History of the Literature of the Scandinavian North/Part 2/Chapter 1
CHAPTER I.
THE MIDDLE AGE.
THE conditions under which literature began in Denmark—and every general remark on this subject, applies essentially to Sweden also — and by which its character and quality were for some time determined, differed widely from the conditions under which the Norwegian-Icelandic scaldic poetry and saga writings had been developed. Both in Norway and in Iceland, and indeed especially in the latter country, there existed, as we have seen, many circumstances which of necessity made the literature, when once it had attained the stage of self-consciousness, assume a marked national stamp, and remain intimately connected with the heathendom of the past, in which it was so deeply rooted; while in both the other northern countries it acquired a far more cosmopolitan character, and became more closely identified with Christian culture. Christianity had been introduced from Germany. During a long time it had been preached by foreign, partly German and partly Anglo-Saxon clergymen, and even after the inhabitants had accepted the new doctrine, and begun to choose its future apostles from among themselves—a fact which did not, however, prevent a number of foreign monks from immigrating throughout the middle age, nor even whole monastic colonies from being introduced from abroad—even after the establishment of the new faith, the clergy, as the sole representatives of culture, still continued to form a caste separate and distinct from all other social orders, with which they were frequently engaged in violent and bitter controversy, as, indeed, was also the case in the countries from which Christianity had been brought. The inevitable result of this state of things was that the clergy not only lacked sympathy with, but also the requisite knowledge of the ancient records, the preservation of which was indispensable for the production of a national and popular literature. As a matter of course, the language of the Roman church, the Latin, became the learned clergy's sole medium of communication, but it was also employed in matters of general and national interest, and thus it absolutely obstructed the road to any free and natural intellectual development. In other words, while in the Icelandic literature, the popular element had vindicated its own rights, the conditions in the rest of the North were of such a kind that they could give birth only to a learned literature, a literature created by and for the use of scholars, and thus the influences which had their origin in the people, and which had been transmitted from the heathen time, were completely interrupted by Christianity, and could only at a much later period find their way back into the literature.
The spiritual culture, and that means, then, the intellectual culture of Denmark, in general, throughout the entire middle age had not only been originally introduced from abroad, but it continued to be closely connected with the centres of learning in foreign countries. All clergymen who desired to acquire a higher culture at first visited the German universities of Cologne and Heidelberg, and later the renowned universities of Paris, Bologna, Padua, etc., until the close of the middle age, when spiritual interests had considerably declined, and men again contented themselves with visiting the neighboring German universities. During the golden period of Denmark, the age of the Waldemars, from the middle of the twelfth to the middle of the thirteenth century, the country enjoyed a high degree of power, prestige and prosperity, and the national culture unfolded its fairest mediæval flowers, and during this period the Danish youths were particularly fond of going to Paris to study. The university of that city was at that time the most comprehensive and in all respects the most excellent scholastic institution in Europe. Youths from all lands gathered there in large numbers. From the North and especially from Denmark there came many a young man eager to secure the highest degree of scholastic culture that the age afforded. Not unfrequently they would attain high honors abroad and then return to their native country to fill the highest places in the church. This was the case with the renowned archbishops Absalon and Anders Suneson, of whom the latter was for a long time a professor, perhaps even the rector of the University of Paris, a position which on several occasions was filled by Danes. Prom the fourteenth century we know the names of at least four rectors of the University of Paris, who were "de Dacia." That the number of Danes in Paris was comparatively large and conspicuous may be inferred from various circumstances, and among them from the fact that about the middle of the twelfth century there was founded the "Collegium Danicum," the first of its kind, and it continued to exist for more than two hundred years.
Theology and its kindred subjects, particularly philosophy and canonical law, were well nigh the only studies pursued. It was the age of mysticism and scholasticism, and at the universities the scholastic researches, to which the Italian Anselm and the Frenchman Abalärd, the two most eminent ecclesiastical teachers of the middle age, had given the impulse, engrossed the attention of all students. As a matter of course these studies could be of no great benefit either to the heart or the mind. They accepted the doctrine of the church as infallible, established once for all, one in regard to which there was no room for doubt, and they only exerted themselves to secure a sort of external harmony between free thought with Aristotle as the basis and their accepted system of dogmatical formulas. While the scholastic investigations were pursuing these formulas down to the most subtle deductions, they can only be regarded as mental exercises, in which definitions and distinctions were of primary, and the living and essential contents of merely secondary importance. The instruction imparted in the convents and cathedral schools in Denmark was of course of the same kind and quality, as far as it was not limited to the Latin and to the poorest elementary training needed for the service of the church. It is hardly necessary to add that the Latin language was cultivated in a manner corresponding to the general intellectual life of the clergy. During the best period of the church, learning was held in high honor and the study of the Roman authors was pursued with great zeal, and both in the convents and by private individuals there were made valuable collections of books. But in a later period of the middle age there occurred in this as in all other matters a sad collapse.[1]
It is a most characteristic fact in regard to the part which the church and all that is connected with it played in Denmark from the beginning of the middle age, that the oldest work of any importance, of which we are certain that it was written in Denmark, contains the apotheosis of a man whose whole life had been devoted to the advancement of clerical interests. It is a biography of Knud the Saint (Historia ortus, vitae et passionis S. Canuti, regis Daniæ), written by the English monk Ælnoth, who lived in Denmark from the close of the eleventh to the beginning of the twelfth century. He was preacher to St. Alban's church in Odense, in which the afterward canonized King Knud was murdered by rebellious peasants.[2]
It was natural that the conventual literature should by preference occupy itself with subjects belonging to the religious domain. A number of eminent churchmen are named as authors of learned theological works; poems were also written in honor of saints, legends were produced, etc., all of course in Latin, although there are traces to be found which seem to indicate that some of them at least were written in the national vernacular in order that they might find a larger circle of readers. Psalms, hymns, and other similar productions were of course mostly written in Latin, since the divine service was performed in that language exclusively.
The most considerable work produced by the scholastic learning of that period was Anders Suneson's poem, the "Hexaëmeron." This notable man, the successor of Absalon on the archiepiscopal seat of Lund (1201-22) stood at the head of the learning of his time, and during his prolonged stay in Paris, England and Italy, he acquired a very high reputation, which, as has already been mentioned, secured him the eminent position in the University of Paris. This reputation was further enhanced by his great poem which was universally extolled by all his contemporaries. The poem contains 8,093 hexameters, which, from a metrical point of view, are in nowise masterly, nor does the work as a whole betray any very great poetic talent. In the preface the author states that the poem is chiefly intended for the instruction of the youth in the Latin language without exposing the pupils to the corrupting influences that beset them when they peruse "those sirens," the heathen poets. Through the instrumentality of this poem they were rather to be beguiled into loving the Christian religion. As the title indicates, the work describes the creation of the world in six days; yet it does not confine itself to this, but also contains a number of allegories and of scholastic comments on various points of ecclesiastical doctrine. Moreover, it furnishes liberal abstracts from the author's theological system, and affords upon the whole substantial evidence of Suneson's great learning and dialectic acumen.[3]
Still, even when Latin language and culture flourished most luxuriantly, there was fortunately not an entire lack of historical taste in Denmark. Several Danish kings of the middle age took the deepest interest in the history of their country, and were themselves well versed in it. Thus Svend Estridson, for instance, was able to contribute to Adam of Bremen many of the facts incorporated by the latter in his chronicle of the Bremen bishopric concerning Danish affairs, which had happened before his time, and King Valdemar I also studied the past and its monuments with the deepest interest. But the chief credit for diffusing a taste for national history and for securing to it at least some exquisite fruit belongs to Archbishop Absalon (1128-1201), the great servant of that great king. This man, equally eminent as a prelate and as a warrior, made his powerful influence felt in the establishment and propagation of foreign science in Denmark, but he was none the less impressed with the necessity of preserving the ancient monuments. Thus at his orders the monks in Sorö compiled annals of the most remarkable events in Denmark. This chronicle writing, which also was enjoined on other convents, was however chiefly limited to dry annals, a few biographies, stories of convents, etc., but matters of historical value they did not furnish. We are also indebted to Absalon's zealous efforts for the two most important works that were produced in Denmark in the middle age, namely the chronicles of Svend Aageson and of Saxo, the latter of which is a work of the highest value, and would be an ornament to the literature of any country. Both of these men wrote at the direct request of Absalon.
Svend Aageson belonged to one of the richest and noblest families descended from Palnatoke. Archbishop Eskild in Lund (1137-1178) was his father's brother. But little is known concerning him, beyond the fact that he was a clergyman, and probably a "canonicus" in Lund. His book, "Compendiosa histoeia regum Daniae," is the first attempt at a connected presentation of the history of Denmark, and embraces the time from King Skjold to Knud VI; but, as indicated by its title, it is very brief, and merely dwells now and then on a few more important episodes, such as Vermund and Uffe, Thyra Danebod and others. Concerning Valdemar the Great and Knud VI, who reigned during Svend Aageson's lifetime, his information is strikingly scanty, and he himself alleges as a reason for this, that Saxo was then engaged on an elaborate history of his own century; and he, moreover, well knew that the latter was fully equal to a task of this kind. Svend Aageson availed himself of the Icelanders and their poetry as sources, but he also, and doubtless chiefly, relied on native authorities, "aged men whom he consulted."[4]
Saxo, surnamed Longus, that is descended from a family Lange, also called Grammaticus, on account of his elegant Latin style, is described as the "contubernalis" of Svend Aageson, probably because both these clergymen had taken part in some military expedition; a circumstance of common occurrence in those days. Svend Aageson himself relates that he took part with Archbishop Absalon in an expedition against the Vends, and Saxo's description of the military events of his time is so vivid and graphic, that in many instances the reader is almost forced to assume that he describes as an eyewitness, and that like his father and grandfather, who had done military service under Valdemar the Great, Saxo also had taken a personal part in those campaigns. According to an old tradition, he is said to have been a dean (præpositus) in Roskilde, and to lie buried in the cathedral of that city. We know with certainty only that he was the private secretary of Archbishop Absalon, that he stood in a very close relation to the latter and had been encouraged by him to undertake his great work. He survived his master and dedicated his work to his successor, Anders Suneson. The year of Saxo's death is not certain, but it can hardly have been before 1208.
Saxo's Chronicle of Denmark, "Gesta Danorum," or "Historia Danica," is the greatest intellectual effort of Denmark in the middle ages. It is a work which had no sooner become generally known than it became the object of an equally general admiration. It is a masterpiece in style, both on account of the exceptional elegance and tasteful use of the Latin language according to the standard of the times, the circumstance which gave the author the honorable surname Grammaticus, and also on account of the fascinating, graphic manner in which the facts are related. Svend Aageson, whose work is in all respects far inferior, cheerfully acknowledges Saxo as his master in style; and the Zealand chronicle, which belongs to the second half of the thirteenth century, praises the singular beauty and elegance of Saxo's diction. But as the culture and love of learning gradually died out in the convents and cathedral chapters, the faculty of appreciating Saxo's style was by degrees lost, and about the middle of the fifteenth century, or perhaps earlier, the monk Thomas Gheysmer undertook the timely, and in fact meritorious task of replacing his work, which had well-nigh ceased to be read, with a compendium more suited to the times, and of completing it by adding a continuation. He alleges as a reason for assuming this task, that "Saxo was in many places too discursive, and had said much rather for the sake of adornment than in behalf of truth," and furthermore, that "his style is obscure on account of its verbosity." and that "his inserting fragments of poetry was out of keeping with modern times;" remarks which furnish abundant evidence of the intellectual decline which had taken place in the course of a few centuries. Fortunately, however, the work of Saxo did not perish, though it cost the canon Christiern Pederson much trouble in his day to secure a single copy, according to which the first edition was printed in Paris in 1514. There scarcely ever existed many written copies of this work, which so greatly surpassed the productions of its own time and of the centuries immediately following, and at present we have only a few parchment leaves of it. The Paris edition was soon followed by two others, and as soon as the book became accessible to the world of letters, it became greatly admired. The learned Latin scholars with one accord extolled the excellence of the style. Erasmus of Rotterdam goes the farthest in his encomiums. Not long after the publication of the book, he says of Saxo: "He has written the history of his country in a style both splendid and sublime. I praise his vivid, ardent spirit, his diction, which never betrays nagging or exhaustion, no less than the wondrous richness of his style, his wealth of sound principles and remarkable variety of imagery. One constantly wonders whence a Dane in that age derived all that copious flow of grandly vigorous eloquence." And in truth Saxo has well deserved all the praise that has been bestowed on him. In point of style and in the art of historical narration, he not only surpasses all other Danish writers of the middle age, which is in fact not saying much, but he also surpasses them to such a degree that he takes high rank among the Latin writers of Europe. In the numerous translations of old poetry which are found in his work he proved himself an uncommonly gifted and able Latin poet. On the other hand, it cannot be denied that in his free, verbose and elegant paraphrases of the old songs, he strayed so far away from the spirit and character of the original, that the latter is wholly lost. But the problem could hardly be solved in any other way, and he performed his task with great ability and excellent taste. The fact is, however, that had he rendered the old poems in a strictly literal prose translation, or had he written his work in the national vernacular, it would have become a priceless treasure, the like of which few other nations would be able to boast. Still, such as it is, it is fairly entitled to the rank of a first-class work. That it was written in Latin was owing to the conditions that have been described, and which couid not well have been otherwise.
Saxo's history of Denmark consists of two parts, which derive their contents from sources essentially different, and which consequently are essentially different in character. The former, which is purely legendary history, comprises the first nine of the sixteen books of the work. In the latter, which is mainly historical, history, pure and authentic, appears with the beginning of the twelfth book. In both the preceding ones, and especially in the tenth, legend and history wrestle with each other for the supremacy.
The entire work doubtless rests exclusively on oral tradition, which had been gathered by Saxo, and which he repeated precisely as he had heard it, for in the whole chronicle there is no trace of criticism proper. In reference to his own time, and that immediately preceding his birth, that is the period treated in the last five books of his work, his materials were so abundant that he was able to be very elaborate, and of course the more so as he gradually approached his own time. Archbishop Absalon, in his eagerness to further the work which he had himself suggested, doubtless took pains to have Saxo provided in the most complete manner with materials.
The tenth and eleventh books are the weakest part of the work, and here the traditions seem to have been particularly scanty and unsatisfactory. On the other hand, the first nine books are of invaluable importance on account of the pictures they furnish of Denmark's legendary age. Saxo's sources are here in all probability old songs, of which a great number doubtless still lived on the lips of the people. His Latin verses all seem to be translations of Danish songs or of fragments of such songs. Among these there are a number which can hardly have been known in Iceland, since no traces of them are found in that country. In many instances there is, moreover, a notable difference between the Icelandic traditions and Saxo's rendering of old Danish legends, a fact which doubtless proves that this kind of poetry and legendary lore lived an independent life in Denmark.
Saxo is guilty of a poetical exaggeration when, after stating that the ancient Danes not only composed poems on the deeds of their heroes but also risted (cut) these poems in rocks and stones, he claims to have himself investigated these runic monuments as well as all the old written records, and to have scrupulously translated them verse by verse. His own elegant and flowing verses are in spirit and style widely different from the originals which he had before him, and on this point we are not left to a general impression, but in certain passages we are able to trace his method. Thus he has, for instance, translated the poem Bjarkamal, of which a few fragments in the original old Norse text are extant, into Latin hexameters, but smooth and graceful as these are they are decidedly weak and redundant as compared with the original.
But Saxo must also undoubtedly have had Icelandic saga-men as authorities for the legendary part of his work. In his preface he himself directly asserts this fact, and his book, however much it may differ in its general style from the Icelandic sagas, still affords evidence that Saxo was familiar with the latter. On the other hand, there is not the slightest evidence to show that he ever had a written Icelandic saga before him. His method in relating the myths and heroic legends, which constitute the contents of the first nine books, evidently consisted in collecting the existing materials, in arranging and reconstructing them in the manner that best suited his vivid and creative fancy, and finally in reproducing them in as epic and graphic a style as possible. In this part of the work he betrays no effort to separate fact and fiction; on the contrary, there is good reason for the assumption that in translating the legendary lore into Latin he has, in many instances, consciously or unconsciously adorned the original materials in order that they might make a better appearance in their foreign dress. While between the first and second parts there is the difference, that the former deals more or less exclusively with mythical stories, and the latter mainly with well authenticated historical facts, still these heterogeneous elements are reduced to a sort of unity, by being subjected to a strictly uniform treatment by the author. He is neither annalist nor collector of legends as are most of the other historians of the middle ages, but he selects his favorite leading character and groups around him all his materials. He depicts the life and deeds of his hero in a singularly vigorous and picturesque manner, and presents with rare force and skill the most prominent traits of character and the leading events.
In this way he succeeds in giving us a general picture of the development of the Danish people from the remote antiquity down to his own time precisely as it presented itself to his poetic mind. And for this reason his history of Denmark, despite the various elements of which it consists, became, taken as a whole, a thoroughly harmonious one. It is an inspiring and fascinating book for all time.[5]
The other historical works written in Latin in the middle age, are scarcely worthy of mention. They consist simply of a few biographies, conventual stories, chronicles or annals, the most important and best of which belong to the second half of the twelfth and to the thirteenth centuries. The most valuable of them all is the so-called "Chronicles of Zealand," which closes with the year 1282. From this period the contents of these productions, considered from a literary point of view, grow more and more meagre, but in spite of their intrinsic poverty, they are of great importance as they are the sole sources of Danish history during the middle age. The only attempt at writing a connected history of Denmark is the above-mentioned digest of Saxo's chronicle by Thomas Gheysmer, together with his continuation of the same.[6]
While theology and historiography constituted the chief literary occupation in the convents, some attention was also paid to medicine, natural science and other researches. Great results were, however, not attained, and the number of scientific works from that time, either preserved or known to have existed, is very limited.
The oldest books written in the vernacular are the Provincial Laws from the thirteenth century. In them we find the separation of the Danish language from the Old Norse in rapid progress, and the process of separation is at this period already so far advanced that it must be presumed to have begun at a much earlier date: There appear three popular dialects, those of Scania, Zealand, and Jutland. The vocabulary is still the same as in the Old Norse, but the old inflectional endings have for the most part disappeared, and the vowels have undergone various changes. In the centuries immediately following, shortly before the Reformation, there was developed on the basis of the Zealand dialect a uniform Danish literary language, in which the old stamp was gradually lost. The language became by degrees softer, the multitude of inflectional and derivative endings, which are so fully developed in the Old Norse, were so far as practicable abandoned, and the vocabulary of the language began to admit German elements. In reference to grammar the language occupied during the great spiritual activity of the Reformation period, which produced a vast Danish literature, essentially the position it does at the present time.
The old Danish laws are of no less importance to philology than they are to the history of culture. They are partly secular, partly ecclesiastical, and so far as the form in which they exist is concerned, there is no essential difference between them as regards the time of their origin, for they all belong to the twelfth and thirteenth centuries, and none of the manuscripts are older than 1250. But in reality the secular laws can be traced far back into antiquity, while the ecclesiastical are a product of the institutions introduced together with Christianity. Of the oldest codes which were framed for a special purpose, as for instance Knud the Great's "Vederlagsret" and Palnatoke's laws for the Jomsviking fraternity, only a few fragments have been preserved, while Saxo and Svend Aagesen give us a few extracts from them translated, of course, into Latin. The secular laws are based on legal customs followed from time out of mind and preserved by oral tradition. That they might be the more easily remembered they were expressed in short, pithy sentences, which were frequently given in the form of alliterated poetry. The number of these legal provisions naturally increased with the lapse of years, so that it became necessary to sift and arrange them. This task was performed at royal command by men skilled in the law, and in this manner each district obtained its own code based on the traditional provisions that had been in force in smaller judicial districts which gradually grew into larger circuits. There still exists a large number of manuscripts of these codes from various periods of antiquity.
The most important Danish provincial codes are the Scanian Law, both the Zealand Laws, and the Jutland Law (Jydske Lov). The first is from Valdemar the Great (1157—82), and among the manuscripts of it is found the only runic manuscript in existence. The first Zealand law is also the work of the same king, and the second is named after a king Erik, but it is not known which one of the Danish kings who bore this name in the thirteenth century is meant. The Jutland law, which was promulgated by king Valdemar the Victorious in 1241, and in the passing of which Bishop Gunner took part, is the most carefully prepared of all the provincial laws, and accordingly it yields the greatest harvest to the student of the history of culture, giving, as it does, a most faithful picture of the social conditions of the country, and of the circumstances amid which people lived in that age. The king is even said to have intended to make it the general law of the whole kingdom. The Jutland law was in force in Denmark in 1683, when it was superseded by the Danish law of Christian V, while in Slesvig it has in many respects retained its validity even down to the most recent times. Of the ecclesiastical laws, the Scanian, promulgated by Archbishop Eskild, and the Zealand ecclesiastical law, given by Archbishop Absalon, are the most important. Both of them belong to the second half of the twelfth century, and are in the main identical as to contents. Besides there are various Danish municipal laws and other special codes, which, however, were originally written partly, in Latin, and have come down to us in translations from a much later period, so that their value as linguistic monuments is comparatively small. An important exception is the Flensburg municipal law of 1284, of which there is a manuscript of well-nigh equally ancient date. There are also various statutes of guilds and associations, which are of linguistic and historical value.[7]
Besides these collections of laws there are but few Danish books from the middle age, and not many of these have any general value, excepting, of course, what light they throw on the history of Danish language and culture. The "canonicus" Henrik Harpestreng (died 1244) of Roskilde, ordinary physician to Erik Plogpenning, wrote a small number of medical works, probably in Latin, and of these we have a few translations into Danish, made in the beginning of the fourteenth century. Of historical works written in Danish, the Erik's Chronicle alone is worthy of mention. All that it contains in regard to antiquity is pure fiction, and the part relating to later times is nothing but dry annals. It exists both in Danish and in Latin, and the Danish text, which goes to the year 1313, seems to have served as the basis of the Latin version.[8]
But while the vernacular, as we have now seen, lived but a sickly existence in the written literature, it enjoyed a youthful, vigorous life on the lips of the people in the popular rallads which were scattered throughout the north of Europe; hence it is eminently proper to consider here this poetry in its triple connection with Denmark, Norway and Sweden.
The popular ballads of the North may in one sense be regarded as a continuation of the Old Norse popular poetry, with which we are acquainted from the mythic and heroic songs of the Edda. Even their form points to this old poetry. Notwithstanding the great differences, which can easily be pointed out, and according to which one would, at a first glance, be inclined to regard the metric form and the rhymes generally used during the middle age as essentially different from those employed in the Edda songs and as based on totally different principles; still a closer investigation seems fully to establish the fact that the younger is really a product of the older poetical form. A characteristic feature of the ballad is the strophe, consisting of two or four lines, in which the final rhyme has taken the place of the alliterative rhyme. This and the refrain are the essential facts upon which the theory is based that the Edda lays and the middle-age ballads are not child and parent. But both things also occur in the old poetry, though only sporadically. They can, however, be distinctly pointed out, and thus it is not possible to maintain that these elements in the popular ballad are something entirely new, something that did not exist before. We are compelled to acknowledge that they were developed out of preexisting principles, and that in this evolution the lyrical character predominating in the ballads gave their development an altogether peculiar direction. Already in the skaldic poetry we encounter these elements, although developed in a very different and far less pregnant manner. From a rhythmical point of view both the leading forms which occur in the ballad, the strophe of two and that of four lines with regular accent but irregular syllabic measure, are manifestly built on the same fundamental plan as the strophe of the fornyrðalag and Ljdóðaháttr.
If we consider the poetical style of the ballad we are also forced to admit its near kinship to the poetry of antiquity. The entire treatment of the ballad, in spite of the romantic stamp which is peculiar to it, and which accords with its much higher degree of lyric character, is in many essential and important respects analogous to that of the old poetry. Precisely as in the latter, the action in the ballad is developed in bold and mighty strokes, and there is manifestly an effort to make it as strong and effective as possible. For this reason only the most important facts are presented, and these are given in short, striking sentences which throw a strong light on the characters and situations described. Whatever does not concern the main action or does not essentially contribute toward awakening the sentiment which the poet wishes to produce is either wholly omitted or merely alluded to. Hence the rapidity with which the theme is developed both in the ballad and in the ancient songs, and hence also the great array of stereotyped phrases for the same thought and the same situation, which the ballad has produced and still continues to employ.
The language in which we possess the ballads is, upon the whole, younger than the songs themselves, since the latter had long been preserved by oral tradition before they were put in writing. None of the collections extant date back beyond the sixteenth century, and but very few of them belong to this period. Not before the seventeenth century was there any extensive work done in recording the old songs, which, up to this time, had lived only on the lips of the people. The natural inference is that these songs, both as regards form, substance and language, had undergone various changes. Of a great number of them we have several widely different versions, so that it is exceedingly difficult to form even an approximately correct idea of the original aspect of the ballad. But however corrupted they may be, they still have retained enough of beauty to charm any one who has taste for poetry. Even their language, despite the barbaric style in which they were put in writing by the noble ladies of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, remains full of interest, because it has preserved so many old words and forms which we could not otherwise have known. They frequently, it is true, appear in a very disguised form, since neither the reciter nor the scribe understood their purport, so that only a far advanced linguistic science has been able to interpret them. In this respect, and in spite of the levelling influence of tradition, the ballads have m many ways preserved traces of what they owe to antiquity.
By their contents, the ballads are divided into two principal groups: 1. The mythic and heroic, including songs of magic and versified wonder-stories. 2. Songs of chivalry, to which may be added various other categories of songs, chiefly relating to the adventures of knights.
In the first of these groups we include all those songs which are more or less definitely connected with the ancient mythic and heroic poetry. Some of them are mere transformations of old songs with which we are familiar in their original form, and this applies, for instance, to the ballads, "Tor on Havsgaard" and "Young Sveidal." The former is based on the exquisite old lay about the god Thor, when disguised as Freyja, with Loke as his handmaid, he recovers his hammer from Jotunheim (Thrymskviða).[9] In the ballad we are able to trace the plot worked out in the old lay, step by step, and hence the lay, which was popular throughout the North, must have received its present form at a time when the myth still lived in the memory of the people, though it was no longer an object of faith; that is to say, soon after the introduction of Christianity. The memory of the god Thor, particularly, continued in many ways in the North. In a most suggestive manner it was applied to Christian legendary heroes like Olaf the Saint, and even at the present time it survives in popular legends. Thus it is quite natural that the ballad which represents in the purest and clearest manner the transformation of an old mythic lay, should by preference be connected with that divinity. In the ballad the myth has of course been conceived and rendered as a merry story. Thor is no more the god of Asgard, but the nobleman, "Tor of Havsgaard," Freyja becomes the "Maid of Fröjeborg," etc. The humor of the original poem has been preserved in the ballad in a fresh and charming manner. "Young Sveidal" is a very interesting paraphrase of an ancient poem, of which a few fragments have been preserved in the two Edda songs, "Gróugaldr" and "Fjölsvinnsmál. In the form in which these songs are preserved in the Edda, and which they accordingly must have assumed before they were committed to writing in that country, they appear as two distinct poems which are in no way related to each other; but the ballad furnishes conclusive evidence of their original unity, and also contributes in many ways to a better understanding of these obscure lays on which it is based. The obscure ballad, Svend Vonved, which we possess only in a very imperfect form, also points, both in its general structure and in many of its details, to the mythical poetry as its source. We are not able, as was the case in the other ballads, to point to some particular poem of antiquity as its foundation, but in all probability it is based on some heathen religious poem which has been lost.
Of the heroic poetry of antiquity we also find several more or less distinct traces in the popular ballads. The whole group of songs which are designated by the term "Heldenlieder" (heroic lays)[10] in German, constitute one class, in which the heroic ideas inherited from the past are blended with the cosmic views of the middle age. That powerful, oftentimes grotesque, imagination which we constantly meet with in many of the ballads and which may properly be compared with that which we find in many of the popular tales and legends of the North, also has its root in the heathen age. But the popular ballads are also related to the poetry of antiquity in respect to contents, and we discover in them many of the myths and mythic groups which served as the basis of the ancient lays. This is particularly the case with the Niblung story, which is scattered thoughout the North and Norway, and has furnished the materials for several of the finest songs in the Elder Edda, for the Volsunga Saga, for the Vilkina Saga, for the Niebelungen Lied, which is based on lost German popular songs; and finally, for the four Danish ballads on Sivard Snaresvend, as Sigurd the Volsung here is called. The same applies to the heroic tradition about King Dietrich of Bern (Theodoric of Verona) and his warriors, a story which is known throughout Gothdom, and which is the subject of seven Danish ballads. These Dietrich ballads are based on German songs that were early imported into the North, while some few of the Sivard ballads give the northern version of the story, and, indeed, partly in its original form and partly with the changes caused by the lapse of time. Among the ballads presenting purely Norse themes, special mention must be made of the one about Aage and Else; about the knight who, after his death, returns to his bride, called from his grave by the intensity of her grief. In this ballad we recognize the close of the second lay of Helge Hundingsbane, in a Christian and romantic dress, it is true, and applied to entirely different persons, but the ideas in the ballad are unquestionably the same as those in the Edda poem. The celebrated song, famous throughout the North, of the faithful love of Harbard and Signe—a love which brought death to both of them, for be must expiate it on the gallows, while she perishes in the burning chamber which she has herself set on fire—is a rendering of a world-old story which doubtless had been the theme of many a song in antiquity. Finally, we have a number of ballads relating to traditions with which we are not acquainted, but which, according to their entire character, belong to the olden time. This is certainly true of the weird ballad of the Sword of the Avenger. In it blood revenge is painted in most powerful colors, and the cruelty of the sword is to such a degree personified, that the latter continues to rage in the wildest manner, until the master of the sword invokes the help of God in order to make an end to the bloodshed.
In addition to the mythic and heroic ballads there is a large group of songs, the original elements of which must also be sought in pre-Christian times. They are songs of magic and of miracles, in which we do not find any direct reminiscences of ancient poetry, but rather all that demonology which, under the influence of Christianity, was created on the basis of the heathen religion. The transition from heathendom to Christianity was by no means a sudden and abrupt one. Many traits of the old religion found their way, in a more or less modified form, into the new faith, and it was particularly difficult to get rid of all those beings with which the myth had peopled nature, though the priests put forth every effort to accomplish this end. These beings continued their lives in legends and songs, though under essentially modified conditions; nay, the development of new myths continued on the basis handed down from the heathen times. In the Christian faith nature appeared fallen and corrupted. Accordingly the beings connected with nature must share her fate and be conceived as evil powers, hostile to the salvation of human souls, no matter how good and beneficent the heathen faith might have represented them. The groups and the individual divinities were in the main accepted as the myth-creating fancy had produced them, but they were all relegated to the realm of the devil as beings that a good Christian must under all circumstances shun, and that would cause his perdition if he had any dealings with them. The gods whose memory had been preserved became wild, damned spirits, the friendly and luminous forms of the elves became wanton, faithless beings, celebrating their nightly dances and stealing the senses of any knight who might chance to be a spectator. They make him oblivious to everything, and he forfeits his own soul. But the ingenious dwarfs which, in the olden time had been conceived as beings of an inferior order, but still upon the whole as the friends of men, were in the middle age to some extent classified with the giants, the foes of mankind, and like the latter they were turned into wizards and mountain-spirits, who as a rule are friendly neither to God nor to men, though some of them, for instance the gnomes, the nisses, the underground spirits and the like, were regarded in a somewhat more favorable light. All these ideas, which are most intimately connected with the faith of the heathen age, we rediscover in a large number of the ballads. It will be sufficient to mention "Elveskud," the ballad concerning Olaf the Knight, who through his encounter with the elf-maid forfeits his life; the ballad which tells of Bösmer the Knight in Alfheim, who is enticed into the mountain, where he is made to forget all that was dear to him; the ballads of the merman Rosmer; of Germand Gladensvend (both of which remind us of the grand conceptions the ancients had of the giants), and of Agnete and the merman, etc.
In all these ballads, and as a rule in all the popular poetry of the middle age, we find in addition to these echoes from antiquity a new element which was entirely foreign to the ancient time, namely a dreamy romanticism, which is characteristic of the cosmic conception prevailing throughout the middle age. In the ballad-world imagination reigns almost supreme, and lends a peculiar color to all forms and ideas. Hence it was that this poetry acquired so great importance, and was, so to speak, regenerated, when in the beginning of this century romantic poetry became predominant, and borrowed its material to so great an extent from the popular poetry. In the North people are generally familiar with this popular poetry, not only from the original ballads themselves, but perhaps especially from the poems which Oelenschlæger and other northern poets of modern times have produced in imitation of them.
The same points of contact between the middle age and the heathen time appear even in a more marked degree in the numerous ballads which tell of metamorphoses and of incantations. These, too, are based on superstitions handed down from heathendom, and they simply assumed a somewhat different form during the middle age. Closely allied to these are the songs of the supernatural, terrible power of the runes. The belief in ghosts and apparitions, which occurs in many Danish ballads, as in "Svend Dyring," "Aage and Else," etc., is also founded on very ancient representations of "drows" and "hill-dwellers"[11] which had been transmitted almost without change from time immemorial.
Thus we see at every point where it could be expected a remarkably well preserved connection between the views concerning the supernatural in the poetry of antiquity and in the middle-age ballad.
But it is still more surprising to find this same relation existing in a field where we would hardly look for it, that is to say in the ballads of Christian miracles or legendary songs, which have for their themes episodes from the life of Christ and of the saints. Thus King Olaf the Saint and his fight with the evil spirits (the trolls) is blended with the god Thor and his fight with the giants, and the king even inherits the red-beard of Asa-Thor. An Icelandic skaldic lay describes Christ sitting at the fountain of Urd, and the old poem Solarljoð in the Elder Edda, with its remarkable struggle between the asa-faith and Christianity, is closely connected with the Norwegian ballad Draumkvæði, in which we can in a few passages trace the very words of the original poem. In Danish ballads too mythical ideas are applied to the life of Jesus, as, for example, the episode of the blind Hoder, who pierces Balder with his arrow.
Many of the saints who are celebrated in the legendary ballads are in reality the old heathen gods in a Christian dress, and the whole outline of these songs is frequently more heathen than Christian. Especially striking is also the popularity which St. Jörgen (St. George) enjoyed among the nations of the North. There can be no doubt that this was due to a union of Christian ideas with imperishable memories of heathendom. St. George acquired a special prominence, for while his fight with the dragon symbolized the struggle between Christianity and the devil, it at the same time commemorated Thor's fight with the midgard-serpent and the combat between Sigurd and Fafner.
Although we have included all these songs under the general head of mythical ballads, still this term does not apply absolutely to all the poems embraced in this category, but we trust it indicates with sufficient clearness the fact we wished to establish. Regardless of their real poetical value, these ballads are of the deepest interest on account of the unique and instructive light they throw on the manner in which the heathen and Christian ideas confronted each other in the middle age. These ballads illustrate how many of the old myths were preserved in a more or less modified form, and how during the amalgamation of the different elements a very strange and romantic view of nature was developed. The second group, which embraces the historical ballads and those closely allied to them, acquires its chief importance from its abundance of vivid and highly colored pictures of middle-age life and view of things in general, which are presented to us precisely as they must have looked to the people of that time. These ballads portray to us no less graphically how certain important events were conceived and transformed by the masses. While the mythic ballads are chiefly transformations or adaptations of the poems of a more remote period, or while they, at all events, are so completely based on traditions from the heathen time that they belong, so to speak, to both ages, the historical ballads and those belonging to the same general group, contain the poetry, thoughts and views of life of the middle-age proper. When the history of the age was to be told the vernacular was silent, but, instead, the historical views of the middle-age were expressed in broad outlines in the contemporary ballads. They are not of course historical sources in the sense that the details which they furnish may be relied on; they are primarily poems in which the facts are modified and adapted with admirable skill to the poetical idea which the poet wished to work out. Moreover, the oral tradition which handed down these poems—far more interesting on account of their poetical than on account of their historical contents—from generation to generation, could not fail to have an altogether unfavorable influence on the preservation of the historical details. Nevertheless these ballads are of great historical value, first as pictures, which may have been sketched not very much later than the events they describe occurred, that is to say, while the events in their general outlines were still vividly present to the mind of the poet; and, secondly, as an expression of the popular opinion of the event and of the persons connected with it. Thus we have in the ballads not only a number of exquisite poems, but also pictures drawn from the life of the middle age, and the latter are of great value to history, although it can in many instances be pointed out that their description of events does not tally with the results yielded by other strictly historical sources.
Besides the ballads relating to historical persons, we have numerous so-called ballads of chivalry, in which the plot is chiefly pure fiction. Many of them possess great beauty. They introduce us into the different walks of life in the middle age and furnish very interesting pictures of the daily activities of men at that time. We see the castles with their halls, their bowers for ladies and for maidens, the orchard and the game-park, the towers above the gates, from which the watchmen sound their horns before the draw-bridge is lowered when strangers arrive on horseback. We see the busy life within their portals: how the ladies and the waiting-women ply the loom or study their prayer-books; how the knights and their friends sit over their wine-goblets; how accompanied by their servants and hounds they set out on their hunting expeditions, or arm themselves for a war either to defend the realm or to take revenge on an enemy. In short, we are able, on the basis of these ballads, to draw vivid and faithful pictures of the life of chivalry in all its aspects, pictures for which these ballads alone can furnish the materials, and thus they are of inestimable value to the student of the history of civilization. And, finally, in their rich and varied contents they reveal to us the customs and usages, the mode of thought and manner of action of the middle age in an endless variety of grotesque stories.
Great prominence is given to love in these ballads. Many a touching episode is given of inviolable faith and of hard struggles against a pitiless fate preventing the union of lovers, as for instance in the celebrated song of Axel and Valborg. Still love, as revealed in these ballads, is rarely of the sentimental kind; on the contrary it is usually passionately sensual and shuns no means of securing the coveted prize. Upon the whole we are in many ways reminded that we are contemplating a remote age teeming with untamed passions and regarding right and honor with eyes totally different from ours. Abduction of women, deeds of violence, savage and cruel revenge on successful rivals, etc., are by no means rare occurrences, but on the other hand there are numerous examples of noble, lofty feelings. In some ballads of chivalry the development of the plot is made so subordinate that the lyric element predominates. Still these are mere exceptions, for as a rule these too, like the other varieties of this group, are epic in their contents though highly lyric in form. Deserving of mention are also the not very numerous humorous poems which must also be included in the category of ballads of chivalry, since they borrow their materials from the life of the knights, and finally the satirical songs in which especially godless monks are held up to ridicule. The latter date, of course, from the close of the middle age, when the clergy had already become very much degenerated, and form the transition to the satires of the age of the reformation.
The popular poetry, which we have now sketched, is not, as above stated, especially a product of Denmark, though we have centred our attention on this country, but it belongs to the entire group of Teutonic nationalities. A poetry of precisely the same kind is found not only in all the Northern countries, but also in Germany, England, and Scotland, while the Icelandic and Faroese rimas must also be embraced in the same category. Many ballads have been transplanted from the country in which they originated into another and there become naturalized, a fact peculiarly true of the three northern countries, in which during the age of the greatest bloom of this poetry there was a strong reciprocal influence, so that it is now often almost impossible to determine to which country a given ballad originally belonged. It is, of course, most easy to determine the locality of the historical ballads, but these, too, were frequently scattered over the whole North.
This phenomenon is, in a large measure, explained by the fact that these ballads were invariably intended to be sung, and as a rule are an accompaniment to the dance, just as this is still practised in the Fareys. The melodies composed simultaneously with the words which are characterized by a charming simplicity, easily carried the songs from one country to another, and only such changes would be made in the text as were made necessary by the slight differences of language, and thenceforth the imported songs would go hand in hand with the native ones.
Like the poetry of antiquity the most splendid remnants of which have been preserved in the Elder Edda, the northern poetry of the middle age must be characterized popular. This term being ambiguous requires a more exact definition. We do not know the authors of the ballads, all of which have come down to us anonymously; but they owe their origin to real and exceptionally gifted poets. Of any direct share on the part of the people in the authorship of these ballads we can only speak in a relative sense, inasmuch as they in their transmission by oral tradition suffered various more or less radical changes, being now remodelled, now enlarged, and now shortened; of all which facts the copies now extant give sufficient proof. These changes were certainly in the most instances rather corruptions than improvements, so that the remains that have come down to us of this poetry are both in extent and form—and that not merely the rough, purely external or linguistic form—must be considered simply as fragments and ruins of this poetry. When we, therefore, speak of them as popular ballads it is not because the people have a share in corrupting them, but because their authors were popular poets in the true sense, imbued with the spirit of the people, and endowed with a talent for expressing the feelings and sentiments of the masses in such a manner that the people at once accepted them as their own. This was the first and most necessary condition for the development of a tradition which should be able to transmit the ballads from race to race. But it was not necessary that the popular poets should spring directly from the common people. On the contrary, when we consider the whole character of this poetry, it is evident that it owed its origin to men who moved in the higher circles. The burgher never appears in the ballads, and when the peasant occasionally puts in his appearance, it is only the poor wretched boor, whose lot was a sad one, one not apt to supply the conditions for the production of poetry of this sort. The entire scenery, all the images revealed to us in the ballads, are borrowed from the life of the knights; they display the nobles in all their splendor and magnificence, and to this social order they must accordingly owe their origin. Whether there were in the North as in other lands minstrels who wandered from castle to castle or remained at the court of a single master, and whether the origin of the ballads is to be ascribed to those or even to gifted poets among the nobles themselves, so that the poetry may be said to have sprung from the very flower of the nation, are questions that cannot be satisfactorily answered. The latter hypothesis seems the most plausible; at all events the castles were the true homes of the ballads. For a long time they were also limited exclusively to these until they in the beginning of the fifteenth century gradually went out of fashion, and were crowded out by romances of chivalry, erotic poetry, and popular tales. In this manner they made their way to the lower strata of the population, where they also, on account of their popular character, became the property of the people, since they expressed feelings and sentiments in a manner intelligible and pleasing to all, sentiments that could be felt and appreciated by the great and the lowly, by nobleman and peasant alike. By the common people they were faithfully preserved until the second half of the sixteenth century, when an interest for them again revived among the nobility, and when it especially became the custom of the noble women to collect and put in writing old songs from the lips of the people. The printed collection of ballads, of which that of Vedel of 1592 is the oldest, constituted for centuries a favorite reading, and at the same time oral tradition has continued even down to the present. Many a ballad that has never been taken down in writing has thus been preserved until the interest awakened in modern times for the monuments of the past made it a matter of duty to collect everything of this kind that could be found. Certain localities of the North are particularly rich in old ballads, and the Hammerum Harde in northwestern Jutland is a striking example of this. In this desolate heath-region, where the popular life assumed a peculiar character created by the "Bindestuer" (rooms in which people get together for the purpose of knitting; they are now fast disappearing), the conditions were most favorable for the preservation of the old ballads and legends. In the long winter evenings old and young would assemble at the larger farms, each provided with his woollen stocking, and there the old traditions were related by persons who excelled in knowledge of them. Here therefore the harvest of ballads handed down from generation to generation was particularly abundant. In Thelemark, in Norway, there is also to be found a large store of popular songs.
In reference to the age of the ballads we have the historical ballads as our only safe guide. It would not be safe to assume that a song, describing an event, was composed immediately after the event, and that it then received its present form; but still the composition must have taken place before the persons and circumstances described had faded from the memory of the poet. If we keep this principle in mind, we will arrive at the result that the golden period of the historical ballads, the age of which extends from the beginning of the twelfth century to the Reformation, must have been the latter half of the twelfth and the whole of the thirteenth century; for from this period, confining ourselves to Denmark alone, we have of purely Danish ballads about thirty to each century, while from the remaining three hundred years there is not that number of ballads. This result is perfectly natural, for the period which produced the greatest number of ballads was also the richest in events and in all respects the best period of the Danish middle age. Its stirring times and its high degree of culture necessarily gave this period the conditions for the production of this kind of poetry. In the ballads of Marshal Stig with their tragic descriptions of the guilt of the king (Erik Glipping) and of his marshal, as well as of the calamities which it brought upon the whole land, this poetry reaches its climax. Full of energy it bursts forth again in the ballad about Niels Ebbesen, and then it gradually vanishes, though it still now and then sends forth a vigorous bud, as it did, for the last time, in the beautiful allegorical poem about Christian II and the nobility.
Thus, while we can not place the first historical ballads earlier than the twelfth century, still the popular poetry, considered as a whole, must be much older. The mythic ballads and the songs kindred to them, which, as we have seen, are in many ways connected with the ancient poetry, and which in part are mere corruptions of older songs, must of needs belong to a time when the poetry and the ideas on which they are based were still fresh in the memory of the people. The transition from the older to the younger form can hardly be placed later than the eleventh century, and at about this time occurred the change of the ideas handed down from antiquity into the new form, until the time became ripe for a poetry in every respect independent, that is to say, for the historical ballads.
That this is correct can also be inferred from the circumstance that in the first half of the twelfth century there was a large influx of German ballads into Denmark; for it is scarcely probable that the transformation of old songs into heroic ballads was contemporaneous with the introduction of foreign poetry. Nor is it possible to assume that the transformation took place after that period. Every circumstance favors the theory by which we refer the beginning of ballad literature to the eleventh century, and this may be done the more safely since we have immutable and incontrovertable proof that the peculiar form of the heroic ballad existed in the time of Knud the Great (1014-1035). For in an old English conventual chronicle from the eleventh century we read that when the king with his queen and followers once happened to be rowing in a boat toward the convent of Ely he gave vent to his joy in a ballad, which he composed on the spur of the moment, and in which he requested his followers to join him in singing. A few lines of this ballad have been preserved, and they leave no room for doubt that it is the heroic ballad fully developed, and it is not to be confounded with the skaldic lay. King Knud's ballad was sung in the English tongue. It is, however, very difficult to determine where the new form was first developed, whether in England, Germany or the North, but it cannot have been long before it was universally adopted.[12]
The popular ballads furnish a strong and cheering proof of the poetical activity in Denmark throughout the middle age. The grand age of the Waldemars, the golden age of Denmark, and then the deep humiliation, when the country, thoroughly subjugated by German princes, was brought to the verge of ruin, all this is powerfully and distinctly mirrored in the ballads, which in the most touching strains express the joy and sorrow of the people. But this natural poetry welling forth from the inmost recesses of the people's soul is, in connection with the chronicles of Saxo and Svend Aagesen, all the middle age literature of any importance of which Denmark can boast.[13]
Of secular poetry of art there are no traces whatever except what was borrowed from foreign literatures. Toward the close of the middle age and in the beginning of the reformation period a number of romances and tales of chivalry from the circle of stories of Charlemagne, King Artus and his knights, etc., made their way, in versified and prose translations and adaptations, into Denmark from the rest of Europe, where they had already long been read with great delight. In Denmark they shared the fate of the ballads; they were first received in the higher circles, where they soon gained such a foothold that they banished the ballads. This could scarcely have happened had there not been a marked decline in poetic taste; for whatever merit many of the imported productions may have possessed in their original form, still in the form in which they reached the North, that is, in second or third-hand translations, they had unquestionably lost much of their poetic spirit. When the art of printing was introduced, they spread rapidly into wider circles and finally reached the lowest classes of the people. Many of them, and among these the chronicle of the Emperor Charlemagne and the story of Griseldis, have continued to this day as books for the people.
Of the rhymed compositions of this class are the Euphemia songs, which owe their name to the fact that the Norwegian queen Euphemia, the wife of Hakon Magnusson, introduced them in Norway about the year 1300. From the Norwegian they were probably translated into Swedish, and we know with certainty that they were translated from Swedish into Danish. Two of the poems, Iwein the lion-knight and Duke Frederick of Normandy, with their glowing descriptions of the life of chivalry, with their deeds of heroism and adventures of love, belong to the circle of Artus legends, while a third is the celebrated love romance of Flores and Blanseflor. They came originally from France, but probably reached the North in German versions. The Norse Euphemia rhymes are doubtless not translations, but rather versified adaptations of works originally written in prose. Not one among them can be regarded as original, at least none such has yet been found. The same is probably true of three poems in the Danish language. These are: the dwarf-king Lavrin, who is here connected with the legend circle of Dietrich of Bern; Persenober and Konstantionobis, an adaptation of the French romance of Patronopseus; and finally the chaste queen. The last treats of a queen who, during the absence of her husband, has to endure the importunities of a faithless courtier, and on the king's return is slandered by the courtier. The king thereupon repudiates his queen, but the latter is rescued by a strange knight — a plot often used in both rhymed and unrhymed songs and romances. The only prose story of any magnitude in the Danish language from this time is the history of Charlemagne. The manuscript written in 1480 is probably a retelling from memory (and in a very much abridged form) of the Norwegian "Karlamagnussaga," while the latter is itself an adaptation of the numerous poems belonging to the Charlemagne circle of legends as they were developed in the course of the middle age, continually getting further and further away from the historical background. The history of Charlemagne was printed in 1501 by Gotfred von Ghemen, and together with Flores and Blanseflor was one of the first books printed in Denmark. For a long time the book was a favorite with readers, to which fact the circumstance doubtless contributed that the work, despite its fabulous contents, was regarded as authentic history.[14]
Among the rhymed poems of purely Danish origin from the close of the middle age the most important is the Danish Rhyme Chronicle, which describes the career of the Danish kings from Humble to Christian I. Each king is introduced to relate his own story, and tells not only of his life but also of his death and burial. It has no historical value. It follows Saxo's chronicle as far as that goes, and after that depends wholly on dry conventual annals. Its contents are correspondingly meagre, and yet the work is in some passages marked by a peculiar and rather attractive directness and originality. In regard to the origin of the Rhyme Chronicle opinions are greatly divided. Molbech, the first editor of the work in modern times, relying on a remark in a Low-German manuscript translation of the Rhyme Chronicle attributes the compilation of the work to the monk of Sorö, Neils (died 1481). On the other hand, the celebrated Grundtvig has expressed the opinion that the Chronicle is the joint work of the monks in Sorö convent, who, as above stated, were requested by Archbishop Absalon to write a national chronicle. "Every monk," says Grundtvig, "who could rhyme did his best for the king or kings whose turn it was to be rhymed," and in support of this opinion he points to the striking difference between the different parts of the work in respect to intellectual effort and historical knowledge. This supposition is overruled by the circumstance that in style and language the work unmistakably belongs to the close of the middle age. A third authority in this field of inquiry, the historian of literature, Professor Petersen, leaves the question of the origin of the Rhyme Chronicle undecided for the reason that all reliable information on that point is wanting, and the work itself furnishes no safe clue. The good and the bad are thoroughly intermingled, and the whole is too monotonous to be allowed to serve as a faithful mirror of the changes of popular life through a long period of time. This opinion is doubtless the correct one.[15]
About the time of the reformation, the national vernacular begins, upon the whole, to assert itself with more success, and at this time it is especially employed in the field of religious literature, where, hitherto, the Latin has reigned supreme. Heretofore, men had taken pride in being able to express themselves elegantly and fluently in the Latin tongue, but it gradually became corrupted, and the monks, whose taste for scientific investigations was rapidly declining, did their share towards accomplishing its utter ruin. But in the same degree as the Latin was banished, the vernacular made progress, not only in the conventual Latin, which continued to incorporate into itself an increasing number of Danish words and phrases, but also in the literature and the church service. From the middle of the fifteenth century, Danish was also heard from the pulpit, legends and prayer-books were translated, and in several convents attempts were made at translating the Bible. An old fragment from the time of Christian I embraces the first eight books of the old Testament, according to the Vulgata, and there are translations of the psalms of David dating from the same time. Also the well known work found in every European country, the half theological popular book called "Lucidarius," appeared in the Danish language.[16]
In this period occur the first efforts in religious poetry in the Danish tongue, the forerunners of the psalms of the reformation period. The hymns in honor of the Virgin Mary are a peculiar product of these efforts. In their religious-erotic sentimentality they give the impression of being love songs rather than hymns for edification. The rhymed poems of Michael, priest of St. Alban's church in Odense, are the only ones whose value rises above being merely of use to the historians of civilization and literature. Priest Michael wrote them in 1496, at the request of Queen Christine, the wife of King Johan. After his death in 1515, they were published, and they consist of three songs, one of the rosary of the Virgin Mary, one of the creation, and one of human life. The first and longest is a free, and in its form, perfectly independent poetical extract from a Latin work of the Dominican monk, Alanus de Rupe (Alain de Roch), who lived in the fifteenth century, and who was very zealous in spreading the worship of the Virgin Mary, by means of the rosary and of the prayers therewith connected. Both the other poems are also free adaptations of Latin originals. But all his works are marked by a deep, tender, not only religious, but also poetical sentiment—by a taste strikingly delicate for his time in the choice of words, and by a generally good style. In all these particulars he not only surpasses his contemporaries, but it was long before there appeared another Danish poet who could boast the same command of language. In consequence of the Reformation, the rhymed poems of Michael were put aside as being too intimately connected with Catholicism; but a few fragments of "Virgin Mary's Rosary" were retained and were inserted, partly changed and partly without alteration, in the Lutheran psalm-book. Even at the present time several of them are found in the evangelical psalm-books of the Danish church. The poem on human life was in 1571 again brought to light by Anders Vedel and edited by him.[17]
The collection of proverbs by Peder Laale is a work in which poetry and prose, Latin and Danish, are mingled together in strange fashion. Of the author nothing definite can be said, but we may assume him to have been a learned clergyman who occupied himself with the instruction of the youth. His work at least seems to show this, for it was manifestly not compiled for the purpose of preserving the proverbs, but rather of serving as a text-book in learning the Latin. The Latin verses are the chief thing, and the proverbs are simply introduced in elucidation of the former. Apparently the original compilation of the work was made in the fifteenth century, but it has doubtless received various later additions. It is of course of great interest, not only linguistically, but also to the history of civilization, being as it is the oldest collection of the kind in the Danish language, and because it contains many pithy proverbs which belong to a much earlier date. But its value as a school-book cannot be rated high, for the Latin of its leonine verses is far from being classical, and the whole character of the book, and particularly the many French words with which it teems, clearly betray the fact that France must have been the original home of the book. Still, it has been extensively used as a school text-book. In 1506 it was edited by "the scholars of the Copenhagen University," and two years later a fresh edition was called for. When Christiern Pedersen edited the book in Paris, in 1515, he complained of the barbaric Latin in which it was written, and in the school ordinance of Christian II it is enumerated among the books to be burned. No one took notice of the proverbs which it contained, and a whole century elapsed before Peder Laale was again rescued from oblivion,[18] and it was then done in honor of the old pithy proverbs, which the book contained.
The Danish literature of the middle age offers no pleasing picture for our consideration. At the very outset the national element was excluded, and was tolerated only in the popular ballads, while the entire literature proper was not only written in Latin, but also, in respect to contents, entered a field where the people were unable to follow, and the result was that it became exclusively the property of the learned class. This was, however, the condition of things not only in Denmark, but also in all the rest of Europe. But while strenuous efforts were made in other lands to throw off the Latin yoke in order to give more room to the national and popular element, such efforts were almost wholly wanting in Denmark, and when the vernacular at length began to claim some of the place that belonged to it, the reason for this was not that any strong national impulse stirred the people, but chiefly that the representatives of the foreign culture were no longer equal to the performance of their task. The Danish clergy won no laurels as guardians of the spiritual culture of the middle age. Only in the first centuries after the introduction and establishment of Christianity was the conduct of the clergy such as to exempt them from this blame, and during the most flourishing period of Denmark their relation to European culture in general is deserving of great praise, but it was not long before genuine culture (so far as there was any real culture in those days) degenerated into the semblance of culture, and even the latter gradually disappeared. The convents had at first been the seats of diligent and successful intellectual activity, though they produced no very marked results; but they gradually became the gathering places of indolent and ignorant monks whose sole aim it was to make themselves as comfortable as they could with the least possible trouble and to monopolize the direction of affairs. Though a few exceptions might be cited, still the learned profession, taken as a whole, kept sinking deeper and deeper from the position it had occupied in the twelfth and thirteenth centuries, as we gradually approach the period of the Reformation. The schools became perfectly demoralized, and but few efficient teachers could be found. Morten Borup (1446-1526) therefore deserves special mention. He was rector of the Aarhus academy and distinguished himself in many ways.[19] Many of the prominent men of the reformation period were indebted to him for their education.
The former earnest desire for higher culture also diminished more and more. The ardor, which had impelled so many Danes to visit the celebrated foreign university, was damped. There were but few who had any ambition to acquire fame by their learning, and these few endeavored to obtain their knowledge with as little effort and sacrifice as possible. They contented themselves with visiting the German universities, and men of real learning were exceedingly rare exceptions. The establishment of a university in Copenhagen on the 1st of June, 1479, did not produce any marked change in this respect. The want of a Danish university had long been felt, and Erik of Pomerania had already in 1419 secured the pope's consent to found one, but had been compelled to abandon the project. The university of Cologne was taken as a model for the Copenhagen university, and from the former came the first faculty of teachers and the first class of students.
Meanwhile this institution did not at first accomplish what was expected from it. The chief reason was that the age no longer favored the catholic principles on which the institution was based. Its curriculum was made out according to the old scholastic system, and could not therefore have any attraction for the Danish youths, who continued to resort to German universities, so that King Johan found it necessary to publish an ordinance forbidding anybody to visit a foreign university before he had attended the University of Copenhagen at least three years. The latter institution did not therefore from the very outset have any great measure of success, and when the stirring times of the Reformation began, bringing in their wake disorder and uncertainty in all ecclesiastical matters, the university languished, and in the last years of the reign of Fredrik I it can hardly be said to have existed.
Many circumstances coöperated in smothering the incipient germs of an intellectual development which might have been of great importance to the whole people. The disturbances and misfortunes which Denmark had to endure during the last two centuries of the middle age were particularly detrimental to her prosperity. Among these are the parcelling out of the country among foreign conquerors, pestilence, the dissensions between the spiritual and civil powers, etc. The worst of all was perhaps the increasing influence of Germany on Danish affairs. The latter was an inevitable result of the whole historical situation, but that influence necessarily obstructed the development of an independent intellectual life and the creation of Danish literature on a national basis. The German language and German customs monopolized everything, and contributed much to the destruction of national sentiment and self-reliance among the people. The Hanseatic cities had by degrees monopolized the commerce of the whole North; German craftsmen had immigrated in vast numbers; the Danish kings were of German extraction; the whole culture of the country, so far as it was not already Latin, became Germanized, or, in other words, foreign influence prevailed everywhere. The national ascendancy which raised the country to an ephemeral greatness during the reign of Valdemar III (called Atterdag) and Queen Morgarethe, had but little influence on the popular life of the day and none at all on the national literature. Immediately after the death of the great queen the national element again collapsed. The times were not favorable for the realization of her bold idea, the consolidation of the three northern kingdoms, and instead of being a blessing the Calmar union became a source of strife and discord among the nations of the North. The chasm between them grew wider and wider, and in the same proportion they became defenceless against their foreign foes. At the close of the middle age German ruled supreme in the church, in the schools, in the state and in society, and it was destined to retain its hold for a long time to come.
- ↑ F. Hammerich: En Skolastiker og en Bibeltheolog i Norden. Copenhagen, 1865.
- ↑ Scriptores rerum Danicarum medii ævi, III.
- ↑ F. Hammerich.
- ↑ Scriptores rerum Danicarum I.
- ↑ The last and best edition is that of P. E. Müller and J. Velschow, Copenhagen, 1839. (Saxonis Grammatici Historia Danica, I-II.)
- ↑ Scriptores rerum Danicarum.
- ↑ The last edition of the Danish provincial laws is by P. G. Thorsen, in four volnmes, 1853-53. An important and comprehensive collection of old Danish laws is: Samling af gamle danske Love, I-V, Copenhagen, 1821-1837.
- ↑ Henrik Harpestrengs Lægebok udgivet af C. Molbech, 1826.
- ↑ See Anderson's Norse Mythology, pp. 328-336.
- ↑ The term "Heldenlieder" is not quite identical with the Danish word "Kæmpeviser," for "Kæmpe" also means a giant, and many of the ballads treat of giants.
- ↑ These are names of beings that have formerly lived on earth, but now haunt caves and sepulchral mounds. The "drows," according to the conception of the ancients, cannot leave their homes, but they are malicious and harm those who visit their abodes. The "hill-people" can under certain circumstances visit the upper world.
- ↑ The Norwegian Professor, Storm, in his work, "Sagnkredsene om Karl den Store og Didrik af Bern," Christiania, 1874, has with great ability advocated a totally different theory from the one here presented concerning the age of the ballads and the manner of their origin. We confine ourselves here simply to noting that he endeavors to prove that the metre of the Scandinavian ballads was modelled after that employed in the court-poetry of Germany, and that this can not be older than from the fourteenth or possibly from, the end of the thirteenth century.
- ↑ The chief collection of Danish ballads is "Danmark's gamle Folkeviser," udgivne af Sv. Grundtvig, Copenhagen, 1853. A very comprehensive, but very uncritical collection was published by Abrahamson, Nyerup and Rahbek: "Udvalgte danske Viser fra Middelalderen"; "Norske Folkeviser," samlede og udgivne af M. B. Landstad, Christiania, 1833; "Gamle norske Folkeviser," samlede og udgivne af Sofus Bugge, Christiania, 1838; "Altdänische Heldenlieder, Balladen und Märchen," übersetzt von W. Grimm, Heidelberg, 1811; Talvj: "Versuch einer geschtl. Charakteristic der Volklieder germ. Nationen," Leipsic, 1840.
- ↑ C. J. Brandt: Romantisk Digtning fra Middelalderen, I-III, Copenhagen, 1869-1877.
- ↑ The Rhyme Chronicle was edited by C. Mohlbech, Copenhagen, 1825. A photolithograph of the first edition (of 1495) was published in Copenhagen in 1873.
- ↑ Lucidarius udgivet af C. J. Brandt, Copenhagen, 1849.
- ↑ Hr Michael's Rimværker udgivne af C. Molbech, Copenhagen, 1849.
- ↑ Peder Laales Ordsprog, udgivne af R. Nyerup, Copenhagen, 1828.
- ↑ He wrote Latin verse, and his charming song to Spring: "In vernalis temporis ortu lætabundo" is particularly noteworthy on account of its sympathy with the ballads.