The study interprets the oldest extant correspondence in German, the letters from the secular priest Heinrich von Nördlingen to the Dominican nun Margaretha Ebner dating from the second quarter of the14th century. The study reads the letters as spiritual missives with something of a mystagogical character; this interpretation is then supplemented with a reconstruction of the history of their genesis and transmission and a location of them in their mystical context (Mechthild of Magdeburg, Heinrich Seuse [Suso] et al). The work is an impressive study in cultural history which develops the function of literary communication for religious self-interpretation.
