This volume brings together the papers held at an international conference in Frankfurt am Main (September 1996) commemorating the First Assembly of German Studies Scholars in 1846 in the same city. Proceeding from an earlier understanding of the term Germanist, which in 1846 was extensive enough to embrace law historians, historians and language scholars, the authors reflect on the specialization of German Studies in the form of a 'national philology', proceeding from there to take a comparative focus on what has always been a problematic relation between nation and philology in Europe. Systematic and biographic approaches are taken to issues associated with the development of tradition, the transfer of knowledge and culture, and the political implications of philological work.