Forgotten Medieval Library Discovered – Reminds Scientists of ‘Indiana Jones’

Romania
Forgotten medieval library discovered – scientists are reminded of “Indiana Jones”.

The ancient books from the church tower

© Adinel C. Dinca

A research team discovered around 200 works from the period between 800 and 1600 in the church tower of a small town in the middle of Romania.

When scientists talk about the Middle Ages, one complaint is often: There are too few sources from that time. Although much had already begun to be written down, countless books were lost or destroyed over the course of history. A find made in Mediaș, Romania, is almost a miracle: researchers discovered more than 200 medieval books and fragments there.

The spectacular find was made in the steeple of the local Margaret Church. The city of Mediaș was founded around 1250 by Transylvanian Saxons, a German-speaking population. They also built the church and seem to have started building a library. At the end of the 16th or during the 17th century, an employee of the church seems to have moved part of the book inventory: the works that had just been discovered were taken from the actual library to a chamber in the church tower. There they were correctly sorted, stored – and forgotten. Til today.

200 medieval books

The rediscovery of this “forgotten archive” reminds them of “a story like Indiana Jones”, according to the scientists involved. They can only speculate as to why the many books were brought to the church tower. Perhaps there was simply no more space in the lavish library that once contained 7,700 works. Or the writings that have now been found were particularly close to the hearts of the believers and they wanted to protect them from the many raids on the city and the numerous wars. However, they seem to have been there well before the First and Second World Wars: “Their arrangement did not strike me as accidental and makes me suspect that the collection was placed here early on,” said the lead historian Adinel C. Dincă.

The writings consist of 139 printed books from the period between 1470 and 1600, two manuscripts from the early 16th century, around 60 handwritten documents from the period between 1300 and 1550 and also several fragments, the oldest of which date from the 8th century . Most of them are religious texts.

Fund should bring new insights

The scientific team is now carefully examining all the works and would then like to scan them in order to make them digitally accessible to all interested parties. Thanks to the astonishing find, the researchers hope to learn more about how much and what the Transylvanian Saxons in north-western Romania read and how manuscripts were produced locally.

Source: “Medievalists”

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