Processing Music Manuscripts Completed at the St. Boniface Abbey Library, Munich (D-Mb)

Friday, February 10, 2012

The abbot of the St. Boniface Abbey in Munich, RR Johannes Eckert, was presented with a catalog of the music manuscripts in his abbey library on January 20, 2012. This brought to a close the inventorying of manuscripts by Dr. Gottfried Heinz-Kronberger, from the RISM working group in Germany.

All libraries that have their music manuscripts indexed by RISM or do it themselves with RISM’s cataloging program can receive such a catalog free of charge for their own use. The data are, of course, also directly incorporated into the RISM online catalog.

The holdings of music manuscripts at the library of St. Boniface Abbey are made of two collections: 1) that of the monastery located in Munich, and 2) that which was added from Andechs Abbey, an affiliated priory. The latter includes numerous manuscripts that were owned by the St. Nikolaus Institute in Andechs, a reformatory that existed from 1856-1925.

Only a few manuscripts date from the time before secularization (before 1803). The majority are from the 19th century. In consideration of documenting the entire holdings, all of the music manuscripts were cataloged, including some from the 20th century. The compositions of Fr. Pius Meier (1896–1982), which are absent from this catalog, are the only exception.

The holdings together total 455 manuscripts, resulting in 2,291 records.

Click here for more information, including a summary of a preliminary catalog that was published in 1976 in English.

Category: Library collections