Open Access

Frank Meier

• Die Ebstorfer Weltkarte als Aufgabe für die Geschichtsdidaktik
• My paper gives a short description of the Ebstorf map, its origins, contents and structure as well as some aspects of the underlying Weltbild. Furthermore I give a short outline of my plan to examine the didactic possibilities for using it in schools and adult education. The Ebstorf map is the largest known medieval world map; it measures over 3 metres across. It was destroyed in an air raid in 1943 but has been carefully reconstructed from earlier reproductions. Four full-size replicas have been made with scrupulous care, using surviving photographs as well as other evidence of the colouring of the original. Two portions of the map had been lost before (bottom left) and after (top right) the map came to light in 1830 in the convent at Ebstorf, near Lüneburg. At the edge of the T-map are the head, hands and feet of Christ. Medieval world maps like the Ebstorf map from Gervase of Tilbury (ca. 1160 -1234/35) are mental maps. They are a composition of geographical experience, literaryMy paper gives a short description of the Ebstorf map, its origins, contents and structure as well as some aspects of the underlying Weltbild. Furthermore I give a short outline of my plan to examine the didactic possibilities for using it in schools and adult education. The Ebstorf map is the largest known medieval world map; it measures over 3 metres across. It was destroyed in an air raid in 1943 but has been carefully reconstructed from earlier reproductions. Four full-size replicas have been made with scrupulous care, using surviving photographs as well as other evidence of the colouring of the original. Two portions of the map had been lost before (bottom left) and after (top right) the map came to light in 1830 in the convent at Ebstorf, near Lüneburg. At the edge of the T-map are the head, hands and feet of Christ. Medieval world maps like the Ebstorf map from Gervase of Tilbury (ca. 1160 -1234/35) are mental maps. They are a composition of geographical experience, literary knowledge, and philosophical speculation. The three continents of the medial world, Asia, Europe, and Africa, were centred around the Holy Land, and there were mountains or deep waters inaccessible to mankind. There are no national boundaries on the map because the mapmaker would draw the world as a unity. In this way the Ebstorf map is a dictionary for the medieval world on one sheet of paper. The Ebstorf map is nearer to the Vercelli and Psalter maps. The date as well as the authorship is a matter of debate, but it belongs to the early or mid-thirteenth century. It has been convincingly argued that it dates from 1239; either it was made at or for the convent at Ebstorf or for the Duke of Braunschweig-Lüneburg, Otto the Child. Its didactic function had been to teach the people and the Welfen-dukes Otto IV. (1198-1218) or Otto the Child (1235-1252) about the wonderful world. Could the Ebstorf map do this today also? I think it is absolutely necessary to treat this map in schools, when we try to understand the medieval mentality.…