Medieval Manuscripts from the National Library of the Czech Republic

In 2017, the first two manuscripts from the library of the monastery in Vyšší Brod were digitised. This monastery was founded by Vok of Rožmberk in 1259 and its library still contains works from its entire development, including the codices that were brought by the first monks from the mother monastery in Wilhering, Austria. Information on the content of the library at the end of the 13th century is provided by the incomplete list of books that is recorded in one of the Vyšší Brod codices and that is one of the oldest preserved in the Czech lands. Despite the number of manuscripts covering the entire existence of the monastery, which ranks the Vyšší Brod collection among exceptional ones in Bohemia, the medieval as well as later history of the library has only been devoted limited attention in scientific literature. From the monastic library, access has been provided to two manuscripts, shelf marks XXXVII and 8b. The first one is an illuminated prayer book from the Franco-Flemish area or Burgundy, written in the first half of the 15th century. The second codex is mainly known to German Studies scholars. It is the so-called Hohenfurter Liederbuch (Vyšší Brod Songbook), which was written around the middle or after the middle of the 15th century, contains 81 German spiritual songs and is one of the most important works of medieval German literature deposited in the Czech Republic.

From the collections of the Regional Museum in Teplice, an Utraquist gradual from 1560 (MS 1) and a hymnal from 1566 (MS 2) have been digitised. Both manuscripts were procured for the literati brotherhood at the parish church of St John the Baptist in Teplice and were written in the Prague workshop of Jan Táborský from Klokotská Hora. They were decorated by the leading illuminators of the time: Fabián Puléř and Matouš Ornys of Lindperk. Unlike other, similar works, both manuscripts still contain also texts and depictions related to John Hus and his feast day.

In 2017, the Museum of the Jindřichův Hradec region provided access to a total of 16 manuscripts and early printed books from its collections. The manuscripts comprise a smaller part of the collection – they include works of medicine, wedding speeches and prophecies written in the 18th century. On the border between the two groups, there is an album amicorum of Johann Hegenmüller, who had his Stammbuch records, including the accompanying decoration, written in the printed book Emblematum liber by Andrea Alciato. With a few exceptions, the early printed books represent the Czech- and German-language production of printers in Jindřichův Hradec in the 18th century. Some of the digitised volumes come from the property of the provost of Jindřichův Hradec Vojtěch Juhn (1779–1843).

In 2017, the Regional Museum in Louny digitised six manuscripts and three early printed books. In terms of its content, the set of manuscripts is homogeneous – they are all Czech-language prayer books (exceptionally complemented by Germans sections) from the second half of the 18th century and the first third of the 19th century; some of them even contain the exact date of origin and personal notes by their owners. According to the records available, all the printed books (shelf marks S 117, S 5275 and S 7724) are single copies.

In 2017, twenty modern manuscripts from the collections of the Royal Canonry of Premonstratensians at Strahov were digitised (some of them are deposited in the National Archives, in the collection Premonstráti – klášter Strahov, Praha). Almost without exception, these are historiographical sources and diaries that are related to the history of the monasteries in Doksany and at Strahov, but also to other institutions (the Norbertinum College, the church of St Gallus in the Old Town of Prague, the convent of Discalced Carmelite Nuns, the Benedictine Monastery of St John under the Cliff, the monastery of the Minims in the Old Town of Prague), orders (the history of Augustinian monasteries written by J. F. Hammerschmid) and events (the siege of Prague in 1744).

The Cistercian abbey Lilienfeld was founded in 1202 by the Babenberg duke Leopold VI. The construction of the medieval abbey was finished in 1263. Lilienfeld was a centre for scholarly traditions in the Middle Ages, later a strong connection with Vienna University was maintained. The monastery library contains 39000 prints, 119 incunabula and 226 medieval manuscripts, including the collection of medieval and early modern codices from the library at Stift Lilienfeld, containing religious, liturgical, devotional, and patristic texts, as well as texts on other subjects. Famous is the concordantiae caritatis codex a compiled work of abbot Ulrich von Lilienfeld, who lived in the 14th century. It is the most voluminous typological collection oft the late medieval times. To be maintained also are the works of monk Christanus von Lilienfeld (d. before 1332) a liturgical poet of hymns, rhymed offices, sequences and compilator of several religious and liturgical works. Its wealth and glory was not sufficient to prevent the dissolution of the monastery under Emperor Joseph II in 1789. After its restoration in 1790 as a substitute for loss in the course of the abolition of 1789 a bundle of 49 manuscripts from the Lower Austrian Benedictine monastery Mariazell in Österreich was awarded to Lilienfeld.

The Gallery of the Central Bohemian Region has provided access to an excised illumination that it acquired in an auction in 2009. It has been digitised by the company AiP Beroun s.r.o. The sheet of a size of ca 64.5 x 44 cm depicts silver-ore mining and processing in Kutná Hora. It was painted shortly before 1500. Besides its artistic qualities, it is an important source on the method of ore mining and processing, which has analogies in other paintings from both Kutná Hora and the region of the Ore Mountains (Krušné Hory).

Most of the recently digitised manuscripts from the National Library of the CR are medieval codices containing Czech texts. In terms of their content, these are predominantly theological, ascetic and morally instructive works translated or adapted from Latin originals, whose authors include e.g. Thomas à Kempis, Albertanus of Brescia, Henry Suso and others. The manuscripts further comprise sets of prayers, legends, dictionaries and medical compilations. Texts in Latin are only represented by a set philosophical treatises written in Prague at the beginning of the 15th century (XIV.F.20) and two codices from the Prague Lobkowicz Library, whose previous owner was the Premonstratensian monastery of Weissenau.

The National Library has recently provided access to 19 codices from between the 14th century and the beginning of the 16th century. Most of them are placed under the shelf mark XVII and thus contain texts in Czech. The manuscripts include i.a. probably the oldest extant version of the collection Ráj duše (/The Paradise of the Soul / from 1383, XVII A 19; the same text has also been preserved in the codex XVII D 32 from the turn of the 15th century), several volumes containing a Czech version of Lives of the Holy Fathers (XVII C 16, XVII C 17, XVII C 28) and Czech translations of Historia scholastica, the narrative Biblical history by Peter Comestor (XVII D 18), and of the moral-educational work Quadripartitus apologeticus (XVII E 12, in Czech Čtverohranáč). A unique notation of the song Našě sestra Jana [Our Site Jane] forms part of the collection of poems and other texts XIV G 45; several of the newly digitised codices are written in German (shelf mark XVI and a collection of theological texts from the Prague Lobkowicz Library XXIII D 178).

The National Library of Medicine in Prague digitised four volumes of medical and veterinary printed books in 2016. They all come from the last quarter of the 18th century and were mostly printed in Vienna, some also in Bratislava and Lübeck. The binder’s volume of individual parts of the work Anfangsgründe der chirurgischen Vorbereitungswissenschaften für angehende Wundärzte (F 184) by J. J. von Plenck is also interesting for its ownership marks.