Abstract

When Leibniz’s house in Hanover was torn down in the middle of the nineteenth century, Ludwig Kugelmann sent some scraps of wallpaper from Leibniz’s study that had been found in the overburden, to his friend Karl Marx in London. Marx framed it and hung it up in his own study. The beautiful story has been handed down because Marx told it in a letter to Engels, not without adding: “You know my admiration for Leibniz” (see Holz 2015, p. 55f.). A beautiful picture for reception: framed fragments. An enlightening picture for Marx, who very early made excerpts from Leibniz (Marx 1976, p. 183 ff.). An apt image also for the relationship of the century to tradition: demolitions create a need for storage.