LATIN
29
LATIN
attempts at a Latin school drama^ in so far as they
servea educational purposes, were most zealously wel-
comed in the schools of the regular orders (especially
those of the Jesuits), and cultivated with great suc-
cess. Thus the purely external side of the dramatic
art developed from the crudest of beginnings to the
brilliant settings of the so-calleii liidi cicsarii. With
the suppression of the Society of Jesus the school drama
came to a rapid end, and no serious attempt has been
since made to revive it and restore it to its fonner posi-
tion. However from time to time new plays nave
been produced both in Europe and America, and the
'*St. John Damascene", written by Father Harzheim
of the Society of Jesus, is worthy to take its place
among the best productions of the Jesuit dramatists.
B. Latin Lifncal Poetry. — This division of Latin poetry falls naturally into two classes: secular and re- ligious. The former includes the poems of itinerant scholars and the Humanists, the latter h^innody. The development of vagrant scholars {cleria, vagi) is con- nected with the foundation of the universities, as stu- dents wandered about to visit these newly founded in- stitutions of learning. From the middle of the twelfth century imperial privileges protected these travelling schoku^. The majority intended to devote them- selves to theology, but comparatively few reached orders. The remainder found their callings as amanu- enses or tutors in noble families, or degenerated into loose-living goliards or into wandering scholars who became a veritable plague during the twelfth and thir- teenth centuries, as they wandered, begging, from place to place, demanded hospitality in monasteries and castles ami like the wandering minstrels paid with their songs, jugglery, buffoonery, and tales. Proud of their scholarly attainments, they used Latin in their poetical compositions, and thus arose a special literature, the goHaraic poetry. Of this two great col- lections are still extant, the " Benediktbciircn " collec- tion and the so-called Harleian MS. (no. 978) at Cam- bridge. The arrangement of Carmina burana", as their first publisher, Schmeller, named them, was upon a uniform plan, according to which they were divided into serious, comic, and aramatic pieces. Songs cele- brating the spring and the winter, m which sentiments of love also find expression, follow one another in great variety. Together with these are pious hymns of en- thusiasm for the Crusades or of praise for the Blessed Virgin. We also find the most riotous drinking-songs, often of a loose, erotic nature, nor arc diatribes of a satirical nature wanting: these soured and dissolute, though educated, tramps delighted especially in lam- poons against the pope, bishops, and nobles, inveigh- mg with bitter sarcasm against the avarice, ambition, and incontinence of the clergy. In this Professor Schonlmch sees the influence of the Catharists.
Concerning the composers of this extensive litera- ture nothing can be stated with certaintv. The poems were m a certain sense regarded as folk-songs, that is as common property and international in the full sense of the word. Some representative poets are indeed mentioned, e. g., Golias, Primas, Archipoeta, but these are merely assumed names. Particularly famous among the poems is the "Confessio Goliae", which was referred to the Archipoeta, and may be re- garded as the prototype of the goliardic songs : strophes 12-17 (Meum est vropositum in taberna ynori) are even to-day sun^ as a clrinking-song in German student cir- cles. The identity of the Archipoeta has been the sub- 1'ect of much investigation, but so far without success, 'aris was an important centre of these itinerant poets, particularly in the time of Abelard (1079-1142), and it was probably thence that they derived the name of
foliards, Atfelard having been called Golias by St. Bernard. From Paris their poetry passed to England and Germany, but in Italy it found Httle favour. At a later period, when the goliardic songs had become known ever}'where, the pngin of their title appears to
have grown obscure, and thus emerged a Bishop Go-
lias — a name referred to the Latin gtUa — to whom a
parody on the Apocalypse and biting satires on the
pope were ascribed. There even appeared poets as
filiuft or puer or discipulus de familia GolicBf and fre-
quent mention is made of a goliardic order with the
titles of abbot, prior, etc. Apart from their satirical
attitude towards ecclesiastical life, the goliards showed
their free, and at times heretical, views in their paro-
dies of religious hymns, their irreverence in adapting
ecclesiastical melodies to secular texts and their use
of metaphors and expressions from church hymns in
their loose verses.
In outward form the poetry of the goliards resem- bled the ecclesiastical sequences, rhyme being com- bined with an easily sun^ rhythm and the verses being joined into strophes. Smgularly rapid in its develop- ment, its decay was no less sudden. The cause of its decline is traceable partly to the conditions of the time and partly to the character of the goliardic poets. In a burlesque edict of 1265 the goliards were compared to bats — neither quadrupeds nor birds. This was in- deed a not inapt comparison, for their unfortunate begging rendered them odious to clergy and laity alike. Forgetting their higher educational parts, they found it necessary to ally themselves more and more closely with the strolling players and thus became subject to the ecclesiastical censures repeatedly decreed by synods and councils against these wandering musi- cians. Thus, regarded virtually as outlaws, they are heard of no more in France after the thirteenth cen- tury, although they are referred to in the synods of Germany until the following century. Together with the poets gradually disappeared their songs, and only a few are preserved in the KommersbUcher of the stu- dent worla. Yet the influence of their poetry on the secular German lyric, and perhaps also on the out^r form of religious poetry, was both stimulating and permanent. In this fact lies their principal literary importance and they are valuable as illustrations of the literary culture of the time.
Quite distinct in subject and form is the lyric poetry of the humanistic period, the era of the revival of classical learning. The work of a few scattered poets, it could not attain the popularity won by the goliardic poetry, even had its form not been exclu- sively an imitation of ancient classical versification. From the beginning of the sixteenth century the Cath- olic humanist, Vida, had been engaged among other works on the composition of odes, elegies, and hymns: he belonged to the poetcs urhani of the Medici period of Leo X, many of whom wrote lyrical, in addition to their epical, pieces. Johannes Dantiscus, who died in 1548 as Bishop of Ermland, composed thirty religious hymns after the fashion of the older ones in the Brevi- ary, without any trace of classical imitation. Even the renowned Nicolaus Copernicus composed seven odes embodying the beautiful Christian truths associ- ated with Advent and Christmas. Among the Hu- manists of Francer John Salmon (Salmonius Macrinus) was named the French Horace, and among the numer- ous other names those of Erixius with his " Carmina" (1519) and Theodore de Bds^e with his "Poemata" (1548) deserve special mention. In Belgium and the Netherlands Johannes Secundus (Jan Nicolai Ever- aerts,d. 1536) was conspicuous as a lyrical poet. From Holland Latin poetry found an entrance also into the Northern Empire under the patronage of Queen Chris- tina, while even Iceland haa its representative in the Protestant Bishop Sveinsson (1605-74), who among other works published a rich collection of poems to the Blessed Virgin in the most varied ancient Clascal metres.
As in the domain of drama, so also in that of lyrical poetry. Humanism showed itself most fruitful in Ger- many, particularly in connexion with the disseminsr tion of the new doctrine of Luther. * * Thus among the
