An Application of Conceptual History to Itself: From Method to Theory in Reinhart Koselleck’s Begriffsgeschifte

From Method to Theory in Reinhart Koselleck's BegriffsgeschifteW ith the exception of some studies of Melvin Richter, the history of the Koselleckian conceptual history has been hardly thematized.Reinhart Koselleck himself has, however, recently made an interesting comment on this, which legitimates a closer historical discussion of the changes in his programme.In his Reflections, published in 1994, he writes on the experiences around the publication of Geschichtliche Grundbegriffe: Publication of that lexicon has been going on for two decades by now and, for me at least, its theoretical and methodological presuppositions, first formulated some twenty-five years ago, have grown into an intellectual straightjacket.While it was necessary to maintain these presuppositions in relatively unchanged form in order to be able to proceed with the collaborative project of the Geschichtliche Grundbegriffe, my own