Abstract

This essay portrays the “law of the good neighbor” as the principle of the Warburg Library's collections — as the argument for their expansion and coherence, as well as the principle governing the scholarly practice inspired by the Warburg Institute and “Warburg school” of cultural analysis. The essay includes a tribute to Anne Marie Meyer (1919 – 2004), Warburg scholar and long-time affiliate of the Institute, with special emphasis on the question that she uniquely raised: “Exactly what was the relation between [Aby] Warburg's research on paganism in the Renaissance and his meditations and fears about Judaism (and Jews)?”