WEBVTT

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Leibniz was a graphomaniac.

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He fell asleep and woke up with a pen in hand.

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The Leibniz archive is the biggest of the 4 Akademie Ausgabe Leibniz Edition units.

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We produce the volumes,

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the critical complete editions of approx. 800 - 1000 pages each.

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Two editors work on each volume

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and need four to five years to complete it.

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The Leibniz collection, especially the mathematical manuscripts,

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comprises a flood of paper scraps.

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That’s how Leibniz worked.

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He made notes on large sheets, cut them up,

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and sorted them according to subject area.

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A historical-critical edition calls for a chronological approach.

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Manuscripts have to be picked

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in the chronological and topical order of our editions.

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The symbols and mathematical content serve as our guideline.

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We also analyse the paper.

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One characteristic is the typical watermark.

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Since the beginning of the 20th century,

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Leibniz Edition has been putting together a watermark catalogue of all papers.

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This enables a more exact dating of the manuscripts.

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“The Complete Writings and Letters“. That’s the edition’s official title

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Ritterkatalog, our centrepiece, serves as starting point.

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All of Leibniz’s writings and letters are listed here.

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This is where I find text evidence whenever I edit a letter.

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Leibniz’s letter to John Wallis, e.g. has 6 textual witnesses:

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3 ideas and 3 transcripts drafted in England.

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I get copies of all these references,

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which form the basis of our edition.

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All textual witnesses are taken into account.

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We print one and list the different versions.

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We also explain the letters in the edition.

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The Leibniz collection comprises approximately 150,000 - 200,000 pages.

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Not all of it has been viewed yet.

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We expect to finalise the complete edition by 2055.

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There is still a lot of work ahead of us.