Augsburg SuStB going digital?

Update: Whoa. Nikolaus Weichselbaumer added a comment: "Augsburg SuStB has been taken over by the Bavarian state from the city of Augsburg in late 2012. Since then they have reorganized and created a better equipped digitization department that – as far as I know – is now working its way through their rare books collection. There probably won't be a wave, but a I expect a steady buildup of digital editions from SuStB." That's about as surprising and momentous as it gets in the world of old book digitization projects.

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Here's a surprise: The BSB recently released digital editions of late medieval manuscripts from the Augsburg Staats- und Stadtbibliothek. As I observed earlier, Augsburg seems to have a collection rich in unique items, but it remains stubbornly offline. I'm not expecting a wave of digital facsimiles anytime soon, but maybe we can hope for more to follow from this initial effort.

Here are the two most recent additions:

Ulrich Schriber: Historienbibel. SuStB Augsburg 2 Cod 50 (Cim 74).
Der Heiligen Leben, Sommerteil. SuStB Augsburg 2 Cod 154.

At the moment, I find a total of nine Augsburg manuscripts listed in the BSB WebOPAC (searching for "SuStB Augsburg cod," but without quotes), and the online catalog does not link to the digital editions. It's a small but very welcome first step.

Totentanz (updated)

Update 18 March 2014: Link to a new facsimile added (VD16 T 1660)
Update 14 March 2014: One new edition added (VD16 Z 710). 

Update 13 December 2013: I've added links to newly available facsimiles and expanded the bibliography. It occurs to me that the Totentanz is another genre with a continuous transmission from the late Middle Ages into the modern period, and examples of the genre have quite a bit to say about the structure of society. It would be interesting to compare the pre- and post-Reformation Totentanz and observe how the text is treated over time.

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One of the works that I find very useful for teaching the later Middle Ages is the Dance of Death. The Totentanz in its various versions has a double payoff: it illustrates late medieval attitudes towards death, and it provides a graphic overview of the structure of late medieval society. In manuscript and print (not to mention a number of famous murals), the tradition lasts more than two centuries, so there are numerous possibilities for student papers. Best of all, several different versions of the Totentanz are now available online. The next time I teach the medieval to early modern course, we're going to spend some more time on the Totentanz, and I'll make it a required paper. Here's a first attempt at a bibliography.

Johannes Virdung online (updated)

Update  6 December 2013: Several new editions of Virdung's works have recently come online, particularly from the Österreichische Nationalbibliothek and the Landesbibliothek Coburg, so I'm updating this post. I've also added a section for Virdung's works on apocalyptic themes, including his prognostication on a false prophet for 1503, on the Antichrist for 1525, and his 1512 invective against the Persian astrologer Lucas (actually a late appearance of the "Toledo Letter"; see Gerd Mentgen, Astrologie und Öffentlichkeit im Mittelater, 114-16). The Latin and German editions of 1512 have still not been digitized, but the work was included in Goldast's Politica imperialia of 1614, which is available.

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New online this week from dilibri, the digitalization portal for Rheinland-Pfalz, is Johannes Virdung's practica for 1534. My argument in Printing and Prophecy (and in expanded form in an upcoming AGB article) is that Virdung, even more than Wenzel Faber von Budweis, helped create the characteristic form of the German annual astrological prognostication that stayed quite stable for many decades. The Bayerische Staatsbibliothek has digitized quite a few of Virdung's Latin practicas of the 1490s, the crucial period for the genre's development, but few of the German practicas that are most important for driving the developement, and the later practicas are much more sparsely represented online. Only some of Virdung's numerous other works are available. At the moment, I find:

Almanacs and calendars
Almanach, 1492 [Latin]. ISTC iv00301000, GW M50705
Almanac for Heidelberg, 1498 [German]. ISTC iv00302000, GW M50711

Incunable practicas
Prognosticon 1491 [Latin].  ISTC iv00302055, GW M507162
Prognosticon 1491, for Leipzig [German]. ISTC iv00302050, GW M5072210
Prognosticon 1492, for Leipzig [Latin]. ISTC iv00302120, GW M50725
Prognosticon 1492 [Low German].  ISTC iv00302200, GW M50728
Prognosticon 1493, for Leipzig [Latin]. ISTC iv00302215, GW M50732
Prognosticon 1495 [Latin]. ISTC iv00302240, GW M50737
Prognosticon 1497 [Latin]. ISTC iv00302257, GW M50742
Prognosticon 1497 [German].  ISTC iv00302259, GW M50745
Prognosticon 1498 [Latin].  ISTC iv00302264, GW M50748
Prognosticon 1500 [German]. ISTC iv00302270, GW M50750

Postincunable practicas
Practica for 1511. VD16 ZV 15221
Practica for 1523. VD16 V 1280
Practica for 1526. VD16 V 1284

Practica for 1531. VD16 V 1290
Practica for 1534. VD16 V 1292
Practica for 1537. VD16 V 1294


Comet prognostications
Comet 1506. VD16 V 1259
Comet 1506. VD16 V 1260
Comet 1531. VD16 V 1255
Comet 1532. VD16 V 1254

Others
Lunar signs 1514. VD16 V 1263
Lunar signs 1514.  VD16 V 1264
Eclipse prognostication 1513. VD16 V 1317
Eclipse prognostication 1519. VD16 V 1315
Nova medicinae methodus (1532). VD16 V 1267 
Nova medicinae methodus (1533). VD16 V 1268
De cognoscendis et medendis morbis ex corporum coelestium positione libri IV (Venice 1584).


Prognostication on the conjunctions of 1524
[Landshut: Johann Weißenburger], 1521 [Latin]. VD16 V 1303
Oppenheim: [Jakob Köbel, 1521]. VD16 V 1304
[Cracow: Vietor], 1522 [Latin].
Oppenheim: [Jakob Köbel, 1522]. VD16 V 1305
[Augsburg : Melchior Ramminger], 1523. With prognostication of Sebastian Ranßmar. VD16 V 1306/R 211
Oppenheim: [Jakob Köbel, 1523. VD16 V 1310
[Augsburg: Heinrich Steiner 1542]. VD16 V 1300
Strasbourg: Jakob Cammerlander, 1542. With "Hidden Prophecy" of Johann Carion. VD16 V 1301

as the Große Practica (with the Prognosticatio of Johannes Lichtenberger)

[N.p.: n.p.], 1543. VD16 L 1611

Apocalyptic works
Prognostication of a False Prophet on the Great Conjunction of 1504. VD16 V 1296
Invective against Lucas (VD16 V 1265), reprinted in Melchior Goldast, Politica imperialia... (VD17 1:018471V)
Prognostication on the Antichrist (1525). VD16 V 1302