Malena Ratzke
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malenaratzke.bsky.social
Malena Ratzke
@malenaratzke.bsky.social
250 followers 410 following 120 posts
German literature & manuscript culture up until 1650. Likely libraries.
@uni-jena.de
http://linktr.ee/malenaratzke
Banner image: København [Copenhagen], Det Kongelige Bibliotek, GKS 79 2º, fol. 011r (detail). https://t1p.de/speculum-humanae-salvationis
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malenaratzke.bsky.social
How many floors are there in hell?

Join me for an online presentation on the visualization of hell in the 'Speculum humanae salvationis': Seminar Religion and Writing @ Columbia University. Tue Nov 18, 12pm EST (Europe: 6pm CET).
RSVP via t1p.de/hell-11-18 by Fri, Nov 14
#medievalsky #bookhistory
A tinted outline-drawing from a medieval manuscript: Three rows with busts of anguished people, burning flames at the bottom. German writing between the rows: "di helle di do heiset daz vegevuer", "diz ist der helle die ane toufe sterben", "die helle der vertumpten vnd der [...]" ('Hell that is called purgatory', 'hell for those who died unbaptized', 'hell of the damned').
November 12, 2025 at 9:53 AM
malenaratzke.bsky.social
Don't go astray: Pilgrim's way above the river Neckar.

This week in Heidelberg, German medievalists met for a conference on 'Heimat' - home & belonging.
(2) Cpg 148 @ub-heidelberg.bsky.social.
(3) Selling Heimat.

#academicnomad #bibliapauperum
#medieval #pilgrimage #academiccommunity
A yellow pilgrim's scallop on a tree trunk overlooking a town in a river valley. Grey clouds with a spot of light above. The 15th-century manuscript of codex palatinus germanicus 148. The left verso page has a fairly standard two-column layout, whereas the recto page on the right utilizes the convention of 'pagina cum textu incluso': A colorful arrangement of rectangular miniatures in the center is surrounded by text that fills up most of the page. Visible in the center are scenes related to Judas' betrayal of Christ, along with four prophets. (3) An advertisement showing a container of seasoning for deer or game, from a shop called 'Heimat' - home.
October 11, 2025 at 8:37 AM
malenaratzke.bsky.social
Catching up with the #NineWorthies of #Braunschweig: Hector of Troy, Alexander the Great, Julius Caesar, King David, Judah Maccabee

--
t1p.de/di-35-83

t1p.de/9-h-comp-her...

#germanistiktag #germanistentag #germanstudies #prophets #typology #nineworthies #medieval 🗂️
Three basins of a medieval market square fountain. Visible on the edge of the lower basin are seated prophets with scrolls. On the next level above: Coats of arms with inscriptions: "brunswik · ector · allexa(n)d(er) · yulius · r(ex) david · yodas ·"
September 17, 2025 at 1:54 PM
malenaratzke.bsky.social
Unerwartet Pferdekoppel

#germanistiktag #braunschweig #germanistentag
A dark horse on a green meadow with white clouds in the sky, in the foreground a wooden fence
September 15, 2025 at 5:21 PM
malenaratzke.bsky.social
You don't expect this scenery on a conference coffee break

#germanistiktag #braunschweig #germanistentag #germanstudies
A dark horse on a green meadow with white clouds in the sky, in the foreground a wooden fence
September 15, 2025 at 5:19 PM
malenaratzke.bsky.social
In pleasant news: Our book 'Graffiti Scratched, Scrawled, Sprayed' is now available in paperback.

Have a look, it's even got pictures!

www.degruyterbrill.com/document/doi...

#graffiti📁 #art #anthropology #archaeology #epigraphy #medievalsky
A green and beige bookcover, reading 'Graffiti Scratched, Scrawled, Sprayed. Towards a Cross-Cultural Understanding. Edited by Ondřej Škrabal , Leah Mascia , Ann Lauren Osthof and Malena Ratzke'
July 11, 2025 at 9:01 AM
malenaratzke.bsky.social
Vff myn libry ich mich verlan - I rely on my library! This wall art in the main building @ Uni Jena - doesn't it remind you of the book fool in Sebastian Brant's Ship of Fools?

Basel, 1499. Bamberg, SBB, Inc.typ.Ic.I.1, 4v. CC-BY-SA 4.0.
nbn-resolving.org/urn:nbn:de:b...

#medievalsky #bookhistory
Quadratic field on a wall with blue and yellow geometric shapes forming something that looks like a bespectacled bird reading in an open book Sebastian Brant's book fool The first image in context: a brown wooden staircase
June 20, 2025 at 6:05 AM
malenaratzke.bsky.social
Spuk im Gästehaus @intbund.bsky.social

Die drei ???: Spuk im Hotel

#academicnomad #justuspeterbob #diedreifragezeichen #dreifragezeichen
Rotes Ablagebrett, darauf das Buch-Cover für die Doppelausgabe von Die drei ???: Der Zauberspiegel und Spuk im Hotel
May 13, 2025 at 8:57 AM
malenaratzke.bsky.social
Finally: No-nonsense labels in the cookie policy

#digitalnomad
Two blue buttons in a cookie policy, both showing the label "Button"
April 17, 2025 at 9:06 AM
malenaratzke.bsky.social
Mittelalterliche Bedeutungsforschung als widerständige Praxis. W. Harms und W. Hogrebe über Friedrich Ohly und die Bologna-Universität.
In: Friedrich Ohly. Vergegenwärtigung eines großen Philologen. Hrsg. von dens., Stuttgart 2014, 16–33.

#medievalsky #germanstudies #academiccommunity
Screenshot aus dem Vorwort von Harms und Hogrebe. Der zentrale Absatz lautet: "Von akademischer Ausbildung kann an deutschen Universitäten nur mehr in Fällen des Widerstands die Rede sein, der Ohlys Elixier war. Es dominiert jetzt die Abrichtung. In einer Universität der Betriebswirte gibt es zwei Wachstumszweige, den des ökonomisch opportunen Trainings und Einwerbens und den der aufwendig evaluierenden Verwaltung. Friedrich Ohly war als Forscher und Lehrer unter Ungezählten ein starker Repräsentant der Geschichte einer autonomen Universität."
April 15, 2025 at 8:25 AM
malenaratzke.bsky.social
Borg Cube Plattenbau

#academicnomad #startrek #architecture #trainstation
Night view of passing a train station, a parking lot structure in the distance that looks like a prolonged Borg cube
April 9, 2025 at 6:37 PM
malenaratzke.bsky.social
A review for my dissertation is in: Exciting!

Julia Gold, in Archiv für das Studium der neueren Sprachen und Literaturen. doi.org/10.37307/j.1...

(Btw, the book comes with an extended English abstract:
doi.org/10.1515/9783...)

#medievalsky #literature #germanstudies
#academiccommunity #rhetorics
Tilted photo of the table of contents in the scholarly journal 'Archiv'. Under the heading of 'reviews', the entry for Julia Gold's review of 'Erzählte Oratorik' - 'Narrative Oratory'
April 3, 2025 at 6:53 AM
malenaratzke.bsky.social
Seventies? No sevenTEEN - as in seventeenhundreds.

Exploring Schiller's garden house @uni-jena.de.

#unijena #Germanistik #academicnomad #Literaturgeschichte
#germanstudies #literature 🗂️
A painted border in Friedrich Schiller's study in Jena. Mostly blue, black and white, diamong-shaped geometrical pattern on orange
March 19, 2025 at 4:41 PM
malenaratzke.bsky.social
Staying warm in #Wilhelmsburg: Grog recipe in a pub wall painting. "Rum's a must - Sugar an option - water not so much"

"Rum muß - Zucker kann - Wasser braucht nicht"

#Kneipe #pub #Lokalgeschichte #Hafen #Hamburg #history #sailor'scocktail #graffiti 🗂️
Faded grog recipe in a pub wall painting. A rum bottle and keg, a sugar cone, a faucet and a kettle accompanying the text: "Rum's a must - sugar an option - water not so much" ("Rum muß - Zucker kann - Wasser braucht nicht")
March 18, 2025 at 5:25 PM
malenaratzke.bsky.social
Got up early today, looking forward to this guest lecture in Bamberg

#medievalsky #bookhistory
Poster for a guest lecture: Material Hermeneutics in manuscripts of the 'narrative' Biblia pauperum, Bamberg
January 29, 2025 at 6:34 AM
malenaratzke.bsky.social
Alexander v Dareios

"den mâhen er frôliche entfienc [...] / sîne hant fol pefferis er nam. / Ze Darien boten er do sprach: / "Diz ezzen dîn hêre, ob er mach."(Straßb. A.)

#Germanistik #Mediävistik
#academiccommunity #medievalsky
#germanstudies #literature #teaching #alexanderromance
A piece of poppyseed cake, pepper and salt in glass shakers on a table
January 16, 2025 at 3:59 PM
malenaratzke.bsky.social
Getting ready to grade the last papers of the year. Sublime.

#Germanistik #Mediävistik
#academiccommunity #medievalsky
#germanstudies #literature #teaching
A table with colorful tablecloth, a golden cup of coffee and sweets.
December 3, 2024 at 1:03 PM
malenaratzke.bsky.social
Werde das Gefühl nicht los, dahinter steckt eine Parabel auf die Universitätswelt...

(Ja, es geht hier um sowas wie 'Erdung')

#academiccommunity #unijena
Eine weiße Metalltür zu einem Versorgungsschacht, auf einem Aufkleber das Wort: "Potentialausgleichschiene"
November 29, 2024 at 8:37 AM
malenaratzke.bsky.social
Unexpectedly enchanted by this picture of Theodor W. Adorno. Can't seem to trace the source - can someone help out?

#criticaltheory #Adorno #theory #sociology #literature
Theodor W. Adorno in a black sweatshirt, his white collar showing, making a thumb-down gesture.
November 7, 2024 at 4:21 PM
malenaratzke.bsky.social
Latrinalia and Scrabble happily united @uni-jena.de

#graffiti #jena #germanstudies #academicwriting
A checkered pattern on a tiled bathroom stall wall forms the grid for purple tags by 'Rudel'. Other people have added words in black and red to this base layer: Para (short for paranoia), Saale (Jena's river), Äpfel (apple), Liebe (love)...
October 16, 2024 at 2:25 PM
malenaratzke.bsky.social
Rotunda writing - Albertina edition.
#academicnomad
#librarynomad
Rotunda reading room (theology and political science) at Bibliotheca Albertina Leipzig. In the mainly whitewashed room, a sea-green glass ceiling above a row of arched windows with dark portraits of scholars in a row below. Some bookshelves and doorways visible in the lower third of the image.
October 14, 2024 at 9:33 AM
malenaratzke.bsky.social
Come with us to the allotment, they said. It's going to be fun!, they said.

(Kleingärtnermuseum Leipzig)

#urbangardening #Kleingarten 🌱 #gardening
Historic family photograph of five mostly smiling people in the foreground and a grumpy (scary!) teenager who seems to recede into the foliage of a hedge
August 31, 2024 at 2:57 PM
malenaratzke.bsky.social
More happy fish on fish day! This manuscript has a whole fish game going on. Again: Surprising contrast to the emotional distress on the part of the humans (Flore sets sail to Babylon to look for Blanscheflur).

Heidelberg, UB, cpg 362, 79v.
doi.org/10.11588/dig...
#bookhistory #medievalsky
15th-century pen drawing of two happy fish in the water. The main topic of the image, however, is a ship setting sail. A king and queen say goodbye to their son, the queen embraces him. On board the ship, three male figures show signs of distress in their faces and hand gestures.
August 22, 2024 at 3:16 PM
malenaratzke.bsky.social
Happy fish day!
Blanscheflur, distressed because she is being carried off to distant lands, can't find consolation in the wonders of the sea, but that doesn't keep this fish from enjoying the waves.

Heidelberg, UB, cpg 362, 48r.
doi.org/10.11588/dig...

#bookhistory #bestiary #medievalsky
15th-century coloured pen drawing of a pleased fish in the blue sea. Above: A distressed courtly lady - Blanscheflur -, dressed in red, white and blue, in a yellow ship amidst three gesticulating male figures.
August 22, 2024 at 7:18 AM
malenaratzke.bsky.social
Onwards! Summer #writing at the comfortably cool German national library, passing fabulous Sgraffito art (Heiner Vogel). Annalena Metz has more on the art in this building, see alt text!

#bookhistory #academicwriting #writing #library
#librarynomad
#medievalsky #skybrarians
A medieval scribe writes with a quill at his desk. White lines on green/dark grey . Detail of a Sgraffito by Heiner Vogel at the German national library, Leipzig. See https://blog.dnb.de/wissensspeicherung_12/ for more info. An ancient and a medieval scribe write on tablets and at the desk, respectively. Below, a man works at a printing press. White lines on green/dark grey. Detail of a Sgraffito by Heiner Vogel at the German national library, Leipzig. See https://blog.dnb.de/wissensspeicherung_12/ for more info.
August 21, 2024 at 2:25 PM