The Baltic Battle of Books

Jonas Nordin, PhD, is Professor of Book and Library History at Lund University. His research is mainly focused on book culture and intellectual history in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. Gustavs Strenga, PhD, is a Post-Doctoral Research Fellow at the University of Greifswald and a Senior Researcher at the National Library of Latvia. The history of medieval Livonia, memory studies, remembrance of medieval heroes, ethnicity in the Middle Ages, gift giving as a historical phenomenon, and book history are his main academic interests. Peter Sjökvist, PhD, is Associate Professor of Latin at Uppsala University and Rare Books Librarian at Uppsala University Library. His research interests are early modern occasional poetry, dissertation culture, and literary spoils of war.

Contents


Contents


Preface


 Jonas Nordin, Peter Sjökvist and Gustavs Strenga





List of Figures and Tables


Notes on Contributors





A Battle of Books through Five Centuries


 Jonas Nordin, Peter Sjökvist and Gustavs Strenga





Part 1: Creating Libraries


1 Fifteenth-Century Manuscripts


 The Liturgical and Musical Testimonies from the Cistercian Nunnery in Riga


 Laine Tabora





2 Gradual Formation and Dramatic Transformation


 Mendicant and Cistercian Book Collections in Late Medieval and Post-reformation Riga


 Andris Levāns and Gustavs Strenga





3 The Printing of Missals and Breviaries as Ecclesiastical Authority in the Late-Medieval Baltic Region


 A Battle between Printers or between Bishops?


 Mattias Lundberg





4 A Game of Cities


 Driving Forces in Early Modern Scandinavian Book History


 Wolfgang Undorf





5 English and Scottish Jesuits and Print Culture of the Sixteenth-Century Grand Duchy of Lithuania


 Hanna Mazheika





6 Pre-suppression Jesuit Libraries


 Patterns of Collection and Use in Northern, Central, and Eastern Europe


 Kathleen M. Comerford





Part 2: Relocating Libraries


7 Building a Nation through Books


 From Military to Cultural Armament in Seventeenth-Century Sweden


 Jonas Nordin





8 War Booty of Books from Olomouc


 Catholic Libraries in Lutheran Sweden


 Lenka Veselá





9 Useful Literary Spoils of War from Riga at Uppsala University Library


 Peter Sjökvist





10 Battles of Books in Denmark from the Reformation to the Great Northern War


 Anders Toftgaard





11 ‘An Ornament for the Church and the Gymnasium’


 The War Booty in Strängnäs Cathedral and Its Relation to the School


 Elin Andersson





Part 3: Reconstructing Libraries


12 The Fragment of the Personal Library of Johannes Poliander in the National Library of Poland


 Fryderyk Rozen





13 The Fate of the Riga Jesuit College Library (1583–1621)


 Aspects of Research into a Historic and Unique Book Collection in the Digital Age


 Laura Kreigere-Liepiņa





14 Dissonance and Consonance in the Early Modern Battle of Books


 A Personal Reading


 Janis Kreslins





Illustrations


Index