Emma Hagström Molin is Associate Professor in History of Ideas at Södertörn University in Stockholm. She is specialised in the history of archives, libraries, their objects, organisation and classification. Her current research project focuses on provenance – as a historically contingent concept, an organising principle, and a historiographical research practice conducted in European archives and libraries in the nineteenth century.
Hagström Molin has a BA in book history, and her doctoral thesis explores the fate of seventeenth-century war booty – mainly archival documents, manuscripts, and books – taken by Swedish regents and field marshals during their respective military campaigns in Europe. It has been revised for publication in English in Brill’s series Library of the Written Word in 2023. Hagström Molin is affiliated with Uppsala University, and has previously been a visiting postdoctoral fellow at the Max Planck Institute for the History of Science (Daston) and the Humboldt-Universität in Berlin (te Heesen).
This article considers the rise of provenance in nineteenth-century Europe
through a case study o... more This article considers the rise of provenance in nineteenth-century Europe through a case study of manuscript research. In the early 1850s, Benedictine scholar Beda Dudík was sent to Stockholm and Rome by the Committee of the Moravian Estates in Habsburg Austria to trace manuscript objects abducted from Moravia (Mähren) by Swedish commanders during the Thirty Years’ War (1618–1648). This article considers Dudík’s work with the manuscripts by combining perspectives from book history with those of the history of historiography and the history of ideas and science: I examine the ways in which Dudík worked with classification, and how this work was influenced by source fetishization. Dudík’s work with the manuscripts, recorded in his publications and notes, reveals that provenance is a transformable epistemic category. Moravian interest in provenance reflects their sense of scholarly inferiority, and the changing view of heritage as a public matter, collectively fetishized. In conclusion, the Moravian case illustrates just how significant historical materiality was to people of marginal lands, as inquiries into provenance can be a means of asserting historical existence.
During their military campaigns in the seventeenth century, Swedish regents and field marshals pl... more During their military campaigns in the seventeenth century, Swedish regents and field marshals plundered many Continental collections. Consequently, several Central and Eastern European scholars came to Sweden in the nineteenth century – as the status of historiography increased tremendously in Europe, the location of its sources also gained importance. A significant example is the Moravian historian and Benedictine priest Beda Dudík, who mapped Bohemian and Moravian sources in Sweden in 1851. In Stockholm, Dudík met the librarian Gustaf Edvard Klemming, and a life-long collaboration was initiated. Their correspondence reveals how spoils were researched, perceived, and, especially in the 1870s, how a possible restitution of loot was negotiated. Dudík’s success – 21 Bohemian manuscripts were restituted in 1878 – heavily depended on his friendship with Klemming. Ultimately, at a time when history and heritage were nationalised, the Dudík-Klemming letters emphasise a transnational dependency of some nations and regions in this process. https://translanth.hypotheses.org/ueber/dudik
This essay analyzes the long-term effects of looted books through one case: the creationof the Up... more This essay analyzes the long-term effects of looted books through one case: the creationof the Uppsala University library in seventeenth-century Sweden. Without denyingthe religious controversies o ...
Provenance – an object’s history of ownership – is a historically contingent concept and research... more Provenance – an object’s history of ownership – is a historically contingent concept and research practice that emerged in nineteenth-century Europe. In a novel project examining the cases of Beda Dudík (Moravia/Austria), Carl Schirren (Livonia/Russia), and Franz Hipler (Warmia/East Prussia) ca. 1850–1900 I argue that, while the art market and nationalism are important, scholars representing regions with a suppressed past and present are key to understanding the relevance of provenance. Due to seventeenth-century plundering, these scholars were dependent on foreign archives and libraries when researching their regions’ history. Their publications describing provenance research are the project’s main sources. The analysis of these publications targets practices such as classification, a crucial tool as determined provenance equaled historical existence. Merging regional inferiority and transnational dependencies, diverse institutional settings, and political, religious, and scholarly...
During their military campaigns in the seventeenth century, Swedish regents and field marshals pl... more During their military campaigns in the seventeenth century, Swedish regents and field marshals plundered many Continental collections. Consequently, several Central and Eastern European scholars came to Sweden in the nineteenth century – as the status of historiography increased tremendously in Europe, the location of its sources also gained importance. A significant example is the Moravian historian and Benedictine priest Beda Dudík, who mapped Bohemian and Moravian sources in Sweden in 1851. In Stockholm, Dudík met the librarian Gustaf Edvard Klemming, and a life-long collaboration was initiated. Their correspondence reveals how spoils were researched, perceived, and, especially in the 1870s, how a possible restitution of loot was negotiated. Dudík’s success – 21 Bohemian manuscripts were restituted in 1878 – heavily depended on his friendship with Klemming. Ultimately, at a time when history and heritage were nationalised, the Dudík-Klemming letters emphasise a transnational dependency of some nations and regions in this process.
Materialising the Swedish National Archives: A biography of spoils from Mitau in 1621. The articl... more Materialising the Swedish National Archives: A biography of spoils from Mitau in 1621. The article deals with the meanings and effects of a collection of documents that was taken as spoils of war by the Swedish army in the Livonian town Mitau in 1621. An object biography of the documents from Mitau makes it possible to follow the collection through the entire 17th century in order to analyse how the meanings and effects of the documents changed when introduced into new contexts. But such a biography also reveals how the war booty object itself was transformed over time. The Mitau object, which came into being when the collection was gathered and taken by the Swedish army, quickly changed in the context of the Swedish national archives, located in the royal castle Tre Kronor in Stockholm during the 17th century. Several inventories and lists of the national archives make it possible to follow the Mitau documents being separated through different arrangements made by the archivists. Some of the papers were incorporated with other documents associated with Swedish kings, other Mitau documents were put in barrels, chests and boxes and were moved to other rooms in the royal castle due to lack of space in the rooms of the national archives. Over time, documents of very different provenance were added to the Mitau object, changing its composition once more. The Mitau documents became a meaningful historical and political resource for the Swedish government. But the documents also affected the national archives. They were a material quantity that demanded space, a disorder that needed to be ordered and of several provenances that needed to be classified by the archivists – sometimes conflicting with the chronological and dynastic order that dominated the national archives at the time. The Swedish national archives were not only materialised by documents that had been produced by the Swedish government and Sweden’s kings and queens, but also with spoils collected during war, making the national archives partly an effect of war looting practice.
Denna essä kommer att belysa hur krigsbyten, bestående mestadels av handskrivna och tryckta böcke... more Denna essä kommer att belysa hur krigsbyten, bestående mestadels av handskrivna och tryckta böcker, var med om att skapa Uppsala universitetsbibliotek under 1600-talet. Egentligen bör föremålen bara benämnas som byten, eftersom ordet krigsbyte inte gjorde entre i det svenska språket förrän 1712. I 1600-talets svenska källor beskrevs dock böckerna inte ens som byten, utan som föremål vilka var " hämtade " eller " komna " från en viss plats. Det rör sig onekligen om ett kulturarv med en lång och händelserik historia, som genom sina förflyttningar visar på kopplingen mellan krig, kultur och samlande. Många byten har bevarats i bibliotekets samlingar in i vår tid. Varför är det viktigt att forska om bokliga byten och om skapandet av bibliotekssamlingar under 1600-talet? Vad kan vi lära oss av att analysera hur böcker hanterades och klassificerades av bibliotekarier i äldre tid? Istället för att utgå ifrån välkända politiska händelser och religiösa diskurser kommer det följande att ta avstamp i bibliotekariernas praktiker, för att besvara dessa frågor.
This article considers the rise of provenance in nineteenth-century Europe
through a case study o... more This article considers the rise of provenance in nineteenth-century Europe through a case study of manuscript research. In the early 1850s, Benedictine scholar Beda Dudík was sent to Stockholm and Rome by the Committee of the Moravian Estates in Habsburg Austria to trace manuscript objects abducted from Moravia (Mähren) by Swedish commanders during the Thirty Years’ War (1618–1648). This article considers Dudík’s work with the manuscripts by combining perspectives from book history with those of the history of historiography and the history of ideas and science: I examine the ways in which Dudík worked with classification, and how this work was influenced by source fetishization. Dudík’s work with the manuscripts, recorded in his publications and notes, reveals that provenance is a transformable epistemic category. Moravian interest in provenance reflects their sense of scholarly inferiority, and the changing view of heritage as a public matter, collectively fetishized. In conclusion, the Moravian case illustrates just how significant historical materiality was to people of marginal lands, as inquiries into provenance can be a means of asserting historical existence.
During their military campaigns in the seventeenth century, Swedish regents and field marshals pl... more During their military campaigns in the seventeenth century, Swedish regents and field marshals plundered many Continental collections. Consequently, several Central and Eastern European scholars came to Sweden in the nineteenth century – as the status of historiography increased tremendously in Europe, the location of its sources also gained importance. A significant example is the Moravian historian and Benedictine priest Beda Dudík, who mapped Bohemian and Moravian sources in Sweden in 1851. In Stockholm, Dudík met the librarian Gustaf Edvard Klemming, and a life-long collaboration was initiated. Their correspondence reveals how spoils were researched, perceived, and, especially in the 1870s, how a possible restitution of loot was negotiated. Dudík’s success – 21 Bohemian manuscripts were restituted in 1878 – heavily depended on his friendship with Klemming. Ultimately, at a time when history and heritage were nationalised, the Dudík-Klemming letters emphasise a transnational dependency of some nations and regions in this process. https://translanth.hypotheses.org/ueber/dudik
This essay analyzes the long-term effects of looted books through one case: the creationof the Up... more This essay analyzes the long-term effects of looted books through one case: the creationof the Uppsala University library in seventeenth-century Sweden. Without denyingthe religious controversies o ...
Provenance – an object’s history of ownership – is a historically contingent concept and research... more Provenance – an object’s history of ownership – is a historically contingent concept and research practice that emerged in nineteenth-century Europe. In a novel project examining the cases of Beda Dudík (Moravia/Austria), Carl Schirren (Livonia/Russia), and Franz Hipler (Warmia/East Prussia) ca. 1850–1900 I argue that, while the art market and nationalism are important, scholars representing regions with a suppressed past and present are key to understanding the relevance of provenance. Due to seventeenth-century plundering, these scholars were dependent on foreign archives and libraries when researching their regions’ history. Their publications describing provenance research are the project’s main sources. The analysis of these publications targets practices such as classification, a crucial tool as determined provenance equaled historical existence. Merging regional inferiority and transnational dependencies, diverse institutional settings, and political, religious, and scholarly...
During their military campaigns in the seventeenth century, Swedish regents and field marshals pl... more During their military campaigns in the seventeenth century, Swedish regents and field marshals plundered many Continental collections. Consequently, several Central and Eastern European scholars came to Sweden in the nineteenth century – as the status of historiography increased tremendously in Europe, the location of its sources also gained importance. A significant example is the Moravian historian and Benedictine priest Beda Dudík, who mapped Bohemian and Moravian sources in Sweden in 1851. In Stockholm, Dudík met the librarian Gustaf Edvard Klemming, and a life-long collaboration was initiated. Their correspondence reveals how spoils were researched, perceived, and, especially in the 1870s, how a possible restitution of loot was negotiated. Dudík’s success – 21 Bohemian manuscripts were restituted in 1878 – heavily depended on his friendship with Klemming. Ultimately, at a time when history and heritage were nationalised, the Dudík-Klemming letters emphasise a transnational dependency of some nations and regions in this process.
Materialising the Swedish National Archives: A biography of spoils from Mitau in 1621. The articl... more Materialising the Swedish National Archives: A biography of spoils from Mitau in 1621. The article deals with the meanings and effects of a collection of documents that was taken as spoils of war by the Swedish army in the Livonian town Mitau in 1621. An object biography of the documents from Mitau makes it possible to follow the collection through the entire 17th century in order to analyse how the meanings and effects of the documents changed when introduced into new contexts. But such a biography also reveals how the war booty object itself was transformed over time. The Mitau object, which came into being when the collection was gathered and taken by the Swedish army, quickly changed in the context of the Swedish national archives, located in the royal castle Tre Kronor in Stockholm during the 17th century. Several inventories and lists of the national archives make it possible to follow the Mitau documents being separated through different arrangements made by the archivists. Some of the papers were incorporated with other documents associated with Swedish kings, other Mitau documents were put in barrels, chests and boxes and were moved to other rooms in the royal castle due to lack of space in the rooms of the national archives. Over time, documents of very different provenance were added to the Mitau object, changing its composition once more. The Mitau documents became a meaningful historical and political resource for the Swedish government. But the documents also affected the national archives. They were a material quantity that demanded space, a disorder that needed to be ordered and of several provenances that needed to be classified by the archivists – sometimes conflicting with the chronological and dynastic order that dominated the national archives at the time. The Swedish national archives were not only materialised by documents that had been produced by the Swedish government and Sweden’s kings and queens, but also with spoils collected during war, making the national archives partly an effect of war looting practice.
Denna essä kommer att belysa hur krigsbyten, bestående mestadels av handskrivna och tryckta böcke... more Denna essä kommer att belysa hur krigsbyten, bestående mestadels av handskrivna och tryckta böcker, var med om att skapa Uppsala universitetsbibliotek under 1600-talet. Egentligen bör föremålen bara benämnas som byten, eftersom ordet krigsbyte inte gjorde entre i det svenska språket förrän 1712. I 1600-talets svenska källor beskrevs dock böckerna inte ens som byten, utan som föremål vilka var " hämtade " eller " komna " från en viss plats. Det rör sig onekligen om ett kulturarv med en lång och händelserik historia, som genom sina förflyttningar visar på kopplingen mellan krig, kultur och samlande. Många byten har bevarats i bibliotekets samlingar in i vår tid. Varför är det viktigt att forska om bokliga byten och om skapandet av bibliotekssamlingar under 1600-talet? Vad kan vi lära oss av att analysera hur böcker hanterades och klassificerades av bibliotekarier i äldre tid? Istället för att utgå ifrån välkända politiska händelser och religiösa diskurser kommer det följande att ta avstamp i bibliotekariernas praktiker, för att besvara dessa frågor.
Spoils of Knowledge. Seventeenth-Century Plunder in Swedish Archives and Libraries, 2023
In Spoils of Knowledge, Emma Hagström Molin offers novel perspectives on document and book plunde... more In Spoils of Knowledge, Emma Hagström Molin offers novel perspectives on document and book plundering. At the forefront is the controversial heritage connected to the Swedish Empire (1611-1721) kept in Swedish archives and libraries. Previous studies suggest that continental spoils were perceived as an inferior and problematic category, and that Catholic books in particular were hard to accommodate in Protestant libraries. However, by considering systems of classification and collection orders of archives and libraries, Hagström Molin unearths a much more complex history of how plundered knowledge was appreciated, used and fused with its new Swedish settings. Moreover, spanning a history of 400 years, she shows that the understanding of spoils changed significantly over time.
Times of History, Times of Nature: Temporalization and the Limits of Modern Knowledge, 2022
While studies of nineteenth-century historiography often focus on its professionalization within ... more While studies of nineteenth-century historiography often focus on its professionalization within Western nation-states, marginal Moravia is prominent when considering multiple notions of time and historiography’s material needs. Thus, the chapter analyzes Moravian scholars’ time-binding practices, through which Moravian time was synchronized with those of nature and Christianity, and a Moravian, chronological timeline was established by collecting, organizing, and mediating sources classified as Moravica. Notably, archaeological evidence and geological metaphors helped unite horizontal and vertical time-thinking. In conclusion, the case underlines the multiplicity of temporal thinking, as well as the fundamental importance of mapping, knowing, and claiming historical matter.
As climate change becomes an increasingly important part of public discourse, the relationship between time in nature and history is changing. Nature can no longer be considered a slow and immobile background to human history, and the future can no longer be viewed as open and detached from the past. Times of History, Times of Nature engages with this historical shift in temporal sensibilities through a combination of detailed case studies and synthesizing efforts. Focusing on the history of knowledge, media theory, and environmental humanities, this volume explores the rich and nuanced notions of time and temporality that have emerged in response to climate change.
Rethinking Europe: War and Peace in the Early Modern German Lands, 2019
This essay analyzes the long-term effects of looted books through one case: the creation of the U... more This essay analyzes the long-term effects of looted books through one case: the creation of the Uppsala University library in seventeenth-century Sweden. Without denying the religious controversies of that time, the essay challenges the idea of Catholic books being useless in a Lutheran library. By mainly analyzing library catalogues, the essay demonstrates how Jesuit epistemology affected the organization of the Uppsala library, and that confessional books urged librarians to think about temporality in terms of old and new knowledge.
Who owns cultural assets? Who has narrative control? What could fair and just solutions look like... more Who owns cultural assets? Who has narrative control? What could fair and just solutions look like in dealing with them, independently of restitution? Discussions about historical appropriation practices for cultural assets in the context of their associated relocation are highly topical and widely reflected across different academic disciplines. Not only are seizures and sales of objects and collections considered problematic which were forced by violence or under dictatorial government structures, but widespread public criticism has also been directed towards the exhibition of artefacts with unclear provenance, amongst other issues. Increasingly, such questions concern those who work in the art market, museums , politics and the media, scholars from diverse disciplines such as ethnology , archaeology, and law, as well as artists and writers. Yet the translocations as such rarely come into focus-with the people involved, the related traumas, discourses, gestures, techniques and representations, all of which will be the primary focus of the conference. An event conceived by the team of the Leibniz-Prize-funded (DFG) project-cluster translocations at the chair of modern art history at Technische Universität Berlin (Bénédicte Savoy). Open to the public. Admission is free but seats are limited. The conference language is English.
Within the world of art and collecting, provenance is the history of an object told through its c... more Within the world of art and collecting, provenance is the history of an object told through its chain of locations and owners, which lately has been given increasing amount of attention (Milosch & Pearce 2019; Feigenbaum & Rest 2012). Above all, Nazi looting has brought provenance to attention (Anderl et al. 2009), and as Western museums more often look into the history of their collections, post-colonial provenance research is becoming an influential field (Savoy 2018). Provenance has likewise travelled between different areas of research: for instance, in the wake of the digital revolution, art history’s understanding of provenance has been introduced to the world of data, as tool for interpretation and quality evaluation (Moreau et al 2007). Considering its topicality and interdisciplinary relevance, then, the time is ripe to explore what provenance does to an inquiry; in terms of establishing value, originality, and historical facts. Being a distinct European concept and problem, introduced in English as late as 1785, provenance has inherently had shifting meanings in different languages, scholarly and societal contexts, and times. The purpose of the workshop is therefore to explore different understandings and makings of provenance in a variety of historical as well as contemporary situations. Through discussion of different cases and disciplinary traditions, then, the workshop aims to flesh out both the general and the specific in provenance, scrutinize its meanings across fields, and consider its possible transdisciplinary theorizations. To its purpose the workshop will consider, but is not limited to, the following questions:
1. How is the concept provenance understood in various contemporary disciplines? 2. What shifting meanings and uses has provenance had in different historical contexts, places, and languages? 3. How has provenance been theorized? And can these theorizations work across disciplines?
The workshop will bring together researchers from different academic fields where provenance is of relevance, for two days of interdisciplinary conversations. Each invited speaker will present a twenty-minute paper followed by a ten-minute Q&A. The workshop will close with a joint summarising discussion.
Please RSVP at your earliest convenience by sending an e-mail with a proposed title to emma.hagstrom.molin@idehist.uu.se. Abstract deadline is the 25th of May 2020.
We are happy to provide travel arrangements and accommodation for our invited speakers. For practical concerns, please contact ingrid.berg@circus.uu.se.
Provenance: Interdisciplinary Conversations has been generously funded by the Centre for Integrated Research on Culture and Society (Circus). Circus is a platform for interdisciplinary research across the Humanities and the Social Sciences at Uppsala University. For more information on Circus’ activities, please visit https://www.humsam.uu.se/circus-en/.
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Papers by Emma Hagström Molin
through a case study of manuscript research. In the early 1850s, Benedictine
scholar Beda Dudík was sent to Stockholm and Rome by the Committee of the Moravian Estates in Habsburg Austria to trace manuscript objects abducted from Moravia (Mähren) by Swedish commanders during the Thirty Years’ War (1618–1648). This article considers Dudík’s work with the manuscripts by combining perspectives from book history with those of the history of historiography and the history of ideas and science: I examine the ways in which Dudík worked with classification, and how this work was influenced by source fetishization. Dudík’s work with the manuscripts, recorded in his publications and notes, reveals that provenance is a transformable epistemic category. Moravian interest in provenance
reflects their sense of scholarly inferiority, and the changing view of heritage as a public matter, collectively fetishized. In conclusion, the Moravian case illustrates just how significant historical materiality was to people of marginal lands, as inquiries into provenance can be a means of asserting historical existence.
© Groupe de recherches et d'études sur le livre au Québec, 2022 Ce document est protégé par la loi sur le droit d'auteur. L'utilisation des services d'Érudit (y compris la reproduction) est assujettie à sa politique d'utilisation que vous pouvez consulter en ligne.
https://translanth.hypotheses.org/ueber/dudik
The Mitau documents became a meaningful historical and political resource for the Swedish government. But the documents also affected the national archives. They were a material quantity that demanded space, a disorder that needed to be ordered and of several provenances that needed to be classified by the archivists – sometimes conflicting with the chronological and dynastic order that dominated the national archives at the time. The Swedish national archives were not only materialised by documents that had been produced by the Swedish government and Sweden’s kings and queens, but also with spoils collected during war, making the national archives partly an effect of war looting practice.
through a case study of manuscript research. In the early 1850s, Benedictine
scholar Beda Dudík was sent to Stockholm and Rome by the Committee of the Moravian Estates in Habsburg Austria to trace manuscript objects abducted from Moravia (Mähren) by Swedish commanders during the Thirty Years’ War (1618–1648). This article considers Dudík’s work with the manuscripts by combining perspectives from book history with those of the history of historiography and the history of ideas and science: I examine the ways in which Dudík worked with classification, and how this work was influenced by source fetishization. Dudík’s work with the manuscripts, recorded in his publications and notes, reveals that provenance is a transformable epistemic category. Moravian interest in provenance
reflects their sense of scholarly inferiority, and the changing view of heritage as a public matter, collectively fetishized. In conclusion, the Moravian case illustrates just how significant historical materiality was to people of marginal lands, as inquiries into provenance can be a means of asserting historical existence.
© Groupe de recherches et d'études sur le livre au Québec, 2022 Ce document est protégé par la loi sur le droit d'auteur. L'utilisation des services d'Érudit (y compris la reproduction) est assujettie à sa politique d'utilisation que vous pouvez consulter en ligne.
https://translanth.hypotheses.org/ueber/dudik
The Mitau documents became a meaningful historical and political resource for the Swedish government. But the documents also affected the national archives. They were a material quantity that demanded space, a disorder that needed to be ordered and of several provenances that needed to be classified by the archivists – sometimes conflicting with the chronological and dynastic order that dominated the national archives at the time. The Swedish national archives were not only materialised by documents that had been produced by the Swedish government and Sweden’s kings and queens, but also with spoils collected during war, making the national archives partly an effect of war looting practice.
As climate change becomes an increasingly important part of public discourse, the relationship between time in nature and history is changing. Nature can no longer be considered a slow and immobile background to human history, and the future can no longer be viewed as open and detached from the past. Times of History, Times of Nature engages with this historical shift in temporal sensibilities through a combination of detailed case studies and synthesizing efforts. Focusing on the history of knowledge, media theory, and environmental humanities, this volume explores the rich and nuanced notions of time and temporality that have emerged in response to climate change.
the religious controversies of that time, the essay challenges the idea of Catholic books being useless in a Lutheran library. By mainly analyzing library catalogues, the essay demonstrates how Jesuit epistemology affected the organization of the Uppsala library, and that confessional books urged librarians to think about temporality in terms of old and new knowledge.
1. How is the concept provenance understood in various contemporary disciplines?
2. What shifting meanings and uses has provenance had in different historical contexts, places, and languages?
3. How has provenance been theorized? And can these theorizations work across disciplines?
The workshop will bring together researchers from different academic fields where provenance is of relevance, for two days of interdisciplinary conversations. Each invited speaker will present a twenty-minute paper followed by a ten-minute Q&A. The workshop will close with a joint summarising discussion.
Please RSVP at your earliest convenience by sending an e-mail with a proposed title to emma.hagstrom.molin@idehist.uu.se. Abstract deadline is the 25th of May 2020.
We are happy to provide travel arrangements and accommodation for our invited speakers. For practical concerns, please contact ingrid.berg@circus.uu.se.
Provenance: Interdisciplinary Conversations has been generously funded by the Centre for Integrated Research on Culture and Society (Circus). Circus is a platform for interdisciplinary research across the Humanities and the Social Sciences at Uppsala University. For more information on Circus’ activities, please visit https://www.humsam.uu.se/circus-en/.