From the year 1573
What the Styrian calendar of 1573 predicted
It was a lucrative business that filled the leather wallets of clever men more than 500 years ago: the creation of annual calendars, which are still popular today and land on desks and credenzas in a wide variety of versions from the first day of the new year.
The calendar makers of the early modern era were able to interpret mysterious omens in the sky and in their environment and thus create detailed forecasts for the future of their contemporaries. They published their predictions for the coming months in so-called almanacs, which readers literally snatched out of their hands.
Like the Gutenberg Bible, these annual calendars were among the earliest printed works that circulated across the country from the middle of the 15th century and were real bestsellers - not least because they already revealed the forthcoming date of Easter and meticulously listed the other public holidays and name days. The calendar makers also shone with their astronomical knowledge and depicted the individual phases of the moon on the pages.
The first almanacs were bestsellers
Styria's first calendar maker, Hieronymus Lauterbach, came from Saxony. He came to Vienna as a young man, where he became a professor of mathematics and astronomy in 1555 and completed his studies as a Master of Arts in 1556. In 1560, Emperor Ferdinand elevated him and his three brothers - one of whom was his twin brother Johann - to the nobility.
"Although Lauterbach was ultimately Dean of the Faculty of Philosophy in Vienna, he did not want to miss out on the income from making calendars and had several almanacs printed," explains Graz historian Norbert Weiss. The oldest surviving copy is the Vienna calendar print for 1562. "Lauterbach's move to Graz in 1561 also had a financial background, because as professor and rector of the Latin school in Graz he earned twice as much as in Vienna," reports Weiss.
As the first Styrian landscape mathematician, Hieronymus Lauterbach now had to produce the calendar in Graz year after year. The Latin school, where he taught from then on, was located in the Landhaus, where his brother Tobias Lauterbach set up a print shop.
Annual calendars were printed in the Landhaus in Graz
"This costly undertaking was made possible by a loan from the provincial government. Lauterbach was able to have his calendars printed here in future, even after the death of his brother Tobias."
"May the Almighty God grant us all a happy and joyful new year, amen " - with these words, Hieronymus Lauterbach concludes the foreword to his almanac for the year 1573, which was printed in Graz and is kept in the Styrian Provincial Archives. The book consists of two parts: a writing calendar with monthly sections and a practical section, known as "Practica", which contains the exciting predictions. "The title page of the work shows allegories of theology and astronomy with compasses and sextants on the left and right," says Weiss.
If you (carefully) leaf through the writing calendar, you will find the most favorable times for bloodletting, bathing, cupping, sowing, taking medicines and weaning children. This is followed by name days, astronomical data and weather forecasts, followed by five pages of notes each month.
Lauterbach predicted war and peace for readers
As interesting then as now: the predictions section of the precious printed work. The content: the announcement of a lunar eclipse on December 8, 1573, information on fertility and diseases as well as the current zodiac signs of the individual countries (Graz and Styria, for example, were under the sign of Capricorn). There is also a chapter entitled "Of acts of war, peaceful and unpeaceful" - Hieronymus Lauterbach uses the planetary constellations to tell readers whether a dangerous year lies ahead.
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