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Rh nuncio Aleander as the main authority in Luther research work as far as this diet was concerned. Brieger presented these letters by using the manuscript of Trent and by comparing it with the original jottings of Aleander — in the archives of the Vatican at Rome — and thus answered the question as to their chronological sequence. But it was Kalkoff who in 1886 gave them to the world in a trustworthy translation, which because of their original text — half Italian, half Latin — made them accessible for the first time to wider circles. Written by an excellent judge of men who was directly influenced by the great events and who stood in the midst of the excitement and tension occasioned by the fight, entirely unreserved in his estimate of men and conditions, these dispatches of Aleander to the vice-chancellor, Julius de Medici, later on Clement VII, allowed their writer to give full play to his wagging tongue, and revealed unabashedly the inspirations of his unscrupulous wit, the arousing of his fanatical hate and the little expression of his egotism, of his wounded vanity, cowardice and meanness. Thus these dispatches bring home to us fully how severe a test these days were for Luther and the business of God's Kingdom. Aleander tried everything to prevent Luther from being invited to the Diet, and when this failed, he again used every means to make Luther's appearance as harmless as possible.

Kolde has closely investigated the Emperor's Herald, Kasper Sturm, who escorted Luther to Worms,60 and so has made us acquainted with him for the first time. At the same time he has also made it appear probable that it was no other than this herald who wrote the first anonymous circular, which within a brief space of time reported Luther's trial.