Alba Amicorum

The article is an attempt at systemizing and interpreting trompe l'oeil motifs and devices - from single objects shown as if resting on a page, through those altering the appearance of the page, such as folded page corners, up to still lifes - that constitute elements of book-of-friendship entries in one particular collection.
Examples are used to show their relations with the entry text: illusionistic elements could illustrate, but also extend or complement it. It was particularly the quodlibet-type compositions that could allude to the book's owner and the shared memories, forming as if a visual counterpart of "memorabilia". The researched motifs do not always comply with all the criteria of trompe l'oeil; they do, however, aspire to be illusionistic, additionally fulfilling well the tasks that are associated with books of friendship.

Artykuł jest próbą systematyzacji oraz interpretacji motywów o charakterze iluzjonistycznym - od pojedynczych obiektów ukazanych jako leżące na stronie, poprzez zabiegi zmieniające wygląd
strony, jak np. zagięte rogi kart, aż po martwe natury - stanowiących elementy wpisów sztambuchowych w jednej kolekcji.
Na przykładach wskazany został ich związek z częścią tekstową.
Mogły one ilustrować treść wpisu, ale też rozwijać ją i uzupełniać. Zwłaszcza kompozycje typu quodlibet kryć mogły aluzje do osoby właściciela albumu i wspólnych wspomnień, stanowiąc
wizualny odpowiednik "memorabiliów". Badane motywy ukazane zostały jako nie zawsze spełniające wszystkie kryteria trompe l’oeil, ale niewątpliwie aspirujące do iluzjonizmu, a dodatkowo
dobrze wypełniające łączone z twórczością sztambuchową zadania.

The study of alba amicorum is still a relatively obscure yet growing pursuit in the Anglophone world. By browsing through these autograph albums, it is possible to unlock the names of Scots so long sunk into oblivion or simply reveal additional details and facets to the personality of those whose names have come down the centuries. Additionally, vriendenboeken weave networks of relations between Scots and Europeans expanding our understanding of these mobile and endeavouring individuals. These volumes are important as they help the historian get a clearer picture and add to the better knowledge of the peregrinatio scotica in particular vis-à-vis the Netherlands. The genre of alba amicorum fully deserves a greater consideration from the Scottish, and indeed British, historian. They offer a rounder picture of the contributors’ identities and give a voice to Scottish women which is independent from that of their husbands.

The paper explores "Scottish-Scandinavian relations through the almost entirely untapped medium of visual culture, particularly heraldry and alba amicorum [autograph albums]. [...] The article first examines the use of coat of arms by [northern] Scots abroad, demonstrating their flexible, self-fashioning nature, and then turns to alba amicorum of both Swedes and Scots, interrogating the social and intellectual interactions between the two nations. What emerges in both sections is the protean nature of national or cultural identity: Scots and Swedes shaped and reshaped themselves to respond to a wide variety of situations, sometimes grimly holding on to an ever-more distant foreign past, at other times seamlessly blending in amongst the inhabitants of another part of Europe. The article offers a valuable commentary on the dangers of making sweeping statements about the national or ethnic allegiances of immigrants, as well as opening up exciting new stretches of visual history which have until now remained largely untapped in Scottish-Scandinavian studies". (This is taken from the introduction to the volume written by Kelsey Jackson Williams and Kathrin Zickermann).

Temples of friendship. The meaning and function of images of the landscape garden monuments in the books of friendship from the late 18th and early 19th c. in the collection of the Wroclaw University Library

The article systematizes and tries to analyze motifs inspired by small garden architecture and sculpture, preserved in friendship albums found in the collections of the University Library in Wrocław (see footnote 4): urns, antique-like altars, monuments in the form of broken columns, steles, pyramids, sarcophaguses, stones, etc. They are either independent representations or, less often, an element of larger quodlibet compositions. Most of these monuments are fantastic
in nature, but the Altar of Truth (“Altar der Wahrheit”) from the Seifersdorfer Tal landscape park in Saxony and the famous Rousseau’s Tomb on the poplar island of Ermenonville were also depicted.
Based on the literature devoted to the “cult of friendship”, the author points to other than only aesthetic functions of these representations, as well as to their links with the older tradition of album decoration.

Die Staatsbibliothek gab vom 7. Juni bis 12. August 2018 einen Einblick vor allem in die Hamburger Stammbuchkultur des 16. bis 20. Jahrhunderts und zeigte eine Auswahl von Stammbüchern vornehmlich aus ihren Sondersammlungen, ergänzt durch Alben aus dem Museum für Hamburgische Geschichte und dem Hamburger Staatsarchiv. Mit-Kuratorin war Prof. Dr. Gisela Jaacks.

English title: 'Thus the Page Unites Friends': Paper as Social Networking Device at the University of Groningen (1614-Today).
Catalogue article for the exhibition 'Papier Ontvouwd. Groningers en hun papier'/'Paper Unfolding. Groningers and their paper' (GRID Groningen, 2017).

On the basis of the autobiography of the orthodox Calvinist minister Abraham Trommius (1633-1719), this article argues that the Republic of Letters created its own cultures of memory. The very use of the word ‘Republic’ begs the question whether there was some kind of early modern ‘state building’ at play within the networks of learned men and women. Although sentiments of religious and political alliance cannot be ruled out in the practices of learned memories, the identity arising from these cultures aimed at stressing learning, friendship and communication. Its acts of memory were localized instances of learned identity formation across borders, serving travelling students regardless of their political and confessional affiliations. This article argues that memories of learning or learned memories present a new logical, although hitherto ignored, line of research, to complement well-studied political and confessional memories. Trommius draws particular attention to Erasmus and to Joseph Scaliger and his father Julius Caesar Scaliger. The article also discusses the broader memory of these towering figures to exemplify the study of early modern learned identity formation by means of cultures of memory.

Keywords: locations of knowledge,  learned identity,  material memory,  Grand Tour,  Erasmus,  Scaliger