Page:History of the German people at the close of the Middle Ages vol1.djvu/303

PROSE AND POPULAR READING 291 The writers of fiction in Lower Germany were parti- cularly distinguished for their ingenuous, elegant, and poetic style of diction. The translations also were particularly well done, a good example of which is the version from the Latin of ' The Seven Sacres.' The writers lean to the popular dialect, and usually avoid all use of foreign words and expressions, which was in later times such a blemish in literary work. The style is simple, graceful, and charming. Several of the historical works of this period are written in a direct and truly epic style, very appropriate to the events and characters. The ' Limburger Chro- nicle,' which belongs to the fourteenth century, gives a good idea of the style of the epoch. Of like character are the ' Chronicles of Alsace,' by Jacob Twinger, canon of Strasburg (from Konigshofen), and the ' Chronicles of Thuringia,' by Johannes Eothe, a priest of Eisenach. The popular Bavarian chroniclers, Hans Ebran of Wil- denberg, Ulrich Eiitrer, and Veit Arnpeck, the pre- cursors of the historian Johann Thurmayer (surnamed Aventin), were also examples of persevering industry, true love of their profession, and pure literary talent. The Sleswick historian, Peter Eschenloer, was distin- guished for his knowledge of diplomacy. Switzerland is remarkably rich in historians, and among her most renowned we may place Melchior Euss and Petermann Etterlin, of Lucerne, Conrad Justinger and Diebold Schilling, of Bern. We have a remarkable record of burgher life in the autobiography and town chronicles of the great traveller and tax-receiver, Burkard Zink, of Augsburg. With delightful candour and in fluent language he im- parts to the reader a knowledge of his own travels and of u 2