Fool of the Bürgererschützenhof
The fool of the civil court protection , including as Hansnarr , Havemeister and flatbed master called, has been since at least the late 16th century by the Lübeck citizens Schützenhof entertained.
role
The fool appeared only once a year, namely during the shooting festival of the offices , which lasted four to five days and always took place around St. John's day. Every year the fool, who normally held his position for many years, was reintroduced into his office by a ritual with a symbolic beating at the opening ceremony for the march of the riflemen. As an integral part of the rifle customs, he constantly entertained those present with crude jokes, accompanied the splendid procession of the reigning rifleman and announced the name of the new rifleman on horseback on a richly decorated horse on the last day of the festival after the king's shot.
Although the fool was a very popular figure during the shooting festival, the role discredited its owner for the rest of the year, which is why he had little opportunity for a normal livelihood. Although he received wages from the Bürgererschützenhof for his work at the festival (1 courantmark , 6 shillings and 6 pfennigs in 1600; 1 courantmark, 8 shillings in the 18th century), that was not enough for a full year of living. That is why the fool's office was associated with the privilege of collecting money during the shooting festival outside of the strict restrictions of the begging order. In practice, this meant that anyone who refused to give the fool a gift would be exposed to loud ridicule as a curmudgeon and exposed to general laughter.
Appearance
Descriptions of the fool's costume are rare; 1785 he was wearing a red and white (the Coat of arms of Lübeck colors striped) jacket with a black imperial eagle on a red background on the back, a yellow waistcoat , breeches , each with a red and white stockings and a richly decorated with feathers and bells decorated dunce cap . He also held a multicolored cot in one hand and a whip adorned with colored ribbons in the other .
A painted wooden plaque from the middle of the 17th century is now in the St. Annen Museum and was hung on the market in earlier times to announce the shooting days at the Bürgerschützenhof. The illustration of bird shooting shows a man in the middle of the participants who is holding a large cot in his hands. His clothes in a contemporary cut made of red and white striped doublet and trousers as well as one red and one white stocking; on his chest is a white disk with five black dots. He is not specifically referred to as a fool, but the similarities of his clothing with the later description make it very likely that it is a representation of the fool of the Bürgeschützenhof.
The clothes were not provided by the fool, but by the Bürgerschützenhof. As late as 1830, there is a box in the inventory of the Schützenhof with his funny person items of clothing , which at that time had not been used for 24 years.
history
The oldest surviving evidence of the fool's existence dates from 1598; In the account books of the Bürgerschützenhof, his remuneration is recorded at 11 shillings. In 1784, at the instigation of the Schonenfahrer and ten civil colleges , the council completely forbade the fool from begging during the rifle festival. The trade offices united in the Bürgerschützenhof tried to prevent the decision, pointing out that the income from begging constituted the fool's livelihood, but were unsuccessful. The authorities then paid the fool a one-off compensation of 70 Courantmarks for the current year and stipulated that from now on he should be paid 50 Courantmarks annually for his services and that he was entitled to an additional tip of 8 shillings per day while shooting birds.
In 1791 the previous fool named Jacobsen fell ill, and it was doubtful that he would be able to fill his role in bird shooting. There were considerations to forego the appearance of a fool altogether in the future, but the offices insisted on maintaining the custom. In the search for a suitable replacement, they came across Jacob Zenner, a Jew from Moisling , who enjoyed a good reputation as a well-known joker and, among other things, worked as an entertainer for the prince-bishop in Eutin . But when the representatives of the offices and the mayor Hermann Georg Bünekau informed that they had hired Zenner, Zenner raised objections: According to current law, only the Lübeck protective Jew , but no other Jew, was allowed to pass the city gates. Thus, Zenner would not have been able to take part in the parades that led through the Holsten Gate at the beginning and at the end of the bird shooting . The mayor and the council categorically refused an exemption; Zenner received compensation, Jacobsen held the role despite his illness and also competed again the following year.
During the French period from 1807 to 1815 there were no shooting festivals. The last fool, a Hamburger named Schröder, received a Courantmark from the Bürgerschützenhof on February 12, 1807, and then the office of fool was lost. After bird shooting was resumed in 1817, the authorities expressed the wish that the funny man or so-called Hans Narr would be reintroduced at the shooting festival and repeated this request in 1818. But since rough jokes no longer corresponded to the taste of the beginning Biedermeier , they finally renounced it to the resuscitation of the fool.
swell
- J. Warncke: The fool of the Bürgererschützenhof , in: Heimatblätter - Mitteilungen des Verein für Heimatschutz Lübeck , No. 116, September 20, 1934. Charles Coleman Publishing House, Lübeck
- Heinrich Asmus: Lübeck, pictures and sketches from the past and present . F. Asschenfeldt, Lübeck 1857
- David Alexander Winter: History of the Jewish community in Moisling / Lübeck . Verlag Schmidt-Römhild , Lübeck 1968