Bavarian Middle High German
Bavarian Middle High German is the language that was written in the Danube region and in the Eastern Alps, i.e. in the Bavarian language area, from around the year 1100 to 1400. It is the language form of the Middle High German manuscripts created in this region , which includes such prominent texts as the Nibelungenlied , the Meier Helmbrecht , the Vorauer manuscripts , the Millstatt manuscripts and the non-Latin parts of the Carmina Burana , as well as the authors Heinrich von Melk , Williram von Ebersberg , Dietmar von Aist , Konrad von Fußesbrunnen , the Burgrave of Regensburg , Walther von der Vogelweide , Hugo von Montfort , Oswald von Wolkenstein and the most famous female poet of the Middle Ages, Mrs. Ava .
The exact temporal delimitation to the old Bavarian (750–1100) before and the printer language Gemainteutsch (15th century) and the Maximilian chancellery language (16th century), which later emerged with book printing in the entire Upper German-speaking area, is often difficult. An exact geographical demarcation is also problematic, since in the early Middle Ages there were still many linguistic similarities, especially with the Swabian - Alemannic language area, and many texts, such as the traveling minstrels , were adapted to the respective regional audience and so often several versions of a work have survived.
Geographical demarcation
A precise geographical delimitation of Bavarian Middle High German to the also Upper German subregions, i.e. to the Swabians and Alemanni in the west and the Franks in the north, is sometimes difficult in the documents of the early phase. Especially in the 12th century there were only a few linguistic differences between Bavarian and Alemannic Middle High German. This is changing, however, due to the New High German diphthongization that was emerging in the southern Bavarian region (Carinthia, Tyrol, Styria) , which extended to the entire present-day Bavarian-Austrian region by the 14th century and spread to central German regions. However, the Alemannic West did not adopt the diphthongization and thus remained acoustically conservative, which results in a clearer distinction. On the other hand, the strongly Alemannic poetic language around the Hohenstaufen court in the 12th and 13th centuries had an influence on the written language in the Bavarian-speaking area and was at this time a leading variety for upscale and national literature.
Compared to the Upper Franconian area, the linguistic differences are initially clearer. Both language regions were previously largely isolated geographically, as large forest areas stretched from the Fichtel Mountains to the Upper Danube. As a result of the expansion of the Bavarian settlements northwards into the Upper Palatinate and towards Bohemia, this previously partially Slavic-speaking area also becomes Bavarian-speaking and northern Bavarian comes into being. At the same time, the Franconian settlement border expands to the south and leads there to a Bavarian-Franconian dialectal transition zone in the area from Amberg to Nuremberg .
In Bavarian Middle High German, however, there was no discernible difference between texts from today's Bavaria and today's Austria. The Danube region formed despite the division of the baierischen duchy in the year 1156 with its trade relations a relatively uniform language region, which later in the early modern period and through the larger urban centers arise in one of Vienna oriented eastern and after Regensburg and Ingolstadt , and later to Munich- oriented western part will be divided. At that time, there were only small recognizable linguistic differences between the lowlands and the alpine regions, although today typical southern Bavarian characteristics were more widespread and in the foothills of the Alps were only replaced by Middle Bavarian forms in the high Middle Ages . For example, the aspirated pronunciation of the Fortis consonant <k> was also widespread on the Danube and is often even found graphically marked in the texts - written as <ch> (chind, chlagen, Chriemhild) which can be read as <kch> is. In the 12th to 14th centuries, the Alpine region was the linguistically more innovative one, for example in the southern Bavarian dialects the New High German diphthongization was carried out completely for all long vowels. It was not until the 12th century that the Middle Bavarian consonant lenization ( p, t, k to b, d, g ) emerged in the lowlands , as well as the L-vocalization in the 13th century, both of which were never able to spread into the alpine area and thus become one clear distinguishing feature between Central and South Bavarian. It should be noted that although the aspirated pronunciation of the <k> was retained in the east of North Tyrol, in the Salzburger Gebirgsgauen and in the northernmost parts of Styria, the L-vocalization also prevailed there a little later.
Time limit
Late Old Bavarian until 1100
The boundary between the Old High German language level and Middle High German is usually given around the year 1050 for the entire High German language area. However, Old Bavarian was still productive in the late 11th century. An Old Bavarian translation of the Alemannic Sankt Gallner Notker was made in Wessobrunn Monastery after 1050 . This work is now called Wiener Notker after its place of storage . Also still largely altbairischen According to Booth, the in Regensburg written after 1067 Otlohs prayer on, as well as in the Tegernsee Abbey incurred Ruodlieb -Glossen. These late group are also still the Bible translations of the fact the Middle Rhine but originated around 1060 in the Bavarian Benedictine Ebersberg acting Williram of Ebersberg to count, some of which are already expected to Early Middle High German. The Millstätter Blutsegen from the beginning of the 12th century already stands on the border with Bavarian Middle High German . It is typical of the late Old Bavarian, however, that it was written exclusively in the monasteries, while lay people also began to write from the 12th century.
Early Bavarian Middle High German between 1100 and 1200
The early phase of Bavarian Middle High German is characterized by a phonetic proximity to the Swabian-Alemannic writings of that time. On the one hand, this has to do with the fact that both belong to the Elbe-Germanic group of West Germanic languages; on the other hand, new, more modern spellings often come from the Alemannic West, since at this time the courtly poet language of the Hohenstaufen exerts an influence on the written language. Writers from today's Bavarian-speaking area, who for the first time no longer wrote only in Latin, but made literary attempts in the vernacular, often based themselves on the spelling of the poets at the court of the Swabian Staufer. Furthermore, the Lech forms the natural geographical border between the two language areas, but this is blurred by trade relationships and cultural exchange. As a result, works that were created in this contact area, for example in South Tyrol , Vorarlberg or Swabia , often cannot be clearly assigned to Alemannic or Bavarian. It was not until the 12th century that Bavarian began to clearly distinguish itself from its western neighbors, with the southern Bavarian language area initially being the more innovative at the vowel level and later the Central Bavarian Danube area providing the sound change at the consonant level ( lenization ).
The works of the first known poet Mrs. Ava , the first known minstrel Der von Kürenberg , the innkeeper von Grafenberg , the burgrave of Regensburg and Dietmar von Aist belong to the early 12th century . The oldest Middle High German translation of the Roland song by Konrad the Pfaffen is also written in Bavarian. The later phase includes Konrad von Fußesbrunnen , Walther von der Vogelweide , Reinmar der Alte and Thomasîn von Zerclaere , as well as the monastic works of the Vorau manuscripts with the Kaiserchronik A, the Voraurer books of Mosis, and the Bavarian versions of the Alexander song by Pfaffen Lamprecht and the Ezzo song . The Millstatt manuscripts were created around the year 1200 with a South Bavarian version of the Genesis, the Exodus and a Physiologus, as well as the Viennese version of it in the Viennese manuscript 2721 (also called Old German and Viennese Genesis , Exodus and Physiologus ).
Bavarian in the High Middle Ages between 1200 and 1300
In the 13th century, new cities emerged and the art of reading and writing spread to new layers of society. For the first time there is also a large number of surviving non-Latin documents in today's Bavarian-Austrian region, which, in addition to religious and literary topics, also concern everyday things, such as legal documents, sales contracts, guild regulations and local chronicles, some of which were also written by less educated scribes . Although these document writers still tried to orient themselves in writing style and spelling to literary models, they used a small-scale vocabulary and dialectal phonetic peculiarities much more often. The breaking of this writing monopoly led to the fact that oral forms, which have probably been in use for a long time, are now being used in writing for the first time. For example, in the documents of this time, the doubling (diphthongization) of long vowels is increasingly found for the first time. The venerable episcopal chancelleries, for example in Regensburg or Salzburg , continue to write according to the old forms for longer, while the new forms used to dominate in smaller offices .
At the same time, the lenization of p , t , k, which is typical for the Middle Bavarian region of the Danube and foothills of the Alps, begins . In Salzburg documents from the late 13th century, for example, the weekday "Wednesday" is handed down as " midichen " three times , the place name Ötting ( Altötting ) is written in a Latin document from 1231 as " vetus Odingen " or is from St. Georgenberg in Tyrol From the late 13th century a person " friderich satelchneht " (Friedrich the saddle servant) in the spelling " friderich sadelchnecht " has been passed down several times , with a soft <d> instead of a hard <t>. Typical of the südbairische Tirolerisch in this example also aspirated <kh>, here as <ch> written ( c stands as the Latin for k , while the hour for the fricative ch (IPA [ x ] stands)) .
Important Bavarian authors of the 13th century were:
- 13th century: Wernher der Gartenaere , Neidhart von Reuental , Reinmar von Brennenberg , Ulrich von Liechtenstein , Brother Wernher , Friedrich von Sonnenburg , as well as the heroic epic Dietrich's escape from an unknown scribe.
Bavarian in the late Middle Ages
- 14th century: Hadamar von Laber , Andreas Kurzmann ,
- 15th century: Johannes von Tepl , Oswald von Wolkenstein , Ulrich Füetrer
The Ambraser Heldenbuch , which was written by the South Tyrolean scribe Hans Ried between 1504 and 1517 on behalf of Emperor Maximilian I, is a special feature and practically the end of Middle High German literature in the Bavarian language area . It is a collection of the most important texts in the German language of the 12th and 13th centuries, from the Nibelungenlied to Hartmann von Aue , whereby these have been translated into a reconstructed medieval South Bavarian writing language regardless of their original regional coloring.
Passed on manuscripts and authors
literature
- Ingo Reiffenstein, Aspects of a linguistic history of Bavarian-Austrian up to the beginning of the early modern period ; Chapter 191, page 2897 ff . ; in: Werner Besch : Sprachgeschichte - A manual on the history of the German language and its research , Volume 2.3, Walter de Gruyter, 1998, ISBN 3110158833
- Ingo Reiffenstein, metalinguistic statements about German and its subsystems up to 1800 in a historical perspective ; Chapter 157, page 2205 ff .; in: Werner Besch : Sprachgeschichte - A manual on the history of the German language and its research , Volume 2.3, Walter de Gruyter, 1998, ISBN 3110158833
- Peter Wiesinger, Spelling and Pronunciation in Older Early New High German: On the relationship between grapheme, phoneme, phon in the Bavarian-Austrian example by Andreas Kurzmann around 1400 ; Walter de Gruyter, 1996, ISBN 3110137275 , online at Google Books
- Walter Haas, The dialects in Jacob Grimm's linguistic argumentation ; Chapter 4, from page 41 ; in: Walter Haas: Jacob Grimm and the German dialects ; Franz Steiner Verlag, 1990, ISBN 3515055746
- Hannes Scheutz: Drent and Herent, dialects in the Salzburg-Bavarian border area , EuRegio Salzburg - Berchtesgadener Land - Traunstein, 2007, with speaking dialect atlas on CD-ROM
Individual evidence
- ↑ Marburg Repertory: Heidelberg, Universitätsbibl., Cpg 112 ( Memento of the original from April 30, 2008 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.
- ↑ Ingo Reiffenstein in: Hannes Scheutz: Drent und herent , 2007, p. 142
