Hendrik van Veldeke is the first writer in the Low Countries that we know by name who wrote in a European language other than Latin. He was born in Veldeke, a hamlet on the territory of Spalbeek, which has been a community of Hasselt

Hasselt

Hasselt is a Belgian city and municipality, and capital of the Flemish province of Limburg...

, Limburg

Limburg (Belgium)

Limburg is the easternmost province of modern Flanders, which is one of the three main political and cultural sub-divisions of modern Belgium. It is located west of the river Meuse . It borders on the Dutch provinces of North Brabant and Limburg and the Belgian provinces of Liège, Flemish Brabant...

, Belgium

Belgium

Belgium , officially the Kingdom of Belgium, is a federal state in Western Europe. It is a founding member of the European Union and hosts the EU's headquarters, and those of several other major international organisations such as NATO.Belgium is also a member of, or affiliated to, many...

, since 1977. The ‘Vel(de)kermolen’, a water mill on the Demer river, is the only remainder of this hamlet. In Limburg he is celebrated as a writer of the Old Limburgish

Limburgish language

Limburgish, also called Limburgian or Limburgic is a group of East Low Franconian language varieties spoken in the Limburg and Rhineland regions, near the common Dutch / Belgian / German border...

.

Veldeke’s years of birth and death are uncertain. He must have been born before or around 1150, as he was writing in the early 1170s. There is no evidence that Veldeke was born in 1128, as is often suggested. He certainly died after 1184, because he mentions in his Eneas that he was present at the court day that emperor Frederik Barbarossa

Frederick I, Holy Roman Emperor

Frederick I Barbarossa was a German Holy Roman Emperor. He was elected King of Germany at Frankfurt on 4 March 1152 and crowned in Aachen on 9 March, crowned King of Italy in Pavia in 1155, and finally crowned Roman Emperor by Pope Adrian IV, on 18 June 1155, and two years later in 1157 the term...

 organised in Mainz at Pentecost of that year. He must have died before Wolfram von Eschenbach

Wolfram von Eschenbach

Wolfram von Eschenbach was a German knight and poet, regarded as one of the greatest epic poets of his time. As a Minnesinger, he also wrote lyric poetry.-Life:...

 wrote his Parzival, which was completed between 1205 and 1210. Wolfram mentions in that work that Veldeke died prematurely. Veldeke probably was a member of a ministerial

Ministerialis

Ministerialis ; a post-classical Latin word, used in English, meaning originally servitor, agent, in a broad range of senses...

 class (unfree nobles) family. The existence of such a family is mentioned in deeds from the thirteenth century. It may be concluded that he received a thorough education, as he used Latin sources in his works.

The Life of Saint Servatius

Veldeke wrote the Life of Saint Servatius

Saint Servatius

Saint Servatius was bishop of Tongeren—Roman Atuatuca Tungrorum the capital of the Tungri—one of the earliest dioceses in the Low Countries. Later in his life he fled to Maastricht, Roman Mosae Trajectum, where he became the first bishop of this city...

, which was likely his first work, for mister Hessel, sexton of the Maastricht

Maastricht

Maastricht is situated on both sides of the Meuse river in the south-eastern part of the Netherlands, on the Belgian border and near the German border...

 Servatius chapter, and for Agnes van Metz, countess of Loon. The work consists of two parts. The first part is a biography (vita) of Servatius of Maastricht, the patron saint of that town, who supposedly died on May 13 384. This part is usually dated around 1170. The second part treats the miracles of Servatius after his death. It is sometimes assumed that the second part of the opus was only written between 1174 and 1185.

Servatius is an Armenian who travels to Lorraine and becomes bishop of Tongeren. The sinful citizens of Tongeren turn against him, causing him to flee to Maastricht. When Servatius becomes aware that God intends to punish the citizens of Tongeren by sending Atilla the Hun to them, he goes on a pilgrimage to Rome and prays on the grave of Peter

Saint Peter

Saint Peter or Simon Peter was an early Christian leader, who is featured prominently in the New Testament Gospels and the Acts of the Apostles. The son of John or of Jonah and from the village of Bethsaida in the province of Galilee, his brother Andrew was also an apostle...

 to divert the disaster. His prayers go unfulfilled, but Peter does give him a silver key with which Servatius can grant mercy and impart punishment on sinners. The citizens of Tongeren are all killed, but Servatius grants them mercy and so they all go to heaven in the end.

Maastricht was situated on an important crossroads: the road from Cologne from the west, the Meuse river as north-south axis. In Veldeke’s day, the canons of the Servatius chapter tried their hardest to promote pilgrimages to the grave of the saint. It is in this context that the origin of Veldeke’s Servatius must be situated. Dating back to the same period are the current Servatius church and the reliquary (Distress Case) that contains the remains of Saint Servatius. In times of great distress and disasters, the Case is carried through the town. Veldeke’s Servatius is a liberal adaptation of the Actus Sancti Servatii by Jocundus (written between 1066 and 1088) and the Vita Sancti Servatii, that is indirectly inspired by the Actus. The Servatius has been preserved completely in a manuscript from 1470 (Leiden, Universiteitsbibliotheek, BPL 1215). Also, several fragments have been found in various book bindings that all originate from a manuscript that may have been written while the poet was still alive (ca. 1200).

Eneas Romance

Veldeke’s most sizeable work is the Eneas Romance, which he based on the Old French Roman d'Enéas

Roman d'Enéas

Le Roman d'Enéas is a romance of Medieval French literature, dating to ca. 1160. It is written in French octosyllabic couplets totaling a little over 10,000 lines. Its subject matter is the tale of Aeneas, based on Virgil's Aeneid...

, that in its turn is inspired by Virgil

Virgil

Publius Vergilius Maro, usually called Virgil or Vergil in English , was an ancient Roman poet of the Augustan period. He is known for three major works of Latin literature, the Eclogues , the Georgics, and the epic Aeneid...

’s Aeneis. Veldeke wrote the largest part around 1175. According to the epilogue of the Eneas, Veldeke allowed the countess of Cleves to read his work when it was for four fifths completed. She in turn entrusted one of her ladies in waiting with it. The work was stolen, and it was only returned to Veldeke in 1184 by count palatine Herman of Thuringia, who gave him the order to finish it. The identity of the thief remains unclear. Some believe it was Hendrik Raspe, brother to Herman of Thuringia; others believe the thief was Heinrich von Schwarzburg. The latter had a feud with landgrave Louis III of Thuringia, Herman’s eldest brother and also bridegroom to the countess of Cleves.

Veldeke’s Eneas is the first courtly romance in a Germanic language. He devoted a lot of attention to courtly love, courtly virtues (moderation, self-control, eloquence, …) and the beauty of courtly life. Despite the tragic events of the story (e.g., Dido’s suicide and the death of Pallas, Eneas’ brother-in-arms, and of many other heroes), a positive tone is dominant. For example, at the end of the romance he describes with great enthusiasm Eneas’ and Lavinia’s wedding feast, where he represents an optimistic view of humanity and the world as the apotheosis of the romance. Veldeke also insists on comparing the wedding with the court day that emperor Frederik Barbarossa organised in 1184 in Mainz. This is one of the argument that is often used as proof that Veldeke wrote for the imperial entourage. It is in this context that the choice of material may perhaps be viewed. The story of Eneas is, after all, also the story of the foundation of Rome; the German emperors considered themselves the heirs of the Roman Empire. Medieval royal houses quite often had falsified family trees made that went back to the Trojans.

That the Eneas Romance has only been preserved in Middle High German versions has given rise to the question whether the part of the romance Veldeke showed to the countess of Cleves was originally written in Maaslandic or Middle High German. Germanists such as Otto Behaghel (in his 1882 edition) and Theodor Frings and Gabriele Schieb (in their edition of 1964-1970) believed Veldeke wrote the Eneas in his mother tongue, Maaslandic. They have attempted to reconstruct such a lost version. This reconstruction is considered too hypothetical by many modern philologists. Usually, Ludwig Etmüller’s critical edition of 1852 or Hans Fromm’s diplomatic edition of the beautifully illustrated Berlin manuscript (Berlin, Staatsbibliothek Preuβischer Kulturbesitz, germ. fol. 282) from 1992 get preference.

According to the Germanist Thomas Klein (Bonn), Veldeke used neutral rhymes. This means Veldeke consciously selected rhyme couples that were possible both in Maaslandic and Middle High German. Wapen / slapen in Maaslandic becomes wafen / slafen in Middle High German; the Maaslandic rhyme couple jare / mare on the other hand becomes jâre / mære in Middle High German. Klein believes Veldeke applied the same technique in his Servatius. Apparently, he hoped to reach as large an audience as possible with as little an effort on the part of a scribe as possible.

Lyric Poetry

Some thirty romantic lyrics by Veldeke have been preserved. He is therefore one of the first generation of minnesangers that put the Roman courtly romantic poetry in a Germanic language. In comparison to his contemporaries, his lyrics stand out by their humour and even irony. He also likes to play with sounds and adapts the rhyme to his liking. Veldeke uses the conventional description of nature (Natureingang) to open his lyrics, and then usually parallels it – as in the example below – or contrasts it with the lover’s feelings:

Ez sint guotiu niuwe maere,

daz die vogel offenbaere

singent, dâ man bluomen siht.

zén zîten in dem jâre

stüende wol, daz man vrô waere,

leider des enbin ich niht:

Mîn tumbez herze mich verriet,

daz muoz unsanfte unde swaere

tragen daz leit, das mir beschiht. (MF I)

(It is good news that the birds sing out loud where one sees flowers. In this time of year, one ought to be happy, but alas, I am not: my foolish heart has betrayed me, and must now, sad and sombre, suffer the hardship that is imparted on me.)

In contrast to what he does in his Eneas Romance and his Servatius, he does not use neutral rhyme in his lyrics, as this technique limits the number of rhyme words available to the poet too drastically. Middle High German and Maaslandic rhymes are used indifferently. Undoubtebly this is because the rhyme scheme in the lyric has higher demands than the coupled rhyme in story texts such as the Servatius and the Eneas Romance; in one strophe, more than two rhyming words must be found. Veldekes lyrics have been preserved in three Middle High German manuscripts from the late thirteenth and early fourteenth century: the Kleine Heidelberger Liederenhandschrift (Heidelberg, Universitätsbibliothek, Codex Palatinus Germanicus 357), the Weingartner Handschrift (Stuttgart, Württembergische Landesbibliothek, Codex HB XIII 1) and the Groβe Heidelberger Liederenhandschrift, better known as the Codex Manesse (Heidelberg, Universitätsbibliothek, Codex Palatinus Germanicus 848).

Influence

The significance of Hendrik van Veldeke on German literary history is exceptionally large. This is proven by the fact that his lyrics and the Eneas Romance have solely been preserved in Middle High German manuscripts. Hendrik van Veldeke is also named as a great example by many thirteenth-century writers (Wolfram von Eschenbach

Wolfram von Eschenbach

Wolfram von Eschenbach was a German knight and poet, regarded as one of the greatest epic poets of his time. As a Minnesinger, he also wrote lyric poetry.-Life:...

, Hartmann von Aue

Hartmann von Aue

Hartmann von Aue was a Middle High German poet. He introduced the courtly romance into German literature and, with Wolfram von Eschenbach and Gottfried von Strassburg, was one of the three great epic poets of Middle High German literature...

 and Gottfried von Straßburg). His influence on Middle Dutch literature appears to have been rather limited, aside from one allusion by Jacob van Maerlant

Jacob van Maerlant

Jacob van Maerlant was the greatest Flemish poet of the thirteenth century and one of the most important Middle Dutch authors during the Middle Ages.-Biography:...

that is difficult to interpret.

Veldeke Today

Both in Maastricht and Hasselt a statue has been erected for the poet. Also, in various municipalities streets, places, schools and associations have been named after him. The provincial association that occupies itself with the popular culture of Limburg is called Veldeke. In 2007 an exposition took place about Veldeke and his time.

On the Web

Literatuurgeschiedenis.nl http://www.literatuurgeschiedenis.nl

DBNL http://www.dbnl.nl

Viva Veldeke (exposition Hasselt)http://www.vivaveldeke.eu

Facsimiles of Heidelberger Handschrifte http://digi.ub.uni-heidelberg.de/diglit/cpg357/
http://digi.ub.uni-heidelberg.de/diglit/cpg848/