Die Papierschlange. Scheybs Kampf mit der Tabula Peutingeriana

Im Jahr 1750 erhielt Franz Christoph von Scheyb eine Anfrage der besonderen Art; er möge ein Porträt für ein Gelehrtenlexikon einreichen. Der Empfänger kommentiere diese Einlandung mit ostentativer Abgeklärtheit: " in Kupfer soll ich mich stechen lassen?" Als sichtbares Zeichen falscher Bescheidenheit fügte Scheyb seinem Gedanken ein Fragezeichen hinzu. Der interpunktive Schnörkel am Endes des Satzes - er war für den damaligen Literaturpapst Johann Christoph Gottsched bestimmt - hatte einen konkreten Grund. Scheybs editorisches Großprojekt war damals noch nicht abgeschlossen: die erste originalgetreue Kopie der Tabula Peutingeriana aus der Wiener Hofbibliothek.

Kant and the Problem of “True Eloquence”

This article argues that Kant's attack on the ars oratoria in §53 of the Critique of the Power of Judgment is directed against eighteenth-century school rhetoric, in particular against the “art of speech” (Redekunst) of Johann Christoph Gottsched. It is pointed out that Kant suggests a revision of Gottsched's conception of “true eloquence,” which was the predominant rhetorical ideal at the time. On this basis, and in response to recent discussions on “Kantian rhetoric,” Kant's own ideal of speech is addressed. It emerges that he favors a culture of speech embedded in moral cultivation, which excludes any disciplinary form of rhetoric.

Kasuale Lehrgedichte im Kontext der aufklärerischen Gelehrtenrepublik

In the early decades of the eighteenth century, a number of German authors published poems that combined features of occasional and didactic poetry. The article examines ›occasional-didactic poems‹ by Johann Christoph Gottsched and Abraham Gotthelf Kastner that were read out loud at academic ceremonies. The study seeks to show that Gottsched and Kastner used this hybrid genre to intervene in, or to comment on, quarrels and controversies within the learned world, in particular controversies involving different faculties and disciplines. Thus, these poems should not be dismissed as mere attempts to upgrade the much-criticized genre of occasional poetry by adding philosophical digressions. Rather, they constitute one of the specific forms of communication developed within the Enlightenment republic of letters. In addition, these poems are instructive with respect to the development of eighteenth-century didactic poetry in general.