Briefwechsel zwischen Christian Wolff und Ernst Christoph von Manteuffel: 1738–1748

The survival of the correspondence between Christian Wolff (1679-1754) and Christoph von Manteuffel (1676-1749) is a singular piece of luck. The volumes preserved in Leipzig University Library contain the almost complete and thus largest surviving exchange of letters in all of Wolff's correspondence.

This historical-critical edition presents material which sets the study of Wolff and of the Enlightenment on a new footing. As well as previously unknown biographical details about Wolff's time in Marburg and his first years of activity after his return to the University of Halle, it provides insights into Wolff's and Manteuffel's positions within the political, philosophical, theological and scientific debates of the period. In addition the correspondence opens up an innovative perspective on the functions of a scholarly political and epistolary network which Count Manteuffel maintained and nurtured in order to spread Wolffianism throughout Europe.

The edition is part of a collaborative project between the Martin Luther University Halle-Wittenberg and the Saxon Academy of Sciences, based at the Interdisciplinary Centre for European Enlightenment Studies at the University of Halle.