The Project Gutenberg eBook ofThe Plays of RoswithaThis ebook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States and most other parts of the world at no cost and with almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included with this ebook or online atwww.gutenberg.org. If you are not located in the United States, you will have to check the laws of the country where you are located before using this eBook.Title: The Plays of RoswithaAuthor: HrotsvithaAuthor of introduction, etc.: Francis Aidan GasquetTranslator: Christopher St. JohnRelease date: June 17, 2019 [eBook #59770]Language: EnglishCredits: Produced by Cameron Coulter*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE PLAYS OF ROSWITHA ***
This ebook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States and most other parts of the world at no cost and with almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included with this ebook or online atwww.gutenberg.org. If you are not located in the United States, you will have to check the laws of the country where you are located before using this eBook.
Title: The Plays of RoswithaAuthor: HrotsvithaAuthor of introduction, etc.: Francis Aidan GasquetTranslator: Christopher St. JohnRelease date: June 17, 2019 [eBook #59770]Language: EnglishCredits: Produced by Cameron Coulter
Title: The Plays of Roswitha
Author: HrotsvithaAuthor of introduction, etc.: Francis Aidan GasquetTranslator: Christopher St. John
Author: Hrotsvitha
Author of introduction, etc.: Francis Aidan Gasquet
Translator: Christopher St. John
Release date: June 17, 2019 [eBook #59770]
Language: English
Credits: Produced by Cameron Coulter
*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE PLAYS OF ROSWITHA ***
The Plays of Roswithatranslated by Christopher St. JohnTranscriber’s NoteCopyrightContentsTranslator’s NoteIntroductionBy His Eminence Cardinal GasquetThe Plays of RoswithaBy Christopher St. JohnThe Prefaces of RoswithaPreface to the Plays of Hrotswitha, German Religious and Virgin of the Saxon RaceEpistle of the Same to the Learned Patrons of this BookRoswitha’s Preface to her Poetical WorksTo GerbergRoswitha’s Preface to the Complete WorksGallicanusArgumentCharacters in Part ICharacters in Part IIGallicanus—Part IScene IScene IIScene IIIScene IVScene VScene VIScene VIIScene VIIIScene IXScene XScene XIScene XIIScene XIIIGallicanus—Part IIScene IScene IIScene IIIScene IVScene VScene VIScene VIIScene VIIIScene IXDulcitiusArgumentCharactersDulcitiusScene IScene IIScene IIIScene IVScene VScene VIScene VIIScene VIIIScene IXScene XScene XIScene XIIScene XIIIScene XIVCallimachusArgumentCharactersCallimachusScene IScene IIScene IIIScene IVScene VScene VIScene VIIScene VIIIScene IXAbrahamArgumentCharactersAbrahamScene IScene IIScene IIIScene IVScene VScene VIScene VIIScene VIIIScene IXPaphnutiusArgumentCharactersPaphnutiusScene IScene IIScene IIIScene IVScene VScene VIScene VIIScene VIIIScene IXScene XScene XIScene XIIScene XIIISapientiaArgumentCharactersSapientiaScene IScene IIScene IIIScene IVScene VScene VIScene VIIScene VIIIScene IXA Note on the Acting of the Plays
These transcriptions are also available on a GitHub repository, where they are available as markdown-formatted text files. If you want to remix this text, the GitHub repository would probably be the best place to build off from:https://github.com/cncoulter/Transcription_The-Plays-of-Roswitha
The Plays of RoswithaTranslated by Christopher St. JohnLondon: Chatto & Windus, 1923
The works consulted include the following:
I am much indebted to Dame Laurentia McLachlan, O.S.B., Superioress of Stanbrook Abbey, and to the Reverend Paul Bonnet of Lyons University, for assistance in the work of translation.
—Christopher St. John
Whatever may be thought of the precise merits of these six short dramas, now translated into English for the first time,1it will be conceded that a collection of plays bearing the date of the 10th century, authenticated as the work of a woman, and a nun, is a remarkable phenomenon, interesting to students of monasticism and of the drama alike.
At one time, it is interesting to note, it was suggested that the author of these dramas was an Englishwoman. In fact, the English scholar, Laurence Humfrey, who first introduced them to notice in this country, endeavoured to prove that Roswitha was no other than St. Hilda of Northumbria. His theory cannot, of course, be maintained; but the very anxiety shown to identify this talented poetess and dramatist as a native of this country is evidence of the high estimation in which her compositions were held in the 16th century, the time when Laurence Humfrey, an exile from England for his religion, learnt to know them in Germany. It is now an established fact that the plays are the work of a Benedictine nun of Gandersheim, in Saxony, and their merits certainly justify her biographer’s exclamation: “Rara avis in Saxonia visa est.”
It used to be assumed that between the 6th and the 12th century all dramatic representations ceased, but each of these centuries when patiently searched has yielded some dramatic texts. The feudal period, reckoned the most barbarous, and Germania, set down then, as later in history, as the least civilized of countries, have produced the most considerable and least imperfect of these texts in the plays of Hrotsuitha, or Roswitha, a nun of the Order of St. Benedict, who spent her religious life in the Convent of Gandersheim.
There is a marked difference between her plays and such dramas asThe Mystery of the Wise and Foolish Virgins, which is little more than an amplification of the sequence of the liturgy. We find here an author familiar not only with the Scriptures, the works of the Fathers of the Church, of the agiographers, and of the Christian philosophers, but with Plautus, Terence, Horace, Virgil, and Ovid—an author who, on her own confession, took the theatre of Terence as her model.
The Abbey of Gandersheim, where these plays were written, was founded about the year 850 by Ludolph, Duke of Saxony, at the request of his wife Oda, a Frankish princess. Although these were what men call “the dark ages,” the darkness was comparative. The Saxon court at this time was enlightened, and the Abbeys of Saxony, notably that of Corbei, were centres of learning and civilization. Gandersheim was one of the “free abbeys,” that is to say its Abbess held it direct from the King. Her rights of overlordship extended for many miles; she had her own law courts, and sent her men-at-arms into the field. In fact, she enjoyed the usual privileges and undertook the usual responsibilities of a feudal baron, and as such had the right to a seat in the Imperial Diet. Coins are extant, struck by the Abbesses of Gandersheim, whose portraits they bear.
During the 10th and 11th centuries these Abbesses were drawn chiefly from the royal house of Saxony, which had been raised to the dignity of the Imperial throne of Germania. Leuckfeld, in his voluminous history of Gandersheim, quotes a contemporary chronicler who praises the royal nuns for keeping all luxury and state out of the life of the community, and for observing the Rule of St. Benedict strictly. “They were forbidden,” says the chronicler, “to eat away from the common table at the appointed times, except in case of sickness. They slept together, and came together to celebrate the canonical hours. And they set to work together whenever work had to be done.” The Abbess who ruled the community in Roswitha’s time was Gerberg, or Gerberga, a niece of the Emperor Otho I. Gerberg was a good classical scholar, and Roswitha tells us, in one of the introductory prefaces with which, fortunately for posterity, her works are freely sprinkled, how much she owed to the tuition of this Abbess, “younger in years than I, but far older in learning.”
It is from such sentences as this that we are able to gain a little information about Roswitha’s life. Her mention of certain historical events and personages proves that she was born after the year 912 and before the year 940 (the known date of Gerberg’s birth). She seems to have entered the religious life at Gandersheim when she was about twenty-three years old. She tells us nothing about her antecedents, but as Gandersheim was an exclusive house we may assume that she was of gentle birth. What education or experience of the world she had had before she became a nun is a matter of guesswork.
Roswitha wrote in Latin, the only language used in the 10th century in the West for literary composition. Conrad Celtes, the well-known humanist, discovered the manuscript, the writing of which cannot be earlier than the 9th, or later than the 10th century, in the library of the Benedictine monastery of St. Emmeran, Ratisbon, in the last days of the 15th century. In the year 1501 it was printed. This first edition has an interesting frontispiece representing the nun poet and dramatist presenting her works to the Emperor Otho II, in the presence of her Abbess Gerberg, who wears the crown of a “Fürstabtin.” This and the other plates illustrating incidents in the plays have been attributed to both Dürer and Cranach, but they are not signed. Another edition, that of Schurzfleisch, in nearly all respects a reprint of the first, was issued in 1707, augmented with biographical and philological notes. The text given in the Latin Patrology (Migne, Tomus 137) is taken from the Schurzfleisch edition. More valuable to the student is Magnin’s edition. The French commentator collated the Celtes and Schurzfleisch texts with the original manuscript, which in 1803 had been moved from St. Emmeran to the Munich library, and found one or two readings preferable to those of Celtes. Magnin also restored some stage directions omitted by Celtes, one of which, in the eighth scene ofCallimachus, affords, as the English translator notes, valuable evidence that the play was acted, or at least intended for representation.
The original manuscript is divided into three parts. The first contains eight poems or metrical legends of the Saints in which reliable authorities are carefully followed, much skill being shown, however, in the arrangement of the material and in the handling of the “leonine hexameter.” The second part consists of the six plays here given in English; the third, of a long unfinished poem called “Panegyric of the Othos.” Celtes changed the order, which is to be regretted, as it is obviously chronological. Roswitha’s preface to Part III shows more confidence than the preface to the plays, and very much more than the diffident preface to the poems. One of these poems, Passio Sancti Pelagii,” once enjoyed a very high reputation, and is often quoted by Spanish and Portuguese agiographers. The Bollandists print it entire in theActa Sanctorum. It has another interest in that Roswitha tells us that she obtained her facts from a witness of the saint’s martyrdom.
Although Roswitha claims Terence as her master in the art of play-writing, it cannot be said that she imitates him closely. WhenPaphnutiuswas acted in London in 1914 the dramatic critic ofThe Timeswas justified from one point of view in asserting that Roswitha’s style is “not in the least Terentian.” For one thing she is quite indifferent to the “unities,” and transports us from place to place with bewildering abruptness. Her relation to Terence, as she herself insists, is one of moral contrasts rather than of literary parallels. The “situation” in Terence’s comedies almost invariably turns on the frailty of women; in Roswitha’s plays as invariably on their heroic adherence to chastity. Although considerable variety is shown in the treatment of each story, the motive is always the same—to glorify uncompromising fidelity to the vow of virginity. This nun dramatist deals courageously, but, it must be added, delicately, when it is remembered that she lived in an age when even the best educated were neither fastidious nor restrained in manners or conversation, with the temptations which her characters overcome. The preface to her plays shows that it was not without some qualms of conscience that she wrote of things “which should not even be named among us.” But the purity of her intentions, which was obviously recognized by her religious superiors, should induce the most prudish reader to refrain from charges of impropriety. With all their shortcomings, Roswitha’s works have a claim to an eminent place in medieval literature, and do honour to her sex, to the age in which she lived, and to the vocation which she followed.
This translation of the six plays of Roswitha (there are really seven, for the two parts ofGallicanuspractically constitute two separate dramas) was begun in the year 1912 and completed in 1914. The lively interest provoked by the stage performance of one of the translations (that of the playPaphnutius) by the Pioneer Players in January 1914 led me to think that the publication of the whole theatre of Roswitha in English would be welcomed by all students of the drama. Unfortunately, the war delayed publication, and the manuscript was entirely destroyed by a fire at the publisher’s premises in Dublin during the Irish insurrection of Easter 1916.
The work of collating the various Latin texts of Roswitha’s plays and producing a translation which should preserve some of the naive simplicity of the original had been a difficult one, and to begin it all over again was a heart-breaking task. The consciousness that the interest in Roswitha provoked by the performance ofPaphnutiushad waned did not alleviate the heaviness of spirit in which the work of replacing the burned manuscript was undertaken.
Those readers who are unable or unwilling to compare the translations with the original should be warned that Roswitha’s dialogue is characterized by a simplicity and conciseness hardly attainable in any tongue but Latin. The difficulty of finding equivalents for the terse phrases employed tempts the translator to “write them up.” Although I have aimed at producing a readable translation for lovers of the drama in all its forms rather than an exact paraphrase for scholars, I have tried to resist this temptation at the risk of making the dialogue seem at times almost ludicrously bald. Except in a few cases where the use of “thou” seemed dramatically fit, “tu” has been rendered by “you.” Roswitha’s style is colloquial, and the constant employment of the singular pronoun would misrepresent its character. The Latin is not obsolete, and it would surely be a mistake to translate it into an obsolete vernacular. Although the author’s syntax is decadent, and there is a tendency to make every sentence analytical, her use of words is classical, and her Latin in this respect superior to the scholastic Latin of the Middle Ages. The only principle observed in my translation has been the general one laid down by Edward Fitzgerald: “The live dog is to be preferred to the dead lion—in translation at any rate,” and if this has involved a loss of dignity, I hope there may be some compensating gain in ease and force.3In regard to the names of the characters in the plays, when there were well-known English equivalents such as “Hadrian” and “Constantine” I have not hesitated to use them, but when there were none I have given the Latin names. There is a good precedent for this inconsistency. We speak of “Rome” and “Venice,” but we do not try to Anglicize Perugia or Assisi.
The plays are all founded on well-known legends, which Roswitha follows very closely as regards the facts. But she shows great originality in her use of the facts and in her development of characters often merely indicated in the legends. Three of the plays,Gallicanus,Dulcitius, andSapientia, deal with the conflict between infant Christianity and Paganism, martyrdoms under the Emperors Hadrian, Diocletian, and Julian the Apostate being the chief incidents.Gallicanus, which comes first in the manuscript, shows considerable skill in dramatic construction. Incident follows rapidly on incident. The scene lies alternately in Rome and on the battlefield, yet the action is kept quite clear. The story is easily followed, although Roswitha, like all good dramatists, eschews narrative. Gallicanus, one of the Emperor Constantine’s generals, claims the hand of the Emperor’s daughter as a reward for undertaking a dangerous campaign against the Scythians. The Emperor knows that Constance has taken a solemn vow of chastity, but he dares not offend Gallicanus by a refusal, on account of the value of his military services. So he temporizes, and consults Constance, who shows great shrewdness in dealing with the situation. She sends her almoners, John and Paul, to accompany Gallicanus on the Scythian expedition, in the hope that they will convert him to Christianity before he returns to marry her. The stratagem succeeds. Gallicanus, saved from defeat at a critical moment in the battle by the intervention of a heavenly host, becomes a Christian, and on his return to Rome shows respect for Constance’s resolution to remain in the virgin state, and renounces her. But he admits that the renunciation is bitter—Roswitha often shows such touches of sympathy with natural human desires—and we are made to feel that, although the dramatist was in no doubt that the life of chastity, poverty, and obedience is the highest life, she understood how hard it is for those who embrace it to believe that the yoke will be easy and the burden light.
The second play,Dulcitius, is poorly constructed and, as a whole, less interesting than any of the plays. Yet it has some features which repay close study. It is the only play of Roswitha’s obviously designed to provoke laughter, and if the level of the opening scenes had been maintained would be a very droll religious farce. Here we have the usual tale of martyrdom interspersed with incidents of buffoonery. The conventional cruel and bloody executioners are replaced by comic soldiers and a comic governor. Unfortunately, the farcical vein is suddenly abandoned, perhaps because Roswitha’s Abbess thought such fooling undignified in a nun! There must be some explanation of the sudden disappearance of the comic character of Dulcitius from the play. However, even as it standsDulcitiusis worth a great deal, since it affords the best proof we have that Roswitha’s plays were written for representation. There is indirect proof in the fact that we know that plays were acted at Gandersheim, as at other monasteries, on great occasions, but here is direct evidence. All the fun ofDulcitiuslies in the action. No dramatist who had not in mind the effect onspectatorscould have conceived the scene in which the foolish governor, black as a sweep from his amorous encounter with the kitchen pots and pans which he mistakes for young women, is chased away from the palace gates, asking the while if there is anything amiss with his fine and handsome appearance. Stage directions, ordidascalia, are very rarely found in old dramatic texts, but when Magnin compared Roswitha’s original text4with the first printed edition he found several which had been omitted by Celtes.
Callimachus,Abraham, andPaphnutiusprecedeSapientiain the manuscript, but as the last belongs by reason of its subject to the same group asGallicanusandDulcitius, it is more convenient to discuss it next. It is the best constructed of the “martyrdom” plays, and is singled out for special praise by most of the Roswitha commentators. The final scene in which Sapientia, having buried the bodies of her martyred children outside Rome, lifts up her soul in an ecstatic prayer for death is described by Magnin as “a ray of Sophocles shining through a Christian mind.” Many, however, may find the repetition in the long-drawn-out “torture” scenes monotonous, and the impertinence of Sapientia’s daughters to their imperial persecutor as trying as the real thing must have been. These slips of girls defy “law and order” in the person of the Emperor Hadrian much as in our own day youthful suffragettes used to defy British magistrates. Probably this is in accordance with truth. Roswitha was separated from the days of the first Christians by a shorter space of time than that which separates us from her, and she based her narrative poem about the martyrdom of Saint Pelagius on an account given her by an eye-witness. While modern authors (with the exception of Mr. Bernard Shaw, whose Christian martyrs inAndrocles and the Lionbear a resemblance to Roswitha’s) love to dwell on the dignity of the early converts to Christianity, Roswitha conveys the impression that the dignity was mingled with impudence.
InCallimachus,Abraham, andPaphnutius, Roswitha sets out to describe the war between the flesh and the spirit, and the long penance which must be done by those who have allowed the flesh to triumph. It is not enough for them to be converted and to realise their crime against the infinite beauty and goodness of God. They are called on to take practical measures to cleanse themselves.Callimachusis the first of these plays, and by no means the best, although it timidly sounds a note of passion, rare, if it exists at all, in medieval literature. Some commentators have laboured to establish a resemblance betweenCallimachusandRomeo and Juliet, and there are curious parallels. In both you see a sepulchre, a woman’s open grave, and the shroud lifted by the desperate hand of a lover. In both two men come to this tragic scene, bowed down by grief, yet able to control it —inRomeo and Juliet, Capulet and Friar Lawrence, inCallimachus, the husband of the dead woman and the Apostle John. It would be idle to strain the parallels too far. They might not strike the attention at all ifCallimachusdid not possess a touch of the spirit ofRomeo and Juliet. It is this which makes the play seem to belong to a later period than the others, and gives it a different character. The passionate language employed, the romance of the story, the colour of the earlier scenes are extraordinary when we remember that the play was written in the 10thcentury. Haltingly, and apparently without any conscious intention, Roswitha describes the kind of love of which Terence her model knew nothing —that feverish desire absorbing the senses and the soul, which leads to sin or madness or self-slaughter. As if frightened by her own daring (or did the Abbess intervene, as we guess she intervened inDulcitius!), Roswitha spoils the play as a play by a lengthy and tedious final scene in which St. John appears to more advantage as a theologian than as a man.
AbrahamandPaphnutiusshow Roswitha at her best as a dramatist. In both plays the scenes are well knit, the characterization deft and sure, and the dialogue admirably expressive. The opening scenes ofAbrahamreveal that power to suggest character and situation without wordy explanations which is essential in drama. We know at once, although we are not told, that Mary, mere child as she is, is not made of stern stuff, and that her vocation is doubtful. Her replies to the two holy hermits are all that they should be superficially, but through them penetrates a materialism antagonistic to their mystical exaltation. Equally rich in the quality of suggestion is the scene in the house of ill-fame which Abraham visits to rescue his niece from her evil life. She does not recognize him at first, but melancholy seizes her at the supper which it is her duty to enliven by her gaiety. There is the beauty which never ages and appeals to all nations in all times in the following scene, when the hermit, throwing off his worldly disguise, shows his hair grown white through vigils and fasts, and his tonsure, the badge of his thorn-crowned Master, and in words more compassionate than upbraiding moves his lost child to contrition. It is indeed amazing that so true and touching a scene, dealing with a subject which has led later dramatists into false sentiment, coarseness, or mere preaching, should have been written nearly a thousand years ago by an obscure nun in a convent in Lower Saxony.
Perhaps nothing inPaphnutiusis on quite the same level of achievement, but a play is not made by a single scene, andPaphnutiusas a whole is better thanAbrahamas a whole. Few will question that it is Roswitha’s masterpiece. It is very creditable to her that, although the stones of the two plays are similar, she should have shown such variety in the treatment of them. When we compare them we find hardly any repetition. It is interesting to notice that it is not Mary, brought up to the religious life from which she lapses and to which she turns again, who becomes a saint, but Thais, whose life from childhood has been spent in “dangerous delights.” There is a spice of irony in the fact that the penitence of Thais, who had not had Mary’s opportunities, is represented by the dramatist as being on a much higher spiritual plane. With true insight Roswitha makes Paphnutius treat his penitent with far more severity than the hermit Abraham treats Mary. Yet the angelic love of Paphnutius for Thais, thanks to the dramatist’s power of suggestion, penetrates through his austerity, although he never manifests it until the moment when he is assured through the vision of Paul, St. Anthony’s disciple, that the repentance of the sinner has caused that joy in heaven which exceeds all the joy that can be given by the righteous.Paphnutiusalone among Roswitha’s plays has stood the test of stage representation in modern times,5and come through it triumphantly, although the miraculous swiftness of Thais’s conversion was considered most “unnatural” by the critics who witnessed the performance.
Roswitha, it must be remembered, believed in miracles. The average Englishman is sceptical. As Mr. Chesterton has pointed out, he will not swear to the possibility of a thing he has not seen, although he is quite ready to swear to the impossibility of a thing he has seen. In the foreword which Mr. Chesterton wrote for the programme of the first performance ofPaphnutiushe compared Roswitha’s treatment of the story of Thais’s conversion with Anatole France’s in his well-known novel “Thais.” “This very strong and moving play (Paphnutius) was written by a person about as different from the author of ‘Thais’ as could be capable of wearing the human form, a devout woman, vowed to a restricted life, and writing in the light of a Latin that was gradually going out like a shortening candle. … It is inevitable that such darkness should breed dangerous and even savage things, and that even religion should become almost as fierce as its enemies. … This nun of the Dark Ages wrote without any of that modern comfort and culture which ought, at the very least, to make men kind. When M. Anatole France was the author of ‘Silvestre Bonnard’ it did make him kind. But about Paphnutius and Thais, the harsh ascetic of the hardest times of the 10thcentury is far kinder than he. In the ‘Thais’ of the great French romancer the whole point is that Thais repents but that Paphnutius relapses. The nun saves both souls. Anatole France loses one of them. That is modern universalism.”
I hope that the publication of these plays in the English language will confirm Roswitha’s right to a high place in medieval literature, and a place also among the few writers of plays which have more than a transitory interest. Perhaps a certain predilection for medieval art is necessary before we can love her wholeheartedly. I do not imagine that those who see no beauty in the primitive art of Cimabue, Giotto, Sana di Pietro, or Lorenzetti will admire the work of a primitive dramatist. But others who find sincere simplicity, as opposed to affected simplicity, a charm in itself, will take Roswitha to their hearts and will have no difficulty in recognizing her merits. In addition to the six plays I have translated the five prefaces printed in Roswitha’s complete works, in the hope that the “strong voice of Gandersheim,” speaking directly to the reader, may win a fresh interest for the plays, and give some idea of the character and attainments of the remarkable woman who wrote them.
There are many Catholics, and we cannot entirely acquit ourselves of the charge, who, attracted by the polished elegance of the style of pagan writers, prefer their works to the holy scriptures. There are others who, although they are deeply attached to the sacred writings and have no liking for most pagan productions, make an exception in favour of the works of Terence, and, fascinated by the charm of the manner, risk being corrupted by the wickedness of the matter. Wherefore I, the strong voice of Gandersheim, have not hesitated to imitate in my writings a poet whose works are so widely read, my object being to glorify, within the limits of my poor talent, the laudable chastity of Christian virgins in that self-same form of composition which has been used to describe the shameless acts of licentious women. One thing has all the same embarrassed me and often brought a blush to my cheek. It is that I have been compelled through the nature of this work to apply my mind and my pen to depicting the dreadful frenzy of those possessed by unlawful love, and the insidious sweetness of passion—things which should not even be named among us. Yet if from modesty I had refrained from treating these subjects I should not have been able to attain my object—to glorify the innocent to the best of my ability. For the more seductive the blandishments of lovers the more wonderful the divine succour and the greater the merit of those who resist, especially when it is fragile woman who is victorious and strong man who is routed with confusion.
I have no doubt that many will say that my poor work is much inferior to that of the author whom I have taken as my model, that it is on a much humbler scale, and indeed altogether different.
Well, I do not deny this. None can justly accuse me of wishing to place myself on a level with those who by the sublimity of their genius have so far outstripped me. No, I am not so arrogant as to compare myself even with the least among the scholars of the ancient world. I strive only, although my power is not equal to my desire, to use what talent I have for the glory of Him Who gave it me. Nor is my self-love so great that I would, to avoid criticism, abstain from proclaiming wherever possible the virtue of Christ working in His saints. If this pious devotion gives satisfaction I shall rejoice; it it does not, either on account of my own worthlessness or of the faults of my unpolished style, I shall still be glad that I made the effort.
In the humbler works of my salad days I gathered up my poor researches in heroic strophes, but here I have sifted them into a series of dramatic scenes and avoided through omission the pernicious voluptuousness of pagan writers.
To you, learned and virtuous men, who do not envy the success of others, but on the contrary rejoice in it as becomes the truly great, Hrotswitha, poor humble sinner, sends wishes for your health in this life and your joy in eternity.
I cannot praise you enough for your humility, or pay an adequate tribute to your kindness and affection. To think that you, who have been nurtured in the most profound philosophical studies and have attained knowledge in perfection, should have deigned to approve the humble work of an obscure woman! You have, however, not praised me but the Giver of the grace which works in me, by sending me your paternal congratulations and admitting that I possess some little knowledge of those arts the subtleties of which exceed the grasp of my woman’s mind. Until I showed my work to you I had not dared to let anyone see it except my intimate companions. I came near abandoning this form of writing altogether, for if there were few to whom I could submit my compositions at all there were fewer still who could point out what needed correction and encourage me to go on. But now, reassured by your verdict (is it not said that the testimony of three witnesses is “equivalent to the truth”?), I feel that I have enough confidence to apply myself to writing, if God grants me the power, and that I need not fear the criticism of the learned whoever they may be. Still, I am torn by conflicting feelings. I rejoice from the depths of my soul that the God through Whose grace alone I am what I am should be praised in me, but I am afraid of being thought greater than I am. I know that it is as wrong to deny a divine gift as to pretend falsely that we have received it. So I will not deny that through the grace of the Creator I have acquired some knowledge of the arts. He has given me the ability to learn—I am a teachable creature—yet of myself I should know nothing. He has given me a perspicacious mind, but one that lies fallow and idle when it is not cultivated. That my natural gifts might not be made void by negligence I have been at pains, whenever I have been able to pick up some threads and scraps torn from the old mantle of philosophy, to weave them into the stuff of my own book, in the hope that my lowly ignorant effort may gain more acceptance through the introduction of something of a nobler strain, and that the Creator of genius may be the more honoured since it is generally believed that a woman’s intelligence is slower. Such has been my motive in writing, the sole reason for the sweat and fatigue which my labours have cost me. At least I do not pretend to have knowledge where I am ignorant. On the contrary, my best claim to indulgence is that I know how much I do not know.
Impelled by your kindly interest and your express wish I come, bowing low like a reed, to submit this little work to your judgment. I wrote it indeed with that idea in my mind, although doubt as to its merits has made me withhold it until now. I hope you will revise it with the same careful attention that you would give to a work of your own, and that when you have succeeded in bringing it up to the proper standard you will return it to me, that I may learn what are its worst faults.
(The Life Story of the Blessed Virgin, The Fall and Conversion of Theophilus, The Martyrdom of Saint Agnes, Poems concerning the First Cenobites at Gandersheim, The Acts of Otho I, etc., etc.)
I offer this little book, which has not much to recommend it in the way of beauty, although it has been compiled with a good deal of care, for the criticism of all those learned people who do not take pleasure in a writer’s faults but are anxious to amend them. I am well aware that in my first works I made many mistakes not only in prosody but in literary composition, and there must be much to criticise in this book. By acknowledging my shortcomings beforehand I hope I am entitled to ready indulgence as well as to careful correction of my mistakes. To the objection that may be raised that I have borrowed parts of this work from authorities which some condemn as apocryphal, I would answer that I have erred through ignorance, not through presumption. When I started, timidly enough, on the work of composition I did not know that the authenticity of my material had been questioned. On discovering this to be the case I decided not to discard it, because it often happens that what is reputed false turns out to be true. In these circumstances I shall need as much assistance in defending this little work as in improving it. It must be remembered that when I began it I was far from possessing the necessary qualifications, being young both in years and learning. Up to the present I have not submitted the work to any experts much as I needed their advice, for fear that the roughness of the style would make them discourage me to such an extent that I might give up writing altogether. Unknown to all round me, I have toiled in secret, often destroying what seemed to me to be ill written, and rewriting it. I have tried to the best of my ability to improvise on phrases collected from sacred writings in the precincts of our convent at Gandersheim. I was trained first by our most learned and gentle novice-mistress Rikkarda and others. Later, I owed much to the kind favour and encouragement of a royal personage, Gerberga, under whose abbatial rule I am now living. She, though younger in years than I, was, as might be expected of the niece of an Emperor, far older in learning, and she had the kindness to make me familiar with the works of some of those authors in whose writings she had been instructed by learned men. Although prosody may seem a hard and difficult art for a woman to master, I, without any assistance but that given by the merciful grace of Heaven (in which I have trusted, rather than in my own strength), have attempted in this book to sing in dactyls. I was eager that the talent given me by Heaven should not grow rusty from neglect, and remain silent in my heart from apathy, but under the hammer of assiduous devotion should sound a chord of divine praise. If I have achieved nothing else, this alone should make my work of some value. Wherefore, reader, whosoever you may be, I beg you, if you think it right before God, to help me by not sparing censure of such pages as are poor and lack the skill of a master. If, on the contrary, you find some that stand the test of criticism, give the credit to God, ascribing all defects to my shortcomings. Do this in an indulgent rather than in a censorious spirit, for the critic forfeits the right to be severe when the writer acknowledges defects with humility.
Illustrious Abbess, venerated no less for uprightness and honesty than for the high distinction of a royal and noble race, Roswitha of Gandersheim, the last of the least of those fighting under your ladyship’s rule, desires to give you all that a servant owes her mistress.
O my Lady, bright with the varied jewels of spiritual wisdom, your maternal kindness will not let you hesitate to read what, as you know, was written at your command! It was you who gave me the task of chronicling in verse the deeds of the Emperor, and you know that it was impossible to collect them together from hearsay. You can imagine the difficulties which my ignorance put in my way while I was toiling over this work. There were things of which I could not find any written record, nor could I elicit information by word of mouth which seemed sufficiently reliable. I was like a person in a strange land wandering without a guide through a forest where the path is concealed by dense snow. In vain he tries to follow the directions of those who have shown the way. He wanders from the path, now by chance strikes it again, until at last, penetrating the thickness of the wood, he reaches a place where he may take a long-desired rest, and sitting down there, does not proceed further until someone overtakes him, or he discovers the footprints of one who has gone before. Even so have I, obeying the command to undertake a complete chronicle of great deeds, gone on my way, trembling, hesitating, and vacillating, so great was the difficulty of finding a path in the forest of these royal achievements.
And now, worn out by the journey, I am holding my peace and resting in a suitable place. I do not propose to go further without better guidance. If I could be inspired by the eloquent words of learned folk (either already set down or to be set down in the future) I might perhaps find a means of glozing my uncouth workmanship. At present I am defenceless at every point, because I am not supported by any authority. I also fear I shall be accused of temerity in presuming to describe in my humble uncultured way matters which ought to be set forth with all the ceremony of great learning. Yet if my work is examined by those who know how to weigh things fairly, I shall be more easily pardoned on account of my sex and my inferior knowledge, especially as I did not undertake it of my own will but at your command. Why should I fear the judgment of others, since if there are mistakes I should fall only under your censure, and why should I not escape reproof seeing that I was anxious to keep silence? I should deserve blame if I sought to withhold my work. In any case I leave the decision to you and your friend, Archbishop William, to whom you have thought fit to show these unpolished lines.
I found all the material I have used in this book in various ancient works by authors of reputation, with the exception of the story of the martyrdom of St. Pelagius, which has been told here in verse. The details of this were supplied to me by an inhabitant of the town where the Saint was put to death. This truthful stranger assured me that he had not only seen Pelagius, whom he described as the most beautiful of men, face to face, but had been a witness of his end. If anything has crept into my other compositions, the accuracy of which can be challenged, it is not my fault, unless it be a fault to have reproduced the statements of unreliable authorities.