Course Information

Instructor: Michaela Ullmann

Location: Germany: Mainz, Rüdesheim, and Bingen

Mode: In-person, in English

Dates: June 21–25, 2027

Tuition: $1500.00, excluding transport

Course Description

This five-day intensive course explores the Middle Rhine Valley between Mainz and Bingen as a vital center of European learning, religious life, manuscript production, and printing from the twelfth through the fifteenth century. Designed for librarians, scholars, antiquarian booksellers, collectors, and others interested in the history of the book, the course combines expert lectures, close examination of original materials, hands-on workshops, and visits to significant cultural and historical sites in Mainz, Bingen, Rüdesheim, and the surrounding region.

The course begins in Mainz, where participants will examine the city’s development from a Roman settlement into a powerful ecclesiastical, political, and commercial center. Visits to Mainz Cathedral, the Diocesan Museum, and the Wissenschaftliche Stadtbibliothek (Mainz City Library) will introduce the religious institutions, monastic networks, artistic traditions, and geographic conditions that supported the region’s rich book culture. Selected manuscripts — including medieval choir books and examples of Mainz Gothic fleuronnée decoration — will provide opportunities to study the physical characteristics, production, use, and preservation of handwritten books.

At the Museum am Strom in Bingen and at the former Rupertsberg monastery, participants will investigate the life, works, and intellectual legacy of Hildegard von Bingen. Lectures and site visits will place Hildegard’s theological, musical, scientific, and medical writings within the context of medieval monastic culture while also engaging critically with recent scholarship and the construction of her modern reputation. At the Abbey of St. Hildegard in Rüdesheim, participants will explore the transmission of Hildegard’s works through the Scivias manuscript tradition and learn about the contemporary work of the sisters including conservation, preservation, bookbinding, and wine making.

The course then turns to fifteenth-century Mainz and the development of printing with movable type. Sessions at the Gutenberg Library and Gutenberg Museum will consider Johannes Gutenberg’s innovations in relation to existing technologies and practices — including manuscript production, metalworking, the wine press, and regional trade. Particular attention will be given to Gutenberg, Peter Schöffer, and the craftspeople, merchants, fairs, and transportation networks that enabled early printing to flourish in the region. Examination of incunables such as Schöffer’s Gart der Gesundheit will reveal the continuing influence of manuscript conventions on the design, decoration, and use of early printed books.

Throughout the week, hands-on workshops in manuscript illumination, historical ink making, bookbinding, and letterpress printing will deepen participants’ understanding of the materials and labor involved in producing books. Site-based learning, conversations with local specialists, and structured reflection will encourage participants to connect individual objects with the religious, intellectual, technological, environmental, and commercial networks through which they were created and circulated.

By the end of the course, participants will be able to:

• Analyze manuscripts and incunables as material objects, identifying evidence of their production, decoration, use, transmission, and preservation.
• Explain the religious, political, geographic, and commercial factors that made the Middle Rhine Valley an important center of medieval learning and book production.
• Situate Hildegard von Bingen’s writings and intellectual legacy within medieval monastic culture and critically assess their later reception.
• Describe the materials, tools, skills, and collaborative labor involved in manuscript illumination, ink making, binding, and early printing.
• Evaluate continuities and differences between manuscript and print culture, including the influence of scribal traditions on early typography and book design.
• Situate Gutenberg’s innovations within established artisanal practices and regional networks of trade, transportation, and communication.
• Compare the roles of monasteries, ecclesiastical institutions, libraries, workshops, and urban commercial centers in the production and circulation of books.
• Apply insights gained through object-based and experiential learning to the description, interpretation, teaching, collecting, and stewardship of rare books and manuscripts.

A limited number of scholarships may be available.

The course is dependent on enrollment confirmations. It is strongly recommended that potential participants book only refundable flights, hotels, and other travel arrangements.

In some field sites, transportation may be infrequent, so wait times may be surprising.

CalRBS is not responsible for the weather, institutional closures, restaurant dietary accommodations, and political disruptions. Many institutions in Europe do not have building climate control.

Are you an established expert in rare books, special collections, and print culture? Or perhaps an expert in library and information studies, critical librarianship, or data studies? CalRBS encourages course proposals on innovative topics that build on its vast array of courses focusing on rare books, special collections, and manuscripts.

CalRBS is especially interested in the following areas as they relate to rare books, galleries, libraries, archives, and museums:

• Grant Writing
• Advanced Pedagogy and Teaching
• Remote Course Programming and Design
• Space Planning and Innovative Alternatives
• Social Media
• Programming for ESL and Bilingual Constituencies
• Data Preservation
• Digital Knowledge Repatriation
• Crisis Recordkeeping
• Public Libraries and At-Risk Populations
• Sustainability Studies
• Climate Change Impacts on the Profession
• Grassroots Communities
• Archives Organization
• Reappraisal and De-Accessioning
• Digital Methods for Research and Scholarship
• Data Activism
• Collection Development for Specific Communities
• Ink and Papermaking (Maker studio and/or history of)
• Children and Young Adults and Public Libraries
• Primary sources in K-12 Education
• History, production, and publishing of children’s books
• Material, Collections, and Institutions through Indigenous and First Nation lenses
• International Librarianship, Bibliography, and Rare Books
• Disability Studies
• Feminist and Gender Studies
• Postcolonial, Decolonial and Critical Development studies
• History of small presses and independent publishing in Los Angeles/California/U.S. and beyond
• Gastronomy, cook books, and food culture
• Topic and survey courses that focus on undergraduate and high school students

Courses that focus on critical analysis, diversity, ethics, and promote justice-oriented approaches are especially welcome. In addition to these areas, we are looking for courses that fill identified gaps in the current CalRBS curriculum. While new courses can extend beyond the domain of rare books and special collections, they should contextualize rare books within a larger library and information economy, emphasizing the importance of book and print culture throughout the discipline of Information Studies.