Gregorius
Gregorius or The Good Sinner is a Middle High German courtly legend writtenin verse by Hartmann von Aue , which is dated around 1186 to 1190 and is based on a French model by an unknown author.
content
In the prologue of Gregorius Hartmann developed general theological thoughts about guilt and penance. His warning against the zwîvel ( desperatio ) (v. 56–75) and the presentation of the biblical Samaritan parable (Lk. 10, 30–35; v. 97–143) are emphasized. He mixes this with other biblical parables and their contemporary interpretation. He also warns against the vürgedanc , by which the sin of the praesumptio is to be understood (vv. 7–34).
The actual story begins with the prehistory of the poor sinner, namely the biography of his parents (vv. 177–922). The master of the land of Aquitaine ( Equitânjâ ), who has to raise his two children alone after the death of his wife, unexpectedly ends up on his deathbed and is gripped by remorse for not having looked after his daughter (vv. 239–242). So he recommends the salvation of the daughter to the son (v. 259ff.) And thus prefigures the incest of the two (vv. 273-410), to which the whisperings of the devil still contribute. The fruit of the fraternal cohabitation is then the child later named Gregorius (v. 411-500), who, on the advice of a fatherly friend, is put in a box and sent out to sea in a boat, so that God may - according to his destiny - let it perish or drift to a distant bank where it will be saved. Meanwhile the brother goes on a crusade and dies (vv. 501–922). With the boy in the box, however, 20 gold marks and a plaque are added that certify the distinguished origin of the child (vv. 719–751).
The further growing up of the child is now described in verses 923-1824 (or 1841): The boy is driven onto a canal island and fished out of the water by the abbot of a monastery and placed in the care of a fishing family, while the clergy himself takes care of the upbringing and also the baptism of Gregorius (v. 1136) takes over. An extensive education of the boy and also some argumentative ruse by the abbot are not able to prevent the mature boy from wanting to become a knight instead of submitting to the clergy , which is also due to the fact that he learned of his sinful origin . However, the change of status is charged with the handover of the plaque of origin.
While the water motifs, which were reminiscent of the biblical Jonah and, more clearly, of Moses , promised a turn of salvation, the oedipal incest motif of the initial report is now made up when leaving the monastery . Verses 1825–2750 tell how the young knight freed a city from a besiegers. The fact that the mistress of the city, who, as a single ruling woman, had aroused the desire of a “Roman Duke” (v. 1999), was the mother of Gregorius, has already been revealed in verses 899–922, so that the “production of fate “remains transparent. Gregorius, striving for his êre , faces a duel with the besiegers and, after he has won it, frees the mistress of the city, who thus becomes his wife. Only a maid (v. 2295ff.) Discovers the secret of the new master, who weeps daily for his descent documented on the tablet he has taken with him, and reveals this to her mistress, who learns that she is the mother and wife of the same man (vv. 2471ff .).
The remorse for the act, which also is a repeat offense for the mother who asks sensitive fines . While the mother, who was previously inclined to a Christian way of life, now completely takes off the veil and renounces all belongings , Gregorius retreats to a rock, onto which he is chained by a fisherman. Verses 2751–3136 describe this unusually sharp and seventeen year (v. 3139) repentance. After the death of the Pope in Rome (v. 3144), the Lord appears to the two cardinals favored as successors to the Pope and announces to them that he has appointed a holy man who lives on an island in Aquitaine as the next Pope. Verses 3137–3740 tell how the "chosen one" is sought and found. The trip to Rome, the papal coronation and the absolution of the mother (v. 3741–3958) is followed by an epilogue (v. 3959–4006) that summarizes and allegedly wrong conclusions ( praesumptio ) .
Classification in literary history
Gregorius in Hartmann's work
The emergence of Gregorius can be between 1187 / 89 and 1190 and 1197 date. There is little in the work itself that could help to locate it precisely in terms of time. For stylistic reasons, it is included in Hartmann's chronology of works as the second major work after Erec and before Armen Heinrich and Iwein .
Because of the prologue, in which the poet turns away from the works of his youth aimed at secular wages, Gregorius has long been seen as Hartmann's older work. The programmatic statements, however, do not have to have any biographical relevance, but are largely given topically by the legends .
Substance and source
The subject matter of Gregorius should have become known to Hartmann in the anonymous old French story Vie du pape Grégoire , this French work is considered a “direct model” in science. The dating of the French Grégoire is controversial, but is usually put in the middle of the 12th century. Hartmann von Aue left the basic ideas of the narrative unchanged, but made additions to the religious and the portrayal of the courtly.
The motif of the mother-son incest , the subsequent self-punishment and finally the purification of the hero leads back to the ancient Oedipus saga, which, however, entered medieval literature before 1200 through a detour via other narratives.
Another line of tradition was the type of Christian sinner saint, as represented by Mary Magdalene . The special form of the incest saint, the oldest representative of which is the Metro of Verona, has been known since the 10th century .
A double incest is the subject of the Albanus legend from the second half of the 12th century. Due to the temporal proximity to the Gregorius stories, influencing is possible, but due to the imprecise dating of both works, the relationship of dependency can hardly be determined.
Interpretative approaches
Gregorius of the legend cannot be identified with any historical pope of this name , but it is mostly assumed that the story deals in particular with popular tales about Gregory the Great : He was the first monk to be elected Pope in 593 , and this fact probably formed the starting point of the fictional reports about an obscure origin and a sinful past life. This does not have to mean that a medieval audience would have regarded the Vita as fictional. Already in the prologue it is discussed that the narrative should convey “truth”. The tradition of Gregorius with other historical and salvation-historical works shows that he was actually not understood as an invented story. This is also proven by church patronage such as St. Gregorius im Elend ( St. Gregorius in Exile ), which refer to the penitential years of Gregorius.
The entire narrative is interpreted in very different ways in research, only the goal is undisputed: With the office of Pope Gregorius achieved the final atonement and assurance of salvation. However, there is no consensus in research on the question of whether Gregorius is guilty again by leaving the monastery or whether this is a mandatory step towards his salvation.
reception
Tradition and reader interest
The Gregory is in six manuscripts and five fragments handed down from the mid-13th to the 15th century, the majority of the upper German members speaking countries. Only from Iwein are there more text witnesses among Hartmann's works. However, only two text witnesses also pass on the prologue of "Gregorius".
All codices are carefully executed, but they do not include illustrated representative manuscripts. The prologue is missing in the two oldest and in the youngest manuscript, otherwise the tradition is relatively constant.
The complete copies can all be found in collective manuscripts that hand down court epics from the historical and salvation-historical area, such as Stricker's Karl (manuscript A) or Seifrits Alexander (E), or in combination with courtly verse didactics Freidanks (D) and the Winsbecken (L) . From the 14th century, Gregorius is also passed down with legends and other spiritual texts. Only in manuscript B (14th century) is there a similar courtly legend, Konrads von Würzburg Alexius . Substances that were understood to be fictional were not included in the collective manuscripts - a clear indication that the Gregorius story was also understood as 'reality'. Hartmann's other novels also do not belong to Gregorius' tradition .
Arrangements in the Middle Ages and in the early modern period
The Gregorius was Latin to 1450 in three and processed two German adaptations.
The Latin version of Arnold von Lübeck , abbot of the Johanniskloster in Lübeck, is particularly important . His Gesta Gregorii Peccatoris originated between 1210 and 1213 on behalf of the Guelph Duke Wilhelm von Braunschweig-Lüneburg . Above all, Arnold changed the lay theological statements of the court poet, in some cases greatly.
Since around 1330, the material has been distributed throughout Europe through its inclusion in the Gesta Romanorum collection of examples . The Gregorius legend probably goes back to the old French Grégoire rather than Hartmann's text.
A Latin composite manuscript from the second half of the 14th century uses Gregorius in 453 hexameters .
Around 1300 a German plenary was created in which the legend was linked to a sermon as an example. The plenary was printed in Lübeck in 1492 and later several times in Basel .
A prose version of Hartmann's work was included in the most popular German collection of legends, Der Heiligen Leben (over 150 manuscripts and more than 40 prints between 1471 and 1521). The Gregory is assigned here to the 28 November. In 1692 the Capuchin Father Martin von Cochem included this version in his Ausserlesenes History book . Via the sermon temple, it came into the sphere of the people's book in the 18th century .
In a Zurich manuscript from the 15th century (C 28), Gregorius came into a different tradition. The compilation of secular, edifying entertainment literature with the Willehalm trilogy, the prose version of George von Reinbot von Durne and other texts from the Gesta Romanorum and the Schachzabel book by Konrad von Ammenhausen is related to the contemporary knight renaissance , which looks to a past courtly culture.
A book advertisement from the writing workshop of Diebold Lauber has come down to us from the 15th century, offering a manuscript by sante gregorius dem súnder for sale. Which version was behind it can no longer be determined today.
Edition history
Since Lachmann's Gregorius edition from 1838, handwriting A has been used as the main manuscript. Manuscript B, which is only available in copies, was increasingly used for the creation of the text, according to Burghart Wachinger , who in 1984 reworked the edition of the Old German Text Library . It was published for the first time in 1882 by Hermann Paul and has been revised several times by Albert Leitzmann since 1929 and by Ludwig Wolff from 1959 . In 2004 Volker Mertens re- edited Gregorius for the library of German classics .
Modern edits
With the advent of Romanticism, interest in the old folk books was awakened, and Gregorius was also included in a compilation by Karl Simrock in 1839 for every soulful reader .
In modern times, edited Franz Kugler to Gregory in a ballad (1832), the Carl Loewe than five movements Legend set to music for voice and piano.
By far the most important adaptation of Hartmann's work was in the novel The Chosen by Thomas Mann (1951).
In 2004, the Düsseldorf Theater der Klänge developed the theatrical version of "Gregorius on the Stone" from the two materials by Hartmann von Aue and Thomas Mann. In 2012, this material will be adapted by the Theater der Klänge / Klangfilm.
literature
Text output
- Hartmann von Aue: Gregorius, The poor Heinrich, Iwein . Edited and translated by Volker Mertens. Frankfurt am Main 2004 (Library of the Middle Ages 6; Library of German Classics 189). ISBN 3-618-66065-0
- Gregorius . Edited by Hermann Paul, revised. v. Burkhart Wachinger (Altdeutsche Textbibliothek 2), Tübingen 2004. ISBN 3-484-20001-4
- Gregorius . Based on the edition by Friedrich Neumann, transferred from Burkhard Kippenberg. Stuttgart (Reclam) 1963. ISBN 3-15-001787-4
- Gregorius - Poor Heinrich. Text - retelling - explanations of words . Edited by Ernst Schwarz. Darmstadt (WBG) 1967.
Introductions
Volker Mertens offers a good introduction to Gregorius in the afterword of the text edition. Comprehensive bibliographies can be found in the article Hartmann von Aue .
- Christoph Cormeau, Wilhelm Störmer: Hartmann von Aue. Epoch - work - effect . 2., revised. Edition. Beck, Munich 1998, ISBN 3-406-30309-9
- Hugo Kuhn , Christoph Cormeau (ed.): Hartmann von Aue . (= Paths of Research ; Vol. 359). Wissenschaftliche Buchgesellschaft, Darmstadt 1973, ISBN 3-534-05745-7 (collection of important older articles)
- Ulrike Beer, The Gregorius Motif. Hartmanns von Aue “Gregorius” and his reception with Thomas Mann . Meldorf 2002.
- Ulrich Ernst, The "Gregorius" Hartmann von Aue. Theological foundations - legendary structures - tradition in spiritual literature (= Ordo 7). Cologne u. a. 2002
- Oliver Hallich, Poetological, Theological. Studies on "Gregorius" Hartmann von Aue (= Hamburg contributions to German studies 22). Frankfurt a. M. u. a. 1995.
- Sylvia Kohushölter: The Latin and German reception of Hartmanns von Aue “Gregorius” in the Middle Ages. Dissertation Münster 2000/2001. Niemeyer, Tübingen 2006, ISBN 978-3-484-15111-6
- Volker Mertens , Gregorius Eremita: A way of life for the nobility with Hartmann von Aue in its problematic and its change in reception ; (= Munich texts and studies on German medieval literature, published by the Commission for German Middle Ages literature of the Bavarian Academy of Sciences, 67). Zurich u. Munich 1978.
Web links
- Manuscript census (list of surviving manuscripts)
- Bibliography at Mediaevum.de
Individual evidence
- ^ Friedrich, Neumann and Fritsch-Rößler: Hartmann von Aue - Gregorius. Reclam, Stuttgart 2011. p. 321
- ^ Friedrich, Neumann and Fritsch-Rößler: Hartmann von Aue - Gregorius. Reclam, Stuttgart 2011. p. 322
- ↑ Cormeau, Christoph; Störmer, Wilhelm: Hartmann von Aue. Epoch, work, effect. Second, revised edition. Munich 1993. p. 123
- ↑ Cormeau, Christoph; Störmer, Wilhelm: Hartmann von Aue. Epoch, work, effect. Second, revised edition. Munich 1993. p. 20
- ↑ www.theater-der-klaenge.de - Gregorius accessed on February 22, 2012