Abstract
In the studies of seals, the interests in the medieval German city seals have an original place. Firstly, the city seals for the historical sources show the city as one character as well as the persons such as Crowns and feudal lords in the feudal societies and express their existence. Secondary, the city seals were traditionally regarded as the things to express the city as the existence embodied the different thoughts from the characters in such feudal societies. Above all, the city seals reflect the city images in the heyday of the medieval period. Thus, it may be said that the studies of Germany where the category of the city seals occupies not small ranges in the studies of seals show the trend of the interesting studies.
In this dissertation, I focus on the studies concerned with the city seals appeared in the formation period of the medieval German cities. I will regard the formation of the medieval German cities as their proofs which are narrated by the cities, review the studies discussing about the city seals and point out the characteristics clarified by the studies trend. According to the studies of the city seals, we can get the visions that this type of seals werenʼt originally the seals of the “cities” at that time. The city seals embody the unit consisted of members of local churches where originally all people from cleric to secular persons congregate and which have the different rights and duties. Therefore, according to the trend of studies, it is clarified that the images of the medieval cities were originally elicited from the characteristics similar to churches.
