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the second founded on the ancient legends peculiar to the Teutonic nations. In the first department, the labours of the German writers were unwearied; and it is curious to observe how generally and cotemporaneously the subjects of romance (wherever we are to seek their origin) were diffused. The Troubadour Rambaud d'Orange (who died probably about 1173) makes distinct allusions to the well known adventures of the Romance of Tristan; a chanson of Chrestien de Troyes (who died in 1191) turns not an inelegant compliment from one of its incidents;

(Ainques dou buvraige ne bui

Dont Tristan fut empoisonez;
Car plus me fait aimer, que lui,
Fins cuers, et bone volentez.)

and Henry of Veldig, the earliest known Minnesinger, was as nearly as possible at the same time (perhaps. earlier, and of course long before the German version*

* These sheets were in the printer's hands when the new edition of Warton's History of English Poetry appeared. The reader is referred to it, not only in connexion with the observations made above on the romance of Tristan (on which subject an excellent note will be found, vol. i. p. 181), but in relation to the romances of Titurel and Parcival, mentioned sup. p. 24. "The editor," in his preface (p. 71), has given some highly interesting particulars of the nature and origin of Kyot's Provençal poem as preserved by the German translator. The opportunity must not be omitted of bearing testimony to the very great merit of this new edition of a work now rendered doubly valuable. "The editor" brings to his task that intimate

of the French romance was executed by Godfrey of Strasburg) making the same allusion in one of the most ancient German songs:

Tristan mueste sunder sinen dank

Stete sin der Kuniginne,

Wan in der poysun darzuo twanc

Mere dan diu kraft der minne:

Des sol mir diu guote danc

Wissen das ich solken tranc

Nie genam; und ich si doch minne
Bas danne er; und mac das sin

Wol getane,

Valsches ane,

La mich wesen din

Und bis du min!

No thanks to Tristan that his heart had been
Faithful and true unto his queen ;

For thereto did a potion move

More than the power of love :

Sweet thought to me,

That ne'er such cup my lips have prest;

Yet deeper love, than ever he
Conceiv'd, dwells in my breast:
So may it be!

So constant may it rest!
Call me but thine

As thou art mine!

The Germans were not only translators of the French class of romances, but they employed the

acquaintance with ancient Scandinavian and German literature which is so necessary to a full development of the subject, but in which the French and English antiquaries have hitherto been lamentably deficient.

same materials in the composition of what may properly be called original productions. This is in general the character of the works of Wolfram of Eschenbach, which display great original genius at the same time that they excite astonishment at the extent of acquaintance with the literature both of North and South France, which could be acquired by a man, who, as has been before observed, is said not to have been able even to write. At the same time the appetite for romance which the prodigious quantity of works of this sort evinces, did not prevent the same writers from devoting equal attention to lais and fabliaux similar to those of the Trouveurs. In short, the literary tastes of every country of Europe seem to have been drawn into Germany as to a common centre, to be there pursued with a diligence and avidity almost incredible.

But the romances of the Teutonic cyclus are more valuable than those of the French school, inasmuch as they have served to preserve historical traditions, which most likely would have otherwise entirely perished. The selection of these materials for a new national class of romantic fiction, shows that the popular regard for such traditions was still strong, and at the same time evinces the original talent and discrimination of the men who were not content with imitating the fashionable topics of the day, but selected subjects of their own, so well calculated to perpetuate

their fame. These romances furnish an interesting field of inquiry; but it is of great extent, and one into which it is not prudent for him to trust himself who does not pretend to sufficient acquaintance with the subject to enable him to speak with confidence; the English reader, too, has fortunately a great store of valuable information on the subject in the "Illustrations of Northern Antiquities," a book which has never received the support it deserves. A few observations on the most distinguished works of this sort seemed, however, proper, in order to fill up our sketch of the national literature of this singular period; and in the few extracts that will be made, the translations are in substance (though with some freedom of alteration) borrowed from that book.

The period in which is laid the historic basis of most of the Teutonic traditions adopted by the poets of the 12th and 13th centuries, extends as far back as that of Attila and the Hunnic conquest. That they were in substance tales which had formed the burden of popular songs in and probably long previously to the Carlovingian dynasty, seems highly probable; particularly since the discovery of the precious fragment of Hildibrant and Hathubrant, which has been before noticed as actually connecting and identifying the older traditions with the rifacciamenti of the Suabian times. These and similar stories had probably been preserved in Ostrogoth, Longo

bard, Francic and Saxon song; they had been popular at the court of Theoderic, and afterwards at that of Charlemagne ; and the same subjects found their way into the Sagas of Scandinavia, where many of them now exist in nearly the same form as in the Suabian romances.

The "Nibelungen Lied," or "Song of the Nibelungen," ," is not only the most ancient in date, but the most perfect in its epos and execution. Almost every thing in the story is in proper keeping. The manners, tone, thoughts and actions are in unison, and bear testimony to an antiquity far beyond that of the present dress of the poem: and if anachronisms in facts or allusions sometimes appear, they are rather to be attributed to the remodelling and dressing up than to the substance of the fable. Its author can only be conjecturally fixed upon. It appears that Pelegrin bishop of Passau, who died in 991, collected the then current legends of the Nibelungen, which he committed to writing in the favourite Latin tongue, with the assistance of his scribe Conrad, whose name has occasioned the Suabian poem to be sometimes ascribed to Conrad of Wurtzburg, who lived long after. The present poem is most likely, to a great extent, founded on this Latin version.

Whoever was the author, his powers are undoubt-` edly of a very high order; he belongs, apparently, to the middle of the twelfth century; and from inter

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