While pursuing my MA in Augsburg, Germany, I had the opportunity to participate in a political science seminar in which we examined a variety of texts known as “mirrors for princes,” texts that taught one how to rule or how to raise a future ruler.
The occasion for the topic was the university’s acquisition of a wonderful old library, the Oettingen-Wallersteinsche Bibliothek. Each seminar participant was able to work with an original in this library. After the seminar, we wrote biographical texts to contextualize our mirrors for princes, and we selected excerpts from these sources to go with our analysis. The result was FĂĽrstenspiegel der FrĂĽhen Neuzeit, edited by Hans-Otto MĂĽhleisen, Theo Stammen, and Michael Philipp (Frankfurt a.M.: Insel Verlag, 1997).
My specific contribution to that collection was “Christof Vischer: Wie man junge Fürsten und Herren aufferzihen solle, 1573,” pp. 219–27 (biography and interpretation) and pp. 228–51 (excerpts).
Nowadays it is possible to view a high-quality scan of Vischer’s book online at the Bayerische Staatsbibliothek, which is where I obtained the screenshots featured on this page.
