Egloff Etterlin (c. 1400 – c. 1470) served as secretary of the city of

Lucerne Lucerne ( ) or Luzern ()Other languages: ; ; ; . is a city in central Switzerland, in the Languages of Switzerland, German-speaking portion of the country. Lucerne is the capital of the canton of Lucerne and part of the Lucerne (district), di ...

from 1427 until 1452, and during 1458/9 as judge. A native of

Brugg Brugg (sometimes written as Brugg AG in order to distinguish it from other ''Brugg''s) is a Switzerland, Swiss Municipalities of Switzerland, municipality and a List of towns in Switzerland, town in the canton of Aargau and is the seat of the Bru ...

, Egloff received Lucerne citizenship in 1422. He married Agnes Stutzenbergin, daughter of

Basel Basel ( ; ), also known as Basle ( ), ; ; ; . is a city in northwestern Switzerland on the river Rhine (at the transition from the High Rhine, High to the Upper Rhine). Basel is Switzerland's List of cities in Switzerland, third-most-populo ...

merchant Klaus Stutzenberg, and, after his first wife's death in 1439, Mechthild von Löwenbach as his second wife. Besides acting as city scribe, he was the delegate to the

Swiss Diet The Federal Diet of Switzerland (, ; ; ) was the legislative and executive council of the Old Swiss Confederacy and existed in various forms from the beginnings of Swiss independence until the formation of the Switzerland as a federal state, ...

and to

Milan Milan ( , , ; ) is a city in northern Italy, regional capital of Lombardy, the largest city in Italy by urban area and the List of cities in Italy, second-most-populous city proper in Italy after Rome. The city proper has a population of nea ...

. During the

Council of Basel The Council of Florence is the seventeenth ecumenical council recognized by the Catholic Church, held between 1431 and 1445. It was convened in territories under the Holy Roman Empire. Italy became a venue of a Catholic ecumenical council aft ...

he sought connections to merchants of

Verona Verona ( ; ; or ) is a city on the Adige, River Adige in Veneto, Italy, with 255,131 inhabitants. It is one of the seven provincial capitals of the region, and is the largest city Comune, municipality in the region and in Northeast Italy, nor ...

, and later entered business relations with Milan in the interest of his father-in-law. He is the author of the "Silver Book" ('' Silbernes Buch''), an extensive

cartulary A cartulary or chartulary (; Latin: ''cartularium'' or ''chartularium''), also called ''pancarta'' or ''codex diplomaticus'', is a medieval manuscript volume or roll ('' rotulus'') containing transcriptions of original documents relating to the fo ...

which was richly ornamented in 1505. Introducing Italian methods of book-keeping, he greatly facilitated the organisation of the Lucerne chancery, allowing the administration of the growing territory of Lucerne and its presidency in the Swiss Diet. Egloff is the father of chronist Petermann Etterlin who authored the Chronicle of the Swiss Confederation. It is uncertain whether Egloff himself was the author of a (lost) chronicle. Egloff died at some point between 1469 and 1477.

References

* *K. Wanner, "Schreiber, Chronisten und Frühhumanisten in der Luzerner Stadtkanzlei des 15. Jh", ''Jahrbuch der Historischen Gesellschaft Luzern'' 18, 2000, 2–44. {{DEFAULTSORT:Etterlin, Egloff 15th-century births 1470s deaths People from Brugg People from Lucerne Swiss diplomats 15th-century Swiss people