Page178, line 434—'If he be a heathen.' This inability of the unbaptized to behold the Grail, and the renewal of the power of the stone every Good Friday are the two most direct proofs of the Christian nature of the Talisman to be found in the poem. As remarked in Note to BookIX., Wolfram never seems really to connect the Grail with the Passion of our Lord.
Page179, line 441—'If I, for your sake, be baptizèd.' It should be noted that Feirefis is not in the least influenced by any religious motive in seeking Baptism; throughout, as in the combat with Parzival in BookXV., it isLovethat is his guiding impulse.
Page181, line 501—'God is Man,'etc.Cf. p.171where Trevrezent makes use of exactly the same words.
Page181, line 506—'Each tree from the water draweth,'etc.This and the following lines are inscribed on the fountain erected in 1860 to the memory of the poet, in the market-place of Ober-Eschenbach.
Page182, line 526—'The Templar whom God henceforward.' In the face of the antiquity of the Swan-knight legend, it is impossible to regard this as more than an ingenious attempt on the part either of Wolfram or of his French authority to account for Lohengrin's prohibition of the question, cf. Note on 'Lohengrin.'
Page183, line 562—'Anfortas, he sent a message.' Cf. BookIX.p. 285.
Page183, line 566—'Lœhprisein,' BookVIII.and Note. 'Lœhtamreis,' BookXII.and Note.
Page183, line 580—'Camelot.' This is the only mention in this poem of the town so well known in other versions of the Arthurian legend.
Page184, line 589—'Prester John.' The belief in a Christian kingdom in the East, ruled over by a king who was at the same time a priest was very widely spread in the Middle Ages, but it is very curious to find it thus connected with the Grail legend. Simrock takes this connection to be a confirmation of his theory, that the Grail myth was originally closely connected with St. John the Baptist. According toDer jüngere Titurel, a poem which, professedly written by Wolfram and long supposed to be his, is now known to be the work of a certain Albert von Scharffenburg, the Grail with its guardians, Parzival, Lohengrin, Kondwiramur, and all the Templars, eventually left Monsalväsch, and found a home in the domains of Prester John, but the story seems to be due rather to the imagination of the writer than to any real legendary source.
Page184, line 610,and seq.—'The Lohengrin myth.' This legend of a supernatural benefactor or deliverer, who arrives at the land which he is to benefit in a boat, miraculously guided, and leaves it in the same way, is extremely widely spread, and may be regarded rather as the property of the Aryan race as a whole, than of one nation in particular. In its earliest forms, such as the legend of Sceaf among the Anglo-Saxons, and Höni in the Faroe Isles, the hero is undoubtedly of divine origin, and the second of these seems to be the first in which the swan element is introduced. The original signification appears to be that of a 'year-myth,' symbolising the conflict between the seasons; the god of spring first overcoming, and then in his turn being overcome by, the power of winter. Bloete, in an article on the subject in theZeitschrift für Deutsches Alterthum, explains the connection with the swan by the fact that this is a migratory bird, and that in the days when the lower part of the Rhine formed a marshy Delta, swans frequented these lowlands in large numbers on their way to, and from, their summer quarters in Northern Europe. In this way the birds were the heralds alike of the coming and of the departing light and warmth, and became associated with the embodied genius of spring and summer. It is certainly a curious fact that the legend of the Swan-knight in its developed form is distinctly to be traced to these countries. The original association with the god of light, Bloete thinks, was the work of Keltic fancy, and by them imparted to their Batavian successors in the lowlands of the Rhine. By the thirteenth century, the story had clothed itself in distinctly chivalric form, the hero was no longer a god, but a knight, and in this shape the legend became connected with the origin of more than one noble family of the day; notably with that of Godfrey de Bouillon, the Crusader. It is noticeable in this connection that Gerbert, one of the continuators of Chrêtien, hasa passage prophesying that of Perceval's race shall spring the 'Swan-knight and the Deliverer of the Holy Sepulchre.'
This passage, together with the fact that Wolfram connects Lohengrin with Brabant, seems to indicate that the German poet was not the first to connect the legend of the Swan-knight with that of the Grail, but found the story in his French source; though he certainly gives the earliest version of the legend in the shape in which, through Wagner'sLohengrin, it is familiar to us to-day. A more prolonged and elaborate account of Lohengrin's adventures is given inDer jüngere Titurelalready referred to; here the lady is the Duchess of Lizaborye, and the catastrophe is brought about by the advice of a treacherous maid, who persuades the Duchess that if she cuts off, roasts, and eats a portion of her husband's flesh, he will be unable to leave her. In pursuance of this intention, armed knights break into Lohengrin's chamber at night, and in the struggle with them, though overcoming his assailants, he is himself slain. The unhappy wife dies of grief, and the name of the country is changed from Lizaborye to Lothringen (Lorraine) in memory of Lohengrin. (Those familiar with the Wagner Drama will note the skill with which Wagner has combined these two versions of the legend.)
In the forbidden question we probably have a surviving testimony to the originally divine nature of the hero; it is a well-known feature of such legends that a mortal wife wedded to a divine husband may not inquire too closely into that husband's nature,e.g.the myths of Jupiter and Semele, and of Eros and Psyche. The question therefore probably belongs to the original form of the story, and the passage on p.182is merely, as suggested above, an ingenious attempt to explain a feature which puzzled the later compilers.
Page186, line 661—'Here Herr Erec should speak.' An allusion to Hartmann'sErec, so often referred to. The hero forbids his wife to speak to him, she breaks the silence in order to warn him of an impending danger, and is punished by him for so doing.
Page186, line 663—'If Chrêtien of Troyes,'etc.Here for the first time Wolfram gives us clearly to understand that he knew Chrêtien's Grail poem, but deliberately preferred to follow Kiot's' version, to which he has made frequent allusions. If Wolfram's statement is to be accepted as it stands, we must perforce conclude that both the first two books and the last three (of which Chrêtien has no trace) were in Kiot's poem, 'To the end, the Provençal told it.' Certainly Wolfram himself does not wish us to consider that any part of the tale was due to his own invention, but rather that he was throughout faithfully adhering to lines already laid down. The question of the connection between Chrêtien and Wolfram will be found fully discussed in Excursus B.
FINIS
Printed by T. and A.Constable, Printers to Her Majesty at the Edinburgh University Press
Transcriber's Notes:Simple spelling, grammar, and typographical errors were silently corrected.Anachronistic and non-standard spellings retained as printed.
Simple spelling, grammar, and typographical errors were silently corrected.
Anachronistic and non-standard spellings retained as printed.