The cloak (Ambraser Heldenbuch)

from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

The coat is a medieval story of verse. It is a Middle High German version of the French Fabliau du Mantel mautaillé that has only survived in fragments . The Arthurian story is only preserved in the Ambraser Heldenbuch , which was commissioned by Emperor Maximilian I at the beginning of the 16th century.

Dating, origin and attribution of the author

The Ambraser Heldenbuch, in which the fragment The Coat is handed down on pages XXVIIIra to XXXrb , was written between 1504 and 1516 by a Bozen customs collector named Hans Ried . and comprises a total of 25 texts, which can be divided into six “didactic epics”, eight “heroic epics” and six “moral tales”, with Iwein , First Booklet, Second Booklet and the Mantel-Erec in the first section, i. H. under the “didactic epics”. The 994 couplet verse fragment comprising the sheath is in the handwriting without breaking right in front of Hartmann's Erec and is provided with a headline that both the content of the envelope , insert the Erec reflects short. According to this fact, the writer probably not only assumed that the coat had also been written by Hartmann von Aue, but he apparently considered the two texts to be a single novel. However, "it is easy to see that the coat is the beginning of a completely different poem, because there is a clear break in the content as well as in the sentence management at the transition point".

In his study of this fragment published in 1883, Otto Warnatsch brought the name Heinrich von dem Türlin into play as a possible poet of the coat . Warnatsch assumed that the coat was a "youth work of Heinrich von dem Türlin, the poet of the Crone" and consequently compared the two poems for "material and content matches", "similarities in sound, choice of words, treatment of verses" and "literal matches" . He also located the fragment in the first decade of the 13th century.

However, this point of view is no longer shared by current research, as it is assumed that the "literal correspondences" in Warnatsch are more about content-related details "that are related to the substance of the virtue tests" and of "everyday topics of Arthurian poetry, such as exemplary character of the king, invitation to a court festival, splendor of the festival ”, etc. act. Based on this consideration and other clues, the date of the mantle is set after the creation of the crone , around 1230/40, and with regard to the poet's assignment, it is to be expected that the author was perhaps a Bavarian-Austrian compatriot of Heinrich von dem Türlin , "Who set about transmitting a French Arthurian story again in the post-classical period".

Abbreviated summary of the fragment

The fragment The Cloak begins in the Ambras book of heroes with a summarizing heading, which explains that it first revolves around King Arthur and Queen Guinevere and their court, to which the knights Gawein and Keie belong, and a cloak, which both the queen and other women must try on to prove their loyalty. Another part is about Erec and his wife Enite. This heading, which reproduces the content, is followed by a prologue by the author with a reference to King Arthur and his bravery, as well as praise for bygone times, a so-called laudatio temporis acti.

The actual story about the test of virtue at Arthur's court is then introduced with the fact that King Arthur and Queen Ginover have many guests, i.e. H. Order knights and their wives for the traditional Whitsun festival, who arrive at the Karadigant court (v. 128–148) and a lavish festival begins. King Arthur makes his guests wait for the meal, however, as he usually does not begin to eat until he has been told a story or an event . In this phase of the narrative, the knight and stewardess of King Keie also appears, who criticizes the king in relation to the food on behalf of the guests (v. 398–448) and also dominates the entire upcoming sequence with mocking comments. Shortly afterwards a messenger arrives at Arthur's court with a cloak and asks to speak to the king (vv. 514-531). On behalf of the owner of the cloak, he demands that all women at court try on the cloak (v. 606–612) and tells the assembled knights that by changing its length, the cloak will make it clear whether the woman who wears it being faithful to her husband or not (vv. 589-598). King Arthur granted the messenger his request and had the women called. Queen Ginover is the first to try the coat on, but it doesn't fit her in the least. However, the Knights of the Round Table begin an attempt to lengthen the cloak by pulling it in order to soften the truth. King Arthur, on the other hand, is very wounded and angry by the unfaithfulness of his wife that has been proven (v. 720–772) and then forces all women to undergo this test of loyalty. Keies friundinne is the next to try on the coat after the queen and, just like her predecessor, fails. Each knight, one at a time, is ashamed and angry to find out that his wife was also unfaithful to him. Only at the end of the story is the test of virtue passed by a woman: Erec's wife Enite fits the coat almost perfectly and she can thus uphold the courtly virtue of loyalty (vv. 955-994).

Arthurian features in the fragment

The fragment that precedes the Erec is introduced by the narrator with a “lengthy prologue” in which, as required by the genre, King Arthur is introduced and his bravery is praised. In addition, the poet praises the past times when King Arthur was still alive: des Leben noch vil wol bewant / bî disen zîten would be (vv. 34–35). In the following "originally short festival description" of the French source literature Fabliau du Mantel mautaillé, the poet describes in an "extensive opening credits" the invitation of the guests to the traditional Whitsun festival and other "conditions and customs at the Artus Court". The actual part of the narrative then begins with the habit of the king, who does not want to begin eating until he has been told a story or an adventure: The künic vast nâch âventiure, / unz daz diu ezzen bî dem fiure / iezuo perish (v. 398-399). At this point Keie, the king's knight and stewardess, appears actively for the first time, who will dominate the course of the poem with his mocking comments. In this situation he is sent to the king by the starving guests and criticizes him with the words: herre, waz sol daz, / daz dise ritter unâz / sitting alsô long? (V. 426-428). The king's answer also makes it clear that Keie plays a double role in this story, as in all other Arthurian novels, namely that of the "highest court official" and the "bestallte [n], in any case tolerated critic [s] courtly discipline "as well as that of the" swaying figure ", who is" scornfully dismissed "by Arthur: " Hey, Kei, how rudely you mow, "[...] you have to ask (v. 439, 442). This negative role of the Keie is also underpinned by the following descriptions of the poet: the virtuous loss, / mockery and hôn coast, / des hete er et genuoc (vv. 246–248) or by the fact that he “at meals [...] sitting at a cat table ”.

However, King Arthur himself is also portrayed as a "rumbling and abusive domestic tyrant" and this does not correspond to the model of Fabliaus du Mantel mautaille , which was much more courtly. Shortly afterwards, a messenger arrives at Artus Court and brings the desired adventure with him, which plays the central role alongside Keie as a commentator on the event. However, not in the form of a narrative about an " Aventiureweg ", as provided in Arthurian novels , but in the form of a test of virtue using a magical cloak. This coat can prove whether or not a woman was faithful to her husband. Queen Ginover was the first to fail trying on the cloak, and after her so did the girlfriend Keies and all the other wives of the knights. And consequently the künic was unfolded, / daz the mantel stöuwet / at the künegin solhe untriuwe, / unde het sin tougen riuwe (v. 747-750). “In his story, Enite is the only one of the women who passes the test by some distance. […] Only Enite brewed on the soume / kume drier vinger: / so vil was ringer / ir owed the da before (M 966–969) “With this turn of the test of virtue, the narrator brings in his poetry that Hartmann's Erec and whose wife Enite are known, which increases the literary claim of the fragment Der Mantel. Passing the coat test continues to provoke a good end to the story typical of the genre. The end of the story is followed by the epilogue "with a renewed rebuke of Keiis evil (M 987): siniu wort muose man vliehen (M 994)" and then merges seamlessly into Hartmann's Erec in the Ambras book of heroes.

expenditure

  • The cloak: fragment of a Lanzeletroman by Heinrich von dem Türlin, together with a copy of the legend of the drinking horn and cloak and the source of the crown . Edited by Otto Warnatsch. Breslau 1883 (Germanistische Abhandlungen 2), reprint Hildesheim 1977 ( scan from the Internet Archive )
  • The Ambras coat fragment reissued from the only manuscript . Edited by Werner Schröder. Stuttgart 1995 (meeting reports of the scientific society at the Johann Wolfgang Goethe University Frankfurt am Main 33, 5).

literature

Remarks

  1. ↑ Schröder 1995, p. 127.
  2. ↑ Hardin 1998, p. 97.
  3. ↑ Kratz 1977, p. 1.
  4. ↑ Warnatsch 1883, p. 2.
  5. ↑ Warnatsch 1883, p. 3.
  6. ↑ Kratz 1977, p. 11
  7. ↑ Kratz 1977, p. 17.
  8. ↑ a b c Kratz 1977, p. 7.
  9. ↑ Schröder 1995, p. 167.
  10. ↑ Schröder 1995, p. 173.
  11. ↑ a b c d Schröder 1995, p. 174.
  12. ↑ Mertens 1998, p. 189
  13. ↑ Schröder 1995, p. 166.
  14. ↑ Schröder 1995, p. 167.