Ludwigslied
Encyclopedia
Old High German
The term Old High German refers to the earliest stage of the German language and it conventionally covers the period from around 500 to 1050. Coherent written texts do not appear until the second half of the 8th century, and some treat the period before 750 as 'prehistoric' and date the start of...
poem of 59 rhyming couplets, celebrating the victory of the Frankish army, led by Louis III of France
Louis III of France
Louis III was the King of France, still then called West Francia, from 879 until his death. The second son of Louis the Stammerer and his first wife, Ansgarde, he succeeded his father to reign jointly with his younger brother Carloman II, who became sole ruler on Louis's death...
, over Danish (Viking
Viking
The term Viking is customarily used to refer to the Norse explorers, warriors, merchants, and pirates who raided, traded, explored and settled in wide areas of Europe, Asia and the North Atlantic islands from the late 8th to the mid-11th century.These Norsemen used their famed longships to...
) raiders at the Battle of Saucourt-en-Vimeu
Battle of Saucourt-en-Vimeu
The Battle of Saucourt occurred between Danish forces of pagan Viking warriors and the Christian troops of Carolingian joint Kings Louis III of France and...
on 3 August 881.
The poem is thoroughly Christian
Christian
A Christian is a person who adheres to Christianity, an Abrahamic, monotheistic religion based on the life and teachings of Jesus of Nazareth as recorded in the Canonical gospels and the letters of the New Testament...
in ethos. It presents the Viking raids as a punishment from God: He caused the Northmen to come across the see to remind the Frankish people of their sins, and inspired Louis to ride to the aid of his people. Louis praises God both before and after the battle.
Although the poem is Christian in content, and the use of rhyme reflects Christian rather than Germanic
Germanic languages
The Germanic languages constitute a sub-branch of the Indo-European language family. The common ancestor of all of the languages in this branch is called Proto-Germanic , which was spoken in approximately the mid-1st millennium BC in Iron Age northern Europe...
poetic tradition
Poetry
Poetry is a form of literary art in which language is used for its aesthetic and evocative qualities in addition to, or in lieu of, its apparent meaning...
, it is not without Germanic elements. It belongs to the genre of Preislied, a song in praise of a warrior, of a type which must have been common in Germanic oral tradition
Oral tradition
Oral tradition and oral lore is cultural material and traditions transmitted orally from one generation to another. The messages or testimony are verbally transmitted in speech or song and may take the form, for example, of folktales, sayings, ballads, songs, or chants...
.
The poem is preserved in over four pages in a single 9th century manuscript formerly in the monastery of Saint-Amand
Saint-Amand-les-Eaux
Saint-Amand-les-Eaux is a commune in the Nord department in northern France. The town people are named Amandinois , Amandinoise ....
, now in the Bibliothèque municipale, Valenciennes
Valenciennes
Valenciennes is a commune in the Nord department in northern France.It lies on the Scheldt river. Although the city and region had seen a steady decline between 1975 and 1990, it has since rebounded...
(Codex 150, f. 141v-143r). In the same manuscript, and written by the same scribe, is the Old French
Old French
Old French was the Romance dialect continuum spoken in territories that span roughly the northern half of modern France and parts of modern Belgium and Switzerland from the 9th century to the 14th century...
Sequence of Saint Eulalia
Sequence of Saint Eulalia
The Sequence of Saint Eulalia is the earliest surviving piece of French hagiography and one of the earliest extant vernacular writings, dating from around 880...
.
The poem speaks of Louis in the present tense: it opens, "I know a king called Ludwig who willingly serves God. I know he will reward him for it". Since Louis died in August the next year, the poem must have been written within a year of the battle. However, in the manuscript, the poem is headed Ritmus teutonicus de piae memoriae Hluduice rege (German song to the beloved memory of King Louis), which means it must be a copy of an earlier text.
The dialect of the poem generally regarded as Rhine Franconian
Rhine Franconian
Rhine Franconian , or Rhenish Franconian, is a dialect family of West Central German. It comprises the German dialects spoken across the western regions of the states of Saarland, Rhineland-Palatinate, and Hesse in Germany...
, though there are some peculiarities which have received a variety of explanations. It is assumed that the manuscript was written by a bilingual scribe in Saint-Amand and we have no other example of an OHG text from this area. Some regard it as the sole textual example of the otherwise little known West Franconian dialect, which is assumed to have been the language of the Carolingian court.
Further reading
- Althochdeutches Lesebuch, ed. W.Braune, K.Helm, E.A.Ebbinghaus, 17th edn, Tübingen 1994. ISBN 3-484-10707-3. Includes the standard edition of the text.
- Bostock, J. K. A Handbook on Old High German Literature Second Edition. Revised by K. C. King and D. R. McLintock. OxfordOxfordThe city of Oxford is the county town of Oxfordshire, England. The city, made prominent by its medieval university, has a population of just under 165,000, with 153,900 living within the district boundary. It lies about 50 miles north-west of London. The rivers Cherwell and Thames run through...
: Clarendon Press, 1976. Contains an English translation. Limited preview at Google Books - Fouracre, Paul, "The Context of the Old High German Ludwigslied", Medium Aevum, LIV (1985), pp. 87-103
- Green, Dennis H., 'The "Ludwigslied" and the Battle of Saucourt', in Judith Jesch (ed.), The Scandinavians from the Vendel period to the tenth century, Boydell Press, 2002, pp. 281-302. Limited preview at Google Books
- Schwarz, W. "The "Ludwigslied", a Ninth-Century Poem." The Modern Language Review, Vol. 42, No. 4. (Oct., 1947), pp 467-473.
- Wolf, Alois. "Medieval Heroic Traditions and Their Transitions from Orality to Literacy". In Vox Intexta: Orality and Textuality in the Middle Ages, ed. A. N. Doane and C. B. Pasternack, 67-88. MadisonMadison, WisconsinMadison is the capital of the U.S. state of Wisconsin and the county seat of Dane County. It is also home to the University of Wisconsin–Madison....
: University of Wisconsin PressUniversity of Wisconsin PressThe University of Wisconsin Press is a non-profit university press publishing peer-reviewed books and journals. It primarily publishes work by scholars from the global academic community but also serves the citizens of Wisconsin by publishing important books about Wisconsin, the Upper Midwest, and...
, 1991.
External links
- Le Rithmus teutonicus ou Ludwigslied - facsimile and bibliography from the Bibliothèque Municipale, Valenciennes (in French)
- High quality facsimile of all four sheets (Biliotheca Augustana)
- Transcription of the text (Biliotheca Augustana)
- OHG text
- OHG text and modern German translation
- OHG text with modern French translation