Ubi sunt
The question Ubi sunt , "Where are you (got to)?", Complete Ubi sunt qui ante nos in mundo fuere? "Where have they (got to) who were in the world before us?" Is a formulaic recurring topos in the sermon and poetry of the Middle Ages , which serves to show the reader or listener the impermanence of everything earthly through examples of past power or beauty to call to mind and to refer to the hereafter as the destiny of man, which at times also combines with nostalgic glorification of the past and time-critical complaint about the present.
The topos, which is similarly widespread in the Islamic tradition, represents a variant of the Judeo-Christian vanitas motif in the Christian Middle Ages and can already be found in the book of Baruch (Bar 3, 16-19):
| Latin Bible text of the Vulgate : | Literally translated from the Vulgate: |
|---|---|
| ubi sunt principes gentium et qui dominantur super bestias quae sunt super terram | Where are the rulers of the peoples who themselves rule the animals of the earth; |
| qui in avibus caeli inludunt | playing with the birds of the sky |
| qui argentum thesaurizant et aurum in quo confidebant homines et non est finis adquisitionis eorum qui argentum fabricant et solliciti sunt nec est inventio operum illorum | who heap silver for treasure and gold in which people trusted; who forge the silver and were called for help; and yet her work is nowhere to be found |
| exterminati sunt et ad inferos descenderunt et alii loco eorum exsurrexerunt | they are extinguished and descended into the underworld, and others have risen in their place |
In the Middle Ages, the motif was first developed into a commonplace in the field of preaching and then adopted in many cases in Middle Latin and vernacular poetry. Even in the early modern period , especially in the vanitas laments of baroque poetry , it was still alive. The best-known medieval example is the later so-called Ballad des dames du temps jadis ("Ballad of the ladies of the past") from the will (1462) of the poet François Villon , which forms a triad there together with two similar ballads about great men of the past (Test. 329-412) and through her refrain Mais ou sont les neiges d'antan ("But where's the snow from last year?") That recurs at the end of each stanza , it has shaped a proverbial saying that is still in use today. Further examples can be found in student songs, for example in early versions of Gaudeamus igitur since the 13th century, such as in O old boys' glory and its different versions and parodies.
More recently, for example, Pete Seeger used such a motif in his anti-war song Tell me where the flowers are (written at the end of the 1950s) , which in turn borrows it from the novel The Silent Don by Mikhail Scholokhov , where it is in the form of a quote from a Ukrainian Folksong shows up.
literature
- Carl Heinrich Becker: Ubi sunt qui ante nos in mundo fuere . In: Essays on the history of culture and language, primarily of the Orient: Ernst Kuhn dedicated to his 70th birthday on February 7, 1916 by friends and students , Marcus, Breslau, 1916, pp. 87-105.
- James E. Cross: "Ubi Sunt" Passages in Old English - Sources and Relationships . In: Vetenskaps-Societeten i Lund Årsbok , 1956, pp. 23-44.
- Mary Ellen Becker: The Ubi sunt: form, theme and tradition . Dissertation, Tempe (Arizona), Arizona State University, 1981, University Microfilms International, Ann Arbor (Michigan), 1984.
- Pamela Kalning: Ubi-sunt-Topik in the "Ritterspiegel" of Johannes Roth. Between Latin sources and literary design . In: Henrike Lähnemann, Sandra Linden (Ed.): Poetry and Didax. Instructive speaking in German literature of the Middle Ages . Walter de Gruyter, Berlin / New York 2009, ISBN 978-3-11-021898-5 , pp. 427–438 , urn : nbn: de: hebis: 30: 3-234423 ( uni-frankfurt.de [PDF; 86 kB ; accessed on April 14, 2019]).