(no subject)

[tree_and_leaf]

This is unbelievably awful: Cologne city archives collapse into a hole in the ground. It is, in fact, a bigger disaster than the fire at Anna Amelia library. Four people are unaccounted for (at least), and it looks as if the archives themselves are a total loss (they poured concrete into the hole, in an attempt to shore things up. This includes a large number of mediaeval religious manuscripts relating to the Rhineland mystics, as well as stuff relating to Heinrich Böll.

... I know. It's rather monstrous to be concerned about that when people are probably dead, but all the same: the manuscripts are a very great loss, too.

Comments

[juno-magic.livejournal.com]

The Deutsche Welle has an article that indicates that at least a part of what was lost is archived on microfilm somewhere in the Black Forest. So while the originals may be lost, it's quite possible that the content is still around.

The big hole is quite shocking to look at, though.

[tree_and_leaf]

It's good that something's preserved, but I'm fairly sure that large numbers of the mss weren't (a friend of mine is, or was, working on them, and has spent an awful lot of time in that very archive. He was looking rather green today).

[juno-magic.livejournal.com]

Wait and see. Our methods of recovering trashed manuscripts are better than ever before.

While I share the pain, I think it's also a good reminder of all the things we've lost throughout history because of fire, flood, war ... or simply because an abbot decided that something wasn't at all funny ...