple and the eventual loss of the Menorah, it became the quintessential symbol of the Jewish people. It also figures prominently in Christian thought and imagery. Especially Christian monumental seven-branched candelabra raise questions about their spatial aesthetics as well as their liturgical and performative functions. This volume offers interdisciplinary reflections on the Menorah in both Jewish and Christian traditions, and thus contributes not only to a better understanding of their cultural entanglement in pre-modern times, but also to a more differentiated view of their specific and contextual aesthetic qualities.

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Medieval Translatio. Interdisciplinary Studies in the Translation and Transfer of Language, Culture, Literature

Edited by Massimiliano Bampi and Stefanie Gropper
De Gruyter | 2024
Modes of Modification 2

Abstract: The interdisciplinary papers in this volume focus on the translation of texts in its broadest meaning. The contributors represent Latin, Slavic, English and Scandinavian philologies and deal with very different aspects of translation as for example ‘The Aftermath of the Norman Conquest’, ‘Re-writing parts of Europe in vernacular adaptations of the Imago Mundi’, ‘Translating A Philosophical Style’, ‘The Hermeneutics of Animal Voices in Early Medieval England’, ‘Vernacular Literary Cultures in the Latin West’, ‘Latin, Medieval Cosmopolitanism, and the Dynamics of Untranslatability’, ‘Non-Autonomy of South Slavic Metaphrastic Translation’, and ‘Alexander and the Ars Dictaminis’. It is the aim of all contributions as well as the whole volume to demonstrate the importance of translation in the Middle Ages as a means of not only linguistic transfer but also of a transfer of culture and knowledge.

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Seele – Engel – Gott. Konturen der Rede vom Licht in Meister Eckharts volkssprachlichen Predigten

Anja Bork
frommann-holzboog | 2024
Mystik in Geschichte und Gegenwart 22

Abstract: The study is a first attempt to explore the so far almost unexplored speech about light in Meister Eckhart’s vernecular sermons. Due to a consistent close reading of Meister Eckhart’s vernacular sermons, the study elaborates the motif of light with reagrd to its significance for the history of tradition, as well as to its use for homiletic communication. Thus, it offers a sensitive perception of Eckhart as a theologian and thinker in the Christian world of the early 14^th century.

Andere Ästhetik meets Andere Ästhetik. Visualisierungen von Antiken nördlich der Alpen in der frühneuzeitlichen Druckgraphik

Edited by Laura Di Carlo, Johannes Lipps, Anna Pawlak and Daniel R. F. Richter
De Gruyter | 2024
Andere Ästhetik – Studien 5

Abstract: This interdisciplinary volume deals with the cultural relevance of antique artefacts in the early modern period. It concentrates on prints which, from the 16th century onwards, were intensely engaged with Roman antiquities north of the Alps. From an archaeological and art historical perspective, the authors of the volume focus on the complex aesthetic strategies of the prints, which give evidence of the historical interrelation between identity formation and artistic practice. This interrelation becomes visible in the dynamics between complementary concepts like past and present, familiar and foreign, imagination and reality. The contributions highlight a number of examples to analyse various strategies of visualizing, transforming and programmatically adopting those antiquities.

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Personifikationen als ästhetische Reflexionsfiguren. Studien zu Sangspruch und Totenklagen

Julia Fischer
De Gruyter | 2024
Andere Ästhetik – Studien 6

Abstract: In medieval German literature, personifications are an extremely popular and diversely deployed stylistic device. This popularity is founded in a multiplicity of representations, which, according to the theory, is principally motivated by its action. This can be understood as a point of interface at which the representation of personifications is reflected, varied and staged with varying degrees of complexity. Personifications can be placed in proximity to allegory and metaphor. They touch on basic metaphorical processes and in individual cases can be shaped into an allegory. In this way, the stylistic device can be understood as a form of inauthentic speech which aims to makes facts evident and implicitly negotiate an understanding of the stylistic device itself. Personifications are not only used to narrate, by using them, an understanding of the stylistic device itself is offered. These reflections can be demonstrated particularly in pragmatically-oriented genres, which relate to the real world. For this reason, Sangspruch and Totenklage offer self-contained short forms which foster a particularly variable interaction with personifications and thus enable the understanding of aesthetic reflections.

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Mystik und Allegorese. Der Platoniker Porphyrios über Götterstatuen (Περὶ ἀγαλμάτων). Eine Studie zur spätantiken Religionsphilosophie

Irmgard Männlein
Franz Steiner | 2024
Roma Aeterna 16

Abstract: In his work ‘On Statues of Gods’ (Περὶ ἀγαλμάτων) the Platonist Porphyrios (3^rd century AD) interprets the statues of Greek and Egyptian divinities philosophically and as allegorically-coded cosmic powers. In doing so, he becomes involved in an old discourse on the religious relevance and philosophical evaluation of divine images. His allegorical interpretation of the statues of gods proves innovative considering the context of contemporary platonic and Christian theories about idols. His allegorism, which is in many ways original, and the mystical stylisation of these texts has anti-Christian undertones. Some time later, this controversial content prompts Eusebius, bishop of Caesarea, to quote Porphyrys’ text critically and polemically in a shortened form. For the first time, Irmgard Männlein’s study offers a complete collection of the fragments and testimonies this text transmits, contextualising them from a literary, philosophical and religious studies perspective. It also presents this text’s first complete German translation.

Story, World and Character in the Late Íslendingasögur. Rogue Sagas

Rebecca Merkelbach
Boydell & Brewer | 2024
Studies in Old Norse Literature 13

Abstract: The late Sagas of Icelanders, thought to be written in the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries, have hitherto received little scholarly attention. Previous generations of critics have unfavourably compared them to "classical" Íslendingasögur and fornaldarsögur, leading modern audiences to project their expectations onto narratives that do not adhere to simple taxonomies and preconceived notions of genre. As "rogues" within the canon, they challenge the established notions of what makes an Íslendingasaga. Based on a critical appraisal of conceptualisations of canon and genre in saga literature, this book offers a new reading of the relationship between the individual, paranormal, and social dimensions that form the foundation of these sagas. It draws on a multidisciplinary approach, informed by perspectives as diverse as "possible worlds" theory, gender studies, and social history. The "post-classical" sagas are not only read anew and integrated into both their generic and socio-historical context; they are met on their own terms, allowing their fascinating narratives to speak for themselves.

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Freiheit der Kunst. Genealogie und Kritik der ästhetischen Autonomie

Jörg Robert
De Gruyter | 2024
Andere Ästhetik – Studien 7

Abstract: Can art be considered ‘free’? Where do the borders to its freedom lie? What does the phrase ‘aesthetic autonomy’ (or ‘aesthetics of autonomy’) mean, as currently being discussed in contexts such as the debates surrounding ‘cancel culture’? The book searches for answers to such questions by investigating the origin and history of the concept ‘aesthetic autonomy’. In doing so, it reveals the loosely coherent discourse that developed around 1800 out of individual premodern motifs, including both ‘autological’ (genius, work, form) and ‘heterological’ (art’s functions) aspects. Influenced by the idea of freedom, well-known motifs dating back to antiquity developed into an ‘aesthetic figure of reflection’, only appearing as a systematic ‘aesthetics of autonomy’ in polemic retrospect – particularly in critical theory (Adorno). Using the praxeological approach of the CRC 1391 (‘Different Aesthetics’), this study represents the first attempt to comprehensively define the concept ‘aesthetic autonomy’ both historically and systematically. With its interdisciplinary approach, the study is aimed at researchers in historical philology, art and musicology, as well as an interested media audience.

Link: about the book on the publisher’s page

Formaggiata. Lob auf den Käse

Giulio Landi
Edited by Frank Schuhmacher
Harrassowitz | 2024
Gratia 69

Abstract: The Italian humanist Giulio Landi (1498–1579), with his composition Formaggiata: Praise for Cheese, created a paradoxical encomium, a poem praising a hard cheese from his home city of Piacenza, ‘one of the best things we have here’. In this short work, which appeared in 1542, he paradoxically used all possible means of rhetorical artistry to praise an everyday object to the highest heavens. The genre of the paradoxical encomium greatly increased in popularity during the Renaissance due to Erasmus of Rotterdam’s In Praise of Folly. It directly followed the antique tradition of taking particularly small, everyday things and praising them playfully with an ironic tone. For the first time, Frank Schuhmacher presents the text in a bilingual, Italian-German edition and classifies it historically and rhetorically in the epilogue. Why were such curious speeches composed? Why did the humanist choose to write on cheese, of all things? And what does this reveal about culinary tastes? In a broad panorama, Landi describes the production of his favourite cheese: His tale goes on detours through Greek mythology and astronomy, criticises the corruption of clergymen of his time and clearly explains where and how the cheese was produced and sold.

Drucksachen. Inkunabeln und Einblattdrucke der Universitätsbibliothek Tübingen

Edited by Andrea Worm, Sandra Linden and Kristina Stöbener
Museum der Universität Tübingen | 2024
Schriften des Museums der Universität Tübingen MUT 30

Abstract: The advent of the printing press with movable letters in the mid-15^th century led to books on a wide range of topics becoming widely available for the first time. Early prints that were produced up to 1500 are known as incunabula. Early on, printers recognised the rich potential of images that were inserted as woodcuts and often later coloured, giving the books substantial decorative value. The University Library of Tübingen possesses a diverse and valuable inventory of such ‘printed matter’, which, as a new type of media, brings to life the knowledge and interests of the time in its vivid and detailed depictions. In this exhibition, the works will be presented to a wider audience for the first time. The spectrum of exhibits encompasses large-scale bibles and books for religious edification and instruction, treatises on astronomy and botany, works of history and legislative texts, but also prayers, indulgences and flyers issued as broadsides (one-sided prints).

Beten in Mainz. Religion als Herausforderung in der Geschichte der Stadt

Edited by Nina Gallion and Johannes Lipps
Nünnerich-Asmus Verlag & Media | 2023

Abstract: Over the course of its 2000-year history, Mainz has been shaped by different religions. In antiquity, its inhabitants worshiped Celtic gods, oriental gods and Roman rulers, then early Christianity took root in the 3rd Century. In the Middle Ages, the city developed into one of the Roman-German Empire’s spiritual centres, while also housing one of the oldest Jewish communities. As a ShUM city, Mainz and its Jewish community are one of UNESCO's World Heritage Sites. Even in the tumultuous Reformation period, Catholicism held its ground, and its unbroken tradition made Mainz a particularly loyal stronghold of the Vatican in the 19th century. During the First World War at the latest, Mainz experienced the entry of Islam with Muslim soldiers from the Maghreb. This publication explores the multitude of religious challenges in Mainz’s urban context. The fate of individual citizens, as manifested in texts, images and material legacies, will serve as the focus of this exploration. These remnants present a multifaceted account of past hopes and fears.

Schein und Anschein. Dynamiken ästhetischer Praxis in der Vormoderne

Edited by Annette Gerok-Reiter, Martin Kovacs, Volker Leppin and Irmgard Männlein-Robert
De Gruyter | 2023
Andere Ästhetik – Koordinaten 3

Abstract: The CRC Different Aesthetics explores various pre-modern artefacts and their reflexions on their own aesthetic status. Following these studies, this volume wants to investigate the topic of illusion versus appearance – a central issue in aesthetic discussion since antiquity. Starting point is the term inherent ambiguity of the German word “Schein”: the term can describe the glow of light, it can describe the process of appearance, of becoming visible, as well as appearance as illusion. The contributions to this volume analyse this phenomenon using different texts, monuments and paintings ranging from antiquity to the early modern period. Each interdisciplinary article tries to answer the question: What are the cultural contexts as well as the specific forms that aesthetic constructions appear either as “Schein” as in fostering knowledge and enlightenment, or “Anschein” as deceptive illusion?

Link: about the book on the publisher’s page

Plurale Autorschaft. Ästhetik der Co-Kreativität in der Vormoderne

Edited by Stefanie Gropper, Anna Pawlak, Anja Wolkenhauer and Angelika Zirker
De Gruyter | 2023
Andere Ästhetik – Koordinaten 2

Abstract: The contributions in this volume engage with the aesthetics of plural authorship from a multidisciplinary and interdisciplinary perspective, encompassing literary studies, art history and musicology. The volume aims to develop plural authorship in the pre-modern era as a coordinate for Different Aesthetics and contextualize it within cultural history. The volume focuses on two key questions: 1. Which forms of plural authorship exist in the pre-modern era, and how are these collaborative creative processes reflected in aesthetic acts and artefacts? 2. How do collaborative creative processes affect the aesthetic structure, as well as the function, meaning and reception of an artefact? The second question includes aspects such as the material production of texts and images, as well as the status of anonymous works and references to divine co-authorship. The contributions examine the added historical value of communal authorship, while also considering paratextuality and intermediality, and economic considerations in the production and reception of aesthetic artifacts.

Link: about the book on the publisher’s page

Veritatis Imago. Visuelle Konzepte der Wahrheit in der niederländischen Druckgraphik des 16. und 17. Jahrhunderts

Mariam Hammami
De Gruyter | 2023
Andere Ästhetik – Studien 4

Abstract: This study uses a selection of Dutch prints from the 16^th and 17^th centuries to analyse different visual representations of truth and explore the potential for truthfulness in specific graphics. The guiding hypothesis is that these various copper engravings and etchings use the figure of Veritas to demonstrate the possibilities and limitations of visualizing abstract 'truth'. The cultural and historical relevance of prints as a medium of discourse within the context of political and religious crises is explored and reveals the artists' continuous experimentation with the aesthetic potential of the medium.

Link: about the book on the publisher’s page

Ästhetik und Pragmatik der Zeit im 16. Jahrhundert

Christian Kiening
Edited by Annette Gerok-Reiter and Anna Pawlak
Tübingen University Press | 2023
Special Lectures – Andere Ästhetik 1

Abstract: In his contribution to ‘The Aesthetics and Pragmatics of Time in the 16th Century’, Christian Kiening addresses two central tendencies when dealing with time in intellectual, cultural and literary history in the 16th century; the tendency to increasingly treat time as an aesthetic phenomenon and the tendency to relate questions of temporality to dimensions of the measurable, the quotidian and lifespan. The connection between these tendencies is examined using the example of different visual and written testimonies. Aspects of the CRC 1391 come into play where the relationship between the forms of appearance and of reflection, as well as the praxeological dimensions of the aesthetic, are concerned.

Link: about the book on the publisher’s page

Römische Archäologie in Deutschland. Positionsbestimmung und Perspektiven

Edited by Stefan Krmnicek and Dominik Maschek
Propylaeum | 2023

Abstract: What does "Roman archaeology" stand for today, what is its position in modern society, and what are the discipline’s methodological prospects and opportunities? Against the backdrop of new analytical methods and research questions, Roman archaeology in Germany is confronted with fundamental new challenges. Bringing together general overviews, concrete case studies, innovative methods, and perspectives on other national research traditions, the contributions gathered in this book present a range of approaches that are intended to stimulate self-reflection and intellectual repositioning amongst Roman archaeologists, in Germany and beyond.

Link: about the book on the publisher’s page

Die Mainzer Salus. Gesellschaft und Stadtkultur im Norden der Germania Superior

Johannes Lipps, Detlev Kreikenbom and Jonas Osnabrügge
Ludwig Reichert Verlag | 2023
Material Appropriation Processes In Antiquity 3

Abstract: The volume at hand introduces a slightly less than life-size female figure with naked torso and hip cloak made of sandstone that was found in the “Zollhafen” of Mainz in October 2020. Her left foot rests on a bovine head, and a snake coils towards her left hand from her left shoulder. The inscription on the plinth identifies the figure as a “Salus”, donated to the inhabitants of the Mainz canabae in 231 AD by Senecionius Moderatus and Respectius Constans. Together with a sculpture from Cologne, the Mainz Salus forms a statue scheme adapted to local needs, the origin of which we place in the Flavian period and hypothetically associate with a newly founded cult at that time. Furthermore, the statue’s origins can be easily traced. The stone was probably quarried in the Nahe valley and imported to Mainz, where a workshop known to have distributed across the the province produced statues, presumably including the Genius from Nida (Heddernheim). With such products, the workshop catered to particularly ambitious clients, who adorned cities across Upper Germania with statues of various deities of salvation presented in public spaces, especially in the Severan period. Through this religious practice they both increased their own social prestige and contributed decisively to the urban added value of their communities. Finally, a second statue fragment found together with the Mainz Salus is presented and interpreted as Neptune.

Materialität und Medialität. Grundbedingungen einer anderen Ästhetik in der Vormoderne

Edited by Jan Stellmann and Daniela Wagner
De Gruyter | 2023
Andere Ästhetik – Koordinaten 5

Abstract: Aesthetic acts and artefacts are conditioned by their materiality as well as by the medial processes they are integrated in. Following this idea, the interdisciplinary contributions of this volume discuss the self-inherent logic, semantics, and resistances of materiality. Using different perspectives on mediality, they also specify the tension between artistic design and the role of societal mediator that is central to the aesthetic theorem. Materiality of medial processes, the way references of materiality are mediated, as well as intermateriality and intermediality as productive crossing of boundaries are the main foci of this volume.

Link: about the book on the publisher’s page

Die „Leib Christi“-Metapher. Kritik und Rekonstruktion aus gendertheoretischer Perspektive

Saskia Wendel
Transcript | 2023
Religionswissenschaft 32

Abstract: The “Body of Christ” is a key metaphor in Christology, ecclesiology and sacramental theology. At the same time, it proves capable of granting legitimacy, particularly in regard to the traditional Catholic conception of the church and the ecclesiastical office. Through the lens of gender theory, Saskia Wendel revisits the origins, classifications and practical functions of this metaphor, as well as the associated social constructs of Jesus’ body. In drawing out theological alternatives to the universally understood Body of Christ, she outlines her own model of “gender sensitive” theology.

Link: about the book on the publisher’s page

Auszählen und Ausdeuten. Quantitative und qualitative Zugänge zum ästhetischen Wortschatz der mittelhochdeutschen Literatur

Edited by Manuel Braun and Marion Darilek
V&R unipress | 2022
Mitteilungen des Deutschen Germanistenverbandes 69.1

Abstract: What is the conception of 'aesthetics' in German literature of the Middle Ages? The articles in this issue explore this question by historically and semantically examining the aesthetic vocabulary of Middle High German texts. As the texts have been annotated beforehand, conventional qualitative approaches can be supplemented with quantitative ones. The methodological starting point is a praxeological model of aesthetics, which has the interplay between the concept of 'art' and social action at its centre. For this reason, texts which have clear discursive and functional purposes, such as chants, mystical texts, and didactic poetry, have been chosen for investigation. Their aesthetic self-conception can be located at the intersection between self-reference and external reference.

Bach unter den Theologen. Themen, Thesen, Temperamente

Edited by Ingo Bredenbach, Volker Leppin and Christoph Schwöbel
Mohr Siebeck | 2022

Abstract: The question of “Bach among the Theologians” can be traced through the centuries: from Bach’s theological impressions and influential contemporaries, to his sinking into oblivion and later rediscovery around 1800, to Albert Schweitzer’s monumental monograph on Bach. Such inquiries lead to the question of theology’s current reciprocal relationship with Bach. This volume compiles the eight articles from the theological symposium “Re-visiting Bach” (“Bach bearbeitet”), which took place in the context of the New Bach Society’s (Neue Bachgesellschaft) 93rd Bach festival in Tübingen in 2018. The published entries reveal an engagement with Bach to be deeply embedded in theological and cultural developments – Bach himself will always be more than a piece of cultural memory: he was and is both a challenge and an inspiration.

Andere Ästhetik. Grundlagen – Fragen – Perspektiven

Edited by Annette Gerok-Reiter, Jörg Robert, Matthias Bauer and Anna Pawlak
De Gruyter | 2022
Andere Ästhetik – Koordinaten 1

Abstract: What is art? What does art achieve? Why does art move us? These are the questions which have occupied the Tübingen Collaborative Research Centre 1391 Different Aesthetics since its foundation in 2019 by the DFG. Through these, the aim is to work through layers of history to trace a change in perspective, which is defined by not situating art and the arts in separately delineated spaces. To do so, the research project reassesses the 2000-year history of European art and culture before the 18th century. The volume explains what the benefit of concentrating on the pre-modern era is, which analytical adjustments must be made, and what fundamental consequences arise from this for questions of aesthetics. The contributions, which range from philology to art history, archaeology and musicology to history, theology, and the digital humanities, offer concrete examples of this. From these aesthetic reflections of the pre-modern era, the aim is to also gain insight and new directions within current discussions.

Link: about the book on the publisher’s page

(Re-)Inventio. Die Neuauflage als kreative Praxis in der nordalpinen Druckgraphik der Frühen Neuzeit

Edited by Mariam Hammami, Anna Pawlak and Sophie Rüth
De Gruyter | 2022
Andere Ästhetik – Studien 2

Abstract: The practice of reprinting single sheets and series of prints, which was common in the early modern period, was not only guided by the economic interests of the publishers, but was also an expression of an innovative aesthetic examination of existing pictorial models. The spectrum of this productive handling of established inventions ranged from unchanged re-editions or copies to conceptual revisions and additions, as well as programmatic recontextualizations. Following on from recent research in art history, which has recognised the significant creative potential in the act of drawing, painting or printing reproductions, these reconfigurations within Northern Alpine printmaking will be examined as a multimedial form of creative appropriation. To this end, new editions will be defined as (re-)inventions, whose specific visual strategies of conforming to and deviating from previous editions are the subject of this interdisciplinary volume. Through various case studies, it will be explored to what extent ongoing questions of socio-economic factors within the production and reception of prints can be combined with considerations of their relevance as a locus for cultural expression and a medium for artistic (self-)reflection.

Link: about the book on the publisher’s page

Maarten van Heemskerck & Co. – World/Moving

Edited by Ariane Koller and Sophie Rüth
2022

Abstract: The 1564 copper engraving series ‘The Cycle of Human Existence’, engraved by Cornelis Cort after designs by Maarten van Keemskercks and published in Hieronymus Cock’s famous Antwerp publishing house ‘Aux Quatre Vents (In de Vier Winden)’, lies at the centre of this exhibition catalogue. Forming a creative response to an allegorical festival that was performed in 1561 as part of a procession of relics – the so-called 'Besnijdenis'-Ommegang – in Antwerp, the nine instalments of the series stage a multi-layered and intermedial worldview. Conceptually framed by depictions of the 'Triumph of the World' and the 'Last Judgement', the engravings present a continuous succession of the triumphs of wealth, pride, envy, war, poverty, humility and peace, which all arise in turn from human ambitions, actions and weaknesses, constantly regenerating and superseding each other until Christ’s Second Coming. The publication explores the complex social functions of allegorical engravings, which act as catalysts within religious, political and economic tensions during the sixteenth century in the Netherlands. At the same time, it considers the contemporary relevance of these graphics as a locus for artistic self-reflection.

To order the exhibition catalogue: E-mail to Ariane Koller

Vom Herrscher zum Heros. Die Bildnisse Alexanders des Großen und die Imitatio Alexandri

Martin Kovacs
Marie Leidorf Verlag | 2022
Tübinger Archäologische Forschungen 34

Abstract: Antiquity did not know only one image or only one idea of the figure of Alexander the Great. On the contrary, hardly any other historical figure of antiquity proved to be so divergent, controversial and literally multiform for contemporaries. The monograph seeks to grasp this diversity through a critical presentation of the representations of Alexander the Great, to reorganise the scattered archaeological evidence and to make them useful for cultural-historical analysis. For this purpose, not only the sculptures in the round are taken into account, but also other media are consistently included: the coinage, large-scale monuments such as votives in greek sanctuaries, as well as the literary and epigraphic tradition. A decisive result is the finding that the figure of Alexander the Great could be restaged in different contexts either as a divinely or heroically impregnated being, as an energetic but potentially approachable general, or as a mythological figure with paradigmatic significance. These different conceptualisations will be elaborated on the basis of the highly divergent portrait designs between Hellenism, the Roman imperial period as well as Late Antiquity, recontextualised both historically and in terms of cultural history, and in particular asked about the role of the actors who commissioned the images in each case. This perspective counters a traditional conception of the image of Alexander, in which a rather selective perception has predominated up to now, with a preference for the lifetime portraits of Alexander. The study shows that divergent images of the Macedonian ruler were created at different times, in different places and in different political and cultural contexts, and that their specific iconography also reflects specific ideas of the figure of Alexander the Great. These figurations of Alexander in different cultural contexts illustrate the preferences of the actors who created them. For the imperial period in particular, it can be shown that Alexander was also visually staged as a mythological rather than a historiographical figure. The final analysis of the visual Imitatio Alexandri, the pictorial imitation of the Macedonian king in different historical and cultural contexts during the Hellenistic period, is based on the results obtained.

In the Eye of the Beholder. The Aesthetics of Roman Coins

Edited by von Stefan Krmnicek, Michele Lange and Jan Papenberg
TOBIAS-lib | 2022
Von Krösus bis zu König Wilhelm. Neue Serie 5

Abstract: Roman coins are peculiar objects. In the first place, they were the official means of payment of the Roman Empire and thus the most important mass product of the pre-modern era. Because of the many images and texts depicted on ancient coins, we can also correctly refer to Roman coins as the first mass medium of antiquity. Given their intrinsic monetary function, they reached the remotest corners of the empire and were able to communicate the messages of the imperial administration to the people. However, in their aesthetics—both in their materiality and in their function as a means of communication—Roman coins differ fundamentally from their modern relatives. It is precisely this that the present exhibition takes as a starting point, aiming to present a broad perspective of the phenomenon of Roman coins and their peculiar aesthetics and significance in an ancient context. To this end, we have chosen five representative thematic areas, which we believe can be used to present the most important perspectives on ancient life: Beautiful and Ugly / Portraits / Representations of Nature / Dynasties / Role Models. The broad spectrum of themes makes it clear; the beauty or specific nature of these objects is and was truly in the eye of the beholder.

Link: about the exhibition catalogue on the TOBIAS-lib

Artifizialität und Agon. Poetologien des Wi(e)derdichtens im höfischen Roman des 12. und 13. Jahrhunderts

Jan Stellmann
De Gruyter | 2022
Andere Ästhetik – Studien 3

Abstract: This study develops the theory that the practice of retelling reflected in the poetologies of German-language chivalric romance (twelfth and thirteenth centuries) must be understood not just as artificial poiesis but also as a practice of imitation and dispute. The study derives these two dimensions of the retelling historically from Horace’s Ars poetica and describes them conceptually using the concepts of artificiality and agon.

Link: about the book on the publisher’s page

Ägypten übersetzen. Fremde Schrift als Imaginationsraum europäischer Kulturen

Edited by Anja Wolkenhauer and Johannes Helmrath 
Harrassowitz | 2022
Wolfenbütteler Forschungen 173

Abstract: Whenever culture was defined within the borders of Europe, Egypt was seen as the great ‘foreign culture’ and the image of a ‘different antiquity’. The enduring fascination with Europe was most visibly expressed in the erection of Egyptian obelisks in Rome and other European cities, but also extended to Egyptian hieroglyphics. This ancient ideogrammic script found its way into mnemohistorical concepts of antiquity and knowledge, leaving traces of Egyptianisation but also of Platonism. The Early Modern image of Egypt was historically based on the growing assumption that these pictograms carried arcane knowledge, perhaps even residues of an Adamic ‘original language’. Hieroglyphics were utilised as powerful symbols, transformed in impresas and emblems, for example. They inspired alchemists, influenced linguistic considerations and even had an effective impact far beyond the borders of Europe by shaping the use of other, non-European writing systems. In nine individual studies, this volume investigates the historical impact and imagination of Egypt, particularly of its hieroglyphics, from Graeco-Roman antiquity to the 17th century.

Martin Opitz: Gesammelte Werke. Bd. 5: Werke 1630–1633

Edited by Gudrun Bamberger and Jörg Robert
Anton Hiersemann Verlag | 2021
Bibliothek des literarischen Vereins Stuttgart 355

Abstract: Martin Opitz (1597–1639) is a key figure of the late European Renaissance. With his ground-breaking book von der deutschen Poeterey (‘of German poetry’, 1624), he became the undisputed pioneer and 'father' of modern German literature. The critical editions of the works of Martin Opitz are a milestone in early modern philology. Between 1968 and his death in 2010, George Schulz-Behrend published them with the Hiersemann Verlag up to Volume IV, 2. This continuation now finally closes a critical gap for researchers by presenting Opitz’s post-1630 writings – including Vesuvius (1633), Judith (1635), Antigone (1636) – for the first time in a reliable critical edition. A detailed commentary expounds all the texts and places them in their historical context, touching both on their production and their impact. Volume 5, which contains the poetry from 1631–1633, is the beginning of the 4-volume conclusion to the critical Opitz editions. This will be the first time that the complete works of the most consequential German author of the 17th century are available in a form that meets modern critical standards.

In Search of the Culprit. Aspects of Medieval Authorship

Edited by Stefanie Gropper and Lukas Rösli
De Gruyter | 2021
Andere Ästhetik – Studien 1

Abstract: Despite various poststructuralist rejections of the idea of a singular author-genius, the question of a textual archetype that can be assigned to a named author is still a common scholarly phantasm. The Romantic idea that an author created a text or even a work autonomously is transferred even to pre-modern literature today. This ignores the fact that the transmission of medieval and early modern literature creates variances that could not be justified by means of singular authorships. The present volume offers new theoretical approaches from English, German, and Scandinavian studies to provide a historically more adequate approach to the question of authorship in premodern literary cultures. Authorship is no longer equated with an extra-textual entity, but is instead considered a narratological, inner- and intertextual function that can be recognized in the retrospectively established beginnings of literature as well as in the medial transformation of texts during the early days of printing. The volume is aimed at interested scholars of all philologies, especially those dealing with the Middle Ages or Early Modern Period.

Link: about the book on the publisher’s page

Repräsentation und Reenactment. Spätmittelalterliche Frömmigkeit verstehen

Volker Leppin
Mohr Siebeck | 2021

Abstract: Spirituality of the late Middle Ages seems distant and alien in regard of most of its elements. Volker Leppin paves a new eay to it, introducing the terms of "representation" and "reenactment". Both are related to perception of God's presence in late medieval culture: as a reality bound to certain places or persons in representation or as an active re-activating in reenactment. Thus, the author leads through visual art and prayer practice, visionary experience and literary design, saturated with sources. The reader encounters particularly religious phenomena as well as aesthetic shaping. In effect, the book presents a multifaceted picture of late medieval spiritual culture and at the same time a new theoretical framework for its understanding. It is aimed to stimulate and connect theological and cultural studies research equally.

Ruhen in Gott. Eine Geschichte der christlichen Mystik

Volker Leppin
C.H. Beck | 2021

Abstract: Greek monks found rest in God through asceticism, Bernhard von Clairvaux allowed himself to be embraced by the crucified Christ, and Mechthild von Magdeburg gave herself to Christ, her bridegroom. Volker Leppin traces the story of Christian mysticism in a new way by locating mysticism, understood as the search for the immediate proximity of God, at the centre of Christianity rather than at its fringes. His confident, masterfully written presentation offers a fresh perspective on Christianity as a whole, which to this day relies on mysticism as a driving force. Mystics felt so close to God that differences between clergy and laity, men and women, became irrelevant to them. It was often up to chance, whether they would be revered as enlightened or as reformers like Francis of Assisi and Hildegard of Bingen or suspected of heresy like Marguerite Porete and Meister Eckhart. In his brilliant presentation, Volker Leppin shows how early Christian teachings in conjunction with Platonic philosophy formed mystical worldviews and paths to salvation that formed the core of orthodox spirituality, but which remained highly controversial in the West, including in Protestantism. The fact that mysticism was harnessed to anti-modern ideologies in the 19th and 20th centuries brought suspicion on it once again. But the interest in similarities with other religions and a growing distancing from the church show that mysticism is vital for the survival of modern Christianity.

Schaffen und Nachahmen. Kreative Prozesse im Mittelalter

Edited by Volker Leppin
De Gruyter | 2021
Das Mittelalter. Perspektiven mediävistischer Forschung, Beiheft 16

Abstract: This volume comprises contributions to the 18th symposium of the Mediävistenverband, which took place in Tübingen in spring 2019. The topic is conected to current debates on authorship, copyright, originality, and plagiarism, which indicate that these concepts have currently been in flux. Different scholarly perspectives shed light on the question whether and to what extent the ways of understanding authorship in the end are more comparable between the Middle Ages and modernity than commonly assumed. Thus, the concepts of creativity formed in modernity are questioned and undermined. At the same time, it becomes apparent that creative processes of modernity that do not meet the high normative demands of a culture of genius are not simply deficient, but show variations of multiply practiced techniques that can be understood by medieval productivity. Creation and imitation cannot be sectored into an "artistic" realm of culture, but they prove to be a basic structure of human activity also in the scholarly, ethical or religious field. Thus, this volume presents a strong plea for the recognition of the creative power of emulation.

Link: about the book on the publisher’s page

Appropriation Processes of Statue Schemata in the Roman Provinces / Aneignungsprozesse antiker Statuenschemata in den römischen Provinzen

Edited by Johannes Lipps, Martin Dorka Moreno and Jochen Griesbach
Ludwig Reichert Verlag | 2021
Material Appropriation Processes in Antiquity 1

Abstract: The majority of ancient statues can be typologised on the basis of formal overlaps, i.e. arranged in ‘schemes’. Individual statue schemes were handed down over centuries in ever new versions and integrated into different material, spatial and functional contexts. These processes of reception and transformation can be understood as cultural appropriations that were aesthetically, politically and/or religiously motivated. As a rule, they presupposed education and thus also had a social component. Often, however, purely practical reasons such as the availability of a certain form led to the reproduction of anthropomorphic figures according to a scheme. In the process, the pictorial works could preserve the former contexts of meaning of their models, only partially adopt them or ignore them and ‘overwrite’ them with completely new meanings. This volume, which is the result of an international conference in Tübingen, brings together contributions that discuss the above-mentioned processes of reception in individual centres and regions of the Roman Empire.

Die römischen Steindenkmäler in den Reiss-Engelhorn-Museen Mannheim

Edited by Johannes Lipps, Stefan Ardeleanu, Jonas Osnabrügge and Christian Witschel
Verlag Regionalkultur | 2021
Mannheimer Geschichtsblätter, Sonderveröffentlichungen 14

Abstract: The Reiss-Engelhorn museums in Mannheim house one of the most important collections of Roman stone monuments in Germany. The fact that this archaeological collection has not been comprehensively documented and published until now is due to its turbulent history, especially its partial destruction in bombings during World War II. At that time, many objects were so badly damaged that, after their initial rescue, they stayed hidden in storerooms beneath the city, their condition unknown. With the present volume, this collection is now documented as comprehensively as possible for the first time.
The inscription monuments, sculptures and architectural elements presented come mainly from the surroundings of Mannheim, as well as from the wider collecting activities of the prince-electors. They have given rise to research that rewrites the foundations of our knowledge of the Roman period in the Rhine-Neckar region.

People Abroad

Edited by Johannes Lipps
Marie Leidorf Verlag | 2021
Tübinger Archäologische Forschungen 31

Abstract: The aim of these conference proceedings is the application of recent scientific discussions on mobility and migration to stone monuments from Roman provinces. The contributions exemplify whether and how movement of people affected the design of funerary and votive monuments or architecture and what statements were intended thereby. The book starts with an introduction by the editor and integrates the 33 essays into the overarching thematic fields of “dying abroad” [16 papers], “cults abroad” [7] and “objects, knowledge and craftsmanship abroad” [10]. Topics are the funeral representation of equestrian-senatorial groups, evidence for strangers in towns and provinces, grave monuments of the Cohors II Cyrrhestarum sagittaria, a commercial network in Cisalpine Gaul, and funeral monuments of Celtic tribes. The second chapter deals with Jupiter Dolichenus and cults in Thessaly, the Balkans, Thessaloniki, and Burgundy. Finally, there are papers on foreign artisans, the provincial reception of imperial monuments, Sicilian sarcophagi, sculpture from Novae, a Viergötterstein, a relief from Lebanon, the Corinthian order in Thrace, and a female head of Greek marble found in Spain.

Bilder, Heilige und Reliquien. Beiträge zur Christentumsgeschichte und zur Religionsgeschichte

Edited by Mariano Delgado and Volker Leppin
Schwabe Verlag | 2020
Studien zur christlichen Religions- und Kulturgeschichte 28

Abstract: This volume carries on the cultural and religious-historical research on the topic of images, saints and relics in an interdisciplinary way. Ist contributions cover the rejection of the cult of images in the Bible and in early Christianity, the development of a distinct cult of images and relics in late antique and medieval Christianity, and the criticism of this cult in the Reformation and the Enlightenment. The interdisciplinary diversity of approaches in church history, cultural history, social history, art history, and the history of religion opens up new perspectives on this important topic in the history of religion. The contributions provide thought-provoking impulses for further research on images, saints and relics in the history of Christianity, but also in Judaism, Islam and Buddhism.

Aushandlungen religiösen Wissens / Negotiated Religious Knowledge

Edited by Annette Gerok-Reiter, Anne Mariss and Markus Thome
Mohr Siebeck | 2020
Spätmittelalter, Humanismus, Reformation 115

Abstract: Religious knowledge, according to the basic assumption of the Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft’s Research Training Group Religious Knowledge in Pre-Modern Europe (800–1800), is generated when dealing with the knowledge revealed in the Bible. In day-to-day interactions between religious experts and laypeople however, this knowledge – conceived as intangible – is continuously transformed and adapted to the respective historical circumstances. The discursive competition that arises between religious knowledge and other fields of knowledge, such as natural history, art and literature, are the focus of this interdisciplinary volume’s articles. They hone in on the practices employed to adapt and shape religious knowledge in these adjacent fields, as well as the tensions, rivalries and synergies that emerge in the process.

Link: about the book on the publisher’s page

Norm und Hybridität / Ibridità e norma: Linguistische Perspektiven / Prospettive linguistiche

Edited by Antje Lobin, Sarah Dessì Schmid and Ludwig Fesenmeier
Frank & Timme | 2020
Romanistik 35

Abstract: On the one hand, communication requires a systematic foundation, but on the other hand, communicative needs and/or communication contexts also lead to changes. Research in the fields of individual historical languages and discourse traditions has increasingly been focussed on the complex interplay between stability and innovation, and the resulting transformations. The varied contributions collected here are dedicated to this tension between ‚norm’ and ‚hybridity‘, which stand in a dialectical relationship and are mutually dependent. They survey the fields of language history, language systems, as well as specific Italian language variations.

Reflektierte Algorithmische Textanalyse. Interdisziplinäre(s) Arbeiten in der CRETA-Werkstatt

Edited by Nils Reiter, Axel Pichler and Jonas Kuhn
De Gruyter | 2020

Abstract: The Center for Reflected Text Analytics (CRETA) develops interdisciplinary mixed methods for text analytics in the research fields of the digital humanities. This volume is a collection of text analyses from specialty fields including literary studies, linguistics, the social sciences, and philosophy. It thus offers an overview of the methodology of the reflected algorithmic analysis of literary and non-literary texts.

Link: about the book on the publisher’s page

Ästhetische Reflexionsfiguren in der Vormoderne

Edited by Annette Gerok-Reiter, Anja Wolkenhauer, Jörg Robert and Stefanie Gropper
Universitätsverlag Winter | 2019
Germanisch-Romanische Monatsschrift, Beiheft 88

Abstract: What does ‘aesthetic’ mean in periods and cultures before it was explicitly dealt with in the 18th century? This interdisciplinary volume explores what pre-modern texts and artefacts can tell us about their aesthetic foundations. It contains contributions from archaeology as well as Latin, German, Scandinavian, Roman, English and American Studies. All these chapters look at forms, types and figures that can be read as manifestations of aesthetic self-reflection ‘in action’.
Based on examples from different languages, cultures, and media the authors develop a mode of descriptive and heuristic categories, that will help to outline ‘different aesthetics’, within pre-modern aesthetics. For these forms of aesthetic self-reflection, they suggest the term ‘figures of aesthetic reflection’. All contributions investigate how these ‘figures of aesthetic reflection’ may help to develop ‘different aesthetics’ in their manifestations, functions and socio-cultural meaning.

Money Matters. Coin Finds and Ancient Coin Use

Edited by Stefan Krmnicek and Jérémie Chameroy
Dr. Rudolf Habelt | 2019

Abstract: The study of money and coinage is an integral part for our understanding of the Ancient World. As part of the archaeological record, coin finds provide unparalleled information on the varying roles of coinage within society, how these roles differed and changed over space and time and how people also formed part of these changes. Centering around hoard evidence and archaeological contexts, this volume compromises a collection of essays in English, Italian, French, and German by international leading scholars from German, French, British, Italian, Belgian, Greek and American scholarship that features the latest developments in the study of coin finds and ancient coin use.

Von Meister Eckhart bis Martin Luther

Edited by Volker Leppin and Freimut Löser
Kohlhammer | 2019
Meister-Eckhart-Jahrbuch 13

Abstract: In 2017, the Meister Eckhart Society dealt on a conference with the relationship of Meister Eckhart and late medieval mysticism to the Reformation and Martin Luther. The meeting witnessed an exchange between researchers in the fields of German studies, of philosophy, and of theology, and asked about the mediation of thoughts and ideas from the 14th to the 16th century. The yearbook therefore gathers contributions that ask about mediation paths and patterns, developments, spots of contact, but contrasts as well.

Meister Eckhart: Reden der Unterweisung

Edited, translated and commented by Volker Leppin
Evangelische Verlagsanstalt Leipzig | 2019
Große Texte der Christenheit 8

Abtract: Meister Eckhart († 1328) was the central figure within the so called Rhenish mysticism. When he served as the prior of the Dominican monastery at Erfurt in the late thirteenth century, he wrote the treatise presented here in modern German. Here, we find him more as a spiritual counselor than as a speculative philosopher who answers to questions and problems raised by his brothers. Against a background of mystical interior piety, he traces the issues of monastic as well as average Christian behavior. He speaks about human sinfulness as well as about imitation of Christ and the communion in the Lord’s Supper.