Published in 1929 as Kaiser, Rom und Renovatio: Studien und Texte zur Geschichte des römischen Erneuerungsgedankens vom Ende des karolingischen Reiches bis zum Investiturstreit ("Emperor, Rome and Renovatio: Studies and Texts on the History of Roman Ideologies of Renewal from the End of the Carolingian Empire to the Investiture Controversy"), Schramm's thesis was a landmark piece of highly original, interdisciplinary scholarship that transformed the way medieval historians approached the subject of political ideology.

In a rite of passage required of most German medievalists at the time, Schramm worked for two years at the Monumenta Germaniae Historica before being offered a professorship.

His students at Göttingen included Berent Schwineköper; the American professor of German History, Donald Detwiler; and the Hungarian medievalist, János Bak.

In Spring 1932, Schramm spoke publicly in Thalburg on behalf of the re-election of Paul von Hindenburg, who was running against Adolf Hitler for the Presidency of the Weimar Republic.

[2] Schramm's duties involved keeping detailed records about the day-to-day activities and decisions of the General Staff, which included the top military field commanders in the German Army.

Herrschaftszeichen was a major survey of the representative art of medieval rulers or symbols of their power, including their regalia, seals, coinage, armaments, clothing, and other objects.

These objects and their history were catalogued in more detail in a book Schramm authored together with the eminent art historian Florentine Mütherich, Denkmale der deutschen Könige und Kaiser ("Monuments of the German Kings and Emperors", 1962).

The enduring legacy of Schramm's work in these and numerous other studies and articles, was to demonstrate the importance of symbols, liturgical ceremony, gestures and images as critical sources for political history.

Along with his contemporaries, Ernst H. Kantorowicz and Carl Erdmann, Schramm introduced an important element of cultural history to a field which (especially in Germany) tended to focus largely on institutions and their texts.