Karlstadt Edition

The long-term DFG project "Critical Complete Edition of the Writings and Letters of Andreas Bodenstein of Karlstadt" was supervised by the Göttingen Academy of Sciences and Humanities in Lower Saxony from October 2015 until the end of 2025. The aim of the twelve-year project, which had begun its work in 2012 under the auspices of the University of Göttingen, was to produce a complete edition of all writings and letters by Andreas Bodenstein of Karlstadt (1486–1541) in both digital and printed form. The digital edition was developed in cooperation with the Herzog August Bibliothek Wolfenbüttel.

Andreas Bodenstein, named after his hometown on the Main River, "Karlstadt," was an important reformer of the 16th century. Approximately seventy printed works in over two hundred editions testify to his influence as a theologian and publicist of the Reformation. Among the authors who actively contributed to spreading the Reformation through German-language prints between 1518 and 1525, Karlstadt ranks second only to Martin Luther. Many of Karlstadt’s reformist initiatives were innovative and influenced the various Protestant factions. While initially central to the Wittenberg circle around Luther, his impact also became apparent among dissenters and in the Swiss Reformation shaped by Zwingli.

Since 2013, individual units of the "Critical Complete Edition" have been successively published online. This presentation includes treatises, pamphlets, series of theses, letters, poems, and official documents from the period from 1507 to 1524. Five volumes have been published in print (KGK I: 1507–1518; KGK II: 1519; KGK III: 1520; KGK IV: 1521; KGK V: 1522).

You can access the project homepage here.

You can access the digital edition here.