Blanschandin
Blanschandin is a Middle High German fragment from the middle of the 13th century. It is based on a French heroic epic that is in the tradition of the Matière de Bretagne .
Lore
The Middle High German fragment "Blanschandin" was discovered in 1868 in a manuscript from the former Benedictine monastery Mondsee , in which it was glued on as a spine binding and bound in at the end of the 15th century to reinforce the spine of the book. It can be assumed that the fragment was in inadequate condition or of little value at this time, otherwise it would not have been used for binding.
The only text witness to the fragment is in the Vienna National Library under the shelf mark Codex Series Nova 102 . Seven vertical strips of parchment have been preserved, three of which are on the first sheet, while there are two vertical strips each on the second and third sheet. The text is written in Gothic book script, the typeface of which suggests a single editor. Furthermore, at the beginning of the verse , there are capitals that are pushed out in a 7-8 mm wide margin. The paragraphs are marked and set off by floral ornamental letters that are held in red or blue. A total of 384 verses, some of them cut, have survived. On all three pages, the margins were cropped and the text was lost. The number of lines per page is 32.
Dating
The fragment represents an expansion of a surviving French poem, which was written in the first third of the 13th century. The dating of the German constitution of the fragment is set in the middle of the 13th century . The shape of the letters or the written form as well as the language usage can be used for dating. The title of the text, which the unknown German editor used as a model, was 'Blancandin et l'Orgueilleuse d'amour' and had a length of 6136 rhymes . Five French manuscripts have survived.
It can be assumed that the German editor was familiar with texts by Hartmann von Aue and Wolfram von Eschenbach , as stylistic similarities can be seen in his work. Based on his linguistic usage, the German editor was Middle German; more precisely, his origin can be located in the Rhine-Franconian area.
action
The position of the three surviving fragments can be classified in the opening parts of the narrative using the French model. When comparing the two texts, it becomes clear that the author of the German fragment was very detailed in its processing.
Content of fragment part I.
The first part of the fragment begins with the scene in which the king's son Blanschandin asks his teacher about the tournament scenes that he discovered on a tapestry of his parents. This conversation leads to Blanschandin developing the desire to become a knight himself . In the night after dinner with his parents, during which he could only think of the longed-for knighthood, he leaves the royal court with his father's horse and sword, without knowing where his path will lead him.
Contents of the fragment part II
The second fragment tells of a fight between Blanschandin and a knight who murdered a man. The fight arises from an argument between Blanschandin and the knight when he beats the woman who was stolen by the murdered knight and Blanschandin asks him to leave the lady. The fighting cannot be fully understood because the fragment has been trimmed at larger parts of the text. The fight results in the death of the foreign knight.
Contents of the fragment part III
The third fragment tells of a reflection of love by Blanschandin, which he - as is clear from the French model - in the lady whom he previously freed and who recognizes her killed knight. To him, love seems like a dream and he expresses the desire to experience it. In the following he puts the stolen armor back on the murdered knight and rides on to face new adventures. At a ford he meets a knight who knows the ford , who asks him to spend the night in a nearby inn and who promises Blanschandin to lead him through the ford the next day. The knight gives him a ring made of fine gold as a pledge of identification. The fragment ends after this scene.
Research situation
The published research on the Middle High German fragment "Blanschandin" is limited to the nineteenth and twentieth centuries:
- Joseph Haupt was the first to publish an impression and a brief commentary on the fragment in 1869.
- In 1905, Heinrich Meyer-Benfey made a short comment on the fragment in his textbook “Middle High German Exercise Pieces”, which he placed before the fragment was printed.
- In addition, short descriptions of the fragment are given in the “Directory of Old High German Literary Manuscripts of the Austrian National Library” and in the “Catalog of Occidental Manuscripts of the Austrian National Library”.
- In 1969, Georges Perkins published a French dissertation entitled "Le Roman Chevaleresque de Blanchandin" , in which he presented a facsimile copy of the fragment. In his work, Perkins juxtaposes a copy of the original, a corrected text and a text in modern standard German. The French edition received extensive commentary from Michelant and Sweetser.
literature
- Joseph Haupt: Blanschandin. Fragments of a mhd. Poem , in: Germania 14/1869, pages 68–74 (with print).
- Heinrich Meyer-Benfey: Middle High German Exercise Pieces , 2nd edition, Halle (Saale) 1920, pages 155–165 (with reprint).
- Hermann Menhardt : Directory of the old German literary manuscripts of the Austrian National Library , 3 vol. (= Publications of the Institute for German Language and Literature; Volume 13), Berlin 1960/61, page 1442
- Otto Mazal and Franz Unterkircher: Catalog of the Occidental Manuscripts of the Austrian National Library. "Series Nova" (new acquisitions) , Part 1: Cod. Ser. N. 1-1600 (Museion, Publications of the Austrian National Library, NF IV, 2.1), Vienna 1965, page 41
- Georges Perkins: Le Roman Chevaleresque de Blanchandin. Traité comparatif des manuscrits français, anglais et allemands, et de leurs éditions avec une étude approfondie du fragment du manuscrit allemand , Diss. (Mach.) Paris 1969, pages 98-108, 117-138, 379-407 (with reprint)