Studien zur Germania Sacra. Neue Folge

The "episcopalization of the church" did not just mean the expansion of a bishop's authority to exert power; it was a universal, all-pervasive principle: it was no longer possible to imagine any area of society that was not under episcopal influence, which radiated in all directions. The contributions in this volume trace and analyze this central process of transformation in the early and high Middle Ages in a European comparison.

The reign of Dietrich of Moers, Archbishop of Cologne, spanned major military conflicts and above all the conflict in church politics regarding the supremacy of either pope or council, particularly as it was fought out during the years of the Council of Basel. This study concentrates on the relationship between the chapter and the Archbishop, and contains features such as biograms of the canons of the Cologne Cathedral Chapter.

The Benedictine Abbey of Gottesaue was founded in 1094. Based on written evidence, the remains of the Gottesaue library, liturgical manuscripts, archeological finds, and works of sacred art, the study traces the history of Gottesaue from its beginnings as part of the Hirsau Reforms, through late medieval reforms, until the dissolution of the convent, including its brief reconstitution during the Thirty Years War.

Die früh- und hochmittelalterliche Bischofsforschung hat in den letzten Jahren unbestreitbar einen Aufschwung erlebt. Dabei lag der chronologische Fokus vor allem auf der Zeit bis zum Ende der Karolingerherrschaft sowie auf der Epoche nach dem Investiturstreit. Thematisch nahm man vor allem das Agieren der Bischöfe auf der Reichsebene in den Blick. Demgegenüber widmet sich der Tagungsband mit der Zeit zwischen 850 und 1100 sowie den diözesanen Handlungsräumen von Bischöfen zwei Themenfeldern, die wenig Beachtung gefunden haben, wobei zusätzlich ein räumlicher Schwerpunkt im Reichsgebiet nördlich der Alpen gesetzt wird.

Beiträgerinnen und Beiträger des Bandes: Gerd Althoff, Andreas Bihrer, Jörg Bölling, Stephan Bruhn, Helmut Flachenecker, Lioba Geis, Thomas Krüger, Nathalie Kruppa, Jens Lieven, Theo Riches, Hedwig Röckelein, Sebastian Scholz, Dominik Waßenhoven, Jérémy Winandy, Thomas Zotz.

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This volume examines the special connection between monasticism and nature. From the outset, monks looked for sites that marked the boundaries between nature and culture: deserts, mountains, and islands. The sea quickly took the place of the desert where the first months sought retreat. Thus, along with mountain monasteries, monastic islands are part of the foundation of Western monasticism, on which later generations of monks would build.

On the occasion of the centenary of the Germania Sacra: Historical-Statistical Description of the Church during the Holy Roman Empire, this volume examines the history of the Germania Sacra, from its “"invention” in the 16^th to the 18^th century, the launch of the project by P.F. Kehr during World War I, its evolution during the Weimar Republic, through the Nazi era, until today, in the context of European partnership projects.

This volume is devoted to the early history of the Uetersen nunnery in southwest Holstein. It examines the foundation of the cloister and the first 70 years of its history, taking into consideration prosopography, order history, and territorial, memorial, and economic aspects. In the presentation, it also integrates literary and historiographic works of the 13^th to the 18^th century.

The exercise of worldly power by Church institutions is among the characteristic features of the Holy Roman Empire and its constitution. Bishops, abbots, and abbesses represented both ecclesiastical and secular authority. This volume examines the details of worldly rule in religious hands in the 17^th and 18^th centuries, and is organized according to the broader themes of "Constitution," "Self-Conception," "Representation," and "The Economy."

The Premonstratensian Chapter of Marchtal, founded in 1171 by Palatine Hugo II of Tübingen, was geographically situated at the locus of major territorial and political conflicts in the second half of the 13^th century. The investigation of the "Marchtal Forgeries" uncovers new sources that help cast light on the conflicts of Bishop Heinrich II of Constance and his predecessors with the Habsburgs as they advanced along the Danube.

What was the nature of life – and death – in an 18^th century Catholic convent? From an anthropological and cultural perspective, Dietmar Schiersner examines the lives of the sisters in sickness and in health, their clothing, living spaces and spaces of the imagination (reading, writing, and music-making), and the rhythms of their lives: days, years, life stages, generational conflicts, the hour of death, eternity, and institutional memorials.

The study focuses on the abbesses in the oldest and most socially exclusive women’s religious communities in lower Alsace. Drawing on prosopographic and network analytic methods, it examines the influence of origins as well as gender on the scope of action open to the abbesses.

In the medieval Christian church the claim to authority possessed by abbots, bishops, and popes stood in contrast to the rights of consultation held by monks, canons, and cardinals. This work demonstrates how the latter formed themselves into more or less independent electoral and consultative colleges.

In her study Miriam Montag-Erlwein investigates the entire monastic source material of the Heilsbronn Abbey from 1132 to 1321. This provides information about the connections within the Order, about the power structure as well as about the identity-giving role of the monastery for the nobility and the urban upper class.

After Cologne, Strasbourg was the city with the most religious women's communities in the late medieval empire. The study sheds light on the broad spectrum of religious lifestyles for women in a late medieval city, their close integration into the urban environment and the sometimes considerable power of clerical women in political, economic and religious matters.