Bibliotheca Arnamagnæana - 01.06.1985, Side 234
The Chronica Carionis in Iceland
By Robert Cook
The Chronica1 of Johann Carion (1499-1537), court astrologer to
the Elector of Brandenburg, was first printed in Wittenberg in 1531.
This octavo volume of 170 folios surveyed in the vernacular all of
world history from Adam to Charles V, divided according to the four
principal monarchies: Assyrian, Persian, Greek, and Roman. With its
sound use of sources2 and its forceful conciseness, it proved to be one
of the more popular universal histories of its time. Latin, English,
French, Italian, and Danish translations grew out of this first German
version.
Philip Melanchthon, who had aided Carion in the preparation of his
book3 and who used it as the basis for his leetures on history at Witten-
1 So called in the first editions, but many of the later editions, especially of the
Melanchthon-Peucer revision, use the singular, Chronicon.
2 Emil Menke-Gliickert, Die Geschichtsschreibung der Reformation und Gegenrefor-
mation (Leipzig 1912), p. 21: “Sie ist die erste deutsche Weltkronik, die ihren Stoff nicht
mehr kompilatorisch sekundåren Quellen entnimmt, sondern die in der alten Geschich-
te unmittelbar auf die ersten Quellen zuriickgeht und fur den grossten Teil der mittelal-
terlichen Geschichte die beste damals bekannte erzåhlende Quelle, das Chronicon Ur-
sper gense, zugrunde legt.”
3 On the question of the extern of Melanchthon’s share in the first edition, see
Hildegard Ziegler, Chronicon Carionis: ein Beitrag zur Geschichtsschreibung des 16.
Jahrhunderts, Hallesche Abhandlungen zur Neueren Geschichte, Heft 35 (Halle 1898),
pp. 11-19. Dr. Ziegler quotes a letter from Melanchthon to Antonius Corvinus, dated
January 29, 1532: “Mitto tibi Xooviy.ov, in quo, etsi sunt mei quidam loci, tamen ipsa
operis sylva non est mea. Misit enim Carion ad me farraginem quandam negligentius
coacervatam, quæ a me disposita est, quantum quidem in compendio fieri potuit. In fine
adjeci tabellam annorum mundi utilem et veram, quam spero tibi et aliis doctis placitu-
ram esse.” According to Menke-Gliickert (note 2), pp. 26-36, Melanchthon was respon-
sible not only for the overall ordering and the lesser divisions, but also the attitude
toward history, the choice of sources, and most of the content.