Kneipbild with silhouette of Arthur von Eck and dedication to Franz Schaedel, 1844, ca. 8.6 × 10.2 cm, India ink, behind glass in wooden frame. KIT Archives 28005/36.
This silhouette is of a student from Karlsruhe Polytechnical College sporting the colors of a Karlsruhe student fraternity, presumably the Nassovia, on his cap and ribbon. Handwritten below: “A. Eck seinem Schaedel, Carlsruhe 1844”, along with a monogram for the fraternity's motto, the so-called Zirkel. Before the advent of photography, such representations, known as Kneipbilder (literally, ‘libation portraits’) or Couleurbilder, depicted members of student fraternities. These images were exchanged among students and kept as mementos after graduation. Long rows of them were also displayed on the walls of a fraternity house. These customs, common among student fraternities, illustrate that the students at Karlsruhe Polytechnical College were following university traditions long before it became an officially acknowledged advanced Polytechnic. The first student fraternities in Karlsruhe were established in the mid-1830s, well before the Baden government recognized the university ranking of this college. This reflects how much the students’ sense of identity and tradition anticipated the formal development of their educational institution. kn