Munich (dpa / lby) – The archive collection of the Deutsches Museum now includes a total of 4.7 kilometers of shelves of documents. Among them are secret documents on the National Socialists’ nuclear program as well as the diary of an industrial spy or a parchment manuscript by the polymath Albertus Magnus from the High Middle Ages, said the Nature and Technology Museum in Munich on Tuesday. The book “Treasury for Technology and Science: The Archive of the Deutsches Museum” by Wilhelm Füßl, who was chief archivist of the museum for 29 years, now provides insights into the collection.
One of the special treasures of the 67-year-old is Otto Hahn’s inconspicuous laboratory book, in which the discovery of nuclear fission and the way to get there is documented. “The world changes in one night,” commented Füßl, impressed. From 1480 comes a “Fireworks Book” with ideas for the craft of war.
The “Physicorum Libri VIII” by Albertus Magnus from the 13th century, the oldest piece in the collection, is likely to be particularly valuable. The Deutsches Museum once bought the font from an antiquarian bookshop “for the sum of 500 marks, which today seems ridiculously low,” said Füßl. “I do think that you should add a few zeros to it.”
