‘Some have it from Birth, Some by Disposition’:1 Foolishness in Medieval German Literature

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Janina Dillig
Keyword(s):  
Intellectual Disability ◽  
Middle Ages ◽  
German Literature ◽  
Middle High German ◽  
Wolfram Von Eschenbach ◽  
14Th Century ◽  
The Difference ◽  
Middle High German Literature

This chapter examines depictions of fools in Middle High German literature to demonstrate that the medieval idea of folly is more complex than a simple opposition to reason, and to ascertain if there are notions of intellectual disability in the German Middle Ages. To understand medieval ideas of foolishness, this chapter explores the difference between ‘will fool’ and ‘natural fool’ as depicted by Konrad von Megenberg in the 14th century. This medieval differentiation is then tracked through several different Middle High German texts, including the Parzival of Wolfram von Eschenbach and the Middle High German stories Die halbe Birne and Des Mönches Not.

Heinrich von Veldeke's and the Tradition of the Alliterating Word-Pair

2010 ◽  
Vol 66 (1) ◽  
pp. 103-136 ◽  
Author(s):  
John M. Jeep
Keyword(s):  
Word Pair ◽  
German Literature ◽  
Middle High German ◽  
Comprehensive Data ◽  
Temporal Boundary ◽  
First Time ◽  
Middle High German Literature

Building on recent findings from Early Middle High German literature, this study compiles and analyses for the first time completely the circa eighty alliterating word-pairs from Heinrich's , a work dated just after the evasive temporal boundary between Early Middle High and Middle High German (circa 1170). Comparisons are established to pairs from Heinrich's somewhat earlier texts and comprehensive data available on Old High and Early Middle High German. Methodology considers speculation on the figurative nature of some of the expressions and formal issues related to idiomatic usage.

Exemplarik und Erfahrung in allegorischen Ich-Erzählungen (am Beispiel von Konrads von Würzburg ›Klage der Kunst‹)

2017 ◽  
Vol 139 (3) ◽  
Author(s):  
Katharina Philipowski
Keyword(s):  
German Literature ◽  
Narrative Form ◽  
First Person ◽  
Middle High German ◽  
Main Thesis ◽  
The One ◽  
Middle High German Literature

AbstractMost of the longer worldly fictional Middle High German first-person narrations are allegorical. The article discusses the reasons for this interdependence between allegory and the first-person narrative form, which is observable not only in Middle High German literature, but also in texts belonging to other European vernacular literatures of the time. In my article I develop two main thesis: The first is that the use of allegoric forms marks on the one hand a highbrow literary level and serves as a stylistic ornament of texts, which tend to present themselves mainly as author-speech. This is also the reason why in these texts the ›I‹ is often not only a narrating ›I‹, but also takes over the role of an author on the narrative level of the

scholarly journals Frau Ava’s, the first named German female writer’s, poem Jüngstes Gericht ‘The Last Judgement’ and its Lithuanian translation

Literatūra ◽  
2019 ◽  
Vol 61 (4) ◽  
pp. 8-26
Author(s):  
Aleksej Burov ◽  
Ignė Vrubliauskaitė
Keyword(s):  
World War Ii ◽  
Present Article ◽  
German Literature ◽  
The Other ◽  
Middle High German ◽  
World War ◽  
14Th Century ◽  
John The Baptist ◽  
12Th Century ◽  
Manuscript Dating

The present article offers an overview of several poems written by Frau Ava (1060–1127), a German poetess whose literary works are virtually unknown in Lithuania. Ava, an anchoress in Melk Abbey, is the first named German female writer, who broke ‘the deep silence of German literature’ lasting over a century (Stein 1976, 5). All poems attributed to Frau Ava are of religious character: Johannes ‘John the Baptist’ (446 lines), Leben Jesu ‘Life of Jesus’ (2418 lines), Antichrist (118 lines) and Jüngstes Gericht ‘The Last Judgement’ (406 lines), which make up an impressive biblical epic of 3388 lines. Leben Jesu, Antichrist and Jüngstes Gericht are found in the Vorau Manuscript dating the first half of the 12th century (Codex 276, 115va-125ra), whereas the Görlitz Manuscript (Codex A III. 1. 10), compiled in the 14th century but lost during World War II, contains the poem Johannes as well as the other poems mentioned above, excluding the epilogue of Jüngstes Gericht (lines 393-406).The article presents an overview of Frau Ava’s life and works as well as a Lithuanian translation of her poem Jüngstes Gericht, written in Early Middle High German (Ger. Frümittelhochdeutsch). The translation is based on Maike Glaußnitzer and Kassnadra Sperl’s text, published in 2014.

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