Knights and castles: Special Collectons acquires a new manuscript

The collection of Utrecht University Library has acquired a new manuscript by Aernout Buchelius (1565-1641). In this manuscript, the Utrecht historian laid down information about the ‘‘Vrije ende Ridder Hofsteden’ (Free and knights’ manors) in the province of Utrecht. He illustrated it with three drawings of castles and eighty coats of arms of Utrecht families. After it was sold in 1906, this manuscript had pretty much disappeared from public view. It has now been digitised under call number Ms.35 A 21.

A rather unknown man of learning

Aernout van Buchell (Buchelius) was not famous: he is not on the list of famous Utrecht citizens, and he only published one book and that posthumously. Yet he is the subject of dozens of books and publications, and his legacy has great historical value for Utrecht and beyond. In the period of the Reformation and the Eighty Years’ War, Buchelius wrote about anything he saw and found interesting. He recorded this in diaries, reports, notebooks, letters, poems, essays and all kinds of other writings. Many of them have been preserved, in libraries as far as London, Oxford, Berlin and Munich. The Buchelius Collection (in Dutch only) containing approximately sixty manuscripts is the largest there is, and is part of the Treasury of Special Collections.

The acquired manuscript

The manuscript bearing the title ‘Vrije ende Ridder Hofsteden’  (Free manors and Knights’ Manors) perfectly fits into that collection. It was probably written in the 1630s and has 122 pages, of which 71 are written upon. The largest part deals with knights’  manors: castles or fortified country estates in possession of noble Utrecht families, who were exempt from paying taxes for that reason. Buchelius wrote an introduction about these houses in the province of Utrecht,  selects a few and discusses their history and families. He made a drawing of three of them: the House at Oud-Wulven, Zuylen Castle and the House of Zuylenstein. These drawings are among the oldest, if not the oldest, we have of these manors. He also cites from old charters and other sources that in part cannot be found elsewhere. As a result, the manuscript is a valuable source about the history of the province of Utrecht.

Auctioned off

The manuscript was sold in an auction of a large batch of Buchelius’  manuscripts. For over a century it was privately owned by a family, and only photos of the drawings were known. However, it was wrongfully mentioned that the manuscript was located in De Haar castle. Two later copies were there, but without all the drawings. In the extensive standard work Kastelen en ridderhofsteden in Utrecht the original manuscript by Buchelius was not mentioned. That is why the manuscript remained virtually unknown. By acquiring the manuscript from Bubb Kuyper auction house, it becomes available to the public, and the Treasury of Special Collections is expanded by a new gem.