Documents: 127, displayed: 41 - 60

Sub-project: Manuscripts from the Carthusian monastery of Basel

Summer 2017 - December 2020

Status: Completed

Financed by: University Library Basel

Description: The Carthusian monastery of St. Margarethental was founded in 1401 in Kleinbasel (Lesser Basel); until the Reformation it was an important spiritual and intellectual center whose influence extended far beyond the city of Basel. At the beginning of the 16th century its library contained about 2,000 books, almost all of which became the property of the university after the dissolution of the monastery and constituted the substantive basis of the early university library. Among these books are more than 600 manuscripts, which are currently in the process of being catalogued and made accessible by the University Library Basel. In addition, a scholarly relevant selection of these manuscripts is being digitized, among them the German manuscripts from the the library of the lay brothers as well as the manuscripts containing texts by the Carthusians of Basel.

All Libraries and Collections

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Basel, Universitätsbibliothek, A X 93
Paper · 135 ff. · 15.5 x 11 cm · middle of the 15th century
Thomas à Kempis, De imitatione Christi libri I-III

Ludwig Moser brought this small-format volume to the Carthusian Monastery of Basel (cf. note of ownership 1r), from where it came to the Basel University Library. It contains the first three of the four books of Thomas à Kempis’ De imitatione Christi. This text, which is influenced by the teaching of various mystics, especially Meister Eckhart, offers spiritual people a guide for detaching from the world. It was very well received by Catholics as well as Protestants and is considered one of the most widely read books of Christendom. (mue)

Online Since: 10/10/2019

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Basel, Universitätsbibliothek, A X 95
Paper · 272 ff. · 14 x 10.5 cm · 1523
Devotionalia varia ex usu Cartusiensium

This small-format paper manuscript from the Carthusian Monastery of Basel is mostly by the hand of the librarian Georg Carpentarius, who for the sake of daily spiritual exercises compiled prayers for various occasions, hymns, meditations and other theological texts. Among the identifiable authors are great ones such as Anselm of Canterbury and Bernard of Clairvaux, as well as lesser known names such as Basilius Phrisius. Two colored prints are glued in the covers: St. George with the dragon (front pastedown) and the Mass of St. Gregory (back pastedown). (mue)

Online Since: 12/14/2018

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Basel, Universitätsbibliothek, A X 117
Paper · 261 ff. · 22 x 15 cm · Basel · 1st quarter of the 16th century
Composite manuscript of theological content

This volume, originally from Ludwig Moser’s private book collection (cf. note of ownership 2r) came to the Basel University Library as part of the holdings of the library of the Carthusian Monastery of Basel. It contains various theological texts in German, beginning with a version of Wilhelm Textoris’ Migrale vel Ars moriendi (Sterbebuch, a book on the art of dying), which Moser himself translated into German. This is followed by Henry Suso’s "Büchlein von der Wahrheit”, Thomas Peuntner’s "Büchlein von der Liebe Gottes”, and several sermons by Johannes Tauler and Meister Eckhart. (mue)

Online Since: 10/10/2019

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Basel, Universitätsbibliothek, A X 121
Paper · 33 ff. · 21 x 15 cm · Basel · around 1500
Obsequiale Carthusian Monastery in Basel

This obsequiale, written by Prior Jacob Lauber in his own hand, governs the Office of the Dead at the Carthusian Monastery in Basel. The inserted prayers (among them the Lord's Prayer in Latin and in German) as well as the chants with musical notation are situated in a liturgical context. (stu)

Online Since: 03/22/2018

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Basel, Universitätsbibliothek, A X 122
Paper · 154 ff. · 22 x 16.5 cm · Carthusian Monastery of Basel · 1496-1498
Composite manuscript Theology

This paper manuscript from the Carthusian Monastery of Basel contains ordinaries for priests (among them an address in German to the lay brothers), deacons and subdeacons, instructions for the office of the sacristan, as well as a number of shorter and longer pieces of liturgical music. Among the latter, otherwise all in Latin, there is a German version of the sequence Ave praeclara maris stella (135r-135v) written by Sebastian Brant. This manuscript was written by Thomas Kress, the last Carthusian in Basel (†1564), at the beginning of his monastic career (more precisely: in the third year of his period of profession, cf. 102v). (mue)

Online Since: 12/14/2018

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Basel, Universitätsbibliothek, A XI 59
Paper · 260 ff. · 14 x 10.5 cm · Basel (?) · 4th quarter of the 15th and 1st quarter of the 16th century
Ascetic-catechetical composite manuscript

This manuscript, written mostly in German, consists of various parts, all of which probably date from the same time, the end of the 15th century to the beginning of the 16th century. This codex belonged to the library of the lay brothers of the Carthusian monastery in Basel and may have been written, at least in part, in this same monastery. Among the texts in this devotional book are the exemplum of the pious [female] miller, the “Guten-Morgen-Exempel” often attributed to Meister Eckhart, a recounting of the history of the Carthusian order, as well as various sermons, prayers, sayings and exempla. (stu)

Online Since: 12/14/2017

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Basel, Universitätsbibliothek, A XI 61
Paper · 159 ff. · 14.5 x 10.5 cm · Upper German speaking area · 2nd half of the 15th century
Prayer and devotional book with the Office of the Virgin

This German devotional book was written by a single hand; it is from the library of the lay brothers of the Carthusian Monastery in Basel. In addition to the Office of the Virgin, which is at the beginning and takes up about half of the manuscript, this codex also preserves various prayers and other devotional texts. (stu)

Online Since: 03/22/2018

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Basel, Universitätsbibliothek, A XI 71
Paper · 228 ff. · 14.5 x 10.5 cm · 15th century
Composite manuscript (theology)

This small-format codex probably is from the Carthusian monastery of Mainz, from where it came to the Carthusian monastery of Basel, where numerous ownership notes were added. It contains a great variety of excerpts from religious, historical and other literature from the Middle Ages and antiquity. The length of the texts also varies considerably: in addition to short excerpts and two- or four-line verses about various things such as popes or bees, there are longer pieces such as Hugh of Fouilloy’s De rota verae et falsae religionis or the first half of Paradisus Animae by Pseudo-Albertus Magnus. (mue)

Online Since: 06/18/2020

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Basel, Universitätsbibliothek, A XI 72
Paper · 184 ff. · 14.5 x 10.5 cm · 15th century
Composite manuscript (theology)

This composite manuscript from the Carthusian Monastery of Basel, written by various 15th century hands, is decorated simply. The manuscript contains a miniature; on a torn out page, only remnants of a second miniature can be discerned. In two places, musical notes are added to the text. The texts collected in this volume consist almost exclusively of prayers, most of which are quite short, sometimes taking up no more than half a page of the already small-format manuscript. Some prayers are in prose, others are in verses. (fis)

Online Since: 12/10/2020

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Basel, Universitätsbibliothek, A lambda III 10
Paper · 90 + 26 pp. · 29-29,5 x 20-21,5 cm · Basel · 1480-1526
Chronicle of the Carthusian monastery of Basel

This chronicle, which came to the Basel University Library as part of the holdings of the Museum Faesch, contains two parts. The first part was written by Heinrich Arnoldi and deals with the foundation and development of the monastery until 1480; it is written in the form of a dialogue between the prior of the monastery and its patron saint, St. Margaret. This dialogue format, which Arnoldi employed in several of his writings, is unusual for historical content; it is abandoned in the second part. This second part, an autograph by Georg Carpentarius, continues the chronicle until 1526, that is, until shortly before the dissolution of the monastery in 1529. (mue)

Online Since: 06/18/2020

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Basel, Universitätsbibliothek, AN IV 11
Parchment · 83 ff. · 23 x 16.5 cm · 11th century
Sallust

This manuscript from the Carthusian Monastery of Basel consists primarily of the best-known works by the Roman historian Sallust – De coniuratione Catilinae and De bello Iugurthino. In addition, it contains various short texts and fragments of known (Isidore, Publilius Syrus, Ps.-Serviolus) and unknown authorship (rules for syllabification, arithmetical riddles) and a drawing of a labyrinth. The manuscript contains numerous interlinear and marginal glosses by various hands. (mue)

Online Since: 06/14/2018

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Basel, Universitätsbibliothek, AR I 2
Paper · 70 ff. · 31.5 x 11 cm · Carthusian Monastery of Basel · around 1520
Georg Carpentarius: Registrum pro antiqua bibliotheca cartusiae Basiliensis

Around 1520, Georg Carpentarius, the librarian of the Carthusian Monastery of Basel at the time, compiled a shelf list  for the library. This catalog consists of two volumes, one each for the two library rooms of the Bibliotheca antiqua (AR I 2) and the Bibliotheca nova (AR I 3). The catalog for the Bibliotheca antiqua is preceded by the so-called “Informatorium bibliothecarii”, a guide for the librarian which instructs him in his tasks, among them the cataloguing and the care of the books as well as of the inventory. Bound into the front is a list of books that were donated to the Ittingen Charterhouse by the Carthusian Monastery of Basel in 1526. (stu)

Online Since: 10/04/2018

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Basel, Universitätsbibliothek, AR I 3
Paper · 84 ff. · 32 x 10.5 cm · Carthusian Monastery of Basel · around 1520
Georg Carpentarius: Registrum pro nove bibliotheca cartusiae Basiliensis

Around 1520, Georg Carpentarius, the librarian of the Carthusian Monastery of Basel at the time, compiled a shelf list for the library. This catalog consists of two volumes, one each for the two library rooms of the Bibliotheca antiqua (AR I 2) and the Bibliotheca nova (AR I 3). The catalog for the Bibliotheca nova was designed for expansion and contains blank pages after each letter of the alphabet, where more shelfmarks could be added. (stu)

Online Since: 10/04/2018

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Basel, Universitätsbibliothek, AR I 4
Paper · 119 ff. · 29 x 10 cm · Carthusian Monastery of Basel · 1482-1527
Registrum recognitionum librorum Cartusiae Basiliensis

In 1482 Jakob Lauber, the librarian at the time, began to compile a loans register for the holdings of the library of the Carthusian Monastery of Basel. This register was continued after Lauber’s tenure until 1527. The loans register was set up according to the shelfmark letters A to I, and it even was possible to record volumes on loan that had no shelfmark. Borrowed books were listed with the exact shelfmark under the corresponding letter; after the book’s return, the entry was crossed out. (stu)

Online Since: 10/04/2018

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Basel, Universitätsbibliothek, AR I 4a
Paper · 309 ff. · 33 x 23 cm · Carthusian Monastery of Basel · around 1515
Urban Moser: Repertorium universale in librariam Cartusiae Basiliensis

The Repertorium of Urban Moser, librarian of the Carthusian Monastery of Basel, is a register of the library holdings of the Carthusian Monastery of Basel, alphabetically arranged by authors, titles and topics. Since Moser’s successor Georg Carpentarius changed the shelfmark of various volumes, around 1520 he added a shelfmark concordance to the catalog, so that this alphabetical register could still be used. Thus the alphabetical register and the shelf lists (Basel, UB, AR I 2 and AR I 3) could be used in complement. (stu)

Online Since: 10/04/2018

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Basel, Universitätsbibliothek, B I 1
Parchment · 240 ff. · 46.5-47 x 33-33.5 cm · Basel · 1445
Biblia Sacra, tertia pars

Third volume of a Latin Bible originally in four parts that was made in Basel between 1435 and 1445. Illustrated by an anonymous artist, the volumes were written by Heinrich von Vullenhoe, one of the most important calligraphers of the Carthusian Monastery of Basel. The biblical books follow the order specified in the liturgy. Also included in this group are codices B I 2 and B I 3. (flr)

Online Since: 12/20/2016

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Basel, Universitätsbibliothek, B I 2
Parchment · 190 ff. · 45.5 x 33 cm · Basel · 1443
Biblia Sacra, quarta pars

Fourth volume of a Latin Bible originally in four parts that was made in Basel between 1435 and 1445. Illustrated by an anonymous artist, the volumes were written by Heinrich von Vullenhoe, one of the most important calligraphers of the Carthusian Monastery of Basel. The biblical books follow the order specified in the liturgy. Also included in this group are codices B I 1 and B I 3. (flr)

Online Since: 12/20/2016

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Basel, Universitätsbibliothek, B I 7
Parchment · 333 ff. · 47 x 32 cm · France · 2nd quarter of the 13th century
Peter Lombard, Commentary on the Psalms

This 13th century manuscript with Peter Lombards’ commentary on the Psalms, previously owned by Petrus Medicus, came to the Carthusian Monastery of Basel in the 15th century. The codex is organized in three columns, although the outermost column closest to the margin remains empty. The two columns of text are in turn again partly divided in half and give the biblical text in the left half and the commentary in the right half, in lines of half the height. Figure initials in delicate French style correspond to the division of the Psalter into eight liturgical sections. The blank area below the text contains nearly unreadable notes perhaps in pencil, which may be a further commentary. (flr)

Online Since: 12/20/2016

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Basel, Universitätsbibliothek, B I 11
Parchment · 299 ff. · 36.5 x 27 cm · Basel (?) · about 1460
Missale Basiliense

Missal for the Diocese of Basel, created around 1460. This richly illustrated volume was part of a donation by the widow Margaretha Brand († 1474) to the Carthusian Monastery of Basel. It was used at the altar of the holy Virgin in the small cloister of the Carthusian Monastery. In terms of art history, the manuscript can be assigned to the "Vullenhoe-Gruppe." (stu)

Online Since: 09/26/2017

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Basel, Universitätsbibliothek, B I 12
Parchment · 200 ff. · 35.5 x 30 cm · 11th/12th and 13th century
Gregorius, Moralia in Iob, Books 1 to 16

First part of a two-volume edition of Gregory’s Moralia in Iob. From the Carthusian Monastery, purchased at the Council of Basel. The main part of the manuscript was written at the turn from the 11th to the 12th century; the Tabula found at the very beginning and very end of the volume was added in the 13th century. The earlier provenance of the manuscript is not clear, but an origin in common with the second volume (B I 13a) stands to reason. (stu)

Online Since: 09/26/2017

Documents: 127, displayed: 41 - 60