Abstract
Research into early modern Germania Sacra has recently experienced a renewed momentum. Nevertheless, there are still numerous research desiderata, and an overall synthesis providing an overview is lacking. Within the research on the early modern imperial church, that on the pre-modern cathedral chapters, which were rightly described as the ‘conregentes’ of the prince-bishops (Franz Brendle), represents an even smaller intersection – we still know comparatively little about their functionality and their agency. This is where Oliver Kruk's work comes in.
With this study, Kruk aims to ‘make a contribution […] to examining the Bamberg cathedral chapter with regard to its administrative and ruling practices. In doing so, it adopts a decidedly knowledge-historical perspective’ (30). ‘The aim of the present work is to make the administrative and ruling history of the Bamberg cathedral chapter comprehensible as a history of knowledge. The reconstruction of knowledge and information management practices is therefore at the centre of the study’ (34). Kruk understands this information as ‘practices of knowledge generation, storage and processing’ (34). However, the author always retains an abstracting investigative position: ‘to work out general structural features of pre-modern corporations’ (36) is ultimately his epistemological aim, which he seeks to achieve through the lens of the Bamberg cathedral chapter in the period from 1522 to 1623.
Methodologically, Kruk is oriented towards recent work in the history of knowledge, praxeology, history of administration and rule as well as the approach of a pre-modern ‘information state’ – in particular the diverse studies by Stefan Brakensiek and Arndt Brendecke. With his innovative study, Kruk is thus able to combine a classically studied thematic field – imperial church, cathedral chapter, governance – with new research trends and analytical approaches.
Kruk's study is based on a broad range of archival sources. In particular, the author includes the Rezessbücher in his analyses, which he aptly classifies as a ‘central collection of the administrative and ruling knowledge of the Bamberg cathedral chapter’ (216). In addition, his study is based on Protokollbücher, Copeybücher and Kopialbücher from the holdings of the Bamberg State Archives, and Kruk also consults Aufschwörbücher and Admissionsbücher for prosopographical access to the Bamberg cathedral chapter.
In his introduction (15–47), the author concisely describes the current state of research (with the exception of the missing works by Anton Schindling and Franz Brendle on the imperial church, the cathedral chapters and the electoral capitulations). Kruk stresses that research has seen the cathedral chapters as a backward and reform-inhibiting corporation. In contrast, Kruk quite rightly emphasizes the importance of the pre-modern cathedral chapter for the rule of the ecclesiastical states during vacancies of sedis at the beginning of his study. It should be mentioned that the cathedral capitulars were also able to exercise rule in the absence of the prince-bishop (accumulation of benefices, political exile) or in the event of incapacity to govern (by means of the so-called coadjutory) – their influence was therefore even greater than the author explains.
In Chapter II (49–90), the study focuses on the Bamberg cathedral chapter as an administrative and governing body, with Kruk convincingly demonstrating the functioning, powers and structural organization of this corporation and its rule, emphasizing the striving for consensual decision-making at the chapter meetings in particular.
Chapter III (91–161) focuses on the ‘practices of information acquisition’ (91) by the Bamberg cathedral chapter in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries and underlines the different areas of rule for which this information was necessary. Kruk postulates that the area of jurisdiction was a ‘core task’ (93) of the Bamberg cathedral chapter. In addition, Kruk describes the increasing implementation of written proceedings in the course of the sixteenth century. In this chapter, the study is also able to show the change from a previously reactive to a proactive government during the sixteenth century, especially in terms of confessional politics.
In Chapter IV (163–217), Kruk shows how the Bamberg cathedral chapter reacted to the consolidation and intensification of writing as a practice of rule. The focus of the study is therefore on the ‘development of the archive as an independent authority’ (164). The author also takes a closer look at the materiality of the writing process and the need for largely institutionalized paper procurement. Kruk underlines the spatial dimension of the cathedral chapter's archive, which was always kept separate from the prince-bishop's archive. The Bamberg cathedral chapter even differentiated between an archive (in Bamberg Cathedral) and a registry (in the chapter house).
Chapter V (219–74) then examines the ‘rule in everyday life’ (219) of the Bamberg cathedral chapter, with Kruk analysing ‘individual practices of information management’ (219) and the administrative actions of the local and central officials of the Bamberg cathedral chapter as a whole. The study convincingly establishes that ‘the offices of the cathedral chapter were economically independent institutions’ (225) – the cathedral chapter's role was more that of a ‘supervisory board’ 229) in the sense of ‘quality control’ (271). In this chapter, the author makes the concept of ‘practical knowledge’ particularly useful for everyday administrative life in the sixteenth century.
The final chapter, VI (275–333), then examines ‘the role of the Bamberg cathedral chapter in the political system of the Prince-Bishopric’ (275) from an ‘information and knowledge history perspective’ (275). In particular, Kruk shows how the cathedral chapter stabilized the rule of the Bamberg Prince-Bishopric as a governmental ‘corrective’ (312). Kruk also postulates a considerable break in the communication relationship between the prince-bishop and the cathedral chapter around 1550 – from then on, they no longer communicated directly with each other, but indirectly via various prince-bishop's officials.
Overall, Oliver Kruk presents an excellently structured and stringently and concisely argued study on the Bamberg cathedral chapter in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries that reads fluidly. It is characterized in particular by the exemplary linking of a broad archival source base to a methodologically clearly defined and consistently operationalized set of instruments. Overall, Kruk's study reveals the administrative and communicative practices of a pre-modern corporation, the negotiation processes regarding governance and rule as well as the rise of a textual culture in the sixteenth century. Thus, the study will be seminal for future work on and beyond the early modern cathedral chapters of the Germania Sacra, and the author is to be congratulated on this thoroughly successful study.