Inventory description: Dept. 159 Herrnsheimer Dalberg-Archiv (files, official books) Size: 1943 units of description (= 27 lfm = 201 archive cartons, 2 large cartons, 2 lfm oversized formats - own inventory: 1878 VE, remainder in Heylshof = 64 VE, with sub-VE in total) 2015) Duration: 1445 - 1866 Zur Familie und Herrschaft Dalberg (Note 1) The family of the chamberlains of Worms, later called 'von Dalberg', belonged as an influential family association to the episcopal ministry of Worms. Since 1239 she held the hereditary office of the chamberlain of Worms; this was later associated with economic-financial privileges in Worms, court rights and the Jewish Court in Worms. Since the 14th century, the family has succeeded in expanding various ownership complexes between Niederelsass and Hunsrück, with a focus on Wormsgau. This also includes the expansion of power in the towns of Herrnsheim and Abenheim, which began in the 14th century, through the acquisition of feudal rights and property (2). The dominion complex with Herrnsheim and Abenheim was predominantly surrounded by Electoral Palatinate territory. Around 1460 a castle was erected in Herrnsheim (castle) and a surrounding wall was built around the village; between 1470 and 1492 a chapel of the local parish church of St. Peter was converted into a burial place, which has led to the development of the situation of a small residential town in Herrnsheim, which can still be seen today from the buildings and the townscape. Today's Herrnsheim Castle, owned by the town of Worms since 1958, was built together with the important English landscape garden in two construction phases from 1808 to 1814 and from 1820 to 1824. The dominion of Dalberg is a typical middle imperial knighthood territory. Since the late Middle Ages, the Dalberg dynasty had provided the fiefdoms of the Electorate of Mainz and Palatinate and held important ecclesiastical offices, including the bishop of Worms, Johann von Dalberg (1445-1503). The family split into different lines and branches. Outstanding persons for whom the collection contains material are Carl Theodor von Dalberg (1744-1817, Elector of Mainz, Grand Duke of Frankfurt); Wolfgang Heribert von Dalberg (1750-1806, Minister of State in Mannheim, Director of the National Theatre); Johann Friedrich Hugo von Dalberg (1760-1812, bishop and humanist); Emmerich Joseph Duc de Dalberg (1773-1833, diplomat and politician). In 1883 John Dalberg-Acton sold Herrnsheim Castle with all its interior and the park from his family's estate to Cornelius Wilhelm Heyl (Cornelius Wilhelm Freiherr von Heyl zu Herrnsheim), a leather industrialist from Worms, due to financial shortages (3). Thus also the library stored there and the documents and files of the Herrnsheimer Dalberg Archive of the previous owners were transferred to the buyer. After the death of his father in 1923, D. Dr. jur. Cornelius Freiherr Heyl zu Herrnsheim took over the castle, which he officially moved into in April 1929 (4). In the years of the Second World War the documents were relocated several times for safety reasons and probably suffered incomprehensible, but rather smaller losses (5). Until it was converted into an apartment, the Dalberg Archive was housed in a special archive room locked with an iron door in the castle, then in the library in the tower room on the first floor. When Siegfried Freiherr von Heyl zu Herrnsheim, son of D. Dr. jur. Cornelius Frhr. Heyl zu Herrnsheim, sold the castle to the city of Worms in July 1958 (6), the documents, files and official books of the Dalberg archive kept in boxes and bundles were not part of the sale. However, it was to be left on loan to the town on the basis of an agreement with the community of heirs (in autumn 1959) and an inventory was to be taken before a corresponding contract was concluded (7). This work was done by Carl J. H. Villinger (8), who handed over his summary list with the disaggregation to Dr. Georg Illert on 3.7.1964 (9). The draft of the loan contract was completed to the satisfaction of both parties at the end of 1965, so that there was nothing to prevent it from being concluded the following year. On 19 July 1966, lawyer H. Ramge, in his capacity as joint executor of the will, surprisingly approached the city with the offer that it could purchase the Dalberg Archive and the library holdings of Herrnsheim Palace from the estate of D. Dr. jur. Cornelius Freiherr Heyl zu Herrnsheim (10). With the support of the Landesarchivverwaltung Koblenz, which prepared an expert opinion on the basis of Villinger's list, the value was determined and one year later - in July 1967 - the documents were sold to the city. Thus, the Dalberg Archive, which according to the decree of the Prime Minister of Rhineland-Palatinate of 13.7.1961 had been entered into the state register of nationally valuable archives, could remain in Worms as a closed collection (11). A more detailed inventory should then be made, which was completed before the archive was moved to the city archive for security reasons. Villinger had compiled a detailed list of the contents of the 39 archive boxes, the qualitative condition of which was indicated from good to partly very poor, and of the remaining archive documents (12). On the basis of this list of Villingers, the lack of various documents and files as well as individual letters from correspondence series and gaps in official book series could be ascertained (13). In 1980 Siegfried Freiherr Heyl zu Herrnsheim handed over 14 sealed parchment documents and in 1985 his daughter, Mrs. Cornelia von Bodenhausen, another 72, partly decorative documents from the former possession of the treasurers of Worms Freiherr von Dalberg to the Foundation Kunsthaus Heylshof (14). The documents kept there were examined with the consent of the then Chairman of the Board of Trustees, Frhr. Ludwig von Heyl, as part of the project for the Dalberg Regestensammlung under the auspices of Hess. Staatsarchivs Darmstadt microfilmed in Darmstadt in 1985 and included in the Regestenwerk (15). The further written material lying in the Heylshof such as files, correspondence etc. could be taken into account in the preparation of the present repertory (16). Some files, which were offered at an auction in Heidelberg in 1984, could be bought with the support of the Altertumsverein Worms (17). Also in 1994, with the financial support of the Kulturfonds der Wormser Wirtschaft, the city was able to acquire 23 official and accounting books from private sources, which were added to the collection. With the help of this material, gaps in existing series could be closed again. Among these acquisitions was also the inventory "Verzeichnis der Urkunden, Schriftstücke etc. des Kämmerer-Dalbergarchivs Schloß Herrnsheim...", compiled in 1919 by Heyl's librarian and archivist Wilhelm Graf, in which he [until then] had only recorded the documents (18). For the use and recording of the Dept. 159 This inventory, Dept. 159, comprises the Herrnsheimer Dalberg Archive (files and official books), which, together with the other inventories, Dept. 159-U Herrnsheimer Dalberg Archive (documents) and Dept. 159-P Dalberg Plan Collection, comprises the entire collection of the archive of the chamberlains of Worms Freiherr von Dalberg, formerly kept in the Herrnsheimer Palace. As a complex aristocratic archive within the holdings of the Worms City Archive, it is of supra-regional importance. It reflects the work of a knightly aristocratic family with its lordly function and family ties. After the takeover of the material by the city of Worms in 1967, the directory prepared by C. J. H. Villinger served as a finding aid for years. In the archive, the bundles and official books of No. 1 - No. 428 were numbered consecutively and recorded in a corresponding list. While the documents (No. 1 - No. 323, plus sub-numbers (19)) already registered in 1919 by the Heyl's librarian and archivist Wilhelm Graf in document folders with numbers and title entries were initially easy to use, the files and folders with short titles and box numbers contained in the remaining archive boxes were relatively reliably findable, but only vaguely citable due to missing individual signatures. After in the 1980s the processing of the Dalbergian document holdings in Darmstadt, Worms (Stadtarchiv, Heylshof, Pfarrarchiv Herrnsheim) and in other archives had been implemented under the auspices of the Hessisches Staatsarchiv Darmstadt, a more precise indexing of the files was started as a further project (20). Dr. Jürgen Rainer Wolf of the Hessisches Staatsarchiv Darmstadt processed the documents kept in the other archive boxes of the Worms Dalberg Archive, which were brought to Darmstadt for this purpose. However, only a part of the boxes (21) was opened, and each box was given a number with sub-numbers separated by slashes for the individual pieces contained therein. However, the work did not come to a conclusion. With immediate effect Wolf's finding aid, which also included official book series, had to be used in addition to the directory compiled by Villinger (22). From then on, the use of the holdings was regarded as a particular challenge, especially since there was also a link between the holdings of documents and files. This was because, at the time of the document project, the comprehensive record of documents also included the documents lying dormant in the files, the location of which was then not reliable or only difficult to secure (23). At the beginning of 2011, due to the unsatisfactory usability of the inventory on the one hand and due to the discontinuous and inconsistent depth of distortion on the other hand, the complete new distortion of the file inventory was decided and completed in October 2012. The signatures should not be changed completely, but as many as possible should be preserved and the link with existing old signatures by means of concordance should of course be guaranteed. The titles were recorded directly in the Augias archive program, at the same time the documents were embedded in acid-free archive folders and boxes. "The numbering of the convolutes was retained as signatures and, if necessary, sub-numbers separated by slashes were assigned as soon as the mostly extensive fascicles contained various individual folders. "The official records retained their signatures. "The Wolf's units of description with their signatures (no. 430/1ff - no. 440/1ff) were taken over, sifted through and the existing title recordings were deepened and supplemented on the basis of the newly recorded pieces. "Documents (24) possibly in the files, which were considered in the Dalberger Regesten volumes, were seized with the title admission both over the old signature, and usually with reference to the sequential number in the second volume of the Dalberger Regesten (25). "The further archive boxes not yet taken up by Wolf were continued and listed according to the given pattern, i.e. each further archive box received a new number (No. 442ff (26)) and the individual files, folders etc. preserved therein were provided with sub-numbers, separated by a slash. "The unlisted material found at the end of the inventory was then added with consecutive signatures. "The Dalberg letters purchased on various occasions in the 1970s, mainly letters from Carl Theodor von Dalberg, which had been integrated into the collection at the time, also remained with the new indexing in Dept. 159. " The documents kept at Kunsthaus Heylshof were recorded and selected pieces digitized (27). The digital copies were integrated in the Worms Municipal Archives into the collection of Dept. 159, since the pieces of their provenance can be attributed to the former Herrnsheim Dalberg Archive. In the case of the originals, the signatures of the city archives were noted, while the numbering used in the Heylshof (28) was recorded as an "old signature" in the title recording. This enables targeted access to the originals at Heylshof if required. "Within the scope of the registration work also the files of Dept. 159 N were dissolved (29) and inserted into Dept. 159 (now Dept. 159 No. 852 - No. 884). These are files, correspondence and family papers (mainly on the Petersau donation and the Tascher affair), which obviously also belonged to the Dalberg Archive in the past. These once formed the inventory of Dept. 158 of Dalberg, which must have existed before 1967, about its origin, i.e. (pre-)provenance before transfer into the archive, but no information is available. During the title recording it became apparent that the inventory did not have a coherent structure and that the development of a system would only make sense after completion of the work. The classification was finally drawn up on the basis of the main points of content. The assignment of each individual unit of description to the corresponding classification group then took place in a final work step, after the completion of which a real overview of the contents of the present tradition and its meaning in its entirety could be obtained. Contents The documents that were last kept in the library tower of Herrnsheim Castle before being transferred to the Worms City Archives essentially comprise archival documents relating to the Herrnsheim Dalberg Line. By the marriage (oo 12.1.1771) Wolfgang Heribert von Dalbergs with Elisabetha Augusta nee Ulner von Dieburg (30) as well as by connections of the Dalberger with other families further document and file material was added. The collection of Dept. 159 as part of the Herrnsheimer Dalberg Archive comprises the file and official book tradition, the temporal focus of which clearly lies in the 18th and the first half of the 19th century. The early material (from 1249) is mostly copies of documents. A copy in which a large number of documents were recorded between 1249 and 1469 (31) deserves special mention here. Temporal "runaways" in the 20th century came about through subsequent additions to the holdings. On the one hand, various correspondences and records had been added sporadically at the time of the von Heyl family (32) and on the other hand, in connection with the purchase of Dalberg letters, the corresponding correspondence had been left with the letters (33). The most closed collection within the Dept. 159 is the archive material dating back to Emmerich Joseph von Dalberg (1773-1833). Due to the fact that with him the Herrnsheimer Dalberg line died out in the male tribe, after the death of his father Wolfgang Heribert all administrative matters of the Herrnsheimer line and after the death of his uncle Carl Theodor von Dalberg as his universal heir were incumbent upon him the order and administration of his inheritance including the Regensburg endowment. Furthermore and especially in Dept. 159 there is the diplomatic estate of the Duc de Dalberg with numerous memoirs, correspondence and rich material (targeted collection, own records etc.) on the (foreign) policy of France and other European countries. In addition, its business activities are richly reflected, not least in the activities of the Paravey Bank.
