Aschanes
Aschanes or in the Latinized form Askanius is according to the legend of the origin of the Saxons collected by the Brothers Grimm , the ancestor and first king of the Saxons . According to an old folk legend, it grew out of the Harz rocks in the middle of the green forest near a cute fountain.
The following parody can be found in Georg Rollehagen's 1595:
"Since Aschanes with his Saxons / From the Harz rock grew / Was in the middle of the green forest / A little spring jumping sweet and cold ..."
Etymologically, the name Aschanes / Askanius can hardly be associated with Askr , the first man in the Nordic mythology of the Edda , but rather a scholarly reference to the Roman Ascanius . In the early Middle Ages it was a widespread custom to link Germanic peoples and ruling families, such as the Merovingians , with the Troy saga .
With the Annolied (around 1080) and the Imperial Chronicle (middle of the 12th century), parts of the Saxon legend were first handed down in the local language; in their entirety, they can be found in the 13th century in the Saxon World Chronicle and in the Sachsenspiegel .
Since 1500, the origin of the Saxons (and thus of the Germans) was moved back even further, right up to Noah's descendants of Ashkenaz . Representatives of this thesis included Martin Luther , Philipp Melanchthon , Justus Georg Schottelius and, in the 19th century , August Knobel . Attempts were made to bring the Bible and the Germania of Tacitus into harmony in order to create an early history of the "Teutons" from the Saxons, Franks, Goths and other peoples.
literature
- Hilkert Weddige: hero and tribal legend. Iring and the fall of the Thuringian Empire in historiography and heroic poetry. Max Niemeyer, Tübingen 1989. ISBN 3-484-15061-0 . Pp. 119-140.
Individual evidence
- ^ Georg Rollehagen: Froschmeuseler. Edited by Karl Goedeke , 1876.
- ↑ cf. Jacob Grimm : German Mythology Volume 1. Dieterich, 1844. P. 537
- ↑ cf. Weddige 1989, p. 120
- ↑ Weddige 1989, p. 122
- ↑ Weddige 1989, p. 139
- ↑ August Knobel: The Table of Nations of Genesis. Ethnographic research. Giessen 1850, p. 35.
- ↑ Weddige 1989, p. 139