Rostock song book

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The Rostock songbook is a collection of late medieval songs in German and Latin. The songbook , which is unique in northern Germany, contains various sacred and secular songs and texts from different genres and also lists some of the associated melodies.

history

This testimony to Low German music culture was discovered by the librarian of the Rostock University Library, Bruno Claussen , who, during a systematic review of the holdings of the University Library in 1914, saw a single sheet of the manuscript protruding from the cover of a book that belonged to Duke Johann Albrecht's library and was reinserted in 1568 had been. Inspired by the spectacular discovery, Claußen also had other volumes of this collection examined and in this way was able to collect 44 sheets of the inconspicuous songbook. Today there is the Rostock songbook, restored in 1960, with the signature Mss. Phil. 100/2 in the Rostock University Library .

The songbook, which is only around 12 × 9 cm in size, was created in the late 15th century, presumably in the vicinity of Rostock University . However, some of the contents of individual songs suggest that some of the songs also relate to historical events outside the Rostock urban district. It can be assumed that the Rostock songbook was created in the last quarter of the 15th century by the anonymous main scribe of the paper manuscript and that it was expanded with further entries towards the end of the century.

Structure of the songbook

The Rostock songbook does not show a uniform structure, but smaller groups with songs that have comparable content or a uniform melody continue to crystallize. In addition, the Latin or Latin-German songs are often in close proximity to one another.

Number of texts

The Rostock songbook contains a total of 51 songs . The majority of the songs are in German ( High German and Low German ), but there are also five Latin and two Latin-German mixed texts. There are also 30 melodies (including two two-part movements). There are also 14 non-singing pieces.

In terms of language level and tradition, the texts can be divided into three main groups:

  • Texts from High German traditions (partly with High German language features, with parallel transmission from the High German language area)
  • Purely Low German texts
  • Latin texts

Type of texts

literature

expenditure

  • Bruno Claussen (Ed.): Rostock Low German song book from 1478 . With a selection of the melodies arranged by Albert Thierfelder . Rostock 1919.
  • Friedrich Ranke, Joseph M. Müller-Blattau (Ed.): The Rostocker Liederbuch. Low German manuscript from the 15th century from the holdings of the Rostock University Library . Kassel 1987.
  • Rostock song book. Facsimile of the manuscript Mss. Philol. 100/2 of the Rostock University Library . With an afterword by Karl-Heinz Jügelt, Rostock 1989

Secondary literature

  • Arne Holtorf: 'Rostocker Liederbuch'. In: Kurt Ruh , Burghart Wachinger (Ed.): The German literature of the Middle Ages. Author Lexicon . Volume 8. Berlin, New York 1992.
  • Kurt Heydeck: The medieval manuscripts of the Rostock University Library. Described by Kurt Heydeck . (= Catalogs of the Rostock University Library. 1), Wiesbaden 2001, pages 128–132.
  • Hartmut Möller: The "Rostocker Liederbuch". Current research perspectives . In: Ekkehard Ochs (Hrsg.): Studies on the local and territorial music history of Mecklenburg and Pomerania . Greifswald. 2. 2002, pages 107-111.

See also

Web links