Salman and Morolf
Salman und Morolf is the title of a Middle High German strophic story, probably written in the Rhineland, which belongs to the group of so-called minstrel sepas. Although the tradition does not begin until the last third of the 15th century (five manuscripts ; two prints from 1499 and 1510), the epic is generally dated to the second half of the 12th century. The author's name and identity are unknown.
The content of the story also follows three traditions:
- 1. the oriental material widespread in the Middle Ages about the biblical King Solomon and his pagan wife, Pharaoh's daughter, who betrayed him and was kidnapped by him,
- 2. the narrative scheme of the dangerous courtship (with kidnapping and kidnapping) and
- 3. the wobbly burlesque picaresque motif.
In Salman and Morolf it is told how the Christian king Salman of Jerusalem is duped twice by his wife, the pagan king's daughter Salme. King Fore von Wendelsee desires her to be a wife and kidnaps her through the use of a magic ring and cunning: she dies in appearance and is kidnapped from her grave. Solomon's brother, the cunning Morolf, the real hero of the story, goes in disguise to look for her. He finds her after years. An army expedition from Salman was able to bring Salme back after some complications; Fore is hanged. Despite all of Morolf's warnings, the same thing happens again after seven years: King Princian von Akers (= Akkon ) wins Salme for himself with a magic ring. Morolf goes out against the promise to kill the unfaithful queen this time and finds Salme's abode on a rock in the sea. With the support of a mermaid and a small army, he overpowers Princian and Salme this time alone. At home in Jerusalem he kills Salme himself.
The figure of the cynical, cunning Morolf and his relationship to King Salman represents a narrative transformation. Already in the early Middle Ages the proverbial wisdom of Solomon was contrasted with the foolish-peasant shrewdness of Marcolfus in Latin dialogue form . Texts from this didactic-satirical tradition existed at least from the 10th to the 16th century, and in German since the 14th century.
The Middle High German story is written in about 800 five-line stanzas (so-called Morolf stanzas ). It belongs to the singable epic like the Nibelungenlied . With some certainty the stanza form suggests the origin of the text in an oral situation; the written state of the text in the 15th century shows the stanza - as an apparently no longer vivid and therefore misunderstood template - in the process of dissolution. Accordingly, the seal is difficult to date. It cannot be determined when between the 12th and 15th centuries Salman and Morolf were first written down, nor how fixed or varied the wording of the story was before this point in time.
literature
- Alfred Karnein (ed.): Salman and Morolf , (= Altdeutsche Textbibliothek; Volume 85), Tübingen 1979 ISBN 3-484-20099-5 and ISBN 3-484-20098-7
- Michael Curschmann: Salman and Morolf , in: The German literature of the Middle Ages. Author's Lexicon, Volume 8, 2nd Edition Berlin, New York 1992, Column 515-523
- Michael Curschmann: Marcolfus German. With a facsimile of the prose print by M. Ayrer (1487) , in: Smaller narrative forms of the 15th and 16th centuries, ed. by Walter Haug and Burghart Wachinger, (= Fortuna Vitrea; Volume 8), Tübingen 1993, pages 151-255
- Sabine Griese: Salomon and Markolf. A literary complex in the Middle Ages and in the early modern period. Studies on transmission and interpretation (= Hermaea; New Series Volume 81), Tübingen 1999, ISBN 3-484-15081-5
- Wolfgang Spiewok and Astrid Guillaume (eds.): Salman and Morolf (mhd./nhd.), Original text after Friedrich Vogt (reviewed and improved), prose translation by Wolfgang Spiewok and Astrid Guillaume, with pictures from the Strasbourg print from 1499. (WODAN 60) Greifswald 1996, ISBN 3-89492-068-8
- Michał Głowiński : Myths in Disguise: Dionysus, Narcissus, Prometheus, Marchołt, Labyrinth . From the polish. by Jan Conrad. Frankfurt am Main: Suhrkamp, 2005