The most important German hymnologist
Wilhelm Bäumker Collection
Bäumker - The most important german hymnologist
The collection of the Catholic theologian and important german hymnologist Friedrich Wilhelm Bäumker was handed over to the Cologne City Library after his death in 1905. Bäumker's library, which presumably consisted of at least 2000 volumes, including 900 hymn books and song collections, is now located in the UCL Cologne, as well as a small part of the manuscript collection. His theological and musicological books were placed in the existing signature groups of the old Cologne City Library. The hymnbook collection was placed under the BAEU signature group. It will continue to be supplemented by the UCL, i.e. hymnbooks of other provenances of the Bäumker collection will also be added.
After Bäumker's death, Joseph Gotzen endeavoured to ensure that the private library would be handed over to the Cologne City Library. According to the records of the city council meeting, an " Anregung der Bibliotheks-Verwaltung bzw. (...) das Zusammentreten einer Anzahl opferwilliger Bürger von Cöln " (suggestion of the library administration or (...) the meeting of a number of sacrificial citizens of Cologne) had preceded this in order to " vor der Zersplitterung zu bewahren (...) und sie der Stadtbibliothek zum Geschenk zu machen" (save the collection from fragmentation (...) and to make it a gift to the city library) (Council resolution of 20 July 1905). In addition to books with the proverbs and psalms of David, it contains numerous hymnbooks for various regions of Germany (in particular Cologne), as well as devotional books of various brotherhoods and various congregations on certain feasts or saints, devotional exercises and devotional orders. Prayer books for the mission are represented as well as pilgrim books and pilgrimage literature, in addition theoretical works, above all to the Gregorian chant. The USB Cologne has further hymnbooks at its disposal.
In addition to the various hymnals, the USB also owns the Gotzen-Kartothek. This consists of around 55,000 handwritten postcard-sized index cards, which show the location of texts and melodies for Catholic hymns. The life's work of librarian Joseph Gotzen can be viewed in the Historical Collections Reading Room. The digitalised version of the cartotheque is provided by the hymnbook archive of Johannes Gutenberg University Mainz in collaboration with Mainz University Library, USB Cologne and the "Kirchenlied und Gesangbuch" research centre.
It can be accessed at Gutenberg-Capture.
Friedrich Wilhelm Bäumker (1842 -1905)
Friedrich Wilhelm Bäumker was born on 25 October 1842 in Elberfeld. After his graduation from the Elberfelder Gymnasium (1863) he studied Catholic theology and philosophy in Münster and Bonn. In 1866 he entered the seminary in Cologne and was ordained a priest on September 1, 1867. As a priest and school vicar he worked in Bergerhof near Waldbröl, later in Alfter near Bonn and Niederkrüchten and finally in the small parish of Rurich in the Erkelenz district. Father Bäumker spent decades collecting and cataloguing hymns. On 26 November 1889, the University of Breslau awarded him an honorary theological doctorate for his music-historical works. Friedrich Wilhelm Bäumker died in Rurich on 3 March 1905.
Biographical notes on Wilhelm Bäumker
In the year of his ordination Bäumker became school vicar in Bergerhof near Waldbröl, parish vicar in Alfter near Bonn in 1868 and school inspector in 1880. Since 1869 he worked in Niederkrüchten near Erkelenz. He was also an avid music researcher. From 1881 he devoted himself to his main scientific task, the study of the Catholic German hymn. Thus he continued the groundbreaking work of Karl Severin Meister, former music teacher at the teacher seminar in Montabaur. In 1892 the church authorities gave him the parish of Rurich, which had only 350 souls, so that he could devote himself even more intensively to his research. Bäumker's main work is the dissertation on "Das katholische deutsche Kirchenlied in seinen Singweisen von den frühesten Zeiten bis gegen Ende des 17. Jahrhunderts" (The Catholic German Church Song in its Ways of Singing from the Earliest Times to the End of the 17th Century) (Freiburg 1883-1900), the fourth volume it was published posthumously by Joseph Gotzen in 1911 ( shelfmark: T36/104, vol. 1-4). The working material of the Cologne librarian Gotzen, a handwritten catalogue of church songs, about 55,000 postcard-sized index cards, with references to texts and melodies, has been available in the Historical Collections Reading Room since 2008. At present, this hitherto undeveloped cartothek is being processed in the archives of the hymnbooks of the University of Mainz. As a DFG project, a database "Bibliographie deutschsprachiger Gesangbücher" (Bibliography of German-language hymnbooks) is being created there, which will list all hymnbooks published between 1500 and 2000. The Cologne holdings of the Bäumker Collection will be taken into account there.
Selected Literature (German)
Quelle: Schmidt, Peter: Friedrich Wilhelm Bäumker (1842-1905), in: Kölner Sammler und ihre Bücherkollektionen in der Universitäts- und Stadtbibliothek Köln, 2003.
Weitere Literatur:
Beßelmann, Karl-Ferdinand: Die Gesangbuchsammlung Wilhelm Bäumker in der Universitäts- und Stadtbibliothek Köln und ihre Fortführung, in: Syré, Ludger (Hg.): Musiksammlungen in den Regionalbibliotheken Deutschlands, Österreichs und der Schweiz. Frankfurt am Main: Klostermann, 2015, S. 243-252. Signature: 43A1846
Image credit for collection banner: © Photograph from the autograph collection of the USB Cologne, Wilhelm Bäumker, c.1870. For further information, please visit “Die Portraitsammlung der USB Köln”.