Call for Proposals: The Sharing of Doctrinal Knowledge and Erudition in Academia in Early Modern Central-Eastern Europe

24 January 2025

Doctrinal Knowledge and Erudition

The Reformations of the 16th century demanded a renewal of ways to share doctrine and learning. New ideas were communicated through academic institutions, books and disputations, but also through songs, poetry, theatre and art. Universities and academies had to rethink their curriculum and textbooks in cooperation with the demands of the church, and were at the same time instruments of promoting and defending doctrine. Catholic priests becoming protestant pastors or schoolmasters needed re-schooling but the same is true for catholic clerics remaining catholic and needing instruction on reformation doctrine and how to oppose and refute it. The history of education in the early modern period has different facets. On the one hand, the content is religiously determined (“denominations”), which found expression in catechisms, textbooks and school dramas and in school discipline: The gender-segregated schools had both commonalities and divergent profiles at different levels (in terms of content, and socially), and in their respective regional dominions. This was dependent on funding, the scholarship system, but especially on the staff and their educational path (peregrinatio academica, but also domi-doctus).

These are just some examples of the wide field of doctrinal and eruditional/didactic knowledge sharing in Early Modern Europe.

Two Conferences

Following the successful Báthory conferences, we would like to organize another series of two conferences on the academic sharing of knowledge in early modern Eastern Europe as part of REFORC’s Coram Deo programme. The main focus will be on presenting native-language research in the context of current scholarly discussions, so that it can then be made available in a compendium for international research. Two conferences are envisioned: September 15-16, 2025 in Prešov, and in October 2026 in Cluj-Napoca/Kolozsvár.

The lectures can be held in the native language of the presenter, or in English or German. We will endeavour to provide a translation.

We would like to ask you to provide one or more proposals for topics that you could present at the first conference or (if it’s not possible for you to attend it) alternatively to indicate whether you could offer your ideas in essay form as a contribution to a compendium.

Examples

The following topics are examples of potential topics, but of course alternative ideas are also welcome:

• Who financed the schools (and influenced their employment and content)?
• How was school organization and student co-administration structured and implemented (coetus?)?
• Who taught (educational path and content/humanistic/denominational profile)?
• What was taught (when) (curriculum; possibly also physical education/sports or “natural sciences”/Comenius)?
• How was the content taught (didactics, school dramas, excursions/field trips)?
• Which religious macro-contexts, challenges and controversies determined the developments? How was spirituality promoted (influence of “Protestant orthodoxy”, Enlightenment and Pietism)?
• Which “cross-border” relationships existed, were promoted or (polemically!) prevented (international, interregional, interdenominational, social mobility)?
• What connections were there with the church (space, personnel, liturgy and music/casual services/funerals)?
• Which sharing processes, but also which region-specific characteristics are recognizable? (Adaptation or transformation?)
• Are hybrid phenomena or syncretism or mediating positions apparent?

Topic Suggestions

Please send your topic suggestions by 31 January 2025 to

Prof. Dr. Ulrich A. Wien, email, RPTU Kaiserslautern-Landau, Institute for Protestant Theology

And Prof. Dr. Peter Konya, email.

Please let us know if you will be able to attend the conference in Prešov on September 15-16, 2025 or if you are willing to write a contribution for the compendium.

I can participate in the conference 15/16.09.2025 in Prešov.  ☐YES / ☐No

I can offer a contribution to the compendium: ☐YES / ☐No, on the following topic: ________________________________________________________________________________