Fateful Periods. Routinisation of a Wittenberg Chronological and Eschatological Concept within Bohemian University Humanism (c. 1550–1620)

0574924 - FLÚ 2024 RIV HU eng J - Journal Article
Storchová, Lucie
Fateful Periods. Routinisation of a Wittenberg Chronological and Eschatological Concept within Bohemian University Humanism (c. 1550–1620).
Central European Cultures. Roč. 3, č. 1 (2023), s. 38-64. ISSN 2786-068X. E-ISSN 2786-0671
R&D Projects: GA ČR(CZ) GA20-11795S
Institutional support: RVO:67985955
Keywords : Protestant Historiography * Bohemian lands * cultural exchange * Carionʼs Chronicle * Philipp Melanchthon * Caspar Peucer
OECD category: History (history of science and technology to be 6.3, history of specific sciences to be under the respective headings)
Method of publishing: Open access
https://doi.org/10.47075/CEC.2023-1.03

The article deals with ways in which one of the most important chronological tools of Lutheran historical writing and eschatology – the “fateful periods” that were based on Daniel’s prophecy and predicted originally the demise of the Holy Roman Empire and the End of the World – was modified when it spread from Wittenberg to the University of Prague. The study does not seek to illustrate the importance of apocalyptic imagination by adding further examples of Central European provenance: rather, its goal is to demonstrate how eschatological discourses became absorbed into scholarly material, how they were rewritten and reapplied in individual humanist texts and, particularly, how their meanings and functions changed in the process of cultural exchange. Calculations based on “fateful periods” of 500 or 250 years were made part of the ordinary curriculum of the University of Prague and became one of the basic intellectual themes employed by non-theologians in various subjects, for example in different historical narratives, strategies for seeking patronage or as a tool for producing a community and shared identity among humanist scholars.
Permanent Link: https://hdl.handle.net/11104/0344897