The Herzog August Library restitutes historic work to the Grand National Mother Lodge “The Three Globes”

The li­brary Her­zog Au­gust Bib­lio­thek (HAB) has re­turned a mul­ti-vol­ume phar­ma­ceu­ti­cal work by phar­ma­cist and al­chemist Jo­hann Rudolph Glauber (1604-1670) to its right­ful own­er, name­ly the Grand Na­tion­al Moth­er Lodge “The Three Globes”. Resti­tu­tion was com­plet­ed in au­tumn 2022, al­most 90 years af­ter the seizure of the work by the Gestapo in 1935.

The HAB orig­i­nal­ly ac­quired it in 2000 from an an­ti­quar­i­an book­shop with a view to sup­ple­ment­ing its his­tor­i­cal col­lec­tions. The prove­nance of the work was in­ves­ti­gat­ed through the re­search project NS-Raubgut unter den an­ti­quar­ischen Er­wer­bun­gen der Her­zog Au­gust Bib­lio­thek seit 1969 (“As­sets loot­ed by the Nazis among the an­ti­quar­i­an hold­ings ac­quired by the Her­zog Au­gust Bib­lio­thek since 1969), fund­ed by the Ger­man Lost Art Foun­da­tion. Rep­re­sen­ta­tives of the Grand Na­tion­al Moth­er Lodge “The Three Globes” have de­cid­ed to leave the work as a de­posit in the HAB in or­der to en­sure it re­mains ac­ces­si­ble for schol­ar­ly use on site. What is more, the work is to be digi­tised.

Dur­ing the very first in­dex­ing of the work for the li­brary cat­a­logue, a clear­ly leg­i­ble stamp on the ti­tle page was no­ticed along­side the book­plate of En­light­en­ment philoso­pher Friedrich Nico­lai (1733-1811) which iden­ti­fies the work as the prop­er­ty of the Grand Na­tion­al Moth­er Lodge. This sus­pi­cion was pur­sued in the project on cul­tur­al prop­er­ty ex­pro­pri­at­ed as a re­sult of (Nazi) per­se­cu­tion that be­gan in 2020. Af­ter ini­tial re­search in­to the his­to­ry of the Lodge, it emerged that the vol­ume was in­deed to be clas­si­fied as cul­tur­al prop­er­ty ex­pro­pri­at­ed as a re­sult of (Nazi) per­se­cu­tion. The Ma­son­ic Grand Lodge was banned dur­ing the Nazi era and all its prop­er­ty was con­fis­cat­ed, in­clud­ing the work iden­ti­fied in the HAB. A joint so­lu­tion was ar­rived at with the rep­re­sen­ta­tives of the Grand Lodge, tak­ing in­to ac­count not just the his­tor­i­cal con­text of the con­fis­ca­tion but al­so the work’s im­por­tance as part of the HAB’s col­lec­tion.

Re­search in­to cul­tur­al prop­er­ty ex­pro­pri­at­ed as a re­sult of (Nazi) per­se­cu­tion at the HAB is cur­rent­ly be­ing car­ried out in the fol­low-up project NS-Raubgut unter den Zugän­gen der Her­zog Au­gust Bib­lio­thek 1933-1969 (“Cul­tur­al prop­er­ty ex­pro­pri­at­ed as a re­sult of (Nazi) per­se­cu­tion among HAB ac­qui­si­tions 1933-1969”), which is like­wise be­ing fund­ed by the Ger­man Lost Art Foun­da­tion.

Title page with stamp from: Johann Rudolph Glauber, Pharmacopaeae Spagyricae, Amsterdam 1668 (excerpt) Source:  HAB