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Ill. 6: WZMA: Watermark list
Beta radiography photos of the watermarks in the WZMA
collection as well as metadata on the marks and the concerning
manuscripts have been available on the internet
since 1999 (http://www.ksbm.oeaw.ac.at/wz/wzma/). This
database (last visited 31 August 2008) contains images of
about 9,000 watermarks from approximately 600 codices in
Austrian manuscript libraries, dating from 1321 to the beginning
of the 16 th century. About 1,000 new images from
manuscripts in the Vienna Schottenstift, the Innsbruck University
Library and the Austrian National Library were added
in March 2007, when the site was updated.
The WZMA database can be used like a printed collection:
By choosing the name of a watermark motif in the
menu list or an icon of one of the collection’s watermark
groups (Ill. 4), all the relevant watermarks are listed in a
table; by clicking on the reference number of a particular
watermark, its picture appears as well as details about the
watermark and the manuscript it is found in (Ill. 5).
In addition, by clicking on a manuscript’s signature, a list
of its documented watermarks appears, also including identical
watermarks and variants (Ill. 6). Photographs of related
watermarks can be accessed by clicking on their reference
number (for example AT5000–165_37, etc.) and compared
to one another directly on the screen.
It is planned to incorporate, on a yearly basis, any newly
documented watermarks from Austrian manuscripts from
the Middle Ages into the WZMA online database. As well,
in the immediate future it is planned to improve the links
between the WZMA and other watermark online databases
and published watermark collections. This will be undertaken
by the Commission of Palaeography and Codicology of
Medieval Manuscripts of the Austrian Academy of Sciences,
in part within the framework of the EU project “Bernstein –
The Memory of Paper”.
***
Alois Haidinger, Emanuel Wenger, Victor N. Karnaukhov: Wasserzeichen
Klosterneuburger Handschriften, in: Gazette du livre médiéval
32 (1998), p. 8–13.
Alois Haidinger: Datieren mittelalterlicher Handschriften mittels
ihrer Wasserzeichen, in: Anzeiger der phil.-hist. Klasse der Österreichischen
Akademie der Wissenschaften 139 (2004), p. 1–18, plate
1-X.
Alois Haidinger: Projekt “Wasserzeichen des Mittelalters” – Arbeitsstand
und Perspektiven, in: Gazette du livre médiéval 47 (2005),
p. 42–45.
Alois Haidinger: Die Sammlung “WZMA – Wasserzeichen des Mittelalters”
der Kommission für Schrift- und Buchwesen des Mittelalters,
in: Piccard-Online – Digitale Präsentationen von Wasserzeichen
und ihre Nutzung, hg. von Peter Rückert, Gerald Maier, Jeannette
Godau (= Werkhefte der Staatlichen Archivverwaltung
Baden-Württemberg, Serie A, Heft 19), Stuttgart 2007.
Alois Haidinger, Maria Stieglecker, unter Mitarbeit von Franz Lackner:
WZMA – Wasserzeichen des Mittelalters. Online-Sammlung
‘vorwiegend mittelalterlicher Wasserzeichen aus Handschriften
österreichischer Bibliotheken, Wien 1999ff. (Last version: v.
3–2007–03-21).
A.H. (C.P.-K.)
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