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V 6 William Algernon Churchill – Edward Heawood
William Algernon Churchill: * 1865, British Consul in Amsterdam,
Milan, etc., † 1947.
Edward Heawood: * 1863, 1886 Fellow of the Royal Geographical
Society, librarian of the Society until 1934, † 1949.
The monograph “Watermarks in paper in Holland, England,
France etc. in the XVII and XVIII centuries and their interconnection”,
published by William Algernon Churchill in
1935, is not merely a collection of watermarks, but is rather
a history of papermaking, above all Dutch, illustrated with
578 watermark tracings. Papermaking is recorded in Holland
from the end of the 16th century. In the second half of
the 17th century, Amsterdam established itself as an important
centre for paper production and its export – not only
of Dutch paper, but also paper from France and Germany.
One of the most important importers of Dutch paper in the
17th and 18th century was England. The excellent reputation
of Dutch paper in the 18th century led to its paper (and its
watermarks) being copied in France and also, to some extent,
in southern Germany.
Closely connected to the above publication of Churchill is
the watermark collection “Watermarks mainly of the 17th
and 18th centuries” of Edward Heawood. Churchill’s publication
includes many watermarks from Heawood’s collection;
conversely, for his own publication, Heawood, who was a
close friend of Churchill, used many tracings Churchill had
made but not included in his work. Heawood’s collection contains
4,078 tracings of watermarks, classified according to
motifs, collected primarily from books and maps from the library
of the Royal Geographical Society, the Victoria and Albert
Museum and the British Museum.
* * *
William Algernon Churchill: Watermarks in paper in Holland, England,
France etc. in the XVII and XVIII centuries and their interconnection,
Amsterdam 1935, Reprint Nieuwkoop 1985.
Edward Heawood: Watermarks mainly of the 17th and 18th centuries
(Monumenta chartae papyraceae historiam illustrantia 1),
Hilversum 1950, Reprint Amsterdam 1957 and 1970.
V 7 Karl Theodor Weiß
A.H. (C.P.-K.)
* 13 February 1872 (Schwetzingen), parents from Constance,
paper historian and watermark researcher, † 12 Mai 1945, Erfurt.
Karl Theodor Weiß passed his general qualifications for university
entrance in Ettenheim and subsequently studied philology,
German language and literature as well as history at the
Universities of Freiburg, Strasbourg, Tübingen and Heidelberg.
After an internship at the Großherzogliche Landesbibliothek
in Karlsruhe, he studied – pushed by his father, with
whom he had a difficult relationship – law in Freiburg and Heidelberg.
He graduated, however, from the faculty of philosophy.
Two years later, Weiß founded the Deutsche Papiermuseum.
At the turn of the century he worked as a lawyer in
Karlsruhe and later, in Engen (Hegau); his greatest commitment,
however, was devoted to his studies on paper and watermarks.
Three children were born between 1899 and 1904:
Werner, his daughter Wissigard, and finally his son Wisso.
From 1910 he conducted systematic surveys, sending questionnaires
of up to 5,000 copies to public institutions, church
parishes, archives and active paper mills. These questionnaires
asked for a broad range of information about former paper
mills, individual paper makers, their products and their watermarks.
Weiß was not only interested in acquiring watermark tracings,
he also collected original paper samples and described
them in a standardized manner. In the context of his research
on watermarks, he also studied historical papermaking techniques
intensively. He collected old moulds and studied the
watermarks pairs produced from two moulds in a single papermaking
process. In a study on the Stockach paper mill published
in 1915, he carefully noted watermark pairs: “Only both
moulds of a pair of moulds are of value. They allow the most
reliable dating of writing paper, prints, and drawings.” His
monograph, “Paper History and Watermark Research”, was
published in 1926. It clearly demonstrates that he did not consider
the history of paper merely an auxiliary science.
His “Handbuch der Wasserzeichenkunde” (Handbook of
Watermark Research), a project that he planned and
worked on for decades, remained unfinished at his death.
Also projected “Regesten zur Papiergeschichte” (Inventory
of Paper History), mentioned in his correspondence with
the publisher Karl W. Hiersemann of Leipzig, was not completed.
After World War I, Weiß discontinued his law practice,
moved to Mönchweiler near Villingen, and for the following
two decades privately worked on his research in limited
financial circumstances. In 1937, on the suggestion of
Hellmuth Müller-Clemm, an Expert Committee for Paper
History and Watermark Research was founded by the Verein
der Zellstoff- und Papier-Chemiker und -Ingenieure (Association
of Pulp and Paper Chemists and Engineers), but despite
some negotiations, he declined a position. He was also
not willing to place his collection at the disposal of the
Forschungsstelle für Papiergeschichte (Research Centre for
Paper History), founded in 1938 in Mainz. Alfred Schulte,
who Weiß had familiarised with the fundamentals of paper
history already in 1930, became the head of this institution.
In 1939, Weiß and his wife, urgently in need of support,
were brought by their son Wisso to live with him in Erfurt.
The collection was packed into cases and became nearly inaccessible.
During World War II, under the threat of air
raids, a paper manufacturer had parts of the collection
transferred to a bunker. Wisso Weiß was a prisoner of war
when his father died on 12 May 1945 in Erfurt, immediately
after the end of World War II. It was left to his son to finish
all the works his father had left incomplete.
* * *
Alfred Nadler: Zum 100. Geburtstage von Dr. Karl Theodor Weiß,
in: IPH-Information N.F. 6 (1972) 1, p. 5–7.
Karl Theodor Weiß: Die Papiermühle zu Stockach, ihre Geschichte
und ihre Wasserzeichen. Nach seiner papiergeschichtlichen Sammlung
dargestellt von Dr. Karl Theodor Weiß, in: Schriften des Vereins
für Geschichte des Bodensees 44 (1915), p. 14–31.
Karl Theodor Weiß: Papiergeschichte und Wasserzeichenkunde. Erreichte
Ziele und zu lösende Aufgaben, in: Archiv für Buchgewerbe
und Gebrauchsgraphik 63 (1926), p. 292–308.
Karl Theodor Weiß: Handbuch der Wasserzeichenkunde, bearbeitet
und herausgegeben von Wisso Weiß, Leipzig 1962.
Ulman Weiß: Karl Theodor Weiß. Prolegomena zu einer Biographie,
in: International Paper History 5 (1995), Heft 3, p. 48–53.
F.S. (F.S. / C.-P.-K.)
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