Erasmus Center for Early Modern Studies opens in Erasmus’ birthplace
September 2005 will see the opening of the Erasmus Center for Early Modern Studies in Rotterdam, Desiderius Erasmus’ birth town. This Center aims to study early modern social, political, cultural and intellectual history (1450-1700), specifically in relation to the rich Erasmus collection held at the Rotterdam City Library. This collection comprises some 10,000 volumes of works by and about Desiderius Erasmus.
Erasmus collection at the Rotterdam City Library
One of the objectives of the Erasmus Center is opening up the most voluminous Erasmus collection in the world. Apart from works by Erasmus himself and text editions and translations of authors of classical antiquity from his hand, this collection also includes a wealth of literature on Erasmus. Approximately thirty percent of the works in this collection date from Erasmus’ time (1466-1536). Some ninety volumes are first editions. The collection includes letters from Erasmus as well. The Erasmus collection is an indispensable instrument for the ongoing publication of Erasmus’ Opera Omnia, published under the auspices of the Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Sciences.
Erasmus Online
The Erasmus Center’s world catalogue of Erasmus editions is available on the Center’s website under the name Erasmus Online. Until recently it could only be consulted as a card-based system in the Rotterdam City Library. The catalogue contains a wealth of data on all Erasmiana printed up to ca. 1700, including bibliographical descriptions, references and present locations. As an open database Erasmus Online makes this mine of information accessible to the whole world and provides images of title pages as well. This then is the Erasmus Center’s specific interpretation of Erasmus’ maxim Quaevis terra patria or ‘All the world is your fatherland’.
Erasmus University Rotterdam
The Erasmus Center for Early Modern Studies is a collaboration of the Rotterdam City Library and the Faculties of Philosophy, Social Sciences, Law, and History and Arts of Erasmus University Rotterdam. The Center brings together all expertise in the early modern period available in the university. The general research theme is the way in which the individual, the community and the government were given shape in the Low Countries and in Europe between 1450 and 1700 – from Desiderius Erasmus to Pierre Bayle – and were thought through in their mutual relationships. Special focus is on the development of ideas, attitudes and theories of prominent persons and its influence on the public domain and the private domain. Combining the scientific forces at hand, the Erasmus Center will strengthen the research in the field of the early modern period conducted at Erasmus University Rotterdam by internationally renowned scholars.
Further information may be obtained from
Dr. A.H. (Adrie) van der Laan
Erasmus Center for Early Modern Studies
At Erasmus University Rotterdam & Rotterdam City Library
PO Box 22140 NL – 3003 DC Rotterdam
Tel. +31 10 281 6188
vanderlaan@erasmus.org
www.erasmus.org
