The holy fountain

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The Holy Born is a historical novel by Wilhelm Raabe , which was written in the first half of 1860 and published in 1861 by Kober and Margrave in Prague. Raabe saw re-editions in 1891 and 1906. Meyen gives six reviews from the years 1863 to 1937.

content

In 1556 the Weser near Holzminden is a border between Catholics and Lutherans . In the village of Stahle on the left bank of the Weser, the young vicar Festus is sitting in the Catholic rectory and on the right bank opposite in Holzminden the strict Lutheran pastor, Magister Valentin Fichtner, is writing his work “De Daemonibus”. The Catholic Festus and the young Lutheran Klaus Eckenbrecher love the pastor's 17-year-old daughter Monika Fichtner. Monika's mother has passed away. While Festus is aware of his forbidden love, and therefore keeps it a secret, Klaus openly acknowledges his strong inclination and meets the bitter resistance of his father. Pastor Fichtner does not want a penniless orphan with a questionable parental home for a son-in-law. Klaus Eckenbrecher's father was a town trumpeter in Holzminden and his mother Alheit Leifheit was the widow of a decapitated man. Klaus realizes that before he can lead Monika home, he has to do something first. The young fellow is lucky. The 26-year-old Philipp von Spiegelberg , Count of Pyrmont , takes him on as a brush . Not far from the count's castle , near Lügde , is the holy Born , a spring whose water is said to work wonders against physical ailments. Rumor has it that the “Wunderbronn” even works as a fountain of youth . The small county of Pyrmont can by far not accommodate all bathers. Klaus Eckenbrecher is employed by the Count to keep order among the countless strangers who camp outside in summer. The call of the Holy Born at Pyrmont penetrates national borders. Italians arrive. The unmarried young count has to settle the dispute between two mortal enemies. The doctor Simone Spada from Bologna met the beautiful Fausta La Tedesca on Born. Philipp von Spiegelberg directs the doctor from the county. Spada goes down the Weser and then rides to Osnabrück . Philipp von Spiegelberg takes the tramp Fausta into his castle. Fausta was able to escape from a German monastery in which the doctor Spada had locked her up. Fausta's mother Lydia Santoni has passed away. During his lifetime she had become unfaithful to Fausta's father, the doctor Benedictus Meyenberger from Osnabrück. Simone Spada and his friend Meyenberger brought Fausta to Germany. Through Fausta's fault, Spada had previously almost died at the sword of a certain Don Cesare Campolani.

It seems as if the Count of Fausta is being bewitched. Fausta turns the cheerful reveler Philipp von Spiegelberg into a shy lord of the castle. The beautiful woman serves her lover, the knight Cesare Campolani. The count is to be recruited as a follower of the King of France in the fight against the Spanish king on the Flemish battlefield. "Feldmarschalk" Christof von Wrisberg helps Campolani with the cunning recruitment of troops. While von Wrisberg later beats the drum for the King of France elsewhere, Fausta and Campolani continue their work at Pyrmont. But the count sees through the couple. In addition, he was informed by his duke that he had to fight on the Spanish side in Flanders. Fausta and Campolani flee with their husbands. The count takes up the chase.

In Stahle, their mortal enemy Spada gets in the way of the refugees. The doctor had carried his fatherly friend Benedictus Meyenberger to the grave in Osnabrück. On the way home to Italy, Spada stayed with the Vicar Festus. Before going to bed, the traveler tells the clergyman the story of his unhappy love for Fausta. The vicar, dismayed, takes in what has been said. He sees parallels to his unfulfilled love for Monika. Before the doctor can take up the fight against Fausta's armed companions, he is shot by one of the men. When the count reached the village of Stahle with his brushwood, Klaus Eckenbrecher shot Fausta. After the burial of the two dead, the vicar Festus loses his mind and approaches Monika. The horrified Pastor Fichtner asks Klaus Eckenbrecher for protection; calls the daughter Eckenbrecher's bride. Klaus has won the game. The pastor regrets his hasty request for help, but doesn't know how to undo it. Festus plunges into the evening Weser fog and can no longer be found by those looking for local information.

Klaus and Monika are not yet a couple. In August 1557, Klaus and his count take part in the battle of Saint-Quentin on the side of the Spaniards against von Wrisberg. The Pyrmonters fight on the winning side. The count falls from Campolani's hand and is buried in Kammerich . Klaus, who immediately avenged his master in the field in return - stabbed Campolani - leads the surviving Pyrmontese home. Having risen to captain, Klaus sets off from Pyrmont Castle on the way to his bride in Holzminden. He meets the mad Festus in the forest. Klaus, who lost an eye in the battle, is welcomed by Monika with open arms. Pastor Fichtner, still writing to “De Daemonibus”, is forced to come to terms with this son-in-law. Festus is found lifeless on the grave of the doctor Spada the morning after Klaus Eckenbrecher's return.

shape

The narrator of "this history" occasionally looks into the future. For example, in the fourth of the twenty-two chapters, he foresees the evil end of Vicar Festus. Thanks to his typist, he pulls out the most varied of registers. When things get serious, he puts the "goose feather of romance" aside. Scoundrels are simply prejudiced.

You can jump back and forth between the locations of the Weserufer near Holzminden, Pyrmont Castle and Osnabrück. Gaps and incomprehensible things are sometimes retold more tangibly later. The narrated time does not appear as a continuum. For example, the narrator lets Klaus retell the Flemish battle at a convenient time.

reception

  • Oppermann gives Raabe's sources ( Heinrich Bünting : Newe volstendige Braunschweigische und Lüneburgische Chronica (Magdeburg 1620), Jobst Höcker (1568), Theodor Christoph Grotrian, Johann Philipp Seipp (Hanover 1719), Heinrich Matthias Marcard (Leipzig 1784) and Gottfried Kaeppel (Leipzig 1800)) and mentions a praise by Hans Blum .

expenditure

First edition

  • “The holy Born. Leaves from the picture book of the sixteenth century by Jakob Corvinus. ”548 pages. Kober & Markgraf, Vienna and Prague 1861. Linen

Used edition

  • The holy fountain. Leaves from a picture book of the sixteenth century . Pp. 5-346. With an appendix, written by Hans Oppermann , pp. 469–505 in Karl Hoppe (arrangement), Hans Oppermann (arrangement): Der heilige Born. A secret . On a dark ground . The black galley Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, Göttingen 2005. Vol. 3 (2nd edition, obtained from Eberhard Rohse ), ISBN 3-525-20107-9 in Hoppe (ed.), Jost Schillemeit (ed.), Hans Oppermann ( Ed.), Kurt Schreinert (Ed.): Wilhelm Raabe. Complete Works. Braunschweig edition. 24 vols.

Further editions

Meyen names seven issues.

literature

  • Fritz Meyen : Wilhelm Raabe. Bibliography. 438 pages. Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, Göttingen 1973 (2nd edition). Supplementary volume 1, ISBN 3-525-20144-3 in Karl Hoppe (Ed.): Wilhelm Raabe. Complete Works. Braunschweig edition . 24 vols.
  • Cecilia von Studnitz : Wilhelm Raabe. Writer. A biography. 346 pages. Droste Verlag, Düsseldorf 1989, ISBN 3-7700-0778-6

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ von Studnitz, p. 309, entry 14
  2. ↑ Edition used, p. 470 below
  3. ↑ Edition used, p. 477 below
  4. ↑ Meyen, p. 343
  5. ↑ Edition used, p. 158, 15. Zvo
  6. ↑ Edition used, p. 55., 12. Zvu
  7. ↑ Edition used, p. 192, 12. Zvu
  8. ↑ Edition used, p. 194, 9. Zvu
  9. ^ Oppermann in the edition used, pp. 471–474
  10. ^ Oppermann in the edition used, p. 477, middle
  11. ↑ Meyen, pp. 88-89