Plagiarism of Leibniz' historiographical work? Reconstruction of early-medieval nobility history by G.W. Leibniz and J.G. Eckhart. Part 1.

While it is a commonplace even for mathematicians and philosophers that Leibniz was working since 1685 on a Historia Domus for the dukes and electors of Hanover, that what he then actually worked out is much less a topic in the Leibniz research. Therefore, the old claim of Louis Daville, that Leibniz's amanuensis Johann Georg Eckhart has plagiarized this Historia Domus in his own books, which stands unrefuted since 1911, is a good starting point to examine Leibniz's historical work and method in detail. In this first part I describe the environment in which dynastic history at this time took place and the new aspects which Leibniz introduced into the historical research, especially into medieval prosopography. Further in a first example, I examine Daville's claim in a comparison between Leibniz and Eckhart on the basis of the deductions of possible descendants of Widukind, the famous rival of Charlemagne, in Leibniz's Annales imperii and Eckhart's Historia genealogica. In a second part I will continue the comparison with two further examples of reconstruction of early medieval nobility.