Die älteren Urkunden des Klosters S. Maria zu Aquileia

The Benedictine Nunnery S. Maria in Aquileia is one of the oldest and at the same time most important ecclesiastical institutions of the medieval "state" of the Patriarchs of Aquileia. The preserved documental tradition is widely dispersed and reflects to a high degree the specific conditions of a transition- and contact zone which is unique in Europe. It is here where Roman-Germanic and Slavic traditions overlay. The two monasteries of the convent, one in the Habsburgian Aquileia, one in the Venetian Cividale, and their consequently being dissolved twice are of emblematic significance. Of the oldest documents of the nunnery many are known to historical research already, but appearances are deceptive: From among the 178 numbers of the present edition 114 have been edited in some form or another, and 15 more have been published as regesta. Many of those prints however, date back to the 18th or early 19th centuries and do in no way meet today`s demands. About three quarters of what has been published since 1960 can be found in non-printed academic theses. These are quite inadequate from the editorial point of view, and above all the access to these publications is a lot more difficult than to what is stored in archives, so one cannot really call them "publications". One can say that a renewed edition of two thirds of the documents being referred to has become a matter of urgent need. What is new against the research to date (comprising material up to 1200) is above all a critical evaluation and the rectifying of chronological attribution; and for the first half of the 13th century it is above all the supply of material hitherto unknown. The edition on hand is the main result of a research-project sponsored by the FWF (project-number P14518-AWI). It has been conceived as the second volume of the series "Vorarbeiten zu einem Urkundenbuch des Patriarchats Aquileia". However kindly the first volume (concerning the oldest documents of the Monastery of Moggio) was accepted by experts, one of its characteristics has been repeatedly criticized, i.e. the principle to offer documents already edited only as regesta. This objection has been taken into account in the edition on hand. The integration of this edition into a larger untertaking has determined the chronological limit, i.e. the middle of the 13th century. The edition on hand has been supplemented by various items: accounts of results concerning the research into the nunnery, the character of legal transactions and the messages of documents concerning general history, the catalogues of possessions in the documents expressing general confirmation of rights, and diplomatic considerations into the monastic documents. The access to the contents of the edition is given through an index of names of persons and places alongside a word register concerning also the phrases of the contemporary legal terminology.