Leo Armenius

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Data
Title: Leo Armenius / Or Prince Murder
Genus: Tragedy
Original language: German
Author: Andreas Gryphius
Publishing year: 1650
Place and time of the action: Constantinople,

23/24 December 820

people
  • Leo Armenius ("Keyser of Constantinople")
  • Theodosia ("Keyserlich's Consort")
  • Michael Balbus ("Oberster Feldhauptman")
  • Exabolius ("Dess Keyser's most secret")
  • Nicander ("Hauptman about the bodyguard")
  • Phronesis ("Overseer for the Serious Frawenzimmer")
  • Tarasius ("Spirit of the Patriarch of Constantinople")
  • The judge
  • "The jury members and those of Crambe"
  • Papias
  • The satellites
  • The chief priest
  • "A Botte"
  • Iamblichus ("A Magician")
  • "A servant of Crambe's"
  • "The Infernal Spirit"
  • "A Guardian"
  • "A drum player"
  • "The Reyen of the court people / Jungfrawen / and priests."

Mute people:

  • "The Keyserin Chamber Jungfrawen"
  • "Dess Keyser's personal servant"
  • "The News"
  • "A boy who waits for the magician"
  • »A ghost in the form of Michael / who appears next to Tarasii ghost to the Keyser«

Leo Armenius was first named in 1650 under the full title Ein Fürsten = Murderous / Trawer = game /. Leo Armenius published a tragedy by the German baroque poet Andreas Gryphius , most likely written as early as 1646 . In the 17th century alone, the drama saw several editions with slightly different titles, for example in 1657 in the collected works of Gryphius and in the last edition of 1663 as Leo Armenius / Oder Fürsten-Mord .

Plot and sources

The tragedy Leo Armenius ("the Armenian") processed primarily based on historiographical representations by Georgios Kedrenos and Johannes Zonaras , the overthrow of the Byzantine emperor Leo V , who on Christmas morning of the year 820 by a group of "sworn together [r]" Leading his Supreme Field Captain Michael Balbus is murdered at the altar.

I. Treatise

Beginning at "noon before Holy Christmas Day", the drama begins after a short exposition, which shows the conspirators' request for the murder of Leo, as well as their (pseudo) legitimation based on - as the story progresses - a highly ambiguous lion - Oracle, presented, with a tactical maneuver initiated by the emperor, a kind of test of conviction that seeks to put Michael's loyalty to the test one last time: although Leo already senses the betrayal of his captain, and refuses to give evidence of his conspiratorial activities he nevertheless decided (not least out of fear of political unrest) to snap him prisoner prematurely. Finally, in a lengthy conversation ( 4th entrance ) with the imperial advisor Exabolius, in which the latter involved Michael at the imperial behest of the emperor, the latter - feeling safe - more or less openly confesses his plans to attack, whereupon he immediately abandoned the one behind a curtain standing by imperial guards is captured.

II. And III. treatise

After the verdict was passed towards the middle of the second treatise on Michael Balbus, " that he was burned with foot and hand / Gefasselt to the Paal openly " (II, 333-34), the imperial wife Theodosia obtained one, literally at the last minute Consequential postponement of this execution: "Covering the high day that all the world rejoices [...] Will you go to JESUS ​​'table stained with murder?" (II, 499–501) Reluctantly only grants Leo Theodosia's request, foreseeing his own fate (" One judges enemies who are standing by the altars. «[II, 502]), and leaves Michael - as he thinks - safe custody of the dungeon, guarded by his supposedly loyal servant Papias.

The question of who is actually master, who is servant, who is tyrant and who is a prisoner, convicts the III. Treatise in an impressive puzzle: awakened by an ominous ghost apparition from heavy dreams, Leo sneaks down into Michael's cell at night, but to his horror and contrary to expectation, he does not find him in chains, but instead in »purple and scarlat / curtain / tapet and Binding / decorated with rich gold / the sky with stone / occupied by the highest art / purple enveloped you! "(III, 232-34); Papias ordered to watch, slumbering peacefully at Michael's feet. Whether this blatant betrayal is finally resigning 'in his own house', so to speak, leaves Leo Armenius, his own death, incapable of preventing it, as it were, once again announcing (“this is the last night / which heaven doesn’t” [III , 265-66]), for the remainder of the tragedy the scene behind him, only to gain a new presence as a corpse in the reports of the "Bothen" and the High Priest ( fifth treatise, 1st entrance ).

IV. And V. treatise

Informed by a ruse by Michael, who paradoxically freely acted in captivity, the conspirators plan the final steps of their conspiracy in the fourth treatise - in some cases obtaining interpretative advice from the black magician Jamblichus (see here also the parallels to the lion oracle of the first treatise) : the murder of Leo as well as the liberation of Michael. Disguised as a priest, she stabbed Leo at the altar of the Christmas mass, who for his part took hold of the cross in his passing, which by the preface to the reader is even identified as the 'real cross', 'on which our Savior is sacrificed', and thus at least Pro forma suggests one's own martyr role. Right on the borderline to blasphemy, the death scene, which is enormously provocative in its religious explosive power and the complexity of drawing theory, closes with the materialitarian unification of tyrant and redeemer in the mixture of both bloods:

»How to break the corpse / how to force
the blunt daggers through every limb / how JESUS ​​gave the last /
his thewres flesh and blood / refresh the dull souls / who
refreshed a languishing heart in the last fear
with key blood / (O grewell) mixed. " (V, 166–170)

Historical literary location

This is when Leo Armenius not just about the first independent tragedy of the poet Gryphius, but also to the first German drama ever to the the 17th century (and in some cases even beyond) normative poetological specifications ' Martin Opitz implement exemplary. Thus "the piece represents a decisive turning point in the development of the baroque drama and at the same time the history of German drama" - a special position that reflects the programmatic preface to the reader in part, as it self-confidently positions Leo Armenius at the beginning of an entire group of works, on the other hand, their poetological substrate in the direct amalgamation of historical reality ( Thirty Years War ) and metaphysical interpretation of being ( vanitas ) is explicated:

“As our whole Vatterland buried itself more in its own ashes and turned into a place of vanity; I am diligent in introducing you to the transience of human things in current / and several subsequent trawler games. Not because / because I don't have something different and maybe more pleasant in your hands: but because this time I am so little loved / as allowed to say something different. "

Despite his undisputed prominent position within the history of German drama, Leo Armenius gave and continues to pose riddles to his interpreters, which are often reflected in aesthetic value judgments that could hardly be more divergent: For some, a tragedy whose "artistic level" Gryphius "was never able to achieve it again," he even led other philologists to attempt to excuse them, who ascribed the alleged inhomogeneity and the apparently unfortunate choice of subject to the not yet fully developed artistic skills of the poet as "typical" defects sought to rationalize a ›first work‹. At least in part, this ›evaluative uncertainty‹ results most likely from the genre-typological indifference of the play, which plays with elements and structural moments of the martyr's drama, but as a whole is by no means a martyr's drama, rather it turns out to be a “hermeneutic chameleon”.

Expenses (selection)

  • Andreas Gryphius: German rhyme poems . In it: A royal-murderous trawer game / called Leo Armenius . Frankfurt (Main) 1650 ( digitized version and full text in the German text archive )
  • Andreas Gryphius: Joy and sadness games also odes and sonnets . Breslau 1663 ( digitized version of the Bavarian State Library )
  • Andreas Gryphius: Works in three volumes with supplementary volume, Volume 2, Darmstadt 1961 ( zeno.org )
  • Andreas Gryphius: Complete edition of the German-language works, Volume V. Tragedy II. Edited by Marian Szyrocki and Hugh Powell. Niemeyer (= reprints of German literary works, vol. 14), Tübingen 1965
  • Andreas Gryphius: Leo Armenius. Tragedy. Edited by Peter Rusterholz. Reclam (= Reclam Universal Library, Vol. 7960), Stuttgart 1971
  • Andreas Gryphius: Leo Armenius , Philipp Reclam jun., Stuttgart 1996, ISBN 3-15-007960-8 ( Gutenberg-DE )

literature

  • Wilfried Barner: Gryphius and the power of speech. For the first Reyen of the tragedy Leo Armenius . In: Deutsche Vierteljahrsschrift für Literaturwissenschaft and Geistesgeschichte 42, 1968, pp. 325–358.
  • Peter J. Burgard: King of Ambiguity. Gryphius' "Leo Armenius". In: Peter J. Burgard (Ed.): Barock. New perspectives on an era. Vienna: Böhlau, 2001, pp. 121–141.
  • Karl-Heinz Habersetzer: To the lion oracle in Andreas Gryphius' Leo Armenius . In: Wolfenbütteler Barock-Nachrichten 5, 1978, p. 186 f.
  • Gerhard Kaiser: Leo Armenius, or princes = murder. In: Gerhard Kaiser (ed.): The dramas of Andreas Gryphius. A collection of individual interpretations. Stuttgart, 1968, pp. 3-34.
  • Nicola Kaminski: Andreas Gryphius. Reclam (= Reclam Universal Library, vol. 17610), Stuttgart 1998, ISBN 3-15-017610-7
  • Nicola Kaminski: Martyrogenesis as a theatrical event. Leo Armenius 'theatrical hermeneutic commentary on Gryphius' martyrs . In: Daphnis 28 (1999), pp. 613-630.
  • Eberhard Mannack: Andreas Gryphius. Slaughterer. 2nd edition (= Metzler Collection, Vol. 76), Stuttgart 1986, ISBN 3-476-12076-7
  • Peter Schäublin: Andreas Gryphius' first tragedy Leo Armenius and the Bible. In: Daphnis 3, 1974, pp. 1-40.
  • Marie S. South: Leo Armenius or the heresy of Andreas Gryphius. Reflections on the figural parallel structure. In: Journal for German Philology 94, 1975, pp. 161-183.
  • Harald Steinhagen: Reality and Action in Baroque Drama. Historical-aesthetic studies on the tragedy of Andreas Gryphius. Niemeyer, Tübingen 1977, ISBN 3-484-18046-3
  • Gerhard F. Strasser: Andreas Gryphius' Leo Armenius. An emblematic interpretation. In: Germanic Review 51, 1976, pp. 5-12.
  • Gerhard F. Strasser: To the lion oracle in Andreas Gryphius' Leo Armenius. In: Wolfenbütteler Barock-Nachrichten 5, 1978, p. 187 f.
  • Marian Szyrocki : Andreas Gryphius. His life and work . Tübingen: Niemeyer 1964.

Individual evidence

  1. ^ "Supplement" in: Gryphius, Andreas (1971): Leo Armenius. Tragedy. Edited by Peter Rusterholz. Stuttgart: Reclam (= Reclam Universal Library, Vol. 7960), pp. 115–121. German translation in excerpts from South, Marie S. (1975): Leo Armenius or the heresy of Andreas Gryphius. Reflections on the figural parallel structure. In: Journal for German Philology 94, pp. 161-183.
  2. ↑ The victor carries the cross . Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung . June 8, 2019.
  3. ↑ cf. z. B. Strasser, Gerhard F. (1976): Andreas Gryphius' Leo Armenius. An emblematic interpretation. In: Germanic Review 51, pp. 5-12 or Kaminski, Nicola (1998): Andreas Gryphius. Stuttgart: Reclam (= Reclam Universal Library, Bd. 17610), pp. 84-89
  4. ^ South, Marie S. (1975): Leo Armenius or the heresy of Andreas Gryphius. Reflections on the figural parallel structure. In: Journal for German Philology 94, pp. 161-183.
  5. ↑ Wilfried Barner : Gryphius and the power of speech. For the first Reyen of the tragedy Leo Armenius . In: German quarterly journal for literary studies and intellectual history 42, 1968, p. 325.
  6. ^ Szyrocki, Marian: Andreas Gryphius. His life and work. Tübingen: Niemeyer 1964, p. 85.
  7. ↑ cf. z. B. Clemens Heselhaus : Gryphius. Catharina of Georgia. In: Benno von Wiese (Ed.): The German Drama. From the baroque to the present. Interpretations. 2 volumes. Düsseldorf 1962, Volume 1, p. 36.
  8. ↑ Kaminski, Nicola: Martyrogenesis as a theatrical event. Leo Armenius 'theatrical hermeneutic commentary on Gryphius' martyrs. In: Daphnis 28 (1999), p. 614.