editing the nation's memory textual scholarship and nation-building in ninteenth-century europe...

EUROPEAN STUDIES

26

EUROPEAN STUDIES

An Interdisciplinary Series in European Culture, History and Politics

Executive Editor

Menno Spiering, University of [email protected]

Series Editors

Robert Harmsen, The Queen’s University of BelfastJoep Leerssen, University of Amsterdam

Menno Spiering, University of AmsterdamThomas M. Wilson, Binghamton University,

State University of New York

EUROPEAN STUDIESAn Interdisciplinary Series in European Culture, History

and Politics

26

EDITINg THE NATION’S MEMORY:TExTUAL SCHOLARSHIP AND NATION-BUILDINg

IN NINETEENTH-CENTURY EUROPE

Amsterdam - New York, NY 2008

Edited by

Dirk Van Hulle and Joep Leerssen

Le papier sur lequel le présent ouvrage est imprimé remplit les prescriptions de "ISO 9706:1994, Information et documentation - Papier pour documents - Prescriptions pour la permanence".

The paper on which this book is printed meets the requirements of ‘ISO 9706: 1994, Information and documentation - Paper for documents - Requirements for permanence’.

ISBN: 978-90-420-2484-7©Editions Rodopi B.V., Amsterdam - New York, NY 2008Printed in The Netherlands

The editors wish to thank the European Science Foundation for funding the Exploratory Workshop ‘From Europe to nations and backagain: Scholarly editing between the universal appeal of the classics andthe national pasts’ (Amsterdam, December 2005), from which thisvolume has emerged.

NOTE FOR CONTRIBUTORS

European Studies is published several times a year. Each issue is dedicatedto a specific theme falling within the broad scope of European Studies.Contributors approach the theme from a wide range of disciplinary and,particularly, interdisciplinary perspectives.

The Editorial board welcomes suggestions for other future projects to beproduced by guest editors. In particular, European Studies may provide avehicle for the publication of thematically focused conference and collo-quium proceedings. Editorial enquiries may be directed to the seriesexecutive editor.

Subscription details and a list of back issues are available from the pub-lisher’s web site: www.rodopi.nl.

CONTENTS

Authors in this volume 9 JOEP LEERSSEN

Introduction: Philology and the European Constructionof National Literatures 13

TEXTS BETWEEN PAST AND PRESENT: EUROPEAN READERSHIPS, NATIONAL ROOTEDNESS

DIRK VAN HULLEA Darwinian Change in European Editorial Thinking 31

GEERT LERNOUTThe Angel of Philology 45

CASE STUDIES IEMERGING CANONS AROUND THE EUROPEAN RIM

DARKO DOLINARSlovene Text Editions, Slavic Philology and Nation-Building 65

PAULIUS V. SUBAČIUSInscribing Orality: The First Folklore Editions in the Baltic States 79

PAULA HENRIKSONScania Province Law and Nation-Building in Scandinavia 91

MARY-ANN CONSTANTINEWelsh Literary History and the Making of

‘The Myvyrian Archaiology of Wales’ 109

BERNADETTE CUNNINGHAMJohn O’Donovan’s Edition of the Annals of the Four Masters:

An Irish Classic? 129

8 EUROPEAN STUDIES

JOÃO DIONÍSIOAfter the Lisbon Earthquake: Reassembling History 151

MAGÍ SUNYERMedieval Heritage in the Beginnings of Modern Catalan Literature,

1780-1841 169

PHILIPPE MARTELThe Troubadours and the French State 185

CASE STUDIES IIEUROPEAN CROSS-CURRENTS: ENGLAND, GERMANY

AND THE LOW COUNTRIES

TOM SHIPPEYThe Case of Beowulf 223

THOMAS BEINWalther von der Vogelweide and Early-Nineteenth-

Century Learning 241

HERMAN BRINKMANHoffmann von Fallersleben and Medieval Dutch Folksong 255

JAN PAUWELSPrivate to Public: Book Collecting and Philology in

Early-Independent Belgium (1830-1880) 271

MARITA MATHIJSENStages in the Development of Dutch Literary Historicism 287

JOEP LEERSSENThe Nation’s Canon and the Book Trade 305

AUTHORS IN THIS VOLUME

THOMAS BEIN is professor for medieval German literature and ‘Kultur-und mediengeschichtliche Textwissenschaft’ at the RWTH Aachen Uni-versity. His areas of interest are twelfth- and thirteenth-century verse,Walther von der Vogelweide, scholarly editing, didactics, philology andthe new media.HERMAN BRINKMAN is senior researcher at the Huygens Institute (RoyalNetherlands Academy of Arts and Sciences), The Hague (Netherlands).He works on Dutch literature of the later Middle Ages and has broughtout editions of the Van Hulthem and Comburg miscellanies. At presenthe is preparing, in collaboration with Ike de Loos, a critical edition of theGruuthuse Manuscript, the oldest and by far the richest collection ofmedieval Dutch poems and songs that have been preserved with theiroriginal melodies.MARY-ANN CONSTANTINE’s publications include Breton Ballads (1996)and, with Gerald Porter, Fragments and Meaning in Traditional Song (2003).Since 2002 she has led the research project ‘Iolo Morganwg and theRomantic Tradition in Wales’ based at the University of Wales Centrefor Advanced Welsh and Celtic Studies in Aberystwyth. Her most recentbook is The Truth Against the World: Iolo Morganwg and Romantic Forgery(2007). BERNADETTE CUNNINGHAM is Deputy Librarian at the Royal IrishAcademy. She is author of The World of Geoffrey Keating (2000), andco-author with Raymond Gillespie of Stories from Gaelic Ireland: Micro-histories from the Sixteenth-Century Irish Annals (2003).JOÃO DIONÍSIO is professor of Portuguese Medieval Literature andTextual Criticism at the University of Lisbon. He has brought out texteditions of English and of Portuguese poetry, and is currently workingon an electronic edition of the late medieval treatise Leal Conselheiro, byKing D. Duarte (1391-1435).DARKO DOLINAR is head of the Institute of Slovene Literature andLiterary Studies at the Slovenian Academy of Sciences and Arts(Ljubljana). He has published widely on literary theory and methodology,an on the history of literary scholarship in Slovenia. He was involved aseditor or co-editor in the journal Primerjalna književnost (Comparativeliterature, 1978-1997) and the monograph series Literarni leksikon(1980-2001) and Studia litteraria (since 2004).

10 EUROPEAN STUDIES

PAULA HENRIKSON, currently a postdoctoral fellow at Uppsala Univer-sity, is working on a project about the history of editorial scholarship inSweden. Among her publications are the books Dramatikern Stagnelius(2004) and Textkritisk utgivning. Råd och riktlinjer (2007). She also works aseditor in the editorial society Svenska Vitterhetssamfundet.DIRK VAN HULLE teaches English literature at the University of Ant-werp. He is an editor of the Journal of Beckett Studies and Genetic Joyce Stud-ies, and maintains the Beckett society’s Endpage (www.ua.ac.be/beckett).He is the author of Textual Awareness (2004) and Manuscript Genetics, Joyce’sKnow-How, Beckett’s Nohow (2008). He is co-director of the Beckett DigitalManuscript Project.JOEP LEERSSEN holds the Chair of Modern European Literature at theUniversity of Amsterdam. His work on early cultural nationalism acrossEurope includes books like De bronnen van het vaderland (2006) and Na-tional Thought in Europe (2nd ed. 2008).GEERT LERNOUT teaches Comparative Literature at the University ofAntwerp, where he is director of the Joyce Center. He has publishedbooks on Joyce, Hölderlin, Bach’s ‘Goldberg Variations’, the history ofthe book, the bible. With Vincent Deane and Daniel Ferrer he is editorof the Finnegans Wake Notebooks at Buffalo. He is a member of the Aca-demia Europaea.PHILIPPE MARTEL is researcher at the CNRS and lectures in OccitanCivilisation at Montpellier University. His research focuses on SouthernFrench cultural history, in particular aspects involving Occitan revival-ism. Among his publications are Les Cathares et l’histoire (2002) and L’écolefrançaise et l’occitan, le sourd et le bègue (2007).MARITA MATHIJSEN is Professor of Dutch Literature at the University ofAmsterdam. She is mainly concerned with nineteenth-century literatureand editorial scholarship. Among her books are De gemaskerde eeuw (2002),Nederlandse literatuur in de Romantiek (2004) and the standard Dutch intro-duction to textual scholarship Naar de letter (3rd ed. 2003). She leads aresearch group ‘The construction of the literary past (1750-1850)’. JAN PAUWELS has been on the staff of the Royal Library in Brussels asChief Acquisitions and Keeper of nineteenth- and twentieth-centuryprinted books from 2004 onwards. Currently, he is seconded as spokes-person to the federal Secretary of State for Transport and Mobility.

AUTHORS 11

TOM SHIPPEY has recently retired from the Walter J. Ong Chair at SaintLouis University. Among his publications are The Critical Heritage: Beowulf(co-edited with Andreas Haarder, 1998), and an edited volume of essayson The Shadow-walkers: Jacob Grimm’s mythology of the monstrous (2005). Avolume of essays in his honour has appeared as Constructing Nations,Reconstructing Myths (2007), which also focuses on the effects of the philo-logical revolution inaugurated by Grimm. He intends to continue thistheme with further publications on medievalism and nationalist philol-ogy.PAULIUS VAIDOTAS SUBACIUS is associate professor in literary theory atVilnius University and a member of the Lithuanian Catholic Academy ofScience. Member of the board of the European Society for TextualScholarship. He has published numerous monographs, collections andarticles in the areas of literature, history, religion, and academic politics.His main interest is in the biographical, social and religious context oftextual production. He is now working on an edition of Antanas Ba-ranauskas’s poetry.MAGÍ SUNYER I MOLNÉ is lecturer in Catalan literature at the Rovira iVirgili University in Tarragona (Catalonia). He has published poetry,fiction and a contemporary tragedy. Among his scholarly work is a col-lection on the reprinting of classic Catalan texts, as well as numerousstudies on aspects of nineteenth- and twentieth-century Catalan litera-ture, with particular emphasis on Modernism and national myths. Hisbook Els mites nacionalistes Catalans appeared in 2006.

EUROPEAN STUDIES 26 (2008): 13-27

INTRODUCTION

PHILOLOGY AND THE EUROPEAN CONSTRUCTIONOF NATIONAL LITERATURES

Joep Leerssen

The Language/Literature/Nationality ParadigmCulture lies at the heart of our idea of the nation-state, and thus at theheart of our idea of Europe’s national diversity. While the nation-statederives the state’s constitutional sovereignty from a specifically nationalmandate, ‘the nation’ invoked is not only a social idea (the body politicjoined in a citizenry) but crucially also a cultural one – those peoplesharing a common set of historical memories and a common culture.

Culture, in turn, has from the Romantic period onwards been insis-tently linked to the idea of a shared language, and considered as express-ing itself most authentically in the oral and written literature in that lan-guage (Leerssen 2006b). Thus, the national specificity of the Europeanstates (and, in the general perception, one of the main reasons why theEuropean Union, though similar in demographic and economic size, cannever be as seamlessly integrated as the USA) resides in their cul-tural/linguistic foundation.

While this idea is so universally current as to be almost a matter ofself-evidence, it is in fact the result of a scholarly paradigm which,though apparently highly academic in nature, the province of the rarefiedrealm of philology, turns out to have been intricately intertwined, eversince its incipience around 1800, with the rise and dominance of Euro-pean nationalism. This volume explores the rise of this philologicalmodel of nationalities defined in their languages and expressing them-selves in their literatures.

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We tend to view Europe’s literary landscape implicitly as a set ofvarious literatures in different languages; each European language ex-pressing itself in its ‘own’ literature. By the same token, each Europeanliterature so defined forms the nation’s collective memory, its premiercultural inheritance with its own history, its own inner consistency link-ing texts from succeeding centuries by different authors into a distinctcorpus and tradition. Language and literature thus closely intertwinedform the very backbone of the nation’s identity and its persistence acrossthe generations.

The template of national specificity projected onto Europe’s literarytraditions is already signalled by the fact that they are periodized, notaccording to general historical faultlines (i.e. the invention of Guten-berg’s printing press, or the invention of woodpulp paper and othertechnological advances in printing and book production between 1800and 1840), but along country- or language-specific lines. Often the majorhistorical caesuras of the literary traditions are linked to the great linguis-tic shifts. Anglo-Saxon (or Old English), Middle English and Early Mod-ern English literature are distinguished from each other on the basis ofthe major transitions and discontinuities that divide the linguistic formsof Old, Middle and Early Modern English. The great difference betweenMalory and Spenser, it would seem, is that one wrote before, the otherafter the Great Vowel Shift. Similar linguistically-based periodizationscan be noted for other languages like Gaelic and German. This hassomething to do, obviously, with the competence of the philologiststudying the texts in question, much as in literary studies it is a truthuniversally acknowledged that the only way to understanding a text is byreading it in the original: reading the literature requires knowing thelanguage. As a result, our education system has traditionally linked thetwo in the philological model of the Siamese Twins called Lang and Lit.

The Lang-Lit model has long been a serviceable template for aca-demic work, but its limitations have over the last decades become in-creasingly obvious. It had long been realized that many authors andcorpuses are ambiguous in their linguistic appurtenance: Milton writingin Latin and English, Nabokov in Russian and English. The tradition ofMedieval Latin and Neo-Latin; the cases of authors from bilingual coun-tries rooted in more than one linguistic tradition (Ireland, Belgium, Fin-land, Switzerland); the case of languages stretching over different societ-ies, different continents even, with different social contexts and literarytraditions (French, English, Spanish): all that is an ongoing reminder that

INTRODUCTION 15

1 Borges 1930: ‘Para el concepto clásico, la pluralidad de los hombres y de lostiempos es accesoria, la literatura es siempre una sola’.

the criterion of language is not as universally categorical for the classifi-cation of literature as it would seem at first sight. In the last decades,new disciplines and specialisms have accordingly grouped literary cor-puses in new ways, often combining texts from different languages intonewly-constituted aggregates: from area studies and postcolonial studiesto ‘period’ studies. It is now readily admitted that Chaucer and Boccacciohave, across the English-Italian linguistic divide, more in common thanChaucer and Galsworthy, or Boccaccio and D’Annunzio.

At the same time it has become increasingly obvious that the Lang-Litparadigm is of relatively modern vintage. Although our literary historiesall work on its basis, and accordingly trace a single national literatureback to its earliest beginnings in the medieval vernacular (thus making itseem that these traditions always had an autonomous identity for as longas we can retrace the written evidence), the insight is now gaining groundthat this is in fact an anachronistic retroprojection. The meaning of theterm ‘literature’ was wholly different before Romanticism, its old sensebeing perhaps best illustrated by William Godwin’s definition, in theInquiry into Political Justice of 1793, of literature as ‘the diffusion of knowl-edge through the medium of discussion, whether written or oral’. Simi-larly, the compartmentalization of literature on the basis of language waswholly different the further we travel back in history. It is safe to say that‘national’ or language-based categorizations of literary corpuses wereunimportant in the seventeenth century, let alone earlier. The word litera-ture was often used as a singulare tantum, in the sense of learning as ex-pressed in writing, and nationally or linguistically a-specific. At most therewas a distinction between the literature of classical antiquity and that ofmodern times, but the literary canon was blithely multilingual and uni-versalist, embracing Homer, Virgil, Dante, Cervantes and Shakespeare.As Jorge Luis Borges phrased it, this classical view saw the distinctionbetween people and centuries as incidental, and literature was always inthe singular.1

The question of nationality and universalism in pre-Romantic Euro-pean literature is of course enormously complex, and can only be sketch-ily outlined here. By all accounts, however, something like a paradigmshift occurred in that period between 1760 and 1840 that was marked bya number of concurrent revolutionary changes – such as the democratic

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revolutions of 1776 and 1789, the end of the ancien régime, the IndustrialRevolution (which affected book production as much as other aspects oflife) and the rise of Romanticism. For our present purpose, it is useful todraw attention to two further paradigm shifts: the rise of comparatism,and the rise of historicism. By comparatism I mean that the philosophicaland anthropological questions which had been addressed in the abstractin the Enlightenment decades (the study of Man, the origin of Language,the meaning of History) was turned inside-out and became a compara-tive study of differentiations: anthropology became a comparative-ethno-graphical study of the differences between races and societies; the studyof the origin of Language and Culture was, following Herder, turned intoa comparative calibration of the diversity between languages and be-tween cultures; and the philosophical history-writing of Hume, Voltaireand Gibbon (what Bolingbroke called ‘Philosophy teaching by example’)abandoned its political emphasis on succeeding dynasties and rulers, andanchored itself in the demotic track record of the nation’s collectiveexperience (cf. generally Leerssen 2006).

Historicism, for its part, was the investigation of the past, not as aphilosophical exemplum or as antiquarian curio, but as a challenging ex-pansion of one’s mental and cultural frame of reference, and as a contin-uous dynamics of processes of growth, decay, conflict and resolution. Ifany continuity existed between past and present, it was not so much amoral or philosophical one as a national-anthropological one, showingthe nation’s evolution from primitive origins to modern maturity (ordecay), and stressing the need not to lose the purity of the nation’s pri-meval roots and energies from sight amidst the complexities of the pres-ent (cf. generally Leerssen 2004a and 2004b).

These developments all of them reflect the belated influence ofGiambattista Vico’s Scienza Nuova of 1724. A gnomic, wayward anddifficult book (which it unavoidably was, since it had no pre-existingmodel to rely on), the Scienza Nuova had spelled out the agenda for some-thing which Vico called by the old-fashioned Greek word for ‘erudition’,filologia, but which he gave a very specific new meaning by opposing it tophilosophy. Whereas philosophy, for Vico, meant the investigation of thetruths that are greater than man (and therefore, in the final analysis, notcompletely knowable by man), philology investigates the certainties thatare a product of the human mind, the factual or ‘constructed truth’ (verumfactum), and which man may understand as fully as a watchmaker knowsthe clocks he has made. Philology dealt, then, with the sum total of man-

INTRODUCTION 17

2 On the conceptual history of ‘philology’, including the impact of Vico: Hummel2000. On Vico: Berlin 2003. The recursive phraseology ‘Erkenntnis des Erkannten’aptly indicates the self-reflexive dimension of a Vicoesque notion of culture and ofphilology (as both a praxis and a reflection on that praxis), rendering it systemicallycomplex and autopoetic.

made certainties, all things by which humans make their world recogniz-able, knowable and predictable – which is tantamount to saying thatphilology deals with culture. Aspects of culture are, for Vico: mythology(a deferential way of saying that religion, too, is a cultural praxis provid-ing certainties), history, manners and customs, law, literature and lan-guage.

Vico was among the first European thinkers to formulate the idea, sopopular from Romanticism onwards, that these aspects of culture are allderived from a single primitive ethnic self-invention and self-articulation.Law-makers, poets and priests have aboriginally one and the same func-tion. It is for that reason that ancient laws jointly address civic and theo-logical issues, and are often couched in a poetic language; it is for thisreason that mythology is so often expressed through the poetic mediumof epic. And that in turn means that all the branches of learning dealingwith these matters can be jointly linked (we would call it ‘interdisciplin-ary’ nowadays) in an endeavour that Vico already called philological. Al-though Vico himself remained obscure during his lifetime and for a longtime after his death, and became famous only in the 1820s, his influencewas felt everywhere. The classical scholar August Boeckh defined philol-ogy without once mentioning Vico, but in a sweeping anthropologicalphrase that would have delighted the author of the Scienza nuova: as theErkenntnis des Erkannten, the ‘understanding of our understanding’.2

The spread of Vico-style philology triggered many important schol-arly developments. For one thing, it resulted in the nineteenth-centurystructural-comparative study of mythology. Its concerns are also notice-able in the new discipline of legal history (and legal historicism) asopened up by Friedrich Carl von Savigny (1779-1861), the great legalhistorian and mentor of young Jacob Grimm. Legal history, nowadays afairly marginal specialism, was at the centre of jurisprudence before theintroduction of Napoleonic legislation in Europe: the full record of legalwisdom constituted the tradition that was invoked for the settlement ofdisputes, and therefore the record-keeping of ancient case law was at theheart of the legal profession and made it the lodestar for textual source-editing in the course of the eighteenth century. The major philological

18 European Studies

source editions of the nineteenth century would as a result often have ajurisprudential slant or interest. In this connection the Swedish edition ofold law texts (Sweriges gamla lagar) by H.S. Collin and C.J. Schlyter(1827ff.) deserves mention, which had, for a spin-off effect, a dictionaryof old Swedish (Ordbok till samlingen af Sweriges gamla lagar, 1877) by wayof a lexicographical companion volume. The established tradition oflegal historicism gained new impetus because laws, in the Romantic viewas represented by Savigny, were not just instruments for conflict manage-ment, but expressions of the morality of the nation-at-large. It was thisanthropological view which led scholars (like Savigny’s erstwhile studentand assistant Grimm, who considered legal history an integral part ofGermanistik) to focus on the cross-currents between law, moral outlook,vocabulary and literary expression (cf. Schmidt-Wiegand 1987). This or-ganicist and Vicoesque focus can also be noticed in the enormous up-surge, between 1800 and 1830, of philology sensu stricto, that is to say: thestructural-comparative and historicist study of variants in languages,texts and literatures. In other words, the rise of the Lang-Lit paradigm ofnational literatures and national literary histories can be dated from thisperiod.

From Reinventory to Reinvention: The Institutional ContextNone of this would have been possible merely as a result of intellectualratiocination. The rise of philology was also prepared by a slow butaccelerating process of textual availability and anamnesis. By the mid-eighteenth century, much of the medieval textual record of Europe’svernaculars had fallen into oblivion or neglect. To be sure, this neglectwas not total: there were bibliophiles and antiquaries who collected,studied and/or printed medieval literature – one thinks for example ofthe Marquis de Paulmy, whose private library was the core of thepresent-day Bibliothèque de l’Arsenal, and whose collection Mélanges tiréesd’une grande bibliothèque appeared in no less than 69 volumes between1779-1788. Other examples include the antiquary and librarian Legrandd’Aussy; or the great Scandinavian collector Arni Magnusson, and theeditions of Minnesang and Nibelungen material by Bodmer andBreitinger in 1757.

To some extent, such activities were in the antiquarian mode, and canbe aligned with ballad editions like the Reliques of Ancient English Poetry byBishop Percy (1765); to some extent, again, they belong to a tradition of

INTRODUCTION 19

ecclesiastical and legal scholarship that had always been concerned withcollecting, collating and compiling ancient source material. Literary com-pendia and repertories in the eighteenth century can be encountered aspart of the church-historical and hagiographical school of the Bollandistsand Jean Mabillon, the founder of diplomatics (1632-1707), and aboveall, as part of the legal-historical method, so influential all over Europe,of Luigi Muratori (1652-1750), the founder of modern historical sourcecriticism and a lodestar of text-editorial method.

It would be simplistic, then, given all these scholarly activities, topretend that the philologists of the Romantic generation ‘invented’ thehistorical method or the craft of text-editing, or even that it was they,and they alone, who rediscovered the Middle Ages after centuries of totalamnesia. The editorial work of Correia da Serra in Portugal is in manyways the continuation of an older eighteenth-century pattern. In North-Western Europe, the antiquarianism of Iolo Morganwg and TheophilusO’Flanagan (including their Macphersonesque penchant for fabricatingevidence where needed) forms the stepping-stone for the more philologi-cal work of Thomas Price and John O’Donovan. While in most of West-ern Europe, philology was professionalizing, the edition of oral materialin the Finnish-Baltic area remained, well into the century, the work ofamateur investigators like Elias Lönnrot and Krisjanis Baron. But on thewhole, all parts of Europe participate, whatever the variables of the localsituation, in an undeniable qualitative and quantitative leap after 1770,and again after 1800, and it involved the matter of availability. Textswere becoming available to an unprecedented degree. The eighteenth-century scholars and antiquaries had worked on the basis of textualmaterial that was often in private hands. The large ballad MS from whichBishop Percy published the Reliques was a fortuitous find (cf. Groom1999); the grande bibliothèque of Paulmy and the collection of ArniMagnusson were privately-owned. At best, text editions made use ofsemi-public collections in the hands of monarchs, municipalities or mon-asteries, to which it was a privilege to enjoy access. Bodmer’s first tenta-tive edition of the Nibelungen material, for instance, was based on amanuscript spotted in the private collection of Count Hohenems twoyears previously.

Manuscript-collecting was a pursuit for the educated elite. We seeantiquaries like James Ussher, Sir James Ware, and Edward Lhuyd ac-quire important collections of Gaelic manuscripts between 1620 and1720; we also see how after their deaths, these collections are either sold

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3 The vicissitudes of Irish MSS can be gathered from the introduction to Hancocket al 1865-73; Love 1961; Ó Muraíle 1996.

off to other collectors (giving rise to named MS corpuses such as theSebright MSS or the Stowe MSS), or else acquired by corporate bodiessuch as Trinity College Dublin (in the case of the Ussher MSS) or theBodleian (Lhuyd was curator of the Ashmolean).3 Once materials driftinto institutional ownership, they usually stay there; the instances ofuniversity libraries selling material to private collectors are rare indeed.There is then, a tendency over the eighteenth and nineteenth century forprivate collections to be siphoned off into the institutional, publicsphere. The manuscript holdings of the British Library still carry thenames of the original private-individual collections which its absorbed inthese decades: Royal MSS, Stowe MSS, Cotton, Rawlinson. (The solesurviving manuscript of Beowulf, first spotted in the late eighteenth cen-tury, is accordingly still known by its old catalogue marker ‘CottonVitellius’).

On the Continent, this public siphoning of MS collections abruptlyaccelerates after 1770s with the break-up of the old monastic collections.The trend can be first spotted with the suppression of the Jesuits in the1770s: their library in Lisbon becomes the core, eventually, of the Lisbonuniversity library, and in the process important medieval manuscripts likethe Cancioneiro da Ajuda come to light (cf. Michaëlis 1904). A similarprocess occurs when in the Holy Roman Empire, monastic fiefs aresecularized and mediatized as a result of the Reichsdeputationshauptschlussof 1803. Out of the monasteries of Bavaria, an enormous damburst ofmanuscript material is concentrated into the Munich court library around1803, which as a result almost overnight became the most important re-pository of medieval literature after Paris, Vienna and the Vatican(Hacker 2000). The Carmina Burana of Benediktbeuren surfaced in thisprocess. Likewise, the Comburg MS of the Reynard the Fox fable wasdiscovered when that monastery was dissolved and its library was relo-cated to, and re-inventorized in, the Württemberg library at Stuttgart(Brinkman & Schenkel 1997).

All this was dwarfed by the impact of the French Revolution and theNapoleonic conquests. The Royal Library of Paris first became a Na-tional, then an Imperial Library, and everywhere the conquering Frencharmies nationalized church establishments and sold off their property;initially into private hands, from where the manuscripts prised loose

INTRODUCTION 21

4 Kopitar (1780-1844) was, with Dobrovský (1723-1859), the founder of modernSlavic studies. On Kopitar and Zois, see Merchiers 2005. A good deal of interestingmaterial on Dobrovský is given in Keenan 2003.

5 An intermediary stage should not be overlooked: that of the sociable associationof private scholars into city academies or learned societies.

from their century-old sequestration, drifted into the public domain overthe following decades. And even where libraries were not pillaged orsold off (it was this that brought to light material as diverse as the medi-eval Dutch Servatius Legend, by Veldeke, and the ancient Slavic GospelBook of Rheims), the French occupier would appoint officials in a bu-reaucratic re-structuring which again often triggered re-inventories andrediscoveries. The Biblioteca palatina in the Vatican Libraries is a case inpoint: the old Court Library of the Palatinate, taken from Heidelberg aswar booty in the 1670s and donated to the Pope, was found around 1810(by Gloeckle and Görres) to contain important treasures of medievalGerman literature (cf. Görres 1955), and was eventually donated by thePope to Heidelberg University Library as part of the post-Napoleonicsettlements in 1818. Another case in point involves the appointment ofAngelo Mai (1782-1854) to the Biblioteca ambrosiana in Milan in 1811,which resulted in the discovery important manuscript remains, Latin andeven Gothic.

One of the groundswell-changes of the eighteenth century involvesthe development, traced by Jürgen Habermas (1990[1962]), of a ‘publicsphere’. In the professionalization of the pursuit of philology, this shiftmakes itself clearly felt. The old patrons (like Kopitar’s patron BaronZois in Slovenia,4 or the church seminaries that spawned the priest-scholars like José Correia de Serra, Josef Dobrovský and Angelo Mai)were ceding their role to a new generation of university-trained andacademically-employed scholars; as a result, a good deal of generationalrivalry is seen where young generations are always ready to hurl thereproach of amateurish dilettantism at their elders, thus taking the newly-established high ground of a rigidly scientific methodology. That scien-tific high ground goes together with a professionalization, that is to say:a shift of philology from private hobby to publicly-funded discipline.5The succession of philologists in their various generations is always oneof repudiation, driven by an ongoing urge to outgrow the credulity,untrustworthiness and amateurish imprecision of the older generation.

What has not yet been traced in the cultural shift from private topublic in the emergence of the modern state is the transfer of ancient

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6 In Hroch’s analysis, national movements will typically start with an intellectualrediscovery of the nation’s culture and traditions (phase A), will then move into aphase of social assertions and demands for recognition (phase B), and then into aphase of militant separatism (phase C).

literary material into that public sphere – a transfer which took placeeverywhere, which made medieval vernacular literature accessible to anunprecedented degree and made the entire enterprise of the emergingphilology possible in the first place. Practically all the great philologistsof this generation started their career as archivists and librarians, werepart of this vast, slow landslide of texts from private hands into publicownership. After all, what else does the word publish – which we sothoughtlessly use for the transition from handwritten to printed, fromsingle- to multiple-copy – mean than making a text public?

Nation-Building, National Canons, National RivalryIn many cases, the investigation and publication of the roots of Euro-pean vernacular literatures was part of a nation-building process whichwould in many cases lead to full-fledged nationalist, autonomist or sepa-ratist movements. The many ‘minority’ literatures of Europe find theirroots and ambitions in these romantic-historicist decades: in Catalunya,on the Balkans and in the Baltic. As such, editorial and philologicalscholarship (or folklore research, in those cases where literary materialwas transmitted orally rather than in writing) forms part of whatMiroslav Hroch (1985) has identified as the incipient ‘phase A’ of na-tional movements.6 How these incipiently national movements relate toregional trends elsewhere (e.g., the relations between Celtic philology inBrittany, in Wales and in Ireland, or the relations between the revival ofJocs Florals in Catalan Barcelona and in Occitan Toulouse) remains achallenging task for future researchers (cf. Leerssen 2006b). And even inold-established states, the rediscovery of the literary past tended to inten-sify national feeling, especially since many of the literary heirlooms thatwere brought to light were contested between different modern coun-tries.

Michel Foucault’s dictum (1979) that ‘first of all, texts are objects ofappropriation’ has no clearer demonstration than the publication of thevernacular classics that occurred in these decades. The discoveries orrediscoveries occured when Europe was witnessing the break-up of theancien régime and its reconstitution, following the bulldozings of Napo-

INTRODUCTION 23

7 Cf. Leerssen 2006a: 180-185; Schmidt 1974 [1885]. On the national chauvinism ofGrimm and the Germanisten, also Fürbeth 1999, Netzer 2006.

8 The phrase ‘notre véritable épopée nationale’ is from a review in Le Monde, quotedin the introduction to Michel 1869 [1837]. See also Brandsma 1996; Redman 1991;Taylor 2001.

9 Espagne & Werner 1990; Gumbrecht 1986; Ridoux 2001.

leon, into a system of national states. However, the texts themselvesreflected a Europe which in the early Middle Ages was still organized intribal lordships, and in the later Middle Ages in feudal realms. Thereappropriation of those texts into a new context thus presented manyoccasions for anachronism or categorical mismatch.

The most outstanding example is the case of Beowulf (cf. Shippey &Haarder 1998): a text set on the North Sea coast between NorthernGermany and Southern Scandinavia, reflecting common-Germanic narra-tive and mythological themes, written in Anglo-Saxon, produced andkept in England, and first published in Copenhagen (1815) as a PoëmaDanicum dialecto Anglo-Saxonica. What ensued was not just a long scholarlyand editorial debate on the verbal substance and linguistic appurtenanceof the text, but also a long tug-of-war as to who could claim Beowulf as‘their own’: Danes, English, or even Germans (who considered Beowulf toreflect the tribal culture of Angles and Saxons then still established on‘German’ soil, prior to their British de-Germanization). Relations be-tween Nordic and German philologists7 were famously soured by thecontested territory that is, almost symbolically, Beowulf’s ancestral setting:Schleswig-Holstein, over which two German-Danish wars were fought inthe course of the century.

Nor is Beowulf an unusual case. The French Chanson de Roland, imme-diately hailed as ‘notre véritable épopée nationale’, was retrieved from theBodleian library.8 Medieval Portuguese chronicles were found in Paris.The first edition of the Dutch Caerle ende Elegast was undertaken by theGerman poet/philologist Hoffmann von Fallersleben, and appeared inBreslau in 1824. The rise of Provençal and Spanish medieval philologywas famously influenced by German philologists from the school ofGrimm (who himself had edited a Silva de romances viejos in 1815). Thefigure of the Grimm-adept Friedrich Diez (1794-1876) looms large overthe study of medieval Provençal.9 German-French rivalry, both geo-politically and academically, was no less bitter than German-Danishrivalry, and the strong-arm attitudes of the German philologists withtheir ‘critical’ Lachmann-style editing techniques were much resented in

24 European Studies

10 Paris 1836: ‘We used to have great poems, which for four hundred years formedthe most important object of study of our forefathers. And during that entire period,all of Europe, including Germany, England, Spain and Italy, having nothing compara-ble to place alongside us, either in their historical deeds or in the expression of thosedeeds, vied for the secondary honours of translation and imitation.’

France. There was some friction in Provencal studies between thenativist influence of François Raynouard (1761-1836) and the Germaninfluence of Diez; and in the field of French epic poetry, the great medi-evalist and French patriot Paulin Paris (1800-1881) contrasted thepresent-day pre-eminence of German philologists with the erstwhileprimacy of French medieval literature:

Nous avions autrefois de grands poèmes, qui durant quatre cents ans ontfait la plus importante étude de nos pères. Et durant ce période, l’Europeentière, Allemagne, Angleterre, Espagne et Italie, n’ayant rien à nousopposer de comparable, ni dans leurs fastes historiques ni dans l’expressionde ces fastes, s’est disputé la gloire secondaire de les traduire et de lesimiter.10

This rivalry was exacerbated when literary materials were by their naturepre-national or trans-national, and could therefore be ‘claimed’ (Paris’spossessive and antagonistic use of the first-person plural is telling) bymany heirs: themes like Reynard the Fox, the Charlemagne- and Rolandcycles, Arthurian material.

Thus the political rivalries and geopolitics of nineteenth-centuryEurope (involving disputed areas such as Schleswig-Holstein or Alsace-Lorraine) informs the philological claims to literary heirlooms. Evenmore, it also underpins philological and editorial technique. The ‘critical’style of textual editing, pioneered by the great classical scholar CarlLachmann (1793-1851), aligning various manuscripts into a family treeor stemma of corresponding variants and derivations and distilling fromthis an ideal Urtext, was considered typically ‘German’, linked to theidealistic bent of German philosophy (always extrapolating from thetangible towards the ideal). Much mistrusted was also the tendency toextrapolate away from the actual text towards Stoffgeschichte or mythology,to distill from the texts the disembodied narrative themes, myths andtropes. The opposing tendency was accordingly considered anti-German:to take, after careful comparison, the best available text and to edit thatin its integrity, with the variants merely noted by way of ancillary sideinformation. Later on, that technique was linked to the French anti-Lach-mannian medievalist Joseph Bédier (1864-1938); but the anti-Lach-

INTRODUCTION 25

11 On the Reynard quarrels, Leerssen 2006a: 75-95. On Lachmann and his influ-ence: Lutz-Hensel 1975, Timpanaro 1963, Weigel 1989. On Bédier: Ridoux 2001.

mannian impetus predated Bédier and can already be found in the con-flicting stances of Jacob Grimm and Paulin Paris over the notoriouslycomplex Reynard the Fox material.11

It is in this context that we must situate the rise of the national paradigmin literary studies, and explain the intimate conjunction between nine-teenth-century nation-building and the emergence of medievally-basednational-literary canons in Europe. The idea that literatures were cate-gorized first and foremost by nationality, much as nationality itself wasfirst and foremost categorized by language, rises abruptly in these de-cades: it is the influence of Herder’s cultural relativism combined withthe romantic historicism that flourished against Napoleon’s universalrule.

There are mutliple ironies at work here. To begin with, the ‘national’classics, now so firmly enshrined in our respective literary histories as thefigureheads of a firmly ‘national’ tradition, only emerged from obscurityin the early nineteenth century. Again, although they themself were oftenof indistinct national provenance, they were immediately subjected torivalling national appropriations. Thirdly, the national schools of philol-ogy which were vying for the true ownership of these pre-national, medi-eval texts and authors were themselves only crystallizing as the Europeannation-states were taking firm shape in the post-Napoleonic decades. Onthe whole, then, the process appears one where the very act of compe-tition serves to give a clear outline to the competing parties, whose ri-valry is subsequently retrojected into the past, and given historical roots,by the act of claiming certain textual and cultural heirlooms as ‘theirs’ tothe exclusion of others. Much as, in the line of reasoning of ErnestGellner, Eric Hobsbawm and Benedict Anderson, national identities arenationalist constructs, so too national literatures are philological con-structs.

ReferencesBerlin, Isaiah. 2003. Three Critics of the Enlightenment: Vico, Hamann, Herder (ed.

Henry Hardy). London: Pimlico.

26 European Studies

Borges, Jorge Luis. 1930. La postulación de la realidad. In Prosa Completa1:155-60. 5 vols., Barcelona: Bruguera.

Brandsma, Frank. 1996. Het Chanson de Roland: Van vondst tot nationaal epos.In De Middeleeuwen in de negentiende eeuw, ed. R.E.V. Stuip & C. Vellekoop,155-168. Hilversum: Verloren.

Brinkman, Herman & Janny Schenkel (eds.). 1997. Het Comburgse handschrift, Hs.Stuttgart, Württembergische Landesbibliothek, Cod. poet. et phil. 2. 22. 2 vols;Hilversum: Verloren.

Espagne, Michel & Michael Werner (eds.). 1990. Philologiques I: Contribution àl’histoire des disciplines littéraires en France et en Allemagne au XIXe siècle. Paris:Maison des sciences de l’homme.

Foucault, Michel. 1979. What is an author? In Textual strategies: Perspectives in post-structuralist criticism, ed. J. Harari, 141-160. Ithaca, NY: Cornell UniversityPress.

Görres, Joseph. 1955. Geistesgeschichtliche und literarische Schriften (ed. L. Just). 2vols; Köln: Gilde/Bachem.

Groom, Nick. 1999. The Making of Percy’s ‘Reliques’. Oxford: Clarendon.Gumbrecht, Hans Ulrich. 1986. ‘Un souffle d’Allemagne ayant passé’: Friedrich

Diez, Gaston Paris, and the Genesis of National Philologies. Romance Philol-ogy 40.1: 1-37

Fürbeth, Frank, et al. (eds.). 1999. Zur Geschichte und Problematik der National-philologien in Europa. 150 Jahre Erste Germanistenversammlung in Frankfurt amMain (1846-1996). Tübingen: Niemeyer.

Habermas, Jürgen. 1990 [1962]. Strukturwandel der Öffentlichkeit. Frankfurt/M:Suhrkamp.

Hacker, Rupert (ed.). 2000. Beiträge zur Geschichte der Bayerischen Staatsbibliothek.München: Saur.

Hancock, W. Neilson et al. (eds.). 1865-73. Ancient laws of Ireland. 6 vols; Dub-lin/London.

Hroch, Mirsolav. 1985. Social Preconditions of National Revival in Europe: A Compar-ative Analysis of the Social Composition of Patriotic Groups among the Smaller Euro-pean Nations. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Hummel, Pascale. 2003. Philologus auctor. Le philologue et son oeuvre. Bern: Lang.Keenan, Edward L. 2003. Josef Dobrovský and the Origins of the Igor’ Tale. Cam-

bridge, MA: Harvard University Press.Leerssen, Joep. 2004a. Literary Historicism: Romanticism, Philologists, and the

Presence of the Past. Modern Language Quarterly 65.2: 221-43.Leerssen, Joep. 2004b. Ossian and the Rise of Literary Historicism. In The

Reception of Ossian in Europe, ed. H. Gaskill, 109-125. London: Continuum.Leerssen, Joep. 2006a. De bronnen van het vaderland: Taal, literatuur en de afbakening

van Nederland, 1806-1890. Nijmegen: Vantilt.Leerssen, Joep. 2006b. National Thought in Europe: A Cultural History. Amster-

dam: Amsterdam University Press.

INTRODUCTION 27

Leerssen, Joep. 2006c. Nationalism and the Cultivation of Culture. Nations andNationalism 12.4: 559-578.

Love, Walter D. 1961. Edmund Burke, Charles Vallancey, and the Sebrightmanuscripts. Hermathena 95: 21-35.

Lutz-Hensel, Magdalene. 1975. Prinzipien der ersten textkritischen Editionenmittelhochdeutscher Dichtung: Brüder Grimm, Benecke, Lachmann. Eine methoden-kritische Analyse. Berlin: Erich Schmidt.

Merchiers, Ingrid. 2005. Cultural Nationalism in the South Slav HabsburgLands in the Early Nineteenth Century: The Scholarly Network of JernejKopitar (1780-1844). Doctoral thesis, Gent: Universiteit Gent.

Michaëlis de Vasconcellos, Carolina. 1904. ‘Resenha bibliographica’. In Cancio-neiro da Ajuda. Edição critica e commentada, 1-53. Halle/S: Niemeyer.

Michel, Francisque (ed.), 1869 [1837]. La Chanson de Roland et le Roman deRoncevaux des XIIe et XIIIe siècles; publiés pour la première fois d’après les manuscritde la bibliothèque Bodléienne à Oxford et de la Bibliothèque Impériale. Paris.

Netzer, Katinka. 2006. Wissenschaft aus nationaler Sehnsucht: Verhandlungen derGermanisten 1846 und 1847. Heidelberg: Winter.

Ó Muraíle, Nollaig. 1996. The celebrated antiquary Dubhaltach Mac Fhirbhisigh(c.1600-1671), his lineage, life and learning. Maynooth: An Sagart.

Paris, Paulin (ed.). 1832. Li romans de Berte aus grans piés, précédé d’une dissertationsur les romans des Douze Pairs. Paris.

Redman, Harry, jr. 1991. The Roland Legend in Nineteenth-Century French Literature.Lexington, KY: University Press of Kentucky.

Ridoux, Charles. 2001. Évolution des études médiévales en France de 1860 à 1914.Paris: Champion.

Schmidt, Ernst (ed.). 1974 [1885]. Briefwechsel der Gebrüder Grimm mit nordischenGelehrten (new ed. Ludwig Denecke). Walluf: Sändig.

Schmidt-Wiegand, Ruth. 1987. Das sinnliche Element des Rechts: JacobGrimms Sammlung und Beschreibung deutscher Rechtsaltertümer. InKasseler Vorträge in Erinnerung an den 200. Geburtstag der Brüder Jacob und Wil-helm Grimm, ed. L. Denecke, 1-24. Marburg: Elwert.

Shippey, T.A. & Andreas Haarder (eds.). 1998. Beowulf: The Critical Heritage.London: Routledge.

Taylor, Andrew. 2001. Was there a Song of Roland? Speculum 76: 28-65.Timpanaro, Sebastiano. 1963. La genesi del metodo del Lachmann. Firenze: Le

Monnier.Weigel, Harald. 1989. ‘Nur was du nie gesehn wird ewig dauern’: Carl Lachmann und

die Entstehung der wissenschaftlichen Edition. Freiburg/Br: Rombach.

TEXTS BETWEEN PAST AND PRESENT:EUROPEAN READERSHIP, NATIONAL ROOTEDNESS

1 See Geert Lernout’s contribution in this volume.


A DARWINIAN CHANGE IN EUROPEAN EDITORIALTHINKING

Dirk Van Hulle

AbstractWhile most European editors in the so-called Sattelzeit (the periodleading up to and following after the French Revolution) were preoc-cupied with establishing and fixating national Urtexts in the service ofnation-building, authors became increasingly aware of the literarycreation as a process and started preserving their rough drafts andmanuscripts. This trend prefigured a Darwinian change in editorialthinking: from an essentialist approach to a new focus on gestationsand processes, marked by an acceptance of imperfection and an ap-preciation of the value of ‘mistakes’ as a crucial element in the dy-namics of writing.

Scholarly editing in the vernacular has had a considerable cultural andsocial impact on nation building in different language areas within Eu-rope. Apart from the spatial aspect of this phenomenon, it is also possibleto trace a double movement on the temporal axis. The first movement is atendency from editing as a ‘European’ enterprise to national interests.1The second movement is the development of scholarly editing in thewake of the so-called Sattelzeit. This period is marked by an interestingside effect: the link between scholarly editing and nation building provesto be bidirectional, since nation building in its turn also had an impact onscholarly editing, resulting in the development of different national edito-

32 Dirk Van Hulle

2 For a survey of these schools in relation to twentieth-century literary geneses, seeVan Hulle 2004

3 See Thomas Bein’s contribution in this volume.

rial ‘schools’.2 To try and analyse this development, this article focuseson three schools: the German, the French, and the Anglo-Americantraditions.

As Thomas Bein points out,3 Karl Lachmann was not the only im-portant figure in the foundation of the German school. Sebastiano Tim-panaro notes that the Lachmannian method had been prepared by manyother philologists, such as Carl Gottlob Zumpt, Johan Nicolai Madvig,Friedrich Wilhelm Ritschl, and Friedrich August Wolf (Timpanaro 1971,42; 69). More specifically, they prepared the genealogical division of themanuscripts and the identification of common ‘ancestors’ by arrangingversions in a kind of family tree of textual descent. Lachmann startedapplying his method not only to classical authors and medieval texts, butalso to works by modern authors such as Gotthold Ephraim Lessing(edited between 1838 and 1840). However, Lachmann’s method was notdesigned to cope with autograph manuscripts, drafts and genetic variants(changes made by the author himself during the process of writing andrevising). His genealogical method focused on transmissional variants(‘Überlieferungsvarianten’).

This is interesting because it indicates the impact of the ‘Sattelzeit’phenomenon on scholarly editing: editing was mainly regarded – at leastby Lachmannians – as a tool to provide the German-speaking audiencewith the stable, definitive text of ‘national’ poets. After Lessing, Schillerand Goethe followed in the second half of the nineteenth century. KarlGoedeke’s edition of Schiller’s Sämtliche Schriften (1867-76) and theWeimar edition of Goethe’s works in 143 volumes, the so-called‘Sophien-Ausgabe’ (1887-1919) represent two different tendencies inGerman editorial theory, which Klaus Hurlebusch respectively calls ‘dasproduktionsbezogene Editionskonzept’ and ‘das rezeptionsbezogeneEditionskonzept’ (Hurlebusch 1986, 22; see also Nutt-Kofoth 2000). AsBodo Plachta points out, the publication of the ‘Sophien-Ausgabe’ ofGoethe’s oeuvre reflected the then prevailing view, which took forgranted that the basis of the edited text was the last version revised bythe author (‘Fassung letzter Hand’) or the ‘letztwillige Textrecension’ ofthe final revised edition: this document is a sort of testament, according

A DARWINIAN CHANGE IN EUROPEAN EDITORIAL THINKING 33

to Bernhard Suphan in the preface to the ‘Sophien-Ausgabe’, and as aconsequence, the editor was seen as the executor of the author’s last will.

If we may consider this to be an understandable consequence of theeditorial practices rooted in the period of nation building, it is also im-portant to draw attention to another phenomenon that took place in thesame period and may have been equally, if not more decisive, in thedevelopment of national ‘schools’ of scholarly editing. In Germany,Goethe and Schiller were among the first authors who started preservingtheir manuscripts in a systematic manner. This is indicative of a contem-porary tendency that contrasts sharply with the desire to fix the old textsthat were employed to shape national identities.

The Revaluation of ‘Unfinished Business’The renewed attention to the process as opposed to the finished productwas part of the cult of genius. In his Conjectures on Original Composition(1759), Edward Young had claimed: ‘An Original may be said to be of avegetable nature; it rises spontaneously from the vital root of Genius’(§43). If spontaneity is such an important element in the concept ofgenius, it is only natural that the traces of that spontaneity are revaluatedas well. And indeed, while – on the one hand – editors in the early nine-teenth century are mainly concerned with the retrieval of older, oftenmedieval, textual material in the European vernaculars and the increasingnational value of the literary heritage, writers themselves – on the otherhand – seem to be more concerned with the individual value of jottings,notes, drafts and marginalia. The most famous example is probablySamuel Taylor Coleridge. He used to jot down notes, not only in themargins of his own books, but also in borrowed copies. For instance,there are at least three known copies of the anthology Anderson’s BritishPoets that contain notes by Coleridge. One of these must have beenColeridge’s own copy, which he in his turn lent to his friend WilliamWordsworth. The latter also added his own marginalia to the volume,notably after reading Shakespeare’s sonnets. What takes place at thispoint in the margins of this anthology is a magnificent clash of the Titansof English poetry. Immediately after Shakespeare’s last sonnet Words-worth adds a note in pencil, fiercely criticizing Shakespeare’s ‘Dark Lady’sonnets: ‘These sonnets ^beginning at 127,^ to his Mistress, are worsethan a game at a puzzle-peg. They [are] abominably harsh obscure &worthless. The others are for the most part much better, have many fine

34 Dirk Van Hulle

4 Hugo in Biasi 2000, 13: ‘I donate all of my manuscripts and whatever will befound that is either written or drawn by me to the national library of Paris, which oneday will be the library of the United States of Europe.’

lines very fine lines & passages. They are also in many places warm withpassion. Their chief faults, and heavy ones they are, are sameness, te-diousness, laboriousness, quaintness, & elaborate obscurity’ (Coleridge1980, 42a). Whatever Coleridge may have thought when Wordsworthreturned the anthology, he would not have dreamt of erasing the pencilmarks. Instead, he added his own comments, expressing the wish (in akind of note to posterity) that Wordsworth’s marginalia should never beremoved: ‘I can by no means subscribe to the above pencil mark of W.Wordsworth; which however, it is my wish, should never be erased. It ishis: & grievously am I mistaken, & deplorably will Englishmen havedegenerated, if the being his will not, ^in times to come,^ give it a Value’(Coleridge 1980, 42a). A simple note in the margins of an anthology thusmarks the importance the Romantics attached to the spontaneous, un-structured spur-of-the-moment flashes of insight, which contrast sharplywith the contemporary editorial concerns, focused on establishing andfixating national ‘Urtexts’.

In France, Victor Hugo was one of the first authors who not onlysystematically preserved his manuscripts (from the 1820s onward), butalso made a link between the individual, private, spontaneous aspect ofliterary drafts and the ‘national’ value of the literary heritage. Apart frommedieval texts, modern manuscripts had national value as well, so VictorHugo donated his manuscripts to the national library of France. Whatmay at first sight seem to be yet another example of the Sattelzeit phe-nomenon should however be nuanced, because Hugo saw this ‘national-ist’ act as just a first step toward a European vision. In his testament(1881) he wrote: ‘Je donne tous mes manuscrits et tout ce qui sera trouvéécrit ou dessiné par moi à la bibliothèque nationale de Paris qui sera unjour la bibliothèque des États-Unis d’Europe’.4

More than a century later, it seems irrelevant to speak of a Europeanlibrary. If all the existing online library databases can be regarded as partof one big library, this is a global, not a European endeavour. WhatHugo’s testament seems to be hinting at is a remnant of a nationally con-ceived, Napoleonic Europe, in which all European countries wouldconstitute something like the greater banlieue of Paris.


French editorial theory in those days was closely related to the Ger-man tradition. Romance philology was more or less introduced to theFrench by a German scholar, Friedrich Diez. As Jean-Louis Lebrave haspointed out, it was Victor Cousin who took up the task of developing aFrench editorial school, by drawing attention to ‘the necessity of a newedition of Pascal’s Pensées’. This was the topic of his report to theAcadémie française in 1842 (Sur la nécessité d’une nouvelle édition des ‘Pensées’de Pascal), in which he advocated the consultation of Pascal’s manu-scripts, preserved at the national library. In his lecture, he explains thatnumerous editions of Pascal’s Pensées succeed each other, but that noneof the editors takes the trouble of double-checking the manuscripts. Theautograph is available at the Bibliothèque Nationale in Paris; every editormentions it, but no-one consults it, Cousin complains (Cousin 1949, 109;cf. Lebrave 1992, 58). This neglect is probably the result of an editorialtradition that is so completely geared to the absence of autograph manu-scripts that editors lose all common sense. Cousin’s rhetoric is quiteeffective in that it draws attention to his contemporaries’ blind spot bymeans of one simple rhetorical question: what would people say ifPlato’s original manuscripts were still preserved in a public library, buteditors would simply ignore it and continue copying their editions fromprevious editions?

Among French scholars, there was a genuine admiration for the Ger-man approach to philology. In 1864, Gaston Paris advocated a rap-prochement between German and French scholarly editors. The posi-tivism of philology was contrasted with the French tradition of the BellesLettres. But ironically this new editorial development toward a rapproche-ment and toward an international dialogue was used to create nationalmonuments such as the collection Les Grands Écrivains de la France set upby Hachette in 1862. The timid attempt to exchange ideas was inter-rupted rather abruptly by the Franco-German war in 1870, resulting intwo divergent tendencies. On the one hand, there was the urge to out-strip the Germans in their own field of expertise; on the other hand,philology was increasingly regarded as the science of the enemy, whichresulted in a return to the Belles Lettres tradition. In editorial terms, thisimplied a reaction against Lachmann, which led to Joseph Bédier’s so-called ‘best text’ approach, based on the criterion of ‘good taste’. MichaelWerner explains how this war eventually resulted in a dichotomy that isstill noticeable today:

36 Dirk Van Hulle

5 Werner 1987, 141: ‘In any case, the result is the emergence in France of a typo-logical contrast between on the one hand the rhetorically brilliant critic, who occupiesthe literary scene and also operates in the public domain through mass media andpublications with high print runs, and on the other hand the scholar, who is given lessinstitutional esteem and leads a solitary existence in silence, far from the Parisian sceneof intellectuals.’

Immerhin has sich auch in Frankreich somit ein typologischer Gegensatzherausgebildet zwischen dem rhetorisch brillianten Interpreten einerseits,der die literaturpolitische Bühne besetzt hält und auch über die Medien,Publikationen mit hohen Auflagen in die Öffentlichkeit wirkt, und demGelehrten andererseits, welcher weniger mit institutionellen Ehren bedacht,ein entbehrsames Dasein im Stillen fristet, abseits der PariserIntellektuellen-Szene (...)5

In the Anglo-American tradition, the very notion of ‘best text’ was al-ready questioned as early as 1756, when Samuel Johnson stated in hisProposals for Printing, by Subscription, the Dramatick Works of William Shake-speare:

no single edition will supply the reader with a text on which he can rely asthe best copy of the works of Shakespeare. The edition now proposed will atleast have this advantage over others. It will exhibit all the observable vari-eties of all the copies that can be found, that, if the reader is not satisfiedwith the editor’s determination, he may have the means of chusing betterfor himself. (Johnson 1968, esp. 55-6, emphasis DVH)

As Peter Shillingsburg (2002) has pointed out, this is one of the causesof the fundamental discrepancies between the German and the Anglo-American editorial traditions. In the former tradition, the paradigm isGoethe; in the latter, the paradigm is Shakespeare. The crucial problemwith Shakespeare is the lack of autograph manuscripts; the main diffi-culty with Goethe’s works is the abundance of manuscript versions. As aresult of these contingencies the corresponding traditions of scholarlyediting have developed along divergent lines.

The Notion of ‘Process’A better understanding of the cultural differences that have led to spe-cific editorial approaches and traditions in the past may eventually resultin more cooperation in view of the future of European scholarly editing.If we are willing to try and find a common ground and work towards arapprochement, a crucial concept in this effort is the notion of ‘process’.This notion gradually became important to scholarly editing during and


after the so-called Sattelzeit, which can be seen as the culmination of aparticular aspect of philology. Philology was shaped by the search forcommon ancestors in ancient and medieval texts, as well as the produc-tion of a reliable text of ‘God’s own words’, the Bible. This was a partic-ularly teleological enterprise, in both a chronological and a counterclock-wise direction. The search for the authentic, divine words is a quest inthe direction of an absolute origin. And, not unlike the biblical Genesis(aimed at one goal: God’s satisfaction) the collation of variant readingsof existing copies had one teleological purpose: the constitution of onereliable, definitive text of the Bible or any other Urtext.

When Johnson, in 1756, argues that ‘no single edition will supply thereader with a text on which he can rely as the best copy of the works ofShakespeare,’ this is indicative of an important change of mentality thatreflects the content of several literary and philosophical texts in the sec-ond half of the eighteenth. For instance, in his famous Fragment 116,published in Athenäum, Friedrich Schlegel wrote: ‘Die romantische Dicht-art ist noch im Werden; ja das ist ihr eigentliches Wesen, dass sie ewignur werden, nie vollendet sein kann.’ Whereas the teleology of the Bibli-cal Genesis shaped a particular way of thinking and editing in the pre-Sattelzeit, the post-Sattelzeit mentality in scholarly editing may be charac-terized by a gradual evolution toward a non-teleological approach alongthe lines of evolutionary theory. As Robert M. Young points out, sciencein the nineteenth century was very much preoccupied by issues of ‘origin’– ‘the historicity of genesis of earth, life, mind, and society,’ (Young1985, 638) and also of nations. This thesis seems to be confirmed by thetitle of Charles Darwin’s most famous work. Darwin’s Origin of Species,however, is not about the origin of the world. It is about process. And itis not about proceeding towards a goal; it is non-teleological. The pro-cess does not necessarily go anywhere, it simply goes ‘on’. If anything, itundermines the idea that man is the culmination of creation. Darwin’stheory is sometimes called the second Copernican revolution (Gruber1974, 12). Copernicus showed that the universe does not revolve aroundthe earth; Darwin demonstrated that man is not the centre of biologicalphenomena. His Origin of Species is not exclusively about the origin of ourspecies, but about the multiplication of species and the mechanism be-hind it. This move away from anthropocentrism is already present in oneof his early notebooks: ‘It is absurd to talk of one animal being higherthan another. We consider those, where the cerebral structure, intellectual

38 Dirk Van Hulle

6 Charles Darwin, B-notebook (on transmutation of species) 74; quoted in Gruber1974, 21.

7 Reinhart Koselleck’s research focus is ‘die Auflösung der alten und die Ent-stehung der modernen Welt in der Geschichte ihrer begrifflichen Erfassung’ (‘Ein-leitung’ in Brunner, Conze and Koselleck 2004, I: xiv).

faculties, most developed, as highest. – A bee doubtless would where theinstincts are.’6

The Sattelzeit – as a period marking the beginnings of the so-called‘modern world’ – may be seen as a period of radical changes of conceptswith implications for editorial theory as well. The notion of Sattelzeit,coined by Reinhart Koselleck,7 literally means ‘saddle-period’, i.e. theperiod that flanks the French Revolution by fifty years on either side.The end of this period (1789 + 50) is marked by the gestation of Dar-win’s theory of evolution, which mainly took shape in his notebooksbetween 1837 and 1839.

Unlike most of his contemporaries, who ‘used the marvels of organicnature to demonstrate the supreme intelligence and necessary existenceof the Creator’ and unlike 21st-century advocates of ‘intelligent design’,Charles Darwin ‘used the imperfections and irregularities to be foundeverywhere in living organisms to argue that the design of nature wasachieved not by an omniscient inventor but by a groping evolutionaryprocess.’ (Gruber 1974, 12). In other words, imperfection and errors arekey elements in this story.

This non-teleological view contrasts sharply with the teleological viewon writing as expressed for instance in E.A. Poe’s Philosophy of Composi-tion, published in 1846. The (over-)emphasis on ‘achievement’ is clearfrom the very start of Poe’s essay: ‘It is my design to render it manifestthat no one point in its [The Raven’s] composition is referrible either toaccident or intuition – that the work proceeded, step by step, to its com-pletion with the precision and rigid consequence of a mathematical prob-lem.’ (Poe 1986, 482). According to Poe, one of his first considerationswas ‘the proper length for my intended poem – a length of about onehundred lines’ (483). He presents his writing process as an extremelyteleological project: ‘Here then the poem may be said to have its begin-ning – at the end, where all works of art should begin’ (487). Still, Poe’sauto-analysis draws attention to craftsmanship in such a way that it rep-resents a clear break with an earlier tendency to consider the creativeprocess as the result of ‘an ecstatic intuition’ (481).


8 Goedeke 1867-76, 15/2: vi-vii: ‘Nur eine photographische Wiedergabe könnteeinen Begriff gewähren, was dem Dichter während der Arbeit der Aufzeichnungbedürftig erschien. Aber auch nur in der Photographie würde die Art seines eigent-lichen Schaffens deutlich werden. Dazu reichen gestrichne Lettern und Schriftsortenverschiedenster Art nicht aus. Und doch erschien es als unausweichliche Aufgabe, denProcess seines Schaffens, so weit es mit gedruckten Lettern möglich ist, einigermassenzu veranschaulichen.’ (‘Only a photographic representation could give us an idea ofwhat the poet deemed necessary during the writing process. Only in the photographwould the art of his actual creation become clear. In this regard, crossed-out lettersand different fonts do not suffice. Nonetheless it seemed to be an inevitable task tovisualize his creative process insofar as that is possible at all in print.’)

9 For a thorough study of the history of genetic studies in France, see Gothot-Mersch 1994.

10 Rudler 1923, 85: ‘Why would the author’s final thought and wish be more valu-able than his initial thought and wish?’

A hundred years after Edward Young’s idea that an Original ‘is notmade’ but ‘grows’ notably found its expression in works by poets such asWalt Whitman. The organic metaphors initiated by Whitman himself areexemplified by the steady ‘growth’ of the successive editions of Leaves ofGrass.

In the immediate post-Sattelzeit period, authors seem to be increas-ingly aware of the literary creation as a process, and some editors werequicker than others to react. In Germany, Karl Goedeke tried to recon-struct the ‘Geschichte von Schillers Geist’ (‘history of Schiller’s mind’,Schillers sämmtliche Schriften, 1: v), and to visualize the creative process:‘den Process seines Schaffens (…) einigermassen zu veranschaulichen.’8In France, the ambivalent attitude toward German philology after theFranco-German war did not imply a sudden aversion to manuscriptresearch. On the contrary, early versions of Flaubert’s Madame Bovarywere studied (by Antoine Albalat in 1903), Zola’s writing method wasanalysed (by Henri Massis in 1906), Bernardin de Saint-Pierre’s manu-script of Paul et Virginie was examined (by Gustave Lanson, in 1908).9While in Germany critics such as Georg Witkowski (1921) and ReinholdBackmann (1924) emphasized the importance of the apparatus to recon-struct the textual development, the French critic Gustave Rudler pub-lished a study (in 1923) that contained a chapter with the title ‘Critiquede genèse’. Although Almuth Grésillon argues that this should not beconfused with what is now called ‘critique génétique’, Rudler did makean important statement with regard to editorial theory: ‘Pourquoi lapensée et sa volonté finales de l’auteur auraient-elles plus de prix que sapensée et sa volonté première?’10

40 Dirk Van Hulle

The issue of (final) authorial intention has been a major obstacle inattempts to move toward a rapprochement between different nationaleditorial schools. Not only the French, but also German scholars used itto stress the difference between their traditions and the Anglo-Americanschool. In 1975, in his article ‘A New Approach to the Critical Consti-tution of Literary Texts’ Hans Zeller called it an ‘ill-suited’ principle(244). But it is also a good example of the way in which a principle isblown up in order to highlight and even exaggerate national differences.The danger is in the neatness of nationalization – to paraphrase SamuelBeckett. In his Sandars Lectures in Bibliography (delivered in January1958), even Fredson Bowers – one of the names always associated withthe intentionalist approach – writes: ‘so many changes can take placebetween holograph manuscript and first edition that we should studythese changes through various transcripts and proofs not for the simplemechanical purpose of checking the accuracy of the printed text […] butinstead as an independent act of critical inquiry into the author’s mindand art’ (Bowers 1966, 17). He refers to a study of T.S. Eliot’s works byRobert L. Beare, who concludes: ‘The study of the stages of a poem orplay which precede publication are of interest and significance for thegenesis of the poem rather than as a check of its final published form.’(Beare 1957, 24). If this passage were translated into French, it couldeasily pass for a statement by one of the French theorists of critique géné-tique.

In conclusion, it seems fair to say that the insistence on nationaleditorial schools on the basis of other than linguistic differences is quiteartificial, and perhaps still a remnant of the Sattelzeit, when scholarlyediting was placed in the service of nation building. Especially in thisdigital age, when scholars working on electronic editions communicate inmark-up languages, the notion of national editorial schools seems some-what obsolete. That is why the foundation of an initiative such as theEuropean Society for Textual Scholarship, promoting the dialogue be-tween editorial traditions in different languages, rightly marks the begin-ning of scholarly editing in the 21st century. It is not a coincidence thatthe 2005 issue of Variants (the Journal of the European Society for TextualScholarship) opens with a contribution by the Autralian scholar PaulEggert with the subtitle: ‘The cross-fertilising of German and Anglo-American editorial traditions’. A similar cross-fertilisation is taking placebetween French and other traditions. The reason why French genetic


11 For instance, the notion of ‘relative perfection’ was the reason why the Frenchpoet Francis Ponge presented his ‘Fabrique du Pré’ in the early 1970s as a series ofmanuscript versions, in a facsimile edition with transcriptions.

critics avoid using the term ‘variants’ and prefer to employ the notion of‘réécritures’ is precisely because, traditionally, textual variants were consid-ered to be corruptions. If scholarly editing in the post-Sattelzeit can bedescribed in terms of Darwin’s heritage and its crucial change of focusfrom an essentialist origin to a focus on processes, the following passagefrom The Origin of Species may be elucidating: ‘natural selection tends onlyto make each organism, each organic being, as perfect as, or slightlymore perfect than, the other inhabitants of the same country with whichit has to struggle for existence’ (Darwin in Mayr 1985, 771). The compar-ative ‘more perfect’ is a contradiction in terms. It implies a kind of per-fection that is not absolute; in other words, it implies the acceptance ofimperfection. The consequence is an enhanced interest in processes, notjust products.11 What scholarly editors have increasingly learned to ap-preciate in the post-Darwin age is the value of ‘mistakes’ to understandthe dynamics of the writing process. It is important to realize that thisinternational revaluation has been made possible by the decision of au-thors from the Sattelzeit to start preserving their manuscripts at a timewhen editors were perhaps too busy with nation building.

ReferencesBackmann, Reinhold. 1924. Die Gestaltung des Apparates in den kritischen

Ausgaben neuerer Dichter. Mit besonderer Berücksichtigung der großenGrillparzer-Ausgabe der Stadt Wien. Euphorion 25: 629-662.

Beare, Robert L. 1957. Notes on the Text of T. S. Eliot: Variants from RussellSquare. Studies in Bibliography 9: 21-49.

Biasi, Pierre-Marc de. 2000. La Génétique des textes. Paris: Nathan.Bowers, Fredson. 1966. Textual and Literary Criticism. Cambridge: Cambridge

University Press.Brunner, Otto, Werner Conze, Reinhart Koselleck, eds. 2004. Geschichtliche

Grundbegriffe: Historisches Lexikon zur politisch-sozialen Sprache in Deutschland,vol. 1. Stuttgart: Klett-Cotta.

Coleridge, Samuel Taylor. 1980. The Collected Works of Samuel Taylor Coleridge:Marginalia I (Abbt to Byfield). Ed. George Whalley; London: Routledge &Kegan Paul / Princeton: Princeton University Press.

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Cousin, Victor. 1849. Blaise Pascal. In Oeuvres, 4e série, ‘Littérature’, vol. 1;Paris.

Darwin, Charles. 1959. The Origin of Species. A Variorum Text. Ed. Morse Peck-ham; Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press.

Eggert, Paul. 2005. Version, Agency, Intention: The Cross-fertilising of Ger-man and Anglo-America Editorial Traditions. Variants 4: 5-27.

Goedeke, Karl. 1867-76. Schillers sämmtliche Schriften: Historisch-kritische Ausgabe.16 vols.; Stuttgart.

Gothot-Mersch, Claudine. 1994. Les études de genèse en France de 1950 à1960. Genesis 5: 175-87.

Gruber, Howard E. 1974. Darwin on Man: A Psychological Study of Scientific Creativ-ity. London: Wildwood House.

Hurlebusch, Klaus. 1986. Deutungen literarischer Arbeitsweise. Zeitschrift fürdeutsche Philologie, Sonderheft 105: 4-42.

Johnson, Samuel. 1968. Proposals for Printing, by Subscription, the DramatickWorks of William Shakespeare. In The Yale Edition of the Works of SamuelJohnson, ed. A. Sherbo, 7: 51-58. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press.

Lanson, Gustave. 1908. Un Manuscrit de ‘Paul et Virginie’. Etude sur l’invention deBernardin de Saint-Pierre. Paris: Ed. de la Revue du Mois.

Lebrave, Jean-Louis. 1992. La critique génétique: Une discipline nouvelle ou unavatar moderne de la philologie? Genesis 1: 33-72.

Mayr, Ernst. 1985. Darwin’s Five Theories. In The Darwinian Heritage, ed. DavidKohn, 755-772. Princeton: Princeton University Press.

Nutt-Kofoth, Rüdiger. 2000. Schreiben und Lesen: Für eine produktions- undrezeptionsorientierte Präsentation des Werktextes in der Edition. In Textund Edition: Positionen und Perspektiven, ed. Rüdiger Nutt-Kofoth et al., 165-202. Berlin: Erich Schmidt.

Plachta, Bodo. 1995. German Literature. In Scholarly Editing: A Guide to Research,ed. D.C. Greetham, 504-29. New York: The Modern Language Associationof America.

Poe, Edgar Allan. 1986. The Fall of the House of Usher and Other Writings. London:Penguin Classics.

Rudler, Gustave. 1923. Les Techniques de la critique et de l’histoire littéraire françaisemoderne. Oxford : Oxford UP.

Shillingsburg, Peter. 2002. ‘The Subject of our Mirth’: The Aesthetic Object inAnglo-American Editing. In Perspectives of Scholarly Editing / Perspektiven derTextedition, ed. Bodo Plachta and H.T.M. van Vliet, 47-59. Berlin: Weidler.

Suphan, Bernhard. 1887. Vorbericht. In Goethes Werke. Hrsg. im Auftrag derGroßherzogin Sophie von Sachsen, vol. I.1. Weimar.

Timpanaro, Sebastiano. 1971. Die Entstehung der Lachmannschen Methode. Ham-burg: Helmut Buske.

Van Hulle, Dirk. 2004 Textual Awareness: A Genetic Study of Late Manuscripts byJoyce, Proust, and Mann. Ann Arbor:: University of Michigan Press.


Werner, Michael. 1987. Edition und Kulturtradition in Frankreich. editio 1: 139-144.

Witkowski, Georg. 1921. Grundsätze kritischer Ausgaben neuerer deutscherDichtwerke. In Funde und Forschungen: Eine Festgabe für Julius Wahle, 216-226.Leipzig: Insel.

Young, Robert M. 1985. Darwinism is social. In The Darwinian Heritage, ed.David Kohn, 609-752. Princeton: Princeton University Press.


THE ANGEL OF PHILOLOGY

Geert Lernout

AbstractPhilology is a historical discipline and as such, it cannot fail to beinterested in its own origins. From its earliest forms in HellenisticAlexandria, philology has attempted to understand and preserve oldertexts. With the development of a Christian body of texts in Greekand later also in Latin, this discipline only became relevant again inthe Renaissance, when numerous new texts were rediscovered. In thenext few centuries the new culture of the Republic of Letters led to aflowering of classical philology, which stressed the common Euro-pean culture. Romantic scholars applied the new methodologies tovernacular texts and this in its turn led to ‘national’ philologies whichbegan to lead their own lives.

Let me begin by generalising, just a little bit, about the difference be-tween facts and generalizations. The study of texts and the care for textsin their most general description, which is what I will call ‘philology’ inthis paper, has always been caught in the famous hermeneutic circlewhere we can only understand the first puzzling detail that we find in thetext when we place it in the context of the whole we haven’t even begunto read and where we can only claim to understand that same whole ifwe have first managed to make sense of every single detail. Or, to mud-dle metaphors even more, philology has always tried to navigate betweenthe all too solid rock of individual fact and the whirlpool of generaliza-tions. The dichotomy between the detailed fact on the one hand and thegeneralization on the other hand is true on all levels of philological in-vestigation. At the most basic level it can be seen in the fundamentaldistinction between the material form of an individual copy of a book

46 Geert Lernout

and that platonic ideal of a Book that editors refer to as ‘the text’ andthat most literary theorists try so hard not to think about at all. We canalso observe the philologist’s fascination for little things in the enthusi-asm with which an editor or textual scholar can investigate the presenceor absence of a single comma. It is interesting to see that even a peculiarform of this interest in orthographic pedantry can find a general audiencein Lynne Truss’s successful book on spelling, Eats, Shoots and Leaves. Butdespite its attention to detail, the general field of the study of writing isnot averse to the most encompassing generalizations. On the one handwe have French post-structuralism’s metaphysical ruminations on écritureand on the other the partly unrelated work of the theorists of the powerof the oral, the written, the printed and the digital word such as HaroldInnis, Marshall McLuhan, Walter Ong, Jack Goody, Elisabeth Eisensteinand George P. Landow.

As a fundamentally historical discipline, philology cannot fail to beinterested in its own origins and for the greater part of its history, it hasbeen characterized by a keen interest in a tradition that reached backthrough Christian Rome to a double origin in Hebrew scripture and inGreek literature and philosophy. Both of the foundational cultures forWestern civilization were built on a sense of identity that was not entirelytied to geography (as the Egyptian had been) but to a set of shared val-ues that had first been articulated in oral tales and that was later codifiedin written texts. Although we have been warned by scholars such asWilliam V. Harris for Greek and Roman readers and Harry Y. Gamblefor Christian readers not to overestimate the levels of literacy in theHellenistic and Roman periods (Harris 1989, Gamble 1995), it is clearfrom the spread of libraries and schools that something like a commonwritten culture did exist in the later Roman Empire: the great Greekclassics on the one and the biblical literature on the other hand gave theirrespective communities a sense of unity and purpose that was thought toconstitute a good education. Scribal culture in Egypt had been the pre-serve of an elite priestly class, but in later centuries literacy seems to havebecome more general among Greeks, Jews and Christians. Of course weshould always be aware that we can only come to such a conclusion onthe basis of evidence that is to a large extent limited to texts, i.e. writtenmaterials that were created, passed on and preserved by the same scribalclass that had every reason to exaggerate its own importance.

THE ANGEL OF PHILOLOGY 47

The two essentially scribal cultures, Greek and Hebrew, were basedon an education of the young who were trained to read and write bystudying classic writings. It could thus be argued that through the litera-ture of early rabbinical traditions there is a scribal continuity, for exam-ple, between the first few centuries of the Common Era and presentforms of Judaism. Until a few decades ago, when Latin and Greek werestill taught generally, a similar continuity was claimed to exist betweenGreco-Roman culture and the values of European elites. In both casesthis continuity has recently been questioned: claiming such continuity isnot the same as proving it. In both cases there is a silent supposition thatin the course of history these continuities have not been contaminated byeach other. And in both cases there is the historical fact of a third conti-nuity of texts, which had its origin in roughly the same region at roughlythe same time. In the greater part of Europe it was by the efforts of anexclusively Christian elite that both Hebrew and Greek ideas were trans-mitted in a decidedly changed form. For seventeen centuries the suprem-acy of Christian ideas could not fail to have a decisive effect on the fateof the other two continuities.

But let us start from the fact that on the one hand human beings ingeneral and Western culture in particular need to think that there is acontinuity between the past and the present and that on the other handphilology has been used to supply that sense of continuity. The history ofphilological scholarship itself is subject to the same interest in continuitywe observe in culture in general. The nice thing about the history ofphilology is that this history itself has its own historians, among the mostrecent of them the prolific Anthony Grafton who has written both ex-tremely specialist studies and popular books for a general audience onthe history of scholarship. In an intellectual market where books on theunified field theory in science can become bestsellers, it should not betoo surprising that someone manages to interest a wider audience in theobscure scholarship by writers long dead about obscure authors who hadbeen dead even longer by the time they were written about. But surely inthe case of modern physics and biology the immediate political, meta-physical and moral implications are much more obvious than when thesubject matter is the study of Latin, Greek and Hebrew-Christian schol-arship? Philologists and editors labour under a relatively well deservedprejudice that most of the time they are much more interested in thearcane art of punctuation than in the meaning of the texts they work on.

48 Geert Lernout

In Dutch we used to call them ‘kommaneukers,’ comma fuckers, a termthat with hapax legomenon and lectio difficilior deserves to become part of thephilological terminology. The genius of Anthony Grafton and of theItalian scholar Luciano Canfora is that they manage to find a wider rele-vance in the scholarship of generations of comma fucking philologists,whose work concentrates on tiny nuggets of facts instead of on the grandscheme of things. It is this dichotomy that will haunt this paper.

In Forgers and Critics Grafton traces the tight relationship betweenforgery and literary scholarship through the last twenty-five centuries.Forgery, the attribution of the authorship of one’s text to another person,may well be only a day or two younger than writing itself, just as accord-ing to the German linguist Rudi Keller, human speech and symboliclanguage probably started with the first lie (Keller 1990). But a trulysuccessful forger depends on a certain level of historical knowledge,because forgery can always be exposed by somebody who simply knowsmore about the purported author or genre or period. That person wasthe critic or philologist who began his career in Hellenistic times with theanalysis of false works that in the burgeoning book market of fourth andthird century Athens were being attributed to the great authors of theprevious era: Plato, Aristotle or Hippocrates. The scholars headed, ac-cording to Grafton, ‘by that patron of all later librarians, Callimachus’distinguished between a writer’s gnesiosi (legitimate offspring) and nothoior bastard works, forgeries (Grafton 12). This is the beginning of a phi-lology that attempted to stay one step ahead of the forgers but that couldnot help but transform itself every time a clever forger appeared whosubtly used the same tools that the philologists had earlier employed inexposing forgery in order to create a more convincing fraud. Every timethis happened, the philologists had to outsmart the clever forger, forcingfuture forgers to be even more creative, etc. Forgery and criticism devel-oped hand-in-hand and it does not come as a surprise that the best forg-ers were most often the philologists themselves.

Grafton shows that this was not just an academic parlour game: someof the religious or philosophic sects in the Greek world claimed to havegenuine texts written by their founding fathers, Orpheus and Pythagoras.And in the multicultural world under Hellenistic influence, Egyptians,Babylonians and Jews attempted to prove convincingly, with documentsin hand, not only that their civilisation was older than all the others onoffer but that the central insights of Greek philosophy had been copied


from ancient Egyptian, Babylonian or Jewish wisdom sources. WhenChristianity became the religion of the Roman Empire, the Jewish inter-pretation of historical precedence was simply adopted by the Christianswho saw themselves as the legitimate heirs to the wisdom of Moses andSolomon. And the Christians immediately had their own problems withforgery when early on the authenticity of the Christian writings waschallenged by so-called heretics like Marcion. The canon of Christianwriting was only finalized in a very late stage of its development and thatnot without considerable political pressure from the newly Christianemperors in Rome. In the fight against the writings, both in the Old andthe New Testament, that would henceforth become apocryphal, the samephilological techniques were being used. The Christian scholar JuliusAfricanus pointed out that the story of Susanna and the elders in theBook of Daniel simply could not be genuine. There were historical rea-sons (in the story the captive Jews in Babylon seemed to enjoy far toomuch freedom) and there were also narratological reasons: Daniel in thissection of his Book prophesied in direct speech, whereas elsewhere hiswords were reported. But crucially, the story depends on two elaboratepuns that work in Greek, but not in the Hebrew from which this part ofthe text was supposedly translated. This kind of close textual scrutinydisappeared by the end of the classical period: in the early middle agesthe critical study of the bible and of the work of the church fathers – if itaddressed issues of authenticity at all – tended to be theological ratherthan historical or philological.

The latter type of scholarship was badly needed when the new nationsin the High Middle Ages began to look for classical pedigrees and did sowithout exception by copying Virgil’s example and finding the ancestorsof the British, the French, the Celts and the Frisians in groups of fugi-tives from the most famous ruined cities, Troy or Jerusalem. In the com-petition for the oldest ancestry, serious criticism of the other party’sclaim seems to have been only a second option, resorted to when thefirst counter-attack did not work. And the first attack was nearly alwayssimply a new forgery, as when the fight between the universities of Ox-ford and Cambridge for the oldest pedigree deteriorated into fraudulentclaims and counter-forgeries, which was only won by Cambridge when adocument was found that proved conclusively that the university hadbeen founded in 394 BC. Monasteries, cities and individuals took over

50 Geert Lernout

1 Valla explains in a letter to cardinal Trevisan: ‘Why did I write about the Dona-tion of Constantine? (...) Bear one thing in mind. I was not moved by hatred of thePope, but acted for the sake of the truth, of religion, and also of a certain renown – toshow that I alone knew what no one else knew.’

the market for forgeries and Grafton writes that the new specialists indetecting forgeries were the canon lawyers.

The renaissance marked the genuine rebirth of philology and it was inthe study of Latin and Greek texts that the humanist writers rediscoveredand refined the tests that had been invented by their Hellenistic col-leagues twenty centuries earlier. Francesco Petrarch and the other greathumanist scholars rediscovered scores of texts that had long disappearedand they reinterpreted existing texts in a new light. And at the same timethe new invention of the printing press for the first time in history madeperfect copies of a single editio princeps available for comparison andcollation everywhere in the world.

Grafton’s major intellectual heroes belong in this period: they are thephilologists Lorenzo Valla, Desiderius Erasmus, Joseph Scaliger, JustusLipsius, Richard Bentley, all of them critics and editors who perfectedand sometimes invented the careful critical study of and care for textsfrom the past. In their study of the works of the Roman and Greekwriters, they refused to take anything for granted and their irreverentattitude to the glories of the past led to famous intellectual debates suchas the querelle des anciens et modernes in France or the Battle of the Books inEngland, where the authority of the classics was at stake. The criticalattitude towards tradition is already present in the writings of the earliesthumanists but it would lead inevitably, first to the reformation and then,after the disasters of the different religious wars, to scepticism and whatJonathan Israel has called the radical enlightenment.

What is striking about this heroic generation of philologists is thenew self-assurance needed to position oneself just outside and, if needbe, against the accumulated weight of tradition, even, for those con-cerned, in opposition to the most absolute forms of religious tradition.This attitude may be most famously embodied by the German monkwhen he had been summoned by the Holy Roman Emperor in an at-tempt at reconciliation: ‘Hier steh’ ich, ich kann nicht anders.’ But asimilar attitude can be found in the work of philologists such as Vallawhen he haughtily proves that the Donation of Constantine cannot pos-sibly be genuine1 or when Erasmus edited the most holy Christian texts


from Greek (and thus by definition schismatic) originals and in the pro-cess managed to give the New Testament a new and philologically morecorrect title (Novum Instrumentum). The same extreme self-assurance canbe found in Spinoza’s Tractatus, in Richard Bentley’s textual criticism andin the work of so many of the other erudite and extremely critical think-ers of this period.

It is an irony not lost on the major participants in this movement thatjust as these critics had edited and printed most of the major and minorGreek and Latin texts, when to a large extent issues of chronology andauthenticity had been settled, that the same critical spirit began to cast acold eye on their own discipline (Grafton 1991). In the most advancedcircles of the seventeenth century textual study began to lose its prestigeto the experimental sciences and increasingly also to the experience ofthe practical men who would build the new world of technology. Galileohad already established that if there was a book of nature, that particularbook was written not in Latin or Greek or Hebrew but in the languageof mathematics.

Strangely from our present point of view this generation of textualcritics seems to have agreed with their critics: Richard Bentley wrote thatratio et res ipsa (reason and the thing itself) carried more weight than ahundred manuscripts. The rediscovery of Roman and Greek ruins, thecareful collection of inscriptions and coins had already changed thewriting of history based on literary sources, when the French Jesuit JeanHardouin made the claim, ‘well beyond the verge of madness,’ quotesGrafton from Momigliano (Grafton 2001, 182) that the confrontation ofcoins and literary texts proved that most of the texts of classical and earlyliterature had in reality been written by an atheist sect of fourteenthcentury Italians, who forged among many other texts (including thecomplete works of Thomas Aquinas), all the works of the Latin andGreek church fathers. This conspiracy of clerics, this unholy cabal waseven responsible (dixit Hardouin) for convincing the Byzantine Greeksthat they should abandon their originally Latin liturgy and Bible for theforged Greek translations, and all of this just to confuse the Catholicfaithful (Grafton 2001, 193).

The textual critics and participants in the several querelles did not needunbalanced Jesuits to make a mockery of their own discipline: they hadlampooned themselves and each other even earlier, writing satirical ac-counts of nit-picking editors and over-scrupulous textual critics. That

52 Geert Lernout

they used the all too classical genre of satire for this purpose and thatthese texts were often written in the most difficult and erudite Latin is anirony that cannot have escaped their attention.

The self-criticism of humanism is even older. In her study of the fateof Latin, Françoise Waquet describes the rise in the early sixteenth cen-tury of the stock-character of the pedant in vernacular literatures in Ital-ian, French and English, who quotes Latin and Greek indiscriminately.Examples are Giordano Bruno’s Il Candelaio, Gabriel Harvey’s Pedantiusand Cyrano de Bergerac’s Le pédant joué. In his essay Du pédantismeMontaigne blamed this condition on the fact that the only people whotried to make a living out of learning were people of low fortune: ‘Andwith such people their natures, being by family background and exampleof the lower sort, assimilate the fruits of knowledge falsely’ (Waquet2001: 209). This snobbish dismissal of the lowly pedant should remindus that quite a few of the textual scholars, like Harvey and Bentley, didindeed rise from the lower classes and in both cases they were not al-lowed to forget their original status. The cruel treatment they encoun-tered from the people that used to be called their ‘betters’ may well ex-plain some of the stridency in their writings and it certainly demonstratesthat for ambitious young men of humble birth the thorough mastery ofGreek and of an elegant Ciceronian Latin represented one of the fewchances for advancement (see Stern 1979 and Monk 1883).

Montaigne may have mourned the loss of Latin as a European lan-guage in his essays, but he wrote and published his lament in French andthis is a development that we find everywhere in the seventeenth century:Newton still wrote his Principia in Latin but his Optics was in English.Latin was used by scholars to communicate, but on the continent at least,it began to be replaced in the eighteenth century by French. It is clearthat this common language was an important cohesive factor in Europe.This was certainly the case for the Catholics who still had Latin as alingua franca, but in the study of Latin the close scrutiny of texts by Ro-man writers was part of the education of both Catholics and Protestantsand thus the language was not restricted to the former. Some textualscholars and editors in the sixteenth and seventeenth century showed aremarkable versatility in adapting their religious allegiances to the situa-tion in which they found themselves and Dutch and English Protestantsvisited Italian libraries and monasteries with very few restrictions. Whilethe study and interpretation of biblical and patristic sources was highly


2 A good example is Nicolaes Heinsius, see Blok 1984.

controversial, the reading of Virgil and Horace had the advantage ofrepresenting a neutral territory. When young British and Dutch scholarsvisited Italy on the first grand tours, they found like-minded scholarsthere who certainly did not share their religious ideas.2 So Latin was notan exclusively Catholic language: it was after all in mostly ProtestantGermany that in the nineteenth century the modern secondary schooland university education was first developed.

While political Europe was disintegrating in religious territories,humanism was creating an international intellectual elite that to a largeextent disregarded the new national or religious borders and disputes.This early enlightenment was based on an intricate system of personalties, learned societies and journals that enabled scholars who had com-pletely different social, political, national and religious allegiances toexchange information on Roman and Greek antiquities, on variants andmanuscripts. This is clear when we see that Richard Bentley, an EnglishProtestant, not only had excellent relations with the French Benedictinesat Saint Maur, not just helping them with their edition of the works ofOrigen of Alexandria but even exchanging collations of biblical manu-scripts when both parties were involved in competing Protestant andCatholic editions of the Bible.

This philological international was not an affair of what we now call‘the humanities.’ The split between what fifty years ago C.P. Snow calledthe two cultures had not yet occurred and the most important of thescientific geniuses who created the scientific revolution, Leibniz andNewton, were just as much fascinated by theological and historical is-sues. And so were the many learned societies that were created all overEurope, with support from the more enlightened of the European kingsand princes.

Institutionally, the study of Greek and Latin literature was a late-comer at the university. It was only in 1777 and after quite a fight thatF.A. Wolf managed to be matriculated at Göttingen, not in theology, butas a studiosus philologiae. Famously his near-contemporary, the Englishphilologist Richard Porson was told by the Vice-Chancellor of Cam-bridge University that he might just as well ‘collect his manuscripts athome’ instead of using the university’s resources. For textual scholarsromanticism brought a number of different developments: on the one

54 Geert Lernout

hand all the major Greek and Latin texts had already been edited andmost of the efforts would henceforth be directed on the one hand to-wards the edition of the more obscure texts and on the other hand to theannotation of those works that were beginning to be considered andmarketed as ‘the classics’. But these classics also changed their character:among quite a few other essays and books in the final decades of theeighteenth century, it was the same F.A. Wolf’s study Prolegomena adHomerum that turned the Greek poet from the classicist writer of theprevious era into a natural, naive and folk poet (or group of poets).

The privileged and newly ‘classic’ texts also needed commentary andannotation because their thorough study began to form an important partof a university education that had until this moment been a uniformphenomenon. The earliest universities used to offer an education thatwas not substantially different in Bologna than in Oxford or Paris orPrague. It was only when this essentially religious education split intoCatholic and Protestant versions that there were at least two kinds ofuniversities, but even then the Latin and Greek curriculum tended to besimilar, regardless of the university’s religious allegiance.

It was in the nineteenth century that this common culture came underattack from the most unlikely side: textual scholars and editors, all ofwhom had learned the trade in the study of Greek and Latin literature,began to collect, edit and publish texts in the vernacular languages. Againthe German scholars were pioneers in this practice and it has become acommon-place that it was this development that stands at the start of themodern conception of European humanist study at the secondary andtertiary levels.

No wonder then that by the end of the nineteenth century the Ger-man form of textual criticism was being imitated all over the world. Thisform of inquiry became the basis of the modern humanities departmentsat the new research university that in one way or another is still theworld-wide model for higher education. German textual study was every-where and even Italy, a country that claimed to have invented both clas-sical and vernacular humanist study, had to be prodded by Germanscholars into the editing and studying of early Italian texts. Similar devel-opments took place all over Europe, with local scholars only slowlycatching up with what the Germans had been doing successfully formany years. In the course of the nineteenth century, in other words, thediscipline of philology went through a process of nationalization. By the


end of the century the scholarly study of each of the different nationalliteratures and the historical-critical edition of its major texts had becomea university specialism that of course tended to be restricted in the mainto the university departments in one’s own country. No single Europeanuniversity could afford to have all of the European languages and litera-tures covered. National philologists not only wrote on their own lan-guage but in their publications they increasingly began to use that lan-guage too. In most cases this effectively excluded non-native speakersfrom this form of enquiry and this resulted in the novel fact that some ofthe national philologies began to have their own divergent developments,to some extent outside of the hitherto general university culture.

Language still is a central issue in philology, not just as the object ofstudy but at least as importantly as a medium of that study: philologyused to be an international science that was practiced, like all other sci-ences, in an international language, Latin. Nowadays classical philologyby its nature remains an international and to some extent a non-nationalconcern but its practitioners no longer write in a common language. Inthe nineteenth century the specialized journals began to publish theirscholarship in the vernacular languages, so that modern classical or bibli-cal philologists who wanted to keep up with the literature were requiredto have a reading knowledge of at least Italian, of English, German andFrench and preferably also of Dutch, Spanish and Danish.

Judging from the titles of the contributions in this symposium, it isobvious that in the nineteenth century philology as a science shifted itsattention from classical Greek and Latin texts to texts in the vernacular,beginning with the oldest medieval texts and in some instances movingto what was called the ‘national’ literatures of the eighteenth and nine-teenth century. By the turn of the twentieth century the development ofeditorial practice in some cases would shift from classical philology tothe edition of modern literatures with the difficult cases of ‘national po-ets’ such as in the UK William Shakespeare (no manuscripts and defec-tive printed versions) in the UK and in Germany Friedrich Hölderlin(only drafts of the later major poems) and Franz Kafka (only manu-scripts of the major works) among many other controversial cases. Be-cause of these conditions, in many cases editorial theory ceased to have acommon international forum. When in the seventies and eighties Frenchgenetic criticism became interested in those textual issues that had beendismissed as positivist by structuralism and post-structuralism, the result-

56 Geert Lernout

ing development to a large extent happened without reference to existingmethodologies in German and Anglo-American traditions.

In classical studies editorial theory was and still is considered to be ashared problem, with discussions of Lachmann’s stemmatic approach insome European countries, e.g. in Italy where for all kinds of cultural andpolitical reasons there has been a continuous dialogue between the twophilologies. But in the rest of Europe and in the US the separate devel-opment in classical and vernacular philologies and the fact that increas-ingly the latter issues were being discussed in one’s own national lan-guage, has resulted in entirely separate developments. By the end of thetwentieth century there were a few attempts at a dialogue between Ger-man editors and French généticiens or between the latter and the Italianphilologers. In his study of editorial traditions in the case of the modern-ist writers James Joyce, Thomas Mann and Marcel Proust, Dirk VanHulle was able to trace the exact relationships among the Anglo-Ameri-can, German and French traditions in editing and textual study, a featthat only became possible because in this case the scholar studying thesetraditions was not just fluent in all the languages involved but also suffi-ciently aware of the specific editorial problems in the three very differentcases of Joyce, Mann and Proust (Van Hulle 2004).

This is another source for the divergence in philological theory andpractice: the increasing trend of specialization in graduate education hasresulted in an almost programmatic reluctance to generalise. This isparadoxically demonstrated in the career of Roland Barthes whose firststructuralist work attacked the philology of the traditional critics byattempting to find the structures underlying not just literary but allsemiotic systems, the most ambitious project of providing a general basisfor every aspect of what was called a ‘signifying practice’. But by the endof the seventies Barthes had moved away from such generalization,arguing, in his late study La chambre obscure, for the creation of a mathesissingularis, which he defined as ‘the impossible science of the unique be-ing’ (Barthes 1980, 110).

We can observe in the same period an equivalent for this reluctanceto generalize in similar developments in editorial theory. The representa-tives of the New New Bibliography moved away from the Greg-Bowers-Tanselle insistence on the universal relevance of authorial intention. Wecan also see it in recent German editions, such as Sattler’s edition of theworks of Friedrich Hölderlin or in the refusal of critique génétique to even


3 For general surveys of biblical criticism, see Greenslade 1963 and Reventlow1990-97.

consider editing a text, because that would give a finality to a version ofthe text that by definition no text can or should have. In more recentyears there have been strong arguments by respected authors againsttraditional philology. In his ‘critical history of philology’ BernardCerquiglini argues against the generalising tendencies in philology and hepraises the individual variant that does not allow a generalization(Cerquiglini 1989). In all these cases, editors, critics and theorists ofdifferent national, cultural and ideological backgrounds refuse to general-ize and instead they defend a principled priority of the individual mate-rial and textual fact.

With all these centrifugal forces at work in and (it might be argued)against philology, it is heartening to observe that in some philologicalfields we can see attempts to counter-act the forces that threaten to tearthe discipline further apart. Strangely the most important of these centri-petal forces comes from precisely the field that for so many centurieshad been the direct competitor of classical learning: the study of thebible. Biblical philology suffers from all of the ills of classical philology:specialization on the one hand and on the other a relevant secondarybibliography in at least six languages. Traditionally the study of thestrange book we call the bible was divided strictly along confessionallines with Catholic, Protestant and Jewish interpretations only rarelymeeting. In the nineteenth century attempts were made to find a com-mon ground, both in what in 1787 began to be called the ‘higher criti-cism’ and in the lower criticism that concerned itself with textual detailsand editing. By the mid-nineteenth century the serious scholarly study ofthe bible was no longer restricted to theology departments and non- orno longer religious scholars such as D.F. Strauss and Ernest Renan con-tinued the historical and critical studies of early Judaism and Christianitythat would lead to the inerrancy debate and fundamentalism in theprotestant churches and somewhat later to the modernist crisis in Cathol-icism. It is only in the last half century, after the hierarchy in Romechanged its position on the historical study of the text, that Catholicbiblical scholars have begun to read and study the book from a perspec-tive that is no longer strictly partisan.3

It is interesting first, simply to note that major figures in the historyof philology as a critical discipline such as Richard Bentley and Karl

58 Geert Lernout

Lachmann planned to expose the biblical text to the principles of thenew science. Secondly the history of biblical textual scholarship wouldhave been quite different without the reformation: obviously the seriousstudy of the text of the bible became much more important after theintroduction of the doctrine of sola scriptura. If only the words of God’sbook and not tradition can tell us something about God, then it becomesvitally important that the book as we have it really does contain God’sunadulterated word. As Salvatore Comporeale demonstrated more thanthirty-five years ago, this interest in the biblical text had been pioneeredby Lorenzo Valla as a strictly humanist form of ‘New Theology’(Camporeale 1972). It was Erasmus’s great achievement that he mostclearly understood what Valla had been trying to do in his Adnotationes inNovum Testamentum. The philological interest in the biblical text thuspreceded the reformation but, needless to say, the doctrine of solascriptura gave its findings a kind of relevance that had been absent in thehistory of the church with the exception of its earliest history, betweenthe writing of Revelation 22:18-19 (‘For I testify unto every man thatheareth the words of the prophecy of this book. If any man shall addunto these things, God shall unto him the plagues that are written in thisbook: And if any shall take away from the words of the book of thisprophecy, God shall take away his part out of the book of life, and outof the holy city, and from the things which are written in this book’) andthe discussions about the exact nature of the Christian canon that lastedat least until the beginning of the fifth century. In that earliest history thestatus of the earliest Christian texts had been decidedly non-canonicaland although the arguments for inclusion or exclusion of a particular textin the canon were only seldom historical or philological, these consider-ations had not been completely absent either.

But paradoxically, some of the most thorough biblical criticism in theperiod after Luther and Calvin came from Catholic scholars such asRichard Simon and Alexander Geddes who not only wanted to defendthe orthodoxy of tradition against Spinoza’s rationalist critique but alsoagainst the total reliance on the bible that the Protestants advocated (seeMurri 1972 and Fuller 1984). Even before the publication of his Histoirecritique du Vieux Testament, Simon had been involved in an aborted at-tempt to translate the bible in collaboration with Protestants and in theend it was his use of the term ‘critique’ in combination with the biblethat upset the Catholic critics the most. Apparently in those more inno-


cent days, that word still had its original force. It can only be a hopefulsign that last year, I think for the very first time, a Dutch translation ofthe bible was published that was the result of a real collaboration be-tween Catholics and Protestants and that seems to have been acceptableto both parties. In the field of biblical criticism at least, a general agree-ment has been found on the presumably historical and critical shape ofthe text that transcends these old sectarian divisions.

In conclusion I would like to make a few suggestions. If we can learnanything from the history of our discipline, it is that there is no suchthing as a German or a French philology, just as there is no Catholic orJewish science. The principles governing the creation, transmission andusage of written texts are the same, whether we study classical, biblical ormodern writings. As Joep Leerssen has argued in the introduction to thisvolume, there are no good reasons for the continued separate develop-ment of the national philologies and it might be a good idea to increasethe number and quality of contacts between scholars from the differentnational scholarly traditions in all forms of philology. For that purpose itseems necessary that major contributions to editorial theory or practiceshould at least be reported and maybe systematically translated inEnglish-language publications. That would put an end to the harmfulisolation of some national philologies who continue to be blissfully un-aware of what is and has been happening in neighbouring cultures andliteratures. At the same time scholars working within these nationalliteratures should be much more aware of what is going on in the studyof earlier texts and vice versa. As G. Thomas Tanselle put it, almost aquarter of a century ago:

By not familiarizing themselves with the textual criticism of classical, bibli-cal, and medieval literature, textual scholars of more recent literature arecutting themselves off from a voluminous body of theoretical discussionand the product of many generations of experience. And by not keeping upwith developments in the editing of post-medieval writings, students ofearlier works are depriving themselves of the knowledge of significantadvances in editorial thinking. (Tanselle 1983: 22)

Finally, and this bring us back to the discussion of facts and generaliza-tion in the first part of this paper: in Joseph A. Dane’s recent The Myth ofPrint Culture it becomes evident that what philology in the widest defini-tion needs most desperately is not more generalization. Dane skilfullyand wittily demonstrates that some of the most widely cherished beliefs

60 Geert Lernout

and stories about print culture are no more than convenient myths thatcannot possibly be substantiated. Most relevantly in his Chapter 6 Danedemolishes what he calls ‘the critical mythology that accrues to certainhistorical figures (Erasmus, Bentley, Malone) as they become defined aseditors in the modern sense’ (Dane 2005, 4-5). Since my all-too-general-ising comments have to some extent been based on the mythologicalhistory of the discipline written by latter-day philologists, we may wellhave to revise part of this story. But before we do that, we will requiremany more details, because it is there, among the details, according tothe old saying, that we’ll find ‘der Herr-Gott’. The first irony is that atleast one editorial variant of this old saying claims that instead of Godwe will find ‘der Teufel’ in the detail. And perhaps the final and com-pletely appropriate irony is that both versions of this saying have beenvariously attributed to Goethe, Spinoza, Flaubert and a host of otherwriters. Personally I am quite certain that it is the devil who is to blame.

ReferencesAuvray, Paul. 1974. Richard Simon: 1638-1712. Paris: Presses universitaires

françaises, Barthes, Roland. 1980. La chambre claire Paris: Seuil.Blok, Frans Felix. 1984. Nicolaas Heinsius in Napels (april-juli 1647). Amsterdam:

North-Holland Publishing Company.Camporeale, Salvatore. 1972. Lorenzo Valla. Umanesimo e teologia. Preface by

Eugenio Garin. Firenze: Istituto Nazionale di Studi sul Rinascimento. Canfora, Luziano. 1991. The Vanished Library. London: Vintage.Canfora, Luziano. 1998. La Bibliotheca del patriarca: Fozio censurato nella Francia di

Mazzarino. Roma: Salerno.Canfora, Luziano. 2002. Convertire Casaubon. Milano: Adelphi.Cerquiglini, Bernard. 1989. Eloge de la variante: Histoire critique de la philology. Paris:

Seuil.Dane, Joseph A. 2005. The Myth of Print Culture: Essays on Evidence, Textuality, and

Bibliographical Method. Toronto: University of Toronto Press.Fuller, Reginald C. 1984. Alexander Geddes 1737-1802: Pioneer of Biblical Criticism.

Sheffield: Almond Press, Gamble, Harry Y. 1995. Books and Readers in the Early Church: A History of Early

Christian Texts. New Haven: Yale University Press.Grafton, Anthony. 1990. Forgers and Critics: Creativity and Duplicity inWestern

Scholarship. London: Collins & Brown.


Grafton, Anthony. 1991. Defenders of the Text: The Traditions of Scholarship in anAge of Science, 1450-1800. Cambridge: Harvard University Press.

Grafton, Anthony. 1997. The Footnote: A Curious History. London: Faber andFaber.

Grafton, Anthony. 2002. Bring Out Your Dead: The Past as Revelation. Cambridge,MA: Harvard University Press.

Greenslade, S.L, ed. 1963. The Cambridge History of the Bible. The West from theReformation to the Present Day. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Harris, William V. 1989. Ancient Literacy. Cambridge, MA: Harvard UniversityPress.

Keller, Rudi. 1990. Sprachwandel. Von der unsichtbaren Hand in der Sprache.Tübingen: Francke.

Mirri, F. Saverio. 1972. Richard Simon e il metodo storico-critico di B. Spinoza.Firenze: F. le Monnier.

Monk, James Henry. 1883. The Life of Richard Bentley, D.D. London.Reventlow, Henning Graf. 1990-97. Epochen der Bibelauslegung. 3 vols.; München:

C.H. Beck.Stern, Virginia F. 1979. Gabriel Harvey: His Life, Marginalia and Library. Oxford:

Clarendon Press.Tanselle, G. Thomas. 1983. Classical, Biblical and Medieval Textual Criticism

and Modern Editing. Studies in Bibliography 36: 21-68.Van Hulle, Dirk. 2004. Textual Awareness: A Genetic Study of Late Manuscripts by

Joyce, Proust, and Mann. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press. Waquet, Françoise. 2001. Latin or the Empire of the Sign. London: Verso.

CASE STUDIES IEMERGING CANONS AROUND THE EUROPEAN RIM


SLOVENE TEXT EDITIONS, SLAVIC PHILOLOGYAND NATION-BUILDING

Darko Dolinar

AbstractCritical editions in Slovenia belong to two different contexts: Slavicphilology and Slovenian national culture. Their development can bedivided along two lines. The editions of older texts and materials aremore committed to pure scholarly criteria; they are intended primarilyfor a specialized, also international readership, with less interest in (orfor) the wider public. The editions of more recent literary works havea wider and more mixed target readership. In terms of editorialprocedure they are more subject to compromise and more open to anationally ideological parti-pris. The major contemporary series‘Collected Works of Slovenian Poets and Writers’ represents themixed type of editions where strictly scholarly treatments coexist withaccessibility for the general public. However, this schematic divisionstill leaves room for exceptions such as the recent critical edition ofthe medieval Freising manuscripts, whose eager acceptance amongthe wider public bespeaks the political attitudes of a specific historicalmoment.

Ever since its beginning in the early nineteenth century, editing activity inSlovenia has primarily been tied to national philology or national literaryhistory, and much less, or almost not at all, to other text-related disci-plines such as law, philosophy, history, theology or Biblical studies – thatis, disciplines in which critical editions may have an equally importantrole. The history of critical editions in Slovenia should be seen, then, intwo different but interconnected contexts: Slavic philology and Slovene

66 Darko Dolinar

1 This was the basic standpoint explicitly formulated by Gregor Krek, the firstprofessor of Slavic philology at the University of Graz; cf. Krek 1874, 141-46; thesame in Krek 1887, 477-83.

national culture. I first examine these contexts and then proceed to con-sider critical editions themselves.

ContextsSlavic philology belongs to the group of ‘new’ or national philologies.These were shaped relying heavily on the model of ‘old’, i.e. classicalphilology, with the theoretical and methodological approaches, valuesand techniques of the Classics transposed to the subject areas of ‘new’European literatures and cultures. This occurred at a specific historicaljuncture towards the end of the eighteenth and at the beginning of thenineteenth century, under the influence of the flourishing and predomi-nance of historicism and the rise of national awareness and of modernnation-formation. Against the backdrop of these significant conceptualand intellectual shifts could national literatures and cultures become arewarding subject of scholarly studies. The assumption behind everycritical edition is that a text under consideration has a certain value, andtherefore deserves close philological examination. A priori recognition ofits value is a prerequisite, or the undertaking would not make sense. Thismeans that, similar to the approach adopted by old philology in treatingthe works of classical antiquity, the new philologies view texts written innational languages as having value – albeit that the perspective and eval-uation criteria are now somewhat different. Whereas the Classics carriedethical, cognitive and aesthetic values that constituted the core of theideal of universal humanist education and Bildung, and as such wereaccepted by European cultures of later periods, the texts treated by thenew philologies have yet another, added value in addition to these. Theyare the manifestations of the creativity of a specific ethnic group ornation – or, in other words, the intellectual life of these groups findsexpression through these texts. Perhaps the most energetic expression ofthis belief is the formulation that the individuality of a nation – that is,the nationality of a nation1 – is in essence its language, literature (in thewidest sense of the word, including folklore), mythology and religion.

Roughly speaking, the development of the new philologies seems togo through two crucial phases. In the first phase, the new philologiesdelineated their subject fields, identified the main problems, put in order

SLOVENE TEXT EDITIONS 67

their theoretical foundations and created the methodological apparatus;in the next phase, they broke from the isolated sphere of private erudi-tion and moved towards establishing and encompassing institutions andsocial promotion. Their inner dynamics were governed by two aspira-tions. One was expansion, or the conquering of new dimensions of theirobjects of study and reinforcing and deepening the theoretical founda-tions and methodological procedures. The other was progressive differ-entiation and specialisation with respect to the field of study (in whichthe focus shifted from the philology of broader language groups to par-ticular national philologies) and at the systemic and methodologicallevels, where general philology split into individual disciplines, in mostcases linguistics, literary studies and ethnology or folklore studies.

During the nineteenth century, the period of their greatest flourishing,the new philologies strived to secure for themselves a central placeamong the humanities by applying the highest levels of professionalismin all respects. They adhered to the principles of scholarly studies thatwere valid at that time. However, they did not operate in neutral aca-demic and cultural spaces of pure cognition and evaluation, but werepart of the historical and social contexts of the time. Since as a rule theydealt with languages, literatures and folklores of specific national com-munities – their own national communities – they were obliged to ex-press and affirm corresponding national traits. The more convincinglyand successfully they fulfilled this task – an ideological one, really – themore readily their role as a central national discipline was acknowledged.

The national-ideological aspect is more or less common to all the newphilologies, and their social function largely rests upon this aspect. Howthis worked out in practice was a matter of particular historical circum-stances. By and large, a nineteenth-century spectrum runs from sovereignnations with strong economies, firm social structures and developedcultures (e.g., France, Britain, Spain and Russia), to non-sovereign, politi-cally subaltern, economically and socially weak, and culturally under-developed nations (also referred to as ‘stateless’ or ‘non-historical’ na-tions, e.g., Irish, Catalonian, Lithuanian, Ukrainian). Positioned betweenthese two extremes are nations with significant histories and developedcultures, but without autonomy or political independence (e.g., Czech,Polish and to some extent Italian).

National philologies ranged across very different contexts, and weresubject to different circumstances. Because language, folklore, literature

68 Darko Dolinar

2 Pypin and Spasovich 1864, 2nd expanded ed.: Pypin and Spasovich 1879-80. Thecontemporary German translation of this book (1880-84) was very popular amongSlavic readers in the Habsburg monarchy.

and arts are the main (if not practically the only) manifestations of theexistence of ‘stateless’ nations, they tend to be studied and cultivatedwith special zeal. While a rich and developed culture with many qualitytexts at its disposal can afford to neglect works of less significance, insmaller and less developed nations every cultural phenomenon, regard-less of significance, may become the focus of philologists’ interest.

The Slovene nation falls into this latter category: stateless, with a latedevelopment. A process of national revival or awakening occurred in thelate eighteenth and throughout the nineteenth century; it was initiallyrestricted to linguistic, literary and cultural activities, and later spread intothe economic, social and political fields. National philology emerged as apart of this process. Its very birth and existence testify to the efforts torevive the local language and culture; conversely, it played an active rolein this process and contributed to the emergence of national awareness.National philology was driven by the need for national affirmation, andphilology’s ideological function in the Slovene context was more salientthan in large, developed and sovereign nations.

Slavic studies evolved along more or less the same path as the othernew philologies. The important stages, shifts and milestones in its devel-opment mainly corresponded to the established pattern of Germanic andRomance studies, albeit a little belatedly. One of the central dilemmas,probably not so conspicuous in other studies, related to the specificationof the subject field. The points at issue were the relationships, bound-aries and transitions between the fields common to all Slavic nations ingeneral and those specific to individual ethnic (i.e., national) entitiesinside this framework. One of the problems was a distinction betweenlanguages and dialects and between nations and ethnic groups or tribes.The perspective on this issue obviously changed over time; this is indi-cated by a meaningful difference between the titles of two standardworks. In 1826 Pavol J. Šafárik wrote his History of the Slavic Language andLiterature (note the singular form) in all its Dialects (Šafárik [Schaffarik]1826), but forty years later Pypin and Spasovich published their HistoricalReview of Slavic Literatures (note the plural).2 This vacillation has widerimplications. It is connected with the emergence of Pan-Slavism and itsvarious offshoots (e.g., Illyrianism in the South Slavic region). Above all,


it is related to the fact that in the nineteenth century the constitution ofthe Slavic nations and the shaping of national awareness were as yet influx. The circumstances of political and cultural history prevailing invarious regions dictated various social roles conferred upon Slavic stud-ies in their specific environments. While in Russia, philology dealt withthe culture of the ruling nation, the situation was different in the Habs-burg monarchy, which encompassed the majority of the West Slavicnations and a considerable number of the South Slavic nations in a sub-ordinate political and social position.

The development of Slavic studies in Austria is fairly well known (e.g.Kimball 1973). It began with the collaboration of experts, critics, enthu-siasts and authors from the broader environment whose gravitationalcentre was Vienna. Over several decades, the research work and publish-ing activities of this informal international network provided firm foun-dations for Slavic studies, so that by the mid-nineteenth century itemerged as a mature discipline that found its way into the universities,first the University of Vienna, then those of Graz and Prague. ProminentSlovene philologists contributed a great deal to the discipline’s develop-ment, among them the founder, Jernej (Bartholomäus) Kopitar(1780-1844), his student, successor and the first professor of Slavicphilology in Vienna Fran Miklošič (Miklosich, 1813-91) and the pioneerof Slavic studies at the University of Graz, Gregor Krek (1840-1905).Towards the end of the century, they were succeeded by the representa-tives of the next generation of philologists: Vatroslav Oblak (1864-96),Karel Štrekelj (1859-1912) and Matija Murko (1861-1952), who adaptedto completely new circumstances following the First World War.

In the light of these facts, it is understandable that one of the mainlines of development of national philology in Slovenia was closely relatedto academic Slavic studies in Austria. However, initially the themes andissues specific to Slovenia were relatively less conspicuous. They re-ceived more emphasis only towards the end of the nineteenth century;that is, the time when the previously dominant uniform model of philol-ogy began to split into national disciplines elsewhere as well. It was atthis time that Štrekelj gave the first independent lectures on Slovenelanguage, literature and folk songs at the University of Graz; some ofthese were even held in the Slovene language.

Significantly stimuli towards a Slovene national philology also camefrom outside academic institutions. Among these there were courses in

70 Darko Dolinar

Slovene (as a native language) and Slovene literature that were graduallyestablished in Germanised schools; the textbooks and reference booksused in these courses can be considered the second line of developmentin emerging Slovene studies. Another relevant influence were newspa-pers and magazines, which published popular texts with didactic contentand written in the spirit of national awakening, paving the way for morecomplex literary and critical textual activity. Such journalism combinedthe programmatic standpoints of literary authors, more ambitious bookreviews and the first serious attempts at literary theory. In this long andcomplex process of the constitution of Slovene letters, the crucialpassage-points are marked by the first academic treatises, the first com-plete literary historical reviews, the gradual specialisation of professionalpublications, the strengthening of a theoretical and methodological basisat the beginning of the twentieth century and, finally, the full institutionaland social recognition of this discipline, which occurred only after thedisintegration of the Habsburg monarchy and within the new Yugoslavstate. Slovene studies were accorded a central place in the first Sloveneuniversity in Ljubljana, established in 1919.

Critical EditionsThe manoeuvring space of these editions seems by and large to havebeen determined by three factors: the nature and the scope of the textualheritage in question, the principles and theoretical or methodologicalapproaches employed by their parent disciplines, and various externalsystemic aspects (ideological, cultural and social, organisational, eco-nomic). The interplay of these factors crucially shapes and directs thestructure and function of critical editions.

One of the most important factors influencing editorial practice is thefact that the corpus of older Slovene texts is modest in number andscope. Only some ten medieval manuscripts have survived to date, somein their entirety and others in fragments, and these are predominantlyprayers and sermons; these manuscripts are unique specimens, and sothey do not provide evidence of a copying tradition. The Early Modernperiod saw the emergence of a body of writing with a predominantlyecclesiastical religious focus; alongside, the number of secular functionalwritings gradually increased as well. Artistic literature emerged towardsthe end of the eighteenth century and reached its first peak in the firsthalf of the nineteenth century with Romantic poetry, represented by


3 Kopitar 1836, XXXIII-XLIV; cf. also the modern Slovene translation, Kopitar 1995.4 The series includes the Freising Manuscripts (Bernik et al. 1992, 1993, 2004),

some Old Church Slavonic manuscripts, various Slovene texts from the sixteenth toeighteenth century (works of Protestant writers, collections of poems, collections of

names like France Prešeren (1800-1849). In subsequent decades, post-Romantic and Realistic narrative prose developed (Fran Levstik, 1831-1887; Josip Jurčič, 1844-1881), and readership grew in size; at the sametime, the social basis of literature was strengthened through book pub-lishing, periodicals and school curricula.

On this basis, text editions in Slovenia appear to have followed a dualline of development. One of these runs concurrently with Slavic philol-ogy in general, the other belongs to the domain of national literary his-tory. The former includes primarily older texts and documentary materi-als, whereas the latter is dominated by recent literary works. Folk songsoccupy an intermediate position, showing the traits of both types men-tioned.

The first line has its beginnings in the early nineteenth century andoriginated in the circle gathered around the patron and mentorSigismund Zois (1747-1819). Jernej Kopitar was a member of this circle,as was the poet and versatile essayist Valentin Vodnik (cf. Merchiers2005). Their correspondents also included the ‘father of Slavic studies’Josef Dobrovský. The text editions generated by this circle were intendedprimarily for an academically erudite audience. In terms of quality, thebest among these – for example, Kopitar’s edition of the Freising Manu-scripts, partly published in 1822, with a complete edition appearing in18363 – are on a par with the best international academic works of thattime. This line was carried on by the aforementioned Slovene experts inSlavic studies at Austrian universities, Miklošič, Krek and Oblak, whowere indeed more concerned with texts in Old Church Slavonic,although they did publish several old Slovene texts. This tradition ofcritical editions with predominantly academic goals and specialised targetreadership continued into the twentieth century. One such undertakingwas the critical edition of the Freising Manuscripts prepared by FranRamovš and Milko Kos (1937). Recent editions dating from the secondhalf of the twentieth century include those of older literary texts, manu-scripts, correspondence and documentary materials published by theSlovene Academy of Sciences and Arts and its Scientific Research Cen-tre. 4

72 Darko Dolinar

Baroque sermons), correspondences of literary and historical relevance (Trubar andother Protestants, Čop, Vraz, Korytko, Levec, Govekar, Kidrič and Lavrin), and finallyworks of philology and literary history (Pohlin, Erberg and Kidrič).

5 After Štrekelj’s death in 1912, the edition’s fourth volume was completed by hisstudent Joža Glonar.

6 In many Slavic countries, the matica – an association combining the functions ofreading room, publishing house and book club – was an important initiative towardspopular literacy and the status-raising of the national language (Kimball 1973). TheSlovene matica was founded in 1864; among its aims were the cultivation and dissemi-nation of scientific learning.

Early publications of folk poems dating from the period of Romanti-cism were inspired by literary taste and the ideals of national awakening– for example, Vodnik’s and Prešeren’s redactions in the almanacKranjska Čbelica (‘The Carniolan bee’) in the 1830s, and books edited byEmil Korytko (1839-44) and Stanko Vraz (1839). At the turn of thetwentieth century, Karel Štrekelj prepared a comprehensive critical edi-tion of his Slovenske narodne pesmi (Slovene Folk Songs; 1895-1923),5which came to be regarded as one of the greatest achievements of thisdiscipline by international standards, although the publisher, Slovenskamatica,6 targeted the wider public rather than specialised circles.

The destiny of editions of more recent literary works was quite differ-ent. Owing to the state of affairs in the field of belles lettres as outlinedabove, and the backwardness of literary historiography in the first half ofthe nineteenth century, there was no genuine need for critical editions. Inthe second half of the nineteenth century several editions of mixed typeintended for the wider public appeared, ranging from popular ones toannotated scholarly editions. They were initially prepared by literarywriters and critics and later on by philologists. Their original intentionwas to present the works of individual authors (complete or in part) andalso included the works of most widely recognised living authors. One ofthe first such projects was the edition of poetry written by the mostimportant Romantic poet, France Prešeren, edited by the writers JosipStritar and Josip Jurčič (1866). The most prominent achievements areprobably the editions of prose written by Jurčič, Levstik and certain otherauthors prepared by the critic Fran Levec (1882-92; 1891-95).

Editing activity became more intense in the early twentieth century.The first solid argument for these undertakings was formulated duringthe First World War by the literary historian and critic Ivan Prijatelj. Inhis politically and culturally motivated call for a book series presenting


7 The book was printed in 1914, but publication was delayed due to to outbreak ofthe First World War.

8 Cf. occasional articles by, and interviews with both general editors, Anton Ocvirkand, after his death in 1980, France Bernik, as well as some ambitious book reviewssuch as Pogačnik (1979) and, among the very rare critical works, Kramberger (1993).

classic Slovene writers (Prijatelj 1917a, 1917b), he opted for a popularly-oriented type of edition based on critically checked texts, commentariesand essays, but without the detailed critical apparatus that is of interestonly to specialists. This concept was employed in his edition of Jurčič’sand Tavčar’s works in the 1920s (Prijatelj 1919-27, 1921-32). A stricterscholarly method inspired the editions of Prešeren’s poetry by the literaryhistorians Avgust Žigon (1922),7 Joža Glonar and Avgust Pirjevec(1929), and France Kidrič (1936).

Activities in this area came into full swing in the second half of thetwentieth century with editions of individual authors’ works, and severalambitious book series supplemented with commentaries, each of whichapplied textual-critical and ecdotic elements. Undoubtedly, the centralplace is occupied by the representative series Zbrana dela slovenskihpesnikov in pisateljev (‘Collected works of Slovene poets and writers’), laterdubbed the ‘Slovene classics’ . This series, which has been in progresssince 1945, runs to more than 220 volumes by c. thirty authors. Of these,25 are complete work editions, some of them supplemented with amonograph on the author. Eminent literary historians and critics haveparticipated in this project. This provides a good basis for the exemplaryidentification of the main advantages, but also some drawbacks, of re-cent edition practices.8

This series addresses both a narrow circle of specialist scholars andthe wider general readership. Therefore, much as in the case of some ofits interwar predecessors, the strict critical-editiorial principle was notemployed; instead scholarly methods were combined with approachesthat took as their point of departure accessibility for the general public.This series played an important role in shaping the Slovene literarycanon. The selection of authors shows that while canon was alreadyfirmly established for the nineteenth and early twentieth century , it wasstill open to major changes as regards recent literature. In individualwork editions, it is telling which parts are foregroudned as core texts andwhich are included as additions. Here the editors judge what is complete,finished and aesthetically valuable, and what is merely a draft, a frag-

74 Darko Dolinar

ment, an immature work or simply a failed attempt. In this way theyintervene almost as co-author, particularly in cases in which they dealwith comprehensive legacies where there are no testimonies to the‘author’s will’. The editors decide which text is an original and which anadaptation or translation, and what the most suitable arrangement ofthese texts is; they decide to what extent the borderline, semi-literary andnon-literary components of particular works are taken into account.Finally, their concessions to the readers’ receptive capacities can be in-ferred from the way in which the language of older texts has been mod-ernised.

The series also reveals predicaments in the literary system. Obviously,the Slovene literary market is too small to tolerate specialised scholarlyeditions or perhaps bibliophile ones alongside popular editions of thesame works. This approach works only with few recognised classic au-thors – France Prešeren, Ivan Cankar, Oton Župančič and SrečkoKosovel. In addition, over the last few decades the country’s transitioncrisis has affected publishing activity and has undermined the institu-tional and social support of all commercially less attractive publishingprojects. This means that critical editions have primarily been the domainof academic institutions, whose existence is not dependent on the bookmarket, whereas mainstream publishers undertake such projects onlyexceptionally, with much difficulty and practically in defiance of com-mercial considerations. The most illustrative example is the destiny ofthe collection of classic Slovene writers that was scheduled to appearover the past decade. It survived the abolition of the fiction programmeby its previous publisher and the collapse of its newly found publisher,and finally found shelter under the roof of a third publisher, a studentpublishing organisation.

The various types of editions presented here reveal some essentialdifferences. Critical editions of older texts and documentary materials aremore committed to pure scholarly criteria; they are intended primarily forspecialised circles, including international ones, and they are of less inter-est to the general public and less open to national-ideological influences.The editions of more recent literary works target wider and mixed read-erships. In terms of editorial concepts they are therefore more subject tocompromises. The national ideological function attributed to these workscan be preserved in such editions.


9 For additional information, cf. the survey of studies by Igor Grdina and bibliogra-phy by Marko Kranjec in the critical edition Bernik et al. 2004, 154-91. A recentelectronic critical edition (Grdina et al. 2007) has been placed online athttp://nl.ijs.si/e-zrc.bs

However, this schematic division is not absolute. The Freising Manu-scripts, one among the rare medieval Slovene texts that received the mostattention and saw the greatest number of editions, is the most character-istic exception.9 The reasons are obvious. These manuscripts dating fromthe end of the tenth century are the oldest manuscripts in any Slaviclanguage using the Latin alphabet, and the texts themselves are evenolder than the manuscripts. They present not only the opportunity toresolve certain philological issues relating to the history of language andliterature, but they also raise questions related to ecclesiastical, religious,ethnic, cultural and political history. The issues related to these manu-scripts are relevant for the broader Central European and Mediterraneanregions located at the point where the Alps, the Apennine Peninsula, thePannonian Plain and the Balkans meet. Scholars have expressed interestin these texts ever since their discovery at the beginning of the nine-teenth century. The selected bibliography includes more than six hundredtitles, including almost forty editions. Not all of these are critical – someare adapted for textbooks, are translations, etc. – yet more than half ofthem display serious scholarly intentions. In addition to Slovene editors,there are also Czech, Slovak, Russian, Austrian and German researchers.They illuminate this subject from various perspectives and place it invarious contexts.

One of the central questions, which has pervaded almost two hun-dred years of debate, relates to the linguistic and ethnic origins of thesetexts. Early on, Dobrovský and Kopitar advanced the thesis that theFreising Manuscripts belong to early Slovene. In subsequent debates,contradicting hypotheses appeared, linked the MSS to Old Church Sla-vonic writing from ninth-century Greater Moravia and Lower Pannonia.In accordance with various theories on the origins and emergence of OldChurch Slavonic, these hypotheses suggested either a link with Czech orSlovak regions, or with Macedonian foundations, also allowing contactswith the Croatian glagolitic tradition. At the root of these debates lies theissue of the relative influence of the Western Church (through Germanpatterns of Slovene texts) and that of the Eastern Church (from whichensued the mission of Cyril and Methodius).

76 Darko Dolinar

Academic research on this issue has followed its immanent logic,resting on the subject matter itself and the state of affairs in disciplinesconcerned with it; even so, the interpretations of the findings are notimmune to ideological undertones. Discussions were not only of anacademic, scholarly import; when associating the Freising Manuscriptswith one or another contemporary Slavic nation they also revealed anideological dimension, a mental (historicist) template according to whichwhatever is older is more precious and more valuable, and whereby thehistorical rootedness of cultural patterns or values enhances their con-temporary status.

According to the established research tradition and according to cur-rently prevailing academic opinion, the Freising Manuscripts belong tothe early phase of Slovene, or they are most akin to it. Therefore, Slovenenational philology – or, to be more precise, linguistic, literary and culturalhistory – places the manuscripts at its very beginning, which gives thempowerful symbolic meaning. It is probably no coincidence that twentieth-century debates about the Freising Manuscripts received fresh impetusprecisely during the periods that were significant for the Slovene nationalissue. Certainly, their wider popular reception is connected with thispolitical conjuncture. To illustrate this pattern, the most recent instancemay suffice.

In 1992, on the first anniversary of Slovene sovereignty, a criticaledition of the Freising Manuscripts was published, summarising mostprevious findings. It triggered a fresh cycle of systematic research. Thebook, presented in a bibliophile layout befitting the occasion, also elic-ited a broad response among the wider public. It was followed by apaperback reprint, an audiocassette with phonetic reconstruction of thetexts and a television broadcast. A publishing house of the Slovene mi-nority in Italy published the translated and adapted version of this criticaledition. This provoked extensive polemics in Trieste (located in theethnically mixed border region and sensitive to Italian nationalist resent-ments), in which the issues of the age, comparative advantages and valueof these texts were debated. Finally, the latest, supplemented version ofthe critical edition took place in the context of the celebrations markingSlovenia’s 2004 accession to the European Union. At that time, the fouroldest Slovene manuscripts kept at various locations in four countrieswere exhibited together for the first time. This exhibition, entitled ‘TheBirth Certificate of Slovene Culture’, had so many visitors that it had to


be extended beyond its scheduled closing date. Thus, even today, criticaltext editions, for all their academic and scholarly content and intent, may,given a suitable occasion, obtain an ideological function.

ReferencesBernik, France. 2004. Iz veka v vek, iz roda v rod: ob petdesetletnici zbirke

slovenskih klasikov. In Spektrum ustvarjalnosti, 114-16. Ljubljana: Slovenskamatica. (Reprint from Delo 38, 12 December 1996: 13).

Bernik, France et al., eds. 1992. Brižinski spomeniki. Znanstvenokritična izdaja.Ljubljana: Slovenska akademija znanosti in umetnosti, Znanst-venoraziskovalni center SAZU and Slovenska knjiga.

Bernik, France et al., eds. 1993. Brižinski spomeniki. Znanstvenokritična izdaja. 2nded.; Ljubljana: Slovenska akademija znanosti in umetnosti andZnanstvenoraziskovalni center SAZU.

Bernik, France et al., eds. 2004. Brižinski spomeniki – Monumenta frisingensia.Znanstvenokritična izdaja. 3rd ed, ed. Jože Faganel and Darko Dolinar.Ljubljana: Založba ZRC, Znanstvenoraziskovalni center SAZU.

Glonar, Joža and Avgust Pirjevec, eds. 1929. Doktorja Franceta Prešerna zbranodelo. Ljubljana: Jugoslovanska knjigarna.

Grdina, Igor et al., eds. Brižinski spomeniki: Monumenta Frisingensia. Elektronskaznanstvenokritična izdaja. Ljubljana: Inštitut za slovensko literaturo in literarnevede ZRC SAZU. Online at http://nl.ijs.si/e-zrc/bs

Kidrič, France, ed. 1936. Prešeren. I. Pesnitve – pisma. Ljubljana: Tiskovnazadruga.

Kimball, Stanley B. 1973. The Austro-Slav Revival: A Study of Nineteenth-centuryLiterary Foundations. Philadelphia: American Philosophical Society.

Kopitar, Bartholomaeus (Jernej). 1836. Glagolita Clozianus. Vindobonae (Vi-enna).

Kopitar, Jernej. 1995. Jerneja Kopitarja Glagolita Clozianus – Cločev glagolit. Ed. JožeToporišič; Ljubljana: Filozofska fakulteta, Oddelek za slovanske jezike inknjiževnosti, Seminar slovenskega jezika, literature in kulture.

Korytko, Emil, ed. 1839-44. Slovenske pesmi krajnskiga naroda. 5 vols.; Ljubljana:Blasnik.

Kramberger, Igor. 1993. Sociologija filološko-založniške institucije. Doctoralthesis, Univ. Ljubljana.

Krek, Gregor. 1874. Einleitung in die slavische Literaturgeschichte und Darstellung ihrerälteren Perioden. Theil 1. Graz.

Krek, Gregor. 1887. Einleitung in die slavische Literaturgeschichte: Akademische Vor-lesungen, Studien und kritische Streifzüge. 2nd ed. of Krek 1874. Graz.

Levec, Fran, ed. 1882-92. Josipa Jurčiča zbrani spisi. 11 vols.; Ljubljana.Levec, Fran, ed. 1891-95. Levstikovi zbrani spisi. 5 vols.; Ljubljana.

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Merchiers, Ingrid. 2005. Cultural Nationalism in the South Slav HabsburgLands in the Early Nineteenth Century: The Scholarly Network of JernejKopitar (1780-1844). Doctoral thesis, Univ. Gent.

Ocvirk, Anton. 1954. Zbrana dela slovenskih pesnikov in pisateljev: razgovor zglavnim urednikom dr. Antonom Ocvirkom. Naši razgledi 3.23 (4 Dec.):11-12.

Ocvirk, Anton. 1965. Zbrana dela slovenskih pesnikov in pisateljev. In Dvajsetlet Državne založbe Slovenije, 21-28. Ljubljana: Državna založba Slovenije.

Ocvirk, Anton. 1971. Sto knjig slovenskih klasikov. Govor ob jubilejni knjigi.Naši razgledi 20.22 (26 Nov.): 670-71.

Pogačnik, Jože. 1979. Kritična izdaja in njeni problemi: ob sklepu CankarjevegaZbranega dela. Naši razgledi 20.1 (26 Jan.): 40-41.

Prijatelj, Ivan. 1917a. O izdaji naših klasikov. Naša knjiga (supplement toLjubljanski zvon) 1.2: 5-7.

Prijatelj, Ivan, 1917b. O ureditvi naših klasikov. Naša knjiga (supplement toLjubljanski zvon) 1.3: 10-12.

Prijatelj, Ivan, ed. 1919-27. Josipa Jurčiča zbrani spisi. 5 vols.; Ljubljana: Tiskovnazadruga.

Prijatelj, Ivan, ed. 1921-32. Ivana Tavčarja zbrani spisi. 6 vols.; Ljubljana:Tiskovna zadruga.

Pypin, Aleksandr N. and Vladimir Spasovich. 1864. Obzor istorii slavianskikhliteratur. St. Petersburg.

Pypin, Aleksandr N. and Vladimir Spasovich. 1879-80. Istoriia slavianskikhliteratur. 2 vols.;St. Petersburg. (2nd, expanded ed. of Pypin and Spasovich1864.)

Ramovš, Fran, Milko Kos, eds. 1937. Brižinski spomeniki. Uvod, paleografski infonetični prepis, prevod v knjižno slovenščino, faksimile pergamentov. Ljubljana:Akademska biblioteka.

Schaffarik, Paul J. 1826. Geschichte der slavischen Sprache und Literatur nach allenMundarten. Ofen (Pest).

Stritar, Josip and Josip Jurčič, eds. 1866. Pesmi Franceta Preširna. Ljubljana.Štrekelj, Karel, ed. 1895-1923. Slovenske narodne pesmi. 4 vols.; Ljubljana: Slovens-

ka matica.Vraz, Stanko, ed. 1839. Narodne pesni ilirske, koje se pevaju po Štajerskoj, Kranjskoj,

Koruškoj i zapadnoj strani Ugarske. Zagreb.Žigon, Avgust, ed. 1922. Prešernova čitanka. Prevalje: Mohorjeva družba.


INSCRIBING ORALITY: THE FIRST FOLKLORE EDITIONS IN THE BALTIC STATES

Paulius V. Subačius

AbstractThe earliest Lithuanian and Latvian editorial efforts intended to showthat behind the scarcity of mature literary works there existed anolder medieval, orally transmitted cultural tradition. Its rediscoverywas mostly assigned to folklore publications which were remarkablefor their philological quality. The professional collection of folklorewas likewise more advanced than that of ancient manuscripts. Thecharacter of the first annotated folklore editions was determined bythe fact that they were addressed not only to local readers, but also toforeign linguists, whose interest in the Baltic languages required anexact rendering of textual features. The modern national literaturedrew its pedigree from folk culture and folklore publications, side-lining the heritage of written (religious and didactic) literary sources.

Scholarly editing of oral literature is one of the youngest among thebranches of textual scholarship. It involves very complicated issues suchas the extent and variation of the text, as well as ways of conveying thecharacteristics of its performance in the apparatus (Foley 1995). How-ever, in this context the first philological editions in the Baltic languagesseem paradoxically situated.

In Latvia and Lithuania, the first vernacular editions indicating earlystirrings of textological awareness appeared at the beginning of the nine-teenth century. The great majority of these editions were publications offolklore, especially of the texts of folksongs. The impact of thesepublications on modern Lithuanian and Latvian culture and nationalawareness was huge (Kiaupa 2002, Snyder 2003). Typologically it

80 Paulius V. Subačius

matches the influence exercised on West-European nations by the Ro-mantic recovery of vernacular medieval literature and its introductioninto literary and cultural circulation (Leerssen 2004).

In the period under discussion (1807-1915), both Baltic nations be-longed to the Russian empire, except for roughly one fifth of the Lithua-nian population which lived in the north-eastern part of the Kingdom ofPrussia (the area known as Lithuania Minor). Prior to the twentieth cen-tury, Latvians had never had their own state. Although the states towhich the Latvians belonged changed through the ages, Latvian cultureand language had been under the constant influence of a German nobil-ity from twelfth-century Christianization onwards (Puisāns 1995). InLithuania, from the sixteenth century onwards the language carryingcultural prestige had Polish. Lithuanians lost their joint confederate statewith Poland at the end of the eighteenth century (Bumblauskas 1999, 88-91; Gerutis 1984).

The incorporation of Lithuania and Latvia into Russia revealed clearlythat the new suzerain was far less European (Western-oriented) than thesubject peoples themselves, who responded with several uprisings (1794,1831, 1863). The repression of these uprisings was itself a great blow totraditional forces within Lithuanian and Latvian societies. ‘Battle losses,emigration to Western Europe, exile to the east, estate confiscation andcultural russification all changed the political mood. As the peasantry’sand the intelligentsia’s role became ever clearer, the gentry’s position insociety began to weaken’ (Rowell at al., 2002, 25). A new intelligentsia,clerical and secular, emerged from among the emancipated peasantry.‘An understanding gradually emerged that Lithuanian [and Latvian] wasnot just an ethnic language but national one.’ Thanks to church schoolsin Latvia and secret village schools in Lithuania, where children weretaught their native language, the Baltic countries by the end of nineteenthcentury became the most literate area in the Russian Empire (ibid., 28).

The first books in Latvian and Lithuanian had been sixteenth-centurycatechisms (Žukas 1999, 10, 16), later followed by numerous translatedand original religious texts, as well as linguistic instruments, such asdictionaries and grammars. Some secular publications in the form ofoccasional and didactic works also appeared. Nevertheless, in the twoBaltic languages the first poetic works that could claim to be significantlandmarks in the national literature were written only in the second halfof the eighteenth century. It is important to note that in Lithuania and

INSCRIBING ORALITY 81

Latvia during the period from the thirteenth to nineteenth century thelocal population, as well as settlers from other countries, were prolific indifferent genres in other languages: Latin, Polish, German, Yiddish, andEast Slavic languages (Kubilius et al., 1997). The absence of state institu-tions, along with other factors, determined, however, that a modernLithuanian and Latvian sense of national identity was established alonglinguistic-ethnographic, rather than political, principles. Therefore textswritten in other languages were marginal to an emerging national culture.Acceptance of those texts as part of the Lithuanian and Latvian culturalheritage spread only by the end of the twentieth century (Ulčinaitė 1996,Narbutas 2000).

Thus, as a result of the dearth of the ancient written texts andauthorial literature in the vernacular languages, the very first efforts tosearch for national origins were directed almost exclusively towardsfolklore. These efforts were inspired by intellectual factors current inmany parts of Europe: the influence of Macpherson’s Ossian, and espe-cially of the German philosophers’ and philologists’ ideas on vernacularlanguage and folk culture. Herder’s two-volume collection of Volkslieder(1778-79; now better known under the title of the 1807 re-edition asStimmen der Völker in Liedern), contained some Lithuanian and Latviansongs. This collection provided European philologists with their firstextensive acquaintance with Baltic oral literature. Reciprocally, its impactwas far more important. For a hundred years it was quoted in Lithuaniaand Latvia as an argument that Baltic folklore, and by implication theBaltic languages and nations, stood as equals alongside other Europeannations.

In addition to this general Romantic atmosphere, there was anotherformative reason for the incipient interest in Lithuanian and Latvianfolklore: the emergence of comparative linguistics. The very founders ofthe theory of Indo-European affinity had already asserted that, amongthe living languages of the Indo-European family, the Baltic languagesbest preserved ancient forms. Therefore almost all prominent nineteenth-century European linguists included the Baltic languages in their studies(Žukas 1999, 22). What is more, the most suitable resource in order toidentify the archaic strata of language was considered to lie in the folktradition, rather than in authorial works or in contemporary usage. As aresult, philologically-qualified publications on Baltic folklore could counton an interested academic readership abroad even before they appeared.


At home, the protagonists of the national movements took pride in thefact that the famous European scholars paid attention to the ‘tunes ofsimple country folk’. ‘Folk culture and folk creations were lifted to therange of the highest culture’ (Subačius 1996, 7).

The first separately published collection of the Lithuanian folk songswas entitled Dainos oder Litthauische Volkslieder (1825) and contained 85folklore texts (Rhesa 1825). It was edited by Liudvikas Rėza (Germanspelling: Rhesa; 1776-1840), a Lutheran clergyman of Lithuanian extrac-tion and professor of oriental languages and theology in KönigsbergUniversity. He had earlier brought out re-editions of two almosthundred-year-old translations of the Bible into Lithuanian (Biblia 1816,1824), followed by two voluminous parts of ‘philological critical notes’(Rhesa 1816-24).

The connection between high philology and the publication of folksongs is neither straightforward nor coincidental; both involved text-ological skills. The collection of songs is a parallel edition: Lithuaniantexts and their German translations are printed on facing pages. Themelodies for seven of the songs are appended; so is a synoptic article,which not only stresses the importance and distinctiveness of the oralcorpus but also presents a synopsis of Lithuanian folklore scholarshipand previous (piecemeal) publications. Some songs are accompanied byan account of the circumstances in which they were recorded and of theperformative context.

As far as one can see from the surviving fragments of Rėza’s archive,around 60% of the published texts fairly accurately represent the textsrecorded by the nine assistants who helped Rėza in the collection offolklore. Besides, in his letter (dated 20 March 1826) to Johann WolfgangGoethe from whom he expected assistance in the publication of thecollection, Rėza asserts that he has witnesses who would confirm thatthe editor faithfully represented and rendered the texts that were sent tohim (cf. Jovaišas 1969, 273).

Three editorial interventions in this collection are obvious: the selec-tion of the included songs from a larger collection of recorded folklore;the grouping of the texts by genre and theme; and the fact that the songscarry thematically indicative titles – which Lithuanian folksongs, usuallyidentified by their first line, do not possess.

Other editorial interventions on Rėza’s part are of an entirely differ-ent nature. They are strictly at odds with the philological principles while


reflecting current attitudes towards folk creativity. Archival and textualcriticism research shows that three songs in the collection were actuallywritten by Rėza himself (Jovaišas 1969, 256-90). These songs draw onLithuanian folklore models and on materials concerning Latvian mythol-ogy and cosmology published at the end of the eighteenth century(Bojtár 1999, Ābols 2002). This mythology is treated as representing theshared inheritance of the ancient culture of the Balts. The chief andperhaps the only aim of this forgery was to demonstrate that Lithuanianfolklore contains mythological material, and as such conveys informationabout the deepest layers of the nation’s past. As Rėza wrote in his com-mentaries, he had no doubt that the songs featuring mythological events,such as ‘The Wedding of the Moon’, had been composed in pagan antiq-uity (Rhesa 1825, 333).

In reality, authentic Lithuanian folk songs (unlike the Latvian ones)almost never contain mythological material (such as references to gods,goddesses or anthropomorphised heavenly bodies). Rėza, on the otherhand, created texts about the wedding of the moon and the sun, or aboutthe god Perkūnas (thunder). The circle of his correspondents and hisphilological interests attest that Rėza was directly influenced by JacobGrimm’s ideas on the intertwining of mythology and historical reality inthe epics. Through his forgery, Rėza gave rise to the tradition whichseeks to detect in the Lithuanian folklore the fragments of a lost, primor-dial national epic. This tradition has its adherents in Lithuania to this dayand retains its academic status despite the fact that it has been explodedon the basis of textual and editorial evidence.

And another group of inauthentic texts found its way into this collec-tion – a result, not of conscious forgery, but of uncritical source selectionof the sources and the wish to publish as many songs as possible. Theseare the texts taken from the secondary sources without checking theirreliability or, in a particularly interesting instance, the songs who weretranslated back into Lithuanian by Rėza himself from earlier fragmentarypublications in German.

It is instructive to compare this publication of oral material with thesame philologist’s publication of an authorial text. In 1818 Rėza pub-lished the first edition of The Seasons, a poem by the late-eighteenth cen-tury Lithuanian writer Kristijonas Donelaitis (1714-1780), considered aclassic of the Lithuanian literature (Rhesa 1818). Although the editorrelied on the autograph, he took many more liberties with the authorial


text than he had done with the folklore ones. Out of the poem’s 2968lines he deleted 468, changing characters’ names and otherwise alteringthe text. The principal reasons for these changes were aesthetic andmoralistic. The passages that were omitted or transformed were the oneswhich, according to the editor’s opinion, contradicted ‘good taste’,clashed with the pastoral image of the Lithuanian peasants’ life, or criti-cised Prussian authorities. While Rėza’s statements concerning the au-thenticity of the folk songs was, as we have seen, less than well-founded,still his editorial policy was guided by the principle of faithful textualrendering; but in his interference with Donelaitis’ manuscript he con-sciously disregarded the author’s intention or the documentary evidence.The attitude seems to be that the folk texts should be presented as au-thentically as possible, whereas authorial works can be safely editedaccording to the editor’s taste and the target audience. In Lithuania thiseditorial stance was dominant throughout most of the nineteenth cen-tury. The Romantic attitude towards folklore reached the Baltic nationsalmost a hundred years earlier than the modern concept of authorship.

It is illustrative to compare these two editions by Rėza with the edito-rial strategy of the German philologist G.H.F. Nesselmann, who pub-lished the same texts a quarter of a century later. In diametrical opposi-tion to Rėza, Nesselmann published Donelaitis’ text (Nesselmann 1869)scrupulously following the autograph and the earliest copy, and accu-rately retaining diacritical signs and other features; whereas in his editionof 410 folk songs, compiled mostly from Rėza and other earlier editions,Nesselmann (1853), on the contrary, shortened, supplemented, emendedand reworked the texts. Thus he removes segments that were, in hisview, contaminated; in several cases he splits into two works that are onrecord as one song; in other cases he welds verses from several songsinto one. Such interventions were motivated by his individual taste andthe idea that texts should be subjected to the methods of comparativereconstructive linguistics.

Rėza’s folksong edition was favourably reviewed by Goethe and byJacob Grimm. These endorsements encouraged foreign scholars’ interestin the Baltic nations, and acted as a powerful boost to the few nationally-motivated members of the Lithuanian intelligentsia. In their eyes, publi-cations that were succesful in the international literary system enhancedchances national self-expression.


1 Stanevičius 1829, [6]: ‘A hope to have songs from olden times of valiant Lithuani-ans and Samogitians that were sung by high-priests and songsters of our land is but avain hope. Children who repeat songs of their fathers call them songs of antiquity andhasten to forget them; how then could one wish for the songs of high-priests, sung400 or 500 years ago, to be current today? Without hesitation I could say that allSamogitian songs that are found today are not anterior to the eighteenth century.’

The first edition of Latvian songs appeared somewhat earlier than Rėza’swork and in more extensive form. In 1807 by Gustav Bergmann(1749-1814), a Lutheran priest, who himself collected the texts andprinted them at the printing-house on the island of Rujen, in the prov-ince of Latvia; the printing-house he had established himself. Bergmannis typologically akin to Rėza in that he also had edited and published a(Latvian) Bible translation. Although Bergmann had high philologicalambitions as an editor, his edition of folk songs contains ill-understoodand poorly recorded words; also, authentically traditional texts are inter-mixed with newer songs of various origins. The edition also lacks aphilological apparatus.

A much higher editorial standard is attested by a collection, modest inits extent – the texts of only 30 Lithuanian songs – which in 1829 waspublished in Vilnius by Simonas Stanevičius (1799-1848). Stanevičius, abeggared nobleman and a poet who had graduated in Classics fromVilnius University, was the first Lithuanian who sought to earn his livingas a free-lance professional philologist. Before he published the collec-tion of songs, he had edited and published selections from a sixteenth-century Lithuanian book of sermons, as well as a new edition of an earlyeighteenth-century grammar, in Latin, of the Lithuanian language(Stanevičius 1823, 1829). Stanevičius’ collection was marked by strictselection criteria. He included only one fifth of the texts that he had athis disposal, clearly listing the criteria of selection in the ‘Introduction’:archaic nature, internal coherence of the text, complexity as a song. Thesongs are carefully recorded and numbered, and many are accompaniedby linguistic and factual comments. In his commentaries, Stanevičiusevinces trenchant historicism, as against romantic idealization:

Tykietise idant butu daynas nu karzigiu senowes Lituwiu yr Zemaycziukures daynewa Waydelotay musu zemes wiresnynjey yr daynynynkay, iratuszczia dyngstys. Waykay sawa tiewu daynas atkartodamy wadyn taysenowes daynomys yr nor jas uzmyrszty; ko taygy benoriety idant daynasWai[d]elotu pyrm 400 yr 500 metu daynujemas, szendin pazynstamas butu?Mazne be abejojyma galu sakity jog wysas szendin randamas Zemaycziudaynas nier ankstibesnes uz (...) XVIII amziaus (...).1


The musical scores for all the published songs were published four yearslater (Stanevičius 1833). Stanevičius disseminated these and otherpublications with the declared aim of nurturing national culture andnational awareness.

A substantial part of the gentry intellectuals in Lithuania (bilinguallyPolish- and Lithuanian-speaking) felt sympathy for Lithuanian languageand folklore. ‘Interest of Baltic Germans intellectuals in popular culturewas not very wide and did not transgress the limits of purely scholarlyconcern. Even sympathetically to popular culture disposed Baltic Ger-man intellectuals held German culture superior’ (Pivoras 1996, 7). Eithernegatively or positively, this scholarly concern fed into the ambitiousscheme, in the mid-century, of publishing a full corpus of Latvian songs.The somewhat utopian plan took shape in sections of the Lettisch-Literäri-sche Gesellschaft (Latvian Literary Society, composed of Germans). Latviansongs are short, consisting mostly of a single stanza, and thus it waspossible for collections of thousands of songs to appear earlier on inLatvia. In 1844 Georg Büttner (1805-1883) published, under the aegis ofthe Lettisch-Literärische Gesellschaft a collection of ‘The Songs and zinges ofLatvian People’ (Büttner 1844) comprising 2854 texts, and with an ap-pendix of Clarifications and Remarks. In 1874-1875 the same Society, tocelebrate its anniversary, printed in Leipzig two volumes of ‘The songsof the Latvian Nation’, Latviešu tautas dziesmas (edited by August Bielen-stein, 1826-1907). This edition was intended to run to four volumes andto contain all of the material collected; it was never completed, and only4793 out of the expected number of 10.000 texts have been published.

Lithuanian folk songs are much lengthier (often more than twelvestanzas), which explains why the collection of 7000 songs compiled inthe 1850s and 1860s by the Lithuanian Catholic priest Antanas Juška(1818-1880) far exceeds the Latvian collections in size. Four volumes,almost a thousand pages each, were published in 1880-1883 in Russiathrough the efforts of his brother, the philologist Jonas Juška(1815-1886), comprise only a third of the manuscript collection (Juška1880-82, 1883). The volumes were disseminated legally only outsideLithuania, because in the period between 1864 and 1904 the RussianImperial administration had prohibited the use of the Latin alphabet inLithuanian-language publications. The Catholic clergy played a signifi-cant role in the Lithuanian national awakening movement and in theresistance against the printing ban. Bishops organized the publication of


Lithuanian books in Eastern Prussia and other countries (Baronas et al.,2002, 124-5). Among numerous illegal production smuggled into Rus-sian-ruled Lithuania were not only religious books, but also editions oforal literature.

Juška’s collection establishes a textual corpus in that in the course ofpreparation of his hefty books some 5000 songs were collected in oneparish alone. The folklore publications by the Latvian mathematician andastronomer Krišjānis Barons (1835-1923) ran to even greater girth. Hisfifteen-part annotated collection of ‘Latvian songs’ (Barons 1894-1915)contains over 200.000 songs along with their variants. In 1880, Baronscaptured his great collection of recorded songs in a huge card-catalogue;the basis of a folklore archive which became the first national repositoryof the Latvian cultural heritage, and which was eventually entrusted tothe newly-established independent state of Latvia. Likewise the archiveof the Lithuanian Scientific Society (established in 1907), the first nation-wide collection of the Lithuanian cultural inheritance, was initially alsolargely a depository of folklore records. Both Jonas Basanavičius(1851-1927), the founder of the Society and its archive, and the LatvianBarons, came to be called the patriarchs of their nations even duringtheir lifetime (Senn 1985, 311-5; Bleiere et al. 2006, 42).

Owing to the specific nature of folklore publication it is difficult toidentify any specific textological approach in these Lithuanian and Lat-vian editions of folksong. The editors’ professional and educationalbackground indicates a some familiarity with Biblical and Classical stud-ies; one cannot state anything more specific than that. An peculiar fea-ture of these editions is the effort to retain, as precisely as possible, thelinguistic forms, the accidentals of the texts. In this respect the attentionof the linguists engaged in the Indo-European research was decisive. Itwas also one of the reasons that editions which had been undertaken fora narrow goal – to bolster national self-esteem – were at the same timealso circulated in European academic circles. Later on, bilingual paralleleditions of songs became reference materials for comparative researchinto folklore and mythology, with a methodology borrowed from linguis-tics. Thus, the early philological editions of the Baltic nations, despiterepresenting exotic languages, were never a closed book to Europe-at-large.

The Latvian and Lithuanian nationalist ideology that had proclaimedthe distinctiveness of ancient pagan Baltic culture determined literary and


linguistic interest in folklore. The modern national literature drew itspedigree straight from folk culture, sidelining and marginalising theheritage of religious and didactic literature. The folksong editions were(alongside writers’ own rootedness in an environment naturally perme-ated by folklore), an important factor in this process. For it is preciselythese folksongs editions whose influence one recognises in the lavishinclusion of folklore material in those works of literature which them-selves were not in direct contact with living tradition. An exceptionallytelling case is the Latvian poet Andrejs Pumpurs (1841-1902). In 1888 hepublished an epic in Latvian entitled The Bear-slayer. It was based on awide range of folklore literature and imitated Finno-Ugric, as well asmedieval, epics of a heroic and mythological nature. As most of thenotorious counterfeit fabrications of folklore had already been exposedat the time, Pumpurs decided not hide his authorship. We are talkingabout the period when the standard norm of the Lithuanian and Latvianlanguages was taking shape. In this process, the examples of folklore, aswell as the material from the editions of folk literature, largely overshad-owed that experience of the unification of language which was accumu-lated in textual sources such as Bible translations or religious songs.

The main issue remains this: in Lithuania and Latvia the re-evaluationof old local cultural traditions was mostly manifested in folklore publica-tions. In their level of philological preparation these were ahead of liter-ary editions by more than a half-century. Since, in the beginning of thetwentieth century, the newly emerging national states of Lithuania andLatvia were formed on the basis of the ethno-linguistic concept of na-tionality, folklore editions played an important part, not only in nation-building but also in state-formation.

ReferencesĀbols, Guntars. 2002. The Contribution of History to Latvian identity. Riga:

Nacionālais apgāds.Baronas, Darius et al. 2002. Christianity in Lithuania. Vilnius: Aidai.Barons, Krišjānis. 1894-1915. Latvju dainas: Chansons nationales lataviennes. 6 vols.;

Jelgava & St. Petersburg.Biblia. 1816. Biblia, tai esti: Wissas Szwentas Rásztas Séno ir Naujo Testamento […],

Nů keliû Mokytojû Lietuwoj Lietuwiszkay perstattytas, Dabar isz naujo pérweizdētasir tréczą Kartą iszspáustas. Karaliaučius.


Biblia. 1824. Biblia, tai esti: Wissas Szwentas Rásztas Séno ir Naujo Testamento,Lietuwiszkay pérstattytas, isz naujo pérweizdētas Ir ketwirtą kartą iszspáustas. Tilžė.

Bielenstein, August. 1874-75. Latviešu tautas dziesmas. 2 vols., Jelgava.Bleiere, Daina et al. 2006. History of Latvia: The Twentieth Century. Riga: Jumava.Bojtár, Endre. 1999. Foreword to the Past: A Cultural History of the Baltic People.

Budapest: CEU Press.[Bumblauskas, Alfredas]. 1999. History. Lithuania. Vilnius: Du Ka,Büttner, Georg. 1844. Latviešu laužu dziesmas un zinges. Jelgava.Foley, John Miles. 1995. Folk Literature. In Scholarly Editing: A Guide to Research,

ed D. C. Greetham, 600-626. New York: MLA.Gerutis, Albertas (ed.). 1984. Lithuania: 700 years. New York: Manyland books.Jovaišas, Albinas. Liudvikas Rėza (Vilnius: Vaga, 1969), Juška, Antanas. 1880-82. Liėtùviškos dájnos. 3 vols.; Kazan;Juška, Antanas. 1883. Liėtùviškos svotbinės dájnos. St. Petersburg Kiaupa, Zigmantas et al. 2002. The history of the Baltic countries. 3rd rev.

ed.Tallinn: Avita.Kubilius, Vytautas et al. 1997. Lithuanian literature. Vilnius: LLTI.Leerssen, Joep. 2004. Literary historicism: Romanticism, philologists, and the

presence of the past. Modern language quarterly 65.2: 221-243.Narbutas, Sigitas. 2000. The Mysterious Island: a Review of 13th-16th Century Litera-

ture of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania. Vilnius: LLTI.Nesselmann, G.H.F. 1853 Littauische Volkslieder, gesammelt kritisch bearbeitet und

metrisch übersetzt. Berlin.Nesselmann, G.H.F. 1869. Christian Donalitius Littauische Dichtungen nach Königs-

berg Handschriften. Königsberg.Pivoras, Saulius. 1995. The Development of Lithuanian and Latvian Civic Self-conscious-

ness during the End of XVIII – First Half of XIX Centuries: A Comparative As-pect. Vilnius: VU.

Plakans, Andrejs. 1974. Peasants, Intellectuals, and Nationalism in the RussianBaltic Provinces, 1820-90. Journal of modern history, 46: 445-475.

Puisāns, Tadeušs. 1995. The Emerging Nation: The Path of Agonizing Developmentfrom Baltic Tribalism to Latvian Nationhood. Rīga: Centre of Baltic-NordicHistory and Political Studies.

Pumpurs, Andrējs. 1888. Lāčplēsis, latvju tautas varonis: Tautas epus. Riga.Rhesa, L.J. 1816-24. Philologisch-kritische Anmerkungen zur litthauischen Bibel. 2 vols.

Königsberg.Rhesa, L.J. 1818. Das Jahr in vier Gesängen, ein ländliches Epos aus dem Littauischen

des Christian Donaleitis, genannt Donalitius, in gleichem Versmaaß ins Deutscheübertragen. Königsberg.

Rhesa, L.J. 1825. Dainos oder Litthauische Volkslieder gesammelt, uebersetzt und mitgegenueberstehendem Urtext herausgegeben. Nebst einer Abhandlung ueber die litthaui-schen Volksgedichte. Königsberg.

Rowell, Stephen C.; Reda Griškaitė; Gediminas Rudis. 2002. A History of Lithua-nia. Vilnius: Inter Se.


Senn, Alfred Erich. 1985. The Lithuanian Intelligentsia of the NineteenthCentury. In National Movements in the Baltic Countries during the NineteenthCentury, ed. A. Loit, 311-315. Uppsala: Almqvist & Wiksell.

Snyder, Timothy. 2003. The Reconstruction of Nations: Poland, Ukraine, Lithuania,Belarus, 1569-1999. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press.

Stanevičius, Simonas. 1823. Wyjątek z kazań żmudzkich. Vilnius.Stanevičius, Simonas. 1829a. Daynas Żemaycziu surynktas yr ysżdutas par Symona

Stanewicze Mokslynynka Lyteraturas yr Grażiuju Prytirymu. Vilnius.Stanevičius, Simonas. 1829b. Trumpas pamokimas kałbos Lituwyszkos arba

Żemaytyszkos nuo nekurio nobazna ysz draugistes Jezaus Kunyga lotinyszkayparaszitas yr spaustas Wyjlniuj’ metuse 1737. dabarcziu atrastas yr ysznauja swiêtuyparôditas. Vilnius.

Stanevičius, Simonas. 1833. Pàźimes zemaytiszkas gâydas prydiêtynas pry DaynùŻemaycziu surynktù yr yszdûtu par Symona Stanèwicze Môkslynynka Lyteratùras yrGraźiùju Prytirymu. Riga.

Subačius, Paulius V. 1996. Concept of the Culture of National Liberation. Vilnius:VU.

Ulčinaitė, Eugenija. 1996. Baroque Literature in Lithuania. Vilnius: Baltos lankos.Žukas, Saulius. 1999. The First Lithuanian Book and its Cultural Context. 2nd rev.

ed. Vilnius: Baltos lankos.


SCANIA PROVINCE LAWAND NATION-BUILDING IN SCANDINAVIA

Paula Henrikson

AbstractCompeting Danish and Swedish editions of the Scania province lawexemplify the role of textual editing for nation-building in Scandina-via. A Danish province up to the seventeenth century, Scania hassince 1658 been Swedish territory. This has made the Scania provincelaw, which dates from the Middle Ages, a cultural heirloom of twonations, Sweden and Denmark. The editions of the law, which havebeen produced in both countries from the seventeenth to the twenti-eth century, express their national bias not only in the introductionsbut also through elements such as the evaluation of manuscripts, thetreatment of text and commentary, and visual codes such as formatand layout. On the whole, editing proves to be a means of definingnationality and social identities, fundamentally determined by theeditor's preconceptions and prejudices.

Gary Taylor has compared scholarly editing to the battle between Per-sians and Greeks over the dead body of Leonidas: the text, though pow-erless and dead, is the object of scholarly contest (Taylor 1994, 19). Withthis drastic image Taylor calls attention to the symbolic character oftextual scholarship. The editors pursue their task driven by ambitionsand interests which, though seldom verbalised, nevertheless form thebasis for their historical commitment. Power over the corpus of the textgives power over history as well, and over the understanding of history.

Traditionally, scholarly editing has elicited only sparse theoretical(even though frequent methodological) interest. The old notion of schol-arly editing as the ‘handmaid’ of the higher criticism has been persistent.

92 Paula Henrikson

To see in editing a disinterested task has also been the prerequisite guar-antee for its claim to authority. The representation of history that anedited text embodies secures its reliability through the notion of editingas an objective, neutral and unbiased activity. And vice versa: if theconditions of scholarly editing must be understood as variable with theeditor’s theoretical and historical bias, how is it possible to justify anendeavour which claims to produce the material foundations for compre-hensive and unprejudiced research?

In an ongoing project I explore the tradition of Swedish scholarlyediting from the Renaissance to present times, raising questions of ideol-ogy, power, and responsibility. The historical perspective is meant to layopen the preconditions of textual scholarship, important for presentscholarly editing as well. At the same time the approach is meta-histori-cal: my attention is directed above all to the history of historical under-standing and historical consciousness. Why do we turn to the texts ofhistory? What questions do we hope that the texts will answer? What usedo we believe we have of history? Issues like these have been raisedthrough the narrative turn of historical theory during the last decades,represented by names such as Hayden White, Paul Ricoeur and JörnRüsen. I should like to place scholarly editing in this context.

The modern philologies built their claim to legitimacy on nineteenth-century historicism and its notions about source-critical scholarly meth-ods whose results were founded in positive fact rather than in opinion-ated preconceptions. But this increasing commitment to the ‘scientific’ –understood as a disinterested striving for objectivity – tended also to veilthe roots in ideology which brought forth the philological discipline. Inhermeneutic terms, the modern, methodologically advanced philologywas prone to mask its origins in romanticism’s notions about the uses ofhistory and the ideal of the nation.

In this way also the dependence of textual scholarship on societalinterests became obscured. Yet observing textual editing from an histori-cal perspective makes transparent the fact that texts at all times havebeen edited with specific – societal, ideological and aesthetic – purposesin view, and that such preconceptions govern the editorial choices. Thesame insight provided the point of departure for the scholars who to-wards the end of the 20th century, aimed at re-evaluating the task oftextual criticism in terms of a social and historical understanding of

SCANIA PROVINCE LAW AND NATION-BUILDING IN SCANDINAVIA 93

1 Greetham 1993, 14: ‘While he was thinking of schools of cultural or aestheticcriticism rather than schools of textual editing, Terry Eagleton’s dictum, “Ideology,like halitosis is(...) what the other person has”, could equally well apply to an editor’sconviction that his or her method of textual display has no ideological content and issomehow natural and proper to the work being edited. My point is that there is noinherent physical display of text and apparatus that is more natural to a specific workthan any other, and that each display carries the codes of meaning the editor designs aspart of the total ideological construct.’

2 The term derives from Montrose 1989, 242: ‘By the historicity of texts, I mean tosuggest the cultural specificity, the social embedment, of all modes of writing – notonly the texts that critics study but also the texts in which we study them. By thetextuality of history, I mean to suggest, firstly, that we can have no access to a full andauthentic past, a lived material existence, unmediated by the surviving textual traces ofthe society in question – traces whose survival we cannot assume to be merely con-tingent but must rather presume to be at least partially consequent upon complex andsubtle social processes of preservation and effacement; and secondly, that those textual

literature, as advocated by scholars such as Jerome J. McGann, D.C.Greetham and Peter Shillingsburg.

McGann opposes the view that the purpose of textual criticism is toestablish texts for the literary critics. This, he points out, is in actual factonly a specialised application of the text-critical method. Its general useis much larger: textual criticism provides the tools for studying the his-tory of texts and the history of their reception, both of which are decisivefor constructing a work’s literary meaning (e.g. McGann 1985, 180–99).

Greetham focuses on similar phenomena when he argues how ourways of reading always correspond to the ideological and technical in-structions embedded in an edition’s mode of presenting its material. Thesuccess of the clear reading text was historically and ideologically condi-tioned, just as the present-day concern with variation and polyphony isan expression of a post-modern view of literature. ‘My point’, Greethamwrites, ‘is that there is no inherent physical display of text and apparatusthat is more natural to a specific work than any other’ – all editing is anideological construction.1 Shillingsburg’s conclusion drawn from a simi-lar line of argument is that, instead of hunting for the right text, bothreaders and editors ought to make themselves aware of how theoretical,institutional and social conditions govern the formation of all the textswe work with (e.g. Shillingsburg 1997).

The re-assessment of the task of textual criticism should be seen interms of a new-historicist view of literature that aims at investigating, onthe one hand, the textuality of history, and on the other hand, the historicity oftexts.2 History is a text: this implies that it is governed by rhetorical, ideo

94 Paula Henrikson

traces are themselves subject to subsequent textual mediations when they are con-strued as the “documents” upon which historians ground their own texts, called “histo-ries”.’

3 The title of the edition is Hær begynnes skonskæ logh paa ræth danskæ, och ær skifft i xvijbøgher oc hwer bogh haffuer sith register. ok ær wæl offuer seeth och rættelighe corrigeret (1505).

logical and narrative strategies. Texts, in their turn, have a history – thisimplies that they do not exist above or outside history, but must be stud-ied in all their historical instability. Empirical facts, too, are constructedfrom notions of the nature of history: there is no Archimedean point tostand on in the world of texts.

It is from the example of the Scania Province Law, a text over whichboth Danish and Swedish editors have fought for rightful possession,that I wish to discuss the relationship between textual editing and ideol-ogy. I restrict myself to the printed editions of the law’s Scanian text, andthus leave aside, among other things, the translations to modern Danishand Swedish, not so much for theoretical as for practical reasons. Oneparticular aspect of editorial preconception will be the focus of my inter-est, namely the interconnection between national allegiance, nation build-ing and textual editing. Several interesting aspects of the law’s editorialhistory thus will be left out of my present considerations – among theseare largely, for instance, the issues of legal and linguistic history. I shouldalso add that I will mainly examine what might be called the rhetoric ofthe editions, manifested not least in their paratexts (such as format andillustrations), and thus leave aside all evaluation of the actual editorialdecisions.

Scania nowadays is a province on the southern edge of Sweden, but ithas been so for only 350 years. Before that, it was one of the most im-portant provinces of Denmark, harbouring, notably, the Danish episco-pal see. The Scania Law was drawn up in the thirteenth century, and it isalso Denmark’s oldest surviving law text. But in consequence of Scania’schanged national appurtenance, the Scania Law acquired double owner-ship: both Swedes and Danes have laid claim to the monument. It is thisdouble possession that I wish to explore.

The editio princeps of the law was brought out in 1505.3 This was in asmall quarto service edition printed by Gotfred af Ghemen in Copenha-gen. It derived from a recent, and subsequently lost, manuscript, said inthe title of the edition to be ‘wæl offuer seeth och rættelighe corrigeret’(‘well overseen and set right with corrections’). The flyleaf carries the


Danish royal crest with three lions, symbolising the three main Danishprovinces, including Scania. Britta Olrik Frederiksen, who has comparedthe text with the manuscript which the edition possibly or probably wasbased on, states that the purpose of the edition was ‘det rent praktiske’(‘the entirely practical’), that is, to spread the current lawtext. Ghemenchose a young manuscript, apparently without much critical judgement.In principle he followed its text as far as he understood it – the devia-tions are mainly orthographical (Frederiksen 2001, 118).

Ghemen’s edition thus could be classified as a pre-critical edition, inwhich the main ambition was not to present a better or more authentictext than the existing texts, but simply to further the spreading of thework. The four editions I will take a closer look at, by contrast, were notso motivated. The first of them appeared in 1676, commissioned as a deluxe edition by Johan Hadorph, the Swedish secretary in the SwedishCollege of Antiquities (Antikvitetskollegium). Thereafter it was not until1853 that the Dane P.G. Thorsen published an edition of the Scania Lawin his edition of the Danish laws. In 1859, this was followed by CarlJohan Schlyter’s edition of Sweriges Gamla Lagar (‘Sweden’s Ancient LawTexts’), where the Scania Law occupied volume 9. A new scholarly edi-tion appeared in 1933 in the first volume of Danmarks Gamle Lands-kabslove (‘Denmark’s Ancient Province Laws’).

From the time that Sweden won Scania in 1658, in other words,Sweden and Denmark have fought a long drawn out tug-o’-war over theright to the Scania Law, practically as if it were that province’s deed ofownership. In fact, when the territorial wars over Scania ended, the sym-bolic war over the right to Scania’s history was only just beginning.Hadorph’s edition of 1676 was a prop to the Kingdom of Sweden’sambition to annect and ‘swedify’ the new-won province. His prefaceopens quite frankly: ‘Skåne hafwer af äldste tijderne warit en Ledamot afGötharijket/ hwilket sina Råmärke hafwer mitt uthi Öresund’ (‘Scaniahas since the earliest times been part of the realm of the Goths, whoseborderline goes through the middle of the Öresund’). In this way theedition was put in the service of a tendentious writing of Swedish his-tory.

When Hadorph’s edition came out, the Scania Law was actually stillthe current law in Scania – Swedish law was introduced only five yearslater. There was of course a strong symbolism in the fact that the Law’stext was published in Stockholm, and Hadorph’s edition is also a declara-

96 Paula Henrikson

4 ‘The old Scania Law, which was applied in ancient times, and now is fair-copiedscrupulously from an old parchment, compared with newer codices and thus im-proved, as is noted on the next page, and is published at the expense of His RoyalMajesty’.

tion of power, meant to overpower. The bibliographical codes are corres-pondingly forceful and unambiguous. The book is a de luxe edition inelegant folio. The Swedish royal crest dominates the title leaf, filling halfthe page – which is an emblematic response to the Danish crest inGhemen’s edition. And if anyone in spite of this should feel uncertainwhere the edition belongs, the imprint calls out ‘STOCKHOLM’ in largecapitals. The title reads: Then Gambla Skåne Lagh/ Som i forna Tijder hafwerbrukat warit/ Och nu Aff ett Gammalt Pergamentz MS.to med flijt uthskrifwin/Medh Nyare Codicibus jempnförd och förbättrat/ som på nästfölliande Blad finnesantecknat/ Sampt Medh Hans Kongl. May:s Bekostnat uplagd.4

In the wording of the title, two things at least are noticeable. First, itadvertises at once who funded the major project: His Royal Majesty.Second, the title page expresses unambiguously the ambitious anti-quarianism which motivates the edition. Ghemen’s edition was a serviceedition, meant to increase knowledge about current law. WhenHadorph’s edition appeared, Swedish law, it is true, had not yet beenintroduced in the new province – but he clearly indicated with his editionthat the Scania Law was antiquated as a juridical text. ‘The old ScaniaLaw’ as it applied ‘in ancient times’ had now been carefully fair-copied‘from an old parchment’. Age thus became an argument in its own right,and the antiquarian interest was instrumentalised for appropriating thetext by re-functionalising it. What the title-page tells its readers is that theScania Law has no currency in legal use. It is a piece of the cultural heri-tage, rather, of which the Kingdom of Sweden has gained rightful pos-session.

The newly founded College of Antiquities, within which Hadorphwas active, was Sweden’s central institution for this politically drivenantiquarian interest, and it was also the reason why antiquities of diversekinds and in large numbers came to light and were preserved for poster-ity (cf. Schück 1932, and Lindroth 1975, 235–348). Hadorph’s antiquar-ian ambition is apparent not least in that he chose as base text the oldestknown manuscript, which he had obtained from the county governor inKristianstad through the chancellor Magnus Gabriel de la Gardie. Itwent of course on a symbolic journey from the earlier Danish province


5 Thorsen 1853, 1: ‘Scania’s old province law, whose language is the oldest Danish,is in its content closely related, in many ways, both to the old Själland law and to theJylland law of Valdemar the Second’.

to the capital of Sweden, as the big power it then was, and Hadorphemphasised with satisfaction that the like of this manuscript was hardlyto be found in Denmark. About its language he says that it is ‘renare ochåldrigare än i the senare Manuscriptis, ja aldeles lijkt med thet gamblaGöthiske Språket/ som i Götharijkes Laghböckerne finnes’ (‘purer andolder than in the later manuscripts, indeed altogether like the old Gothiclanguage, as it can be found in the laws of the Goths’) – in the Danishedition from 1505, however, the language is ‘mera fördanskat’ (‘more“danified”’; Hadorph 1676, n.p.).

The antiquarian desire to reproduce an older rather than a youngermanuscript corresponds fully to Hadorph’s patriotic ambition: the lan-guage of the older Danish manuscript was of course closer to the Swed-ish language than a younger manuscript could be. Frederiksen haspointed out, though, that the fidelity to the text is not bigger inHadorph’s edition than in Ghemen’s (Frederiksen 2001, 121). Amongthe alterations Frederiksen registers is the repeated shift of æ as finalvowel to a, which might be interpreted as an attempt to adjust the lan-guage in a Swedish direction. Hadorph’s message is that the Scania Lawis Swedish, its language is Swedish, and its rightful overlord is the Swed-ish King.

The patriotic resonances in Hadorph’s big-power-oriented editionwere of course typical of their day. It is symptomatic, nonetheless, thatwhen the Scania Law was edited again, this time by the Dane P.G.Thorsen in 1853, the introduction opened with an echo in the samespirit: ‘Skånes gamle Provindslov, hvis Sprog er den ældste Dansk,står ved sit Indhold i et meget nært Forhold, på forskjellig Måde, såvel tilden gamle sællandske Lov som til Valdemar den andens jydske Lov’.5 Byassigning the language of the law to ‘the oldest Danish’ and pointing outthe Danish legal tradition as the relevant context, Thorsen not only re-plies to Hadorph’s attempt to ‘swedify’ the law. He also places the law inthe history of linguistics, in accordance with the revolutionary achieve-ments of the early nineteenth century in that field. In his Forsøg til envidenskabelig dansk Retskrivningslære med Hensyn til Stamsproget og Nabosproget(‘An attempt at a scientific theory of Danish spelling, with regard to theroot language and the neighbouring language’, 1826), Rasmus Rask had

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6 Many thanks to Britta Olrik Frederiksen, who called my attention to this connec-tion between Thorsen and Rask.

7 Thorsen 1853, 3: ‘it must yield as to age to the law’s old runic manuscript’.

singled out the language of the Scania Law as precisely ‘den ældste Dansk’(‘the oldest Danish’, 107), and Thorsen could thus on scientific groundsdismiss Hadorph’s politically rather than scientifically motivated view onthe language of the Scania Law.6

Thorsen underscores at the same time that the moment has come forthe Danes, too, to make a bid on behalf of this ‘ærværdige og vigtigefædrelandske Monument’ (‘glorius and important national monument’).Fortunately, he continues, a manuscript happens to exist which is olderthan the one Hadorph edited. Even though Hadorph’s manuscript isvery old, he writes, ‘står den dog i Alder tilbage for det berömte Rune-håndskrift af Loven’.7 He dates this runic manuscript, Codex Runicus,which was brought to Copenhagen by Arne Magnusson, to the secondhalf of the 13th century and uses it as the base text for his edition.

Thus for Thorsen, too, antiquity is the weightiest argument: the Co-penhagen manuscript shall by its very age silence the self-importantStockholmers. The fact that it was written in runes gave an extra aura toThorsen’s native ward, and it was not without a certain mythification thathe enlarged upon the function, significance and ‘ædle og naturlige Stil’(‘noble and natural style’) in the Codex Runicus (ibid., 8). Unhappilyenough, however, the runic manuscript had a major lacuna which in oneway or another had to be filled in. Thorsen states that Hadorph’s manu-script would have been the most desirable source of reference, yet, ‘daden er svensk Ejendom, vilde jeg slet ikke anholde om den’ (‘since it is inSwedish possession, I did not even wish to seek permission to use it’. Heexplains this decision by declaring that he does not wish to anticipate thecontemporary effort by Schlyter to edit the law in his edition of SwerigesGamla Lagar (ibid., 13). Therefore, Thorsen filled the gap instead from amuch younger Copenhagen manuscript – a compromise that in the firstplace, no doubt, had practical reasons, but which at the same time givesevidence of the lack of cooperation between the neighbouring countriesin the editorial enterprise.

The rivalry was loaded as to which manuscript was the oldest, the so-called B76 in Stockholm or Codex Runicus in Copenhagen, and thecompeting claims were to remain controversial in the editions of theScania Law. The two existing Swedish editions are based on B76 in


8 On this, see Holm 1972, 48–80, esp. 60: ‘I have no hesitation in maintaining thatalready in 1827 Schlyter had complete theoretical and practical command of themethods now accepted in modern stemma construction, including the rule of commu-nal and distinctive error.’

Stockholm. The two Danish ones both accept Codex Runicus in Copen-hagen as the oldest and best manuscript. In each individual case carefulscholarly considerations no doubt lie behind the editorial decisions, yetfrom a bird’s-eye perspective this division is inevitably seen to springfrom a sense of editorial scholarship whose task is assumed to be anaffirmation of the primary right of access of one’s own nation to theScania Law.

Carl Johan Schlyter’s edition of the Scania Law followed in 1859, onlysix years after Thorsen’s, but it constituted a qualitative leap in termsboth of theory and of methodology.8 While the frame of reference legiti-mising Thorsen’s edition was still a late romantic nostalgia for the oldNordic heritage, Schlyter’s edition by contrast is an early representativeof the kind of historicism that was to gain ground in the latter half of the19th century. For Schlyter, the aura surrounding the runic hand hassimply become a matter of ridicule. His legitimising strategy lies insteadin an astonishingly modern sense of scholarship. Schlyter is not only theoriginator of the first stemma known in the history of textual scholarship(presented in the edition of 1827 of the Västgöta Law); he is also awareof the need for meticulously compiled inventories of all extant manu-scripts. In his introductions, moreover, his arguments are based on vari-ants, communal error, watermarks and press variants. These introduc-tions, not least for the reason that they explicitly reflect upon his owneditorial principles, are prone to run to the length of some 200 pages.

Schlyter’s consistency of method was innovative, but it should benoted that his scholarly attitude did by no means get in the way of anoutspoken patriotism. The fact that Scania belonged to Denmark whenthe law was instituted ‘har varit mig bekant allt sedan min barndom’ (‘issomething I have known ever since my childhood’), Schlyter asserts. Yethe offers three reasons for nonetheless perceiving the Scania Law athome among Sweden’s province laws. In the first place, the provinces inwhich it was valid law have ever and again been under Swedish rule andtherefore share the same legal tradition as the Swedish laws, he declares;secondly, he claims that the law’s diction and the diction of the Swedishlaws all must be considered dialects of the same language, and thirdly –

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9 Frantzen 1990, xii. Further: ‘My attempt to define history and textual criticismwithin the context of reception and reproduction is designed to emphasize the subjec-tivity inherent in both scholarly practices. The technical nature of historiography andtextual criticism has sometimes caused both to be understood as objective. Yet it isobvious that, just as history requires a writer to reconstruct the story being told,textual criticism requires a scholar to reconstruct the text to be read – not just to“edit” it, but to do so within a specific, reconstructive, and hence interpretive, frame-work. To call either practice ‘objective’ is to forget its hermeneutic function.’

and above all – Scania does now belong to Sweden (Schlyter 1859,CLXII–CLXIII). Schlyter’s argument that the three provinces in question,Scania, Blekinge and Halland, ‘af naturen äro sammanbundna medSverige’ (‘by nature are bound up with Sweden’) is also recurrent inSwedish arguing, not least in the contradictory Swedish attempts to com-bine Scandinavism and patriotism in the 1890’s (cf. Zander 1999,12–30). This reference to ‘natural borders’ appealed to the notion ofsocieties and nations as objectively given by nature and God, rather thanas being human constructions.

Age and origin carry positive connotations for those who valuemanuscripts. The same notions are implicit, too, when the Swedish edi-tors argue for Sweden’s right to the Scania Law. Schlyter speaks of theDanish ‘språkförbistring’ (‘corruptions of the language’) and the lack of‘renare språk’ (‘purer language’) in old Danish manuscripts – the earlydissolution of the conjugational system becomes an index for the degen-erative departure of Danish from the common Nordic origins, betterpreserved in Swedish. In fact, they have been particularly well preservedin Schlyter’s edition of the Scania Law – for his establishment of the textis archaising in such a way that he repeatedly corrects the manuscript textwhere it does not show the right, that is: the ancient, conjugational forms(Brøndum-Nielsen 1917, 127). It is true that, with his famous accuracy,he records his every emendation, but the result is nonetheless an estab-lished, privileged, text, leaning more towards Old Swedish than themanuscript warrants. By way of this archaising, Schlyter proves his con-tention that Scania is by rights a Swedish province. Schlyter’s edition thusmanifests the thesis Allen J. Franzen has argued for in his monographDesire for Origins (1990):

The search for origins is never disinterested; those wishing to trace an ideaor tradition to its historical, linguistic, and textual beginnings have alwaysdone so with a thesis in mind, and the origin they have found has oftenbeen an origin they have produced.9


10 Frantzen 1990, xiii: ‘My thesis – and thus my own reason for seeking the originof Anglo-Saxon studies – is that engagement with political controversy has alwaysbeen a distinctive and indeed an essential motive for studying language origins andtherefore for studying Anglo-Saxon.’

Behind linguistic considerations are always political interests – this isFranzen’s proposition.10 And through the archaising of his editionSchlyter buttresses his thesis that Scania by rights is Swedish. The Swed-ish language is pure, strong and ancient; the Danish is degenerative andcorrupted. This rhetoric can of course be traced to the linguistic specula-tions of the Nordic renaissance, which I cannot discuss further here. Butit should be noted that even though such fantasies of an old, adamiticUr-language nowadays sound bizarre, originality is yet still a catchwordin scholarly editing. Textual scholarship has often defined as its goal areaching back behind a latter-day, ‘corrupted’ layer, and towards a moreor less mythic origin – to be sought in the beginning of times or in theintention of the author. This view also characterises the stemmaticmethod (cf. Aarsleff 1985, 93–113).

Generously, though, Schlyter still concedes that one could hardlyobject if the Danes should also choose to incorporate the Scania Lawamong the old laws of their country (Schlyter 1859, CLXIII). And this isof course precisely what they did, though after Thorsen it was not until1933 that the Scania Law was included in a Danish collection of lawtexts. Modern paradigms of textual scholarship had meanwhile come intofull force, and the editors naturally enough saw no reason for discussingthe inclusion of this law in their collection. Yet traces of the Danish-Swedish conflict are still discernible. The controversy over the manu-scripts continued – the editors now state that B76 dates from the four-teenth century, while the Codex Runicus might be from the late thir-teenth century and therefore should be considered as the oldest of theScania Law manuscripts. The lacunae were now filled in mainly fromB76. Besides the edition of Codex Runicus, the editors also provideeditions of two younger manuscripts of the same law, demonstrating thevariations of the law in its practical use – one of them to be found inStockholm. One should note the diversity they thus invite into the edi-tion.

In 1933, the historical conflict between Denmark and Sweden was nolonger either threatening, or even of interest. At the same time, a newscholarly paradigm held sway that did not permit exposing driving forces

102 Paula Henrikson

11 Gadamer 1990, 296, 299; for the English translation, Gadamer 1989, 291, 294:‘So when we read a text we always assume its completeness, and only when this as-

of a pre-scholarly nature. For the most part, all mention of the editors’motivations had thus meanwhile to be relegated to prefaces and otherforms of more personally reflective paratexts. But even so, one shouldnote the logotype on the flyleaf: it displays yet again the three lions fromthe Danish crest that once adorned Ghemen’s edition.

Though this is only a summary survey of the Scania Law’s editorialhistory, it still permits drawing a few conclusions. On every level – fromthe material one concerned with the book’s physical appearance, viaprefaces and introductions, to the choice of base text, editorial emenda-tion and the establishment of the edited texts, we may discern just howthe editions have been shaped in relation to the symbolically charged lawtext. The editions become building blocks towards the building of na-tions – and seen from an historical perspective, it is precisely such afunction that textual editing has generally assumed as one of its centraltasks. It was by no means fortuitous, for example, that the romantic ideasabout the emergence of the nations coincided with the most significantphase of expansion of the modern philologies – but that is another story.

I wish to conclude with a closer look at the notions my paper hasbeen meant to illustrate: namely, the editor’s preconceptions and preju-dices. Hans-Georg Gadamer’s attempts to re-instate these notions takesa stand against rationalism’s belief in rationality. The belief in ‘rational-ity’s absolute self-construction’ according to Gadamer shuts its eyes tothe insight that whoever wishes to comprehend a text always already hassomething in common with it.

‘Belonging to a tradition’ is in Gadamer’s view therefore a ‘conditionof hermeneutics’; indeed, such preconception is for him in fact ‘the mostbasic of all hermeneutic preconditions’. This pre-existing bond with acommon tradition in its turn leads the interpreter to pre-conceive thetext’s meaning, or the text’s ‘perfection’, Vollkommenheit. Gadamer writes:

So machen wir denn diese Voraussetzung der Vollkommenheit immer,wenn wir einen Text lesen, und erst wenn diese Voraussetzung sich alsunzureichend erweist, d. h. der Text nicht verständlich wird, zweifeln wir ander Überlieferung und suchen zu erraten, wie sie zu heilen ist. Die Regeln,die wir bei solchen textkritischen Überlegungen befolgen, können hierbeiseite bleiben. Worauf es ankommt, ist auch hier, daß ihre rechte An-wendung nicht von dem inhaltlichen Verständnis ablösbar ist.11


sumption proves mistaken – i.e., the text is not intelligible – do we begin to suspectthe text and try to discover how it can be remedied. The rules of such textual criticismcan be left aside, for the important thing to note is that applying them properly de-pends on understanding the content.’

This is one of the few instances where Gadamer explicitly talks about theactivity of textual criticism; and it is hardly surprising that he relates it toan understanding of content. But it is not least in terms of the task oftextual criticism that Gadamer’s reasoning is dubious, and this is not justbecause he leaves aside its ‘rules’. Rather, our discussion of the ScaniaLaw prompts two pressing questions: in the first place, is Gadamer’sview not in fact seriously reductive, narrowing textual criticism, as itdoes, to a mere instrument of power to restore the text in harmony withour expectations? And secondly, how can one within Gadamer’s systemever break with a reductive and oppressive tradition?

What makes the Scania Law an instructive example of the role thatpreconception plays in textual editing is the fact that it has been shownto belong within not just one, but two traditions. Since both Swedes andDanes claim the text, both traditions become mutually revelatory: theone brings out the blind spots in the other. The kind of preconceptionthat in other editions is an implicit and opaque precondition for a text’sadoption, thereby becomes explicit and transparent. This is why I wouldalso suggest that the mechanisms that the Scania Law reveals are notexceptions, but the rule. The Scania Law makes processes visible whichotherwise usually remain invisible.

The circumstance that the Scania Law belongs to two traditionsshows how unstable the categories are that control understanding. WhenGadamer names ‘the text’s perfection’ as the point of origin of textualcriticism, he allows for but a single tradition enveloping us all that makesunderstanding possible and legitimises text-critical decisions. It wouldseem, in fact, as if ultimately but the abstract notion of tradition remainedas the only active principle in his hermeneutics – yet he does not give theinterpreter, in this case the textual critic, a chance of breaking with his orher tradition. On the contrary, the intrusion of textual criticism becomesthe ultimate tool to prevent tradition from losing its grip on the text. Thisis textual criticism as the exercise of power – and from this perspective,a pluralism of traditions were not only a challenge, but above all a salva-tion.

104 Paula Henrikson

12 Martens 1991, 19: ‘Die historisch-kritische Ausgabe hätte danach gerade ihreeigentliche Aufgabe darin, gegen Anpassung und vorschnellen Abbau des für unsabweichend Erscheinenden den geheimen Widersinn des Kunstwerks, seine konsti-tutive Fremdheit freizulegen.’

Is it possible to imagine a mode of editorial scholarship that does notdepend on a notion of tradition like Gadamer’s? Gunter Martens talksabout the text’s ‘konstitutive Fremdheit’ (‘constitutive estrangement’) inhis attempt to describe its unconditional autonomy: it is not the editor’stask to set right the text according to our expectations, but instead toprotect it from hasty intervention.12 Much earlier, the classical scholarUlrich von Wilamowitz-Moellendorff spoke of the ideal scholar’s state ofconsciousness as one of self-surrender. The scholar should dedicate herown individuality unreservedly to the alien (Wilamowitz-Moellendorff1907, 256ff.). In practice, neither Martens nor Wilamowitz are strangersto text-critical intervention, but their common stance in theory may bethus paraphrased: where it runs against our notions, it is not the text thatwe must set right – it is ourselves.

Wilamowitz’ and Martens’ attitudes are, I think, worth to be givensome thought in terms of a reflection on scholarly ethics – and perhaps itis even true to say that the question of the editor’s stance and attitudesbelongs in the field of ethics, rather than in that of a theory of knowl-edge. Yet as a frame within which to model the cultural significance ofeditorial scholarship, their views are insufficient. It would be naive tobelieve that not we too, in our turn, also edited texts in the service ofcertain ends. The truth is, on the contrary, that an historical text remainsrelevant only in the measure that it answers to present needs. The onlytexts towards which we can maintain a totally disinterested attitude – oron which we give up all demands – are those to which we are whollyindifferent.

An historical understanding of editorial scholarship must take itsdeparture from the reception history of the works in their written trans-mission. Our access to history must pass through these texts, the waythey have been transmitted by human beings who, in their turn, had anideological or aesthetic agenda. My overview therefore of the editorialhistory of the Scania Law has above all been a tale of its reception his-tory. In the words of Hans Robert Jauß:

Das literarische Werk ist kein für sich bestehendes Objekt, das jedemBetrachter zu jeder Zeit den gleichen Anblick darbietet. Es ist kein Monu-


13 Jauß 1970, 171ff.: ‘A literary work is not an object which stands by itself andwhich offers the same face to each reader in each period. It is not a monument whichreveals its timeless essence in a monologue. It is much more like an orchestrationwhich strikes ever new chords among its readers and which frees the text from thesubstance of the words and makes it meaningful for the time’ (Jauß 1970-71: 10).

14 This article was prepared during a stay as a guest scholar at the Institut forNordiske Studier og Sprogvidenskab at the University of Copenhagen, funded byStiftelsen för internationalisering av högre utbildning och forskning i Sverige (STINT). I wish tothank STINT, as well as my contact at the institute, Johnny Kondrup. Finally, I alsowish to thank Hans Walter Gabler, for valuable help with the English language.

ment, das monologisch sein zeitloses Wesen offenbart. Es ist vielmehr wieeine Partitur auf die immer erneuerte Resonanz der Lektüre angelegt, dieden Text aus der Materie der Worte erlöst und ihn zu aktuellem Daseinbringt (...)13

To ‘free the text from the substance of the words’ is for Jauß a metaphorfor the power of reading to give the works of literature a renewed pres-ence. But Jauß can be much more radically conceived. To speak of theshifting faces of the literary work is not to speak in metaphor, but of aphysical reality, and the texts’ ‘substance’ is not invariant, just as little asis the literary work itself. Scholarly editing is a material expression of thehistorical transformations of literature.

The editor of a text does not arrest this transformation. The editordoes not – as he or she sometimes believes – remove textual variation orinstability. On the contrary, editions engender added variation, as theygive a new face to the edited text. This is the law of entropy, applied toeditorial scholarship: an editor never creates greater order, but only con-tributes to the accretive disorder. Or, expressed more optimistically: text-critical knowledge is accumulative, not definitive.14

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Zander, Ulf. 1999. Hur stort är fäderneslandet? Skånsk historia och dansk-svenska gränser från sekelslut till sekelslut. Ale. Historisk tidskrift för Skåne,Halland och Blekinge 3: 12–30.


WELSH LITERARY HISTORY AND THE MAKING OF ‘THE MYVYRIAN ARCHAIOLOGY OF WALES’

Mary-Ann Constantine

AbstractThis chapter explores a formative moment in the history of Welshliterature and philology: the publication, between 1801 and 1807, ofthree volumes of medieval Welsh-language texts known as theMyvyrian Archaiology of Wales. Now generally discredited as the productof misguided Romantic-era enthusiasm, the Myvyrian was a respectedand respectable companion for writers and scholars in Wales andbeyond during most of the nineteenth century, and it helped shape avision of ‘Welshness’ still recognisable today. It repays closer scrutiny,both as a work of scholarship and for its contribution to incipientWelsh nationalism. Moreover, the story of its compilation by threevery different men – a compelling mixture of endeavour, generosityand deviousness – is as much a part of Welsh literary history as thepublication itself.

One of the formative moments in the history of Welsh literature andphilology was the publication, between 1801 and 1807, of three weightyvolumes of medieval texts known as the Myvyrian Archaiology of Wales.Although, for reasons which will become clear, it has long since fallen onhard times, the Myvyrian was a respected and respectable companion forwriters and scholars in Wales and beyond during most of the nineteenthcentury, and it helped shape a vision of ‘Welshness’ still recognisabletoday. The story of its compilation – a compelling mixture of endeavour,generosity and deviousness – and of the three men who brought it intobeing, is, by now, as much a part of Welsh literary history as the publica-tion itself.

110 Mary-Ann Constantine

1 La Villemarqué 1850, ii-iii: ‘But alas, the gardens of these Celtic Hesperides, nowso graciously open to those who know how to touch their fruits without spoiling them,were at the time guarded as fiercely as if by fabled dragons: (...) what hope of entry,then, for a poor peasant? Realizing that money alone would provide him with thedragon-vanquishing golden bough, his very love for his country forced him to bid thatcountry farewell, and he made his way to London, where he found employment in a

A culture’s literary history is like a river fed by many tributaries. Fromwhere we stand we feel we know the landscape, in all its twists and turns,well enough – but that sense of what has shaped the river, of the influ-ences and confluences that have most determined its course, dependsdramatically on the viewer’s own position in space and in time. So it maybe salutary to start with the story of the late eighteenth-century Welshliterary revival as seen from Brittany some half a century after it gotgoing. It is a romantic tale of the poor shepherd boy Owen Jones, bornin 1741 in the ‘valley of Myfyr’ (the parish of Llanfihangel Glyn Myfyr,from which he would later take his bardic name ‘Owain Myfyr’). Whenout on the hills tending his flocks, says our author, he would often turnhis eyes to the splendour of Snowdon, that Celtic Parnassus, which,surely, he must often have climbed to sleep the sleep of poetic inspira-tion. Once grown up, and thoroughly versed in the poetic and musicalarts of his native Wales (an innate passion for which is the mark of alltrue Welshmen), he conceived the idea of bringing these national trea-sures, long hidden in manuscripts, out of their ancient strongholds inorder to make them known to the wider world:

Par malheur, ces jardins des Héspérides celtiques, si gracieusement ouvertsaujourd’hui à quiconque sait toucher aux fruits sans les gâter, avaient alorsdes gardiens non moins farouches que les dragons de la fable: (...) quellechance de succès pouvait donc avoir un pauvre paysan? Comprenant que lafortune seule lui fournirait le rameau d’or qui conjure les dragons, il ditadieu à son pays par amour pour ce pays même: il se rendit à Londres (...), ilentra comme employé dans le magasin d’un marchand de fourrures deTames’s street, et après être devenu homme de peine commis, de commisassocié, et enfin chef de l’établissement, à la mort du propriétaire, aprèsavoir, durant quarante ans, prélevé, jour par jour, shelling par shelling, surses économies, la somme nécessaire pour faire copier, puis imprimer lestextes des anciens poèmes bretons; encouragé par quelques amis exilés aveclui du sol de la patrie, avec lui pleurant bien souvent au souvenir du paysnatal, soutenu même et provoqué par les injustes préventions, les doutesinjurieux, et les grossières railleries des étrangers contre les bardes, il lespublia, en 1801, sous le titre d’Archéologie galloise de Myvyr ou MyvyrianArchaiology of Wales 1

THE MYVYRIAN ARCHAIOLOGY OF WALES 111

fur merchant’s shop in Thames Street. Here he worked his way up from apprentice tobecome, at the death of the proprietor, head of the firm, and for forty long years hesaved day by day, shilling by shilling, the necessary amount to have copied and thenprinted the texts of the ancient British poems; encouraged in this enterprise by a fewfriends, who were, like himself, exiled from their native soil, and like himself wereoften moved to tears at the thought of their homeland, hardened and provoked by theunfair prohibitions, the insulting doubts, and the vulgar jests which foreigners directedagainst the bards, he published these texts, in 1801, under the title of the WelshArchaiology of Myfyr, or the Myvyrian Archaiology of Wales.’

2 The Honourable Society of the Cymmrodorion (lit. ‘earliest inhabitants’) wasfounded in London in 1751 by Richard and Lewis Morris with an essentially antiquar-ian remit; the Gwyneddigion (lit. ‘men of Gwynedd’), founded in 1770 with OwainMyfyr as its first President, had a more eclectic membership and a more radical tone.

3 Williams 1926: xvi: ‘bydd ein llên a’n hanes am oes neu ddwy eto cyn byddant lâno ôl ei ddwylo halog ef’.

This fable is recounted by the Breton writer Théodore Hersart de LaVillemarqué in the introduction to his own selection of early Welshpoetry. Like much of what he wrote, it is not exactly fiction, but nor doesit tell the whole story: his version of events collapses a complex prehis-tory of false starts and collaborations involving the London Welsh soci-eties2 and the joint efforts of the three editors of The Myvyrian Archaiology,into the affecting tale of a single hero-figure. Owain Myfyr becomes notonly the Welsh revival’s prime economic mover, as he undoubtedly was,but also its superlative scholar, editor and visionary. The virtual invisibil-ity of the other two editors, William Owen Pughe and Edward Williams,is significant.

Three-quarters of a century on, back on the Welsh side of the river-bank, the view is rather less serene. Owain Myfyr, bulky man though hewas, has now been eclipsed by the small, restless figure of Edward Wil-liams, better known by his bardic name Iolo Morganwg (‘Ned ofGlamorgan’). A careful study of a dozen poems attributed to the four-teenth century poet Dafydd ap Gwilym has just shown, irrefutably, thatthey must be Iolo’s own work: they are forgeries, pastiches, and theimplications for the foundations of Welsh scholarship are serious. In asomewhat shrill introduction to G. J. Williams’s excellent detective work,the academic John Morris-Jones denounces Iolo Morganwg (by then longestablished as a kind of Welsh National Treasure) as a ‘hateful man fullof hate’, a poisoner of well-springs: it will be, he says, ‘an age or two yetbefore our history and literature are clean of the traces of his dirty fin-gers’.3 The river of Welsh literary history has been fed by contaminated


4 La Villemarqué’s relations with Wales and his use of The Myvyrian Archaiology arediscussed in Constantine 2007, 143-98. For a comprehensive introduction to Iolo’s lifeand work see Jenkins 2005.

underground streams, and all of Iolo’s works are now suspect. Theyinclude, of course, large parts of The Myvyrian Archaiology, over which helaboured for many years, tracking down and copying out manuscripts,and sending texts – but how many of them reliable? – to his colleaguesin London. The first decades of the twentieth century saw a fierce rejec-tion of Welsh Romantic scholarship, a return to sources, to new schol-arly editions, and the cultivation of that scrupulousness bordering onmania which becomes one of the hallmarks of modern academic Celticstudies. The Myvyrian Archaiology, a standard text for nineteenth-centurywriters, fell out of favour.

Two centuries on, and standing a good long way back from thesource, the patterns made by the interconnecting streams, complex asthey are, seem rather clearer: it becomes easier to pick out the roles ofthe three editors of the compilation and the relative proportions of theirscholarly endeavour, zeal and deception. It is also easier to situate thenature of their scholarship within a broader cultural context, both Britishand European – a broader context which, incidentally, includes LaVillemarqué’s own somewhat dubious role in transferring (or, as hewould have it, repatriating) part of that Brittonic legacy to Brittany.4 Thestory of the genesis of The Myvyrian Archaiology of Wales is a useful lensthrough which to focus some of these wider concerns, and it really doesnot need dragons and golden apples to make it interesting.

Eighteenth-century Wales was witness to a huge surge in publishedworks, yet in many respects, even by the end of the century, it was stillvery much a manuscript culture: most people still copied out or learnedeach other’s poems, and the collecting and copying of early manuscriptswas far from an elite antiquarian pursuit (McKenna 2005). Yet as thetraditional ways of sustaining cultural knowledge crumbled there was agrowing sense of a need to rescue the written debris of the past: the oldsystem of bardic patronage was by now virtually defunct and Welshgentry looked increasingly to England to educate their sons. Old Welshbooks and papers had ceased to be valued and many perished. By themiddle of the century efforts had begun to stem the tide of neglect: anenergetic circle of writers and scholars around the Morris brothers ofAnglesey became involved in recovering manuscripts and encouraging


5 For the Welsh reaction to the Ossian phenomenon see Constantine 2004 andConstantine 2007, 85-128.

6 The most thorough account of Owain Myfyr’s life to date is the unpublished PhDthesis Phillips 2006. Cf also Phillips 2005.

new authors (cf. Morgan 1981, Herbert & Jones 1988). They began toassess the holdings of the various estate libraries and other private collec-tions, they chased priceless medieval manuscripts still being passed casu-ally around by hand, and they copied them, creating a sizeable collectionwhich would come to be held in the Welsh Charity School at London.The Morrises’ protégé, the unlucky, drink-prone cleric Evan Evans(‘Ieuan Fardd’), was one of the greatest and most dogged collectors ofWelsh manuscripts. He it was who rediscovered the early heroic poem YGododdin, now the immovable cornerstone of any Welsh literature course:its belated addition to the canon offers a neat parallel to England’s longwait for its own literary ‘beginnings’ in Beowulf, first published in 1825.

In 1764 Evan Evans published Some Specimens of the Poetry of the AntientWelsh Bards, a selection of texts in Welsh, with some English translationsand a Latin dissertation on Welsh literature. Specimens was aimed for thefirst time at a readership outside Wales, and was conceived, at leastpartly, as a kind of sobering response to Macpherson’s Ossian: the tone isscholarly, defensive.5 Evans’s work was an important turning point, butit did not go far enough: a generation later there was continuing corro-sive fall-out from the Ossian controversy, and attacks on all things Celticby the ‘Gothic’ apologist John Pinkerton left Wales still driven by theneed to defend both the age and reliability of Welsh tradition. Onesenses, in Welsh scholarly circles, an indignation born of insecurity, afear of being misunderstood. Establishing a verifiable and venerableliterary history, far earlier than anything the Saxons could boast, wouldalso be some consolation at Wales’s effective loss of prestige within anEnglish-speaking ‘Britain’ rapidly consolidating its power-base in Lon-don – the Ancient Britons, after all, undisputably spoke Welsh. Suchconsiderations make the publication of the Myvyrian or something like itseem inevitable: in actual practice, given the characters involved in itsgenesis and the difficulties they faced, it is rather miraculous that it everhappened at all.

By the 1770s Owain Myfyr was doing well in the fur-trade in Lon-don.6 Iolo Morganwg first made contact with him there in 1773-4, whenhe went to find work as a stonecutter. Myfyr, always responsive to fellow


7 William Owen inherited property from a kinsman in 1806 and took the name‘Pughe’ in recognition of the bequest. For an account of his life (in Welsh) see Carr1983, also Carr 2005.

8 Jones and Pughe 1789. Iolo’s forgeries are analysed by G. J. Williams 1926.

Welsh enthusiasts, welcomed him into the Gwyneddigion Society, and,perhaps more fatefully, showed him the Morris manuscripts at the WelshSchool. The poems of the fourteenth-century Dafydd ap Gwilym made aprofound impression on him: he began writing his own poems inDafydd’s style, sending them to Myfyr for criticism and advice. After adifficult, and homesick, period working at his craft down in Kent, Ioloreturned to Glamorgan. By the mid-1780s he was married and enduringextreme financial hardship, and for a while he lost (or gave up) contactwith the London Welsh: the generous Owain Myfyr was distressed todiscover later that Iolo’s debts had forced him to spend a year in prison.Contact was finally re-established in 1788, through Myfyr’s latest ‘discov-ery’, William Owen (later known as William Owen Pughe)7, a modestand hard-working clerk from Merioneth, and another keen enthusiast forall things Welsh. The two men were working towards an edition ofDafydd ap Gwilym’s poems, and Iolo hinted tantalizingly at pieces hehad copied from Glamorgan manuscripts which were not to be found inthe London collections. The editors asked urgently to see them, and atthe eleventh hour Iolo sent a clutch of poems which were included in anAppendix to the publication.8 Several of these Appendix poems – espe-cially those bursting with enthusiastic praise for the county ofGlamorgan and for Dafydd’s great patron Ifor Hael – would becomefirm favourites in the following century; most, of course, were Iolo’sown work. And thus began the somewhat fraught triangular alliancebetween Owain Myfyr, William Owen Pughe and Iolo Morganwg, analliance which would founder in bitter recriminations in 1806, but whichheld together just long enough for a significant part of their ambitiousproject of publication to see the light of day.

None of these men came from a privileged background. They do notfit the typical model of the gentleman collector whose antiquarian pas-sions were funded by family wealth or a Church living; they were noteducated at Oxford or Cambridge, and did not have the benefit of per-sonal tutors – Iolo, indeed, barely had the benefit of the village school.Thus, while it does not seem quite right to romanticize Owain Myfyr inLa Villemarqué’s terms as a ‘poor shepherd boy made good’ (given


9 See Phillips in Jenkins 2005, 403-423.

Wales’s demography it is inevitable that most of the bright minds of theperiod came from some kind of rural or farming background), it is worthrecognizing that the passion for literature, the love of learning and theerudition of these three men was non-institutional, the product of local-ized literary traditions maintained, by this period, not by the Anglicizedgentry but by a lively artisan class. Owain Myfyr was well aware that hisnative area had produced some of the finest poets of the late middleages; Iolo learned his poetic craft from a circle of scholar-poets, all farm-ers or craftsmen, from the Glamorgan uplands.

Although he received subventions from Myfyr, and later from theRoyal Literary Fund, Iolo never escaped the need to practise his manuallabour, and his family frequently struggled against real poverty. Disparityin income played its part in the difficulties which arose between the threecollaborators. For most of his life Owain Myfyr was extremely generouswith his wealth: for many years William Owen Pughe and his familylived rent-free in a house in Pentonville, and he received an allowance of£100 per annum for his efforts in the cause of Welsh literature – effortswhich were, in terms of sheer industry, phenomenal. Iolo, an extremelycomplex character and far from reliable co-worker, found the processesof literary patronage deeply unsettling. He resented the idea of depend-ency on Owain Myfyr and, although glad to receive money when it came,was quick to take offence at perceived slights; a major aspect of theirlater contention was an ‘understanding’ (which proved to be anythingbut) that Myfyr would continue to subsidise Iolo’s literary activities longbeyond the period of the Myvyrian. Pughe’s role, judging from the letters,was often one of patient diplomacy between the two men. His 1806inheritance (which in fact brought him little immediate benefit in termsof ready cash) left Iolo even more aggrieved at his own bad luck; this,compounded with Pughe’s increasing devotion to the prophetess JoannaSouthcott and his ‘barbarous’ lexicographical and orthographical innova-tions, effectively damned him. As Geraint Phillips has suggested, Iolo’sforgeries, his subtle deceptions, may have been part of a compensatorypower game, a ‘secret’ which gave him – unquestionably the best scholarand the quickest mind – a hold over the other two.9 Geography was another complicating factor. In 1799, and not entirelyaccording to plan, Iolo set off on a tour of Wales with the aim of finding


10 Iolo’s travels are tracked in detail by Phillips 2006, 190-211. 11 William Owen Pughe to Iolo Morganwg, 14 June 1799. Correspondence nr. 504.12 Iolo Morganwg to Owen Jones, 22 July 1799. Correspondence nr. 510.

and copying material for the ‘Welsh Archaiology’, which was now, afterseveral false starts, seriously underway.10 Myfyr, in fact, would havepreferred to have had Iolo in London helping William Owen Pughe withthe huge task of editing the reams of material they already possessed, butIolo (who had suffered a nervous breakdown in London in 1792) re-sisted all attempts to lure him back. He did things very much his ownway, travelling on foot all over Wales, sometimes covering thirty or fortymiles a day, and effectively disappearing for weeks on end. Anxiousletters from Pughe and Myfyr, often sending him money, chased himfrom county to county; he did not always bother to reply. Nor did thetreasures he discovered on his travels always correspond to their list ofdesiderata for the great edition; a box full of historical material whichwas urgently needed in London languished for several months in Bristolwhile Iolo turned his mind to what he felt was the far more pressingbusiness of collecting (and, be it said, manufacturing) ancient Welshproverbs (Phillips 2006, 417-418).

Politics played its disruptive part as well. After several fruitful ses-sions copying manuscripts in the great library at Hafod in Ceredigionthere was a marked cooling of relations between Iolo and the landownerThomas Johnes, when, as William Owen Pughe put it, ‘some body musthave insinuated something to him respecting your kingophobia’;11 inLlanrwst Iolo met with aggressive opposition to their ‘little pitiful con-cern (...) of printing some inconsiderable portions of the works of theWelsh bards on a very narrow scale’ by a rival group who claimed thatMyfyr and his men would only publish ‘democratical stuff’.12 There wasan element of truth in this. Although the Myvyrian, a sober edition oftexts, claimed no overt political agenda, Iolo’s revolutionary brand ofbardic nationalism had already infiltrated many of the pieces he wouldsupply to Pughe and Myfyr. His 1794 collection of verse in English,Poems, Lyric and Pastoral, set out a vision of the ancient British past whosepolitical and religious principles were directly opposed to the restrictiverule of Pitt’s government; a couple of years earlier William OwenPughe’s equally innocuously-titled The Heroic Elegies and Other Pieces ofLlywarç Hen had carried a lengthy and learned introductory account of theceremonies and beliefs of the British bards which again owed almost


13 ‘E.B.’ 1710, 3 (this work is sometimes attributed to Ned Ward). For an assess-ment of the Myvyrian as a turning point in Welsh scholarship see Williams 1966.

14 For two draft versions of this work see Charnell-White 2007, 172-181 and 181-201.

everything to Iolo’s ideas. The ‘democratical stuff’ did, therefore, makeits way into the three volumes, although to varying degrees.

The concept of a comprehensive, chronologically-organized reposi-tory of literary texts was new to Wales: previous anthologies, like LewisMorris’s Tlysau yr Hen Oesoedd (1735), had culled poetic ‘gems’ or‘blooms’, while Evan Evans’s scholarly Specimens made no claims tocompleteness, and was decidedly patchy on the early period. The mostinfluential collection at the end of the eighteenth century was RhysJones’s Gorchestion Beirdd Cymru of 1773, which covered a brave chrono-logical span but had only limited access to the manuscripts (cf. McKenna2006). The publication of The Myvyrian Archaiology is thus an interestingmoment in a culture famed (and often mocked) for its fondness forlineage, for its backward gaze – ‘if they want a Pewter Spoon or Porrin-ger in their House’ noted one satirist, ‘yet they will by no means be with-out a Pedigree’.13 Welsh poets had, for example, long acknowledgedTaliesin as the founding father of their craft, even if the body of poemsattributed to him fluctuated from one century to the next; scholars of theRenaissance, such as Humphrey Lhwyd, had begun to trace textual gene-alogies, and develop a sense of historical depth. But the Myvyrian repre-sents a new departure: a type of scholarly literary history closer in spiritto that inaugurated in England in the 1770s and 1780s by ThomasWarton’s History of English Literature. Unlike Warton’s work, however, theMyvyrian did not (as it turned out) offer a descriptive account of literaryhistory in Wales. A promised dissertation on Welsh poetry ‘wherein weshall consider the nature and peculiar character of it, analize the verse ofour different periods, point out in what they differed, the progress of theimprovements’ (MAW 1: xx-xxi) never materialized, and that task wasleft to Iolo’s endlessly-drafted (but also ultimately unfinished) magnumopus, ‘The History of the Bards’.14 Instead, the Myvyrian editors produceda canon: three volumes of texts ascribed where possible to named au-thors, and arranged chronologically and generically.

They comprise, in the first volume, poetry ‘from the earliest times tothe beginning of the fourteenth century’ (MAW 1: vi), beginning with theGododdin of Aneirin, whose floruit is given as 510-560; the second vol-


15 See Leerssen’s introduction to this volume; also Evans 2005, 58.16 Lewis 1991, 232.

ume contained prose works, histories, law texts and saints’ lives. Transla-tions were not included, but each volume bears an index giving namesand dates of the known authors, and an indication of the manuscriptprovenance of variant versions. The editorial principle, set out in anEnglish introduction to the whole work, was ‘to give these ancient manu-scripts with the most scrupulous fidelity, as we find them’ (MAW 1: xix)The first two volumes appeared in 1801; there was then a significantdelay before the third, and most controversial, volume appeared in 1807– a year after the editorial triumvirate had effectively collapsed. A fourthproposed volume, to have contained the texts of the prose romances andnative tales, never saw the light of day.

The contents of the third volume are, for present purposes, the mostinteresting. Advertised as a ‘collection of aphorisms, proverbs, ethicaltriads, legislative triads, laws, and music’, it presents a rich mixture ofwhat might be called foundational texts – material pertaining to the earlystages of a national self-definition, both legal (the official structuring ofsociety) and characteristic (defining the innate character of the people).They perfectly express Joep Leerssen’s notion of ‘a single primitive eth-nic self-invention and self-articulation’ deriving ultimately from Vico,and have many European parallels: one might compare the manuscript‘discovered’ in Zelená Hora in 1819, which ‘cast much light on the pri-mal practices of Czech justice, political counsel and communal organiza-tion’.15 The nature of the contents of the third volume is announced inthe title-page quotation:

Tri dyben addysg a chôv: gwybyddu, diwallu, a dyddanuThe three objects of instruction and record: to convey knowledge, to supply defects, and to give pleasure

Of the three, that middle verb gives most pause for thought: the typicallyeighteenth-century ‘supply defects’, meaning to correct, is given in Welshas diwallu – literally, to remove or erase error. As Gwyneth Lewis hasshown, the concept of revision was central to Iolo’s perception of hisbardic role, expressing itself on both a spiritual and an editorial level as alicence to improve.16 Little wonder, then, that this volume of the Myvyrianhas been both the most influential, and the most reviled.


17 Bromwich 2006, 146. Sequences of Iolo’s triads also appeared in the secondvolume of the Myvyrian.

18 Iolo Morganwg to Robert Macfarlan, 6 June 1804. Correspondence nr. 692.19 For a detailed account of Iolo’s manipulation of the traditional triads see

Bromwich 1969.20 National Library of Wales MS 13088B, 63–78. Iolo’s ‘Moelmutian’ vision of a

just society seems, by a somewhat circuitous route, to have impressed Karl Marx. Seeletters written to Engels in March 1868 and May 1870, Marx and Engels 1975-2005,

The most widely-used texts in the third volume were undoubtedly theTriads (‘Trioedd’ in Welsh), remnants of a mnemonic system used byWelsh bards and other professionals to classify historical, poetic andother instructive material. Many are genuine (or at least pre-Iolo) texts,sequences of elliptical, three-line verses, often tantalizing in their refer-ences to names and narratives partially or completely forgotten:

Three Exalted Prisoners of the Island of Britain:Llír Half-Speech, who was imprisoned by Euroswydd,and the second, Mabon son of Modron,and third, Gwair son of Gweiriodd.17

For many antiquarians, the triads were a form crying out for interpreta-tion – for expansion and clarification. It was a form Iolo made his own,and long before work began on The Myvyrian Archaiology he had expandedor coined dozens of sequences to cover all eventualities: religion, philos-ophy, history, law and the early stages of Welsh civilization. (As hewould remark disingenuously to the Ossianophile Robert Macfarlan in1804: ‘to forge with any hopes of success in the Erse it would not do tofabricate an Ossian, or any thing else alone, you must forge in all theunavoidably concomitant branches of literary knowlege, at least in a greatmany of them’).18 The triads provided a platform for his ‘culture heroes’,characters pulled from the meagre sources into whom he breathed newlife: Hu Gadarn, the ploughman-king who first taught the Welsh theirsystem of Vocal Song; the wise ruler Prydain fab Aedd; the bardsPlennydd, Alawn and Gwron, all of them founding fathers of a culturewhich could be traced back to the Biblical patriarchs.19 One of the mostappealing figures is the early British law-giver Dyfnwal Moelmud(Geoffrey of`Monmouth’s Dunwallo Moelmutius). Iolo’s ‘Moelmutian’triads use legal language to evoke an ideal early British society, a kind ofGolden Age, under this legendary leader, while an essay amongst hismanuscripts extrapolates an entire world from what seem to be largelyhis own invented texts.20 Thus Iolo’s triads, mixed, in the Myvyrian, with


42: 547 and 43: 515-516. I am much indebted to Brian Davies for this information.21 See Löffler 2007, 82-3; Pictet 1856. For Fauriel’s interest in matters Welsh see

Constantine 2007, 145-7.22 The sayings of ‘Catwg Ddoeth’ emerge from a complex process of muddled

substitutions (not all, it must be said, attributable to Iolo) as the Iolo-ized version ofthe Disticha Catonis, or ‘Sayings of Cato’, a popular school-text across Europe in thelate medieval period. Iolo also claimed that the ‘Bardd Glas’ was the ‘Glasgerion’mentioned in Chaucer’s House of Fame.

the genuine articles, became the principal medium of his fictive bardicgrand narrative – a body of knowledge handed down through (invariablyCatholic) periods of repression and intolerance to keep the flame of trueChristian understanding alight. They were immensely popular in thenineteenth century, and won considerable attention on the Continentfrom scholars like Ferdinand Walter, Claude Fauriel and Adolphe Pictet– the latter thrilled to find premonitions of Kant and Leibniz in thewisdom, as he thought, of the ancient Celts.21

But valuable echoes of ancient times might equally be found in thehumbler proverbs of the people, and the third volume of the Myvyrianalso became the repository for earthier voices from the past. Reams ofsayings attributed to wisdom figures like Catwg Ddoeth (‘Wise Catwg’),or the Bardd Glas (the ‘Blue Bard’) encapsulate the spirit of the Welshpeople through time: the running title for this section of the book is‘Doethineb y Cymry’ (‘the Wisdom of the Welsh’).22 The sayings andproverbs listed in the Myvyrian appear, like other texts, without interpre-tative or descriptive commentary, but a sense of what such pieces mighthave meant to Iolo comes across very vividly in a letter he wrote toOwain Myfyr in April 1800. It demonstrates to perfection the spirit ofzealous interpretation and the inevitable direction of its flow:

Amongst my collection of proverbs used in Glamorgan, there is one that issingular enough: a person on receiving useful instructions, information, &c.,says of his instructor by way of complimenting him, ‘Hyfforddwr a fyddgorddwr’ [He who instructs will become a churner]. This proverb is prettycommon, but I have never yet met with a person who seemed to me tounderstand it.

Noting that the saying is never used in a derogatory manner, he suggests:


23 For ‘cordd’ and ‘corddaf: corddi’, see the entries in the Geiriadur Prifysgol Cymru.Although Iolo’s connection of the two would have seemed plausible enough, themeaning ‘tribe, clan’ and the verb ‘to churn, agitate’ are not in fact related; nor has thephrase in question been otherwise recorded. I am grateful to Andrew Hawke for thisinformation.

24 The word gwyddelod, as Iolo happily points out elsewhere, is also the Welsh wordfor the Irish, and does indeed mean ‘dwellers in the woods’; there was little love lostbetween Wales and Ireland during this period, which effectively predates the generalpost-Romantic perceptions of Celtic-speakers bound together by a shared distant pastand ties of blood.

‘Cordd’23 seems originally to have signified a collection into one body ormass of what was before widely scattered, of parts theretofore in wideseperation [sic] from each other; ‘corddi’, to collect into one mass, to incor-porate into one body; ‘corddi ymenyn’, to collect into one mass the butterthat hitherto was dispersed or disseminated in very minute particles throughthe whole milk; ‘trefgordd’, a community of people collected and associat-ing together in one body, from amongst the hunters of woods and forests,from amongst savage nomades in the first rude state of man (...) Now, if Iam right in my etymology of the words ‘cordd’ & ‘corddi’, the true sense ofthe proverb will be, ‘He that can (or will) instruct mankind, will become thehead or chief of a community, or will be able to associate savages or scat-tered inhabitants of woods (‘gwyddelod’)24 into a civilized body, mass, orcommunity’; or, in other words, ‘The instructor, or civilizer will become thepatriarch, founder, &c. of a nation or civilized body of men, the collector ofa number of individuals into one political mass’ – a very natural proverb forthe early states of human society. On similar ideas are founded the mytholo-gies of Sesostris, Hermes Trismegistus, Zoroaster, Orpheus, Amphion, &c.,&c. (...)

Supposing that I have hit on the true idea, it will follow that this proverbof ours is extremely ancient, (...) I know a few instances, besides this, whereobsolete words not now understood by the common people, are still re-tained in popular proverbs and idioms, though never used on any otheroccasion.

It is difficult to imagine a better example of what by the turn of thecentury had become a Europe-wide, post-Herderian propensity to findthe beginnings of nationhood far back in time, preserved unwittingly inthe songs and sayings of the common people. Nice too, that such high-flown sentiments, and such august philosophical company, should besummoned by something as practical as churning butter. As we haveseen, instruction was at the very heart of Iolo’s bardic vision: for him theearly druids (who were also bards) were essentially teachers, not of someselect group of religious initiates, but of the people as a whole. Priestswere necessarily poets because they taught through the medium of po-


25 Iolo Morganwg to Owain Myfyr, 17 June 1800. Correspondence, nr. 547.

etry, through the triads, which were easily retained by the memory ofeven the unlettered masses. Their enlightened, democratic – and, indeed,Unitarian – doctrines could be recovered from both written and oralsources, from the spoken proverbs he collected on his travels aroundWales (‘with all my ears open’, as he put it) as well as in the triads hefound in the libraries of the gentry or from ragged manuscripts passedfrom hand to hand in smoky cottages:

From our ancient proverbs may be collected the sublimest truths of reli-gion, the most refined precepts of morality, the happiest dictates of wisdom,the most excellent maxims of prudence, the most elegant modes of expres-sion, the neatest disposition, and the most rhythmical arrangement of thewords. They also throw great light on ancient usages and manners, and notinconsiderably elucidate history.25

Such cryptic material was, inevitably, immensely rewarding to the eye offaith, and where the necessary ideas failed to materialize Iolo could al-ways provide them himself. His forgeries have long earned him theopprobrium of medievalists, but, as Morfydd Owen has suggested, Iolo’sfascination with the triads and his aptitude for coining them situate himin a long line of antiquarians who, down the centuries, have preservedand revitalized this distinctively Welsh genre (Owen 2007) Similarlyrevisionist interpretations of other so-called forgers, James Macphersonand Hersart de La Villemarqué among them, are now more inclined tosee them as transformative bearers, than betrayers, of their respectivetraditions. I will return to the subject of forgery and betrayal at the end. The putative fourth volume of The Myvyrian Archaiology is also ofinterest. It was to have contained more medieval prose texts, those gen-erally if somewhat erroneously known today as The Mabinogion, from thetitle given them in 1838 by their translator, Lady Charlotte Guest. Theycomprise a dozen or so stories from the fabulous native tales (includingthe earliest Arthurian tale in Europe, and the complex interlinked narra-tive of the Four Branches of the Mabinogi) through to the French-in-flected chivalric romances. Since these much-discussed texts are nowoften the first port of call for the new student of Welsh, and have cometo typify medieval Wales, their virtual absence from the literary landscapeof the time is worth noting. That absence was in part an accident ofcircumstance: although various scholars, Sharon Turner and Sir Walter


26 Parts of some of the tales did appear in the press. See Johnston 1957-58. 27 See especially his essay on the triads in his English collection, Williams 1794,

217-227. For Iolo’s ideas about orality and literacy see Constantine2007, 85-142.28 William Owen Pughe to Iolo Morganwg, 28 August 1800; Iolo Morganwg to

William Owen Pughe, 19 December 1800. Correspondence, nrs. 561 and 570.

Scott among them, urged William Owen Pughe to publish the transla-tions at which he had laboured long and hard, he died before they couldgo to press.26 But it also reveals the relative prestige of poetry, historyand law at this period in the defining of a national culture: one may noteIolo’s own objection to the notion of ‘fable’ (a word invariably associatedin his writings with the works of Geoffrey of Monmouth) and his claimthat prose was a far less reliable receptacle for ancient ‘truths’ thanverse.27

If the value of the Myvyrian’s edited texts has diminished with thediscovery of Iolo’s forgeries and advances in textual editing generally, itsEnglish-language introduction, ‘A short review of the present state ofWelsh manuscripts’ has become more interesting with time. Iolo pro-duced it after much nagging from Pughe and Myfyr (the first volume wasprinted and waiting for ‘the flourish of a preface’ by August 1800: Iolo,for various reasons both practical and psychological, did not manage towrite the piece until December).28 The essay went through many draftsbefore appearing in its published version, and these drafts, preserved inthe huge and chaotic archive of Iolo’s manuscripts held at the NationalLibrary of Wales, shed considerable light on the curiously pressuredatmosphere of the published piece: as I have said elsewhere (2007, 95), itfeels as if it has been written with clenched fists. Iolo defends the Welshmanuscript tradition with vigour, stressing the abundance of manuscriptsdating from many different periods through which the ‘originals’ couldbe traced; he gives the names of private collections and libraries, and abrief history of previous scholarship, with the efforts of predecessorssuch as Evan Evans duly acknowledged. The tone, however, is frequent-ly angry and defensive, castigating both the English for their lack ofsupport and the Welsh upper classes for their lack of patriotic fervour(‘these first-moving virtues, for such they certainly are, have almostdisappeared in Wales’, MAW 1: ix). There are moments of sudden ag-gression:

Why Welsh Bibles were taken out of churches and burnt, as we have itrecorded, and English ones ordered to be used in the room of them, cannot


29 MAW 1: xviii. Compare Dr. Johnson (1775 2: 101): ‘He that cannot read mayconverse with those that can; but the Bard was a barbarian among barbarians, who,knowing nothing himself, lived with others that knew no more’.

now be well known; we trust that, however hostile the politics of this coun-try [i.e. England] were once towards our language, they have so far ceasedto be so, as to become absolutely indifferent about the matter. (MAW 1: x)

Such accusations hardly seem calculated to win over an audience new tothe Welsh material, nor, as Iolo expresses the hope elsewhere, to encour-age sympathetic English scholars to learn the language. Subsequentattempts to mollify his readers still fall some way short of expected levelsof urbanity: ‘We desire to be understood as speaking of past times, sin-cerely hoping that those of the present will make amends before thetribunal of the literary world’ (MAW 1: 10).

Another distinctive feature of the ‘Short review’ is the Ossian contro-versy, strikingly absent from the published version but not from theearlier drafts. Even in the awkwardly restrained published form it is anobvious point of reference, the unnamed ‘imposture’ against which thefidelity and reliability and historical depth of the Welsh tradition can bemeasured. Ironically enough, the attacks on Ossian patently ventriloquizecomments made by James Macpherson’s arch-enemy, Samuel Johnson.Thus Iolo does not merely adopt the position and basic assumptions ofJohnson concerning the Gaelic bard (including the erroneous claim thatthere were no manuscripts in Scots Gaelic), but he echoes his very phras-ing: ‘our bards’, says Iolo, ‘were not barbarians amongst barbarians; theywere men of letters (...) we talk not foolishly and incredibly of oral tradi-tion’.29 Once again the emphasis is on Wales’s civilized early past, con-ceived as everything that Ossian’s Scotland is not: literate, organized,enhanced rather than destroyed by the Roman occupation, and assuredof continuity through the strength and continued presence of Welshitself: ‘our language, as some have imagined, is not altered’ (MAW 1:xviii). In short, Iolo’s preface – an English-language introduction to acollection of untranslated Welsh texts – is a tangle of resistance andcomplicity, a gift for those interested in the paradoxes inherent (andperhaps more intensely so amongst ‘minority’ cultures) in the struggle todefine national identity.

In a recent essay, Joep Leerssen (2006) sets out the case for the study ofa vast range of cultural artefacts – poems and novels, folk songs, dictio-


30 The federal University of Wales was founded in 1893; the National Museum andthe National Library (institutions of which Iolo had dreamed more than a centurypreviously) in 1907.

naries, paintings, textual editions, museums and monuments – as centralto our understanding of the obvious, yet elusive, phenomenon of Euro-pean nation-making during the Romantic period. They should not, hesuggests, be treated merely as preliminaries or by-products of ‘serious’political nationalism, they are its raw material, expressing it, reacting to itand creating it. A helpful taxonomy of different phases of cultural activ-ity shows how the work of ‘salvage’ (inventorizing, rescuing, cataloguing,collecting) forms the basis for ‘fresh productivity’ on national themes(writing, composing, translating); a third phase then sees the conscious‘propagation’ of an idea of nationhood through the public sphere (historytaught in schools, festivals, street-names, pageants). Broadly speaking,these phases succeed each other in the development of a national sensi-bility: the folk songs inspire the Lieder or the waltzes which will, eventu-ally, be played by a National Orchestra in a National Concert Hall. Thepattern holds well enough for Wales, which was relatively early in ‘rescu-ing’ its culture, if slow to realize its major institutions:30 but it is hard toescape the observation that Iolo’s forgeries cut across these categorieswith a striking simultaneity. His acts of creative salvage (retrieving/in-venting poetry, triads and an early Welsh alphabet) had, by the year 1792,already found an enduring means of propagation in his ceremony ofinitiation, the Gorsedd of the Bards, still an integral part of the greatculture-fest which is the annual Welsh National Eisteddfod. Romantichistorical forgery, in other words, plays havoc with time, not only byaltering the past to suit the present (we are all guilty of that), but bycollapsing the historical and the creative mindset at precisely the pointwhen their separation seems to matter most.

Since Eric Hobsbawm and Terence Ranger’s influential book ofessays on The Invention of Tradition (1983), it has become commonplace toacknowledge the ‘creative’ element in the shaping of cultural history.Few would now argue with the notion that cherished national mythsoften rest on trembling foundations; and it can seem that once the neces-sity for such myths has become the proper object of scholarly investiga-tion, their ‘authenticity’ or otherwise almost ceases to be relevant. Thiscan be granted, but with one caveat: the often fraught debates over theauthenticity of poems, songs and documents believed (and then not


31 ‘Rhodd y Cyhoeddwyr ag o law Iolo Morganwg i’r Parchedig DderwyddfarddThomas Glynn Cothi’.

believed) to represent the very voice of the nation became events inthemselves, and had consequences. The Ossian debate (to be distin-guished from the massive influence of the poems themselves) has beencredited, amongst other things, with the rise of literary historicism andthe birth of the Romantic fragment poem (Leerssen 2004; Levinson1986). In Wales the ‘Iolo controversy’ came late, but it mattered greatly:faith was shaken on a grand scale, with both positive and negative re-sults. On the one hand the discovery of Iolo’s forgeries forced scholarsto undertake a comprehensive revision of their sources, thus advancingthe process of textual editing in Welsh. On the other hand, it could beargued that it induced a painfully narrow attitude to ‘correctness’ thatstifled creative engagement with the texts of the past. For much of thetwentieth century Celtic Studies’ answer to the excesses of Romanticismwas philology, not as Vico envisaged it, but in its driest and narrowestmanifestation.

During this period of reaction The Myvyrian Archiology was inevitably alost text, a contaminated source, though one still cheerfully plundered bythe Celtic fringe. But perhaps by now we have enough distance to see itfor the remarkable achievement it was: an astonishing act of generosity(Myfyr’s financial contribution is thought to have been between four andfive thousand pounds; Williams 1966: 9) and the product of long hoursof labour and diplomacy, which gave solidity to a literary tradition andthen delivered that tradition to a new, reading, public. The Myvyrianbecame a key-stone in the nineteenth century Welsh national revival:parts of it were reprinted in journals and pamphlets and the whole workwas re-edited in 1870 as a single volume (Löffler 2007, 82-83). A copy ofthe now rare three-volume first edition is kept for readers’ use at theNational Library of Wales, nicely bound by a later nineteenth-centuryowner with decorative marbled flyleaves. Just inside the first volume adedication in Iolo’s hand offers the work as a gift from the three editorsto fellow radical and ‘chief druid’ Tomos Glyn Cothi.31 Handwritingnever fails to move, and it is salutary to think of this man trying to writehis angry preface in the dark evenings after a day’s hard labour. Althoughnot perhaps with hindsight entirely fair, Iolo’s later, bitter, reproach tohis erstwhile friend and patron Owain Myfyr will do as a timely reminderto those of us who now sit comfortably with the world’s knowledge at


32Iolo Morganwg to Owain Myfyr, 5 April 1806. Correspondence, nr. 763 I am verygrateful to Geraint Phillips for his judicious comments on an earlier draft of this essay.

our fingertips that it was not always thus: ‘In looking over my journalsand itinerary and summing up the whole, I find that I have travel’d afootfor you more than two thousand miles from first to last.’32

ReferencesB., E. 1701. A Trip to North-Wales: Being a Description of that Country and People.

London.Bromwich, Rachel. 1969. ‘Trioedd Ynys Prydain’ in Welsh Literature and Scholarship.

Cardiff: University of Wales PressBromwich, Rachel, ed.. & trl. 2006. Trioedd Ynys Prydein. 3rd ed.; Cardiff: Uni-

versity of Wales Press.Carr, Glenda. 1983. William Owen Pughe. Caerdydd: Gwasg Prifysgol Cymru.Carr, Glenda. 2005. An Uneasy Partnership: Iolo Morganwg and William Owen

Pughe, in Jenkins, 443-460.Charnell-White, Cathryn. 2007. Bardic Circles: National, Regional and Personal

Identity in The Bardic Vision of Iolo Morganwg. Cardiff: University of WalesPress.

Constantine, Mary-Ann. 2004. Ossian in Wales and Brittany. In The Reception ofOssian in Europe, ed. Howard Gaskill, 67-90. London: Continuum.

Constantine, Mary-Ann. 2007. The Truth Against the World: Iolo Morganwg andRomantic Forgery. Cardiff: University of Wales Press.

Correspondence: Geraint H. Jenkins, Ffion M. Jones and David Ceri Jones, eds.2007. The Correspondence of Iolo Morganwg. 3 vols; Cardiff: Cardiff UniversityPress.

Evans, Robert. 2005, ‘The Manuscripts’: The Culture and Politics of Forgery inCentral Europe’, in Jenkins.

Herbert, Trevor and Gareth Elwyn Jones, eds. 1988. The Remaking of Wales in theEighteenth Century. Cardiff: University of Wales Press.

Jenkins, Geraint, ed. 2005. A Rattleskull Genius: The Many Faces of Iolo Morganwg.Cardiff: University of Wales Press.

Johnson, Samuel. 1775. A Journey to the Western Islands of Scotland. 2 vols.; Lon-don.

Johnston, Arthur. 1957-58. William Owen-Pughe and the Mabinogion, NationalLibrary of Wales Journal 10: 323-8.

Jones, Owen and William Owen Pughe, eds. 1789. Barddoniaeth Dafydd abGwilym. London.

La Villemarqué, Th. Hersart de. 1850. Poèmes bretons du VIème siècle. Paris.


Leerssen, Joep. 2004. Ossian and the Rise of Literary Historicism. In The Recep-tion of Ossian in Europe, ed. Howard Gaskill, 109-25. London: Continuum.

Leerssen, Joep. 2006. Nationalism and the Cultivation of Culture, Nations andNationalism 12: 559-578.

Levinson, Marjorie. 1986. The Romantic Fragment Poem: A Critique of a Form.Chapel Hill, NC: University of North Carolina Press.

Lewis, Gwyneth. 1991. Eighteenth-Century Literary Forgeries, with SpecialReference to Iolo Morganwg. DPhil thesis, Oxford.

Löffler, Marion. 2007. The Literary and Historical Legacy of Iolo Morganwg,1826-1926. Cardiff: University of Wales Press.

Marx, Karl and Friedrich Engels.1975-2005. Marx/Engels Collecetd Works. 50vols., London: Progress.

MAW: Jones, Owen, Edward Williams, and William Owen Pughe, eds. 1801-07. The Myvyrian Archaiology of Wales. London.

McKenna, Catherine. 2006. Aspects of Tradition Formation in Eighteenth-Century Wales, Memory and the Modern in the Celtic Literatures, (CSANA Year-book, 5): 37-60.

Owen, Morfydd E. 2007. Traddodiad y Triawd Cyffredinol yn y Gymraeg a’r MyvyrianArchaiology of Wales. Aberystwyth: Canolfan Uwchefrydiau Cymreig aCheltaidd Prifysgol Cymru.

Phillips, Geraint. 2005. Forgery and Patronage: Iolo Morganwg and OwainMyfyr. In Jenkins, 403-23.

Phillips, Geraint. 2006. Bywyd a Chysylltiadau Llenyddol Owain Myfyr. PhDthesis, University of Wales, Aberystwyth.

Pictet, Adolphe. 1856. Le mystère des bardes de l’île de Bretagne: ou, La doctrine desbardes gallois du moyen âge sur Dieu, la vie future et la transmigration des âmes.Genève.

Morgan, Prys. 1981. The Eighteenth-Century Renaissance. Llandybië: Davies.Williams, Edward. 1794. Poems, Lyric and Pastoral. London.Williams, G.J. 1926. Iolo Morganwg a Chywyddau’r Ychwynegiad. Llundain:

Cymdeithas yr Eisteddfod Genedlaethol.Williams, G.J. 1966. Hanes Cyhoeddi’r ‘Myvyrian Archaiology’, Journal of the

Welsh Bibliographical Society 10: 2-12.


JOHN O’DONOVAN’S EDITION OF THE ANNALSOF THE FOUR MASTERS: AN IRISH CLASSIC?

Bernadette Cunningham

AbstractThe Annals of the Four Masters, compiled by professional Irish his-torians in the 1630s, were intended to provide a comprehensive chro-nicle of Irish history from earliest times to the present. Written inIrish, the work remained unpublished in the early modern period,known only to antiquarian scholars. Later, in the atmosphere of civicpatriotism prevalent among Irish scholars in the 1840s, the work waspublished in a dual language edition. At the same time, stories fromthe annals were popularised in cheap magazines. The scholarship andthe ideology of their nineteenth-century editor, John O’Donovan,coupled with the Gaelic and Catholic credentials of the original an-nalists and the romantic perception of the annals as having rescuedIrish history from oblivion, made these annals a foundational text forthe emerging Irish Catholic nation in the nineteenth and twentiethcenturies.

The Annals of the Four Masters is the popular title given to a chronicleof Irish history compiled in the 1630s and eventually published in themid- nineteenth century (O’Donovan 1848-51). Written in the Irishlanguage by professional historians trained in the Gaelic tradition, theannals recounted the history of Ireland, year by year, from the time of theBiblical flood down to AD 1616. The Annals of the Four Masters werederived principally from earlier manuscript sources, only a few of whichnow survive. In the 1630s, most of those older source manuscripts werein the hands of hereditary learned families in the north-west of Ireland,in particular the families of Ó Cléirigh, Ó Maoil Chonaire, Ó

130 Bernadette Cunningham

Duibhgeannáin and Ó Luinín. None of these older sets of provincialannals, however, were deemed suitable to seventeenth-century Europeanfashions in writing the history of nations and so a new research projecton the Irish past was undertaken in the 1630s. The historians involvedwere drawn from the families of Ó Cléirigh, Ó Maoil Chonaire and ÓDuibhgeannáin; the leader of the group was an Irish Franciscan laybrother, Míchéal Ó Cléirigh. The new annals were intended to provide acomprehensive chronicle of Irish history from earliest times to the pres-ent. A key objective of the annalists was to demonstrate the antiquity ofthe kingdom of Ireland and particular emphasis was placed on the suc-cession of kings of Ireland, whose reigns were systematically docu-mented (Cunningham 2005; McGowan 2004).

The original research project that culminated in the writing of theAnnals of the Four Masters was masterminded by the Irish Franciscanswho were based at the College of St Anthony in Louvain in the SpanishNetherlands. That college had been founded in 1607 primarily to providea seminary education for Irish Catholic men who wished to be ordainedas priests. The experience of prolonged contact with educated men fromother nations had a lasting impact on Irish scholarship, and a renewedinterest in researching and writing Irish history, both secular and ecclesi-astical was among the outcomes (Cunningham 1991). Inspired by con-temporary European trends in the writing of national histories, therewere two main strands to the historical research of the Irish Franciscansbased at Louvain. One involved work on the lives of Irish saints, whilethe second focussed on the secular history of Ireland. Arising from thisresearch, two substantial Latin volumes of Irish saints’ lives, edited byJohn Colgan, were published in the 1640s: Acta Sanctorum Hiberniae of1645 and Triadis thamaturgae acta of 1647. A new martyrology of Irishsaints was also compiled, though this was not published until the mid-nineteenth century (Todd & Reeves 1864). A series of meticulouslyplanned historical compilations was also prepared, culminating in 1636with the completion of the Annals of the Four Masters. These essentiallysecular annals of Irish history compiled by Míchéal Ó Cléirigh and hisassociates, were intended to be translated into Latin and made availablein print. However, for a variety of reasons, of which the scarcity of fund-ing was probably the most significant, these comprehensive annals ofIrish history, which extended to over 400,000 words, were not publishedin the seventeenth century. Instead, the work circulated in a very limited

THE ANNALS OF THE FOUR MASTERS 131

1 RIA, MSS 23 F 2-3 and TCD, MS 1279 are late eighteenth-century transcripts ofthe early portion of the Annals of the Four Masters, while RIA MSS 23 F 4-6 aretranscripts completed in 1778 of the later part of the same annals.

way in two separate spheres through the seventeenth and eighteenthcenturies.

Given the quite restricted circulation of the work when first pub-lished, the manner in which the Annals of the Four Masters came toprominence in the nineteenth century requires explanation. The storybegins in County Donegal in the north west of Ireland in the 1630s,where the original compilers made at least two full sets of these newannals. When completed, one set was taken to Louvain with a view topublication, while another set was presented to the patron of the work,Fearghal Ó Gadhra. Thereafter, the after-life of the work can be seen asmade up of two elements. The annals were used as a reference source inthe 1640s by the Irish Franciscan hagiographer, John Colgan, but afterhis death in 1658 the Franciscan copy of the text appears to have lan-guished largely unused for generations. Within the Franciscan order, thecontribution of the only Franciscan among the annalists, Míchéal ÓCléirigh, had already been eulogised in print as early as 1645, in a man-ner that still resonated in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. Mean-while the set of autograph manuscripts that remained in Ireland circu-lated in a limited way among a select number of scholars, including, forinstance, Dubhaltach Mac Fhirbhisigh in the 1640s, Roderic O’Flahertyof Galway in the 1680s and Charles O’Conor of Belanagare in the mid-eighteenth century (Ó Muraíle 1987). In the course of the eighteenthcentury Charles O’Conor assembled an impressive private collection ofmedieval and early modern Irish manuscripts, among them an autographset of the Annals of the Four Masters. One significant aspect of hisinterest in these manuscripts can be discerned in the manner in which heaugmented the work with his own additions relating to O’Conor familyhistory (RIA, MS C iii 3 and TCD, MS 1301). In addition to this,O’Conor commissioned transcripts of the annals for use by others inter-ested in such sources.1 Partly through the efforts of O’Conor the ideagained momentum that the text of these annals - and other Irish-lan-guage treasures that had survived from earlier centuries - should bepublished. Conscious both of the fragility of paper manuscripts and ofthe decline in expertise which meant that few people living could read


2 RIA, Council minutes, vol. I, p. 344 (18 Feb, 1797).3 For an analysis of the membership of the Irish Archaeological Society see Murray

2000, 62-7.

the source texts O’Conor had collected, he observed to fellow antiquaryChevalier O’Gorman in 1783:

Our originals (...) should be printed under the eye of a learned Editor, witha literal translation in English or Latin. If this be omitted (as I foresee itwill) the treasures still preserved in our language will be as certainly lost asthose that have long since perished. (Cited O’Donovan 1848-51, 1: xxxviii)

When the Royal Irish Academy was formed in 1785, Charles O’Conorwas one of the founding members and within a few years the idea oftranslating the Annals of the Four Masters was being given serious con-sideration by this learned society.2 The activities of the Royal Irish Acad-emy went into decline in the decades immediately following the imple-mentation of the Act of Union of Great Britain and Ireland in 1801, butthe drive of men like the antiquarian scholar George Petrie spearheadeda new era of vitality from the 1830s. In a scholarly atmosphere imbuedwith civic patriotism, where particular importance was attached to col-lecting antiquarian artefacts and manuscripts, publication of texts was alogical further step in the process of bringing these records of Irish heri-tage into public ownership (Leerssen 1996, 106-7; Mitchell 1985; Fitz-Patrick 1988, 3-5).

Other learned societies, too, were formed. The belief in the nationalimportance of publishing editions of Irish manuscripts let to the forma-tion of the Irish Archaeological Society on St Patrick’s Day 1840, underthe leadership of J.H. Todd specifically to arrange for the publication ofeditions and translations of manuscripts of particular Irish historicalsignificance.3 That it was founded on the feastday of Ireland’s patronsaint symbolised a perception of the national rather than purely scholarlysignificance of such work. The Celtic Society, with similar objectives wasfounded in 1845, and the two subsequently merged to become the IrishArchaeological and Celtic Society. The stated objective of the Irish Ar-chaeological and Celtic Society was ‘to print, with accurate English trans-lations and annotations, the unpublished documents illustrative of Irishhistory, especially those in the ancient and obsolete Irish language, manyof which can be accurately transcribed and elucidated only by scholarswho have been long engaged in investigating the Celtic remains of Ire-


4 Annual report, The Irish Archaeological and Celtic Society, MDCCCLX: RIA,LR/1/B/10.

land’. That the work was in the nature of a rescue mission is evidencedby the assertion that ‘should the publication of these manuscripts be longdelayed, many most important literary monuments may become unavail-able to the students of history and comparative philology’.4

John O’Donovan emerged as a pivotal figure in the editorial workpromoted by the Irish Archaeological Society. His knowledge of thehistoric Irish language and the intricacies of the Irish manuscript tradi-tion were a rare enough specialism in his intellectual circle in the 1830sand 1840s. His work in this sphere was extensive, and he translated andedited numerous dual language editions of Irish texts published by theIrish Archaeological Society, and later by the Celtic Society. Works trans-lated and edited by O’Donovan during the 1840s included The Banquet ofDún na n-Gédh and the Battle of Magh Rath, an Ancient Historical Tale (1842),The Tribes and Customs of Hy-Many, Commonly Called O’Kelly’s Country (1843)and The Genealogies, Tribes, and Customs of Hy-Fiachrach, Commonly CalledO’Dowda’s Country (1844). He also contributed editions of shorter texts totwo miscellaneous volumes, Tracts relating to Ireland, vol. 1 (1841), and TheMiscellany of the Irish Archaeological Society, vol. 1 (1846). His edition ofLeabhar na gCeart, or the Book of Rights (1847) was published by the CelticSociety, and he also edited the Miscellany of the Irish Celtic Society (1849).

Perhaps of even greater scholarly significance than the variouslearned societies that emerged in mid-nineteenth-century Ireland was thework of the Ordnance Survey of Ireland. This government-sponsoredproject to create large scale maps of the entire island of Ireland, thoughinitially conceived as a military enterprise, served as a kind of proxyuniversity for a group of scholars interested in Irish topography, place-names, folklore and antiquities. The personnel employed in the topo-graphical department of the Ordnance Survey, headed by Sir GeorgePetrie, included people who were also active in the Royal Irish Academyand the Irish Archaeological Society. An article by Sir Samuel Fergusonpublished under the heading ‘Lord Romilly’s Irish publications’ in theQuarterly Review gave due recognition to the vision of the leaders of theOrdnance Survey project in promoting research on Irish history. Fergu-son acknowledged not just the contribution of Sir George Petrie, butalso that of Sir Thomas Larcom, who had overseen the Ordnance Surveyproject. ‘To him is mainly due the idea of attaching the loyal classes to


5 Ferguson 1868, 443. For the identification of Ferguson as the reviewer see Den-man 1990, 195-213.

the cultivation of native letters, an idea which, if carried out as con-ceived, would have forestalled Fenianism by infusing educated influ-ences into all its material’.5

The fact that the Ordnance Survey provided the editor of the Annalsof the Four Masters, John O’Donovan, with his main source of employ-ment between 1833 and 1842, was significant on several counts. It gaveO’Donovan the opportunity to conduct detailed research on the topogra-phy of all parts of Ireland, and this corpus of research was incorporatedin the extensive notes to his edition of the annals. The work also broughtthis Irish Catholic scholar to the notice of the predominantly Protestantsocial elite who comprised the Irish Archaeological Society, and to othersin the intellectual circle of antiquaries in mid-nineteenth-century Dublin.

As part of a process of collecting artefacts and manuscripts of histori-cal interest for the Academy, Sir George Petrie bought the original auto-graph manuscript of the second part of the Annals of the Four Mastersat auction in 1831. The manuscript covered the years AD 1171 to AD1616 and he immediately sold it to the Royal Irish Academy therebybringing it into public ownership. It was unbound and in poor conditionand the considerable sum of £53 that Petrie paid, then the equivalent ofmore than 5 month’s wages for an educated person, was an indication ofthe special regard in which this work was held. From then on, Petrie wasanxious that it should be published. He stressed

the necessity of giving durability, while yet in our power, to the survivinghistorical remains of our country, and thereby placing them beyond thereach of a fate otherwise inevitable. To me it appears a sacred duty on allcultivated minds to do so. Had this compilation been neglected, or had it, aswas supposed, shared the fate of its predecessors, what a large portion ofour history would have been lost to the world for ever. (Petrie 1831, 387)

Petrie had a clear idea of the kind of edition required, and was particu-larly keen that the Irish text should be printed using an appropriateGaelic font. By 1835 he had designed a new Gaelic type for use by theDublin University Press. Petrie’s ‘A’ type, funded by Hodges and Smith,was modelled on the lettering in the Book of Kells. Although this typewas used in various printing projects in which Petrie was involved, in-cluding the Transactions of the Royal Irish Academy and publications of theOrdnance Survey, it was planned by Petrie in 1832-33 when the publication


6 Hodges and Smith circular letter, 31 January 1844 (R.I.A., 12 I 15, p. 311).7 RIA, Council minutes, VI, pp 64-70.8 O’Lochlainn 1940, 179; RIA, Council minutes, VI, p. 218; Cunningham 2006a.

of the Annals of the Four Masters was first proposed (Kinane 1994, 130-131; McGuinne 1992, 102-103).

The design and physical appearance of the Irish text of the Annalswas clearly regarded as important. While the use of a Gaelic script wasreadily justifiable on scholarly grounds, as necessary for the accuraterepresentation of the written text, its significance transcended thosetechnicalities. Just as the Gaelic origins of Irish place-names were beingbrought to light by O’Donovan and other researchers in the topographi-cal department of the Ordnance Survey, so the Gaelic texts that werecentral to Irish antiquarian research were being brought into the publicsphere through the medium of print. Their Gaelic character was whatdefined the authenticity of these texts, and it was deemed necessary topreserve the essence of that character in the print medium. It was part ofa process of re-Gaelicising the memory of the past, while demonstratingthe authenticity of texts (Leerssen 1996, 25; Leerssen 2002, 24-7).

Financing the publication of a text as large as the Annals of the FourMasters proved to be a challenge. Neither the Irish Archaeological Soci-ety nor the Royal Irish Academy had access to the necessary funds.6 TheAcademy applied to the British Government for funding specifically forthe publication of the Annals, but without success.7 Thus, it fell to thecommercial publishing firm of Hodges and Smith to undertake the pro-ject. The publisher, George Smith, paid John O’Donovan for his work oftranslation and also Eugene O’Curry for his work in transcribing thecomplete Irish text in a form suitable for use by the typesetter.8

The editorial scholarship associated with the Annals in the form theywere published was primarily topographical and genealogical in nature,since these were O’Donovan’s areas of expertise. His translation is reli-able and accomplished, but he did not aim at a full critical edition. Thus,even though two autograph manuscripts of the later part of the annals(post AD 1334) were available to him, he did not systematically representthe variant readings of the two sources in his edition. He based his edi-tion on one set of manuscripts (now RIA, MSS 23 P 6-23 P 7) whilereferring in the notes to selected variants in the ‘college copy’ (now TCD,MS 1301). O’Donovan’s primary objective was to make available a fullIrish text and English translation of an historical source he deemed to be


9 RIA Council minutes, V, pp 54-57.10 RIA, Council minutes, IV, pp 295-6.

of key significance as a comprehensive chronicle of Irish history. Hiseditorial method indicates that documenting the ‘facts’ of history was hispriority and this took precedence over the production of a critical editionof the autograph manuscripts. In addition to its intrinsic value as asource of historical information, it was anticipated that this pioneeringdual-language edition of a key text would be of special value to laterscholars in undertaking other planned translations of major Irish histori-cal sources.9

O’Donovan’s three-volume 1848 edition of the Annals was wellreceived by the scholarly community, and the editor and publisher wereencouraged to complete the work by publishing the Irish text and anEnglish translation of the earlier section from AM 2242 to AD 1171.This was completed and published in 1851. In issuing this edition of theearly part of the annals, the prior existence of a published Latin transla-tion was not seen as a threat to the likelihood of commercial success.This was because the 1826 Latin edition of the same pre-1171 Annalshad adopted a quite different approach to editing the text, which provedfar less satisfactory. Edited by Rev Charles O’Conor, grandson of theeighteenth-century collector Charles O’Conor of Belanagare, it was thethird in a series of four volumes of Irish historical texts privately pub-lished in England at the expense of the Duke of Buckingham (O’Conor1826). That the translation prepared by O’Conor was into Latin ratherthan English was unexceptional – and indeed Petrie and his circle ini-tially gave serious consideration to Latin rather than English as the lan-guage for their translation also.10 However, it was recognised that the useof Latin would have confined its readership to a small highly-educatedelite, as happened with O’Conor’s edition. There were problems, too,with O’Conor’s Irish transcript of the text. His rendering of the Irish textwas severely criticised by contemporaries for O’Conor’s failure to ex-pand scribal contractions, and for the use of an italic rather than a Gaelictype font to represent the Gaelic script. It was argued that these twoshortcomings made reading the Irish text extremely difficult for anyoneother than specialist scholars (O’Donovan 1848-51, 1: xxxi-xxxvi).

O’Conor’s edition was privately published and had a limited circula-tion, and was never a serious commercial challenge to O’Donovan’sedition as published by Hodges and Smith in 1848-51. A far more seri-


11 Articles by John O’Donovan in the Dublin Penny Journal and the Irish Penny Journalwere among those adapted without acknowledgement for Brian Geraghty’s publica-tion. See Ferguson 1848, 359.

12 Connellan to John Windele, 24 July 1846 (RIA, MS 12 L 10/83).13 O’Donovan to Windele, 4 January, 1845 (RIA, MS 12 L 9/6 ii).14 Hackett to Windele, 6 Feb 1845 (RIA, MS 4 B 5/88).

ous threat to the viability of the first edition of O’Donovan’s work hademerged with the publication by Brian Geraghty in 1846 of a rival cheaptranslation of the same annals covering the post-1171 period. This alter-native translation was the work of a respected scholar, Owen Connellan,and was published entirely in the English language without any parallelIrish text. The text was augmented with footnotes taken without ac-knowledgment from historical articles published in popular magazines byother scholars, not least John O’Donovan.11 In the manner in which theywere presented by the publisher, the footnotes bore little or no relationto the text of the annals they purported to eludicate, comprising insteadgeneral essays on miscellaneous aspects of Irish history and genealogy.Connellan’s translation of the annals was initially published in periodicalformat, with over 700 subscribers, and was subsequently issued in bookform in 1846. The scholarly community recognised this enterprise as acheap stunt designed to capitalise on the undoubted market that existedfor publications drawn from authentic Irish historical sources. Connellanclaimed that he was refused permission to consult Irish manuscripts inthe library of the Royal Irish Academy because of his association withthe publisher Brian Geraghty’s whose opportunism threatened to under-mine the viablity of O’Donovan’s edition being published by Hodgesand Smith.12 In a letter to John Windele of Cork, O’Donovan mockedthe edition and also criticised Connellan’s adoption of the title of ‘IrishHistoriographer’ to his late majesty, adding ‘I cannot but laugh at thefolly of his publisher in allowing him to assume such a name’. He alsoaccused Connellan of citing his own work ‘without a single word of ac-knowledgement’.13 A fellow antiquary, William Hackett, wrestled withhis conscience when asking for a loan of Connellan’s serial edition fromJohn Windele in the spring of 1845, commenting that it was ‘a pity toencourage such an invidious project but, as I would not consider myborrowing it from you would be any benefit to the Publishers, I shouldnot scruple you sending it (or my receiving it rather) by some convenientopportunity.’14 The 327 unsold copies of Connellan’s English translation


15 Hodges and Smith to Windele, 19 Mar. 1844 (RIA, MS 4 B 5/16).16 Hodges and Smith, circular letter dated June 1855 (RIA, 12 L 15, p 571).17 O’Donovan to Windele, 25 June 1852 (RIA, MS 4 B 12/83 i).18 Review in Irish Ecclesiastical Journal, 5 (1848): 123.

of the Annals, published by Brian Geraghty in 1846, were auctioned twoyears later when the publisher was declared bankrupt. At about the sametime, O’Donovan’s much more ambitious, and much more expensive,three volume dual-language edition of the same work went on sale forthe first time (Cunningham 2006a: 116-9). Connellan’s one-volumecheap edition had retailed at £1.10s. whereas O’Donovan’s three-volume1848 edition retailed at £8. 8s. with a special price of £6. 6s. for subscrib-ers who had placed orders in advance of publication.15 The extendededition, containing the full text from AM 2242 to AD 1616, comprisingsix volumes of text and a seventh volume containing an index, whichwas published in 1851, sold at the very considerable price of £14.14s.The publishers were aware that the high price ‘chiefly confined the saleto public institutions and men of large fortune’.16

The timing of the publication of O’Donovan’s edition of the Annalswas unfortunate, coming in the midst of a diastrous famine in Irelandwhich had reached its peak during 1847, and initially the edition was nota commercial success.17 Despite this, it was reviewed enthusiastically in avariety of periodical publications of various political hues. The Churchof Ireland’s Irish Ecclesiastical Journal (1848) portrayed the work as an iconof Irish ability to triumph over adversity. The reviewer observed that ‘Ina year of famine and great mercantile depression appeared the workwhose title heads this article, as it were an earnest of intellectual propri-ety, and an omen of national convalescence.’18 Again writing from aProtestant perspective in the Dublin University Magazine, the poet SamuelFerguson was equally enthusiastic. Looking at O’Donovan’s edition ofthe Annals in the context of other contemporary publications includingGeorge Petrie’s researches on round towers and William Reeves’s workon papal taxation, Ferguson noted in a tone of national pride:

Our satisfaction is of a high and ennobling kind, for it is chiefly on accountof the country itself that we feel it. We never can despair of a country inwhich works like these succeed one another, in such rapid and regularsuccession, showing, as they do, a systematic application of calm and culti-vated minds to the pursuit of that self-knowledge which will be found, afterall, to lie at the foundation of whatever just national feeling, of whatever


permanent and wholesome public opinion, can be looked for or desired inthis country. (Ferguson 1848, 359).

Ferguson saw in these works of historical scholarship the potential re-demption of Irish civilisation, in the aftermath of Famine and politicalunrest.

Society has, it is true, been almost shaken to pieces. We have, indeed, beeninvolved in a sea of troubles; but in the midst of that confusion and repul-sion, the reconciling power of mind has been at work, settling and establish-ing itself on sure foundations, by unseen but great and persevering labour,for these noble works of learning which day by day begin to show theirheads above the waves of misfortune around us, rest upon deep and solidsuperstructures. (ibid.)

Welcoming even the form in which the Annals were presented, Fergusonenthused that O’Donovan’s edition was ‘in matter, in learned use of it, inmethod, and in typographical excellence ... fit to take its place in anyshelf, of any European library, beside Camden, Mabillon or Muratori’(ibid., 360)

Contrasting Irish scholarship with that then current in England, Fer-guson welcomed the fact that in Ireland ‘all our labours in antiquity andhistory’ contributed towards ‘the propagation, namely, of self-knowledge,self-respect, and attachment to the country in which our lot is cast’.Ferguson had clear opinions on the kind of history Ireland required tounderpin civic patriotism, in a country ‘where society itself has still to beformed and consolidated, before we can begin even the slowest progresstowards greatness or prosperity’. A general narrative history, he believed,would only lead to ‘feelings of regret and despondency’. Rather, he advo-cated,

the histories we now want are particular and local; such as, it is true, wouldfurnish no material for large philosophic inductions, but such as will enableus to know one another and the land we live in, and every spot of it, thatsuch knowledge may beget mutual confidence and united labour, and thatwe may strive to advance our own and our country’s fortunes here in theplace assigned to us in the world. (ibid., 361)

Ferguson belonged to that generation of Protestant establishment literaryfigures who sought to come to terms with being Irish while not yet fullyreconciled to all aspects of Irishness (Denman 1990, 4-5; Campbell 2006,504-515). He and his circle had been primed to respect the value of theAnnals, so much so that Ferguson (1848, 362) could assert that ‘the fame


of these annals of the O’Clerys has been so widely celebrated of lateyears, that it is almost unnecessary to remind readers of the circum-stances of their composition’. That fame had been enhanced by popularpoetry composed by men such as Thomas D’Arcy McGee (in his TheIrish Writers of the Seventeenth Century of 1846), as well as by articles byJohn O’Donovan and others published in popular penny journals fromthe 1830s. Weekly magazines such as the Irish Penny Journal, founded byGeorge Petrie in 1840, and the very similar Dublin Penny Journal(1832–37) that Petrie had also promoted, were established ‘with nationalas well as useful objects in view’, and these magazines brought topics ofhistorical, antiquarian and literary interest to a wide audience. Despitethis popularising of Irish historical material, men such as Ferguson forwhom the medieval texts in the Irish language were virtually a closedbook, displayed a certain lack of affinity with the kind of historical mate-rial recorded in the annals. It is noticeable in his 1848 review of theAnnals that he had rather more to say about the editor’s footnotes thanabout the text itself. Indeed, he explicitly stated that ‘it is mainly to MrO’Donovan’s notes that the reader, who is not a dry local or familyhistorian, or genealogist, must look for really interesting philosophic, andpicturesque matter’. He went on to indulge his poetic interests, invitingyoung poets to accompany him through the notes ‘to find what we mayof picturesque or poetic material. And indeed, the notes furnish abun-dant material of this kind for both poet and romance writer’ (372). ForFerguson, this kind of work was an important means of nation building,the sources containing ‘abundant material, from century to century, backas far as tradition reaches, and capable, every particle of it, to be turnedto the loftiest national purposes.’ Yet, the poetic inspiration that might beprovided by the original Irish text of the annals was beyond the scope ofhis interests. In this, Ferguson was not alone, and there is a sense inwhich for many who have consulted the Annals since Ferguson’s day,the learned notes of John O’Donovan have been seen as the most impor-tant element of the publication. There is no doubt that O’Donovan’smasterly edition has profoundly influenced subsequent perceptions ofthe Annals as a classic source for understanding the Irish past. For some,by the twentieth century, O’Donovan’s creation of a classic merited himthe title of the ‘fifth master’ (Ó Muraíle 1997). Overall, the enthusiasticreception accorded the publication of the Annals, both in terms of thequality of O’Donovan’s work as editor and the prestige character of the


finished product, cemented the reputation of the Annals of the FourMasters as a highly significant source for the history of Ireland and itslocalities from earliest times to the beginning of the seventeenth century.

Many other Irish historical texts were edited for print through thelater nineteenth century, including editions with English translations ofimportant older sets of Irish annals such as the Annals of Ulster, theAnnals of Loch Cé, and the Annals of Clonmacnoise. It was recognisedthat the evidence of the Annals of Ulster, for example, was generallymore valuable to historians than that of the Annals of the Four Masters,but yet these other annals never attained the cult status that came to beassociated with the work of the Four Masters. Other medieval and earlymodern historical texts were also prepared for publication, some of themas part of editorial projects that enjoyed British government funding.Indeed, there was a concerted effort by certain scholars, such as J.H.Todd and J.T. Gilbert, to ensure that Irish historical documents wouldbe accorded equal status with those of Great Britain, and funding wasobtained for some publishing initiatives on that basis. Such editorialwork was seen as one means of demonstrating that Ireland was no mereprovince but a nation. In an era of political tension and cultural rivalries,the authorities in England were acutely aware of the political expediencyof funding the publication of editions of Irish texts (Gillespie 2006). Inall these enterprises, the high standard achieved in editing the Annals ofthe Four Masters provided inspiration and motivation to extend suchscholarship as a means of enhancing the reputation of the Irish nation.

From the time it was first published in 1848-51, the deluxe edition ofthe Annals of the Four Masters could not fail to impress. Nothing onthat scale had previously been published in Ireland, and even the physicalappearance of the seven-volume set was impressive. But was it a nationalclassic? One way of tracing its subsequent influence is by examining themanner in which the work was used by later historians. Among the manynarrative histories of Ireland to be published in the nineteenth century,one of the more successful in incorporating evidence from annalisticsources, most notably the Annals of the Four Masters, was MartinHaverty’s History of Ireland, Ancient and Modern published by James Duffyin 1860. That Haverty’s work proved popular is evidenced by the pro-duction of a separate edition for use in schools, together with reprints ofhis book in 1861, 1865 and 1867. P.W. Joyce’s A Social History of AncientIreland published in a two-volume edition in 1903, drew heavily not just


on the Annals of the Four Masters but also on the other Irish historicaltexts that had been edited by John O’Donovan for the Irish Archaeologi-cal Society. While noting of late ‘among Continental and British writers,something like a spontaneous movement showing a tendency to do [theIrish race] justice’, Joyce still believed his history was necessary becausethe Irish ‘have never, in modern times, received the full measure ofcredit due to them for their early and striking advance in the arts ofcivilised life, for their very comprehensive system of laws, and for theirnoble and successful efforts, both at home and abroad, in the cause ofreligion and learning’ (Joyce 1903, 1: xi-xii). Joyce’s historical writings,like those of Haverty, included works for children. His illustrated AChild’s History of Ireland (1897: 10-11) included an introductory essay onsources, noting the importance of the annals, especially the Annals of theFour Masters. He expressed the hope that his book, ‘written as it is insuch a broad and just spirit, may help to foster mutual feelings of respectand toleration among Irish people of different parties, and may teachthem to love and admire what is great and noble in their history, nomatter where found’ (vi).

Despite the best efforts of these and other historians to present acces-sible narratives based on authentic medieval Irish sources as mediated bymid-nineteenth-century translators, the nationalist writer Alice StopfordGreen opened her study of The Old Irish World (1912) with a despondentchapter on ‘The way of history in Ireland’. She insisted that history was‘portioned out to Irishmen as a fragment of English history’, and ‘Irish-men are still driven to discuss in belated fashion the question that allEurope settled long ago – Why should we make the history of our coun-try our serious study?’ ‘As members of a nation’, she reiterated, ‘we arebound to make History our all important study’ (Green 1912, 2-4). ForGreen, one of the few bright points in nineteenth-century historicalresearch had been the work of the state-sponsored Ordnance Survey, andshe praised the scholarship of Sir George Petrie, John O’Donovan andtheir colleagues, in ‘a kind of peripatetic University’, noting that ‘It issuch things as these that reveal to us the soul of Irish Nationality and themight of its repression’ (55-56). Calling for further research to be carriedout on Irish place-names and Irish antiquities, she argued that ‘All histo-rians, all Irishmen alike, must ardently join in such an entreaty, for thehonour of their land. Is it too much to hope that (...) Irish scholars may


yet be given the patriotic task of saving what yet remains on Irish soil ofthe inheritance of her people’ (61).

Lacking knowledge of the Irish language, Green was limited in theoriginal research she could undertake on early Irish history, but majorprogress in this sphere was achieved by Eoin Mac Neill, in his Phases ofIrish history (1919), and Celtic Ireland (1921). Mac Neill had been intro-duced to the study of history by the Jesuit scholar Edmund Hogan, andstudied Irish with Douglas Hyde. He founded the Gaelic League in1893, and subsequently became active in Irish nationalist politics(Maume 2004; also Byrne & Martin 1971). Mac Neill, as professor ofAncient Irish History at University College Dublin, argued that it wasnecessary to go beyond the mid-nineteenth-century editions of Irishtexts, with the inevitable biases of their translations, and called for finan-cial support for students engaged in the combined disciplines of history,archaeology and Irish philology. Only in this way, he believed, could ‘ourNation’s ancient story’ be given ‘the place it deserves in the world’s his-tory’ (Mac Neill 1921, xiv-xv).

Mac Neill rejected implicitly the historicity of much of the pre-Chris-tian content of texts such as the Annals of the Four Masters. While hisview came to be the orthodoxy in academic circles, the annals continuedto be relied on for the more local evidence they contained relating to themedieval period. The ‘royalist’ master narrative of the Four Masters wasignored, and emphasis was placed instead on other characteristics of thework. Thus, the strands of history that emerged from the use of sourcetexts such as the Annals in the nineteenth century were attention to theminutiae of local history and topography, the cult of individual heroesand the stories of their military exploits, and the Christian heritage ofearly Ireland.

In so far as Samuel Ferguson had been correct in his assessment in1848 that narrative political history was best avoided in Ireland, and thatlocal history was the path to follow, O’Donovan’s edition of the Annalsof the Four Masters provided an important access point to the past. Theeditor had devoted an entire volume to an index of names and places,and together with his encyclopaedic annotations concerning individualplace-names and local family histories, even today the work is regularlyconsulted by local historians and archaeologists concerned with medievalIreland. Scholars such as Edmund Hogan and P.W. Joyce would laterpursue a interest in Irish onomastics, which owed a considerable debt to


the pioneering researches of O’Donovan. The value of the annals tosuch scholars was clear, but that in itself did imply classic status. In1910, however, it is little surprise to find that Hogan’s OnomasticonGoedelicum (1910) is prefaced by the phrase ‘Dochum Glóire Dé ocus onóra nahÉrenn’ (For the glory of God and the honour of Ireland). That phrasewas taken from Míchéal Ó Cléirigh’s 1636 dedication of the Annals tohis patron, Fearghal Ó Gadhra, and over time the phrase came to sym-bolise all that the scholarship of the Annals represented. The adoption ofthe same phrase as part of the banner of the Irish Press newspaperfounded in 1931 by Éamon de Valera continued subtly to propagate thenotion of Irish history, Irish Catholicism and Irish destiny being inter-twined.

People like O’Donovan who edited historical texts in nineteenth-century Ireland had little doubt but that their work, like that of theseventeenth-century predecessors, was being undertaken ‘Do chum glóireDé agus onóra na hÉireann’ (For the glory of God and the honour of Ire-land). From the nineteenth-century perspective, the very act of writinghistory at a time of political and social upheaval could be interpreted asan act of national heroism. By implying that the seventeenth-centuryannalists had rescued the records a lost Gaelic civilisation, O’Donovanhad projected onto the original annalists the essence of his understandingof his own role as a scholar in the 1830s rather than the 1630s in pre-serving the annals for posterity. O’Donovan’s dedication of his editionmade explicit reference to Ó Cléirigh’s 1636 dedication of the annals totheir patron, and he thanked those who had ‘eminently distinguishedthemselves by their exertions in promoting the story of Irish History andAntiquities’ by pursuing ‘the cause of ancient Irish literature, at a periodwhen it had fallen into almost utter neglect’ (O’Donovan 1848-51, 1: v-vi). Projecting back onto the seventeenth-century Four Masters the ‘res-cue mission’ of the nineteenth-century antiquarians had several conse-quences. First, it attached a high rarity value to the contents of the an-nals, presenting them as a national treasure, a rare survival from a once-rich culture. The fact that the annals had not been issued in print in theseventeenth century contributed to this sense that they were the lastfragments of a lost civilization. Secondly, it fed into the story of GaelicIreland having been destroyed by the might of England, so that it wasargued that even the very memory of that society would have been oblit-erated were it not for the work of the Four Masters. Thirdly, it created a


19 For the discontinuities, see Cunningham 2006b and Rankin 2006.20 In 1962 commemorative postage stamps were issued to mark the centenary of

the deaths of John O’Donovan and Eugene O’Curry: Buchalter 1972, 63.

sense of continuity between the activities of nineteenth-century scholarsand those of the late medieval Gaelic tradition, where in truth the eigh-teenth century had been decidedly a period of discontinuity.19 Fourthly, itenhanced the reputation of O’Donovan and his mid-nineteenth-centurycollaborators, ultimately according them a role as shapers of the modernIrish nation.20

While it has been convincingly demonstrated by late twentieth-cen-tury historians that the Annals were not conceived as a rescue mission inthe seventeenth century but rather as a carefully constructed chronicle ofhistory for the Irish Catholic community in Ireland and overseas, thealternative interpretation that formed part of O’Donovan’s editorial ‘pack-age’ still survives in popular interpretations of the work of the FourMasters. The annals were seen as a rare bright light in the sea of oppres-sion, defeat and loss that had emerged as the master narrative in thestory of Ireland (Foster 1993, 1-20). The cult of Mícheál Ó Cléirigh thatarose from this was one manifestation of the national significance of theannals. Evidence of Ó Cléirigh’s cult status in the late nineteenth centuryis provided, for example, by the work of journalist and popular historicalwriter, Eugene Davis, whose ‘Souvenirs of Irish footprints over Europe’was published in serial form in the Evening Telegraph and Freeman’s Journalnewspapers in 1888-9. In addition to tracing the footprints of earlyChristian Irish saints in Europe, Davis also went in search of the sites inLouvain associated with Micheál Ó Cléirigh. Citing poetry from the1840s composed by Thomas D’Arcy McGee, Davis presented an ideal-ised picture of the world of the Four Masters. It seems clear from thework of popular writers such as McGee and Davis that the memory of ÓCléirigh was deliberately cultivated as an icon of Catholic Ireland. ÓCléirigh’s Franciscan credentials and his humble status as a lay brothermade him a particularly appropriate hero.

As the nineteenth century came to a close, the cult of Míchéal ÓCléirigh showed no signs of abating. Writing a survey of Irish literaturefirst published in 1899, Douglas Hyde, an influential scholar and collec-tor of folk literature who later became the first protestant President ofIreland, presented Ó Cléirigh and the Annals of the Four Masters in thefollowing terms:


Before O’Clery ever entered the Franciscan Order he had been by profes-sion an historian or antiquary, and now in his eager quest for ecclesiasticalwritings and the lives of saints, his trained eye fell upon many other docu-ments which he could not neglect. These were the ancient books and secu-lar annals of the nation, and the historical poems of the ancient bards. (...)There is no event of Irish history from the birth of Christ to the beginningof the seventeenth century that the first inquiry of the student will not be,‘What do the “Four Masters” say about it?’ for the great value of the workconsists in this, that we have here in condensed form the pith and substanceof the old books of Ireland which were then in existence but which – as theFour Masters foresaw – have long since perished. (Hyde 1899, 574-580)

If O’Donovan had not already ensured that the Annals of the Four Mas-ters would be regarded as a national classic, the endorsement of DouglasHyde certainly helped confirm the status of the work. As the twentiethcentury progessed, the Franciscan order, too, embraced Ó Cléirigh as apotent symbol of Catholic Ireland (Cunningham 2007).

In the Irish Free State after 1922, as in the nineteenth-century ‘prov-ince’ of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland, the study ofhistory both national and local was important, not least because recallingthe story of Ireland seemed a more achievable objective than reviving thenational language. While an ‘800 years of oppression’ school of national-ist history also came to the fore and informed contemporary politics, forthose who looked to the ancient past for affirmation of the value ofIrishness, the pages of the Annals of the Four Masters continued toprovide inspiration. The annals were valued for the affirmation theyprovided regarding the antiquity of the kingdom of Ireland, the strengthof the Irish Christian heritage, and the tradition of the Irish languagethrough the medium of which those various elements of the Irish pasthad been preserved for posterity. The Annals were not easily read asnarrative history, but yet it was recognised that something of the histori-cal essence of Irishness was captured in their pages.

In the fledgling Irish state of the early twentieth century, there was astrong growth in interest also in folklore and in local history as a wayinto a different, more balanced view of the Irish past (cf. O’Leary 2004).The capacity of the Annals of the Four Masters, in the form in whichthey were presented to readers in the mid-nineteenth-century edition, toconnect local places and communities into the national story, through theminutiae of John O’Donovan’s topographical information, was perhapstheir most important characteristic. O’Donovan’s achievement was to


take a text that had been almost vanished without trace and make itaccessible to a wide public, whether in the full dual language edition thatadorned scholarly libraries or through the stories from the annals that heand others popularised in penny magazines. The enhanced product thatwas O’Donovan’s nineteenth-century edition of the Annals, togetherwith the Catholic credentials of the original annalists, and the romance ofa rescue mission, together created a foundational text for an emergingrepublic out of the royalist ‘Annals of the Kingdom of Ireland’.

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Ireland, 1922-1972. Dublin: Hibernian Stamp Co.Byrne, F.J. and F.X. Martin, eds). 1973. The Scholar Revolutionary: Eoin MacNeill,

1867-1945, and the Making of the New Ireland. Shannon, Irish University Press.Campbell, Matthew. 2006. Poetry in English, 1830-1890: From Catholic Eman-

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Cunningham, Bernadette. 1991. The Culture and Ideology of Irish FranciscanHistorians at Louvain, 1607-1650. In Ideology and the historians, ed. CiaránBrady, 11-30, 223-227. Dublin, Lilliput.

Cunningham, Bernadette. 2005. The Making of the Annals of the Four Masters.PhD thesis, University College Dublin.

Cunningham, Bernadette. 2006a. ‘An Honour to the Nation’: Publishing JohnO’Donovan’s Edition of the Annals of the Four Masters, 1848-1856. InPrint Culture and Intellectual Life in Ireland, 1660-1941, ed. M. Fanning and R.Gillespie, 116-142. Dublin, Woodfield.

Cunningham, Bernadette. 2006b. Historical Writing, 1660-1750. In The OxfordHistory of the Irish Book III: the Irish book in English, 1550-1800, ed. RaymondGillespie and Andrew Hadfield, 264-281. Oxford: Clarendon.

Cunningham, Bernadette. 2007. Remembering Mícheál Ó Cléirigh. In WritingIrish History: The Four Masters and their World, ed. E. Bhreathnach & B.Cunningham, 76-83. Dublin: Wordwell.

Denman, Peter. 1990. Samuel Ferguson: Thee Literary Achievement. Gerrards Cross:Colin Smythe.

Ferguson, Samuel. 1848. The Annals of the Four Masters. Dublin UniversityMagazine, 31..

[Ferguson, Samuel]. 1868. Lord Romilly’s Irish publications. Quarterly Review124: 423-45.


FitzPatrick, Elizabeth. 1988. The Catalogue of Irish Manuscripts in the Royal IrishAcademy: A Brief Introduction. Dublin: Royal Irish Academy.

Foster, R.F. 1993. Paddy and Mr Punch: Connections in Irish and English History.London: Allen Lane.

Gillespie, Raymond. 2006. Printing History: Editing and Publishing HistoricalDocuments in Nineteenth-century Ireland. In Print Culture and Intellectual Lifein Ireland, 1660-1941, ed. M. Fanning and R. Gillespie, 74-94. Dublin:Woodfield.

Green, Alice Stopford. 1912. The Old Irish World. Dublin: M.H. Gill.Hyde, Douglas. 1899. A Literary History of Ireland, from Earliest Times to the Present

Day. London.Joyce, P.W. 1903. A Social History of Ancient Ireland. 2 vols.; London: Longmans,

Green.Kinane, Vincent. 1994. A History of the Dublin University Press, 1734-1976. Dub-

lin: Gill & Macmillan.Leerssen, Joep. 1996. Remembrance and Imagination: Patterns in the Historical and

Literary Representation of Ireland in the Nineteenth Century. Cork: Cork UniversityPress.

Leerssen, Joep. 2002. Hidden Ireland, Public Sphere. Galway, Arlen House.Maume, Patrick. 2004. Eoin Mac Neill. In Oxford DNB. Oxford: Oxford Uni-

versity Press.McGowan, K. Megan. 2004. The Four Masters and the Governance of Ireland

in the Middle Ages. Journal of Celtic Studies 4: 1-41.McGuinne, Dermot. 1992. Irish Type Design: A History of Printing Types in the Irish

Character. Dublin: Irish Academic Press.Mac Neill, Eoin. 1921. Celtic Ireland. Dublin: Martin Lester.Mitchell, G.F. 1985. Antiquities. In The Royal Irish Academy: A Bicentennial His-

tory, 1785-1985, ed. T. Ó Raifeartaigh, 93-163. Dublin: Royal Irish Acad-emy.

Murray, Damien. 2000. Romanticism, Nationalism and Irish Antiquarian Societies,1840-80. Maynooth: Department of Old and Middle Irish, NUI Maynooth.

O’Conor, C., ed.. 1826. Rerum Hibernicarum Scriptores, Tom III: Annales IV Magis-trorum. Buckingham.

O’Donovan, John, ed.. 1848-51 Annála Ríoghachta Éireann. Annals of the Kingdomof Ireland, by the Four Masters, from the Earliest Period to the Year 1616, Editedfrom MSS. in the Library of the Royal Irish Academy and of Trinity College Dublin,with a Translation and Copious Notes. 7 vols.; Dublin.

O’Leary, Philip. 2004. Gaelic Prose in the Irish Free State. Dublin: UCD Press.O’Lochlainn, Colm. 1940. John O’Donovan and the Annals. Irish Book Lover, 27.Ó Muraíle, Nollaig. 1987. The Autograph Manuscripts of the Annals of the

Four Masters. Celtica 19: 75-95.Ó Muraíle, Nollaig. 1997. Seán Ó Donnabháin: ‘An cúigiú Máistir’. Léachtaí

Cholm Cille. 27: 11-82.


Todd, J.H. and W. Reeves, eds. 1864. The Martyrology of Donegal: A Calendar of theSaints of Ireland: Féilire na naomh nErennach. Dublin.

Petrie, George. 1831. Remarks on the History and Authenticity of the Annalsof the Four Masters. Transactions of the Royal Irish Academy 16: 381-393.

Rankin, Deana. 2006. Historical writing, 1750-1800. In The Oxford history of theIrish book III: the Irish book in English, 1550-1800, ed. Raymond Gillespie andAndrew Hadfield, 282-300. Oxford: Clarendon.


AFTER THE LISBON EARTHQUAKE: REASSEMBLING HISTORY

João Dionísio

AbstractThis essay examines the connection between nation-building andeditorial activity in Portugal towards the end of the eighteenth cen-tury. It focuses on the hypothesis that the Lisbon 1755 earthquake (i)fuelled the will to publish unknown preserved documents which,should another earthquake occur, could be utterly destroyed andthereby (ii) speeded up the development of palaeography anddiplomatics as core disciplines in the preservation of textual informa-tion. The article focuses on José Correia da Serra, who between 1790and 1793 directed the Royal Academy of Sciences’ edition of aCollecção de Livros Ineditos da Historia Portugueza. Special attention isgiven to the criteria behind the selection of the texts which wereedited in the Collecção, the rationale of this edition, and its reception.Taken together, these different aspects of Correia da Serra’s worksuggest that already in his time and in the years to come nation build-ing was carried out regardless of scholarly editing.

In an issue of the American newspaper Baltimore Patriot dated 5 February1818, an article bearing the title ‘Something new in diplomacy!’ vigor-ously criticizes Abbe José Correia da Serra, at that time Portuguese am-bassador to the United States. The beginning of the article presents himcumulatively in the following series of epithets: ‘that philosopher, thatmodern Socrates, the distinguished preceptor of Robert Walsh Jr, to wit,(…) the Jesuit, the mock and scientific representative of that pious andhumane king John of Portugal’(Bourdon 1975, 360). By then, the charac-terisation of Correia da Serra as ‘that modern Socrates’ was already a

152 João Dionísio

conventional way of portraying him. On 12 March 1818, in a letter Rob-ert Walsh Jr. sent to Francis Walker Gilmer, he called Correia da Serra‘our Socrates’, maybe referring half-humorously to the dedication of the1817 edition of Henry Marie Brackenridge’s Views of Louisiana, a set ofnarratives of the author’s journey up the Missouri River (Davis 1955,120). In the dedication one reads:

the profound maxims, upon every subject, which like the disciples of Socra-tes, we treasure up from your lips, entitle us to claim you as one of thefathers of the nation.(Davis 1955, 123)

The purpose of this essay is to see to what extent we are allowed to viewCorreia da Serra not only as a father of the United States, but also moremodestly as a begetter of Portugal due to his editorial activity. In orderto do this I will refer back to the second half of the eighteenth century.

Having been raised in Italy, where he took orders, Correia da Serrabelongs to a group of people generally known as estrangeirados, ‘Euro-peanized intellectuals’ who focused on foreign European culture throughwhich they fought clericalism, aristotelianism and superstition in Portu-guese education and culture (Simões et al. 2004, 2006). They are tradi-tionally viewed as the highest representatives of the Enlightenment pe-riod in Portugal because of the core role they played in the 1770s reformof education promoted by the Marquis of Pombal or in the the Academyof Sciences created in 1779 by the Duke of Lafões and Correia da Serra.The international ideology in their actions characterises to some extenttheir writings.

Between 1790 and 1793 the Royal Academy of Sciences of Lisbonpublished three infolio volumes of a series generally entitled Colecção deLivros Ineditos da Historia Portugueza (collection of unpublished books ofPortuguese history), the edition being directed and made by Correia daSerra. These volumes, each running to over 600 pages, were the Acad-emy’s most expensive publications, volume 1 costing 1800 reis (Serra1790, 627), much more than the second most expensive book issued bythe Academy, which cost 800 reis (Memorias Economicas da Acad. Real dasSciencias de Lisboa, para o adiantamento da Agricultura, das Artes, e da Industriaem Portugal, e suas Conquistas). Lisbon bookshops selling the Colecção wereGazeta, Borel and Bertrand, beside an unnamed shop in the universitytown of Coimbra. Two of these three Lisbon bookshops were the prop-erty of originally French families (Domingos 2000; Guedes 1987, 15-44;Caeiro 1980: 311; Guedes 1988: 69). Strictly Portuguese at the start, the

AFTER THE LISBON EARTHQUAKE 153

distribution of the Colecção (and of other Academy books) becamebroader in 1793: volume three was also to be sold in Leiden, throughJohannes and Samuel Luchtmans II (actually the latter had passed awayin 1780), the heirs of Samuel Luchtmans, a town and university printer in1730 with contacts with scholars all over Europe. The Colecção was alsosold in Paris by the bookseller and publisher Théophile Barrois le jeune.

These three volumes should be seen against a complex backdrop, inwhich I highlight two aspects. Institutionally, it should be rememberedthat before the Royal Academy was established (and so before the seriesof historical texts edited by Correia da Serra was published) there hadexisted another institution of a similar kind, the Royal Academy of His-tory. Founded in 1720, it was the first Academy to be created with royalsupport. Its ideology, involving the subordination of civil history toreligious history and the predominance of an apologetic point of viewtowards religion and the royal dynasty, ran counter to the spirit of theEnlightenment – notwithstanding the fact that some of the works pro-duced by its members are still useful today (e.g. Historia Genealogica daCasa Real Portuguesa, by D. António Caetano de Sousa, 1735-48; Bibliothe-ca Lusitana , by Diogo Barbosa Machado, 1741-59; cf. Curto 2001-2002:35; Lopes 1971: 14-15). Although such prejudices do not manifest them-selves in Correia da Serra’s collection, the new Academy did follow inthe footsteps of previous projects involving a thorough or selectivemapping out of Portuguese Literature and History. This needs to be keptin mind when we encounter claims to the effect that the new Academyof Sciences made a clean sweep of past institutions so as to bring thelight of knowledge to Portugal (Curto 2001-2002: 28-43). It is true, allthe same, that the Academy had much broader goals in mind than earliersimilar institutions. According to the 1780 version of the Statutes Plan, itwas the love of the nation, combined with royal support, that stimulatedthe foundation of the Academy, consecrated to the public glory andwelfare (gloria e felicidade publica) in order to develop national instruction,the perfection of the sciences and the arts, and to increase popular pro-ductive labour (industria Popular).

Secondly, to situate the beginnings of the Academy and of its editorialactivity properly, we should take into consideration the intellectual ef-fects caused by the great Lisbon earthquake, which had occurred a quar-ter of a century before the Academy was created, in 1755. In the wordsof an English merchant living in Lisbon at that time:

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1 Jackson 2005, 147. One might here recall that the earthquake totally destroyedthe building of the Bertrand bookshop, later to become one of the selling points of theColecção, and also the Bertrand storehouse: ‘l’incendie du Tremblement de Terre dupremier Novembre de 1755 en aiant consume toute l’Impression, ainsi que tout ce quenous avions de librarie (…) ce n’était gueres le tems, après la perte que nous avionsfait dans ce terrible Tremblement de Terre d’un fonds aussi considerable comme celuique nous avions en livres…’ (cf. Guedes 1987, 34).

2 Ribeiro taught Diplomatics, a subject formally created in 1796 at the Universityof Coimbra, having obtained a post at the Royal Archive in 1801 (Gomes 2001, 44). Inthe preface to volume 1 of the Colecção there is the announcement of the thorough

When, about Ten o’Clock, without the least warning, a most dreadful Earth-quake shook by very short but quick Tremblings, the Foundations fromunder the Superstructures, loosening every Stone from its Cement. Then,with a scarce perceptible Pause, the Motion changed, and every Buildingrolled and jostled like a Ship at Sea; which put in Ruins almost every House,Church, and Publick Building, with an incredible Slaughter of the Inhabit-ants.1

On 1 November, All Saints’ day, between 9.30 and 10 a.m., when manypeople were gathered in churches, an earthquake occurred, measuring 8.5to 9.0 on the Richter scale, and went on for approximately 9 minutes. Itwas followed by a number of fires all over downtown Lisbon whichraged for five or six days, and finally by a tsunami, a gigantic wave rareon the Atlantic coast. Of the estimated 20,000 houses then existing inLisbon, only 3000 could be securely occupied after the quake, whichmainly affected the medieval centre of the city. About 8000 people died,that is, five per cent of the city dwellers. The tower of St. George’s Cas-tle, which hosted the documents of the Royal Archive, was destroyed.

It has been pointed out that a consequence of the earthquake was afeverish desire to reconstruct and to remap the city, of which there werefew descriptions and maps before it happened (Sequeira 1967, 17). Thenatural cataclysm may have had a similar effect in editorial terms byfuelling the will to publish those surviving documents which, shouldanother earthquake occur, stood in danger of total destruction. Theeagerness to protect historical and literary documents from natural disas-ters must have sped up the development of palaeography and di-plomatics as core disciplines in the preservation of textual information.The Academy of Sciences took part in the process by promoting a gen-eral inventory of documents, mainly in religious archives, involvingmembers such as Joaquim de Santo Agostinho, Santa Rosa de Viterboand, above all, João Pedro Ribeiro.2 On the other hand, however, the


research in the national and foreign cartórios, to be carried out by João Pedro Ribeiro eJoaquim José Ferreira. To place this sort of initiative in the European context, seeLeerssen 2006, 567.

3 I am quoting from Gumbrecht’s comment on the debris of Heidelberg’s Castle,when he assigns to the ruins a slow rhythm of change ending in a ‘possible futurewhen the debris will no longer be recognizable as objects that once belonged to abuilding’ (Gumbrecht 2003, 9-10).

4 Although there are several language-related documents in the Correia da SerraArchive, it was the History branch that predominated in the Academy’s first decades.On documents about language, see, e.g., A57 (Correia da Serra archive, hosted by I. A.N. / Torre do Tombo), which comprehends very inchoative ‘Materiaes para o Glos-sário Portuguez’, ‘Da origem immediata da Lingoa Portugueza / Modo Fizico com q-se ella formou, e cauzas / Quanto aos sós / Quanto à sintaxe / Dos períodos devariaçaõ da Lingoa Portugueza e cauzas. / Do estado actual da Lingoa Portugueza. /Das perfeições e defeitos actuaes. / Do modo de augmentar huas, e evitar os outros’,apart from some contrastive observations on Portuguese, French and Italian languagesand on the orthography and pronunciation of Portuguese. There are also some noteson the usefulness of certain manuscripts (kept in Alcobaça) for the Dictionary of theAcademy and for a History of the Portuguese Language.

earthquake must have represented an epistemological tabula rasa, some-thing that some members of the Academy cherished as a necessary con-dition for the cultural and educational development of the country. Afterall, rebuilding the memory of the nation involved two contradictingactivities: silencing some textual debris to the condition of unrecognis-able ‘objects that once belonged to a building’ and exalting other textualdebris to function as the axis of the reconstruction.3

The connection between the Academy’s editorial projects and a re-newed historical self-awareness is not immediately conspicuous in theStatutes Plan of the Academy. In fact, the Plan presents the third Classof the Academy (Bellas Letras) as having to do with the several branchesof Portuguese Literature. One will have to look at the prologue of vol. 1of Memorias de Litteratura Portugueza, the journal of this Class, to get anexplanation of the sense in which the expression ‘Portuguese Literature’is used. ‘Portuguese Literature’, one is told there, refers to PortugueseLanguage and History, which are to be analyzed in all possible featuresand connections (Ribeiro 1872, 38-39).4 Much more than PortugueseLanguage, History would constitute the cherished territory cultivated bythe Academy at the beginning of its existence, which is evidenced by andlarge by the publication of Correia da Serra’s Colecção.

What were the explicit factors that stimulated Correia da Serra to edithistorical texts, and what were the criteria that led him to select preciselythe texts he edited? One way of answering these questions is by analys-

156 João Dionísio

ing the main epigraphs in the Colecção; another is to scan the paratext thatprefaces the first volume of the series.

On the title page of the Colecção’s three volumes there is a significantquote from Horace’s Epistles II, ii, 115-116: ‘Obscurata diu populo,bonus eruet, atque Proferet in lucem [speciosa vocabula rerum]...’ InFairclough’s translation: ‘Terms long lost in darkness the good poet willunearth for the people’s use and bring into the light – [picturesqueterms]’. Putting himself in Horace’s shoes, Correia da Serra plans toreveal texts previously neglected, and claims that there is fruitfulness inthis retrieval. The quote is doubly meaningful, as regards the Academy’saim of public instruction and as regards the Enlightenment spirit. Incontrast with Horace’s quote, the one with which the Preliminary Dis-course of volume 1 starts is more general. It is taken from Lucretius, DeRerum Natura I, 927: ‘Juvat intêgros accedere fontes’. In Rouse’s transla-tion: ‘I love to approach virgin springs [and there to drink]’. As a matterof fact, ‘virgin springs’ seem simply to duplicate Horace’s ‘terms longlost in darkness’.

The short Preliminary Discourse of the Colecção (Serra 1790, VII-XI)starts out with the editor’s statement that necessity and glory impelledhim to study Portuguese History. Necessity, he writes, because if one isto understand the present one must know the past; glory because actionsof his ancestors affected all humankind. This last remark is an obviousallusion to the Portuguese naval discoveries of the fifteenth and six-teenth centuries. A logical progression is thus suggested: since (1) inorder to know the present, one has to know the past, and since (2) theacts of our ancestors affected humankind, (3) people from other coun-tries should be aware of the history of Portugal. This tallies both with theinternational distribution of the Colecção and with Correia da Serra’s inter-nationalist ideology.

In the Preliminary Discourse’s next paragraph, the editor claims thatstudy without certainty is vain, notably in the field of History, where oneis bound to deal with remnants:

The remnants that people left in monuments and the narration of contem-porary people, that is all one has and if by chance [por ventura] they are ab-sent, there is neither inventive ingeniousness [viveza de engenho] nor sharpreasoning [agudeza de raciocínio] that may overcome its absence.

Correia da Serra asserts later that these remnants, these narrations, whichcorrespond to Horace’s ‘terms long lost in darkness’ and to Lucretius’


5 Correia da Serra goes on to present the main persons responsible for the firstvolume and a forthcoming volume in the sixth paragraph; he then gives examples ofcontributions towards his stated goal: a forthcoming volume with the Arabic docu-ments of the Royal Archive, edited by Fr. Joaõ de Souza; a work by the historianDiogo do Couto, Observações sobre as principaes cauzas da decadência dos Portuguezes na Azia,escritas em forma de Dialogo, com o Titulo de Soldado Pratico, to be published by Mr. AntónioCaetano do Amaral.

6 See the reference to extant copies of the Portuguese texts of the Colecção in Askinset al., n.d.: Rui de Pina, Crónica de D. Duarte, Texid 1052; Rui de Pina, Crónica de D.Afonso V, Texid 1149; Rui de Pina, Crónica de D. João II, Texid 1150; Rui de Pina,Crónica de D. João II, Texid 1150; Gomes Eanes de Zurara, Crónica do Conde D. Pedro deMeneses, Texid 1058; Gomes Eanes de Zurara, Crónica do Conde D. Duarte de Meneses,Texid 1053; Livro Vermelho de D. Afonso V, Texid 9483; Livro Antigo das Posses da Casa daSuplicação, Texid 9442.

‘virgin springs’, are the basis for certainty, and that books which fail totake them into account are superfluous. The fact that these works, whichhe does not identify, exist in large numbers shows that Portuguese peo-ple have been obscenely uninterested in having access to source docu-ments. His collection should thus compensate for this historical weak-ness and represent a vigorous back-to-basics movement – back to thetextual basics, that is.

This is why, as is stated in the fifth paragraph, the Academy has de-cided to publish such ancient books, memories and monuments of theMonarchy as were spared by Time (or rather, one should perhaps say, byTime’s more tangible representation, the earthquake). Only when thiswork is finished, Correia da Serra continues, will we know what Portugalwas, what past actions there were relevant to history, their causes andeffects.5 In the concluding paragraph, through a typical captatio benevo-lentiae move, he claims that only the piety towards the fatherland, themerit of the works edited and his own zeal made him endure the lack ofglory and tediousness implied in editing others’ works. The corpus selected for inclusion in the first three volumes can be tabu-lated as follows:6

158 João Dionísio

vol. 1 PrefaceDe Bello Septensi or Livro da Guerra de Ceuta, by Mateus de PisanoCrónica de D. Duarte, by Rui de Pina Crónica de D. Afonso V, by Rui de Pina

vol. 2 Crónica de D. João II, by Rui de PinaCrónica do Conde D. Pedro de Menezes, by Gomes Eanes de Zurara (but ascribed here to Rui de Pina)

vol. 3 Crónica do Conde D. Duarte de Menezes, by Gomes Eanes de ZuraraLivro Vermelho de D. Afonso VFragmentos de Legislação escritos no Livro chamado Antigo das Posses da Casa da Suplicação

If after the earthquake the reconstruction of the fragile medieval struc-tures of downtown Lisbon gave birth to new quarters framed in straightlines, the casting of these texts suggests Correia da Serra was deliberatelysetting out to transmit a new idea of the Portuguese Middle Ages. Thetexts or groups of texts included in the Colecção belong to the late medi-eval period; this is remarkable in that, according to the doctrine summa-rised in the Preface, the remnants of the late Middle Ages would enablethe reader to better understand the Golden period of Portuguese discov-eries. The texts selected are either chronicles or jurisprudential docu-ments. The noteworthy work that opens the series, although not consid-ered a fundamental text, but simply a ‘curious monument of our History’(Serra 1790, 3), perfectly agrees with Correia da Serra’s doctrine regard-ing internationalisation. It is neither written by a Portuguese author, norwritten in the Portuguese language. Furthermore, in the eulogy of KingAfonso V, contained in chapter 1 of Crónica do Conde D. Pedro de Meneses,one learns that King Afonso V had foreign political marketing in mindwhen he commissioned Matteo Pisano with the Latin writing of De BelloSeptensi:

não soomente se comtemtou de hos fazer escrever ē nosso propio vulgarportugues, mas aymda os fez traduzir aa llymgoa llatina, porque nõsoomemte os seus naturais ouvessem conheçimemto e saber das gramdescavalarias daquelle comde e dos outros que com elle comcorrerão, mas que


7 Zurara 1997, 175-176: ‘not only did he [Afonso V] content himself by havingthem written in our own current Portuguese, but ordered their translation into theLatin language, so that not only their naturals had cognizance and knowledge of thegreat chivalric feats of that Count and of the others who took part in them with him,but also in order to make them manifest to the knowledge of the noblety of Christian-ity, by Master Matheus de Pisano’.

8 There is no separate introduction to Rui de Pina’s Crónica de D. João II, this beingsubsumed in the editor’s preface to the Crónica do Conde D. Duarte.

9 Américo da Costa Ramalho writes that the manuscript that served for Correia daSerra’s edition of De Bello Septensi, which is not necessarily a codex unicus, belonged to D.Manuel II’s library, in Vila Viçosa (Ramalho 1989-90, 214). In Geraldes Freire’s view,Ramalho is right in posing the hypothesis of the existence of other manuscripts, for,according to his observation, the copy that served for Correia’s work is not the onekept in Vila Viçosa (Freire 1989-90, 217).

aymda fossem manyfestos a todo conheçimemto de toda a nobreza dacristamdade, per mestre Matheus de Pisano (…)7

How did Correia da Serra proceed editorially? With one exception,8 eachedited text is preceded by a short introduction that reviews the manu-scripts taken into consideration, biographical data, an identification ofthe author’s works, a presentation of the work and of the author’s style.Textual criticism proper plays a role in the collection of manuscripts, thecomparison of readings and the annotation.

As far as collecting material is concerned, the strategy followed byCorreia da Serra is relatively plain: a good part of the texts were thoughtto be transmitted in single copies, which made the editor content himselfwith the codex unicus he had at hand.9 When a text reached the editorthrough more than one copy, he proceeded on the basis both of profes-sional background and of location. Thus with Rui de Pina’s Crónica de D.Duarte, a manuscript of which existed in the Royal Archive, a circum-stance that would automatically prove its status as a sound basis for theedition, since Rui de Pina was a royal chronicler; in Correia da Serra’sphrasing: ‘since it is kept at the Royal Archive it is useless to say anythingabout its authenticity’ (Serra 1790, 66). But in apparent contradiction, thefollowing texts, Crónica de D. Afonso V and Crónica de D. João II, againroyal chronicles, again by Rui de Pina, again transmitted by a manuscriptkept at the Royal Archive, were edited with the help of another copy,then the property of the Benedictine monks.

The other two chronicles included in the Colecção were written byGomes Eanes de Zurara. The first, about the life of the nobleman D.Pedro de Meneses, had the text established, in a typical recentiores deteriores

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10 As a matter of detail: the editor confesses that he did not have the opportunity tocompare the papal bull as quoted within the edited text with its original (1793, 594-595). However, he had recourse to Ordenações Afonsinas in order to detect an allegederror in another text (1793, 605).

decision, by means of the most ancient of the few manuscripts known toCorreia da Serra, owned by a member of the Academy of Sciences (Serra1792: 211). As to the second one, a biography of D. Duarte de Meneses,the basis was an even rarer manuscript (for there were fewer copiesextant) which was the property of another member of the Academy.Correia da Serra is aware of the shortcomings of this copy when hementions its many lacunae, impossible to resolve without the aid of otheruncorrupt copies, unknown to him.

The last two groups of texts edited in the Colecção are legal writings.The first group was taken from Livro Vermelho do Senhor D. Afonso V,which was edited, in the absence of the lost original, according to animperfect copy ordered by King John III. The second group was takenfrom a single manuscript, showing several flaws, of the Livro das Posses daCasa da Suplicação.

In view of what this tells us concerning Correia da Serra’s policy inselecting the copies on which he based his edition, it is no surprise to seethe lack of comparative moves or at the absence of explanation concern-ing the comparison of testimonia. Regarding Rui de Pina’s Crónica de D.Afonso V and Crónica de D. João II, one finds no trace of the variantsdetected in the comparison between the Royal Archive manuscript andthe Benedictine copy. Besides, there is no information as to the criteriathat led the editor to prefer a specific variant reading instead of an-other.10

Correia da Serra’s annotation has mainly to do with lacunae andemendation. He locates the passages where the corruptions are, butneither mentions their nature, nor identifies precisely what lies behindthem. The relatively strong visibility given to the editorial action is due tothe profile of the scribe: careful in calligraphy, far from competent inLatin. Furthermore, some observations occasionally emerge to explainthe blanks and eventually to correct the text ope ingenii (Crónica de D.Duarte de Meneses, p.311; Fragmentos legais, p. 578, 598, 603, 609, 612).

Correia da Serra’s faltering attitude towards emendation is witnessedby his last words in the series – not very famous but still revealing. They


appear at the end of volume 3, on p. 617 (not numbered), and accom-pany a list of Errata. First one reads the introductory note:

Some other words of the Crónica do Conde D. Duarte could have been cor-rected, which we did not, both because they are written in a precious manu-script, as we wrote in Volume II of this collection [p. 211], and because weleave to the intelligent [entendido] reader its correction.

The reader might be confused by the unsystematic criterion that madethe editor emend some words and leave others uncorrected. Yet theuncorrected words are then listed, for immediately after his disclaimerCorreia da Serra adds: ‘And one might correct’, followed by a list ofpossible mistakes in the so-called precious manuscript. By now the pa-tient reader would think that the list he is accessing is a thorough one.Yet, the list is concluded by the tranquil expression ‘And thus some oth-ers’. And this time these remaining alleged mistakes are not presented.

ReceptionThe reception of Correia da Serra’s work was generally enthusiastic.Silvestre Ribeiro, for instance, considered that volume I was preceded byan excellent introduction and that the Academy made the right choicewhen it commissioned Correia da Serra with the research work andselection of the texts to be included in the project (Ribeiro 1872,293-294). According to the hyperbolic description given by the onlineClassic Encyclopedia, Correia da Serra’s Colecção is ‘an invaluable selec-tion of documents, exceedingly well edited’. A curious dissonant in thegenerally benevolent chorus of contemporary opinion is the criticism ofFather Francisco José da Serra Xavier, kept in manuscript (now inBrazil). It had scarcely any impact, for it was never published and, be-sides, it has been passed over in silence by the Academy’s historians.One of these, rather than dealing with the nature of the criticism, in-dulges in presenting the genealogy of the critic: born in the parish of SãoPaulo, borough of Penalva; married to Maria Luisa and moved to Lis-bon, where he established himself as a grocer. The grocery was destroyedby the earthquake. He had two children. When he was about to takeorders, he declared that his grandmother (on his mother’s side) wasnicknamed ‘Black’ (Negra) because she was fed by a black goat. And soforth (See Carvalho 1948, 94).

What strikes us most in both the appraisal and the report of the criti-cism is that nothing, absolutely nothing, is said about the editorial theory

162 João Dionísio

11 One should say on Correia da Serra’s behalf that the most recent edition ofCrónica de D. Pedro de Meneses, a fine piece of scholarship, depends on the very samemanuscript he selected, which undoubtedly gives him some credit (Brocardo 1997, 23and 111). The manuscript is now in Coimbra, Biblioteca Geral da Universidade deCoimbra, ms. 439. Description by Brocardo 1997, 28-33. For a description of Correiada Serra’s editorial work concerning Crónica de D. Pedro de Meneses, see Brocardo 1997,117-148.

and performance of the series. Thus, Correia da Serra was right when hestated that editing did not bring glory, but it did not bring disreputeeither. To bring either glory or opprobrium, it had to be noticed as such.

In the obscure history of Portuguese scholarly editing prior to thenineteenth century, Correia da Serra’s project is as good as non-existent.This is not his fault, however, for in handbooks on textual criticism inPortugal nothing seems to have deserved observation in this field before1800. In a way, Correia da Serra’s project clearly represents this nothing-ness, which has to do with the ‘absence of a previous definition of thefields of intervention of the editor’ (Brocardo 1997: 121). An absencethat is manifested in different procedures not made explicit by our editor:abbreviation development; word separation; introduction of capital let-ters; modernization of punctuation; correction (although rare) throughaddition of words; graphic alteration with and without phonetic implica-tions. All in all, as Teresa Brocardo says, his edition seems akin to a handcopy, that frequently swings to and fro between fidelity and innovation,clearly distant from scholarly editing.11

On another ground, the use made of the Colecção was paradoxical. Ruide Pina, the best-represented author in the series, is an idiosyncraticchoice by Correia da Serra, at odds with the relative lack of importancewith which this historian is credited today (but also already in the nine-teenth century). In contrast, the most canonic medieval chronicler,Fernão Lopes, is ignored in these first three volumes and included onlyin the fourth, in which Correia da Serra had no hand. Thus, the seriesposits a sort of canon that was to be overtaken by later developments.The Colecção failed to meet one of the most important prerequisites ofcanonicity: the fact that ‘over successive generations (…) readers con-tinue to affirm a judgement of greatness, almost as though each genera-tion actually judged anew the quality of the work.’ (Guillory 1995, 236).

Yet there are contradictions even here. For one thing, texts edited inthe Colecção were read over successive generations in school anthologiesand in semi-deluxe books; still, this was a form of recycling rather than


12 E.g. Tavares 1923, 211-222; Oliveira and Machado 1973, 642-46; Pina 1977, 479-1033. On page XXIII of Lopes de Almeida’s introduction to the latter book he writes:‘As to the reliability of the texts, we ask permission to declare them correct’.

involve a result of judgement or appreciation. For instance, in José P.Tavares’ Selecta de Textos Arcaicos e Medievais, published in 1923, one findsRui de Pina’s Crónica de D. Duarte and Crónica de D. Afonso, explicitlyreferenced to Correia da Serra’s work as the source text. The same thinghappens in the prestigious anthology organized by Corrêa de Oliveiraand Saavedra Machado. Again, in a series entitled ‘Treasures of Litera-ture and History’, a volume appeared in 1977 including all of Rui dePina’s chronicles, with the text of Crónica de D. Duarte, Crónica de D.Afonso and Crónica de D. João II corresponding literally to Correia daSerra’s text, and the introductions reproducing those of Correia da Serra(although this is only obliquely acknowledged by M. Lopes de Almeida,who introduces the book).12 This leaves us to a curious contradictionbetween successive reprinting and lack of judgement-based canonicity.

We cannot know what would have happened to the fourth and fifthvolumes of the Colecção, had Correia da Serra stayed in Portugal. But hehad to leave his country with the French naturalist Broussonnet(1761-1807), who had fled France in the persecution of the Girondins.Once the Portuguese government realised that Broussonnet was hidingin the Royal Academy they intervened, and both Correia da Serra and hisFrench colleague decided to escape (Ribeiro 1872: 38-39). Our editormoved to England, then to France and to the United States, where hisintelligence and vast knowledge gave birth to his Socratic epithet. InFrance, Correia da Serra wrote the article ‘Sur l’état des sciences et deslettres parmi les Portugais’ (1804), maintaining in it that the most recentstage in the political and cultural evolution of Portugal, that is, the periodduring which he lived, was one of recovery in both the scientific andliterary branches of knowledge. This, however, did not involve editorialscholarship. Later on, when in the United States he was hyperbolicallylabelled a father of the nation, this had nothing to do with his experienceas an editor. After all, although Correia da Serra was a prestigious natu-ralist, and botanist in particular, deserving admiration in the growingEuropean network of natural sciences, at the same time he was ignorantof works by J.-B. Morel, Rühnken, Bentley, Giulio Pontedera – who was

164 João Dionísio

13 See Gadamer 2004, 182: ‘(...) there is a close correspondence between philologyand natural science in their early visions of themselves. That has two implications. Onthe one hand, “natural” scientific procedure is supposed to apply to one’s approach toscriptural tradition as well, and is supported by the historical method. But on the otherhand, just as naturalness in the art of philology means understanding from a context,so naturalness in the investigation of nature means deciphering the “book of nature”.To this extent scientific method is based on the model of philology.’

14 On textual scholars before Lachmann, see Timpanaro 1990.15 A new section, ‘Inquisitiones’, was created (1888-97) after Herculano’s death.

also a botanist13 – Wettstein, Bengel, as well as those by others whocontributed to scholarly editing as a growing autonomous field. 14

It is true that I am not doing Correia da Serra justice by approachinghis editorial work in a somewhat a-historical way; that is, ignoring whatwas possible for his age and what was not (Gadamer 2004: 15). Actually,the first major step in synchronising Portuguese editorial practice regard-ing historical texts with similar programmes in other countries wouldoccur only several decades later with Portugaliae Monumenta Historica, anew series directed by Alexandre Herculano. Again published by theLisbon Academy of Sciences, it commenced in 1856 and went on untilthe end of the century, lossely modelled on the Monumenta GermaniaeHistorica. It was divided into three sections taken after the structure ofthe German series; of the five sections comprehended in the MonumentaGermaniae Historica (Antiquitates, Diplomata, Epistolae, Leges and Scrip-tores), the Portugaliae Monumenta Historica took over ‘Scriptores’, ‘Leges’(called ‘Leges et Consuetudines’) and ‘Diplomata’ (named ‘Diplomata etChartae’).15 It is true that in the general bilingual (Portuguese and Latin)preface, Alexandre Herculano and Mendes Leal re-use one item ofCorreia da Serra’s introduction by mentioning that this new series willdeal with unknown documents that are bound to modify current opinion,to correct some views and to confirm others. But, immediately following,new issues appear: the desire to emulate other similar collections pub-lished in other countries (Germany, France, England, Italy and else-where); the decision to produce an edition in parallel versions whenauthentic manuscripts show important and numerous differencesvis-à-vis other authentic manuscripts; the presentation of the transcrip-tion strategy against the backdrop of the procedures carried out by Euro-pean editors and paleographers (Mabillon, Achery, Baluzio and Muratoriare mentioned) (Herculano and Leal 1856).


16 See Siegfried Kracauer’s theory against the uniform flow of time as used by HansRobert Jauss’ thesis 6 (Jauss 1982, 36-39).

Leerssen’s appealing use of the concept of network as a means ofexplaining romantic nationalism in Europe is helpful to pinpoint one ofthe main differences between Correia da Serra’s Colecção and Herculano’sseries. The idea of ‘authors influencing other authors’ is shaped accord-ing to the influencing individuals. Correia da Serra, for whom editing issimilar to a scribal act, belongs first and foremost to the naturalist net-work; Herculano, who practises editing as a scholar, belongs to the litera-ture network (in the sense given by Leerssen 2006, 569 to the field ofliterature). With reference to the notion of network I would like to brief-ly consider two practises relating to the awareness of diversity. As to theawareness of diversity regarding the comparison between copies, theColecção generally silences variants, while Portugaliae Monumenta Historicagives them voice. In other words, Correia da Serra tends to produce aunified, self-contained text; Herculano, when it seems fit to him, givesmore than one version of the same text, thus transmitting the idea thatthe reader should have access to the group, otherwise obtaining a muti-lated representation of textual reality. But as to another aspect of thisawareness of diversity, i.e., critical reception or the comparison betweenthe edition and its sources, there is no sharp difference between theColecção and Portugaliae Monumenta Historica. Unlike what happens in Ger-many, as Thomas Bein has made clear through the examples of Lach-mann’s and Pfeiffer’s editions of Walther von der Vogelweide’s Preislied(cf. his essay in this volume), there was no tradition in nineteenth-centuryPortugal of reviewing editions in editorial terms. Consequently there wasno tradition of re-editing the same texts in a scholarly way.

One may explain this situation from the geographically peripheralposition of Portugal, which naturally causes it to be dominated by slowtime curves,16 and one may compensatingly add that Portugal is today theonly country that has chosen to celebrate its national holiday on thefeastday of its foremost canonical writer, Camões (1524?-1580). I think,however, that this vivid example of the instrumentalisation of the literaryheritage in nation-building does not occur as a result of scholarly editing,but rather regardless of it. To some extent, the combination of nationbuilding and scholarly editing in Portugal is still, even as we speak, amatter of wishful thinking.

166 João Dionísio

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aberto. Leituras. Revista da Biblioteca Nacional 9-10: 13-61.Davis, Richard Beale. 1955. The Abbé Correa in America, 1812-1820. The contributions of

the diplomat and natural philosopher to the foundations of our national life. Philadelphia: TheAmerican Philosophical Society.

Domingos, Manuela D. 2000. Livreiros de Setecentos. Lisboa: Biblioteca Nacional.Freire, José Geraldes. 1989-1990. Primeiras referências latinas à conquista de Ceuta.

Humanitas, 41-42: 216-19.Gadamer, Hans-Georg. 2004. Truth and method. rev. trl. Joel Weinsheimer and Donald G.

Marshall; London: Continuum.Gomes, Saul António. 2001. Anotações de diplomática eclesiástica portuguesa. Estudos de

Diplomática Portuguesa, 41-72. Lisboa: Faculdade de Letras da Universidade deCoimbra – Edições Colibri.

Guedes, Fernando. 1987. O livro e a leitura em Portugal. Subsídios para a sua história. SéculosXVIII-XIX. Lisboa – S. Paulo: Verbo.

Guedes, Fernando. 1998. Os livreiros franceses em Portugal no séc. XVIII. Lisboa: AcademiaPortuguesa da História.

Guillory, John. 1995. Canon. In Critical Terms for Literary Study, eds. Frank Lentricchiaand Thomas McLaughlin, 233-249. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.

Gumbrecht, Hans Ulrich. 2003. The powers of philology. Dynamics of Textual Scholarship.Urbana: University of Illinois Press.

Herculano, A., and J. da S. Mendes Leal. 1856. [Advertências]. In Portugaliae MonumentaHistorica. A saeculo octavo post Christum usque ad quintumdecimum, iussu AcademiaeScientiarum Olisiponsensis edita, Scriptores volumen I, V-XXIII. Olisipone: TypisAcademicis.

Horace. 1966 [1926]. Satires, Epistles, Ars Poetica. trl. H. Rushton Fairclough; London –Cambridge, MA: Heinemann & Harvard University Press.


Jackson, K. David. 2005. As narrativas do desastre: a estrutura do relato e o Terramoto de1755. In O grande terramoto de Lisboa. Ficar diferente, eds. Helena Carvalhão Buescuand Gonçalo Cordeiro, 135-159. Lisboa: Gradiva – Fundação Cidade de Lisboa

Jauss, Hans Robert. 1982. Literary History as a Challenge to Literary Theory. In Towardan Aesthetic of Reception, 3-45. trl. Timothy Bahti; Brighton: Harvester.

Leerssen, Joep. 2006. Nationalism and the Cultivation of Culture. Nations and Nationalism12: 559-578.

Lopes, Óscar. 1971. Academias. Dicionário de História de Portugal. ed. Joel Serrão; Lisboa:Iniciativas Editoriais.

Lucretius. 1975 [1924]. De Rerum Natura. trl. W. H. D. Rouse, new ed. Martin FergusonSmith. London – Cambridge, MA: William Heinemann & Harvard University Press.

Maxwell, Kenneth. 2005. O Terramoto de 1755 e a recuperação urbana sob a influênciado Marquês de Pombal. In O grande terramoto de Lisboa. Ficar diferente, eds. HelenaCarvalhão Buescu and Gonçalo Cordeiro, 209-237. Lisboa: Gradiva – FundaçãoCidade de Lisboa.

Oliveira, Carlos Sousa. 2005. Descrição do terramoto de 1755, sua extensão, causas eefeitos. O sismo. O tsunami. O incêndio. In 1755. O grande terramoto de Lisboa, 1(Descrições): 23-86. Lisboa: Público.

Oliveira, Corrêa de, and Saavedra Machado. 1973. Textos Portugueses Medievais. Coimbra:Coimbra Editora.

Pina, Rui de. 1977. Crónicas. ed. M. Lopes de Almeida; Porto: Lello & Irmão.Ramalho, Américo da Costa. 1989-1990. O manuscrito do De Bello Septensi. Humanitas

41-42: 214. Ribeiro, José Silvestre. 1872. Historia dos Estabelecimentos Scientificos Litterarios e Artísticos de

Portugal nos successivos reinados da monarchia, II. Lisboa.Sequeira, Gustavo de Matos. 1967. Depois do Terramoto: Subsídios para a História dos

Bairros Ocidentais de Lisboa, 1. Lisboa, Academia das Ciências.Serra, José Correia da, ed. 1790-93. Collecçaõ de Livros Ineditos da Historia Portugueza. 3

vols.; Lisboa.Simões, Ana, Ana Carneiro, and Maria Paula Diogo. 2004. Building the Republic of

Letters. The Scientific Travels of Portuguese Naturalist Correia da Serra (1751-1823).Revue de la Maison Française 1: 33-50.

Simões, Ana, Ana Carneiro, and Maria Paula Diogo. 2006. Cidadão do Mundo: Umabiografia científica do Abade Correia da Serra. Porto: Porto Editora.

Tavares, José P. 1923. Selecta de Textos Arcaicos e Medievais (VI e VII Classes dos Liceus).Porto: Livraria Chardron.

Timpanaro, Sebastiano. 1990. La genesi del metodo del Lachmann. Padova: Liviana Editrice.Zurara, Gomes Eanes de. 1997. Crónica do Conde D. Pedro de Meneses, ed. Maria Teresa

Brocardo. Lisboa: Fundação Calouste Gulbenkian – JNICT.


MEDIEVAL HERITAGE IN THE BEGINNINGS OFMODERN CATALAN LITERATURE, 1780-1841

Magí Sunyer

AbstractIn the period 1780-1840 there were very few reimpressions of medi-eval Catalan texts and there was considerable confusion about thevalue of the literary past. However, at the end of the eighteenth cen-tury, a modern process of publishing medieval documentation wasinstigated, largely thanks to Antoni de Capmany, that was to have anextraordinary impact on the activity of men of letters, historians andscholars in the following century. The introduction of Romanticismby the review El Europeo (1823-24) prompted an interest in medievalCatalan history in all sorts of literary and historical genres. In the1830s philological projects were undertaken such as the dictionary ofwriters by Josep Torres Amat and some collections of texts by ancientwriters, and the first steps were taken towards the accurate editing ofmedieval texts. By the end of this period, Joaquim Rubió i Ors, im-bued with this spirit, was advocating the use of the Catalan languagefor cultured literature.

Joaquim Rubió i Ors decided to bring the poetical campaign that hadbeen printed in the Diario de Barcelona in 1839 and 1840 to its culminationby publishing Lo Gayter del Llobregat (‘The Piper of the Llobregat’). In ex-plaining his decision, he repeatedly stated, modestly, that he did notdeserve to be considered a troubadour, merely a piper; and among otherpatriotic arguments he wrote:

seria molt convenient traure ses glòries passades a la memòria del poble quetreballa i s’afanya per sa glòria venidera, i que alguns records de lo quefórem podrien contribuir no poc a lo que tal vegada havem de ser.

170 Magí Sunyer

1 Joaquim Rubió i Ors, prologue to Lo gaiter del Llobregat, in Miracle 1960, 278-80:‘[the piper believes] that past glories should be transmitted to the memory of thepeople who work and strive for future glories, and that the reminiscence of what weonce were may contribute to no small extent to what perhaps we should be.’ ‘one needdo no more than open our history book at its most brilliant pages; and sit among thegreen and venerable ruins of the ancient monument that witnessed the heroic deedsdescribed therein.’ ‘Do we not have as abundant and varied a collection of chroniclesas any other people, and an immense gallery of troubadours, fathers to modern vulgarpoetry?’

2 Anguera 1997 provides considerable data about the generalized, practically exclu-sive, use of Catalan as the colloquial language.

To transmit these memories,

ha conegut que no devia fer sinó obrir lo llibre de nostra història en sespàginas més brillants i poètiques; i sentar-se en les verdoses i venerablesruïnes de l’antic monument que presencià los heroics fets que en aquella sedescriuen.

He then specified the historical and literary glories to which he referredand demanded that they be retrieved in Catalan and not in Spanish:

¿No tenim una co¹lecció de cròniques tan abundant i variada com la quepuga posseir qualsevol altre poble, i una galeria immensa de trobadors, paresde la poesia vulgar moderna?.1

The author of this key text in twentieth-century Catalan literary history,Rubió i Ors, was a member of the group of intellectuals around thescholarly authority of Manuel Milà i Fontanals; more than his friends, hehad confidence in the potential of the Catalan language. In this sameprologue, he somewhat prematurely stated that he believed his poetrycampaign to have been a failure because of its lack of followers. How-ever, it did inspire younger writers such as Antoni de Bofarull and Mar-ian Aguiló to take up the pen, albeit for the moment only to write poetry.Subsequently they played decisive roles in the re-publication and popu-larisation of medieval literary and historical Catalan texts. His concernfor language was by no means fortuitous. The Catalan Countries werestill largely monolingual2 but, after centuries of extremely limited use ofCatalan as a means of cultured expression, the first wave of liberalmodernity had the effect of reducing Catalan to the category of a patoisand of restricting its ambit to colloquial situations. At the beginning ofthe period under consideration here, a modern intellectual who played afundamental role in the evaluation of the medieval past, Antoni de Cap-

MEDIEVAL HERITAGE IN MODERN CATALAN LITERATURE 171

many, exhumed a speech by king Martin the Humane and decided totranslate it into Spanish. To justify this decision, he wrote a death certifi-cate of the Catalan language, stating that it could no longer be used forcultural functions.

Therefore, recognising medieval texts as ‘classics’ of Catalan literatureand history had a twofold meaning. First, these texts established thenotion that Catalonia had a tradition of its own; second, this traditionshowed that the Catalan language could be used in all registers; that is tosay, like metropolitan languages, with (unlike Catalan) an active stateapparatus behind them for support and propagation.

1780-1833It should not be forgotten that Neoclassicism had little impact on thepart of the Catalan language domain subjugated by the Spanish crown atthe beginning of the eighteenth century, after the defeat in the War ofSuccession. Northern Catalonia, under French government, and Minorca,a British colony throughout much of the century, were unaffected; it wasin these territories that the Greek and Latin classics were reflected intragedies like Joan Ramis’s Lucrècia, set in Roman antiquity, and the 1808translation of Virgil’s Bucolics by Antoni Febrer i Cardona. However, asJoan Fuster (1976, 150-1) points out with regard to Valencia, we musttake into account the fascination that some eighteenth-century intellectu-als felt for medieval authors. There, several works from ancient Catalanliterature were salvaged by Gregori Maians; also, Jaume Roig’s Espill(Mirror) was published by Carles Ros in 1735, and a project was con-ceived to publish a series of classics (not exclusively Valencian) by LluísGaliana in 1763. Throughout the eighteenth century, it was quite com-mon for language apologias (for instance, those by Agustí Eura and byJosep Ullastre) to refer to better times when both country and languagehad full expression (cf. Feliu et al. 1992).

Josep Fontana points out that 1780 was the year in which the Boardof Trade and two historians, Jaume Caresmar and Antoni de Capmany,established an economic, historic and philological programme that pre-sented Catalonia’s specific needs to the State. Their approach focused onCatalan history and literature as manifestations of a separate individual-ity, which was also expressed in economic issues. The programme alsoinvolved renouncing the Catalan language:

172 Magí Sunyer

3 Fontana 1993, 120-1: ‘What they were interested in was not Catalan literature initself, but Catalan literature as proof of a culture, the mere existence of which gavesupport to the image of a distinct Catalonia that they were trying to present.’

4 Fontana 1993, 119, considers this to be the greatest work of eighteenth-centuryCatalan culture. Previously, Capmany had published Antiguos tratados de paces y alianzasentre algunos reyes de Aragon y diferentes principes infieles de Asia y Africa, desde el siglo XII alXV; his penchant for Spanish (over against Catalan) literature is manifested in hisTeatro histórico crítico de la elocuencia española, an anthology of Spanish literature from theearly romances to the present, published in 1786.

5 Rubió 1986, 83: ‘Suggestions first made by historians gave structure to ideologiesand restoration programmes that were subsequently to be valid during the Renaixença,which has to be studied in the context of the eighteenth century.’

Allò que els interessava no era la literatura catalana per ella mateixa, sinócom a testimoni d’una cultura pròpia, la sola existència de la qual donavasuport a la imatge diferenciada de Catalunya que pretenien exposar.3

Integral parts of the programme were Memorias históricas sobre la marina,comercio y artes de la antigua ciudad de Barcelona, published in 1779 by Antonide Capmany,4 and the plan to publish a dictionary of Catalan writers,initiated by Jaume Caresmar and completed by Fèlix Torres Amat de-cades later. Jordi Rubió i Balaguer (1986, 3: 82) points out that JaumeCaresmar and his followers are fundamental to the process that was tolead from the antiquarian study of history to archival and diplomaticresearch, because it was based on a movement that was active through-out Europe. Jordi Rubió himself stressed the importance of these initia-tives:

Suggestions llançades per primer cop pels historiadors donaren estructura aideologies i programes de restauració que tingueren després vigència en laRenaixença, la qual s’ha d’estudiar en funció del segle XVIII.5

Even so, let me stress once again that this movement rejected what wasto become the distinguishing feature par excellence of the Catalans: theirlanguage.

The effect of these Enlightenment activities was twofold. On the onehand, they drew attention to Catalan history and encouraged ancientdocuments of historical and literary interest to be exhumed; on the other,with the prestige of modernity, they pushed culturally ambitious dis-course towards the use of Spanish. The later process that we know asRenaixença, which depends precisely on pride in former glories, played avital role in the progress of scholarly investigation while striving to recu-perate Catalan as a language appropriate for all uses. This process was


6 Ibid., 95: ‘Catalonia, however, knew how to read and understand theEnlightenment lesson of her past revealed in the documents published in the Mem-oirs.

7 One of these was between Josep Villarroya (Coleccion de cartas histórico-críticas en quese convence que el Rey D. Jayme I de Aragon no fue el verdadero autor de la Crónica ó comentariosque corren a su nombre, 1800) and a rejoinder ‘Sobre la Crónica del Rey Don Jayme I deAragon’ (published in Variedades de Ciencias, Literatura y Artes). Cf. Marcet & Solà 1998.

8 It was at this time that the dictionaries by Just Pastor Fuster and Fèlix TorresAmat were planned; in June 1795 Antoni Elies i Robert read to the Barcelona RoyalAcademy of Arts on a ‘Catálogo de las obras que se han escrito en lengua catalanadesde el reynado de Dn. Jayme el Conquistador’; cf. Marcet & Solà 1998.

eventually to merge with political Catalanism. As Jordi Rubió puts it:‘Catalunya tanmateix va saber llegir i entendre la lliçó i¹luminadora delseu passat que es desprenia dels documents publicats en les Memorias’.6

If we focus on the publication of medieval documents, we must againmention, first and foremost, Antoni de Capmany. In 1879 he published,as part of the aforementioned Memorias, a ‘diplomatic collection of theinstruments that justify the present memoirs’ presenting 488 documents– not, to be sure, literary texts, but privileges, letters, regulations, decrees,treaties, sentences, concessions, etc. These texts testified to the brillianceof Catalonia’s medieval past and at the same time (although this was notthe editor’s intention) to the splendour of the Catalan language. Twoyears later Capmany published a document that was fundamental inraising the awareness of the importance of medieval Catalonia: the ‘Bookof the Consulate of the Sea or Code of maritime customs in Barcelona’,generally known as the ‘Book of the Consulate’. This medieval Catalancode of maritime customs was to prove highly influential in the follow-ing century.

By the end of the eighteenth century various re-editions of Catalanclassics had appeared, such as Jaume Febrer’s Trobes, which were thenthought to be medieval. They were first published in the periodical Diariode Valencia between 1791 and 1795, and then in book form in 1796.There were also some learned controversies about the classics, whichrequired knowledge and study,7 and MS catalogues or projects for cata-loguing Catalan writers.8 But the fact remains that one hundred yearslater, in 1893, Alfred Morel Fatio still deplored the difficultity of writinga true history of Catalan letters since the texts were unknown or unavail-able (Aramon i Serra 1997, 435). If this was the situation at the end ofthe nineteenth century (when considerable trouble had been taken tomake up for the shortcomings), things were even worse in the century’s

174 Magí Sunyer

9 Simbor 1980, 84-85 reproduces an advertisement by the bookseller Just PastorFuster (who was subsequently to publish a dictionary of Valencian authors) in theDiario de Valencia offering ‘por raros’ Jaume Roig’s Llibre de les dones, and the poemslater known as the Cançoner Satíric Valencià (‘The satirical Valencian anthology’).

10 Badia 1994, 10: ‘is apparently based on the tradition that survived (...) throughoutthe so-called Decadence; proof of this is the leading role given to Francesc VicençGarcia’.

early decades. Of course, there were the constant re-editions of AnselmTurmeda’s Llibre de bons amonestaments (‘The book of good admonitions’),but its usage was restricted to primary schools as an entry-level textbook, and had no connection with any rediscovery or revival of themedieval classics.

Between 1780-1833, and with the few exceptions I have mentioned,readers interested in the medieval classics had to go to libraries thatpreserved old editions and manuscripts, or to bookshops specialising inrarities.9 Or they had to make do with a few short anthologies, whichoffered little more than samples. The catalogue of works written in Cata-lan, published as an appendix to the second edition of Josep Pau Ballot’sGramàtica i apologia de la llengua catalana (‘Grammar and apologia of theCatalan language’), is extremely short and reproduces very few frag-ments. In 1824, Jaubert de Paçà’s Recherches sur la langue catalane (publishedin Paris) contained a selection of texts that, according to Lola Badia,

fa la impressió que s’alimenta fonamentalment de la tradició que treballosa-ment ha sobreviscut al llarg de l’anomenada Decadència; en seria una provael paper destacadíssim que assigna a Francesc Vicenç Garcia.10

A prevailing lack of historical knowledge is evinced in such symptomaticslips as the belief that Ausiàs Marc predated Petrarch; also, the Bibliotecavalenciana (‘Valencian Library’, the dictionary of authors compiled by JustPastor Fuster mentioned in note 9, and published in two volumes in1827 and 1830) opens with Vicent Ximeno, an eighteenth-century au-thor. The choice of texts or fragments is haphazard: the volumes containentire compositions from minor writers but, despite all the praise lav-ished on him, only two of Ausiàs Marc’s verses.

The mythification of the medieval past had literary repercussions;witness some fragments of an unfinished but well-known poem byAntoni Puigblanch, usually known as Les comunitats de Castella (‘The com-munities of Castile’). Puigblanch lived in exile in London during thetyrannical periods when Fernando VII reigned (1814-20, 1823-33); his


11 Quoted from Molas 1968, 108-9: ‘Such a noble language, spoken by/ Charle-magne’s conspiring courtiers/ And the able Catalans / Who sailed the Ionian andAegean Seas / To become the masters of Athens. [...] It was also the language spokenby the troubadours / To show noble thoughts and even nobler tenacity.’

12 Cf. also Philippe Martel’s contribution to the present volume.13 See Rubió 1986, 407-17. For Catalan-Occitanian political links after this period,

see Martel 1992.

poem is a radical diatribe against the monarch and an exaltation of lib-erty. He develops the theme of the excellence of the language, and alsovindicates it. He refers to Catalan (or, as it was often called at the time,‘Limousin’) in the following terms:

Llenguatge és tal, aquest, que del mateix usaren,del francès Carlo Magno los cortesans complots,i els destres catalans amb ell se gloriarenque del Jònic solcant, i de l’Egeu, los flots,duenyos foren d’Atenes

[...]En ell també escrigueren los gaios trobadorsamb noble pensament i amb més noble porfia.11

Regardless of obvious historical and philological errors (e.g. the mistakenassumption that Charlemagne spoke Catalan, or the prevalent conflationbetween Catalan and Limousin) the poem interestingly invokes, precisely,medieval and historicist claims to prestige: the expedition to Greece andthe troubadours. The first of these is the most constant and uninter-rupted mythical trope used by Catalans into the nineteenth century. Weshould not be surprised that Puigblanch resorts to it, particularly if weremember that both Antoni de Capmany in his ‘Memoirs’ and the Bookof the Consulate of the Sea had revived interested in the subject.

The troubadour reference is of a different nature. Between 1816 and1821, François Raynouard had published in Paris the six volumes of theChoix des poésies originales des troubadours.12 As a philologist, Puigblanch mayhave been familiar with the work. In any case, the element of trouba-dourism was to become a decisive factor in romantic Catalan medieval-ism and influenced Catalan literature throughout the nineteenth century,and even (with some ups and downs) right up to the present day.13 Theseelements make Puigblanch’s poetry more significant that it might seemfor an unfinished poem that remained unpublished for years. In fact, oneparty among the Renaixença revivalists would later claim thatPuigblanch’s poem, rather than Aribau’s ‘La Pàtria’, was the movement’s

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14 Molas1974, 19-20: ‘It still pleases me to speak the language of those wise men, /who filled the universe with their customs and laws, / the language of the strong whoobeyed the kings, / defended their rights and avenged their wrongs.’

true precursor. Still, the appearance of ‘La Pàtria’ in the newspaper ElVapor, 1833, marks a caesura.

1833-1841: ‘Taking Down From the Sacred Wall the Forefathers’ Lyre’Romanticism entered Catalonia by means of the journal El Europeo (‘TheEuropean’, 1823-24), which was directed by Bonaventura Carles Aribauand Ramon López Soler, and really took off after 1833, the year of thedeath of Fernando VII and the return of the anti-absolutist exiles. Aribauand López Soler showed no interest in promoting medieval Catalanclassics; significantly, the Library of Spanish Authors which Aribau di-rected from 1846 did not publish a single Catalan author either in theoriginal or in translation. The literary and philological orientation ofthese authors was Spanish. López Soler made just one exception to this(he wrote a single verse in Catalan); but among Aribau’s several minortexts, one that was to prove to be fundamental to the history of Catalanletters, ‘La Pàtria’.

It has been said that some passages from Aribau’s poem are indebtedto Puigblanch. However, it was of much greater literary quality andmanaged to synthesize the main features of what would become domi-nant in the re-emergence of Catalan literature. In his praise of the lan-guage, which he also calls ‘Limousin’, the link with childhood and senti-ment plays a major role; but Aribau also refers to past medieval glory,not as explicitly as Puigblanch, but leaving no room for doubt:

Plau-me encara parlar la llengua d’aquells savis,que ompliren l’univers de llurs costums e lleis,la llengua d’aquells forts que acataren los reis, defengueren llurs drets, venjaren llurs agravis.14

He mentions warriors and wise men (i.e., writers), using, in short, thesame characterization as Puigblanch, without making it clear to whichheroic deed or which wise men he is referring. Even so, he relates thelanguage to ‘the song of the troubadour’, and a little later appear the linesthat I quote by way of motto to this section of my article: ‘ni cull del mursagrat la lira dels seus avis’. Thus, like Puigblanch, Aribau uses thewell-known references to seafaring expansion and the troubadours.


15 Manuel Jorba, ‘La Renaixença’, in Molas 1986, 7: 17: ‘Largely owing to theromantic ambition of presenting national individuality in its awareness-raising stage orin its culmination, to the contributions of comparative linguistics and, in some cases,to positivist procedures, did it become possible to discover and appropriate our ownclassics and the project of publishing and studying our literary resources, particularlythe popular and medieval ones.’

Though Aribau was not interested in the advancement of Catalan as acultural vehicle, his poetry was to mark Catalan cultural history like noother.

Manuel Jorba has stated that the importance of Romanticism lies inthe publishing of medieval texts:

Gràcies principalment a l’ambició romàntica de presentar la individualitatnacional en la fase de la seva presa de consciència o en la seva culminació, ales aportacions del comparatisme i, en alguns casos, a procediments positi-vistes, fou possible el descobriment i progressiva assumpció dels propisclàssics i el projecte d’edició i l’estudi del fons literari, especialment delpopular i el medieval.15

In 1835, a scheme was launched to publish in installments a ‘Treasury ofthe Catalan Language’, running to a total of 2560 pages and includingeditions of Catalan classics (Anguera 2000, 134n). In 1836 two workswere published that were to have an important effect on nineteenth-century historiography and literature. The first was Los condes de Barcelonavindicados (‘The revenge of the Counts of Barcelona’) by Pròsper deBofarull, the first modern history of medieval Catalonia based on thenew archiving research approach. The second was Memorias para ayudar aformar un diccionario crítico de los escritores catalanes y dar alguna idea de laantigua y moderna literatura de Cataluña (‘Notes to help draw up a criticaldictionary of Catalan writers and give some idea of the ancient and mod-ern literature of Catalonia’), by Fèlix Torres i Amat. In 1847, Pròsper deBofarull was to begin publishing his Colección de documentos inéditos delArchivo General de la Corona de Aragón (‘Collection of unpublished docu-ments from the General Archive of the Aragon Crown’). These docu-ments were essential to understanding Catalan history and containedsome literary texts. They had a decisive influence on the editor’s nephewAntoni de Bofarull, a historian, man of letters and main proponent of thehistoricist Renaixença. Torres i Amat’s Memorias, the realization of a pro-ject that had begun at the end of the previous century, provided a basisfor understanding Catalan literature.

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Sometime between Aribau’s generation and the next, medievalismbecame a veritable romantic fever. Ramon López Soler (Aribau’s col-league in the Philosophical Society and in El Europeo, and the man re-sponsible for publishing ‘La Pàtria’ in El Vapor) had already used medi-eval Catalonia as the setting set much of the action of the first romantichistorical novel in Spanish, El caballero del cisne (‘The Knight of the Swan’,1830). But the novelist who is generally considered to have tipped theWalter Scott-type historical novel towards Catalan themes, even thoughhe wrote in Spanish, was Joan Cortada with La heredera de Sangumí (‘Theheiress of Sangumí’, 1835), followed by El rapto de doña Almodis (‘Theabduction of Lady Almodis’, 1836), Lorenzo (1837), El bastardo de Entenza(‘The bastard from Entenza’, 1838) and El templario y la vilana (‘TheTemplar and the peasant woman’, 1840). It will suffice here to drawattention, in passing, to the troubadourism of Lorenzo and to the traditionof historical prose which would lead from Cortada to Antoni de Bofarulland Víctor Balaguer. Those authors would exploit crucial moments inCatalan history, first medieval and then from other periods. This processculminated in 1862 when Antoni de Bofarull published the first modernnovel in Catalan, L’orfeneta de Menargues o Catalunya agonitzant (‘The or-phan girl from Menergues or the death throes of Catalonia’), set in acritical juncture at the beginning of the fifteenth century.

These historical novels with medieval themes often contained schol-arly information which, bearing in mind the difficulty of consulting oldtexts, aimed to make up for the evident shortcomings in readers’ knowl-edge of Catalan history. Jordi Rubió (1986, 410) has stated that nobodybefore Cortada had thought of annotating their novels with real facts anddocuments; but the habit was taken up, among others, by Antoni deBofarull and Víctor Balaguer and, subsequently, by Maria de Bell-lloc. In1840, Joan Illas i Vidal anonymously published Enrique y Mercedes. Novelahistórica del sitio de Barcelona. Contiene algunos documentos auténticos pertenecientesa la Guerra de Sucesión, with a highly unusual and controversial setting: theWar of the Spanish Succession. In the prologue, the author expressedregret at not having written in Catalan, because he would only have beenable to do so if he had had the soul and the language of the troubadours.This novel also provided an appendix with documentation from theperiod.

Likewise, Jaume Tió i Noè, who had written his first play about anepisode in Spanish history, followed Cortada’s novelistic development in


16 Piferrer 1839, 190-191: ‘This S is a copy of the one to be found at the beginningof the second of the five ballads by the troubadour Luis de Vilarasa, a Catalan knightfrom the beginning of the fifteenth century, whose work is part of the Paris anthology.As we have one of the copies that the French antiquarian M. Tastu brought to Barce-lona, we believe that it would not be inopportune to continue this ballad, which weshall not translate into Catalan so as not to spoil the extreme simplicity and grace of itsphrases, which cannot be rendered in any other language.’

that he catalanized the theatrical themes from Generosos a cual más (‘No-body more generous’, 1840) along the same lines as he was to do laterwith Alfonso el Liberal o leyes de amor i honor (‘Alfonso the Magnanimous orlaws of love and honour’, 1843) and El espejo de las venganzas (‘The mirrorof revenge’, 1844). Tió also edited two popular historical texts whichwere to inspire and inform a great deal of historicist literature: Expediciónde los catalanes y aragoneses contra turcos y griegos (‘The Catalan and Aragoneseexpedition against the Turks and Greeks’) by Francesc de Montcada(which was based on Ramon Muntaner’s Chronicle, and which generateda great amount of literature on the medieval Catalan almogàver-soldiers),and Historia de los movimientos de separación y guerra de Cataluña en tiempos deFelipe IV (‘History of separatist movements and war in Catalonia in thetimes of Philip IV’) by Francisco Manuel de Melo, a reference text aboutthe mid-seventeenth-century Reapers’ War.

In 1839, Pau Piferrer published the first volume of Cataluña in theseries Recuerdos y bellezas de España (‘Memories and sights of Spain’). Bothhis contemporaries and latter-day historians consider this work to be thecornerstone of Catalan historicist romanticism. Piferrer does not hesitateto include documents, in their entirety or in excerpt, about a history anda literature which he knows to be unfamiliar and poorly publicized. Thequotations are usually of a scholarly nature, but there is no shortage ofliterary passages inserted on the least likely of pretexts. Thus the chapteron Sant Cugat del Vallès begins with a beautiful capital letter S whichdraws with it the following footnote:

Esta S es copia de la que encabeza la segunda de las cinco baladas del tro-vador Luis de Vilarasa, caballero catalán que floreció a principios del sigloXV, y uno de los que forman el cancionero de París. Como poseemos unode los facsímiles que trajo a Barcelona el anticuario francés M. Tastu,creemos no será inoportuno continuar la mencionada balada, que no tra-duciremos del catalán por no concentirlo su estremada senzillez y gracia dela frase, prendas que desaparecerían si se virtiese en cualquier otro idioma16

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– and he then goes on to reproduce the poem. With procedures likethese fragments of medieval classics or poems were made known. AsJosep Fontana (1993, 542) notes, the new historiography began withPiferrer. We should not be surprised that those responsible for popular-izing Catalan history, Víctor Balaguer and Antoni de Bofarull, followedhim also in this respect.

In 1840, the journal that introduced romanticism to the Balearics, LaPalma, was published in Majorca. The instigators, in particular JosepMaria Quadrado and Tomàs Aguilò, focused not only on original litera-ture about medieval themes but also on ancient literature, in such articlesas ‘Majorcan poets’ by Quadrado (who was later to undertake the task ofediting ancient texts). In the same year, in Barcelona, a project that wasimpregnated with the Renaixença spirit (Badia 1994, 11) was started byJosep Maria de Grau and Joaquim Rubió i Ors: the Co¹lecció d'AntiguesObres Catalanes (‘Collection of ancient Catalan works’). The only works tobe published were the poems of Francesc Vicent Garcia (Rector ofVallfogona), and those of Pere Serafí, both in 1840. That the Collectionshould begin with Garcia and Serafí should be no surprise. Garcia en-joyed considerable popularity, as was shown by the number ofre-editions of his poems throughout the nineteenth century, and therewas a widespread misconception that the sixteenth and seventeenthcenturies were the golden age of Catalan literature (analogously to theSpanish Siglo de Oro). For the same reason, it was planned to publishFrancesc Fontanella alongside medieval authors such as Ausiàs Marc(Aramon 1997).

Let us finish where we began. In 1839, Joaquim Rubió i Ors beganthe publication of the poems in Catalan entitled ‘Lo Gaiter delLlobregat’, in the Diario de Barcelona – the first poetic campaign of theRenaixença. Two years later he published them all in one volume with aprologue that was steeped in medievalism. This was considered to be theRenaixença’s first manifesto. By that time, medievalism and trobadourismwere fully established in the literature written by Catalans. Rubió was thefirst to call for the revival of the Jocs Florals (‘Floral Games’), first im-ported to Barcelona by John I:

Catalunya fou per espai de dos segles la mestra en lletres dels demés pobles;¿per què, no pot restablir sos jocs florals i sa acadèmia del gai saber, i tornar


17 Joaquim Rubió i Ors, in Miracle 1960, 283: ‘For two centuries, Catalonia taughtliterature to other nations. Why can we not revive the Floral Games and the academyof poetry, and once again astonish the world with our love songs, sirventes and au-bades?’

a sorprendre al món amb ses tensons, sos cants d'amor, sos sirventesos i sesalbades?17

That did not actually take place until 1859; but in 1841, as a sort ofrehearsal, the Royal Academy of Fine Arts in Barcelona organized acompetition with two prizes. One was for a historical piece of work onthe Parliament of Casp, the prize for which consisted of copies ofBofarull’s Los condes de Barcelona vindicados, and Capmany’s Memorias. Theother was for an epic poem, more than 600 lines long, about the Catalanexpedition to the East, which was awarded to Joaquim Rubió i Ors.Significantly, the bibliography for this latter topic mentioned the popularnarrative history by Francesc de Montcada rather than the original chron-icle by Ramon Muntaner.

ConclusionsOn balance, the period between 1780 and 1840 was a lean time for thepublication of Catalan medieval literature. Very few editions were pub-lished, and the ones that were often showed a considerable lack of edito-rial sense of purpose. At the end of the eighteenth century, and largelythanks to the initiative of Antoni de Capmany, documentation of funda-mental historical interest with a modern approach began to be published.At the same time a project got under way to write a dictionary of Catalanwriters, and in 1836 Torres i Amat published his Memorias. Despite thedifficulty of finding medieval texts, a medievalizing influence can be feltin Antoni Puigblanch’s poem, in the references to Catalan expansion inthe East, in the popularization of troubadourism and, above all, in theadvent of romanticism. In fact it is already noticeable in Aribau’s ‘LaPàtria’ and in historical novels and drama written in Spanish on Catalanthemes (Cortada, Tió i Noè). In Majorca, the journal La Palma was mov-ing in the same direction. The most influential work at the end of thisperiod, Recuerdos y bellezas de España: Cataluña by Piferrer, laid down theguidelines for assessing the past and medieval literature. Joaquim Rubiói Ors started a new cycle with the campaign for catalanizing the languageof poetry and wrote the first manifesto of the Renaixença, including aproposal for reviving the medieval-troubadouric Floral Games. Together

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18 This article is part of the research carried out by the research group in Nationaland Gender Identity in Catalan Literature of the Rovira i Virgili University and projectHUM 2006-13121/FILO of the Ministry of Education and Science.

with Josep Maria de Grau, he was also responsible for the publication ofa Co¹lecció d’Antigues Obres Catalanes, which did not however go beyondtwo volumes (neither of which contained medieval authors).

It was only in the following decades that the great medieval writers,from the chroniclers to Ausiàs Marc, were published. Initially, because ofan inherent mistrust of the Catalan language, they were translated intoSpanish; only subsequently were they published in the original. In a letterto Rubió i Ors, Manuel Milà i Fontanals revealed that he was planning topublish the great medieval classics, but this was not to be. In the courseof the nineteenth century, the assessment of Catalan writers was gradu-ally refined. In this process, considerable influence was exerted by theguidelines and publishing activity of Antoni de Bofarull, ConstantíLlombart, Josep Maria Quadrado, Gabriel Llabrés, Francesc Pelai Brizand, above all, Manuel Milà i Fontanals and Marian Aguiló. According toLola Badia (1994, 13), Antoni de Bofarull’s 1858 vision of medievalCatalan literature was similar to the one we have now, and she considersthat it was between 1860 and 1889 that the work was done to provideCatalan literary history with a clearer profile.18

ReferencesAnguera, Pere. 1997. El català al segle XIX. Barcelona, Empúries.Anguera, Pere. 2000. Els precedents del catalanisme. Barcelona, Empúries. Aramon i Serra, Ramon. 1997. Les edicions de textos catalans medievals, in

Estudis de llengua i literatura. Barcelona, Institut d’Estudis Catalans. Badia, Lola. 1994. La literatura catalana medieval vista per alguns erudits vuit-

centistes, in Actes del Co¹loqui internacional sobre la Renaixença, 9-16. Barcelona,Curial.

Cahner, Max. 2004. Literatura de la revolució i la contrarevolució (1789-1849). Barce-lona, Curial.

Feliu, Francesc et al., eds. 1992. Tractar de nostra llengua catalana. Vic, Eumo.Fontana, Josep. 1993. La fi de l’Antic Règim i la desamortització. 4th ed., Barcelona,

Edicions 62.Fontana, Josep. 1997. El Romanticisme i la formació d’una història nacional

catalana, in Actes del Co¹loqui sobre el Romanticisme, 539-549. Vilanova i laGeltrú: Biblioteca Museu Víctor Balaguer.


Fuster, Joan. 1976. Llengua i literatura en el primer terç del segle XIX, in De-cadència al País Valencià. Barcelona, Curial.

Gadea i Gambús, Ferran. 1994. Notes sobre la recuperació, valoració i ediciódels clàssics durant la Renaixença. Estudi especial de les cròniques, in Actesdel Co¹loqui internacional sobre la Renaixença, 2: 17-32. Barcelona, Curial.

Marcet, Pere, Joan Solà. 1998. Història de la lingüística catalana. Vic, Eumo.Martel, Philippe. 1992. Occitans i catalans: Els avatars d’una germanor, in Actes

del Co¹loqui internacional sobre la Renaixença, 1: 377-390. Barcelona, Curial.Miracle, Josep. 1960. La Restauració dels Jocs Florals. Barcelona, Aymà.Molas, Joaquim. 1962. Poesia neoclàssica i pre-romàntica. Barcelona, Edicions 62.Molas, Joaquim. 1974. Poesie catalana romàntica. 2nd ed.; Barcelona, Edicions 62.Piferrer, Pau. 1839. Recuerdos y bellezas de España I: Cataluña. Barcelona.Rubió, Jordi. 1986. Història de la literatura catalana. Montserrat, Publicacions de

l’Abadia de Montserrat.Simbor, Vicent. 1980. Els orígens de la Renaixença Valenciana. València, Universitat

de València.


THE TROUBADOURS AND THE FRENCH STATE

Philippe Martel

AbstractIn the investigation of the earliest medieval manifestations of theirnational culture, nineteenth-century French scholars and intellectualsfaced a problem: the Troubadours use an idiom which some centurieslater had come to be rejected as mere patois. Paradoxically, a literarytradition of Europe-wide prestige, born on French territory, is notproperly French. The discovery of the Oxford manuscript of theChanson de Roland (1837) and other Chansons de geste of the langue d’oïlafforded more convenient Great Ancestors to the French intelligen-tsia; accordingly, poetry of the langue d’oc drops out of the canoniccorpus of the beginnings of the nation’s literature. Meanwhile, thetheme of the Albigensian crusade is being re-discovered and quicklysidelined as a threat to the French national mythology. But somesouthern French intellectuals, sensitised to this heritage, devote them-selves to its promotion. Mistral and his Félibres make it the basis oftheir planned Occitan Renaissance. This incipiently nation-buildingproject faces two drawbacks: the social status of the actors of theOccitan renaissance (modest middle-class in the main) bars themfrom attaining any significant political or intellectual power; and noroom is provided for Occitan-related research either at Universitylevel or in local institutions of learning. The attempt to re-integratethe Troubadours and Occitan literature and history into the main-stream of canonical French culture was doomed to fail.

From the late eighteenth until the mid-nineteenth century, France, likemany other European countries, built up progressively corpus of histori-cal and cultural references constituting the basis for a national (moral

186 Philippe Martel

1 Even the chivalric matière de Bretagne of Arthurian romance is in French, not inBreton, and in any case deals with Britain rather than Brittany.

and civic) consensus. The dynasty, common identity focus for the subjectof the ancien régime, had vanished after 1789; values, records and mythswere needed for the citizens of the new French nation-state. This in-volved a new scientific discourse about history, language and literature,and a careful evaluation of the various and sometimes contradictoryelements inherited from France’s long past. A key issue in this processwas the tension between North and South.

Multilingualism had been the rule in pre-revolutionary France, and ofcourse it did not vanish on 14 July 1789. Frenchmen then, and through-out the following centuries, could be speakers of Breton, Alsatian orOccitan.

Occitan-speaking France in 1789 covered one fourth of the totalpopulation, on one third of the national territory. An important part ofFrance has, then, its own language, social and familial structures, mental-ity and culture, level of economical development. More than a periphery,it was considered the other half of France, distinct from the regionaround the capital Paris. This situation differs from other regions which,like Brittany, have a particularism but a far less significant geographicalfootprint.

This difference was increasingly highlighted by travelers, administra-tors and statisticians, and was complemented by the gradual scholarlyrecognition of a special language, literature and history. The questionthus arose, how the official new discourse about national identity was todeal with this southern difference. Integrate, separate or ignore it alto-gether?

The problem was further complicated by a basic literary fact: south-ern France had in its own time given birth to a prestigious medievalliterature of Europe-wide renown. The trobadors or troubadours constitutea second difference with other regions.1 Should they be recognised as thetrue fathers of French literature, even though their language was notFrench, but what is usually termed patois (a francocentric word indicatingboorish jargon utterly bereft of any literary quality)? How can the Frenchnational ideology accommodate this awkward duality between the twogreat literatures of medieval ‘France’, oc and oïl? How can it resolve thecontradiction between the image of prestigious medieval Occitan, andthe image of the contemporary southern-provincial patois, which most

THE TROUBADOURS AND THE FRENCH STATE 187

French intellectuals and politicians consider doomed? This contradictioninvolves two other dilemmas.

To begin with, the image of the medieval South and its people (theMidi) runs counter to the nineteenth-century view of southerners, thenwidely considered by French elites as an underdeveloped, illiterate popu-lation too much swayed by their passions owing to the southern climate,and hence violent and politically untrustworthy. Second, history relateshow the civilisation of the celebrated troubadours had died after theferocious thirteenth-century Albigensian Crusade; thus the union ofNorth and South is the result of what many historians from the earlynineteenth century onwards began to represent as mere mass-murderinduced by clerical fanaticism and Northern greed. Was France, then, theoffspring of a genocide?

In what follows, I aim to show how those dilemmas were dealt withby early-nineteenth-century intellectuals. What did they actually knowabout the troubadours and the Occitan Middle Ages? How did theyperceive them? How does their perception change over time? Is it possi-ble to find a difference between northern and southern intellectuals? Andspecifically: are the ancient troubadours to be enlisted by some ‘Occitan’national-literary movement in search of historically legitimate ancestors,particularly when some of those intellectuals (in the ambience of Mistraland the Félibrige) begin to mount a ‘Provençal’ linguistic and culturalself-assertion against Paris?

The Discovery of the TroubadoursAs we know, the great period of the troubadours is over by the end ofthe thirteenth century, despite the attempt, through Toulouse’s JocsFlorals, to continue their heritage during the fourteenth and fifteenthcenturies. After a period of decline, this institution, conceived to culti-vate Occitan letters, converted itself in the early sixteenth century to theuse and cultivation of the King’s French. What has survived of trouba-dour literature is contained in manuscripts conserved in various places,mainly between France and Italy. Their memory was more or less vague-ly conserved from the Middle Ages into the nineteenth century throughvarious channels, which can here only be briefly touched upon (Lafont1982).

Italian culture keeps the memory of troubadour poetry because it isan intertext to Dante and Petrarch, and influences the beginnings of

188 Philippe Martel

Italian literature. This is why from time to time, important Italian schol-ars feel compelled to scrutinise these forerunners of Italian poetry. ThusPietro Bembo in the sixteenth century and Giovanni Crescimbeni in theseventeenth planned (fruitlessly) an anthology of troubadour poetry; thelatter at least managed to see into print an Istoria della volgar poesia (1678)which pays attention to troubadours.

In France meanwhile, ‘gothic’ (i.e. medieval) literature was little ap-preciated, even held in contempt. But in Provence, some sixteen-centuryscholars like Jean de Nostredame (Vies des plus célèbres et anciens poetesprovençaux, 1575) maintained some kind of knowledge about the trouba-dours, albeit tainted sometimes with imaginative reconstructions or evendownright mystifications. Nostredame (brother, incidentally, of the fa-mous Nostradamus) audaciously transforms all ancient Troubadours,whatever their actual birth-place, in true and pure Provençals. He is alsoresponsible for an invention which remain current until the end of nine-teenth century, the strange tribunal of the Cour d’Amour, in which beauti-ful and wise Provençal noblewomen were supposed to have passedjudgement on intricate affairs of the heart. Nostredame is aware of Ital-ian writing about the troubadours, and in return Italian scholars takenote of him throughout the next two centuries, helping his clever andfantastic inventions to the status of respectable tradition.

Among Nostredame’s more reliable successors was the greatseventeenth-century Provençal scholar and humanist Fabri de Peiresc,who researched and copied manuscripts available in France, and also wasin touch with Italian colleagues. Following him, other Provençal intellec-tuals like Gallaup de Chasteuil or Honoré Bouche (author of a 1664History of Provence), and later still, in the eighteenth century, Président deMazaugues continued the tradition of collecting ancient texts. But theirwork remains unpublished and has exercised no direct influence oncultural and literary life in modern Provence. There is still a literary pro-duction in the vernacular language in the sixteenth through eighteenthcenturies, but its models are French and Italian, baroque in style andwithout similarity to medieval Occitan poetry..

But changes were in the air. In Italy, a Catalan cleric, Dom Bastero,developed during an Italian journey an interest in what he encounteredabout troubadours. Although he failed to publish the genuine originaltexts, he did produce a seminal book on the topic, La Crusca provenzale(Rome, 1724), the first study about the subject which escapes the fate of


unpublished obscurity. That does not mean his work is above criticism.He deals mainly with the Vidas or Lives of the ancient poets; they hadalso been used by Nostredame to build some of his fantasies, andBastero does not correct those. Worse: being himself Catalan-speaking,he succumbs to the temptation of claiming his own Catalan language asthe only true heir to the troubadours’ old ‘Provençal’, as opposed to the‘debased’ idiom of ‘Occitania’ (a term he is familiar with). Nostredamehad outrageously ‘Provençalised’ all medieval Occitan poets, and Basterofollows in his footsteps, out of Catalan patriotism. One century later, thefirst protagonists of the Catalan renaixença remembered him, and took itfor granted that their Catalan ancestors had played a leading part in theprestigious courtly productions of the twelfth century. Which could notfail to engender subsequent controversies with Occitan intellectuals....

French learning followed suit. Troubadours found a place in themonumental Histoire générale de Languedoc (1737) by two Maurist Benedic-tines, Dom Vic and Dom Vaissète, who likewise emphasise the contribu-tion of their province to ancient Occitan literature. But their main pur-pose being historical (recalling the glory and, incidentally, the legitimacyof old provincial privileges) rather than literary, their perspective on thesubject is derivative. Also in 1737, the great French literary antiquaryLacurne de Saint Palaye, with the help of collaborators and correspon-dents, began his enormous work of deciphering and copying the materialconserved in French libraries – first of all the Bibliothèque royale, later alsolocal or private libraries. By 1739, Lacurne and his staff extended theirsurvey to Italy. The result of this work: some five thousand items tran-scribed with attempts at translation. One cannot but admire this achieve-ment. Lacurne de Saint Palaye was an expert in medieval French, andhad a good command of paleography, but as a non-Occitan-speakerfrom Bourgogne, he was in no position to grasp the language and thesubtle rhetoric of Occitan poetry. He nevertheless succeeded in makinghis way through a vast amount of this foreign material.

But once again, this remarkable work was to remain largely unpub-lished. Only in 1774 one of Saint-Palaye’s collaborators, Millot, pub-lished a selection of ca. 100 items in a book audaciously en titled Histoirelittéraire des troubadours, contenant leurs vies, des extraits de leurs pièces et plusieursparticularités sur les moeurs,les usages et l’histoire du XIIème et du XIIIème siècle.For the first time, a large public – large by period standards of course –

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2 Millot 1774, 1: xx: ‘Under bright heavens, in a country favoured by nature, wherethe warmth of climate excites spirit the without weakening the body, the inclinationfor poetry has to be more vivid than elsewhere, and more fertile in productivity. So itwas in the French monarchy’s southern provinces, all known at that time under thecommon name of Provence, because all shared the Provençal language’.

was given a glimpse of what ancient Occitan poetry was. And that iswhere the trouble started.

The North-South ControversyConcerning troubadours, their language and their country, Millot hadsome particular ideas. Of course, for him, these old poets are French,and inhabitants of the ‘French monarchy’s southern provinces’. No placeeither for Catalan pretensions or for any notion of a separate Occitanidentity. Moreover, the very location of their homeland provides thesepoets with mental characteristics directly determined by the climate theyenjoy:

Sous un beau ciel, dans un pays favorisé par la nature, où la chaleur duclimat excite l'esprit sans affaisser le coprs, le goût de la poésie doit êtreplus vif qu'ailleurs, et plus fertile en productions. Telles étoient les prov-inces méridionales de la monarchie françoise, toutes comprises sous le nomcommun de Provence, parce que la langue provençale leur étoit communeà tous.2

Nothing really original here. At least since Montesquieu, climate theoryhad been flourishing: an attempt at a materialistic explanation of culturaland anthropological diversity, holding that societies in the various partsof the world are determined by their natural habitat. From this point ofview, the influence of sun and light enjoyed by southern Europe (andsouthern France) affects the bearing of the southerners, makes themmore sensible to sensations, colours, music, but also less reasonable andmore passionate than the stolid populations labouring under a colder,rougher climate. Such a theory, of course, implies a gradation betweenpeoples, a hierarchy privileging Northerners as best fitted for reflection,judgement and progress. The capacity of conceiving and building thefuture is theirs, whereas the sensuous and passionate folk of southernregions had their high-point in remote past periods: classical antiquity,the Italian, and Occitan Middle Ages. According to Millot and his ilk,ancient Occitan poetry owes much more to these objective climaticconditions than to a true creative capacity: from the outset, a close rela-


3ibid. 1: 413-414. ‘In the twelfth, thirteenth and fourteenth centuries, the Provençallanguage had that status among educated persons that was later enjoyed by Italian, andnowadays by French. The fame and works of the troubadours made its fortune. Noth-ing equaled those poets. Everyone was eager to know them, and sing their pieces.They were like the heralds of chivalry and gallantry, whose empire took in all ofsouthern Europe. Authors who know how to please always contribute largely to theprestige of their language. Provençal only fell into oblivion because Italian worksoutshone it by their merit’.

tionship is established between southern France (‘Midi’) and that greatersouth that encompasses Italy, Spain, and the Mediterranean at large. Thesame gesture introduces a subtle devalorisation of this poetry and of itsproducers.

Subtle: for Millot liberally bestows flattering epithets on the poets hedeals with, and strongly suggests that they were in fact the forerunners ofthe West’s cultural renaissance. They only came too soon – a common-place which was to survive for a long time after Millot:

Dans le douzième, le treizième et le quatorzième siècle, elle fut parmi lespersonnes polies ce que devint ensuite la langue italienne, et ce que la fran-çoise est aujourd’hui. La réputation et les ouvrages des troubadours firent safortune. Rien n’égaloit ces poètes. Chacun s’empressoit de les connoître, dechanter leurs pièces. C’étoient comme les hérauts et de la chevalerie et de lagalanterie, dont l’empire embrassoit toute l’Europe méridionale. Les écri-vains qui ont l’art de plaire contribuent beaucoup au sort des langues. Leprovençal n’est retombé dans l’oubli que parce que les productionsitaliennes l’ont effacé par leur mérite.3

Interesting, indeed: not only have those too precocious writers and theirlanguage dropped into oblivion, but this fate is due to the superiority ofother languages and cultures like Italian. ‘Provençals’ dropped behind inthe onwards march of literary progress and were swept aside by moregifted competitors. History itself and their own lack of staying power(rather than, say, the Albigensian crusade), may be held responsible forthe demise of Occitan literature. For Millot, troubadour poetry, on thelong run, lacked depth and variety. Marvelous though these poets are,they are slightly repetitive, unable to renew their art and explore newpaths. As a man with of high moral standards (he is a cleric, after all) healso denounces their immorality. This opinion, too, remained current fora long time.

At the time, however, Millot’s work and saccharine translations metwith some success: at the end of the century, a ‘mode troubadour’ oc-curred, which does not of course imply a true understanding and knowl-

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4 Legrand d’Aussy 1781, 1-2: ‘As chance had associated me to the works of anesteemed scholar, [Lacurne de Sainte Palaye], who had specially devoted himself to theelaborate study of both Romance languages, French and Provençal, I became at lastcapable of appreciating the poets of both traditions. What a surprise it was for me,when, reading through those much-celebrated troubadours, who had been representedto us as the preceptors of our nation, I found their works woeful, monotonous, dulland unreadable, whereas the rhymers of our northern provinces, though unknown anddespised, provided me, to my great astonishment, with productions full of cheer, witand imagination.’

edge of what the troubadours actually were. This success understandablyprovoked some jealousy in the small circle of those who had an interestin medieval literature. A severe critique of Millot’s views was broughtforward from, precisely Saint-Palaye’s staff, with a book by Legrandd’Aussy. Himself an editor of old French fabliaux, he may have resentedthe success of his ex-colleague, which was withheld from himself and hisown works. But on another level, he seems to be the first French scholarto understand what danger the canonisation of long-forgotten trouba-dours might constitute for the ways in which the beginnings of Frenchlanguage and literature were seen. His Observations sur les Troubadours, parl’éditeur des fabliaux are a lengthy and circumstantial attack on ancientOccitan poets:

Le hasard (...)m’ayant associé aux travaux d’un savant estimable, lequels’était consacré spécialement à l’étude approfondie des deux Romanes,française et provençale, je me vis enfin à portée d’apprécier les Poëtes desdeux Langues. Quelle fut ma surprise, lorsque en parcourant ces trouba-dours si vantés, ces troubadours qu’on nous représentait comme les pré-cepteurs de la Nation, je ne trouvai chez eux que des poésies tristes, mono-tones, insipides et illisibles; tandis que les rimeurs de nos provincesseptentrionales, inconnus et dédaignés, m’offraient, à mon grand éton-nement, des productions pleines de gaieté, d’esprit et d’imagination.4

Legrand d’Aussy is unimpressed by climate theory and its application tothe different qualities and flaws of northern trouvères and southern trou-badours. Against Millot he argues:

(...) quoiqu’il en dise, je ne crois pas qu’au nord de la Loire le climat soitglacé; qu’on y naisse au milieu des brouillards, et avec des organes épais etengourdis. Ces tristes couleurs avec lesquelles on nous peint ordinairementle ciel de Sibérie ou celui du Groenland ne sont point celles qui con-viennent au ciel de Paris et d’Orléans. (...) Non, ce n’est point, je le répète,la température favorable de tel ou tel climat qui fait que les hommes yexcellent dans la Poésie ; ce n’est point cet avantage d’une latitude plus


5 ibid. 55: ‘Whatever he may say about it, I do not believe that north of the Loirethe climate is icy; that up there one is born amidst fog, and with thick and sluggishorgans. Those dull colours in which the skies of Siberia or of Groenland are usuallyrepresented to us, are not those which belong to Paris and Orleans (...) No, it is not, Irepeat, the favourable temperature of one climate or another that makes the men thereexcel in poetry; it is not the advantage of a more southerly latitude that bequeathed tous the masterpieces of Greeks and Romans.’

6I bid. 523-53: Therefore I did not compare the two idioms, but the productions ofboth people: because for a musician to become famous, it is not enough to have thebest instrument; he must also play it well. The poorer the instrument our trouvères hadto use, the greater is their glory at being nonetheless able to please us. Their language,inform at first, improved with time (...) [What happened to Provençal] seems to mealmost entirely opposite. Welcomed by Italy and Spain as soon as it was born, it was insome way marked out for a brilliant destiny; but soon this all changed. As soon as thetwo nations which had adopted it began to produce their own poets, its own innermediocrity made it lose its fame. It has fallen back into obscurity and oblivion, and isnow nothing more than the patois of a particular district, whereas the happier Ro-mance language of France succeeds to establish itself with splendour, and to dominateas a sovereign.’

méridionale qui nous a procuré les chefs-d’oeuvres des Grecs et desRomains.5

Legrand d’Aussy clearly prefers northern trouvères:

Aussi ne sont-ce point les deux idiomes que j’ai comparés, mais les produc-tions des deux peuples, car pour qu’un musicien se fasse une réputation, ilne lui suffit pas d’avoir le meilleur des instrumens; il faut encore qu’il sachele toucher. Plus celui qu’avaient à manier nos trouveurs était ingrat et plusleur gloire est grande d’avoir néanmoins réussi à nous plaire. Leur langue,d’abord informe, s’est perfectionnée avec le temps (...) Le sort qu’a obtenula Provençale me paraît presque entièrement opposé. Accueillie dès sanaissance par l’Italie et l’Espagne, elle se voit appelée en quelque sorte àune destinée brillante. Mais bientôt tout change. A peine les deux Nationsqui l’avaient adoptée ont-elles à leur tour produit des Poëtes, que tout àcoup la médiocrité des siens lui fait perdre sa renommée. Elle retombe dansl’obscurité et dans l’oubli, et n’est plus que le patois d’un canton particulier,dans lequel la Romane française, plus heureuse, vient par la suite s’établiravec éclat et dominer comme souveraine.6

Legrand d’Aussy’s venomous attack was answered by a Provençal,Bérenger, whose ‘Lettre à M. Grosley’ was published in the prestigiousMercure de France on 24 August 1782. It points out the fundamental in-competence of both Millot and Legrand, Northerners unable to appreci-ate Occitan language and poetry properly:

Il ne faut pas juger de ces poésies par la mauvaise traduction qui en a étédonnée, mais (...) on doit les lire dans la langue originale; or, cette langue

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7 Bérenger, ‘Lettre à Monsieur Grosley’, Mercure de France, 24 August 1782: ‘Thispoetry is not to be judged by the bad translation that was given of it, but has to beread in its original language. However, this language is not easy to understand. M.Legrand himself confesses he understands it only with difficulty. What opinion is hetherefore competent to give about its proper turns of phrase, expressions, metaphors,imagery, as these, having passed through a foreign idiom, are ill-interpreted, weakenedand disfigured? In order to understand the troubadours’ poetry properly, one musthave been born in the country where they lived themselves. Additionally, it is notenough to know the present language, one must also understand the old ProvençalRomance, which differs greatly from the modern and has no more link with it thantwelfth-century Italian has with modern Italian. And finally, supposing that an inhabit-ant of the southern provinces would undertake to put his mind to this kind of work,he would be infinitely more able than a foreigner to find beauty in these poems be-cause of the analogies that still remain. Those expressions, which would seem weak ormeaningless to outsiders, to him would still offer very charming pictures.’

n’est pas facile à entendre. M. Legrand convient lui-même qu’il ne l’entendqu’avec beaucoup de peine. Quel jugement peut-il donc porter sur lestournures, les expressions, les métaphores, les images qui lui sont particu-lières, & qui n’ont plus aucune valeur quand elles sont mal interprétées,affoiblies & dénaturées, en passant dans un idiome étranger ? (...) Pour biencomprendre les poésies des Troubadours, il faut avoir reçu le jour dans lepays où ils ont eux-mêmes vécu: encore même tout le monde ne pourroit-ilen venir à bout parce qu’il ne suffit pas de savoir le langage actuel, il estencore nécessaire de connoître l’ancienne Romance provençale, qui endiffère beaucoup & qui n’a pas plus de rapports avec lui que l’italien dudouzième siècle peut en avoir avec l’Italien modene. Mais enfin, en sup-posant qu’un habitant des provinces méridionales voulût bien s’appliquer àce genre de travail, il seroit infiniment plus propre qu’un étranger à décou-vrir des beautés dans ces poèsies, par les analogies encore subsistantes.Telles expressions qui paroitroient foibles ou vides de sens à celui-ci,offriroient quelquefois de très belles images à celui-là.7

Three years later, another Provençal, Achard, gave his opinion about thetroubadours and their language in the introduction of his Dictionnaire de laProvence. He went further than Berenger in his praise, making ‘Provençal’the mother tongue of all Romance languages – an idea which otherswould adopt later.

La langue provençale fut long-tems celle des Cours de l’Europe. Elle a lagloire d’avoir donné naissance au François, à l’Espagnol, à l’Italien & àplusieurs Langues analogues à celles-ci. Cette vérité incontestable sembleavoir échappé aux connoissances de plusieurs Auteurs qui font dériver cesidiomes de la Langue Latine (...) Parfaitement analogue à la langue pro-vençale, la Romance, qui étoit la langue des François, éprouva des varia-tions, elle différa bientôt dans chacune des provinces de la France, & cen’est que dans le douzième siècle que la langue françoise prit un caractère


8 Achard 1785, ‘Iinstructions préliminaires’, 1: xi-xii: ‘The Provençal language wasfor a long time that of the European courts. Its glory is to have given birth to French,Spanish, Italian and several languages akin to these. This indisputable truth seems tohave been missed by several authors who derive these languages from Latin (...)Wholly analogous to Provençal, the Romance spoken by the Frenchmen underwentvariations, and soon differed in each French province; not before the twelfth centurydid the French language take on features alien to its mother speech. That motherspeech remained alive in some provinces among common people. It maintained itselfin its perfection in Provence, where it was maintained by the spirit of patriotism.

différent de la langue mère. Celle-ci se conserva dans quelques provincesparmi le peuple; elle s’est maintenue dans sa perfection en Provence où legénie patriotique l’a perpétuée.8

Thus, the marvelous French language extolled by Legrand is representedas merely a late offshoot of southern Provençal, which survived the trou-badours and but maintained itself in all its purity among Achard’s Pro-vençal compatriots... Despite Achard’s obvious, strenuous Provençalpatriotism, it would be wrong to see this as the only motivation behindthose answers to Legrand d’Aussy; indeed Achard was about to producea Provençal grammar, which some years later he sent to none other thanthe patois-hunting Henri Grégoire. But Berenger published only inFrench, in the Parisian press, and obviously sought a nation-wide French(rather than provincial) career. We may assume therefore that his mainpurpose was not so much to stand up for Provençal glories as to offerhis expertise as, shall we say, an indigenous guide able to lead strangersin the maze of an ill-understood language. That trend was to be followedby many southern-born intellectuals: to claim of a position in the na-tional (Paris-centered) cultural world as the recognised specialist ofsouthern particularities. Berenger has no special interest in Occitan,which he does not write, and which, furthermore, people of his socialposition are beginning, at this precise moment (the late eighteenth cen-tury), to abandon as their customary and familial speech.

No real Provençal patriotism, then, and of course not the least idea ofany claims towards a separate, let alone national identity. For Millot andall his contemporaries, Provençal is evidently a part of French. The cele-brated symmetrical pair of oc and oïl plays into this idea, and engendersthe notion of what can be termed the original race between the twins: Atthe beginning there were two varieties of french, and its is only throughhistorical contingency that the French monarchy was based around Paris,thus favouring the final choice of oïl variety as the basis for true present

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9 Rivarol as quoted in Lafont 1982: ‘Had Provençal, which knows only full sounds,prevailed, it would have given to French the glamour of Spanish and Italian; but theMidi of France, always deprived of a capital and lawless, could not cope with thecompetition of the North, and the influence of the Picard patois grew along with thatof the crown. Hence the clear and methodic genius of this idiom, and its somewhatmuffled pronunciation, now dominate in the French language.’

10 Grégoire as quoted in De Certeau 1975, 306: ‘Probably, instead of the trouvères'language, we would speak that of the troubadours, if Paris, the centre of government,had been situated on the left bank of Loire.’

official French. Unlike Legrand d’Aussy’s model, this theory does notblame the decline of Occitan on a lack of intrinsic qualities, is politicalrather than literary and invokes something like a raison d’état. But it leavesthe nature of historical causation open: what precisely were the contin-gencies which made Paris the centre of choice for the political powers,and brought it into a position to enforce its rule upon southern country?Still many authors, whatever their mutual differences, concur in applyingthe ‘race between the twins’ model, and play the little rhetorical ‘what if’game of the failed opportunities: we find it both in the writings of theLanguedocian lexicologist Boissier de Sauvages’s (DictionnaireLanguedocien-français (1785 ed., 2: 143) and in §6 of Rivarol’s Universalité dela langue française (1784):

Si le provençal, qui n’a que des sons pleins, eût prévalu, il auroit donné aufrançais l’éclat de l’espagnol et de l’italien; mais le Midi de la France, tou-jours sans capitale et sans loi, ne put soutenir la concurrence du nord, etl’influence du patois Picard s’accrut avec celle de la couronne. C’est donc legénie clair et méthodique de ce jargon et sa prononciation un peu sourdequi dominent aujourd’hui dans la langue française.9

This has become the accepted version to the point that Henri Grégoire,the Convention representative (who had no common ground with thereactionary Rivarol apart from their love for the French language) as-serted almost literally the same thing in his notorious Rapport sur la né-cessité et les moyens d’anéantir les patois et d’universaliser l’usage de la languefrançaise of 1794:

(...) probablement, au lieu de la langue des trouvères, nous parlerions celledes troubadours si Paris, le centre du gouvernement, avoit été situé sur larive gauche de la Loire.10

‘Probably’: it was after all only a question of chance. As a consolation,southern intellectuals claimed the famous Oaths of Strasbourg as a mon-ument of their language, dating from a time when the scales had not yet


11 Trélis 1807, 104. There is also a historical lapsus here: the Louis mentioned inthe Oaths of Strasbourg was not Louis the Debonaire (better known as Louis thePious), but his son Louis the German.

tipped towards the north: thus in 1807, a distinguished member of theAcademy of Nîmes, Jean-Julien Trelis, ‘demonstrated’ to his colleaguesthat the language of these Oaths (‘the oath of Charles the Bald’s army(...) spoken at Strasbourg in 842’) is pure modern ‘langue d’oc’:

‘Sé Louis lou sacramen Kë a soun fraire Karlë a jurat counservo, & KeKarlë moun signour dé sa part noun lou tenié; se lou destournar noun loupodi ni ieou ni deguz que ieou destournar noun poësse, en nullo ajudocontro Louis noun I iren:’ C'est le serment de l’armée de Charles le Chauveà l’occasion de son traité avec Louis le Débonnaire [sic]. Il fut prononcé àStrasbourg en 842.11

A problem, though: here is the genuine original version:

Si Lodhuigs sagrament que son fradre Karlo jurat conservat Et Karlus meossendra de suo part non lo stanit, si io returnar non lint pois ne io ne neulscui eo returnar int pois in nulla aiudha contra Lodhuig nun li iu er.

The sad reality is that honest Trelis has simply translated the text in hiscontemporary dialect, for the sake of his demonstration. But he is not theonly one to use that stratagem, which was in vogue not only in Occitanregions. Catalan or northern Italian intellectuals did exactly the samearound this time, as they had done before, and would continue to doafterwards...

Revolution and Empire: A CrossroadsWith the 1789 Revolution, all those debates ceded to others, far lessinnocent. The new-born nation’s concerns are far removed from serenespeculation about France’s linguistic and literary origins. In contrast, themore crucial question that arises is the one of the linguistic unity as anecessary condition for the achievement of the nation’s ideological andpolitical unity. At this point we meet again with Gregoire, his linguisticsurvey of 1790, and his aforementioned Report (cf. De Certeau 1975).During the summer of 1790, abbé Henri Grégoire, representative in theAssemblée constituante (1789-1791), and later in the Convention (1792-1795)sent to ‘societés populaires’ in the provinces a questionnaire of 43 pointsabout the various idioms spoken on French territory. Those questionsappear purely scientific (origin of the patois, its phonetic features, exis-

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tence of a literature in patois, etc.); but the core lies in points 30 and 31.Question 30 asks whether the correspondents would consider it useful toeradicate the patois; the next suggests the correct answer, by askingthrough what means this eradication could be achieved. Grégoire’s view,which he shared with many revolutionary thinkers, is that linguistic vari-ety in France is the product of feudalism, the result of a devious aristo-cratic plot to divide the common people into mutually unintelligiblejargons, in order to hinder any concord between them. Grégoire, likemany others (and not all of them on the side of the Revolution), is fur-ther convinced that those jargons, rude and defective, are unable toexpress modernity, Reason and Progress. To connect with those forces,citizens must master French, the language of law and power, and in thesame gesture abandon their ancient idioms, in a kind of quasi-religiousconversion: a new language for a new Man.

A problem: if the correspondents, mostly militant revolutionaries,duly and eagerly agree with Grégoire’s purpose, their answers give rise toa good deal of contradictions, mostly with regard to Occitan dialects. Aswe have seen, Achard naively sent along his grammar – whereasGrégoire believed that a patois could not have any established grammati-cal rules. Others assert that their patois is understood over great dis-tances – whereas Grégoire suggests in his question nr 16 that it changesfrom one village to the next. And many actually give titles of books, andnames of patois authors...Four years later, Grégoire’s Report cannot buttake account of those elements. It concludes, unsurprisingly, by statingthe necessity of eradication, but acknowledges the existence of whatcould be called the Occitan exception, of which we had a glimpse earlier:the vivid idiom of no less vivid Southerners could have been the officiallanguage of France, if... This idiom has its dignity and its merits, itsauthors and its literature. Therefore, if other patois-speaking regionsshould be relieved to abandon their useless idioms, for Southerners it hasto be a heroically patriotic sacrifice – Grégoire speaks of ‘abjuring’. Also,dialects may have their philosophical and scientific interest, for theyprovide elements towards understanding the history of the French lan-guage, in that they have conserved remains of former stages of its evolu-tion. Moreover, southern dialects in particular (that is to say, Provençal;and here perhaps Achard’s ideas show their impact) could provide newpost-revolutionary French with fresh words and turns of phrase.


These, then, are the contradictions mentioned earlier: according toGrégoire’s report, patois dialects are bound to die, the sooner the better,but at the same time, they are granted a sort of interest: they are to bestudied as tools to a better knowledge of French cultural history. Theyare both inside and outside the field of legitimate French national cul-ture.

Accordingly, Grégoire’s report, representative of a large consensusamong militant revolutionaries and bourgeois intellectuals as well,generated two contradictory processes: on the one hand it justified andpaved the way for French linguistic policy, whose goal is to spreadFrench, and only French, at the expenses of pre-existent languages whichare ruthlessly rejected. On the other hand, Grégoire, by making the ill-fated patois an object of study and scholarly interest, may be consideredas the unwilling harbinger of the later revivals of Occitan (as well asBreton and Basque). It is perhaps not uninteresting to note that some ofthe first to devote themselves to studying patois at the beginning of thenineteenth century were, precisely, ex-colleagues of Grégoire in revolu-tionary assemblies. Raynouard and Rochegude (whom we shall meetanon) had been members of the Convention, and the oïl dialect of thePoitou was first explored by La Revellière-Lépeaux, a former member ofthe post-Convention Directoire. In 1803, a Languedoc-born author,Fabre d’Olivet, who had likewise been a participant in the revolutionarymovement, published in two volumes a so-called medieval text; his LeTroubadour: Poésies occitaniques du XIIIe siècle has the same degree of authen-ticity as Trelis’ transcription of the Oaths of Strasbourg, and much lessthan Macpherson’s Ossianic texts. But it testifies to the interest that thetroubadours met with.

The Napoleonic Empire was a time of great administrative surveys ofall kinds: the control of the territory, and a thorough knowledge of itsresources, was crucial for a nation at war. One of the side effects of thisgigantic inventory enterprise was the launching of the great survey, insti-gated by Coquebert de Montbret, of the Empire’s regional patois, underthe supervision of the Ministère de l’Intérieur (1807-12). This survey gath-ered a large collection of dialect texts with important annotations pro-duced by those local erudites whom Napoleon’s prefects tended to in-volve in their research – sometimes, it is the préfet himself who takes onthe task. Trellis’ observations on l’idiome languedocien are part of this mate-rial, and the survey itself more generally signals growing interest in the

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topic of linguistic variety at large, which in turn was beneficial to Occitanstudies. Of course, one this may have been the intention neither of theauthorities nor those intellectuals gathered in Académie Celtique who in-spired the survey (cf. Belmont 1995) They still followed the line of rea-soning indicated by Grégoire: to improve the knowledge of nationalhistory by a data inventory from the obsolescent and doomed regionalpatois. Indeed, the survey’s first effect was to spread awareness amongthe learned public as to the position of Breton, Occitan and other idi-oms. This interest is above all manifest through the impact of books likeEssai sur la littérature provençale (Aubin-Louis Millin, 1808) or Sismondi’sDe la littérature du Midi de l'Europe (1813). Millin was known for havingpreviously published an account of his journey in southern France,bound to nourish both knowledge and imagination about what at thetime was still a rather exotic and distant part of France (Gardy 1989).The Swiss Sismondi is more important still for the early nineteenth-cen-tury history of ideas (cf. Lafont 1982). A historian as well as a literaryspecialist, and even something of an economist (he has his place amongthe early critics of capitalism), he was a member of the famous Coppetcircle, where Madame de Staël gathered first-rate intellectuals such asFauriel, Benjamin Constant and the Schlegel brothers. The importance ofthis circle in the French diffusion of German romanticism and Herderianideas is well known; which makes Sismondi an intellectual opinion-maker of European, rather than merely French, importance.

Sismondi did not know either old or modern Occitan and confesseshis ignorance frankly. What he knows of Troubadours comes directlyfrom Millot. He adds some interesting ideas, for example about a possi-ble influence of Arab poetry (an enduring debate). Moreover, he pointsout what he perceives as a fundamental gap between northern and south-ern France, between two ‘races’, two peoples, each with its own charac-ter, its own culture, its own territory (his Provençals include Catalans aswell). This idea was shared, independently perhaps, by notables from theSouth itself. The comte de Portalis, of an old Provençal family, presentedthe following sentiments in 1813 to the Academy of Aix (of which hewas a member):

La Provence, située sous un ciel pur et serein, avoit mieux conservé lesbienfaits de la civilisation, parce qu’elle avoit été moins souvent visitée parles barbares. La féodalité s’y établit plus tard, avec moins d’empire et moinsd’universalité, et ses liens s’y relachèrent plutôt [sic]. Le commerce des villes


12 Portalis as quoted in Merle 1990, 2: 523: ‘The Provence, situated under a pureand serene sky, had kept the blessing of civilisation better, because it had been lessoften visited by barbarians. Feudalism was established here later, with less might andless thoroughly, and its links loosened sooner. The trade of the free cities of Marseilleand Arles, and their frequent communication with Arabs, kept intellectual movementalive and introduced politeness. Thus, the Provençal language gave birth to vernacularliterature in Europe. (...) Afterwards, Italian, Spanish and French arose on the ruins ofProvençal and those proud daughters obscured the memory of their mother. (...)French prevailed in all respects. The language of the troubadours was forgotten intheir fatherland, as were the books, both in prose and in verse, that they had left. Onlythe exaggerated pretentions of the adepts of old French trouvères compelled the Pro-vençals, aware of the outrage that their nation suffered, to unearth from the dust oflibraries their ancient titles to glory’.

libres de Marseille et d’Arles, et leurs fréquentes communications avec lesArabes y entretinrent le mouvement des esprits et y introduisirent la po-litesse. Aussi la langue provençale donna-t-elle naissance à la Littératurevulgaire en Europe. (...) Bientôt, l’italien, l’espagnol, le français s’élevèrentsur les ruines du provençal, et ces filles orgueilleuses firent oublier leurmère. (...) Le français prévalut en tout (...) On en vint jusqu’à ne plus enten-dre dans leur Patrie le langage des Troubadours: on en vint jusqu’à oublierqu’ils avoient laissé des ouvrages complets tant en prose qu’en vers. Il fallutque les prétentions exagérées des partisans des vieux trouvères françaisobligeassent les Provençaux, sensibles à l’affront que recevoit leur nation, àexhumer de la poussière des bibliothèques leurs anciens titres de gloire.12

Troubadours and Albigensians: The Unholy CrusadeSismondi, though widely read, is an amateur, after all. Enter, now, thetrue founders of nineteenth-century troubadour studies, former revolu-tionaries, now sobered, Raynouard and Rochegude. Raynouard (memberof the Académie Française) published in 1816 the first anthology oforiginal troubadour texts (Choix des poésies originales des Troubadours). Al-though he gives no translations – this will happen immediately afterpublication of the first dictionary of old Occitan – he nonetheless offersdirect access to a hitherto inaccessible corpus. In 1819 followed Roche-gude’s anthology, Le Parnasse occitanien, with more than 200 original texts.Raynouard, the academician, publishes in Paris, Rochegude in Toulouse;he will therefore remain less well-known. But they are both Occitan-born. Raynouard is Provençal, Rochegude of the Toulouse region. Herewe encounter again what we had noticed concerning Bastero: whereauthors come from influences the way they conceive their subject, asshown by their very nomenclature. Raynouard’s troubadours are pro-vençaux, Rochegude’s Parnassus is occitanien, a word which at this stage is

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a somewhat pedantic synonym of ‘languedocien’. But both agree in cele-brating early Occitan language and literature. Rochegude adds a stronganticlerical colour. Raynouard goes very far in the direction, once ex-plored by Achard, of conceiving a ‘langue romane’ as a mother tonguefor all of southern Europe, which thenceforth will be termed ‘Romance’languages. Between classical Latin and those modern idioms, he imaginesan intermediary stage, the Romance proper, of which the language ofTroubadours gives the best idea. This (audacious) idea was refuted asearly as 1818 by August Wilhelm Schlegel, but would remain popular fora long while, particularly in southern cultural circles.

But the Troubadours are not the only focus of interest for Restora-tion scholarship. Another dimension of the Occitan Middle Ages isabout to emerge up, and complete the picture: the record of theAlbigensian Crusade and its horrors (cf. Martel 2002).

Form the sixteenth century, this episode had been mainly interpretedin very general, catholic vs protestant terms: Are Protestants the heirs ofold Albigensians? From a catholic point of view, they share a lineage ofheresy. From a protestant point of view, it means that the True, pureChurch was alive as early as the twelfth century, and that the Reforma-tion will vindicate the martyrs of old times. Later, the theme of theAlbigensian Crusade is used by Voltaire as an example of entrenchedclerical fanaticism. Whatever the use the old Cathars are put to, in thosevery general debates the regional Occitan dimension is of no import,except perhaps in purely regional histories like the aforementionedHistoire Générale du Languedoc. Following the French Revolution and theRestoration of the monarchy, the Albigensian theme obtains a freshfunction: as metaphor for the conflict between Progress and Reaction.Here we encounter Sismondi again, and his copious Histoire des Français.The sixth volume of this monument of liberal historiography (1823)contains an extensive account of Albigensian Crusade, seen less as areligious than as a political and social event. I gather together some keypassages:

Jamais la poésie n’avoit été cultivée avec plus de zèle. Presque tous lestroubadours dont les noms sont restés célèbres pendant six siècles et dontles ouvrages ont été récemment rendus à la lumière appartenoient àl’époque où nous sommes parvenus. (...)Dans le même temps et les mêmes régions, l’esprit humain brisoit les an-tiques chaînes de la superstition; les Vaudois, les Paterins, les Albigeoiss’élevoient à une religion plus sûre, ils soumettoient à l’examen des erreurs


13 Sismondi 1821-44, 6: 158-59, 250-251:‘Poetry had never been cultivated morezealously. Almost all the troubadours whose names have remained famous for sixcenturies and whose works have been recently brought back to light belonged to thistime’ (158). ‘At the same time and in the same regions, the spirit of humanity wasbreaking the ancient chains of superstition: Waldensians, Paterins and Albigensianswere moving towards a more certain religion, and scrutinizing errors long establishedby deceptive fraud and by blind popular credulity’ (159). ‘The Provençals were tryingto constitute themselves as a nation, and to get absolutely separated from Frenchmen,to whom they were inferior in regard to art of warfare, but whom they surpassed inevery progress of civilisation’ (250). ‘The Provençals, having by then come to the acmeof their civilisation, looked upon the Northern French as barbarians. By them, tradeand arts had known rapid progresses. Their towns were wealthy and industrious, andeveryday they obtained from their lords new privileges. Cities were all governed inalmost republican form by consuls elected by the people’ (251).

longtemps consacrées par les fraudes des fourbes et par l’aveugle confiancedes peuples.)

Les Provençaux s’efforçoient de se constituer en corps de nation et de seséparer absolument des Français auxquels ils étoient inférieurs dans l’art dela guerre, mais sur lesquels ils l’emportoient par tous les progrès de la civili-sation. (...)

Les Provençaux, arrivés alors au terme le plus élevé de leur civilisation,regardoient les Français du nord comme des Barbares (...) Chez eux, lescommerces et les arts avoient fait des progrès rapides. Leurs villes étoientriches et industrieuses, et chaque jour elles obtenoient de leurs seigneurs denouveaux privilèges. Les villes (...) étoient toutes gouvernées selon desformes à peu près républicaines par des consuls nommés par le peuple.13

Here, the old Midi is not only shown as a sunny and poetically giftedcountry, but as the privileged theatre of the first attempt of human mindto establish civic democracy: economical development engineered intowns, with political liberty and cultural progress as natural conse-quences, and, to be sure, free thought. Cathars and Waldensians, arecheerfully conflated, claiming interest less by what they actually believedin (Sismondi does not know and does not care) than by the mere factthat they stood against the catholic church.

But this tale has a sad ending, when northern barbarians, aroused byclerical fanaticism, come and crush this fascinating civilisation:

Cette belle région fut abandonnée aux fureurs des fanatiques (...) sa popula-tion fut moissonnée par le fer (...) son commerce fut détruit, ses arts re-poussés dans la barbarie, et son dialecte dégradé du rang d’une langue poéti-que à celui d’un patois (...) Les Provençaux cessèrent de former une Nation.(...) Eclairés de trop bonne heure, marchant trop rapidement dans la voie de

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14 ibid. 6: 251-252: ‘This beautiful land was left to the fury of a horde of fanatics, itspopulation was mown down by iron. Its trade was destroyed, its arts thrown back tobarbarism, and its dialect degraded from the rank of a poetical language to that of apatois. Provençals were no longer a nation. (...) Too early enlightened, walking tooswiftly on the road of civilisation, those people stirred up jealousy and aversion fromthe barbarians who surrounded them. The struggle began between the friends ofdarkness and those of enlightenment, the supporters of despotism and those of free-dom (...) The party opposing the progresses of mankind poured forth his foes, andprofited with such fury of his victory that the vanquished party could never come backin the same provinces or in the same kind of people.’

la civilisation, ces peuples excitèrent la jalousie et l’aversion des barbares quiles entouroient. La lutte s’engagea entre les amis des ténèbres et ceux deslumières, entre les fauteurs du despotisme et ceux de la liberté. (...) Le partiqui vouloit arrêter les progrès de l’espèce humaine anéantit ses adversaires,et profita avec tant de fureur de sa victoire que le parti qu’il avoit vaincu n’ajamais pu se relever dans les mêmes provinces ou parmi la même raced’hommes.14

Enlightenment and Darkness: we move here in the realm of great princi-ples and eternal abstractions, far from the actual land where took placewhat appears, indeed, as one phase in a long confrontation which theRevolution itself failed to bring to an end and which is still awaiting itsconclusion. No Occitan particularism here: in fact, Sismondi, along withall progressive opinion of the 1820s, has no sympathy for present-daySoutherners, generally considered brutal, underdeveloped and fanaticrustics (witness the quotations last sentence). The challenge he speaks ofis a French, or even universal one. It is a battle between two principles,not between two peoples, notwithstanding the use he makes of ethniccategories.

Still, unwittingly, the Swiss Sismondi provided the basis for a south-ern appropriation of medieval Occitan history. Any Provençal orLanguedocian intellectual who subscribes to the notion that his patois hadbeen the first literary vernacular of the West and had even given birth toother languages and literatures, will henceforth also acknowledge that hiscountry was the first fatherland of Progress, Economic Development,Republican Democracy, free thought, and other progressive ideals. Hewill also hold that the collapse of this brilliant civilisation was not thefatal consequence of an inner deficiency, leading to weakness, decadence,and final extinction, but the result of military conquest by illiterate bar-barians. Once our southern-born intellectual was a provincial, living inFrance’s backwaters amidst rude rustics; he will be now the progeny of a


15Unsigned article, Le caducée 25 June 1821, quoted in Merle 1990, 664: ‘Provençals,Languedocians, Gascons always have boasted of having plenty of wit. But what Ichallenge is that their imagination is greater, bolder or more plentiful than that of theinhabitants of northern France. Mr Legrand d’Aussi [sic], having published the collec-tion of our fabliaux, has proved that the troubadours never exhibited any deep senti-ment or any moving adventure. The Southerner pretends that the warmer and brightersun renders his imagination more fertile; so that, following that nice line of reasoning,dark-complexioned people must have more wit than whites, and black ones more thanthe dusky ones. On the contrary, does not the sun do to minds what it does to thesoil? It makes the Provence an arid land. The exaltation which the southerners boast ofnearly always destroys judgement, and without judgement enthusiasm is nothing butmadness: the great merit of an author is to join deep reasoning to exquisite sensibility,and Mr Legrand has proved to us that you cannot name one work from a troubadourthat matches the tales of the trouvères.’

medieval avant-garde. Starting from this point, it is now possible forsome of those intellectuals to conceive the idea of a return to this ancientstate of glory: the Occitan renaissance has here won a ‘national’-ideologi-cal basis.

Gradually, such intellectuals began to claim their ancestry. Not with-out resistance, even at home. One example: the anonymous correspon-dent (apparently not southern-born) of the Marseilles newspaper Lecaducée, who in on 25 June 1821 reproduced the line of reasoning ofLegrand d’Aussy, as if nothing had occurred in the forty-year interval:

Les Provençaux, les Languedociens, les Gascons se sont toujours piquésd’avoir beaucoup d’esprit ; mais ce que je leur conteste, c’est d’avoir plusd’imagination, qu’elle soit plus vive et plus abondante que celle des habitansdu nord de la France. Mr Legrand d’Aussi ayant publié le recueil de nosfabliaux a prouvé que dans les troubadours il n’y avait jamais un trait desentiment profond ni une aventure touchante. Les Méridionaux prétendentque le soleil y étant plus chaud et plus brillant, leur imagination doit êtreplus féconde. De sorte qu’en suivant ce beau raisonnement, les peuplesbasanés doivent avoir plus d’esprit que les blancs, les nègres plus que lesbasanés. Le soleil au contraire ne ferait-il pas sur les esprits ce qu’il fait surla terre ? Il rend la Provence aride. L’exaltation dont les peuples du Midi sevantent détruit presque toujours le jugement, et sans jugemet l’enthousias-me n’est que folie: le grand mérite d’un auteur est d’unir à un raisonnementprofond une sensibilité exquise, et Mr Legrand nous a démontré qu'on nepeut citer aucun ouvrage de troubadour à opposer aux fables destrouvères.15

Still, such outbursts did not hinder a growing interest in the OccitanMiddle Ages, favoured by the climate of Romanticism. Did this meanthat the time has come for a recognition of the Occitan heritage as part

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of a wider, truly inclusive French heritage acknowledging its diversity?Not quite.

1830-1850: The ScissorsBy ‘scissors’, I mean two contradictory movements taking place at thesame time, in those years of relative stabilisation in French society underbourgeois rule and with a national ideology. On one side the troubadoursand their Albigensian accomplices were disconnected from the nationaldiscourse concerning culture and history. But on the other side, newactors enter the fray: those who take part, in increasing numbers, in thebeginning of the Occitan renaissance.

Of course, the rejection of the troubadours is neither immediate norruthless. Some first-rate French intellectuals maintain an interest in thetopic, at least for a while. First of all Claude Fauriel, whose role in Euro-pean as well as French cultural history is well known. His main interest isin popular literature, including that of Greece and the Balkans, as well asFrench culture. He may be considered a key player in a Europe-widecirculation and transfer of ideas, particularly of German origin (and moreparticularly still of Herderian origin; cf. Denis 1982). His universitycareer was justified by his production and intellectual influence; hisbirthplace, Saint-Etienne, is some ten kilometers north-east from thelinguistic boundary between Occitan and Franco-Provençal. Faurielscrutinised medieval literatures for the origins of national cultures, eachvernacular language and culture being the product of a particular Volks-geist. For him (and he was not alone in this respect), vernacular literaturesare the expression of both an ethnic and a popular aspiration to self-articulation. In their texts he seeks a primeval naturel, a naivete which thefurther developments of established literatures have somewhat forgotten.Occitan literature in particular was very important for him, as he saw init the very beginning of all French literature, its status nascendi: not onlythe famous troubadours, but epics as well. To Occitan literature Faurieldevoted a lecture series at the Sorbonne in 1830-1831.

This could be considered as the final promotion of Occitan cultureinto the canon of national culture – were it not for the fact that theselectures formed part, not of a French literature course, but of fauriel’sremit of foreign literature. Fauriel’s preoccupations constitute an end, nota beginning; that also goes for his following works on the subject: the1836 Histoire de la Gaule méridionale sous la domination des conquérants


germains. Domination, Germanic conquerors: the very title is a declara-tion, and the indication of a polemical position. In 1837 Fauriel edited amedieval text, one of the early Occitan literary masterpieces as well as ahistorical document of great interest: the Cançon de la Crosada, the versi-fied story of the event which Sismondi had before put under light.Fauriel has often been criticised, subsequently, for failing to notice thatthe poem has in fact two authors; but at least he made a text availablewhich had remained unnoticed since at least the fourteenth century, andwhich Frédéric Mistral would call ‘the Bible of our nationality’.

Fauriel is not in the mainstream of French literary and historicalstudies as they develop after 1830: he is of an older generation, the gen-eration of those who had been young in the revolutionary years and hadreached maturity during the Napoleonic regime. The younger generationof French scholars held other views, far less favourable to Occitan roots.The general context has shifted: Sismondi’s heroic tale of Enlightenmentfighting Darkness was fashionable and ideologically productive whenFrance was ruled by the two last Bourbon kings, and their revenge-thirs-ty aristocrat followers, when the possibility of a complete Restoration ofthe ancien régime style absolute monarchy was to be apprehended. Withthe 1830 revolution, this risk disappears, and the new regime, a constitu-tional monarchy, claims to incorporate also the heritage of the Revolu-tion: a bourgeois king, and his bourgeois prime ministers (Thiers,Guizot, Soult) are now in charge, and their motto ‘enrichissez-vous par letravail et par l’épargne’ fits admirably well with the ideal of many formeropponents to the Bourbon monarchy. Enlightenment has triumphed overDarkness and fanaticism, and the new battle is now between Order andwhat Thiers calls the vile multitude: those workers and republican hotheadswho from time to time mount their barricades in the city streets. In thisscheme, Albigensian ‘victims of fanaticism’ and their troubadour spokes-men have no role to play. The priority has shifted to provide Frenchsociety with a common origin-tale, emphasizing its long quest for unity;here, again, the idea of a North-South conflict is counterproductive.There were civilian conflicts and wars throughout French history, andregrettable as they are, they can not go unmentioned, but at least theyinvolved in their time the whole of French society, on every point ofnational territory, which made them, in a sense, mere episodes of domes-tic conflict within the big French family. Not so with the North/Southquestion, which proffers the incommodious idea of two mutually hostile

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16Michelet 1975 (1833), 2:. 433 and 501: ‘Those southerners, industrious andcivilised traders like the Greeks, had not really a better reputation of godliness orbravery. They were thought to have too much knowledge, too much ability, too muchloquaciousness. Heretics were abundant in their half-Moorish cities. Their morals weresomewhat Mahomedan (...) The Languedoc was the true mixture of people, the genu-ine Babel. The Semitic element, Jewish and Arab was strong in Languedoc (...) Jewswere numerous.’

17 406: ‘A graceful, frivolous and immoral literature, which did not know any idealbut love, love of woman, and which never rose up to eternal beauty. A sterile perfume,short-lived flower grown on rock, which was already withering when the heavy handof Northerners came and covered it to crush it.’

original families, and implies that French unity was obtained, as far asthe Languedoc was concerned, through the veritable extinction of one ofthose families. This skeleton is stored deep in the recesses of the tricol-oured closet. Jules Michelet, inspiration of the republican discursive tradition con-cerning the nation’s history, makes this clear. As his master Sismondi hadgiven the Albigensian crusade so prominent a place as to render it im-possible to ignore, Michelet subtly revises its import. He retains thewords Sismondi has used to describe pre-French ‘Provençals’ and theircountry, but then plays with these words:

Ces gens du Midi, commerçants industrieux et civilisés, comme les Grecs,n’avaient guère meilleure réputation de piété ni de bravoure. On leur trou-vait trop de savoir et de savoir-faire, trop de loquacité. Les hérétiquesabondaient dans leurs cités demi mauresques; leurs moeurs étaient un peumahométanes. (...) Le Languedoc était le vrai mélange des peuples, la vraieBabel. L’élément sémitique, juif et arabe était fort en Languedoc (...) lesJuifs étaient innombrables.16

Industrious, civilised, knowledge, cities, heretics, even bourgeois urbanrepublics: the elements of the picture are there, but distorted. And inspite of Michelet’s reputation as a democrat and humanist, one cannotbut wonder at the way he insists on the racial mixture that is the charac-teristic of southern society, and the place he assigns to Jews in particular.As for troubadour poetry, it is swiftly dismissed:

Gracieuse, légère et immorale littérature, qui n’a pas connu d’autre idéal quel’amour, l’amour de la femme, qui ne s’est jamais élevée à la beauté éter-nelle. Parfum stérile, fleur éphémère qui avait crû sur le roc et qui se fanaitd’elle-même quand la lourde main des hommes du Nord vint se poser surelle et l’écraser.17


18 Villemain 1830, 1-ff.: ‘While northern France underwent hard and violent domi-nation (...), the Midi had been more peaceful, more industrious, wealthier (...). Themildness of climate, a certain impulse of chivalry and magnanimity coming out ofSpain and even from the Moors, had communicated to the inhabitants a poetic ele-gance that is not unlike the humanity of modern times. (...) Provençal poetry was, so tosay, the liberty of press in feudal times: a tougher, bolder, less repressed one than ours.(...) In Provençal sirventé verse appears then not only a source of new poetry, but aprinciple of reasoning and freedom that stands against what was then far stronger thaniron: theological and monastic influence.’

If someone is to blame, it is feudal barons, and church authorities. As forthe king of France, he is the one who after the crisis recovers the landfor the sake of the building the French state, preparing, in the long run,the reconciliation under his banner between north and south, henceforthunited in the same homeland, fighting side by side against the samehereditary (all too numerous) enemies, and happily oblivious of theirancient grudges..

Literary history follows the same trajectory, which tends to bypassmore and more the specific culture of southern France in order to pre-serve the master narrative of a necessary national unity around a com-mon unique language – this being the clear and precise French. A case inpoint are the remarks on medieval literature in the Cours de littératurefrançaise taught in 1830 by Villemain, a professor at the Sorbonne andfuture member of the Académie Française:

Pendant que la France du Nord était livrée à des dominations dures etviolentes (...) le Midi avait été plus paisible, plus industrieux, plus riche (...)La douceur du climat, je ne sais quelle impression chevaleresque et gé-néreuse venue de l’Espagne et même des Maures avaient communiqué auxhabitants une élégance poétique qui se rapproche un peu de l’humanité destemps modernes (...) La poésie provençale, c’était, pour ainsi dire, la libertéde la presse des temps féodaux, liberté plus âpre, plus hardie et moins ré-primée que la nôtre. Dans les sirventés provençaux apparaît donc nonseulement une source de poésie nouvelle, mais un principe de raisonnementet de liberté qui s’oppose à ce qui était alors bien plus puissant que le fer,l’influence théologique et monacale.18

This sums up the liberal doxa about the achievements of progressiveOccitan literature, blessed by its climate. The author’s carefully chosenanachronisms establish an ideological complicity with a public sharingliberal ideas and happy to see them anticipated even in the so-called darkages. But Villemain is not altogether convinced by the troubadours: ‘WeNortherners, with our rainy summers and cold winters, I wonder if we

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19 223: ‘This troubadour poetry, by becoming satirical and hateful, was losingsomething of its brilliant inspiration. It seems to be born to sing the beautiful sun, thespring and pleasures of the Provence. Once it tore itself away from this sweet use, itwas often more injurious than energetic. It is manifest, it is visible that Provençalshated Frenchmen, and wanted to live apart. A people, a language; a language, a people.Had Provence remained independent, it would have been a was a southern people,with its name, its arts, its own spirit’.

20 ibid.: ‘Gentlemen, we have rapidly outlined the main features of the Provençalspirit, which, at first akin to the French spirit, had left it, had had a vivid glamour, andweakened and vanished as the Midi’s provinces got absorbed into French territory. Bynow, we get actually nearer to our true fatherland, and we will try to make out the firstfeatures, the first clues of the purely French genius.’

are good judges for southern poetry’ (p. 161). Climate now recurs as acleavage between north and south.

Cette poésie des Troubadours, en devenant satirique et haineuse, perdaitquelque chose de sa brillante inspiration. Elle semble née pour chanter lebeau ciel de Provence, le printemps, les plaisirs; quand elle s'arrachait à cedoux emploi, elle était souvent plus injurieuse qu'énergique (...) Il est ma-nifeste, il est visible que les Provençaux haïssaient les Français et voulaientexister à part. Un peuple, une langue, une langue, un peuple. Si la Provencefût devenue indépendante, c'était un peuple du Midi de plus, avec son nom,sa langue, ses arts, son génie propre.19

This anticipates Michelet’s verdict of ‘gracious and immoral’. Worse: thelinguistic singularity of those southerners, and the hatred they felt fortheir northern neighbours could have led to a historical catastrophe: thebirth of a separate nation with a separate language and conscience; to thedetriment of France proper. In the equation ‘a language, a people’,Villemain’s France offers no space for Occitan. Anyway, Villemain atthis point dismissed Occitan with a cursory obituary, moving to this truetopic:

Messieurs, nous avons rapidement esquissé les traits principaux de l’espritprovençal, qui, d’abord parent de l’esprit français, s’en était séparé, avaitbrillé d’un vif éclat, et s’affaiblit et s’éteint au moment où les provinces duMidi sont absorbées dans le territoire français. Maintenant, nous nous rap-prochons de notre véritable patrie, et nous tâcherons de démêler les pre-miers caractères, les premiers indices du génie purement français.20

‘Purely French’ ... Those who were building the edifice of a ‘purelyFrench’ literary history, had the stroke of good fortune around this time.In 1837, the very moment of Fauriel’s edition of Cançon de la Crosada,Francisque Michel retrieved the Chanson de Roland from the Bodleian


21 Nisard 1844, 102: ‘Provençal poetry, yet languishing by the end of the twelfthcentury, died in thirteenth century with the civilisation that had given it birth’, andGérurez 1852, ix: ‘By restricting this work to French literature, I shall have to let asideall that has to do with Latin literature and even Provençal poetry, which left us nothingor hardly anything, and which is more naturally linked, both through analogy of lan-guage and through influence of feelings, to Italy and Spain.’

Library at Oxford. An epic dealing with Charlemagne, the emperor ofDouce France (as the text calls it); an epic opposing the Christian heroRoland and the Saracens whose descendants France was just then con-fronting once again in Algeria: what could be more convenient as a foun-dational text for French literature? Its rough-hewn virility, too, made itdifferent from the effete amorousness of troubadour poetry. Henceforth(and until the present day) the canonic presentation of French literaryhistory in schoolbooks and handbooks will prioritise epics and chansons degeste, relegating lyrical poetry to a more modest place. Two samples ofthose handbooks will suffice as examples.

La poésie provençale, déjà si languissante vers la fin du siècle précédent,s’éteignit au XIIIe siècle avec la civilisation qui l’avait fait naître.

En limitant ce travail à la littérature française, je devrai laisser dans l’ombretout ce qui se rapporte aux lettres latines et même à la poésie provençale,qui ne nous a rien donné ou fort peu de chose, et qui se rattache plusnaturellement, par l’analogie de la langue comme par l’influence des senti-ments, à l’Italie et à l’Espagne.21

After 1860After 1860, medieval philology in Paris was dominated by Gaston Parisand Paul Meyer, who through the Ecole des Chartes, the Ecole Pratiquedes Hautes Etudes, and the Collège de France, held a hegemonic posi-tion in the field of philological studies until the beginning of twentiethcentury, helping their disciples to install themselves in strategic positionsthroughout the university system. Although Meyer was a friend of Mis-tral, and capable of dealing with old Occitan texts, it is clear that the twomasters and their pupils locate early French literature within the langued’oïl. Both doubt any real difference between southern and northern‘gallo-romance’ dialects: the various and varied idioms across the na-tional territory constitute a tapestry in which their colours get impercepti-bly mingled – and Occitan disappears (Lafont 1991).

212 Philippe Martel

22 Diouloufet 1829: ‘Thanks to you, Provençal muse, our land is immortal. By thenyou had no equal, your reign seemed eternal. The proud Muse of the Seine todaywants to reign supreme, since we have become French. But, to whom loves his father-land, and songs, and harmony, the provençalés is always pleasing.’

In Paris at least. Elsewhere, things are different. In Germany, whereGaston Paris (who studied there) and Meyer seek their methodologicalmodels (grudgingly so, after the defeat of 1870), ‘Provenzalisch’ philol-ogy flourish since the time of Diez and his disciples. The part played byGerman universities for two centuries in the field of Occitan researchwould be a subject by itself, and can here only be hinted at here in pass-ing. Numerous text editions, anthologies, grammars, theses were pub-lished in Germany and in German, such as Levy’s modestly-titled Supple-ment Wörterbuch complementing the old dictionary of Raynouard: severalvolumes which constitute until now the best available old Occitandictionary. I also pass over those German poets like Heine and Lenau,who use Provençal material (featuring Albigensians or troubadours) assubjects for verse or theatre. Instead, another development needs to behighlighted: the local disciples of Raynouard and Rochegude.

Thus the Provençal Diouloufet, a correspondent of Raynouard whopublished Occitan poetry as soon as 1819. In a 1829 selection of hispoems, the memory of the old troubadours is showcased:

Graci a tu, Muso prouvençalo, / Nouestre païs es immourtel / Adouncn’avies pas toun egalo / Toun regno semblo eternel: / La fiero Muso de laSeino / Hui voou regnar en souveraino / Despiei que siam vengut francés./ Mai a qu amo bèn sa patrio / Et leis cançouns et l’armounio / Toujourplai lou prouvençalés.22

But who reads Occitan poetry? Some (rare) southern intellectuals under-take to study and edit old Occitan texts, but these are not establishedacademics. A case in point is Gatien-Arnoult from Toulouse, the editorin 1841 of the Leys d’Amor, a fourteenth-century handbook for trouba-dour poetry and Occitan grammar: In a somewhat ironic introduction, herelates how he tried to obtain financial support for his work from theDepartment of Education, and how support was promised but vainly so;so that Gatien-Arnoult in order to get his book published was compelledto apply to the Académie des Jeux Floraux and the municipality of Tou-louse. The uncooperative Education Minister who strung Gatien-Arnoultalong with vain promises turns out to be Villemain, whose opinion aboutthe troubadours we have encountered. Gatien-Arnoult was, politically


speaking, republican-minded, not a very good idea in 1841; but that doesnot fully explain the lack of interest among national institutions.

Another Occitan intellectual was more fortunate. Bernard Mary-Lafon, born in the Montauban region, published his patriotic Histoirepolitique, religieuse et littéraire du Midi de la France in 1845 – in Paris, whereMary-Lafon had previously tried (rather unsuccessfully so) to make hismark as a novelist. His purpose: to tell the story of a Midi characterisedby its love for freedom, gifted with qualities such as tolerance and clever-ness. This Midi finds itself regularly confronted with the oppressivejealousy of a semi-barbarous North, the country of the Franks. Through-out the centuries, the dramatic conflicts in Southern France (theAlbigensian crusade, the sixteenth-century wars of religion, popularrevolts, and the federalist insurrection of 1793) mark so many momentsof struggle between North and South. In the end, Mary-Lafon endorsespost-revolutionary France because it subscribes to the values so longdefended by Southerners; but this does not alter the vindictive tone ofhis history. Of course in this epic of the indomitable Southern spirit, thetroubadours have their place (Mary-Lafon 1845 2: 343-390). Immediatelyafterwards comes the Albigensian Crusade, which ends the second vol-ume and opens the third. Mary-Lafon not only quotes troubadour poemsin the original but also gives a fairly accurate translation, and biographiccomments about the main poets. Against national historians and literaryspecialists who have at that time begun to dismiss both the troubadoursand the Albigensian Crusade, Mary-Lafon founds a counter-discoursecleverly using the topoi established some twenty years earlier by Sismondi.Just as Michelet draws up the outline of a national French history, whosegreat principles, events and heroes constitute a canonical doxa aboutEternal France, Mary-Lafon, with his recurrent cycle of northern attacksagainst freedom-loving southerners, provides his Félibrige and Occitanistsuccessors (on whom, cf. Martel 1992) with an Occitan doxa.

And successors he had, even if he himself did not like them verymuch. Frederic Mistral (the 1904 Nobel Laureate and most prominentrepresentative of the Occitan renaissance) and his Félibrige friends presentthemselves as the heirs of the medieval poets, and never fail to celebratetheir glory. One example among many others is Mistral’s 1861 poem‘Odo i troubaire catalan’, an ode dedicated to Catalans poets and to thefreshly re-established Occitan-Catalan fraternity:

214 Philippe Martel

23 Mistral 1889, 166-168: ‘The troubadours – and no one since then surpassedthem, in spite of the priests – raising the common people’s language to the ear ofkings, sang lovingly, sang freely, the coming of a new world, and the scorn of old fears.By then there were hearts, and sharp revival. The Arles republic, back in its marshes,faced down the Emperor. That of Marseille, in feudal times, displayed written on hisgate: ‘All men are brethren’. By then when from far away to North, Simon de Mont-fort, for the glory of God and the law of the strongest unchained the crusade andwhen the starving raven, came flying, tearing apart nest, mother and brood. Tarasconand Beaucaire, and Toulouse, and Beziers, their body a bulwark, Provence, thou saw’stthem, thou saw’st them seething, running at arms, and for freedom willingly dying.Nowadays, we crouch in front of the face of a constable.’

Li Troubaire – e degun lis a vincu despièi / A la barbo di clergue, à l’aurihodi rèi / Aussant la lengo poupulàri, / Cantavon amourous, cantavon li-bramen / D’un mounde nòu l’avenimen / E lou mesprès di vièis esglàri.Alor i’avié de pitre, e d’aspre nouvelun./ La republico d’Arle au founs de sipalun / arresounavo l’Emperaire / Aquelo de Marsiho en plen age feudau /Moustravo escri sus soun lindau / Tóuti lis ome soun de fraire.Alor, d’eilamoundaut, quand Simoun de Mountfort /pèr la glòri de Diéu ela lèi dóu plus fort/ Descaussanavo la Crousado, / E que li croupatas,abrasama de fam, / Voulastrejavon, estrifant / Lou nis la maire e la nisado,Tarascoun e Beucaire, e Toulouso, e Beziés, / Fasent bàrri de car, Prouvèn-ço li vesiés, / Li vesiés bouie e courre is armo / E pèr la liberta peri tóuticounsènt.../ Aro, nous agroumelissèn / Davans la caro d’un gendarmo.23

However, although Mistral and his fellow Félibres from 1854 onwardwould invoke the troubadours in poems, discourses, quotations andepigraphs, they showed little interest in seriously studying them. Theirknowledge of the topic is most often second-hand and superficial. Oneexception was that circle of Montpellier intellectuals who in 1869founded a Société des Langues Romanes, and a journal (which still exists), theRevue des Langues Romanes combining studies about contemporary andmedieval Occitan, editions of medieval and modern literary texts, evenfolktales and songs (Martel 1988). But they soon become embroiled inrivalry with Paris-based institutional Romance Studies, and its leadersGaston Paris and Paul Meyer: Parisian academics against provincialamateur scholars... By 1890, the founders of Societé des Langues Romanes,the félibres Tourtoulon and Roque-Ferrier, lost editorial control of theirjournal, which from that moment onwards would (until recently) devoteless and less space to proper Occitan studies. Generally speaking, theFélibrige had precious few professional academics on its rolls, and thosenever played a prominent role in it. And the young fervid militants eachgeneration provided to the Félibrige do not seem very interested in austere


studies of the language they use, and of the troubadour ancestry theyboast of. It comes as no surprise, then, to see that after1850 the mainstudies about ancient Occitan and its literature, as well as the editions ofthe fundamental Occitan corpus, continue to be pursued in Paris or inGerman universities.

ConclusionThe problem with the troubadours is perhaps they have been spoken of farmore than actually studied: what Robert Lafont calls the ‘texte-trouba-dours’, as substitute for the ‘texte des troubadours’. Just as if they werenot that important in themselves, but only as a pretext to speak of some-thing else.

However, they had their chance, at one moment. They could havebeen integrated into the official national canon as the first vernacularlyric poets in France’s literary history. Their moment begins around1774, and for all practical purposes may be considered as closed around1840.

They could sow an entitlement to canonicity: their international re-nown in their own day, to begin with, had been long testified to by Ital-ian scholars. There was also their reputation of poetic elegance and pol-ish, which made them stand out amidst the crudeness commonly attrib-uted, in the late eighteenth century, to the Gothic Middle Ages. Theirstyle was both more natural and more naive, as befits the first generationto use vernacular Romance for literary purposes; cultivated, almost mod-ern.

At the beginning of the nineteenth century, the troubadours’ standingwas boosted by their association with the political and social events ofthe Albigensian Crusade: progressive thought and progressive poetrystood shoulder to shoulder against feudal and clerical violence.

But in the long run they faded from the family photograph ofFrance’s glorious past. For their language is not French The illusion thatOccitan is a variant of French, nourished by the false symmetry Langued’oc – Langue d’oïl and the confusing linguistic category of patois, onlylasted as long as the original texts remained unavailable; a more accuratepicture of France’s linguistic landscape only emerged after the 1789Revolution and with the linguistic surveys of the Napoleonic Empire.Occitan is then recognised as distinctly non-French, not even somecollateral ancestor of present French. Worse, its only obvious living

216 Philippe Martel

24 On climate theory and on the ambivalence inherent in many ethnotypes, see therelevant articles in Beller & Leerssen 2007.

relative is the contemporary patois of the Midi, doomed to be eradicated.As for its association with the Albigensian Crusade, politically useful toby left-wing, liberal intellectuals of the during Restoration period, itbecomes problematic after 1830. Before Sismondi, inhabitants of south-ern France and speakers of southern Oc-French could figure as a part ofa larger whole, the people of France at large, of which they were merelythe most sunburnt and extraverted component. But the very insistence ofliberal historiography upon their racial difference and the recriminationsover the horrors of the crusade breaks through this illusion as well: thisMidi definitely was non-French.

The building of a national French ideology after 1789 demands unityfirst of all, and rejects anything that can limit or endanger this unity.History, including literary history, has to serve a purpose: to tell thereassuring story of a difficult but steady march towards unification. Inthis context, there is no place for any Occitan exceptionalism.

Other factors play a role as well: the interference of a ‘Midi’ ethno-type based upon climate theory, giving rise to a characterisation of thesun-dominated South as less truly French, leaning towards a Spanish orItalian temperament (two nationalities enjoying little prestige in Frenchpublic opinion). Romantic exoticism and an apprehensive view of south-ern mobs as particularly prone to political violence (from the time of theRevolution to the ‘White Terror’ of 1815) widen this perceived tempera-mental gap and serve to alienate and depreciate Southerners as seen bythe intellectual and cultural circles of the capital. In fact the ethnotypicalrepresentation of Southerners is somewhat contradictory: the brightsouthern sun is held to breed both the sensual, frivolous troubadoursand the disquieting, violent brown-skinned Provençal and Languedocianpeasants, with their illiteracy and their incomprehensible patois.24 But atany rate, and whatever the variant chosen, the final picture is not posi-tive. At this point, French official culture feels it is more expedient todismiss the troubadours, their poetry and their language, all together.

Of course, southern intellectuals could have recuperated it all, andhave turned it into a trump card in the assertion of cultural dignity, ofautonomy, perhaps even, in due course, of political action towards theacknowledgement by the Centre of the rights of the Periphery: the well-


known transition, first identified by Miroslav Hroch (1985) between theA and B phases of national movements.

Indeed, some did try to follow that more activist path. Their failurewas die in the first place to institutional factors: they lacked the institu-tions that could match the weight and influence of national French cul-ture and the national ideology, and sustain and diffuse an alternativeideology locally. The Paris/Province power imbalance, so pronounced inFrench history since at least the sixteenth century, left no place for anylocal counterforce, be it political or simply cultural. Moreover, most ofthe local intelligentsia preferred to establish their career moves at theCentre rather than to linger unknown at the periphery – witness thefigure of Bérenger and the early ambitions of Mary-Lafon. Only afterthose early ambitions had miscarried did he reorient his career strategyand try to position himself as the spokesman of southern difference onthe central cultural market. Even Mistral himself initially sought acclaimin Paris with his first poem in 1859, hoping that the endorsement of‘national’ critics would gain him attention from his fellow provincials,back there, at home. But that is another story.

Socially speaking, the protagonists of the Occitan renaissance aremainly middle-class men: marginal to the cultural elite in terms of classas well as geography. They possessed neither the cultural capital nor theactual wealth and social weight to enable them to establish an alternativesociety milieu.

That is why they may use the troubadours as a totemic reference,something like an ancestor-worship (rhetorically eloquent rather thanhistorically accurate) without evincing any desire for specific knowledgeabout those ancestors. In fact, what knowledge they have is culled fromParisian sources rather than homegrown. And that, in turn, is why it willbe a long time before the troubadours, neglected in Paris, will meet witha better treatment within their own homeland...

ReferencesBeller, Manfred, and Joep Leerssen, eds. 2007. Imagology. The Cultural Construction

and Literary Representation of national characters. A critical survey. Amsterdam:Rodopi.

Belmont, Nicole. 1995. Aux sources de l’ethnologie française: L’Académie Celtique.Paris: CTHS.

218 Philippe Martel

De Certeau, Michel, Dominique Julia and Jacques Revel. 1975. Une politique dela langue. Paris: Gallimard.

Denis, Andrée. 1982. Poésie populaire, poésie nationale. Deux intercesseurs:Fauriel et Mme de Staël. Romantisme 35: 3-24.

Rieger, Angelika, and Bernadette Schmidt. Der deutsche Beitrag zurOkzitanistik, 1803-1983. Eine Bibliographie. www.occitania.de/bibliografie/bibliografie.htm.

Diouloufet, Jean. 1829. Odo a la Muso Prouvençalo. Id., Fablos, contes, epitros eautros pouesios prouvençalos. Aix.

Fabre d’Olivet, Antoine. 1803. Le Troubadour: Poésies occitaniques du XIIIe siècle.Paris.

Fabre d’Olivet, Antoine. 1988. La langue d’oc rétablie, ed. Georg Kremnitz. Wien:Braumüller.

Fauriel, Claude. 1836a. Histoire de la poésie provençale. 3 vols., Paris.Fauriel, Claude. 1836b. Histoire de la Gaule méridionale sous les conquérants germains.

Paris.Fauriel, Claude. 1837. Histoire de la croisade contre les hérétiques albigeois. Paris. Gardy, Philippe. 1987. L’Occitanie d’Aubin-Louis Millin. Amiras 15-16:

149-158.Gatien-Arnoult, Adolphe Félix. 1841. Les Leys d’amor. Toulouse: Académie des

Jeux Floraux.Géruzez, E. 1852. Histoire de la littérature française du Moyen Age aux temps modernes.

Paris.Hroch, Miroslav. 1985. Social Preconditions of National Revival in Europe: A Compar-

ative Analysis of the Social Composition of Patriotic Groups among the Smaller Euro-pean Nations. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Lafont, Robert. 1982. Le ‘Midi’ des troubadours: Histoire d’un texte. Romantisme35: 25-48.

Lafont, Robert. 1991. La Geste de Roland. 2 vols., Paris: L'Harmattan. Lafont, Robert. 1999. Pour rendre à l’oc et aux Normands leur dû: Genèse et

premier développement de l’art épique gallo-roman. Cahiers de civilisationmédiévale 42: 139-178.

Legrand d’Aussy, Pierre Jean-Baptiste. 1781. Observations sur les troubadours. Paris:Onfray.

Martel, Philippe. 1982. Les historiens du début du XIXème siècle et le MoyenAge occitan: Midi éclairé, Midi martyr ou Midi pittoresque. Romantisme 35:49-71.

Martel, Philippe. 1988. La Revue des Langues Romanes. Romanische Forschungen100: 246-257.

Martel, Philippe. 1992. Le Félibrige. Les Lieux de Mémoire, ed. P. Nora, 3.2:567-611. Paris: Gallimard.

Martel, Philippe. 1997. Occitanum est, non legitur. L’estatut de la literaturaoccitana dins los manuals de literatura francesa (Sègles XIX e XX). Textesoccitans 2: 71-84.


Martel, Philippe. 2002. Les Cathares et l’histoire. Toulouse: Privat. Mary-Lafon, Bernard. 1842-45. Histoire politique, religieuse et littéraire du Midi de la

France. 4 vols., Paris: Mellier.Merle, René. 1990. L’Ecriture du provençal de 1775 à 1840. 2 vols., Béziers: CIDOMichelet, Jules. 1975 (1833). Histoire de France. Paris: Flammarion.Milllot, abbé Claude François. 1774. Histoire littéraire des Troubadours. 2 vols.,

Paris.Mistral, Frédéric. 1889 (1876). Lis Isclo d’or. Paris.Nisard, Désiré. 1844. Histoire de la littérature française. Paris.Raynouard, François. 1816-18. Choix des poésies originales desTroubadours. 3 vols.,

Paris.Rochegude, amiral Henri de. 1819. Parnasse occitanien. Toulouse.Schlegel, August-Wilhelm. 1818. Observations sur la langue et la littérature provençales.

Paris.Schlieben-Lange, Brigitte. 1996. Idéologie, Révolution et uniformité de la langue,

Sprimont: Mardaga.Sismondi, Jean Simonde de. 1821-44. Histoire des Français. 31 vols., Paris.Trélis, Jean-Luline. 1807. De l’idiome languedocien et de celui du Gard en

particulier, ed. Ph. Martel in Lengas 24 (1988): 101-118Villemain, Abel-François. 1830. Cours de littérature française. Paris.

CASE STUDIES IIEUROPEAN CROSS-CURRENTS: ENGLAND, GERMANY

AND THE LOW COUNTRIES


THE CASE OF BEOWULF

Tom Shippey

AbstractThe poem Beowulf proved to be, from its first publication, a contestedsite for nationalist scholarship. Though written in Old English, itdealt exclusively with Scandinavia and its nearest neighbours. Was thepoem, then, in essence a poema danicum, as its first editor called it? Ordid it emanate from the disputed borderland of Schleswig, whereLow German speakers were still in the nineteenth century underDanish rule? Interpretation of the poem was affected at every level bynationalist sympathies, but even more by sub-national andsupra-national sentiments expressed by scholars of divided loyalties,including pro-German Schleswigers, pro-Danish Icelanders, andEnglishmen such as Stephens and Kemble (respectively pro-Danishand pro-German, but outstripping all others in intemperate chauvin-ism). The poem’s early politicisation continues to affect scholarshipto the present day.

Beowulf has now been known to scholarship for almost two hundredyears, and has generated an immense amount of scholarly activity andpublication. In several important respects, though, we are no nearercertain knowledge than we were at the beginning, and the problemsapparent to the scholars of the 1810s remain problematic in the 2000s. Iwill begin, accordingly, by stating first three (I think) incontrovertiblefacts about the poem; go on to indicate three areas of general agreement;and then point to three embarrassing contradictions.

224 Tom Shippey

First, the facts:– we have only one manuscript of the poem;– its provenance is unknown;– it can be dated palaeographically to approximately the year 1000.

Second, the areas of general agreement:– the poem is in Old English;– there is general agreement (now) that it must have been a written

composition, and is not a record of an oral epic;– and there is general agreement (now) that the many references to

God and to Christian belief indicate a securely Christian milieu forcomposition.

Third, the contradictions, which deny successively the three agreementsjust above, in reverse order:

– though there are many references to God, and several to the OldTestament, there is never any mention of Christ, or the Saviour, orthe Redeemer, or anything similar;

– in the same way, though the poem uses the native verb (for)writanand the loan-word (ge)scrifan, they never mean ‘to write’, rather ‘tocut’ and ‘to judge’;

– finally, and most embarrassingly for a potential national epic, thereis no mention in the poem of England, or Britain, or the English,or the Saxons, or anyone who might be considered English exceptfor two dubious and marginal figures, Offa and Hengest, bothnames known to English history, but both firmly localized withinthe poem in Continental Europe. The poem is centred on theDanes, the Swedes, and the Geats – whom most scholars haveidentified with the Gautar or South Sweden.

In brief, our literate Christian English poet has created a poem which isentirely about illiterate pre-Christian Scandinavians. The poem, and theevents of the poem, do not seem to match each other. We have no con-text in which to place it.

One result of this is that the poem became, immediately uponpublication, available for appropriation by competing theorists. It alsoimmediately became a contested site in both a philological, and a geo-

THE CASE OF BEOWULF 225

1 Most of the nineteenth-century works cited here are discussed and excerpted,with translation into English, in Shippey and Haarder 1998. Translated quotations aretaken from there, unless otherwise stated.

2 Scholarly convention is to print transcriptions from runic letters in bold.

graphical, contested area. I can perhaps illuminate this briefly by invitingreaders to consider three brief quotations.

The first is the title given to the poem in its editio princeps, brought outin 1815 in Copenhagen by Grímur Jónsson Thorkelín, Étatsraad andNational Archivist first to King Christian VII of Denmark, and then toKing Frederik VI. It is probably significant, on several levels, thatThorkelin was an Icelander rather than a Dane, though of course Icelan-ders were then and long remained subjects of the King of Denmark. Hedemonstrated his loyalty – and his desire to justify the expenses of hislong stay in England almost thirty years before (see Kiernan 1986, 14-16)by calling the new poem: De Danorum Rebus Gestis Secul[is] III et IV: PoemaDanicum Dialecto Anglosaxonica.

Ignoring the date and the claim to be a ‘Danish poem’, what didThorkelin mean by ‘Dialecto Anglosaxonica’? Lurking in this is the claimthat Anglo-Saxon, or Old English, was just a dialect of Old Norse, ofwhich Thorkelin, as an Icelander, could claim to be a native speaker. Theclaim was useful personally as establishing his editorial credentials. Be-sides, both languages could be said to be dialects of a common tongue,sometimes called (for instance by Thorkelin’s opponent N.F.S.Grundtvig) ‘Gammel-Nordisk’, or ‘Old Nordic’. Since this was alsoreferred to (in Old Norse) as dönsk tunga, or ‘the Danish tongue’, Anglo-Saxon could be seen as a dialect of ancestral Danish, which helped tomake the point that it was in every way Poema Danicum. I do not thinkthat Thorkelin thought any further than that, though later scholars wereto make a serious controversy out of its implications (see, e.g.Brynjolfsson 1852, discussed below).1

My second quotation is the famous runic inscription from the goldenhorn of Gallehus, discovered in 1734, stolen and melted down in 1802,but with its inscription fortunately recorded: Ek HlewagastiR HoltijaRhorna tawido2

It is agreed that this means, ‘I Hlewagast the Holting made the horn’.But what language is it in? Professor Hans Frede Nielsen (Nielsen, 2002:22) translates the inscription into, successively, Old English, Old Norse,Old Saxon, and Gothic, as follows:

226 Tom Shippey

Ic hléogiest hylte horn táwodeEk hlégestr hyltir horn *táðaIk hleogast hulti horn tóidaIk hliugasts hulteis haurn tawida

One might say that the only sensible conclusion is that it is in the lan-guage Prof. Nielsen calls Early Runic. But this was not immediatelyapparent. For one thing, it is clear that the letter given by scholars nowa-days as R, at the end of the second and third words of the inscription, isnot the same as normal runic r, as in ‘horna’. It was read early on as m,which allowed Karl Müllenhoff (see Nielsen 2002, 15) to read bothwords as dative plurals, so that the inscription meant ‘I made the hornfor the Holtings (or Holsteiners), the people of the forest’. But perhaps itshould be transliterated Z? An –r ending on ‘gastir’ would be very likeregular Old Norse gestr. But a –z ending would leave it possible to takethe inscription as Primitive Germanic, or even German, rather thanNorse. Remember that the horns were found no more than ten kilo-metres from the present Danish-German border, on the Danish side. Butif the inscriptions were in Primitive German, not Norse, then that wouldimply that the area had been originally German-speaking, and that Dan-ish had been imposed on it at some later period. Which, of course, in theearly nineteenth century, many German-speakers in Schleswig-Holsteinthought was exactly what was still happening.

Both the Gallehus horn and the poem of Beowulf accordingly becameinvolved in the question of Schleswig-Holstein, or Slesvig-Holsten (infuture written in the compromise form of Slesvig-Holstein). See here mythird quotation, a rather longer one. This comes from a letter written bythe Norwegian philologist P.A. Munch (1810-63), and sent to the Copen-hagen professor George Stephens (1813-95). (I should add that it wasMunch who first suggested the R transliteration for the disputedGallehus rune). The letter is dated 27th April 1848, just after the firstclashes of the first Prusso-Danish war, expresses strong support for theDanes and ends with a remarkable PS:

Aren’t you enthusiastic, by the way, about the Danes’ bravery and strength?

Hwæt we Gar-Dena guð-frumenaþegena and eorla þrym gefrunon!hu þa æþelingas ellen fremedon!Sona Scylding sceaðena þreatum


3 The meaning: ‘Lo, we have heard of the power of the warriors of the Spear-Danes, thanes and nobles, how the princes carried out deeds of valour. Quickly theScylding carries off the mead-benches from troops of enemies, from many tribes ofSaxons and Prussians, those who are camped by the Eider, cruel oath-breakers, full oftreachery, mad for war; they want to have Hedeby, and the ancestral land of the Eng-lish race: that is a monstrous people.’

4 For Kemble on runes, see Kemble 1840. The essay is famous for giving the firstfairly correct reading of the inscription on the Ruthwell Cross, and for Kemble’smerciless mockery of the earlier attempts by the Icelanders Thorleifr Repp and FinnurMagnusson. Just to show that the issue is not dead, the Icelanders have been de-fended, and Kemble in his turn attacked, by another Icelander, see Fjalldal 2005.

meodosetla oftyhð! monegum mægþumSeaxna and Pryssa, þara þe sittaðymbe Fifeldor facen-fulle,wraðe wærlogan, wod-frecan;habban willað Hæðaburh, and frumlondOngelcynnes; þæt is aglæc þeod.

(Indrebø and Kolsrud, 1924-71, I: 277)

This is of course Old English pastiche.3 The first five lines are based onBeowulf lines 1-5, though they move into the present tense. Especiallystriking, though, is the echo in line 7 of the story of Offa in lines 35-44of the poem Widsith, who ‘fixed the boundary against the Myrgings biFifeldore, on the Eider: the Engle and Swæfe kept it from then on as Offastruck it out’. Munch’s point is that the border which was being foughtover in the fourth (?) century, and which seemed to have been settledthen, was still being fought over in the nineteenth, and by what he re-garded as the same adversaries, the Danes and the Germans. In lines 9and 10 he was perhaps, in writing to an Englishman, trying to get Eng-lish support and sympathy (which the Danes of 1848 badly wanted) byalleging that the Prussians and the Holsteiners were trying to seize ances-tral England too: not that there was any problem in gaining GeorgeStephens’s sympathy. His sympathies are well indicated by the title of hisHandbook of the Old-Northern Runic Monuments of Scandinavia and England(1884) – Stephens meant by this title to claim (a) that England and Scan-dinavia had a common culture, as shown by their use of the runic alpha-bet (b) that they had possessed a common language too, indeed‘Gammel-Nordisk,’ ‘Old-Northern’ (c) that this common culture was notshared by Germany, which, whatever Wilhelm Grimm or John Kemblemight say, had never used runes or the runic alphabet.4 Munch, in short,saw Old English poetry as preserving memory of a political situation

228 Tom Shippey

5 Thorkelin 1815, xiii-xiv: ‘Others had an old and single motive for making war, thedeep greed for power and riches. Hrodgar was of far different mind. In order toprotect his subjects, restore a lasting peace for his descendants, and give them theliberty of the sea, he found it necessary to lead an army against the Jutes, and theirassociates the Frisians, monstrous people, hard, fierce and barbarous, who, wanting infaith and honesty no less than in humanity and religion, did nothing unprompted bytheir unbridled lust. There were therefore great dangers for this best of kings at home,and in the field much adversity, all of which he overcame with the help of the Godsand by his own valour: and in all of this, neither did his courage fail in any hardship,nor his industry in any decision. Good and bad fortune affected his wealth, but not hischaracter. He always had before his eyes what was good, favourable and fortunate forthe Danish people, and worked continually to join the Jutes and Frisians together withthe Scyldings, giving citizenship to their common people, appointing their nobility assenators, making them one people, one state.’

very similar to that of his own time, and seeing it from the Scandinavianside. George Stephens’s last work, incidentally, written at the age ofninety-one, was titled Er Engels en Tysk Sprog? (1894, ‘Is English a Ger-man Language?’), and the answer was a resounding ‘No!’

One can see that an English poem which was all about Danes wasvery welcome, in 1815 and later, to some factions. It showed that theEnglish were really Scandinavians; and more importantly that their ances-tral homeland of Angeln, in Slesvig, had also always been Scandinavian,and should remain so; regardless of the question of Holstein, the Danishborder should run along the river Eider, as in Widsith. Any Slesvigerswho thought different were just being ungrateful. But then they alwayshad been, as you could see from Beowulf. It is this thought, I think, whichexplains Thorkelin’s sudden panegyric on King Hrothgar in his Latin‘Preface’ to the edition:

Fuit aliis una et vetus causa bellandi, profunda cupido imperii et divitiarum.HRODGARO longe alia mens fuit. Ut suos ille subditos protegeret, posterisfirmam redderet pacem, et libertatem darit mari, necessum habuit armaferre in Jutos, et horum socios Frisones, populos immanes, duros, feros,barbarosqve, qui tam fidei et honestatis, quam humanitatis et religionisexpertes nihil non ad effrænatæ libidinis sugestionem gerebant. Multa igiturRegi optimo pericula domi, militiæ multa adversa fuere, qvorum omniaDeorum auxiliis et virtute suâ superavit: inqve his omnibus, neqve animusnegotio defuit, neqve decretis labos. Malæ secundæqve res opes, noningenium mutabant. Qvod bonum, faustum, felixqve esset populo Danico,semper ante oculos habuit, et jugiter in id ferebatur, ut Jutos et FrisonesScyldingis conjungeret, horum plebi civitatem daret, primores in patreslegeret, unam gentem, unam rem publicam faceret.5


There are two things underlying this passage: an editorial confusion, anda political motive, the one serving the other. One aspect of the editorialconfusion is this. The monster Grendel is described as an eoten – a rareword in Old, Middle and even modern English, but used some eighttimes in the poem. It was, however, one which Thorkelin understoodwell enough, because of its similarity to the Norse-Icelandic word iötunn,‘giant’. However, the poem also refers some five times, if one acceptsmodern editorial decisions, to the tribe of the Jutes, the Eote in OldEnglish. Unfortunately, the genitive plural of eoten is eoten-a, and thegenitive plural of Eote is Eot-ena. The two are easily confused, and indeedit seems likely that the Beowulf-scribe himself confused them a thousandyears ago. Moreover, in one of the most confusing ‘digressions’ of thepoem – a paraphrase of a heroic song sung to entertain the company inKing Hrothgar’s hall, lines 1068-1159 – the Eotena, as they have become,are associated with the Frysan, or Frisians, and in strong opposition tothe Danes. This explains Thorkelin’s account of ‘the Jutes, and theirassociates the Frisians, monstrous people’, enemies of the Danes: hetakes Jutes and giants to be the same thing, explaining in an Index thatthis is the way people talk about their enemies.

I can, however, see nothing in the poem to explain the remarks aboutHrothgar working continually ‘to join the Jutes and Frisians togetherwith the Scyldings, giving citizenship to their common people, appoint-ing their nobility as senators, making them one people, one state’. This, Ithink, is contemporary politics. Thorkelin praises Hrothgar for doingwhat his master Frederik VI was engaged in doing, namely, trying topersuade the inhabitants of Slesvig-Holstein, who might well be calledJutes, that they were actually and in spirit Danes: and trying to draw in atthe same time, NB, another awkward and anomalous group, namely theNorth Frisians, in the North Sea islands and along what is now theDanish-German border. (The conviction that the poet was really thinkingof the North Frisians rather than the more familiar West Frisians lasteda long time.) Finally, the remark about ‘appointing their nobility as sena-tors’ looks to me like a reference to the repeated attempts by Danishkings to deal with an especially troublesome body, the Ritterschaft ofSlesvig-Holstein, which apparently had unusual independence and auton-omy.

This, we might say, is the Danish view of the question, perhaps espe-cially forceful as coming from another Danish colonial. There was of

230 Tom Shippey

course another view, and it was expressed immediately. The most inter-esting of the seven reviewers of Thorkelin’s edition (for whom seeHaarder 1988) is Pastor Nicholaus Outzen. He was a Dane. Or, heought to have been a Dane: he was a knight of the Dannebrog, and hewas born in Terkelsbøl, which is still (just) inside Denmark. But he spentmuch of his life as Pastor in Brecklum, now part of Germany, and hewrote in German. He wrote also for Kieler Blätter, a journal which wasshut down three years after his review appeared by the Danish authori-ties for its German-nationalist views. And just to add further uncertaintyto his standpoint, he was an authority on the North Frisian dialects – hisGlossarium der Friesischen Sprache was published posthumously in 1837. Isuspect that Outzen was a precursor of Uwe Lornsen, a North Frisianfrom Sylt who argued (a few years later) that the solution to the Slesvig-Holstein question was to form one united independent multilingualgrand duchy to be called Nordalbingien.

Be that as it may, Outzen saw the problem of the poem which Ioutlined at the start very clearly: it was an English poem about Danes.His solution was very straightforward (Outzen 1816). It was a poemfrom North Schleswig, indeed from ancient Angeln, the frumlondAngelcynnes, as Munch called it. That was why it was in English. And itappeared to be about Danes. But that was because the inhabitants ofancient Angeln had been forced to call themselves ‘Danes’, just as hehimself had. The striking thing, to him, was that these ancient North-Schleswigers distinguished themselves from both the Jutes of Jutland andthe Frisians of the islands, as, he said, they still did. Outzen backed thisup with a string of identifications between places in the poem and placeson the contemporary map, which have found very little favour. But hedid at least offer a solution to the problem of the poem, though it wasone which stemmed from contemporary politics: the poem was a productof ancient Danish imperialism. Outzen’s view was in effect the mirror-image of P.A. Munch’s, above.

Outzen’s editor at Kieler Blätter was Friedrich Christoph Dahlmann,who was at once one of the Göttingen Seven; the dedicatee of JacobGrimm’s Deutsche Mythologie, ‘Dahlmann, dem Freunde’; secretary to theRitterschaft of Schleswig; and the man who in some views created theconditions for the second Prusso-Danish war of 1864 (for the last claim,see Cooley 1949). Dahlmann was also very interested in Beowulf, so inter-ested that he added his own views to Outzen’s, in the form of editorial


6 For an account of this extremely confused process, see Shippey and Haarder1998, 29-34, and the excerpted quotations from Kemble in that collection.

notes; and his view was that Outzen had not gone far enough. His threemain points, which he then developed independently (Dahlmann 1840)were that the North Schleswig area was urdeutsch (see the arguments overthe Gallehus horn above); that Anglo-Saxon was not a dialect of ‘OldNordic’ at all, but a Low German branch of West Germanic; and that theDanes had entered the area, indeed taken it over, as a consequence of themass emigration of the Angles. The poem itself had however been writ-ten in England on a basis of Continental tradition.

Rather surprisingly, Jacob and Wilhelm Grimm did not have verymuch to do with these arguments, though of course Jacob was responsi-ble for the generally-accepted classification of Old English as the north-ernmost branch of West Germanic, rather than the southernmost branchof North Germanic, of which more later. Their place was filled for themby one of Grimm’s most devoted acolytes, the Englishman John MitchellKemble. Kemble has been treated very kindly by English scholars, as thefounding father of their discipline, but I have to say that in my opinionhe became, in the end, clinically insane, and that he was also, from thestart, very reluctant to give credit to other scholars, even when he usedtheir work. Be that as it may, he set himself in the 1830s to edit this greatEnglish poem, and produced, in quick succession:

– an edition in 1833, which lacked its glossary;– an excited letter to Grimm immediately thereafter, announcing a new

solution of the poem’s problems of nationality (for which see Wiley1971, 61-5);

– a second edition of the poem in 1835, still without its glossary andwith the same prefatory matter;

– a treatise in German in 1836 summing up his letters to Grimm;– and a translation of the poem in 1837, which added the glossary that

should have gone with the editions, and a further preface which com-pletely retracted his prefaces of 1833 and 1835, saying it was all thefault of the Danish historians for having misled him.6

It is not surprising that scholars have been confused by him ever since.But Grimm’s insertion of much of Kemble’s material first into an Ap-pendix of the 1835 Deutsche Mythologie, and then into the main body of the

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7 To illustrate the kind of problem the poem set for all its editors: modern editorsassume a very violent change of subject in line 1931, where the generosity of Hygd,daughter of Hæreþ, the young queen of Hygelac, is suddenly opposed to the murder-ous and un-queenly behaviour of a legendary lady, Modþryþo (?), whose ways werereformed by the Anglian hero Offa. Kemble saw a lacuna four lines earlier, took‘modþryþo’, not unreasonably, as an abstract noun, and concluded that Hygelac’s

work, as also the fact that the 1835 edition and 1837 translation were thefirst productions, in this area, of the ‘philological revolution’, meant thatKemble’s later views dominated the field for perhaps fifty years.

Kemble’s new idea was this. It had long been noticed that there weretwo characters in the poem called Beowulf. One was the hero of thepoem, Beowulf the Geat, grandson of King Hrethel, henchman of KingHygelac, slayer of monsters. The other was Beowulf the Dane, whoappeared only once, near the start, as the third in a genealogical line offive (or four) kings, Sceaf – Scyld – Beowulf – Healfdene – Hrothgar.Kemble argued that this second character was the true hero, not of thepoem, but of the myth from which the poem derived. He was theculture-hero, the monster-slayer. His exploits had been transferred to theother Beowulf, and embedded in a historical context of wars betweenDanes and Geats and Swedes. But Beowulf, or rather Beowa, was theimportant figure, and he was not a hero but a god, and not just a god butthe divine ancestor of the English people. So the poem really was aboutthe English, who furthermore were entirely German, not just Germanic,not Scandinavians at all. If they were not to be called ‘Saxons’, whichwas the term Kemble preferred, then they were ‘Northalbingians’. Butthe poem Beowulf, as it stood, had been appropriated in antiquity by theScandinavians, and then again in modern times.

Kemble’s main pieces of evidence for this were, first, a document hefound in Cambridge, which is however far later than the poem – Kemblecommits the errors he often accuses the Danes of making, namely jum-bling evidence from widely different periods, and also seizing eagerly onany similarity of names as proving identity (see Wiley 1971, 61-65). Sec-ondly, and later, he discovered a number of place-names in OE charterswhich appear to preserve the names of Beowa and Grendel, sometimesclose together (see Kemble 1849, 416). He also tried to re-read lines1925-31 of the poem, from the very confusing ‘Modthrytho’ episode, asshowing that Beowulf’s uncle Hygelac was the successor of the AnglianKing Offa, so that the Geats were really Angles from Hedeby, not fromSouthern Sweden at all (Kemble 1837, 78-9).7 The idea that the poem


queen, Hæreþ’s daughter, was the murderous lady of legend. She must, therefore, havemarried Hygelac after being married to Offa, which to Kemble meant that Hygelac wasOffa’s successor to the Anglian throne, and therefore an Englishman. Since Hygelacwas Beowulf’s uncle, Beowulf could then be claimed as English too. It is characteristicof Kemble that his 1837 translation does not match the reading of his 1835 edition,136-137.

was stratified, with its deepest and most original stratum a mythical andGerman or Germanic one, overlaid by history, Scandinavianism, andChristianity, remained dominant in many forms for many years.

One problem with it, though – apart from those just indicated – wasthat one fact had been discovered about the events of the poem, and amost surprising one. The poem is in essence about three royal dynasties,the Danish Scyldings, the Swedish Scylfings, and the Geatish Hrethlings.The first two of these are well corroborated by later Scandinavian tradi-tion, but this knows nothing of the Hrethlings at all. Yet it is theHrethlings who are corroborated by evidence from outside the area:Beowulf’s uncle Hygelac is the same person as the king, variously spelledand identified, who was killed while making a raid on the Rhine roundabout the year 525 AD. The identification had been made as early as1817, by Grundtvig, and Grundtvig is always given the credit for thediscovery in modern times. However, Grundtvig very characteristicallymade the point only in a footnote on p. 285, and he did not bother tostate the really convincing argument, which is that we have, in Gregoryof Tours, in the anonymous Liber Historiae Francorum, and in Beowulf,three independent accounts which nevertheless corroborate each other:the Liber’s ‘Attoarii’, for instance, are the Hetware of Beowulf. These pointswere made in 1839 by Heinrich Leo, and generally accepted: Germanscholars regularly gave the credit to Leo, not Grundtvig. The onlyscholar who refused to accept this valuable and indeed unique piece ofinformation was Kemble. In his 1849 book The Saxons in England (notethe title, one might say a mirror-image of George Stephens’s) he said thename-similarity was just coincidence. He wrote to Grimm, ‘Beowa, thegod in Angeln, I cannot give him up’ (Wiley 1971, 231).

I mean to bring only two more scholars into this discussion, and theyare Karl Victor Müllenhoff and Gísli Brynjolfsson, one might say a ‘colo-nial German’ and a ‘colonial Dane’. Müllenhoff dominated the field ofBeowulf studies for the best part of forty years, approximately 1844-84.One might well say he terrorized it, for he was an extremely forbiddingpersonality, quite prepared to destroy careers, such as those of Christian

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Grein or the even more unfortunate Hermann Dederich. Editorially, hewas a disciple of Lachmann, and applied the Lachmann methods to Beo-wulf. His main pupil, and intended successor, was Wilhelm Scherer, whoin 1872 was appointed to a Chair at the University of Strassburg with theapproval of Bismarck, and the avowed intention of strengthening pro-German sentiment in a disputed and recently regained province. ButScherer died young, in 1886, only two years after his mentor, andMüllenhoff’s views on the poem – once he too was safely dead – wererapidly rejected.

His two main contributions were these. On the one hand Müllenhoffapplied Lachmann’s Liedertheorie to the poem, arguing that it was full ofWidersprechungen or ‘contradictions’, that it must be the work of severalhands at different periods. In the end he identified the work of fouroriginal writers and two increasingly incompetent interpolators, and withtypical certainty assigned each line and half-line of the poem to one orthe other (Müllenhoff 1869). This view was taken further in the yearsafter his death, for instance by Bernhard ten Brink (1877), who ran thescore of authors up to eleven, but has now been completely rejected: themodern view is that the poem is completely unified. Müllenhoff’s othermain contribution was to take Kemble’s idea of the poem as not merelycomposite but also as stratified a good deal further. He argued that itwas, at bottom, a myth about a semi-divine figure, and furthermore akind of allegory (Müllenhoff 1849a and b). This view has not been quiteso firmly rejected, though the view as to what kind of myth or allegory itis has changed completely.

I have to say that my understanding of the whole issue of the recep-tion of Beowulf was changed completely by realising that Müllenhoff wasanother Holsteiner, indeed a native of Dithmarschen. Müllenhoff wasmuch too professional and too wary ever to say this explicitly, but it ismy conviction that in his heart he believed, or wanted to believe, thatBeowulf was in fact a product of his native province, the Ditmarsh; andthat if the poem was in Old English, the myth it sprang from had beenspoken in his native language, as it were Proto-Plattdeutsch. Old Englishin any case, Müllenhoff would probably have said, was really anotherdialect, not of course of ‘Gammel-Nordisk’ as the Scandinavians wouldhave it, but of ‘Alt-Nieder-Deutsch’.

There are several indications of this underlying belief:


8 Müllenhoff 1849a, 423-424 (capitalization sic): ‘[Grendel] is the gigantic god ordemon of the wild and stormy sea at the time of the spring-equinox. At this timeBeowulf undertakes his swimming expedition with Breca. The storms rage and the seacould, once it is unchecked, pour over the broad, flat coast-lands of the North Sea,where the inhabitants, Frisian and Saxon tribes, lived on lonely mounds (Pliny 16, 1),and where they were helplessly at the mercy of the wild element, if no god came totheir aid; the unfortunately all-too-credible story of these deities still tells of unbeliev-able devastations, of the death of many thousands of people. I believe that theman-swallowing, house-smashing sea-giant Grendel, and the whole myth, has thisdefinitely local basis.’

– It is revealing that Müllenhoff’s first publication in this area was hisvery long article, ‘Die deutschen Völker an Nord- und Ostsee inältester Zeit’, published in – note the journal title – NordalbingischeStudien for 1844.

– In the following year Müllenhoff brought out the most engaging andenduring of his publications, his collection Sagen Märchen und Lieder derHerzogthümer Schelswig Holstein und Lauenburg. And he included in it,without explanation, a paraphrase of the poem of Beowulf, as no. 345.Immediately after it he put folktales which he had collected, one ortwo of which do indeed appear as analogues of the fight withGrendel in Heorot.

– In 1849 he brought out two connected articles on ‘Sceaf und seineNachkommen’ and ‘Der Mythus von Beowulf’ in Zeitschrift für DeutschesAlterthum, in which he argued, at great length and quite persuasively,that the poem’s monsters, especially Grendel and his mother, wereallegories of the great fear of the marshmen: flood. Grendel in partic-ular

ist der riesische gott oder dämon des wilden düstern meeres um die zeitdes frühlingsäquinoctiums. um diese zeit unternimmt auch Beóvulf mitBreca seine schwimmfahrt. es wüten die stürme und das meer konntesich einst ungehemmt über die weiten flachen küstenländer an dernordsee ergiessen, wo die bewohner, friesische und sächsische völker-schaften, auf einsamen warten hausten, Plin. h. n. 16, 1, und wo sierettungslos dem wilden elemente preisgegeben waren, wenn nicht eingott half; von unglaublichen verwüstungen, von dem untergang vielertausende von menschen berichtet noch die leider allzu glaubhafte ge-schichte dieser gegenden. diesen allerdings auch localen grund, glaubeich, hat der menschenverschlingende, häuserverwüstende meerrieseGrendel und der ganze mythus.8

I have to say that I am one of the very few Beowulfian scholars nowactive who thinks that possibly Müllenhoff might be right. Not that I

236 Tom Shippey

think the poem is an allegory, etc., but I do think that scholarly opinionhas become ‘Scandinavianized’, and sees the poem’s landscape in termsof high moor and mountain tarn, whereas it seems to me to be a boggysort of poem, set in the fen: to quote Philip Cardew, the monsterGrendel and his mother are ‘oicotypes of the marsh’ (Cardew 2005, 205).

Müllenhoff’s views extended of course not only to myth and allegory,to folktale, to Liedertheorie and to the origins of the poem, but also to thevery nature of the English language, and the English nation. As AndrewWawn has pointed out (Wawn 1994, 216-217; 2000, 237-239), there wasin the mid-nineteenth century a certain controversy in England over thenature of the English: were they really Saxons (and so Germans, asKemble for instance would have it), or were they really Scandinavians (aview popular in the North, and often in the manufacturing as opposed tolandowning classes)? The official view on this, still very firmly held andexpressed in British government circles, is that of Sir Walter Scott, name-ly that there was never any such thing as English: just Saxons and Danes andNormans, all now happily assimilated, a model for the present and fu-ture. Nevertheless, the issue was at one time a live one, especially duringthe two Prusso-Danish wars, of 1848-50 and 1864 – as we have seenfrom Professor Munch’s little poem above.

Thus, in May 1852 George Stephens – Munch’s correspondent –wrote a long and angry piece in The Gentleman’s Magazine (Stephens 1852),in which he argued against Grimm’s classification of the Germanic lan-guages, and declared that English was not West Germanic but SouthScandinavian. Such features as the Scandinavian ‘middle voice’ and suf-fixed definite article could be found in English dialects too – andStephens, it should be remembered, was expert not only in standardDanish but also in the southern Danish dialects, which, probably errone-ously, have been thought to be more similar to English than modernscholars can readily recognize. The last word on this may perhaps begiven to Professor Hans Frede Nielsen, who has shown recently that theEarly Runic language must be considered as the ancestor of Old Norsealone (Nielsen 2000). But Professor Nielsen also points out a number ofanomalies in Old English, of which I will mention only one: it is the onlyGermanic language with two complete present tense paradigms for theverb ‘to be’, one very similar to the Scandinavian one, and one verysimilar to Old Saxon (Nielsen 2000, 222-223). A natural conclusion isthat while a majority of the fifth- and sixth-century emigrants to Britain


were speakers of Anglian, or Saxon, from the south of what would be-come a linguistic boundary, a large minority were Jutes, from the northof the boundary (Nielsen 2000, 292-293). The dialects influenced eachother, as English and Danish would do again in later periods.

Gísli Brynjolfsson’s own point, however, was a very telling one,which is that not only is Beowulf all about Danes and Swedes and Geats,its characters are also often figures known from Scandinavian legendarycycles; and – this point severely challenges the Kemble/Müllenhoffbelief in a stratified Anglian-mythological/Scandinavian-historical poem– the link between monster-slaying and the Skjoldung court is madeindependently in the Hrólfs saga kraka (Brynjolfsson 1852). So even if a‘historical’ element was added to a ‘mythical’ element, the mythical ele-ment also has connections with Denmark, not with the Ditmarsh. I mayperhaps add as a final coda to this story that in the prevailing twentieth-century view of the poem, a critical character in it is the silent figure ofHrothulf, addressed at one point by Hrothgar’s queen Wealhtheow,though he makes no reply. He is now regularly identified with the saga-hero Hrólfr kraki; this realization is also largely to the credit of a Danishwriter, Ludvig Schrøder, now almost completely forgotten by scholar-ship, who wrote in the to him very personal aftermath of the Prusso-Danish war of 1864 (Schrøder 1875).

What I have tried to show is how the editing of Beowulf and national self-definitions mutually influenced each other: national feeling influencedthe editing, and editing and interpreting helped to create national, sub-national, and supra-national feeling, in Denmark, in Germany, in Slesvig,in Holstein, in Norway (and eventually elsewhere). What has been largelymissing has been, to quote Sherlock Holmes, the strange case of the dogthat did not bark in the night. Was there, and is there, no English senti-ment about this potentially English national epic? The answer is, effec-tively, ‘no’. The only English scholars to take a serious interest in thepoem were for many years expatriates like Stephens or Benjamin Thorpe,or intellectual expatriates like Kemble, widely disliked for his devotion toeverything German. Partly this was caused by the intense amateurishnessof the two English universities, Oxford and Cambridge. In modern timesthe need to suppress any feelings of English autonomy in the interests ofunity and the United Kingdom has also been powerful, see Shippey2000. But Anglo-Saxon England seems never to have rooted itself in the

238 Tom Shippey

9 They are: Beowulf (directed Graham Baker, 1999); The Thirteenth Warrior (directedJohn McTiernan, 1999); Beowulf and Grendel (directed Sturla Gunnarsson, 2006); andBeowulf (directed Robert Zemeckis, 2007).

national imagination. On the other hand, four movies based on Beowulfhave appeared in recent years.9

ReferencesBrynjolfsson, Gísli. 1852. Oldengelsk og Oldnorsk. Antikvarisk Tidsskrift 1: 81-

143.Cardew, Philip. 2005. Grendel: Bordering the Human. In The Shadow-walkers:

Jacob Grimm’s mythology of the monstrous, ed. Tom Shippey, 189-205. Tempe,AZ: Arizona Center for Medieval and Renaissance Studies.

Cooley, Franklin D. 1949. Early Danish Criticism of Beowulf. English LiteraryHistory 7: 45-67.

Dahlmann, F.C. 1840. Geschichte von Dänemark. Hamburg. (Author’s trl. of Dan-marks Historie, Copenhagen 1840).

Fjalldal, Magnús. 2005. ‘A Lot of Learning is a Dang’rous Thing’: The RuthwellCross Runes and their Icelandic Intepreters. In Correspondences: Medievalism inScholarship and the Arts, eds. Tom Shippey and Martin Arnold, 30-50. Wood-bridge: Boydell.

Grundtvig, N.F.S. 1817. Om Bjovulfs Drape eller det af Hr. EtatsraadThorkelin 1815 udgivne angelsachsike Digt. Danne-Virke 2: 207-289.

Haarder, Andreas. 1988. The Seven Beowulf Reviewers: Latest or Last Identifi-cations. English Studies 69: 289-292.

Indebrø, Gustav and Oluf Kolsrud, eds. 1924-71. Lærde Brev fra og til P.A.Munch. 3 vols.; Oslo: University of Oslo.

Kemble, J.M., ed.. 1833. The Anglo-Saxon Poems of Beowulf, the Traveller’s Song, andthe Battle of Finnes-burh. London (2nd rev. ed. London, 1835).

Kemnble, J.M., trl. 1837. A Translation of the Anglo-Saxon Poem of Beowulf, with aCopious Glossary, Preface, and PhilologicalNotes. London.

Kemble, J.M. 1849. The Saxons in England: A history of the English Commonwealthtill the Period of the Norman Conquest. 2 vols.; London.

Kemble, J.M.: see also Wiley 1971.Kiernan, Kevin. 1986. The Thorkelin Transcripts of Beowulf. Copenhagen: Rosen-

kilde and Bagger.Leo, Heinrich. 1839. Beowulf, dasz älteste deutsche, in angelsächsischer mundart er-

haltene, heldengedicht. Ein beitrag zur geschichte alter deutscher geisteszustände Halle.Müllenhoff, Karl Victor. 1844. Die deutschen Völker an Nord- und Ostsee in

ältester Zeit. Nordalbingische Studien 1: 111-174.


Müllenhoff, Karl Victor. 1845. Sagen Märchen und Lieder der Herzogthümer SchelswigHolstein und Lauenburg. Kiel.

Müllenhoff, Karl Victor. 1849a. Sceaf und seine Nachkommen. Zeitschrift fürDeutsches Alterthum 7: 410-419.

Müllenhoff, Karl Victor. 1849b. Der Mythus von Beowulf. Zeitschrift für DeutschesAlterthum 7: 419-441.

Müllenhoff, Karl Victor. 1869. Die innere Geschichte des Beovulfs. Zeitschriftfür Deutsches Alterthum 27: 193-244.

Nielsen, Hans Frede. 2000. The Early Runic Language of Scandinavia Heidelberg:Winter.

Nielsen, Hans Frede 2002. Guldhornsinskriften fra Gallehus: Runer, sprog, politik.Odense: Odense University Press.

Outzen, Nicholaus. 1816. Das angelsächsische Gedicht Beowulf, als die schätz-barste Urkunde des höchsten Alterthums von unserm Vaterlande. KielerBlätter 3: 307-327.

Shippey, Tom. 2000. The Undeveloped Image: Anglo-Saxon in Popular Con-sciousness from Turner to Tolkien. In Literary Appropriations of the Anglo-Saxons from the Thirteenth to the Twentieth Century, eds. Donald Scragg andCarole Weinberg, 215-236. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Shippey, Tom, and Andreas Haarder, eds. 1988. Beowulf: the Critical Heritage.London: Routledge.

ten Brink, Bernhard Konrad Aegidius. 1877. Geschichte der Englischen Literatur.Erster Band, Bis zu Wiclifs Auftreten. Berlin.

Thorkelín, Grímur Jónsson. 1815. De Danorum Rebus Gestis Secul[is] III et IV:Poema Danicum Dialecto Anglosaxonica. Copenhagen.

Wawn, Andrew. 1994. The Cult of Stalwart Frith-thjof in Victorian Britain. InNorthern Antiquity: the Post-Medieval Reception of Edda and Saga, ed. AndrewWawn, 211-254. Enfield Lock: Hisarlik Press.

Wawn, Andrew. 1995. George Stephens, Cheapinghaven, and Old NorthernAntiquity. In Medievalism in England II, eds. Leslie Workman and KathleenVerduin, 63-104. Woodbridge: Boydell.

Wawn, Andrew. 2000. The Vikings and the Victorians: Inventing the Old North in19th-Century Britain. Woodbridge: Boydell.

Wiley, Raymond A., ed./trl. 1971. John Mitchell Kemble and Jakob Grimm: A Corre-spondence 1832-52. Leiden: Brill.

1 Cf. Heinzle 1996, Müller 2002, Ehrismann 1987, Göhler 1989, Hoffmann 1992,Schulze 1997; and especially on the reception history: Heinzle & Waldschmitt 1991.

2 See 2003, 315: ‘Everywhere, people were searching for the “national epic”, themajor epic in which every national literature was considered to have its identity-build-ing origin and high-point.’


WALTHER VON DER VOGELWEIDEAND EARLY-NINETEENTH-CENTURY LEARNING

Thomas Bein

AbstractNineteenth-century scholars edited the verse of Walther von derVogelweide in various ways. Their different methods led to differenttext editions, which exerted an interesting influence on the receptionof Walther’s works both in the academic field and in public culturallife.

Every text’s edition is a component of a society’s cultural foundations. Acase in point is scholarly editing in Germany, which in the first half ofthe nineteenth century contributed – more or less intentionally – to theformation of national concepts. Although the paradigmatic examplechosen here is that of the famous poet Walther von der Vogelweide, itwould be inadmissible to leave the prime example of the Nibelungenliedunmentioned, if only by way of a preliminary.1

The case has been extensively researched and documented. The dis-covery of the Hohenemser Nibelungen manuscript in the mid-eighteenthcentury and the following printings and editions of parts and of thewhole of the work raised its popularity. ‘Allenthalben suchte man damalsnach dem “Nationalepos”, dem großen Epos, in dem jegliche National-literatur ihren Identitätsstiftenden Ursprung und Höhepunkt habensollte’,2 and finally, such a national epic, supposedly reflecting a German

242 Thomas Bein

3 Hagen 2003, 359: ‘grown from German life and attitude’; ‘No other poem canthus touch and enrapture, delight and fortify a patriotic heart’.

cultural tradition, was found – which is remarkable, given the text’sdepressing, pessimistic nature. (The first and the last stanza of the songmark out, albeit not in all manuscripts, the scope: weinen unde klagen,crying and complaining.) The text’s social and political triumph wasmainly due to the various Nibelungen editions, which gathered pacefrom the late eighteenth century onwards. The following editions cameout in the first third of the nineteenth century in relatively rapid succes-sion:

1807 Friedrich Heinrich von der Hagen: Der Nibelungenlied1815 August Zeune: Das Nibelungenlied1815 Johann Gustav Büsching: Das Lied der Nibelungen1826 Karl Lachmann: Der Nibelungen Not1827 Karl Simrock: Das Nibelungenlied

Even if the editors’ philological orientations differed considerably, theyall made their contribution to the Nibelungen myth – and mainly becauseof their entirely diverse ideas of how medieval texts should be ‘workedup’.

Friedrich Heinrich von der Hagen, the first editor (who presented thewhole text in a strange mixture of Middle High German and ModernHigh German), enhanced with his prefaces the national interest in thetext (which, ‘durchaus aus Deutschem Leben und Sinne erwachsen’ heconsiders one of the greatest and most admirable of all times) to a highdegree. ‘Kein anderes Lied mag ein vaterländisches Herz so rühren undergreifen, so ergötzen und stärken, als dieses’.3 Karl Lachmann stirred upthe fire in his own way, by declaring all existing editions ‘useless’ andsetting himself a goal to bring the oldest extant text as close to the origi-nal record as was allowed and possible (Lachmann 1960 [1826], v). Inthe process two things were accomplished: on the one hand theNibelungenlied was introduced to a non-academic readership, charged withfeelings of nationalism; on the other hand, the text was raised to a first-rate philological object, entailing decades of struggling, even fighting, forthe correct, ‘true’ text as a result.

Against this background it is easier to understand how the poetWalther von der Vogelweide could rise to the status of ‘singer of the

WALTHER VON DER VOGELWEIDE 243

medieval Reich’ (Richter 1988). What early philology did to theNibelungenlied, also happened to Walther a little later – albeit not with thesame intensity.

Participants were, again, Friedrich Heinrich von der Hagen, KarlLachmann, Karl Simrock and – joining as a new member – Franz Pfeif-fer. But the prime instigator in Walther philology was Ludwig Uhland,who had been working on a major presentation of the poet since 1819,and published his work in 1822 with the title ‘Walther von der Vogel-weide, an Old German Poet’ (Uhland 1984). As in the case of theNibelungenlied these philologists worked on the restoration of the medi-eval poet’s texts on different levels and with partly incompatible meth-ods. What they all have in common is the high regard of the poetry andthe conviction of having a cultural mission. In what follows I shall firstoutline Uhland’s initial achievement and then address the other foureditors.

Ludwig UhlandThe aim of Uhland’s monograph was to make a contribution to ‘dasErforschen der altdeutschen Poesie’ (‘exploring Old German Poetry’),with the ultimate goal to create a ‘lebendiges und vollständiges Bild vondem dichterischen Treiben jenes Zeitalters’ (‘a living and complete pic-ture of poetical practices in that period’; Uhland 1984, 31n7). It is thefirst well-thought-out and well-structured attempt to describe Walther’spoetry and its poetical achievement. In a surprisingly sober and detachedmode (by the standards of that time), Uhland analyses the extant texts,refrains from judging, makes an obvious separation between subjectiveopinion and factual description. In nine paragraphs Uhland devoteshimself to Walther’s biography (based on the texts), his poetical appren-ticeship, his political commitment, his wandering life, the Minnesang withits various hues, his (alleged) participation in a crusade, his literary-his-torical position, his religious opinions and the last phase of his life. Near-ly everywhere Uhland relies on the evidence of Walther’s texts. He pres-ents these in New High German or in close paraphrases, because his firstpriority is to make them understandable. However, Uhland was wellaware of the fact that this procedure would meet with disapproval:‘Nicht unbekannt ist mir, wie wenig dieses Verfahren bei gründlichen

244 Thomas Bein

4 Uhland 1984, 33n7: ‘I am aware of the fact that this method is not recommendedby the experts of the German antiquity’.

5 Leitzman 1927, 1: 238, ‘Uhland is a brilliant new poet, but in the Old Germanprobably more uneducated than Köpke.’

6 Uhland 1984, 42n7 and 48ff.: ‘We heard the poet’s painful complaint about Ger-many’s decline. What appealed to us here was one of his most beautiful qualities, thelove of his fatherland. This noble emotion is the soul of an important part of hispoetry. It excites him everywhere to the liveliest participation in public matters.Among all the Old German singers he deserves the name of patriotic singer. No onerecognised and felt his people’s peculiarities the way he did.’

Kennern des deutschen Altertums empfohlen ist’.4 Only two years be-fore, Jacob Grimm had written to Karl Lachmann: ‘Uhland ist einer derguten neuen Dichter, aber im Altdeutsch wohl ungelehrter als Köpke’.5

In the second paragraph of his monograph Uhland characterisesWalther as a ‘Vaterlandsdichter’ (‘patriotic poet’):

Wir haben die schmerzliche Klage des Dichters über den Verfall vonDeutschland vernommen. Es hat uns daraus eine seiner schönstenEigenschaften angesprochen, die Vaterlandsliebe. Dieses edle Gefühl ist dieSeele eines bedeutenden Teils seiner Dichtungen. Überall erregt es ihn zuder lebhaftesten Teilnahme an den öffentlichen Angelegenheiten. Ihmgebührt unter den altdeutschen Sängern vorzugsweise der Name des va-terländischen. Keiner hat, wie er, die Eigentümlichkeit seines Volkes er-kannt und empfunden.6

This characterization of Walther by Uhland was to influence literaryhistory-writing as well as monograph studies for more than a century anda half, with the period of National Socialism – when Walther counted asa ‘Vorkämpfer deutscher Gesinnung’ (‘a champion of German-minded-ness’) – undoubtedly presenting the most inglorious highlight (see Bein1993). Still, it is not Uhland who should be blamed for the anachronisticconnection between the literary and political conditions of the MiddleAges and the nineteenth century.

Karl Lachmann and the poet’s ‘dignified character’It is well known that Karl Lachmann ranks equal with the Grimm Broth-ers as a founding father of German philology. The discipline was basi-cally founded by this triumvirate. The Grimms and Lachmann werelinked by a deep personal friendship; and the philological interests andthe ethical conception of this kind of scholarship were rooted as deeplyas this friendship. This mixture of private and philological matters isobvious in numerous letters, mixing scholarly discussions, scolding of


7 Leitzmann 1927, 579n10: ‘I was not afraid of the cholera, because on the onehand I have begun to dismiss the belief in contagion and on the other hand the das-tardly opinion, that it would happen only to the rabble, an opinion with which a lot ofpeople secured themselves for a short time’.

colleagues, and private matters such as the raging cholera epidemic: ‘DieCholera hat mir keine Angst gemacht, weil ich sogleich theils denGlauben an die Contagiosität aufgegeben hatte, theils die ruchloseMeinung womit sich viele auf kurze Zeit gesichert haben, sie treffe nurden Pöbel.’7

In a constant interchange the three scholars set out to refurbish thediscipline’s foundation. This implies on the one hand differentiating anddescribing the historical gradations of the language starting with Gothicand Old Saxon, and continuing with Old and Middle High German untilEarly New High German (as per Jacob Grimm’s ‘German Grammar’);and on the other hand examining und securing the textual culture of theMiddle Ages, involving scholarly editing.

In matters of editorial method it is Lachmann who sets the tone. Hetransfers his text-critical expertise, based on his experience in classicalphilology (regarding which, cf. Lachmann 1876), to the Middle HighGerman textual culture. His strong belief in the possibility of establishinga stemma, which at least leads to the archetype if not to the original, willdominate German philology for decades. Besides, all three founders areconnected by the strong conviction that a (literary) text in the course ofits handwritten tradition steadily suffers losses, for which the personsinvolved in the transmission process are to blame: heedless copyists,philistines, arbitrary patrons and so on. There is a fundamental mistrustof the text in its diverse handwritten manifestations. The early philolo-gists of Grimm’s and Lachmann’s type see themselves as the poets’advocates, who help them get back their very own words. They do thiswith the help of text-healing operations, called corrections and conjec-tures. A conjecture is an ‘assumption’, which means that a considerablepart of the process is speculation. But that is exactly what is demandedand appreciated as a special ‘scientific achievement’ in the discipline’searly phase.

Even today, Lachmann’s Walther edition is regarded as one of hisbest editorial performances. This reputation was established immediatelyafter its first and second editions, not least because of the high esteemfrom the brothers Grimm. In 1827, Jacob Grimm wrote to Lachmann:

246 Thomas Bein

8 Leitzmann 1927 517n10: ‘I wish you would have taken this opportunity to saymore about the metrical aspects; I do not know what you intentions are in that regard,but it will be hard for the readers to guess and understand you.’

9 Vahlen 1892, 188: ‘The miserable typesetter did more harm to my Walther than Ithought he would. On page 45,27 the text reads und instead of unde, on page 82,23 darinstead of har [etc.]’.

10 Leo 1971, 14ff:: ‘This is the real editio princeps of Walther von der Vogelweide andrightly counts as one of Lachmann’s best performances. The editor used his wholestrength to create a exemplary edition and from his point of view he fully succeeded’.

‘Nun Ihr Walther gefällt mir sicher, die arbeit ist reinlich, gedrängt, be-stimmt, es wird ihr kaum was anzuhaben sein.’ (‘Well I truly like yourWalther, the work is clean, concise, firm, there will hardly be anythingthat can be said against it’). Grimm criticises Lachmann only on onepoint: ‘Ich wollte, Sie hätten bei Gelegenheit dieses buchs sich über dasmetrische näher herausgelassen, doch weiß ich nicht, was Sie damitvorhaben; aber den lesern wirds schwer werden, Sie zu errathen und zubegreifen’.8

Lachmann’s work is ‘hard’ philology. One can almost see him sufferwhen he discovers misprints in his works. Frequently it upsets him somuch that he has to talk about it to friends at once. Thus he writes toMoritz Haupt in 1843: ‘Der elende Setzer hat meinem Walther dochmehr geschadet als ich dachte. S. 45,27 steht und für unde, S.82,23 dar fürhar [etc.]’.9

Lachmann’s Walther edition quickly obtained the status of the bench-mark, truly scientifically philological edition. It is part of what wouldlater come to be called the ‘Berlin School’ of ‘Lachmannians’, whoadopted the patriarch’s methodical heritage and often applied it muchmore rigorously than Lachmann himself. It is no surprise that in 1880Willibald Leo characterised Lachmann’s edition as follows:

Es ist die eigentliche Editio princeps Walthers von der Vogelweide und giltmit Recht als eine der besten Leistungen Lachmanns. Der Herausgeberverwendete seine ganze Kraft darauf, eine mustergültige Ausgabe zu schaf-fen, und dies ist ihm auch von seinem Standpunkte aus vollkommen ge-lungen.10

But Leo also emphasises that Lachmann’s edition is ‘nur für Gelehrteberechnet’ (‘only intended for scholars’), alongside other philologists whopopularised the poet. One of these philologists who surely deserves to bementioned in this context is Franz Pfeiffer, whose edition, according toLeo, finally enabled Walther von der Vogelweide to find his way back


11 Leo 1971, 16: ‘One does not say too much, when one calls Pfeiffer’s work anepoch-making achievement’.

12 Cf. Hagen 1838; see also Grunewald 1988.

into the heart of the German nation. ‘Man sagt nicht zu viel, wenn manPfeiffers Werk ein Epochemachendes nennt.’11

Karl Simrock: Walther in Poetic RenewalPrior to Pfeiffer, the aim of bringing Walther closer to a non-scholarlyaudience and to actually popularise his poetry had also been pursued byLachmann’s erstwhile student Karl Simrock (1802-1876). Simrock de-voted himself intensely to the poetic translation of medieval texts, atranslation which ought to show a peculiar aesthetic. In 1833 he pub-lished his Walther rendition, based on Lachmann’s text (Simrock 1833).It was reprinted repeatedly into the early twentieth century, which is anindication of the enterprise’s great success. In contrast to LachmannSimrock was aware of the necessity (and the scholar’s task) to impartcultural knowledge beyond academia. In his opinion, medieval literatureshould not only be a matter of a few insiders with a good command ofOld and Middle High German. These texts were important to all peopleinterested in literature, culture and art. The majority of them did nothave the necessary historical-linguistic expertise, nor was there any realis-tic hope that they would learn their own ancient language (Simrock 1833,Vorrede, note 18).

Friedrich von der Hagen: Pioneer and AmateurHagen12 delivered a truly gigantic editorial performance with his Minne-singer: Deutsche Liederdichter des zwölften, dreizehnten und vierzehnten Jahrhunderts(1838). For the first time it was possible for a wider audience to takenote of the richness of Middle High German poetry. Even today, nearlytwo centuries later, his edition remains the only one for some texts. Vonder Hagen worked idiosyncratically. For that reason he was often repri-manded, especially by the Grimms and by Lachmann – who were inleague here as usual. Two examples may illustrate this. In 1831 Lach-mann wrote to Jacob Grimm:

Die Arbeit [i.e. the ‘Minnesinger’ edition] hat mich doch überrascht durchihre unerwartete Schlechtigkeit: sie ist im Ganzen grade so gut wie ich sie

248 Thomas Bein

13 Leitzmann 1927 579n10: ‘The work surprised me by its unexpected inferiority: inits entirety it is just as good as I would have done it in 1816. […] If Hagen’s workwould consist of more than just lies, he could achieve much more’.

14Ibid. 588n10: ‘In the meantime I have also had the displeasure of seeing thatHagen has printed treffe in Walth. 106,21 with the note “probably one can read reife”.You can’t expect anything from someone who is capable of such a thing’. It should bepointed out that treffe had been given as a conjecture by Lachmann in his 1827 edition.

15 Quoted Richter 1988, 111n6: ‘In case of several manuscripts I usually took formy basis only one, of course the oldest and best, as far as possible, and used the othersfor support.’

1816 gemacht hätte. (...) Wenn bei Hagen nicht alles Lüge wäre, so könnteer viel mehr leisten.13

And one year later a withering comment followed (characteristic in itscombination of editorial punctilio and judgemental harshness) onHagen’s philological competence: ‘Auch ich habe inzwischen denVerdruß gehabt zu sehn daß Hagen Walth. 106,21 hat treffe druckenlassen, mit der Note “vermutlich ist zu lesen reife”. Wer das kann, dem istbeinah nichts mehr zuzurechnen’.14

Nowadays Hagen’s achievements are judged quite differently. Hiseditorial concept is very similar to the ones that are used more and moretoday. He largely does without reconstruction, which is frequently com-mitted to aesthetic principles, and instead devotes himself intensely tothe wording of the actual textual sources (mainly the Codex Manesse).Hagen gives detailed information and comments concerning his editorialprocedure. His interventions, including his thoughts on phonetic (andorthographic) normalisations, his grammatical and dialectological as wellas his metrical discussions, are of great interest, too. He follows the ‘prin-ciple of a leading manuscript’, does not insert many conjectures andrejects any method of extensive mixed-editing: ‘bei mehreren Hand-schriften habe ich vornämlich immer nur eine, und versteht sich, dieälteste und beste, so viel als möglich, zum Grunde gelegt, und dieübrigen nur zu Hülfe gerufen’.15

With his edition of the ‘Nibelungenlied’, Hagen had already pursueda patriotic aim; the same applies to his Minnesinger edition. As he pointedout in his dedicatory preface to the Prussian King Friedrich Wilhelm III,he intended it as of the ancient ‘Herrlichkeit des Deutschen Vaterlandes’(‘glory of the German fatherland’; Hagen 1838, 111). Among the manypoets in his edition, Walther von der Vogelweide takes the most promi-


16 Pfeiffer 1877 [1864], ix: ‘that series of brilliant critical editions, which take pridein not providing any explanation and instead indulge lavishly in a flood of unpalatablevariants’.

nent position, because Walther had struggled for the honour of medievalGermany and the Holy Roman Empire.

With von der Hagen’s gigantic collection of poetry (includingWalther), with Karl Lachmann’s severe philological edition and withSimrock’s poetic renewal sources had been made available renderingaccess to Walther von der Vogelweide for all types of readership. Theonly thing that was missing was a counterbalance to Lachmann, a synthe-sis between philology and popularisation. This was achieved by FranzPfeiffer.

Franz Pfeiffer: Against Academic PedantryFranz Pfeiffer (1815-1868), professor of German linguistics and litera-ture in Vienna, quickly became the academic antagonist to the Lach-mannianer. He moved into position against Lachmann’s so-called ‘song-theory’ (to the effect that the Nibelungenlied was a cluster of independentcantos) and against Lachmann’s edition. With his students and support-ers, Pfeiffer engaged in a polemic regarding the question to what extenta philologist should address a non-professional audience (Krohn 1994).In Pfeiffer’s opinion, as in Simrock’s, the editor had to offer more than‘naked’ philology à la Lachmann. Because of this attitude he was accusedof vulgarisation. But Pfeiffer defended his conviction with enthusiasm;witness the eloquent preface to his 1864 Walther von der Vogelweideedition.

Pfeiffer’s basic aim is to bring certain poems of the middle agescloser to the present-day German nation. In his opinion none of theearlier editions fulfilled this main purpose. Pfeiffer intensely reprimandsan editorial tendency (on the increase since the 1830s) to confine oneselfto the production of a ‘critical text’, denouncing ‘jene Reihe glänzenderkritischer Ausgaben, die in Abwesenheit aller und jeder Erklärungenihren Stolz setzen und dafür in einem Schwall ungenießbarer Lesartenein seliges Genügen finden’.16 According to Pfeiffer this was the reasonwhy only a small group of teachers and students took note of medievalGerman texts. ‘Man darf sagen, daß gegenwärtig kaum jemand mehr ein

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17 Ibid.: ‘One can say that nowadays hardly anyone buys and reads an Old-Germanbook, except when those who must, i.e. those who are professionally required to doso’.

18 Ibid., xii: ‘Since our collection intends to inspire interest among educated peoplein Middle High German literature, but can only assume a few of these to have athorough command of the old language, it is necessary to show consideration for thatmajority of readers “who do not understand a single word of Old German”.’

19 Ibid. xvii: ‘the Berlin school is not only ignorant of what our editions intend, butit is also absolutely incapable of teaching our nation’s educated classes in an under-standable way’.

altdeutsches Buch kauft und liest, als wer muß, d.h. wer durch seinenBeruf dazu veranlaßt und genöthigt ist.’17

Pfeiffer pursued his fight against this development by bringing to lifea new series of editions: the ‘German Medieval Classics’. He dedicatedthe first volume to the poetry of Walther von der Vogelweide, which hewanted to make accessible to a greater audience by putting the mainemphasis on the commentary.

Da unsere Sammlung sich zum Ziele gesetzt hat, die Theilnahme der Ge-bildeten für die mittelhochdeutsche Literatur zu gewinnen, genauereKenntnisse der alten Sprache aber nur bei den Wenigsten vorausgesetztwerden kann, so mußte vor allem auf jene weit überwiegende Zahl vonLesern Rücksicht genommen werden, ‘die vom Altdeutschen gar nichtsverstehen’.18

Pfeiffer’s concept was very successful. After one year the first editionhad already sold out and a second one was printed. In the preface to thissecond edition Pfeiffer proclaims, with obvious pride, the success of hisapproach. At the same time he takes the opportunity to cross swordswith the ‘so-called critical school’. He reacts to fierce criticism from theBerlin school by levelling a few polemic swipes himself. He emphasizesthat ‘die [Berliner] Schule nicht nur keine Ahnung hat von dem, wasunsere Ausgaben wollen, sondern daß ihr auch vollständig die Fähigkeitgebricht, in einfacher verständlicher Weise lehrend und unterrichtend vordie Gebildeten unsers Volks zu treten’.19

Pfeiffer was confirmed by the success of his edition, which was reis-sued seven times until 1911, with several reprints following even after-wards. It is true that he could not oust the Berlin School – after all Lach-mann’s Walther edition maintained its canonical status and remained inprint until recently – but Pfeiffer and his edition occupied an importantmarket position, and deservedly so. Every editor has to carefully ask


himself, for what purpose he edits and which audience his edition ismeant to reach. These questions are of a surprising topicality. In a similarway as in Pfeiffer’s time, one cannot assume today that German studentshave the linguistic abilities to deal with ‘naked’ Middle High Germantexts on their own. That is why in the first half of the twentieth centurynumerous editions with translations and comments were published. Veryinfluential in this respect was Friedrich Maurer: he shaped the picture ofWalther for many generations of students (Maurer 1955-56, with a newedition Maurer 1972). Meanwhile, the Reclam publishing house offers acomplete edition with translation and comments (Schweikle 1994-98),and even the ‘most philological’ of all Walther editions, published by DeGruyter in the Lachmann-von Kraus-Cormeau tradition, will includeseveral ‘additions’ in the next edition, in which I myself am involved.These ‘additions’ (commentaries, translations and so on) ought to sim-plify the reception for unpractised readers.

To conclude: In the first half of the nineteenth century, in various differ-ent places and with different methods and aims, a corpus of sources wasretrieved that could be used for widely different purposes. The earlyphilologists were aware of the fact that the texts and authors they de-voted their work to played important roles in many attempts to recon-struct a cultural (and political) tradition for the ‘German nation’. Thatthis involved real trench wars between divergent philological schools didno harm. On the contrary: the issue appeared all the more important theharder one was fighting for the right ways to deal with it. This appliesnot only to the long-lasting quarrel about the genesis and best presenta-tion of the Nibelungenlied but also to the quarrel about the appropriatemethod of editing Walther and the most ‘authentic’ way of reconstruct-ing his work, based on the manuscripts. The Nibelungenlied was ‘talkedabout’; Walther was ‘talked about’. Learned philologists were able tohunt around in cleverly thought-out critical apparatuses and variantlistings, while at the same time grammar school pupils were also offeredsome Walther verse for their perusal. German classes in school tended tobecome lessons about cultural roots and traditions. In such an environ-ment it is not astonishing that Walther soon acquired the status of amythical figure.

On the basis of his political poetry he was styled the ‘singer of themedieval Reich’ (cf. Richter 1988, note 6). The narrator in his texts was

252 Thomas Bein

understood to be identical with the real-life author, without any distinc-tion. That is why it seemed as if Walther personally intervened and deter-mined the fate of the ‘German empire’, defending its secular poweragainst the clergy and glorifying German men and women beyond allothers.

In this context the reception of Walther’s so called ‘praise-song’ playsan important role. This song, which does have chauvinistic features,glorifies the German people, stating that even after having seen manyparts of Europe, nowhere can one find such outstanding human qualitiesas in Germany. This song and its a-historical reading establishedWalther’s fame as a ‘patriotic singer’, as a visionary pioneer for Germanvirtues. It comes as no surprise, then, that Heinrich Hoffmann vonFallersleben in his famous Lied der Deutschen (‘Song of the Germans’,1841: ‘Deutschland, Deutschland über alles’) fell back on Walther’s‘praise-song’. In 1922 this ‘Song of the Germans’ was declared the Ger-man national anthem by Friedrich Ebert (Brunner et al 1996, 236-40).

The name of Hoffmann von Fallersleben brings us back to our focusperiod – the first half of the nineteenth century. Philology – at timesclearly politically motivated – freed Walther’s texts from their manuscriptlimbo and published them – in the literal sense of the word: bringingthem before a public. In the many-faceted cultural and political searchfor roots and unity, these new accessible texts filled an obvious need. Inthe early nineteenth century the basis was established for what was tofind its inglorious apex in National Socialism: ‘Whoever touches Walthervon der Vogelweide, touches the deepest nerve of the German-nation’scharacter.’ That was how Conrad Arnold Bergmann, professor of history,literature and education, pointed out the poet’s ‘living significance’ in1933, ‘during the contemporary days of national crisis’ (Bergmann 1933,1). In those days, Walther was called a ‘real German’ (Friedrich Panzer,1934), a ‘speaker and admonisher’ (Herta Gent, 1938), ‘the highest blos-som of the Teutonic branch’ (Wilhelm Dilthey, 1933), the ‘oldest voicecrying for national renewal’ (Kurt Jacob, 1935), the ‘courageous cham-pion of freedom and right, truth and human dignity’ (Franz RolfSchröder, 1930), a ‘priest and ruler, poet, judge and prophet’ and themedieval Reich’s ‘poetical evangelist’ (Hans Naumann, 1934), an origina-tor ‘of a very German purview’ (Friedrich Neumann, 1942), a prophet ‘ofcenturies of German fate’ (Friedrich Knorr, 1941), a ‘pioneer ofChristian-national thinking’ (Conrad Arnold Bergmann, 1933), an author-


20 Documentation and source-referencing of all these quotations in Bein 1993. Theoriginal German phraseologies: ‘echter Deutscher’ (Friedrich Panzer, 1934), ‘Sprecherund Mahner’ (Herta Gent, 1938), ‘die höchste Blüte des germanischen Zweiges’(Wilhelm Dilthey, 1933), der ‘älteste[] Rufer nach völkischer Erneuerung’ (Kurt Jacob,1935), eine ‘Symphonie von deutschen Tönen’ (Hans Naumann, 1935), ‘der uner-schrockene Vorkämpfer für Freiheit und Recht, für Wahrheit und Menschenwürde’(Franz Rolf Schröder, 1930), ‘Priester und Herrscher, Dichter, Richter und Prophet’(Hans Naumann, 1934), Urheber ‘eine[r] Welt deutschester Umschau’ (FriedrichNeumann, 1942), ‘dichterischer “Evangelist des Reichs”’ (Hans Naumann, 1934),Seher ‘deutsche[n] Schicksal[s] von Jahrhunderten’ (Friedrich Knorr, 1941), ‘Vor-kämpfer (...) des christlich-völkischen Denkens’ (Conrad Arnold Bergmann, 1933),Erkenner des ‘deutschen Auftrag[s]’ (Hans Teske, 1935), ‘zeitliche[r] Sammlerüberzeitlicher Kräfte, die deutsches Wesen je und je geformt haben’ (Hans Böhm,1942).

21 Many thanks to Esther Ehlen (Aachen) for the English translation of this article.

ity on the ‘German task’ (Hans Teske, 1935) and a ‘secular collector offorces beyond time, which shaped the German character for ever andalways’ (Hans Böhm, 1942).20

Fortunately these times of politically-motivated distortions and trav-esties of literary history are over. Both the Nibelungenlied and Walther vonder Vogelweide have survived the distortion of meanings and misinter-pretations of Nazi Germanistik, and can nowadays be explored for whatthey are: important heirlooms of the textual culture of the thirteenthcentury.21

ReferencesBein, Thomas. 1993. Walther von der Vogelweide: Ein ‘unheimlich naher Zeit-

genosse’: Werkprofil und nationalsozialistische Mißdeutung. Leuvense Bij-dragen 82: 363-381.

Bergmann, Conrad Arnold. 1933. Walther von der Vogelweide: Lehrer und Führer desdeutschen Volkes. Freiburg i.Br: Herder.

Brunner, Horst et al. 1996. Walther von der Vogelweide: Epoche, Werk, Wirkung.München: Beck.

Ehrismann, Otfrid. 1987. Nibelungenlied: Epoche, Werk, Wirkung. München: Beck.Grunewald, Eckhard. 1988. Friedrich Heinrich von der Hagen, 1780-1856: Ein

Beitrag zur Frühgeschichte der Germanistik. Berlin/New York: De Gruyter.von der Hagen, Friedrich Heinrich. 1838. Minnesinger. Deutsche Liederdichter des

zwölften, dreizehnten und vierzehnten Jahrhunderts. 4 vols.; Leipzig.von der Hagen, Friedrich Heinrich. 2003. Der Nibelungen Lied. In Heinzle et

al., 359-60.

254 Thomas Bein

Heinzle, Joachim; Anneliese Waldschmitt. 1991. Die Nibelungen, ein deutscherWahn, ein deutscher Alptraum: Studien und Dokumente zur Rezeption desNibelungenstoffs im 19. und 20. Jahrhundert. Frankfurt/M: Suhrkamp.

Heinzle, Joachim. 1996. Das Nibelungenlied: Eine Einführung. Frankfurt/M:Fischer.

Heinzle, Joachim et al., eds. 2003. Die Nibelungen. Sage, Epos, Mythos. Wiesbaden:Reichert.

Hoffmann, Werner. 1992. Nibelungenlied. Stuttgart: Metzler.Göhler, Peter. 1989. Das Nibelungenlied. Erzählweise, Figuren, Weltanschauung,

literaturgeschichtliches Umfeld. Berlin: Akademie-Verlag.Krohn. Rüdiger. 1994. ... daß alles allen verständlich sey. Die Altgermanistik

des 19. Jahrhunderts und ihre Wege in die Öffentlichkeit. In Wissenschafts-geschichte der Germanistik im 19. Jahrhundert, ed. Jürgen Fohrmann et al., 264-333. Stuttgart: Metzler.

Lachmann, Karl. 1876. Kleinere Schriften zur classischen Philologie, ed. J. Vahlen.Berlin.

Lachmann, Karl. 1960 [1826]. ‘Vorrede’. In Der Nibelunge Noth und die Klage.Nach der ältesten Überlieferung mit Bezeichnung des Unechten und mit den Ab-weichungen der gemeinen Lesart, ed. K. Lachmann. Berlin.

Leitzmann, Albert (ed.). 1927. Briefwechsel der Brüder Jacob und Wilhelm Grimm mitKarl Lachmann. Jena: Frommann.

Leo, Willibald. 1971 [1880] Die gesammte Literatur Walther’s von der Vogelweide:Eine kritisch-vergleichende Studie zur Geschichte der Walther-Forschung. New ed.Erich Carlsohn; Niederwalluf: Sändig.

Maurer, Friedrich (ed.). 1955-56. Die Lieder Walthers von der Vogelweide. 2 vols.;Tübingen: Niemeyer.

Maurer, Friedrich (ed.). 1972. Walther von der Vogelweide. Die Lieder. München:Fink.

Müller, Jan-Dirk. 2002. Das Nibelungenlied. Berlin: Schmidt.Pfeiffer, Franz (ed.). 1877 (1864). Walther von der Vogelweide. 5th ed. by Karl

Bartsch; Leipzig.Richter, Roland. 1988. Wie Walther von der Vogelweide ein ‘Sänger des Reiches’ wurde.

Eine sozial- und wissenschaftsgeschichtliche Untersuchung zur Rezeption seiner‘Reichsidee’ im 19. und 20. Jahrhundert. Göppingen: Kümmerle.

Schweikle, Günther, ed. 1994-98. Walther von der Vogelweide, Werke: Gesamt-ausgabe. Stuttgart: Reclam.

Schulze, Ursula. 1997. Das Nibelungenlied. Stuttgart: Reclam.von See, Klaus. 2003. Das Nibelungenlied: Ein Nationalepos? In Heinzle et al.,

309-343. Simrock, Karl (trl.). 1833. Gedichte Walthers von der Vogelweide, übersetzt von Karl

Simrock und erläutert von Wilhelm Wackernagel. 2 vols.; Berlin.Uhland, Ludwig. 1984. Werke. Band IV. Wissenschaftliche und poetologische Schriften,

politische Reden und Aufsätze, ed. Hartmut Fröschle & Walter Scheffler, 31-108. München: Artemis & Winkler.

Vahlen, J. (ed.). 1892. Karl Lachmanns Briefe an Moriz Haupt. Berlin.


HOFFMANN VON FALLERSLEBENAND DUTCH MEDIEVAL FOLKSONG

Herman Brinkman

AbstractThe German poet/philologist Hoffmann von Fallersleben (1798-1874) was celebrated during his lifetime for his pioneering work onmedieval Dutch literature; after his death his philological merits werequestioned. This article attempts to place Hoffmann’s pioneeringwork in perspective, taking into consideration his objectives insearching, listing and editing medieval Dutch folk song. Special atten-tion is given to discrepancies between his research strategies in Ger-many and in the Netherlands. A muted response to his several ap-peals to Dutch literati to forward samples of medieval song, as wellas his literary taste and preconceptions about what he believed wasthe extinction of a native song culture in Holland, prevented Hoff-mann from recording the living heritage of folk song in the Nether-lands. Hoffmanns views as an editor are also discussed with respectto his other, less academic objective: restoring medieval folk song topopularity.

The German romantic poet and philologist Heinrich Hoffmann vonFallersleben (1798-1874) was one of the first scholars, and arguably themost important one, who took an interest in the Dutch literature of theMiddle Ages for other than purely linguistic or historical reasons. Duringthree phases in his life he paid scholarly visits to the Netherlands. Apartfrom an early trip to the Walloon provinces of present-day Belgium, thefirst stay took place in the year 1821. After that he returned three timesduring 1836-1839, and once again, from 1854-1856 for three consecutiveyears (Poettgens 1993, 20-23). The results of these philological under-

256 Herman Brinkman

1 Verwijs and Verdam 1927-1952, art. 606.1a, 1b, 5b, 6, 8a: ‘A very arbitrarilyaltered reprint which is not without mistakes’; ‘A philologically hardly serviceableedition’; ‘unreliable’; ‘philologically barely of use’; ‘hardly useful’.

takings found their expression in twelve volumes which were publishedbetween 1830 and 1862 as Horae belgicae (Hoffmann von Fallersleben1830-1862; see the appendix to this article). The importance of his pio-neering work, which led the way to a new appreciation of Dutch medi-eval literature, was fully recognized both during his lifetime, and after hisdeath, both in the Netherlands as in Belgium. Various papers and mono-graphs that were dedicated to him, whether they highlighted the poet, hisencouragement of the Flemish Movement or the philologist, all point atthe official tokens of honour he obtained: a doctorate honoris causa at theUniversity of Leiden (1823), the bestowal of a royal gold medal (1836),the appointment as Knight in the Order of the Dutch Lion (1856) andthe honorary membership of the Society of Dutch Literature (1865) (DeRaaf 1943; Logghe 1991; Poettgens 1993).

Changing AppreciationIn view of this recognition, it seems remarkable that the light shed onHoffmann’s achievements in the one great monument of Middle Dutchphilology, the Middelnederlandsch Woordenboek (MNW, Dictionary of Mid-dle Dutch) is of quite a different nature. In the volume Bouwstoffen, whichpresents detailed analyses of the sources used for the dictionary, paleog-rapher Willem de Vreese, a man of undisputed standing, provided judge-ments on the quality and reliability of the printed sources (Verwijs andVerdam 1927-1952). His comments on Hoffmann’s editions speak forthemselves: ‘Een zeer willekeurig gewijzigde herdruk (...) die niet zonderfouten is’; ‘een philologisch nauwelijks bruikbare uitgave’; ‘onbetrouw-baar’; ‘philologisch nauwelijks briuikbaar’; ‘vrijwel onbruikbaar’.1 It ishard to imagine a greater contrast between these words and the praisethat Hoffmann received during his lifetime.

Apparently after Hoffmanns death a change in the appreciation of hisscholarly work had taken place. When Matthias de Vries, initiator of theWoordenboek der Nederlandsche Taal (WNT, Dictionary of the Dutch Lan-guage) published the first installments of a dictionary of Middle Dutch,an undertaking which he soon afterwards was forced to abandon, hededicated his work in progress to Hoffmann, writing: ‘Aan niemand

HOFFMANN VON FALLERSLEBEN AND DUTCH FOLKSONG 257

2 De Raaf 1943, 92: ‘To no-one does our nation have a greater debt than to you, forits knowledge and appreciation of the literature of the Middle Ages.’

heeft ons Vaderland voor de kennis en waardering zijner letterkunde uitde middeleeuwen hoogere verplichting dan aan U’.2

It is all the more remarkable therefore, that Jacob Verdam, who wasto take up and fulfill the enormous task of writing the MNW, omittedthis dedication, replacing it by a dedication to Matthias de Vries, andleaving no more than a casual allusion to Hoffmann’s role at the concep-tion of the dictionary. In the end, one may wonder if Hoffmann’s philo-logical work has earned true recognition. Some historical differentiationseems called for.

A Conversion to Germanic PhilologyHow much in fact we owe to Hoffmann becomes all the more apparentif we look at the things he did not do. A hardly recognized, yet strikingomission in his work, which I will go into presently, may have hadfar-reaching consequences not only for our knowledge but even for theactual transmission of the old Dutch folk song – this being, paradoxi-cally, precisely the area which Hoffmann cherished most fondly. I willcome to this later on.

But first, in order to put both appreciation and underestimation inperspective, I have to analyse the way Hoffmann developed his idealsand tried to realise them in Germany; and contrast this with the way heoperated in the Netherlands. In doing this I will look at his literary ambi-tions, his research strategies and the role of editing.

Hoffmann’s concern with Dutch literature started when he was astudent of classical philology at Göttingen. Following an early, as yetunfocused interest in Germanic languages and dialects, his commitmentto these studies gained momentum after an encounter with JacobGrimm. At some point the then twenty-year-old student expressed hisfascination for antiquity and told Grimm of his plans to make a literaryjourney to Italy and Greece. Grimm, with a subtle hint, managed to puthim on a different track by asking: ‘Is not your fatherland closer to you?’What followed may justly be called a ‘conversion’. It took place on Sep-tember 5, 1818 and determined the course of his life.

Never has Hoffmann been unclear about his motives. The thing wehear him talk about the most, in his early writings, is his determination to

258 Herman Brinkman

3 Hoffmann 1892-93, 305-6: ‘the folk songs of other countries within and outsideEurope need also to be taken into account; for only in this way a general perspectiveon folk song can be achieved.’

4 ibid. 100-1: ‘It comprised Gothic, Old-, Middle- and New High German with allits regional dialects, Old Saxon, Low German, Dutch, Frisian, Anglo-Saxon and Scan-dinavian; furthermore the history of German culture and literature, folklore in morals,customs, sagas and fairy tales, as well as the history, art, antiquities and law of Ger-many.’

demonstrate the dissemination of German songs and to clarify the affin-ity between the cultures of the Germanic peoples. In a letter of NewYear’s Day 1820, addressed to Jacob Grimm, he writes: ‘Auch müssendie Volkslieder anderer Länder in und ausser Europa berücksichtigtwerden weil sich nur so eine allgemeine Ansicht über das Volksliedgewinnen lässt’.3 The scope of his vision is reflected in the formulationof what he considered to become his new field of study:

Ich begriff darunter das Gotische, Alt-, Mittel-, Neuhochdeutsche mit allenseinen Mundarten, das Altsächsische, Niederdeutsche und Niederländische,das Friesische, Angelsächsische und Englische, und das Scandinavische;ferner die deutsche Litteratur- und Culturgeschichte, alles Volksthümlichein Sitten, Gebräuchen, Sagen und Märchen, sowie endlich DeutschlandsGeschichte, Kunst, Alterthümer und Recht.4

An additional motivation played into this. To Hoffmann, the impact offolk song revival should be far more than antiquarian, philological oreven patriotic. He discerned a definite aesthetic component, that, to hisopinion, should influence the developing romantic poetics. Drawing onthis he aimed at restoring and cultivating esteem and love for the purityand beauty of old folk songs. As a poet, he tried to emulate form andcontent of these songs and ardently hoped that others as well would startreading and singing them, be inspired by them, and in this way wouldgive a new impulse to contemporary poetry.

First Encounters with Dutch SongsHoffmann’s first encounter with Dutch songs goes back to his stay inGöttingen. In 1818 he found a reference in the local library to an editionof the so-called Souter-liedekens (‘psalter-songs’, i.e. vernacular psalmadaptations) dating from the sixteenth century. The songs in this bookhad no musical notation, but were provided with melodic indicationsthat referred to opening lines of unknown Dutch secular songs. Fromthen on he set his mind on retrieving this lost heirloom.


5 ibid., 82.: ‘She spoke the true dialect of Bonn and knew all the songs that used tobe sung when there was a dance, when people went into the fields, or when there weregatherings’.

As early as November 1818, Hoffmann, in a letter to Grimm, dis-played some views on his proposed studies of Dutch folk song. Healluded to a possible journey to Holland the next year, in the company ofa friend who was a good composer (and who was probably invited as arecorder of folk melodies). Especially in Brabant he expected rich har-vest, because people there, he assumed, loved singing much more thanthey did in the ‘deserted dunes of Holland’. Grimm supplied him with alist of songs, extracted from Dutch bluebooks, some of which Grimmhad already published in 1813 in Deutsche Wälder.

Hoffmann realised that there was no reason for him to stay in theclassically oriented university of Göttingen and decided to register at thenewly founded university of Bonn, where he arrived in May 1819. Hishopes of a radically different programme were frustrated. The lectures bySchlegel, whom he considered a very vain man, were disappointing.More stimulating was the student community, which consisted of travel-ling students from all over the German territories.

The following year he was working on several fronts: languageacquisition, library research, transcription, the establishment of a networkof correspondents, source collection and field work. His objective was tomaster the languages he needed for his studies both actively and pas-sively. In the summer, instead of travelling to Holland, he roamedthrough the Walloon region of the Low Countries. Of a short visit toMaastricht he wrote to Grimm that to his regret he was unable to traceany oral legends (Hoffmann 1892-93, 308).

Research Strategies in GermanyThe rest of 1819 Hoffmann spent in the village of Poppelsdorf, nearBonn, where he stayed in a house next to the church. Later in life herecalled the way in which he collected folk songs there, ‘from the lips ofthe people’. He was on very friendly terms with the daughter of his land-lord: ‘Sie sprach das eigentliche Bönnisch und wusste alle die Lieder, dieman zum Tanze oder im Freien und bei Zusammenkünften zu singenpflegte’.5 These girls taught him their dialect and their songs and whenthey were insecure about some texts, they would call in others. A vicar inthe village of Kessenich assisted in melody transcription. In this way

260 Herman Brinkman

Hoffmann was able to collect many songs, including some versions ofthe Song of the Two Royal Children. Apart from this, his fellow studentsKarl Reuter and Peter Adams provided him with several beautiful songsthey had recorded in their own homelands: the Rheingau and the MiddleMoselle.

Around that time he realized that he was severely lacking in studymaterials, since the Bonn library did not fulfil all his needs. He conceivedthe idea of establishing a private library, which was problematic given hislack of financial backing. Nevertheless, using the small funds available,he was able to accomplish a great deal. In the fall of 1819 he discovereda manuscript on the market in Bonn, which contained about a hundredsongs and dated from the sixteenth century. To his great delight he wasable to buy it. From this manuscript he instantly published two studentsongs, maintaining the old orthography. Encouraged by this find hecontinued browsing through the stocks of second-hand booksellers, bywhich means he obtained several German manuscripts, originating fromNonnenwerth monastery.

In addition to this he travelled, mostly on foot, to princely and privatelibraries throughout the country. In the library of linguist JohannGottlieb Radlof he discovered a copy of the Oud Amsterdamsch Liedboek(Old Amsterdam Songbook), to which he was granted free access. Thisbook, which contained a Dutch version of the Song of the Two Royal Chil-dren once again put him on the track of the study of Dutch literature.Some of the songs he translated and added to a collection of his ownpoetry, Lieder und Romanzen (Cologne, 1821). In November 1819 hereceived an unpaid position as library assistant, which enabled him toperuse and excerpt many volumes of both old and new reviews andcollections, and to improve on his foreign language skills: German dia-lects, Danish and Dutch.

Sometimes his best luck mingled with serious setbacks. In the ducallibrary of Wolffenbüttel he discovered the only existing copy of theAntwerps Liedboek (Antwerp Song Book), a unique collection of morethan 200 worldly songs, printed in 1544. How he would have liked totranscribe these songs! However, despite his pleadings, no permissionwas granted. When he found references to song books in the catalogueof Mainz library, no one was prepared to take the books from theshelves. He asked local friends to return to the library at a later date andto transcribe the songs for him, but to his amazement, they replied that


6 Westendorp 1820, 454: ‘The collector wishes, as many already have done forGermany, to record the folksongs, folk- and fairytales, legends etc. which in ourcountry are still alive on the lips of the people.’

7 Brachin 1965, 193: ‘Most of all I would like to know, whether present-day folk-song has preserved traces of remarkable songs of the past, or melodies for that matter;and in what parts of the country the people still take most pleasure in singing’.

the library was closed during the winter and that no one could locate thekey.

In 1820, after a short stay in his native Fallersleben, he took up trav-elling again, visiting acquaintances and libraries. This kind of research,travelling on foot, was extremely arduous. Reading Hoffmann’s accountsof constantly getting wet and losing his way, one can understand thatsuch work could only be done by a young researcher.

The first immediate contacts with the Netherlands were establishedthrough a professor Van Swinderen from Groningen. Van Swinderentook a letter by Hoffmann to the antiquarian Nicolas Westendorp, whoobligingly mentioned it in his periodical Antiquiteiten as follows:

De Verzamelaar zou gaarne, zoo als velen ten opzigte van Duitschlandreeds gedaan hebben, de volkswijzen, Sagen, Märchen, (vertelsels), legendenen soortgelijke, verzamelen, welke nog in ons Land in den mond van hetvolk leven.6

Westendorp strongly supported this call, but also indicated that as anageing cleric, he himself could be of little help, since he seldom had theopportunity to witness the people singing their old songs at merry times.

A letter Hoffmann sent to the legal scholar Hendrik Willem Tydemanat Leiden (July 9, 1820) shows his plan to undertake similar researches inHolland as he had done in Germany:

Zunächst möchte ich wissen, ob der jetzige Volksgesang noch Spuren altermerkwürdiger Lieder, oder auch noch Weisen bewahre, und in welchenGegenden das Volk am singlustigsten geblieben sei.7

Recording the living cultural heritage was, at that point in time, his fore-most research priority.

First Expedition into the NetherlandsIn the meantime Hoffmann compiled an overview of all remainingsources of Middle Dutch literature, the result of which was published in1821. Considering the short period of time and the working conditions

262 Herman Brinkman

(with practically no help from Dutch scholars and without setting footon Dutch soil) one cannot be but amazed of what he had accomplishedso far. Yet he knew that a visit to Holland held the promise of a muchricher harvest. In June 1821 the time had finally come for him to makehis journey to the Netherlands.

Shortly before his departure, he wrote to the 81-year-old Hendrik VanWijn, whose Letterkundige Avondstonden (Literary Lucubrations) had sup-plied him with valuable information. He tried to win over this ailing andsomewhat confused old man and asked him to encourage his Dutchfriends to track oral versions of the Song of the Two Royal Children(Gaedertz 1888, 26-27).

On his arrival in the Netherlands, his first encounter with academiccircles was far from encouraging. The Utrecht professor Simons, onwhom he called, was not amused by Hoffmann’s ambitions, and pointedout that it was no custom in the Netherlands to make literary journeys.He was better received in Leiden, where he stayed with his fellow coun-tryman, the physician Salomon. What is more, without much ado thekeys of the well stocked library of the Maatschappij der Nederlandsche Letter-kunde (Society of Dutch Literature) were entrusted to him. This allowedhim to draw up the first catalogue of medieval manuscripts in this collec-tion.

Up to a certain point Hoffmann proceeded in the same way as inGermany: visiting large and small libraries, browsing the second-handbook trade for old manuscripts and prints. This approach once againproved very successful. In a relatively short period of time he acquiredan extremely valuable collection of medieval books, mostly by receivinggifts and swapping cleverly with booktraders.

Yet there was one striking difference in his approach. One wouldhave expected him to start a thorough investigation into oral traditions.But he did nothing of the kind. Nowhere in his autobiography do wefind any hint that he made endeavours in this field, neither during thisfirst visit nor during any of six consecutive ones. Later in life he statedthat he had started with high expectations, but that his hopes for abun-dant material proved unrealistic (1833). The awkward thing is that Hoff-mann’s notion on the dearth of material was also preconceived to adegree. It appears that professor Siegenbeek of Leiden university, withwhom he had corresponded, had successfully tried to discourage him onthis point. For even before his first journey Hoffmann wrote:


8 Hoffmann 1821, XXII: ‘In Holland folk song is no longer alive; and what is more,all the older song collections are lost, or, as professor Siegenbeek of Leiden writes tome, they are in private possession, for since the days of Scaliger neither manuscriptsnor early printed collections have been considered worth preserving. And in privateownership they remain unnoticed or even scorned.’

9 Hoffmann 1821, 50, 55: ‘I would like to present to my fellow countrymen themost noble specimen of Dutch folk song; and thereby demonstrate that in the old daysthe Netherlands were inspired by a true German spirit for poetry, music and unspoiledmorals. (...) That these songs, in the true sense of the word, were folk songs, can beseen from their resemblance to such German and other Germanic folk songs as can befound in handwritten and printed collections, and up to the present day are being sungin more or less complete form by the people.’

In Holland ist aber gar keine Theilname dafür, und der Volksgesang lebtnicht mehr fort (...). Ferner sind auch daselbst die älteren Lieder-sammlungen untergegangen, oder, wie H. Prof. Siegenbeek zu Leiden mirschreibt, in den Besitz von Privatleuthen gerathen; denn auf öffentlichenBibliotheken hielt man wol seit Jos. Scaliger’s Zeit bis zu Ruhnken wederhdschr., noch gedruckte Sammlungen der Art, des Aufbewahrens werth.Und auch im Privatbesitz liegen sie unbeachtet oder verachtet.8

From the moment of his arrival in the Netherlands, Hoffmann finds hisexpectations confirmed. Three published appeals to the Dutch literaryand scholarly world, to come forward with song texts or songbooks,remained without response, in spite of Hoffmann’s deliberate appeal topatriotic sentiments among the Dutch:

Ik wenschte gaarne aan mijn Vaderland het êelste uit den Nederlandschenvolkszang medetedeelen; en daaruit te doen zien, hoe ook Nederland inouden tijd met echten Duitschen geest voor poëzij, muzijk en onvervalschtezeden bezield was. (...) Dat deze gezangen, in den waren zin des woords,Volksliederen waren, ziet men ook uit derzelver overeenkomst metDuitsche en andere Germaansche Volksliederen, die veelal in schriftelijke,maar ook in gedrukte verzamelingen gevonden, en ook thans nog meer ofmin volledig door het volk gezongen worden.9

In an amazingly short period of time Hoffmann became convinced thatDutch folk song up until the sixteenth century had been related to Ger-man song, but that later on it had been suffocated by learning; with theresult that all that was left were insignificant tunes and dialogues.

Eine Volkspoesie in dem frühern Sinne ist jetzt weder in Holland noch inFlandern und Brabant vorhanden; wenn der Holländer singt, so hat er

264 Herman Brinkman

10 Brachin 1965, 194: ‘Folk poetry, in the ancient sense, can no longer be found inHolland, nor in Flanders or Brabant; when a Dutchman sings, he comes up with somefine songs from the latest fashionable poet and with translated opera texts fromabroad; when a Fleming sings, he prefers to sing in French.’ It should be understoodthat Hoffmann, like Herder and Goethe before him, expressly excluded the songs ofstreet singers from folk poetry.

11 Hoffmann 1892-93, 117: ‘Ah, my little sister died /She was thirteen months ofage, / I saw her laid out in her coffin, /Ah, how cold my sister was.’

nichts als einzelne gute Lieder der neuesten gefeierten Dichter und über-setzte Operntexte des Auslandes, und der Vlaming singt lieber französisch.10

Hoffmann’s View on Contemporary Dutch Song CulturePierre Brachin rightly remarks that Hoffmann may have seen a lot ofboth the Netherlands and Belgium, but he did not get to know the coun-tryside. And yet, he travelled a lot, on foot, mostly, or by track barge,passed through many villages on his way and must have seen as manytaverns. Something of his shocked reaction to contemporary folk songshe did hear can be read in his recollection of a village fair, which hehappened to witness during one of his travels on foot to Haarlem or TheHague. This was very unlike a popular festivity in Germany, he writes,and it did not resemble the old paintings by Teniers in any way. It was achaotic mess, in which boys, girls and children were screaming, dancingand singing. In a dancing hall he was irked by the musicians, who playedworse than beer fiddlers at home. The people were awkwardly dressedand, worst of all, the words of the revellers’ songs so inappropriate as tobecome revolting. Dancing to a cheerful tune, a stanza was such fromthe eighteenth-century poet of childrens’ verse Hieronymus Van Alphen,which went as follows:

Ach mijn zusjen is gestorven,Maar eerst dertien maantjes oud,‘k Zag haar in haar doodkist leggen,Ach, wat was mijn zusjen koud11

– which was followed, he writes, by a wildly sung refrain: ‘Lapperdilapperdi lorischi lorischi, Lapperdi lapperdi lorischa!’ Following suchexperiences Hoffmann reached the conclusion that the Dutch were trulyalienated from their own national heritage. The reticence of the scholarlyworld on his summons told him the rest.

Lack of affection for old folk poetry also revealed itself in a more em-barrassing way. I have already mentioned that the Song of the Two Royal


12 ibid., 121: ‘One day I was invited into a large company of beautiful young girlsand was requested to sing something. I sang German songs and pleased everyone. Butas soon as I sang the first notes of the fine old Dutch song Once there were two royalchildren the whole room exploded into laughter. I stopped singing and said, in my bestDutch: ‘I did not expect the young ladies to spare me, but at least thought they wouldhave had more respect for their own native country and its beautiful poetic heritage.’

Children was one of his favourites; it was the song that had attracted himmore to Dutch literature than any other. Of all the thirty versions he hadcollected in various languages, he preferred the Dutch one. During hisstay in Leyden, he had noticed that many people were fond of his perfor-mances of German folk songs. Naturally, he thought he was at liberty tocome forward with one or two Dutch ones. In later years he recalled theincident in this way:

Eines Tages wurde ich in einer grossen Gesellschaft junger hübscherMädchen ersucht, etwas zu singen. Ich sang deutsche Lieder und Alles warerfreut. So wie ich aber das schöne altniederländische Lied: ‘Het waren tweeconingheskinder’, anstimmte, brach Alles in ein lautes Gelächter aus. Ichsang nicht weiter, sagte eben auf holländisch, so gut ich eben konnte: ‘Ichnehme von den schönen Fräulein keine Rücksicht für mich in Anspruch,habe aber geglaubt, dass sie ihr eigenes Vaterland und seine schöne poeti-sche Vergangenheit mehr ehren würden’.12

Although Hoffmann desisted from preserving the oral song tradition, henevertheless faced an enormous task: the careful reworking of his sur-veys, a continuous search for new printed or handwritten sources and therealisation of his editorial plans.

Hoffmann as EditorEspecially the latter task would prove to be an arduous one. At an earlystage, feeling insecure about the way in which he should edit a selectionof the best texts in his collection, he consulted Jacob Grimm. He did notwant to proceed in the manner of Von der Hagen or Arnim andBrentano, whose work was under serious criticism at that time. On theother hand he abhorred a textual treatment of Germanic texts by thestandards of classical philology.

At first he pleaded for a swift publication of discovered material, topreserve other texts from irreparable loss. But the situation of 1821 didnot allow such a policy. He knew of the existence of important songcollections, was aware, indeed, of their exact location, but restrictedaccessability frustrated an early realisation of his editorial plans. There-

266 Herman Brinkman

fore, there was no option but to wait for better circumstances. However,when in 1828 an anthology appeared entitled Letterkundig overzigt en proe-ven van de Nederlandsche volkszangen sedert de XVde eeuw (‘Literary survey andspecimens of Dutch folksongs from the fifteenth century onwards’),Hoffmann felt obliged to counter this ‘monstrosity’, by releasing thesongs he collected himself (Hoffmann von Fallersleben 1833). The 1828anthology by Le Jeune once again displayed the low standards of Dutchphilology. With little respect for the original text the editor replacedfrivolous lines with lines of his own making.

Unfortunately Hoffmann was unable to use his greatest discovery inthis field: the Antwerp Songbook of 1544. As Gerrit Kalff later rightlystated (Kalff 1884, 644), this book may be considered the foundation ofour knowledge of Dutch song culture of the fifteenth and sixteenthcenturies. Hoffmann’s patron Von Meusebach, who prepared an anthol-ogy of German songs and contended that the majority of the songs inthis Dutch collection were of German origin, monopolized its perusalfor a period of more than twenty years. Only from 1843 onwards,twenty-three years after Hoffmann had discovered the copy, was heallowed to look into it and, during short intervals, and only in Meuse-bach’s presence, copy some of the songs. This restriction was so severethat by 1854 Hoffmann had transcriptions of only 57 of 221 songs. Andwhen he finally obtained permission to publish the collection, he wasgranted a mere eight weeks to get the job done, a task he was unable tofulfill in time. With presses running, he was summoned to return thebook. Only through the intervention of another patron was he allowed touse the little book for a slightly longer period of time, which was justenough to accomplish the work. This edition, by the way, was the onlyone that was benevolently treated by De Vreese in the Bouwstoffen of theMiddle Dutch Dictionary.

In more than one way, it may be argued, Hoffmann failed to live upto his high ambitions. First of all he failed to restore the affection forancient folk song. He realized this when he wrote in 1852:

Wie ganz anders hätte sich die National-litteratur dort zu Lande gestaltet,wenn die altniederländische volksthümliche Poesie als Muster und leitenderGrundsatz betrachtet worden wäre, wenn sie die poetischen Geister angeregtund belebt hätte! Die heutige Poesie huldigt noch immer jener fremdartigenGeschmacksrichtung aus den Zeiten der französischen Ludwige, sie hatnoch immer jenen fremdartigen Zuschnitt in ihren Formen beibehalten,sowie jene gelehrte Ausdrucksweise und bleibt dadurch dem Gemüthe des


13 Hoffmann von Fallersleben 1852, 123: ‘How differently the national literature ofthe Netherlands could have developed, had the old Dutch folk poetry been taken upas an example and lodestar; if this poetry had inspired and animated the poetic minds!Today the poetic tastes are still similar to the fashions of French classicism; it stillmaintains a foreign aspect in its forms, just as it has kept a predilection to phrases thatshow off learning; therefore it will not reach the hearts of the people any closer thanthe past comes close to the present, and often remains as hard to understand as aforeign country.’

14 Hellinga 1941, 181. A recent edition of the Antwerp Songbook (Wolffenbüttel,Herzog August Bibliothek, 236.5 Poetica) is Van der Poel, Geirnaert and Joldersma2004.

Volks eben so fern, wie die Vergangenheit der Gegenwart, und oft eben sounverständlich, wie das Ausland dem Vaterlande.13

At the end of his life a certain indifference regarding editorial procedureseems to prevail. In the 1870 edition of the collection of proverbs byTunnicius, instead of a justification of his editorial practice, we read adiatribe against the modern-day generation of narrow-minded know-it-allcritics, who will never be satisfied, whatever decisions an editor maytake. If you faithfully transcribe the source, he complains, they will arguethat you made no effort to clarify the text; if you present a critical textthey will say it is a bad thing the original is faithfully reproduced (Hoff-mann 1870, 9-10). His remarks may be more than the grousing of agrumpy old man; that is, if we recall the nineteenth century appraisal ofhis faithful textual rendition of the Antwerp Songbook and compare itwith the verdict of Wytze Hellinga, who characterized his edition as ‘asboring as it is correct’, with the addition ‘the song returned, the bookremained dead’.14

The second point on which Hoffmann failed to accomplish what heset out to do, was the recording of the oral tradition. It is most unfortu-nate that Hoffmann seems to have been far too premature in his viewson the possibilities of researching Dutch folk song as part of a livingcultural heritage. The fact that his summons to the scholarly world failedto raise a response, that his appeals to the patriotic sentiment in thesecircles did not have the effect he expected them to have, has nothing todo with the alleged disappearance of folklore. Nor does it have anythingto do with a lack of scholarly interest in history. On the contrary, pre-cisely during the days that Hoffmann concerned himself with Dutchliterature, interest in history revived as never before, within the contextof an outspoken nationalism. In 1812, Jan Frederik Helmers’ De Holland-

268 Herman Brinkman

15 For a recent perspective of Hoffmann’s role in the cultural and nationalist move-ments of the nineteenth-century Netherlands and Belgium, see Leerssen 2006, chapter5; for further reading on Hoffmann see his biography by Jürgen Borchert (1991).

sche Natie (‘The Dutch Nation’) appeared, the most outstanding patrioticpoem ever written in Dutch. In the years following the French occupa-tion this long poem went through many printings and gained immensepopularity. It is a permanent glorification of the past; in passionatephrasings the poet presents historical scenes; a portrait gallery of nationalheroes is established. Only, there is no place, no place at all, for theMiddle Ages in this picture. It is a celebration of the Golden Age and allthose who followed its protestant values.

Only very slowly did this attitude change. Helmers called the MiddleAges the pitch black night of civilization; Willem de Clercq, twelve yearslater, still spoke of ‘the fogs of the Middle Ages’. It took the Belgianrevolution in 1830 and the emergence of the Flemish Movement, with itschallenge to French linguistic supremacy, to create the conditions forHoffmann’s ideals to be taken up again and developed further.15

ReferencesBorchert, Jürgen. 1991. Hoffmann von Fallersleben: Ein deutsches Dichterschicksal.

Berlin: Verlag der Nation.Brachin, Pierre. 1965. Les Pays-Bas vus par Hoffmann von Fallersleben. Études

germaniques 20: 189-209.Gaedertz, Karl Theodor, ed. 1888. Briefwechsel von Jakob Grimm und

Hoffmann-Fallersleben mit Hendrik van Wyn. Nebst anderen Briefen zur deutschenLitteratur. Bremen.

Hellinga, W.Gs, ed. 1941. Een schoon liedekens-boeck in den welcken ghy in vinden sult,veelderhande liedekens, oude ende nyeuwe, om droefheyt ende melancolie te verdryven.’s-Gravenhage: Boucher.

Hoffman von Fallersleben, A.H. 1821. Aanzoek om mededeeling van oudeNederlandsche volksliederen. Algemeene Konst- en Letterbode 2: 50-55.

Hoffmann von Fallersleben, A.H., ed. 1821. Bonner Bruchstücke vom Otfried nebstanderen deutschen Sprachdenkmaelern. Bonn.

Hoffmann von Fallersleben, A.H. 1830-1862. Horae belgicae. Studio atque operaHenrici Hoffmann Fallerslebensis. 12 vols. Vratislaviae.

Hoffmann von Fallersleben, A.H. ed. 1870. Die älteste Niederdeutsche Sprichwörter-sammlung, von Antonius Tunnicius gesammelt und in Lateinische Verse übersetzt.Berlin.

Hoffmann von Fallersleben, A.H..1892-93. Gesammelte Werke. Vol. 7, MeinLeben. Berlin.


Le Jeune, J.C.W., ed. 1828. Letterkundig overzigt en proeven van de Nederlandschevolkszangen sedert de XVde eeuw. ’s-Gravenhage.

Leerssen, Joep. 2006. De bronnen van het vaderland: Taal, literatuur en de afbakeningvan Nederland, 1806-1890. Nijmegen: Vantilt.

Logghe, Koenraad. 1991. Hoffmann von Fallersleben, of hoe het literairenationalisme gestalte nam. Teksten, kommentaren en studies 13.64: 54-59.

Poel, Dieuwke E. van der, Dirk Geirnaert, Hermina Joldersma et al., eds. 2004.Het Antwerps Liedboek. 2 vols. Tielt: Delta/Lannoo.

Poettgens, Erika. 1993. Hoffmann von Fallersleben. Ein Forscher und Dichterzwischen Preussen und den Niederlanden. In Brandenburg-Preussen und dieNiederlande: Zur Dynamik einer Nachbarschaft, eds. Jattie Enklaar and HansEster, 20-40. Amsterdam: Rodopi.

Raaf, K.H. de. 1943. Hoffmann von Fallersleben: voortrekker in het oude land derDietsche letteren. Den Haag: Oceanus.

Verwijs, E. and J. Verdam, eds 1927-52. Middelnederlandsch woordenboek. Vol 10,Willem de Vreese, Tekstcritiek van J. Verdam en Bouwstoffen, eerste gedeelte (A-F);G.I. Lieftinck, Tweede gedeelte (G-Z). ’s-Gravenhage: Martinus Nijhoff.

Westendorp, N. 1820. Over Volksliederen en Vertelsels. Antiquiteiten. Eenoudheidkundig tijdschrift (IVe stuk): 453-455.

Appendix: A.H. Hoffmann von Fallersleben’s ‘Horae belgicae’ series (1830-1862)1: De antiquioribus Belgarum literis (Vratislavae 1830). 2nd ed.: Übersicht der mittel-

niederländischen Dichtung (Hannover 1857).2: Holländische Volkslieder: mit einer Musikbeilage (Breslau 1833). 2nd ed.: Nieder-

ländische Volkslieder (Hannover 1856).3: Diederic van Assenede, Floris ende Blancefloer. Mit Einleitung, Anmerkungen und

Glossar (Leipzig 1836). 2nd ed.: Diederic van Assenede, Floris ende Blancefloer. MitEinleitung, Anmerkungen und Glossar (Leipzig/Hannover 1854).

4: Caerl ende Elegast (Lipsiae 1836; also as dissertation, Breslau). 2nd ed.: Caerlende Elegast (Lipsiae prostat Hannoverae 1854).

5: Lantsloot ende die scone Sandrijn. Renout van Montalbaen (Breslau 1837).6: Altniederländische Schaubühne: Abele spelen ende sotternien (Breslau 1838).7: Niederländische Glossare des XIV. und XV. Jahrhunderts nebst einem Nieder-

deutschen (Leipzig 1845). 2nd ed.: Glossarium Belgicum (Hannover 1856). 8: Loverkens: Altniederländische Lieder (Göttingen 1852).9: Altniederländische Sprichwörter nach der ältesten Sammlung. Gesprächbüchlein, ro-

manisch und flämisch (Hannover 1854).10: Niederländische geistliche Lieder des XV. Jahrhunderts aus gleichzeitigen Handschriften

(Hannover 1854).11: Antwerpener Liederbuch vom Jahre 1544 nach dem einzigen noch vorhandenen

Exemplare (Hannover 1855).12: Bruchstücke mittelniederländischer Gedichte, nebst Loverkens (Hannover 1862).


PRIVATE TO PUBLIC: BOOK COLLECTING ANDPHILOLOGY IN EARLY-INDEPENDENT BELGIUM

(1830-1880)

Jan Pauwels

AbstractThe Belgian Revolution of 1830, which marked the beginning of thecountry’s independence, was initially felt as a disruption in the privateand public care of ancient books and manuscripts. Soon afterwards,however, book-collecting resumed in circles of (mainly Flemish)antiquarians and bibliophiles, whose interests were increasingly recog-nized as providing the fledgeling state with the literary and culturalancestry needed to legitimise its independent existence. Soon, privateinitiatives were to shade increasingly into the formation of public(state-sponsored) initiatives and shifted fom the local (municipal) tothe national level.

The rise of Netherlandic philology in the geographical regions that todayconstitute the federal State of Belgium is inextricably linked with thehistory of book collecting. Nowadays scholars tend to spend a substan-tial part of their time in large libraries and archives, where the nationalcultural heritage is conserved and made accessible to the general public.Save for a few exceptions – mostly manuscripts or books with aestheticappeal – hardly any truly important items are now in private hands. Butwhen philology first manifested itself as a new discipline, at the dawn ofthe nineteenth century, the situation was quite different: the large publicinstitutions we know today were still under construction and the mostnotable manuscripts and books were in private hands. Thanks to theefforts on the part of modern European philologists, unexplored sourcematerial was discovered throughout Europe; a wave of text editions

272 Jan Pauwels

ensued. Gradually these manuscripts and rare books would become theproperty of public institutions. Their status shifted from antiquariancollectables to pieces of the national cultural heritage. Further institu-tional expansion in the course of the century, including a staff of trainedand remunerated scholars, led to greater professionalism in the field.Therefore, in order to fully understand the literary activity during theRomantic era, an institutional approach is required besides a mere poeti-cal one (Leerssen 2004).

As elsewhere in Europe, there was a group of intellectuals in Belgiumwho, from the 1820s, began to study language and literature in the ver-nacular. Their main activity consisted in tracing and publishing oldDutch texts. They represented a cultural emancipation movement thatstrove to promote Dutch in the young, bilingual State of Belgium bystudying its literary history. The three most prominent representatives ofthis movement, essentially amateur philologists, were also enthusiasticbook collectors: the libraries of civil servant Jan Frans Willems (1793-1846) and his younger colleagues professor Constant Philippe Serrure(1805-1872) and doctor Ferdinand Augustijn Snellaert (1809-1872) wererenowned. After the death of these collectors, large parts of their collec-tions became public property. In what follows, I shall try to explain howthis first generation of philologists came to own such significant bookcollections, how they used them for philological purposes, and how thepublic authorities subsequently took over their roles as collectors.

Books Gone AstrayIn the early nineteenth century, unknown manuscripts and early editionswere discovered all over Europe. This was largely due to the fact that,with the rise of philology, scholars were now actively searching for them.However, only decades before, any such activity would have been invain. During the Ancien Régime, large parts of the literary heritage wereconserved and studied behind the closed doors of religious institutions.These books had been standing on the library shelves of monasteries,chapters or colleges for centuries, often since the Middle Ages or theReformation, depending on the country or region. Except for the manybattles and pillaging that took place in Belgium – the proverbial battle-field of Europe, where the great powers traditionally tended to resolvetheir armed conflicts – these collections had remained static. Large partsof the literary heritage never made it into the marketplace.

PRIVATE TO PUBLIC 273

A series of rapid politico-religious developments thoroughly changedthe structure of book possession, and numerous manuscripts and earlyeditions began to circulate again. In the case of the Southern Nether-lands, four regime changes occurred in the space of just two generations:between 1780 and 1830, the region was successively ruled by the Austri-ans, the French, the Dutch and, finally, the Belgian State. Each of theseregimes would have a profound influence on book possession and col-lecting. The first development was prompted by the abolition of monas-teries under Austrian rule. In implementation of the papal brief ‘Do-minus ac Redemptor’, Empress Maria Theresa (1717-1780) dissolved theJesuit order and declared its property forfeit in September 1773. Between1777 and 1780, approximately 150,000 books and manuscripts from theorder’s schools were sold to the public, either item per item, or in lots, oreven by weight. Some of these books were earmarked for the predeces-sor to the Royal Library and were transported to Brussels from all overthe country, often by primitive means (e.g. in oyster barges in the case ofthe collection of the Jesuit College in Bruges). Several years passed be-tween the dissolution of the Jesuit Order and the relocation of its bookholdings, so that considerable irregularities occurred and many booksfound their way onto the market illicitly. The precise provenance of abook was hard to verify, as the Jesuits burnt their library cataloguesshortly before the order’s dissolution (Opdebeeck 2004).

Under the guise of rationalisation, Maria Theresa’s son and successor,Emperor Joseph II (1741-1790), decided in 1780 to disband another 150monasteries belonging to contemplative and therefore ‘useless’ orders.Consequently, between 1782 and 1792, another 60,000 volumes wentunder the hammer. This abundant flow of manuscripts and books over afifteen-year period inundated the private market, and yet more was tofollow: shortly after the French revolution, all objects of art (includingbooks) owned by fugitives, convicts, churches and monasteries, muse-ums and schools were confiscated. In 1794, after the French empire’sannexation of present-day Belgium, all remaining monasteries wereclosed down. Their book collections were sold off or else donated tonewly founded public libraries. The most valuable works were dis-patched to France. These operations were carried out by the specialagences d’extraction, which, among other things, plundered the Royal Li-brary, the archbishopric and the University of Louvain. After the Battleof Waterloo, as the territory of Belgium was added to the Kingdom of

274 Jan Pauwels

the Netherlands, the terms of the Treaty of Paris and the Congress ofVienna ordered the restitution of any confiscated property. But the li-brarians who, under the protection of the occupying forces, set out tolocate the stolen treasures in France were able to recoup only a fractionand, in some instances, actually brought back the wrong books (Lemaire1981, Varry 1991, Machiels 2000, Opsomer 2001, Janssens 2005).

Nor did this partial restitution mark the end of the momentous shiftsin book ownership. On 25 August 1830, a revolution erupted in Brusselsthat would lead to the independence of Belgium and the further disper-sion of a number of sizeable collections. The military commander of therevolutionaries set up his headquarters in the home of the well-knownbibliophile Karel Van Hulthem (1764-1832), on the corner of the Park inBrussels. Consequently, Van Hulthem’s library was – quite literally –caught in the line of fire. Miraculously, most of the volumes survived,but an unknown number of manuscripts and books were lost, andtwenty others suffered ‘bullet holes’. Some valuable manuscripts wereshredded by the revolutionaries to produce cartridges. After a ceasefirehad been called, Van Hulthem had the remainder of his library moved toGent. (Leleux 1965, 421-442) The 6000 volumes in what was then JanFrans Willems’s collection were packed in peat baskets and stored in anattic above the shed of a café in Antwerp. The most valuable items werelooked after by Serrure, who, after the bombardment of the city by theDutch, had some moved to the cellar of his own home and others to thehomes of acquaintances in other towns. If Willems needed any particularvolumes, they would be brought by barge to his new home, seventykilometres from Antwerp. Willems would later, in a letter to Hoffmannvon Fallersleben, complain about this dispersal and about the fact thatsome works, including copies of his own writing, were lost in the process(Deprez 1963, 37-38).

Much research is still required to unravel the developments outlinedhere in their full complexity, but one thing is clear: in the space of justone or two generations, the relatively static book collections of the ancienrégime in the Southern Netherlands had been superseded by a marketinundated with widely dispersed valuable items. The combination of lowprices and wide availability meant that private collectors at the time wereable to acquire huge libraries. Van Hulthem, for example, purchased thebest-known of all Middle Dutch manuscripts – which today carries hisname – for a mere 5.50 francs; a bargain even at the time. The market


also offered opportunities for ‘enterprising’ individuals: there are exam-ples of practices that lie somewhere in between vandalism, theft, and theunderhand selling of items that had supposedly been brought to ‘safety’by monks or others. Furthermore, during these turbulent times, therewas no way of telling what would happen to confiscated items. As itturned out, quite often they ended up in private collections. To name butone example: Jan Frans van de Velde (1743-1823), previously a librarianat the suspended university of Louvain, is believed to have gained accessto a French warehouse in Brussels and to have taken a large number ofmanuscripts and books. Certainly at the auction of his library in 1833,items from the collections of some dissolved monasteries resurfaced,some of which were subsequently purchased by the Royal Library (Des-champs 1993). There were also numerous foreigners, mostly English-men, who bought on the continental market. Sir Thomas Phillips (1798-1872), arguably the greatest collector of all time, and his illustrious com-patriot Richard Heber MP (1773-1833) even went so far as to rent pre-mises to store their new acquisitions. Heber actually lived on the conti-nent uninterruptedly from 1826 until 1831 to buy books in bulk. Aftertheir deaths, the books of such collectors were usually put up for auc-tion, so that the effects of their activities continued to reverberate, cer-tainly until around 1850, and, to a lesser degree, into the twentieth cen-tury. Between 1830 and 1880, all kinds of rarities freshly appeared on themarket, which created an opportunity for philologists to make someimportant discoveries.

Academics and CollectorsIt is no coincidence that all Dutch-speaking philologists in Belgium livedin Gent, the Flemish centre of philological and bibliophile activity duringthe first half of the nineteenth century. Private book ownership flour-ished: of the 400,000 volumes in the city no fewer than 150,000 be-longed to large private collections, with another 150,000 in smaller col-lections and just 50,000 in the library of the university (Voisin 1840, 75-80). The libraries of philologists were even mentioned with the name andaddress of the owner in the annual city almanacs. They were also men-tioned in visitors’ guides to cities, an indication that they were (some-times) accessible to colleagues and that they definitely served a philologi-cal purpose. Their libraries also feature in letters and documents of for-eign contemporaries, and even in publications by (mostly) German phi-

276 Jan Pauwels

lologists, who again emphasised their academic significance. The Ger-man librarian L.C. Bethmann (1812-1867), for example, wrote the fol-lowing in a travel account:

M. Willems, qui s’est principalement occupé de la littérature flamande,possède, en ce qui la concerne, la plus riche collection de la Belgique, aprèscelle de Van Hulthem. M. le professeur Serrure a également en sa posses-sion beaucoup de manuscrits flamands, quelques-uns en vieux français, etun grand nombre de fragments provenant de couvertures de livres, etc.,telles que les deux feuilles des Nibelungen en bas-allemand, qu’il a publiées(Bethmann 1843, 133-162)

After the Belgian revolution, which put a temporary stop to the vicissi-tudes of book collections, and partly under the impulse of the newgovernment, a Belgian national literature emerged simultaneously inDutch and in French. The newly formed State also set out in search of anational history, including in the two literatures (Couttenier 1998). Liter-ary activity was encouraged by means of prize competitions for patrioticpoetry and the subsidising of young authors and their publications, butequally by the establishment of committees entrusted with the publica-tion of ancient sources (which was, for that matter, a continuation of theapproach taken during the Dutch era). The edition of old sources, in-cluding texts in Dutch, was applauded by the largely French-speakingintellectual elite as an enhancement of the foundations of the fledgelingBelgian State.

Initially, the new generation of philologists based their source editionslargely on their own collections. Even in the first episode of Mengelingen,the first series of Dutch-language text editions, Willems edited a satiricalpoem entitled Dit es de frenesie, of which he himself possessed a manu-script (Willems 1827). The most striking example of an editor who basededitions on his own collection is Serrure, who wrote just about every-thing that appeared in the journal he himself had established, Vader-landsch Museum voor Nederduitse Letterkunde, Oudheid en Geschiedenis (1855-1862). Among the texts to be published in this journal were fifteen edi-tions of manuscripts from his personal collection. In the series Maetschap-py der Vlaemsche Bibliophilen, he published twelve text editions, five ofwhich were based on manuscripts from his personal library (Deschamps2004, 348-9, 359-63). Of course these philologists also correspondedfrequently about their efforts to trace and acquire manuscripts and earlyeditions. They also borrowed material from each other, so that break-


throughs in Dutch philology were often achieved through cooperation.Willems, for example, was able to publish excerpts of Spiegel historiael inhis journal Belgisch Museum (1837-1846), which had been made availableto him by the well-known historian Alexandre Pinchart (1823-1884) aftermediation on the part of Jules de Saint-Genois (1813-1867), librarian ofGent University. Inevitably, some conflicts arose regarding the return ofborrowed documents: the two friends Willems and Serrure – the latter inhis capacity as representative of the relatives of Richard Heber – werelocked in a dispute for several years over of the tardy restitution of amanuscript of Brabantsche yeesten to the heirs of the deceased Englishbibliophile. Serrure even threatened legal steps (Bols 1909, 355 & 357).In such situations, a contract could offer a way out: thus, after Willems’sdeath, Snellaert drew up a contract with a publisher concerning the con-tinued publication of the unfinished Oude Vlaamsche Liederen (1846-48).Article two of the agreement stipulated that the entire manuscript andany books from the library that were regarded as indispensable to thispublication would be made available to him, the ultimate proof thatphilological endeavour and book collecting went hand in hand at thetime. Indeed it was simply impossible to work as a philologist withoutaccess to private book collections.

The hunt was on, not only for unknown manuscripts or old books;autograph transcripts by colleagues were also in demand. At the auctionof Willems’s library, for example, there were 27 lots containing‘manuscrits et copies de la main de M. Willems’ (Snellaert 1847, 4752-4778). The items fetched relatively high prices, especially the transcriptsof previously unpublished manuscripts. The ferocity of competition inthe auction room is apparent not only from the prices fetched or thenames of the buyers (especially Serrure), but also from a written eyewit-ness account by the absent-minded Snellaert: ‘I feel embarrassed aboutthe purchase of some of Willems’s manuscripts. (...) Because of an inex-plicable lapse of concentration on my part, I didn’t even bid on no. 4752,so that Serrure was able to buy it on behalf of Mr De Jonge fromBrussels, for the sum of 1.50 francs. I purchased nos. 4758, 4762, 4766and 4767 for you for what I believe to be a reasonable price, especially inthe case of the latter two lots, almost nothing of which has been pub-lished’ (Gent UL, G 17943/151).

The hunt for transcripts by well-known philologists ties in with pre-vailing editorial practice at the time. Quite a few important texts were

278 Jan Pauwels

published on the basis of a transcription rather than the original. Themost striking example is the Van Hulthem manuscript, a collection ofMiddle Dutch texts named after its owner Karel Van Hulthem. Around1828, Serrure, who was still a student at the time, copied various textsfrom the collection, and Willems published a number of songs withoutever having seen the manuscript. After the death of the owner, Willemswas as yet able to borrow the volume and he too transcribed substantialparts of the text. Virtually all editions of known texts from the manu-script – not just those by the amateur founders of Dutch philology inBelgium, such as Blommaert and Snellaert, but also editions by estab-lished foreign philologists such as the Germans Franz Josef Mone (1796-1871) and August Heinrich Hoffmann von Fallersleben (1798-1874) andthe Dutchman Jan Tideman (1821-1901) – were based on transcriptionsby Willlems and Serrure (Brinkman & Schenkel 1999, 16-20). Likewise,the most significant text edition by Snellaert, Alexanders Geesten by JacobVan Maerlant, is not based directly on the original. Because of his pro-fessional obligations, he was unable to travel to Munich to study the onlycomplete copy of the manuscript, so that he based his edition on a tran-scription by the German philologist Johann Schmeller (1785-1852). Snel-laert’s edition was not received favourably, and was superseded twentyyears later by the German-Dutch philologist Johannes Franck (1854-1914), who did consult the Munich manuscript (De Smedt 1989-90).

The Shift Towards Institutional OwnershipTracing dispersed manuscripts was a permanent preoccupation for thenineteenth-centruy philologist. Some even went so far as to draw upauction catalogues or to pose as antique dealers (Pauwels 2000). Often,they acted as advisors to the authorities, who tried to support nationalphilology by setting various committees and who were also prepared tobuy books and manuscripts. In 1836, for example, Willems and Serrureasked the Belgian State to purchase the only surviving manuscript ofReynaerts historie at the eleventh auction of the library of Richard Heber. Itwas the manuscript on which Willems had in part based his text editionof Reynaert (Willems 1836). Willems had been advising the governmentsince the period of Dutch rule, as is apparent from an 1828 letter inwhich Pierre van Gobbelschroy (1784-1850), then Minister of the Inte-rior, asks Willems about ‘old documents from former institutions, spiri-tual associations, abbeys etc’ that were sold in Antwerp. He also asks


Willems to act as an adviser to the government on matters regarding theacquisition of possible rarities: ‘I regard it as my duty to do my utmost tosave such items for the State, and I believe the best way to achieve thatgoal is to ask a knowledgeable person to keep a watchful eye for any-thing that may come up for sale in this manner’ (Bols 1909, 173-174).After a brief interruption, Willems continued to fulfill his advisory rolein independent Belgium. The same holds for Snellaert, who was asked bythe Minister in 1862 to formulate a recommendation regarding the tran-scription of a number of medical manuscripts from the BibliothèqueImpériale in Paris. Snellaert issued a positive recommendation, but at thesame time tried to win over the State for his own (unrealised) edition ofworks by the fifteenth-century physician Jan Yperman: ‘Having beeninformed that the Ministry of the Interior has had a transcription madeof the text of Jan Yperman’s Heelkunde, contained in the manuscript thatwas recently discovered in Cambridge, I request you, Mr. Minister, tolend the aforementioned transcription to me for a few days. I have forconsiderable time been preparing an edition of the works of the father ofDutch medicine, for which I have had at my disposal two manuscripts:the Hulthem manuscript and one from my own collection. It speaks foritself, Mr Minister, that it is of the greatest importance that these twotexts could be compared with a third’. (the Cambridge manuscript is StJohn’s College, CB2 1 TP and was published on the basis of the Dutchtranscription in Broeckx 1863)

The Belgian State, like the earlier Dutch authorities, thus played anactively supportive role in the search for the dispersed national culturalheritage. In the event of the death of an important collector or philolo-gist, the state sometimes purchased their entire collection. In such in-stances, the philological significance of the collection was invariablyconflated with the state’s nation-building ambitions – as with the firstmajor purchase, the Van Hulthem collection, consisting of more than1000 manuscripts and 60,000 books. After the death of the most prolificof all Belgian collectors, the State had commissioned the Gent librarianAuguste Voisin (1800-1843) to compile a catalogue (Voisin 1836-37).The collection was valued at 315,000 francs, so that exceptional fundinghad to be requested from parliament. The young MP Charles AugustinLiedts (1802-1878) opened his report to the Chamber of Representativeson the acquisition of the library with the following evocation of one ofthe core duties of the newly established Belgian State:

280 Jan Pauwels

C’est de former l’esprit national, d’inspirer aux citoyens un si ardent amourde la patrie, de les rendre si idolâtres des institutions nouvelles, qu’ils s’yattachent comme à leur existence, que, présens ou absens, il n’en parlentqu’avec passion, n’y songent qu’avec orgueil et qu’ils ameraient mieux toutperdre que de renoncer à leur patrie.

Liedts referred to the significance of a national library, arguing that VanHulthem’s manuscripts and rare books relating to the country’s literaryand bibliographical history could provide the basis for such an institu-tion. He added that it was important that the State should act beforeforeign speculators moved in (Parliament 1837, 57). In January 1837, thedebate on the acquisition of the library took place, and even opponentsof the purchase ackowledged its national significance. They found thecollection too expensive to acquire in such uncertain times, and they alsoargued that it included too many double copies and insignificant works,and that the catalogue was unreliable. Eugène De Smet MP (1787-1872)was most outspoken of all:

Les livres sont en général de trop bas aloi pour devoir même craindre laconcurrence des étrangers. Et je ne crains pas de déclarer que la valeurréelle de cette collection ne vaut pas le tiers de ce qu’on nous demande; ceserait donc un scandaleux abus que de dilapider ainsi les deniers de l’étatdont nous avons bien besoin pour le moment.

However, these arguments meant nothing in comparison to the national-istic discourse of the proponents, who expressed fears that a piece ofnational heritage and prestige might otherwise be lost. Furthermore, theinspection report of a committee was read aloud which approved thepurchase on academic grounds. The committee was made up of threeheavyweights: Etienne-Constantin de Gerlache (1785-1871), the coun-try’s highest-ranking magistrate, Joseph Marchal (1780-1858), keeper ofmanuscripts, and Willems, the undisputed authority in the field of medi-eval Dutch manuscripts, of which Van Hulthem possessed no fewer thantwo hundred (Moniteur belge 1837, nr. 25). The purchase by the BelgianState for the price of 300,000 francs was eventually approved by theChamber with 56 votes in favour, 11 against and 2 abstentions (Moniteurbelge 1837, no. 26).

The purchase by the State of private collections – either as a whole oronly the most important items – would continue to be a common occur-rence throughout the nineteenth century (Bibliothèque royale: 1969, 135-156), even though a shift of emphasis did occur. In 1872, the owners of


the three most important private collections – Serrure, Blommaert andSnellaert – died within a brief time-span, so that their libraries came ontothe market almost simultaneously. Now that a generation of importantcollectors had virtually disappeared, there would henceforth be feweropportunities for the State to acquire old books. The lawyer and MPfrom Gent, Louis Drubbel (1814-1887), said as much during a debate inthe Chamber on 15 March 1873:

Les occasions favorables de ventes aussi importantes que celles des biblio-thèques Serrure, Snellaert et Blommaert sont rares et ne se présenterontprobablement plus. (...) Ne perdons pas de vue que les occasions d’achat,assez fréquentes au temps des premiers collectionneurs, deviennentexcessivement rares aujourd’hui, et la plupart des bibliothèques ont disparuou vont bientôt disparaître.

He went on to suggest that Snellaert’s library should be purchased in itsentirety. Snellaert’s collection consisted exclusively of Dutch-languageworks, ranging from medieval manuscripts to very rare folk books andcollections of drama (Deprez 1987, De Smedt 2004). After seeking ad-vice from two experts, a professor and a librarian, and after consultationwith the Administration and the Royal Library, it was decided that thecollection should, by way of exception, be acquired on behalf of theuniversity library of Gent (Deprez 1985), the ancient capital of the Coun-ty of Flanders, rather than for the Royal Library:

La bibliothèque de la capitale des Flandres est en effet le dépot naturel destrésors littéraires flamands. Il est bien juste que l’on trouve dans la seulebibliothèque sérieuse des deux Flandres la collection des livres flamands lesplus intéressants et j’allais presque dire ce que l’on n’y rencontre pas, cesont les ouvrages qui concernent la langue et la littérature flamandes.

Moreover, he read aloud a letter from Ferdinand Vander Haeghen (1830-1913), the librarian of the University of Gent, who was prepared to makea special gesture if Snellaert’s library were to be acquired:

Si le gouvernement achète la bibliothèque Snellaert, je m’engage à donnergratuitement ma collection toute entière. Cette série de Gantois comprendenviron 10,000 volumes et pièces et m’a coûté plus du double de la sommequi est demandée au gouvernement pour l’acquisition de la bibliothèqueSnellaert.

It was on this private collection that he had based his bibliographic mas-terpiece, the seven-volume Bibliographie gantoise, which had earned himinternational acclaim (Vander Haeghen 1858-1869). He had previously

282 Jan Pauwels

also exhibited parts of this collection at the Paris Universal Exhibition of1866. In other words, it was a considerable gesture, so that one could nolonger refuse to purchase Snellaert’s Dutch-language works, which wasdescribed as ‘une collection réunie à un autre point de vue, mais à unpoint de vue non moins national’. The Minister of the Interior, Jean-Baptiste Delcour (1811-1889), added his support to the proposal and thespecial credit for the acquisition of the library of Snellaert was approved(Parliament 1873, 753-755). Vander Haeghen’s action set an exampleand several other donations (and purchases) of private collections wouldfollow in the course of his librarianship (Vander Haeghen 1911). Clearly,a pattern had begun to emerge, as successive generations of philologistssaw to it that the collections of their predecessors fell into the hands ofthe State, as indeed would many of their own collections subsequently.This further enhanced the shift from private to public ownership ofmanuscripts and early publications.

The attitude of an owner vis-à-vis the State could have importantconsequences for the destination of their book collections. After a num-ber of irregularities, Serrure, was dismissed as Rector of the University ofGent, and his professorial teaching assignment would subsequently alsobe restricted. Henceforth, he would refuse to sell parts of his collectionto the State, despite a chronic shortage of money and repeated requestson the part of Louis Alvin (1806-1887), the Royal Library’s chief keeper.Nevertheless, he had acted as an intermediary for that institution at im-portant auctions in Gent and literally provided it with hundreds of booksand manuscripts. This, too, came to an end when it emerged that onecould not tell for certain whether all books supplied had actually beenordered (Deschamps 2004, 381-2). It is apparent from a letter by Alvinthat Serrure did not even want his books to fall into the hands of theBelgian State after his death:

Nous avons, du vivant de M. Serrure, fait de nombreuses mais vaines ten-tatives pour acquérir in globo sa bibliothèque, mais le professeur, pré-tendant avoir à se plaindre du gouvernement, n’a jamais voulu traiter. Ilparaît même qu’il a défendu à son fils de traiter avec l’Etat, même après samort. C’est ce qui oblige les héritiers à recourir aux enchères publiques.(Deprez 1985, 363-364)

Because of his dislike for the government, Serrure preferred to organiseanonymous auctions of his books during his lifetime or to sell preciousitems to Engelbert August, the eighth Count of Arenberg (1834-1875). It


appears from Serrure’s correspondence with the Count’s private librarianthat Serrure sold him dozens of rare – unique even – Middle Dutchromances for 5000 francs, quite a substantial sum for a private collector.He would later sell numerous other unique or very rare manuscripts andearly editions on language, literature and the history of the Netherlands,which today are located across the world, mostly in the United States(Cockx-Indestege & De Schepper 2000). The interest of the State –which under normal circumstances is a powerful motor for the retentionof a philological collection – would appear to have had the oppositeeffect in this particular case.

ConclusionDue to an amazing series of historical events, early philologists were ableto make numerous new discoveries. They acquired manuscripts and rarebooks that often had lain hidden behind the walls of monasteries forcenturies, and subsequently edited and published them. Through theseeditions the books and manuscripts themselves gained fame and werebought by the Belgian State upon the death of their owners. These ef-forts for the preservation of the national cultural heritage thus made wayfor the rise of a true professional modern philology. But even before,from the 1830s onwards, book collecting, philological activity and na-tional politics gradually merged into one another (Pauwels 2008). Themost striking example in that field will serve as the conclusion to thepresent article: the before-mentioned Maetschappy der Vlaemsche Biblio-philen, the only Dutch-speaking bibliophile society of the time, foundedby Serrure and Blommaert as early as 1839. Judging by the name, it couldeasily have been mistaken for yet another club of wealthy collectors, butits Laws stated unambigiously the society’s higher goals: ‘1. to publishunpublished documents of literary or historical nature; 2. to reprint rarebooks on national history.’ The limited editions on heavy paper wereintended only for the society’s 28 chosen members, the Royal Libraryand the university library in Gent. The Belgian State however subsidisedindividual editions, bought systematically twenty (and later one hundred)copies of the less luxurious trade editions of each new title and evenwent so far as to buy manuscripts explicitly for editorial work by thesociety. Afterwards they were included in the collections of the universitylibrary in Gent (Waterschoot 1990). There is no better example to illus-

284 Jan Pauwels

trate the shift from private to public book collecting and the rise ofNetherlandic philology in nineteenth-century Belgium.

ReferencesBethmann, L.C. 1843. Rapport de M. Bethmann, de Hanovre, sur les résultats

de ses recherches historiques dans les bibliothèques de la Belgique, faites en1839, 1840 et 1841. Messager des sciences historiques, 133-162.

Bibliothèque royale. 1969. Bibliothèque royale: Mémorial 1559-1969. Bruxelles:Bibliothèque royale.

Bols, Jan. 1909. Brieven aan Jan-Frans Willems. Gent: Koninklijke Vlaamse Aca-demie.

Brinkman, Herman, and Jenny Schenkel. 1999. Het handschrift-Van Hulthem. Hs.Brussel, Koninklijke Bibliotheek van België, 15.589-623. Hilversum: Verloren.

Broeckx, Corneille. 1863. La chirurgie de Maître Jehan Yperman, chirurgien belge.Anvers: Buschmann.

Cockx-Indestege, Elly and Marcus de Schepper. 2000. ‘Il n’en existe pas d’autreexemplaire dans notre littérature’. Handschriften en oude drukken uit deNederlanden van C.P. Serrure naar de hertog van Arenberg, en verder. InMedioneerlandistiek: een inleiding tot de Middelnederlandse letterkunde, eds. RiaJansen-Sieben et al., 287-301. Hilversum: Verloren.

Couttenier, Piet. 1998. National Imagery in 19th Century Flemish Literature. InNationalism in Belgium: shifting identities, eds. Kas Deprez and Louis Vos, 51-60. London: Macmillan.

Deprez, Ada. 1963. Briefwisseling van Jan Frans Willems en Hoffmann von Fallersleben.Gent: Rijksuniversiteit Gent.

Deprez, Ada. 1985. De bibliotheek van dr. F.A. Snellaert: rondom de verwer-ving door U.B. Gent 1872-1874. Verslagen en mededelingen van de KoninklijkeAcademie voor Nederlandse Taal- en Letterkunde, 343-391.

Deprez, Ada. 1987. De verwerving en de structuur van de bibliotheek van Dr.F.A. Snellaert. In Miscellanea Neerlandica: opstellen voor dr. Jan Deschamps, eds.Elly Cockx-Indestege et. al., 3: 85-96, Leuven: Peeters.

Deschamps, Jan. 1993. Handschriften van Jan Frans van de Velde in deKoninklijke Bibliotheek te Brussel. In Miscellanea Martin Wittek: album decodicologie et de paléographie offert à Martin Wittek, eds. Annie Raman et. al., 127-155. Leuven: Peeters.

Deschamps, Jan. 2004. Constant Philippe Serrure (1805-1872). In E codicibusimpressique: opstellen voor Elly Cockx-Indestege, eds. Frans Hendrickx et. al., 3:332-391. Leuven: Peeters.

Vander Haeghen, Ferdinand. 1911. Liste sommaire des principaux fonds entrés à laBibliothèque de la Ville et de l’Université de Gand. Gent: Vanderhaeghen.

Vander Haeghen, Ferdinand. 1858-1869. Bibliographie gantoise: recherches sur la vieet les travaux des imprimeurs de Gand (1483-1850). Gent.


Leerssen, Joep. 2004. Literary Historicism: Romanticism, Philologists, and thePresence of the Past. Modern Language Quartely: 221-243.

Leleux, Fernand. 1965. Charles Van Hulthem 1764-1832. Bruxelles: Académieroyale de Belgique.

Lemaire, Claudine. 1981. Note sur l’activité des ‘agences d’extraction’ adjointesaux armées de la République dans le Brabant entre 1792 et 1795. Archives etBibliothèques de Belgique, 34-50

Janssens, Jeroen. 2005. Van boekendepot tot openbare bibliotheek: de biblio-theken van de écoles centrales. In Abijdbibliotheken: heden, verleden, toekomst,eds. Pierre Delsaerdt and Evelien Kayaert, 77-97. Antwerpen: Verenigingvan Antwerpse Bibliofielen.

Machiels, Jeroom. 2000. Des bibliothèques religieuses aux bibliothèques publiques.Bruxelles: Archives générales du Royaume.

Opdebeeck, Bart. 2004. Boeken uit de bibliotheken van de Engelse jezuïeten-colleges te Brugge, bewaard in de verzameling ‘Ville de Bruxelles’. InBoekgeschiedenis in Vlaanderen, eds. Pierre Delsaerdt and Koen De Vlieger-DeWilde, 79-101. Brussel: Koninklijke Vlaamse Academie van België.

Opsomer, Carmélia. 2001. À la recherche des bibliothèques perdues. Bulletin del’Académie royale de Belgique: Classe des Lettres, 201-218.

Parliament. 1837. Recueil des pièces imprimés par ordre de la Chambre des Représentants.Session de 1836-1837. Bruxelles.

Parliament. 1873. Annales parlementaires de Belgique. Session législative ordinaire de1872-1873. Chambre des Représentants. Bruxelles.

Pauwels, Jan. 2000. Het boekenbezit van Jan Frans Willems, Prudens vanDuyse en Philippe Marie Blommaert. Spiegel der letteren: 259-295.

Pauwels, Jan. 2008. Les seigneurs du livre: Les grands collectionneurs du XIXème siècle àla Bibliothèque royale de Belgique, eds. M. de Schepper, A. Kelders and J.Pauwels. Bruxelles : Bibliothèque royale de Belgique.

Smedt, Marcel De. 1989-90. F.A. Snellaert als tekstuitgever. Spiegel der letteren 31:313-326, 32: 181-193.

Smedt, Marcel De. 2004. F.A. Snellaert als boekenverzamelaar: uit de briefwis-seling met J.J. Nieuwenhuizen. In Letters in de boeken: liber amicorum LudoSimons, eds. P. Delsaerdt and Marcus de Schepper. Kapellen: Pelckmans.

Snellaert, Ferdinand Augustijn. 1847. Bibliotheca Willemsiana. Gand.Varry, Dominique. 1991. Histoire des bibliothèques françaises: les bibliothèques de la

Révolution et du XIXe sciècle 1789-1914. Paris: Promodis.Voisin, Auguste. 1840. Documents pour servir à l’histoire des bibliothèques en Belgique et

de leurs principales curiosités littéraires. Gand. Waterschoot, Werner. 1990. De Maetschappy der Vlaemsche Bibliophilen. Wildert:

De Carbolineum Pers.Willems, Jan Frans. 1827-1836. Mengelingen van historisch-vaderlandschen inhoud.

Antwerpen.Willems, Jan Frans. 1836. Reinaert de vos. Episch fabeldicht van de twaelfde en dertiende

eeuw. Gent.


STAGES IN THE DEVELOPMENT OFDUTCH LITERARY HISTORICISM

Marita Mathijsen

AbstractEditing procedures for early Dutch literature went through fourstages. Initially, in the eighteenth century, the main concern was theorigins of the Dutch language. Next came a stage (decisively influ-enced by initiatives of German scholars) of collection and descriptionwith a view to the literary interest of early texts. This is the periodwhen texts which nowadays still belong to the canon emerged fromarchival collections and libraries. The scholars involved also began toprepare editions by way of a scholarly and, as a rule, individual effort(third stage). By the 1840s this gave way to a concerted effort by fiveunruly Dutch junior scholars to professionalise editing procedures.They founded the ‘Association for the Advancement of Early DutchLiterature’, which made its mark with a feverish production of edi-tions. The Association existed for a mere five years; yet in that shorttimespan it managed to alter editorial practice from the ground upand to effect a complete overhaul of the available knowledge of me-dieval Dutch literature.

A Preliminary StageIn the Netherlands, the study of medieval history and the edition ofhistorical texts took wing due to German influence. It would go too farto speak of a German invasion of medievalists in the Netherlands of thefirst decades of the nineteenth century. Still, one cannot doubt that with-out the German interest in medieval manuscripts the emergence of such

288 Marita Mathijsen

1 Jan Rock, Ph. D. student at the University of Amsterdam and member of theHuygens Institute, is preparing a study of the earliest editions in the Netherlands. Cf.Rock 2006.

an interest in the Netherlands would have been much delayed, and thatthese manuscripts would have been edited much later.

In what follows, I address the first period of Dutch medieval studies,which coincides with the first period of editing. It culminates in thefoundation of the Vereeniging ter bevordering van oude Nederlandsche Letter-kunde (‘Association for the Advancement of Early Dutch Literature’), abody uniting the first group of scholarly editors in the Netherlands. Ishall elucidate the objectives and the mode of operation of this Associa-tion.

In the process of historical editing, four successive stages may bedistinguished, the Association belonging to the fourth. Incidentally, Isuspect that a similar four-stage development may be encountered inother countries, too.

By way of a preliminary I should define what I mean when speakingof an edition. There is no clear-cut boundary line between what one maystill call the renewed publication of an early chapbook and what is alreadya scholarly edition. Particularly in the eighteenth century one encountersmedieval stories in publications which deviate but little from thoseprinted in the sixteenth century, but also publications preceded by a briefpreface pointing at the text’s historical significance. But there are alsoeditions proper, which provide a commentary and elucidate word mean-ings. My definition of a scholarly edition requires at a minimum that thenew publication has been overseen by an editor who makes himselfknown with his name or his initials, and who regards the text as a histori-cal artefact in need of elucidation. Furthermore, the editor takes a criticalview of how the text has come down to us. Not required however inthese early stages of editing are comparisons between variant readings ordirect textual criticism.

The First Stage: The Language at the CenterIn the early-nineteenth-century Netherlands, medieval studies were stillvery much linguistically oriented. There were only a few editions ofDutch medieval texts. At most some five texts seem to have been pub-lished which one may call editions in the sense defined.1 Buijnsters(1984) mentions just four – one of these a mystification. A twelfth-cen-

DUTCH LITERARY HISTORICISM 289

2 Huydecoper is discussed in Stein 2003.

tury monk by the name of Klaas Kolijn was supposed to have written arhymed chronicle about Count Dirk of Holland. The fake manuscriptbegan to cirulate early in the eighteenth century, and soon went throughtwo editions. Considered in European perspective this was a very earlymystification, fabricated c. 1700 by an engraver and sold to a wealthycollector.

The few editions that were prepared were published as a rule byantiquarians who, just as elsewhere in Europe, profited from theopportunity afforded by the disestablishment of the Catholic church inthe Netherlands – the market virtually abounded with manuscripts.Among eighteenth-century collectors Balthazar Huydecoper stands out.His primary interest was the language, his ultimate objective to compilea lexicon of the Dutch language, enabling a reconstruction of pureDutch. His lexicon was never published, but tens of thousands of indexcards have been preserved and later linguists have put them to good use.2

The year 1766 saw the foundation of the Maatschappij der NederlandseLetterkunde (‘Society for Dutch Literature’), which still exists and which inthe nineteenth century was to become central to the scholarly investiga-tion of Dutch language and literature. The Society started its activities bybringing together a library of early manuscripts. Here, too, the produc-tion of dictionaries was the prime objective.

At that time, then, people were busy collecting from a historical pointof view. Surveys of the literary history of the Netherlands did not yetexist. The first dates from 1800, and soon more were written. Theseearliest literary histories discuss about a dozen medieval texts. Siegen-beek’s history of Dutch literature (1826) leaves the reader with the im-pression that no more than some ten texts from the period until 1400had come down, and not even all of these had been edited. It was as-sumed that in the Netherlands no literary texts from before the thirteenthcentury had been preserved.

Two authors stand at the centre of early literary history, Melis Stokeand Jacob van Maerlant. Melis Stoke completed his rhymed chronicle ofthe counts of Holland around 1305. His work was printed for the firsttime in 1591, and the first edition proper was published in 1772 by theaforementioned Huydecoper, who added ‘notes on early history and onthe language’. Alongside Stoke, the celebrated Flemish Jacob van


3 Based on the model of the Academie Française, this Academy (originally named‘Koninklijk Instituut voor Wetenschappen, Letterkunde en Schoone Kunsten’) wasmeant to be the national institution for the advancement of the sciences.

Maerlant, who lived in the thirteenth century, was taken to be the earliestwriter in Dutch. A collector’s collection was not counted complete if theowner could not boast of a Maerlant manuscript in his possession. Hewas regarded as a civic poet, who had managed to disengage from theuncivilised Middle Ages and whose poetry was directed towards thespreading of knowledge.

In addition, collectors were aware of a few songs and a few chivalrictales from the twelfth and thirteenth centuries. These were not valuedparticularly highly. Huydecoper’s statement is well known: not all manu-script fragments of poetic works needed to be preserved, it sufficed tomake linguistic notes.

The Second Stage: Collecting and DescribingThe systematic investigation of what medieval texts in Dutch still existedtook off rather late. Although Huydecoper habitually took note of allthat met his eye, he must be considered a linguist and lacked literaryinterest.

The pioneer collector of manuscripts from a literary point of view,the first to do so consistently, was the celebrated author, linguist, histo-rian, and lawyer, Willem Bilderdijk. Unlike the antiquarians, whose urgeto collect was of a wholly private nature, Bilderdijk collected manuscriptswith a view to society at large. Upon society, so he felt, rested an obliga-tion to foster and preserve the treasures of the fatherland. He, too, re-garded Jacob van Maerlant as the central figure. When Louis Bonaparte,then king of the Netherlands under the aegis of his brother Napoleon,founded a Royal Academy in 1808,3 its Section of Literature was chairedby Bilderdijk. In this capacity he tracked down and purchased manu-scripts, and also collected materials for a dictionary and prepared editions(cf. van den Berg 1999).

The most important incentive however came from Germany. In 1811,Jacob Grimm, librarian to the king of Westphalia, addressed a publicletter Aan Kenners en Liefhebbers der oude Nederlandsche Letterkunde en Dicht-kunst (‘To the devotees and experts of early Dutch Literature and Po-etry’), which appeared in a prominent periodical, the Algemeene Konst enLetterbode (that is, ‘General Messenger of the Arts and Letters’; 2 (1811),


327-330). Grimm realised that the literary heritage of the Dutch and theGermans were closely related and that all kinds of versions of medievalstories might well be written down in Lower German varieties of thelanguage. He sought to get in touch with Dutch linguists and literaryhistorians, and through one of them he made an appeal to search forearly literary sources. By this he meant not only manuscripts, he alsoexpressly asked for ‘popular songs still known to elderly people’. No oneyet had directed such a public appeal to a Dutch audience.

A decade later it was once again a German philologist who tried toelicit an interest in Dutch philology and medieval studies: August Hein-rich Hoffmann von Fallersleben. He entered the archives in person, andlocated the texts that still constitute in good part the medieval canon.The same periodical which in 1811 had published Grimm’s appealprinted Hoffmann’s 1821 survey of medieval texts held in a variety ofarchival collections (Hoffmann 1821-22). Hoffmann also prepared thefirst editions of these and other important medieval Dutch works.

Once again a German, the historian J. Mone, contributed significantlyto the preparation of an inventory of medieval Dutch texts. For a fewyears he was professor of history at Louvain university, and in thoseyears he worked his way through libraries in the Southern Netherlandsand in Northern France. In 1838 appeared his Übersicht der Niederländi-schen Volks-literatur älterer Zeit. This ‘Survey of Dutch popular literature ofearly times’ provides a more extensive bibliographical overview than hadbeen listed by Hoffmann von Fallersleben. The labours of these twoGermans had in any case made available a highly useful overview ofwhat literary manuscripts had been preserved in libraries both at homeand abroad. True, these lists were as yet far from complete; even today,discoveries may still conceivably be made.

The Third Stage: Editing as an Individual OccupationThe editions prepared over the first thirty years of the nineteenth centuryfollow from the earlier activities in collecting and describing. It is still amatter of individual proclivity. Collectors/editors may ask the govern-ment for support, but something in the nature of a shared programme orshared editing procedures has not yet been conceived.

Once again Willem Bilderdijk must be mentioned first. In 1812 hepublished one part of Jacob van Maerlant’s Spieghel Historiael (literally,


4 Bilderdijk must be thinking here of philologists like Von der Hagen and Büschingwho unlike the Grimms were indeed in the habit of modernizing their texts.

5 The history of the Reinhart editions and the way in which editors sought to scoreoff each other, is described in Leerssen 2006.

‘Mirror of History’, that is, an anecdotal history of the world). That textwas well on its way towards becoming a shibboleth text, by which Imean a text which forms the point of convergence where nationalism,early scholarly attention, canon formation, and interest in the literary pastcome together. Bilderdijk called van Maerlant ‘the Father of our litera-ture’. It is interesting that he defended the preparation of a literal, diplo-matic edition, as against the custom at the time in Germany, where edi-tors met their supposedly ‘unexperienced’ readers half-way by modernis-ing the early texts.

Bilderdijk’s introduction to his edition of Jacob van Maerlant’s Spie-ghel historiael opens with a remarkable statement (Bilderdijk 1812). I para-phrase: Those who are less experienced in reading early texts find itconvenient to have them modernised a little. Editors wished to help theirreaders that way.4 But one should not edit early authors for readers whoare in need of such distortions. They are served better with a translationinto modern Dutch. Who truly wants to read an early text, will wish tosee it in its original guise.

Bilderdijk was not the only individual to engage the editing business.The editors in this period were most often connected to universities,where they taught literary history. Some editions prepared by some ofthem have later become classic exemplars of editions as they should notbe, for instance, the first edition, by L.G. Visscher, of the importantchivalric tale Ferguut (1838). But in the editing business, too, we onceagain encounter German prominence. Jacob Grimm edited texts in medi-eval Dutch literature, among these the first edition of Van den vos Reinaer-de, which was taken up in a large-scale Reinhart Fuchs edition of 1834.5Eduard von Kauler published a series entitled Denkmäler altniederländischerSprache und Literatur (1840, ‘Monuments of early Dutch language andliterature’), which contained a Flemish rhymed chronicle. Hoffmann vonFallersleben prepared more editions than anybody else. His publicationsalready fit in with the next stage, which can no longer be called individ-ual and which is clearly marked off from the third stage by its program-matic and scholarly nature.


6 Cf. Herman Brinkman’s article in this volume.

The Fourth Stage: Editing as a Scholarly Activity: The ‘Association for the Ad-vancement of Early Dutch Literature’

Hoffmann von Fallersleben is the man whose labours truly opened upthe great medieval texts which still form the Dutch canon. He began aseries Horae Belgicae (‘The Horae of the Low Countries’), for which heedited texts yet unknown, such as Karel ende Elegast and Floris ende Blance-floer (both in 1836).6 Even so, we do not meet with more truly scholarlyambitions until the activities of those philologists who set out to formwhat they called the ‘New School’. These men turned against the editingprocedures of their Dutch predecessors, but also against those of Hoff-mann von Fallersleben, which they deemed unprofessional. Their realpreference is for Lachmann’s procedures, but in their first editions theystill lack the courage to move in one bold jump from diplomatic to criti-cal editing. They have a programme; they debate editing procedures, andthey work as a scholarly team, complete with the quarrels that tend toaccompany such practices. I shall now address the objectives and proce-dures of these editors, who came together in the Vereeniging ter bevorderingvan oude Nederlandsche letterkunde or ‘Association for the Advancement ofEarly Dutch Literature’.

Around 1840, a young generation of philologists began to criticiseearlier collectors and individual editors as amateurish dabblers, and theyproclaimed their intent to edit early texts in a professional manner. Atleast three motives inspired them. There was in the first place an aware-ness that something was wrong in the Netherlands if the edition of earlymanuscripts depended on Germans and Flemish. There was also a gener-ational impetus: the young generation found that their predecessors hadbungled their editions, lacking both sufficient knowledge of the languageand a thorough investigation of the times in which a manuscript hadoriginated. Thirdly, they were moved by a sense that early literature wasmisunderstood. Maerlant in his dull didacticism was being praised to theskies, so they felt, whereas a far earlier, more romantic literature from thetwelfth and thirteenth centuries remained unknown. Already in 1842young Matthias de Vries wrote to Jan Tideman that he wanted his fellowliterary historians to apply themselves to early texts:

Dat tijdperk onzer letterkunde is het eigentlijk, dat te veel verwaarloosd enmiskend wordt. Het hooge belang daarvan is ons door Duitschers geleerd,


7 28 May 1842: ‘That, after all, is the period in our literature that is being neglectedand underestimated too much. The Germans have taught us its high importance, andnothing in our discipline is more urgently required than to bring to light that literature,the most precious monuments of which still dose in oblivion. (...) Pray remind yourselfhow Walewein, how the children of Limborch, how the Leekenspieghel (...), how amass of early masterpieces cries out for justice and how no one hears them, they whohave never yet seen the light of day.’The records of the Vereeniging, which contain these letters, are at Leiden University,Ltk 1519.

8 Jonckbloet 1846, 3: ‘Once and for all, then: No, our literature does not start by themiddle of the thirteenth century. That is rather where we must date its decay. From1150 to 1270 flourished a poetic school rich in imagination.’

en niets in ons vak dringender noodzakelijk, dan die letterkunde aan hetlicht te brengen, wier kostbaarste gedenkstukken nog den slaap der vergetel-heid sluimeren. (...) Bedenk dan toch, hoe de Walewein, hoe de kinderenvan Limborch, hoe de Leekenspieghel (...) hoe eene massa oudemeesterstukken om regt schreeuwt en niemand hen hoort, hen, die nogniemand ooit het licht deed zien.7

And here is how, in a review in the prominent journal De Gids, anotherrepresentative of the young generation, Willem Jonckbloet, urged themessage upon his readers:

Eens en voor altijd dus: neen, onze letterkunde vangt niet aan met de helftder dertiende eeuw; het is van dien tijd, dat haar verval dagteekent. Van1150 tot 1270 heeft eene dichterlijke school gebloeid, rijk aan verbeelding.8

As is the case with so much in the nineteenth century, the new schoolmarches under the banner of nationalism. The literature of the father-land, its early period included, is extolled for its high aesthetic merits andas a witness to an uncorrupted, poetic language. All this serves the newgeneration to justify their appeal for state support — the governmentshould acknowledge the existence of so fine an early literature and subsi-dise its being edited. To be sure, in voicing these nationalist sentimentsthey do not deviate from the Old School they are opposing.

BeginningsThe Association originated with the friendship between an archivist anda student, both living in Utrecht. The archivist, P.J. Vermeulen, had in1840 addressed a letter to his colleagues with a plan to found a literaryassociation capable of publishing early manuscripts and incunabula.Foreign examples, such as the Stuttgarter Verein, had inspired him. Heregretted in particular that numerous small editions and studies appeared


9 Cf. Gerritsen 1991, 174-175: ‘ (...) moet ieder onzer het werk aanvatten dat zijnehand vindt om te doen.(...) Ik ben in staat en gereed hoogst belangrijke bijdragen televeren.’

in obscure little yearbooks, so that one could not acquire an overview.But Vermeulen failed to strike a chord. Later he got in touch with theyoung student Jan Tideman, who had been charged by the Society forDutch Literature to describe an early drama collection.

Tideman and Vermeulen now jointly conceived of the plan to foundan association. Tideman talked some of his fellow students into joiningthe editorial board, the classicist Matthias de Vries and the theologianJacob de Hoop Scheffer. Both had already published a few small piecesabout literary matters. Scheffer came up with Pieter Leendertz, a clergy-man, and de Vries produced Willem Jonckbloet, who had just completedhis literary studies and who was the most experienced of them all in thathe had already published highly important editions of entirely unknowntexts such as the Beatrijs. Naturally, in responding to the letter of invita-tion Jonckbloet took pains to arrogate the plan to himself. He repliedthat he had already envisaged founding such an association, but had notdone so because he could not imagine anyone in the Netherlands willingto support it. However, now that collaboration has become feasible ‘eachof us must take up the labour that his hands direct him to undertake. (...)I for one am ready and prepared to make highly important contri-butions’.9’

On the first of June 1843 a letter went out, entitled Berigt wegens eeneVereeniging ter bevordering der oude Nederlandsche Letterkunde (‘Message re-garding an Association for the Advancement of Early Dutch Literature’,Ltk 1519), in which those addressed were called upon to become mem-bers of an association committed to publish at least 800 pages a year, foran annual subscription price of six guilders. The signatories appeal toevery ‘Vriend en beoefenaar der Vaderlandsche letterkunde’ (‘Friend andpractitioner of the literature of the fatherland’) to endorse and supportthe plan. Their particular objective is to call attention to our early litera-ture: ‘het zal wel onnoodig zijn op het hoogstbelangrijke dier Letter-kunde te wijzen, of te herinneren, hoe zij ons onze taal in haren oudstenen zuiversten toestand leert kennen’ (‘It surely goes without saying topoint at the high importance of that literature, or to remind you how itacquaints us with our language at its earliest and purest’).


It took a while before a sufficient number of subscriptions had comein. The correspondence between Matthias de Vries and Tideman showsthat letters had gone out to everyone active in the discipline; to Germanand Belgian professional scholars, and to all members of the Society forDutch Literature. But the booksellers remained lukewarm. They assertedthat they had circulated the lists, but upon inquiries made with potentialrecipients this turned out not to be so. De Vries then went ahead torecruit members among his own acquaintances. Several months laterthere were enough members to put the Association on its way. Threehundred and sixty-one members for the first year, with some resoundingnames among them. Not only are all Grand Old Men of the discipline inthe Netherlands represented, but renowned names from abroad, notablyJacob Grimm and Karl Lachmann, are among the subscribers, too. Theking and the crown prince of the Netherlands subscribed as well, and theMinistry of Foreign Affairs procured for itself ten copies (a form of statesubsidy then currently practised).

The first meeting took place on 4 October 1843. Financial matterswere settled; the programme was established; the board was elected, andarrangements were made with the publisher. Vermeulen was electedchairman, Tideman secretary. The first part of the Works of the Associa-tion appeared several months later, in 1844.

ProgrammeThe records of that first meeting have been preserved. Agreement wasreached over who would do what. Jonckbloet was to start with the ‘Ro-man der Lorreinen’; De Vries with ‘Der Leken Spieghel’; Tideman with‘Dboec van den Houte’, and Leendertz with ‘Der Minnen Loep’. Inpractice things went a little different. In course of the first year, 1844,three parts appeared, which contained part of the didactic poem Derleeken spieghel from 1330; Jacob van Maerlant’s Dboec van den Houte fromroughly the same time, and a romance about Charlemagne, Karel de Grooteen zijne 12 pairs. The respective editors were de Vries, Tideman andJonckbloet. The speed with which they worked was remarkable (particu-larly so if one considers that present-day professional editors usuallyneed years to complete an edition). Not only did they provide copies oftexts hitherto unpublished, but they also compared other versions andfragments that had come down. Furthermore, they set up a glossary


meant in the end to lead to the publication of a dictionary of medievalDutch.

In the years to follow six editions were completed, some quitevoluminous. Der leken spieghel (‘Mirror of laymen’), which de Vries edited,was the most voluminous of them all, and comprised six parts.Maerlant’s Dboec van den houte, edited by Tideman, was completed in thefirst year, as was Jonckbloet’s edition of Karel de Groote en zijne 12 pairs.The second volume opened with another voluminous edition, Der minnenloep (‘The course of love’); a didactic poem written by Dirc Potter in theearly 15th century on love silly, good, illicit, and permitted. The entirepoem which Leendertz edited comprised four volumes. No less spectac-ular is the first edition of the Roman van Walewein by Jonckbloet, in twoparts. The final title is once again a religious work by Jacob vanMaerlant, Sinte Franciscus Leven (‘The life of St Francis’), edited byTideman. To sum up the numbers: seventeen parts comprising six edi-tions published by four editors, with Tideman and Jonckbloet responsi-ble for two editions each.

With the exception of Der minnen loep, these works date indeed fromthe earliest times of Dutch literature. The most remarkable thing aboutthem is that some have still not been replaced by new editions — forthree of the six the edition published by the Association has so far re-mained the only one.

Scholarly OutlookThe new generation of philologists, united in the Association, left noth-ing undone to promote themselves as innovators. They called themselves‘the new school’, so as to mark themselves off from an established ‘oldschool’. They felt that the cultivation of early literature had so far been inthe hands of dilettantes, and that responsible scholarly editing startedwith the Association. Before and during the period of the New Schoolone may roughly speak of three directions. Grimm’s direction, followedin the Netherlands by Bilderdijk, stood for the literal, diplomatic rendi-tion of texts. Hoffmann von Fallersleben aimed at a far-reaching nor-malisation of manuscripts, self-evidently including the making of correc-tions, in accordance with the idea that a normative construction of thelanguage of a given century can be attained. But the new developmentwas the one pioneered by Karl Lachmann, aiming for a critical renditionof the texts based upon a comparative investigation of variants in the


10 Ltk 1095: ‘I have entertained myself these days by stripping to the bone Profes-sor Lulofs’ dreadfully incompetent textbook – in the January installment of De Gidsyou shall find him exposed stark naked (...) before the readership. I have used theoccasion to speak my mind about the entire old school. It was about time to showthese gentlemen our teeth. (...) Oh, that damned dilettantism!’

11 Jonckbloet 1846, 3: ‘It has been said more than once, and proofs have been givenfor it, that the cultivation of early Dutch literature (...) has suffered from a dilettantismthat to the right and to the left, devoid of any well-determined objective, full of driveland without conviction, has represented a meagre and fruitless amateurism rather thantrue scholarship!’

lineage of textual transmission. The New School directed its critique notso much against any of these three directions as, rather, against the indi-viduals involved.

Jonckbloet in particular made his views loudly known. In reviewspublished in the leading literary journal of those years, De Gids, but alsoin his editions and in separate treatises he scolded his predecessors in anoften crass vocabulary. He chose for his prize victim a professor past hisprime, B.H. Lulofs, who had compiled an anthology of medieval Dutchliterature. In a letter to a friend Jonckbloet observed:

Om mij wat te verpoozen heb ik dezer dagen het beestachtig slechte Hand-boek van prof. Lulofs eens uitgekleed: gij zult die man in de Gids van ja-nuari eerstkomend spiernaakt (...) in het publiek zien staan. Ik heb bij diegelegenheid zoowat mijne opinie gezegd over de geheele oude school. Hetwerd tijd dat men die heeren de tanden eens liet zien.. (...) O dat verdoemdeliefhebberen!10

And in De Gids itself he expresses himself thus:

Het is meer dan eens gezegd, en met bewijzen gestaafd, dat de beoefeningder oude Nederlandsche letteren (...) geleden heeft door een dilettantismedat regts en links, zonder bepaald doel, beuzelend, zonder systeem, zonderovertuiging, in plaats van de wetenschap, eene schrale, onvruchtbareliefhebberij heeft daargesteld!11

Jonckbloet goes on to upbraid Lulofs for his false representations andfor his incompleteness and lack of consistency, all of which he demon-strates with various examples of the lack of expertise in grammar andlexicography.

What kind of editions, then, did the New School put forward incontrast to the Old School? In organisation and execution all editionsprepared by the Association look the same. Most often the text beginsright after the title page. Most summarily in the margin one finds an


12 Tideman 1895, 31: ‘We edit our pieces the diplomatic way, that is, with thegreatest possible accuracy so that, upon expanding the customary abbreviations, werender the manuscript literally. We know very well that because of this editorial proce-dure, which has most often been followed in this country, we have been attacked byGerman scholars of the first rank. These scholars have established a grammar forevery century, founded upon a reading of the pieces known to them, so as to publishall later manuscripts in the so-called Rechtschreibung [orthography]. We, however,have decided in this to follow our own conviction.’

indication whether more than one version exists. At the page bottom thevariants are rendered in a negative lemma-apparatus. This is followed bya general explanation, by notes, and by a glossary. The notes may serveto elucidate the manuscript but may also add historical explanations tothe text; they are rather concise. The glossary is mostly comparative; thatis, the editor lists other forms of a given word and other works where itoccurs as well.

There is nonetheless a curious discrepancy between the outbursts ofjubilation with which the members of the Association address their owninnovations in the domain of literature, and the direction they actuallyfollow. The statutes lay it down that they shall publish their editions‘with diplomatic accuracy’. But this was no longer in conformity with theeditorial innovations of the time. De Vries and Jonckbloet, in particular,had given up their erstwhile belief in diplomatic editing. Both mensulkingly comply with the agreement, while indicating clearly that theyexpect more from Lachmann’s method and that they prefer critical edi-tions. Indeed, Jonckbloet goes so far as to publish a critical edition en-tirely unconnected to the Association and without taking any of its rulesinto account.

Already in the first annual report we encounter debate. Tidemanwrites:

We geven onze stukken diplomatiesch, dat is met de grootst mogelijkenaauwkeurigheid, uit, zoodat wij, na de gewone verkortingen aangevuld tehebben, het handschrift letterlijk weergeven. Het is ons geenszins onbe-kend, dat wij wegens deze wijze van uitgeven, die hier te lande tot nog toemeestal gevolgd werd, door Hoogduitsche geleerden van den eersten rangzijn aangevallen, die voor iedere eeuw eene grammatica, op de lezing derhun bekende stukken gegrond, hebben vastgesteld, en alle latere hand-schriften diensvolgens met eene zoogenaamde Rechtschreibung in het lichtgeven. Doch wij hebben gemeend in dezen onze eigene overtuiging temoeten blijven volgen.12


13 Ltk 1515: ‘There is no need for our Association to lick clean the plate after it haspleased Jonckbloet to give the cake over to be eaten by De Gids. And what a cake!Hard to chew on, without smell or spices.’

In the Association’s view, early Dutch grammar and spelling have not yetbeen examined sufficiently to make normalisation possible.

Jonckbloet’s and de Vries’ editions show clearly that they felt boundhand and feet by the agreement. Jonckbloet writes in Karel de Groote (‘Char-lemagne’) that the manuscript has been printed the diplomatic way, withall its mistakes and defects, not because he personally thinks that a criti-cal edition would be premature, but because the homogeneity of theeditorial board requires it (Jonckbloet 1844, XXX-XXXI).

Quarrels and Troubles; The EndIt soon became impossible to speak of unity in the Association. The firsttroubles began even before it was formally founded, when de Vriesshared with Tideman his annoyance that everyone credited Jonckbloetwith the initiative. A second conflict arose over one of Jonckbloet’spublications. Just as Hoffmann von Fallersleben had wandered all overthe Netherlands to find early texts, just so had Jonckbloet made a tripthrough Germany to discover Dutch manuscripts in archival collectionsand libraries. He had promised his report to the Association, but gave itto De Gids, which enjoyed wider distribution than the Association’s pub-lications. De Vries was furious, and refused to publish the report a sec-ond time, as Jonckbloet had proposed. Here is what de Vries wrote toTideman (4 December 1843):

Onze vereeniging behoeft den schotel niet uit te likken, als het Jonckbloetbehaagt heeft de taart door den Gids te laten opeten. En welk een taartnogal! Een taaije, zonder geur of kruiderij.13

This conflict was smoothed out, but soon Tideman complained about deVries, who has taken the liberty to make alterations in his glossary andwho has exploded ‘in ludicrous anger’ over his commentaries toMaerlant’s Dboec van den houtte. The next conflict involves Jonckbloetonce more, as he has published a critical edition outside the frame of theAssociation – an action deeply resented by the other members of theboard. Jonckbloet defended himself by pointing out that a critical editiondid not fit into the principles of the Association.


In 1895, many years after the Association has fallen apart, Tideman,by now an old man, wrote its history, which he used to settle old scores.He still felt slighted that in the public eye Jonckbloet had come to countas the principal leader of the Association.

In the journal’s fifth year the editorial board inserted a note that thenumber of members was diminishing, and that government support wasinsufficient to continue. Furthermore, the work had been done. Theboard has contributed to cultivating the literature of the fatherland, andit now wished to dedicate itself to other labours. The note is cool, buteverything goes to show that the editorial board cannot advance anyfurther in the accustomed manner. Two members had failed to contrib-ute to the efforts, Tideman remained the only one still to defend diplo-matic transcription, and both de Vries and Jonckbloet were awaitingappointments to prestigious professorial chairs. The objective had beenattained in that the existence of an earlier literature has been acknowl-edged and Maerlant no longer counted as ‘the father of the fatherland’spoets’.

ConclusionThe Association is an early example of scholarly collaboration. Jonck-bloet is among the first to formulate an opposition between academicand non-academic research, marking the start of the professionalisationof Dutch studies. Given the period when they were prepared, the edi-tions published by the Association do indeed attain a high level ofachievement. Some are still the only available edition of the text in ques-tion; not as if we were not in need of a newer publication but simplybecause no-one has taken the time and effort to edit them in accordancewith present-day standards. In that respect de Vries’ words are still asvalid as ever: ‘eene massa oude meesterstukken schreeuwt om recht enniemand, niemand hoort hen’ – a mass of early masterpieces cries out forjustice and no one, no one hears them.


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van Nederland, 1806-1890. Nijmegen: Vantilt.Miltenburg, A.P.J. 1991. Naar de gesteldheid dier tyden. Middeleeuwen en mediëvistiek in

Nederland in de negentiende eeuw. Vier studies. Hilversum: Verloren.Rock, Jan. 2006. Literary Monuments and Editor’s Jokes: Nationalism and

Professionalisation in Editions of Lodewijk van Velthem’s Spiegel Historiael(1727-1906). Variants: The Journal of the European Society for Textual Scholarship5: 285-314.

Stein, Robert. 2003 De heer Huydecoper bezit ze; maar wie meer? BalthazarHuydecoper (1695-1778). In Der vaderen boek. Beoefenaren van de studie derMiddelnederlandse letterkunde. Studies voor Frits van Oostrom ter gelegenheid van diensvijftigste verjaardag, ed. Wim van Anrooij, Dini Hogenelst, Geert Warnar,11.21. Amsterdam: Amsterdam University Press.

Tideman, J. 1895. De Vereeniging ter Bevordering der Oude Nederlandsche Letterkunde.(1843-1850.) Bijdrage tot de geschiedenis van de Nederlandsche letterkunde in denegentiende eeuw. ’s Gravenhage.

Verslagen en berigten uitgegeven door de Vereeniging ter Bevordering der Oude Nederland-sche Letterkunde 1-5 (1844-1848).


THE NATION’S CANON AND THE BOOK TRADE

Joep Leerssen

AbstractTaking the case of a book series claiming to be a ‘Library of theComplete German National Literature’ (running from 1835 until theearly 1860s), this article looks at the emergence of a readership forthe medieval classics in what was, around these decades, becoming aself-evidently national canon. The commercially-driven enterprise ishere presented, not only in the context of the ongoing professionali-sation and growing academic prestige and ethos of the philologies,but also in its competition with the dissemination forum of biblio-phile societies with publications-for-members. Between sociability,academic careerism and a widening appeal of ‘nationality’, the popu-larisation and nationwide acceptance of the idea of a ‘national litera-ture’ as a self-evident taxonomic unit is here traced in its early, hesi-tant beginnings.

In 1835, the bookseller and publisher Gottfried Basse, based in Quedlin-burg and Leipzig, launched a book series under the ambitious title ‘Li-brary of the Complete German National Literature’ (Bibliothek der gesamm-ten deutschen National-Literatur). The series ran until 1861 and produced 38volumes in all; it was flanked by a ‘second series’ with critical studies (6vols. in all), and an incidental ‘third series’ which went dormant after aninitial volume (1835). Among the texts published in it were Kudrun,Theuerdank, the Kaiserchronik, Floris und Blanscheflur, Brant’s Narrenschiff andLohengrin. Even in today’s libraries, those researching nineteenth-centuryeditions of medieval German literature will find Basse’s Bibliothek a ro-bust presence.

306 Joep Leerssen

1 Dammann 1924,7: ‘From the earliest monuments which have come down to us tothe modern period, no work should be omitted from this library that can claim classi-cal status or that is important in our national literature either for the study of ourlanguage or for our understanding of the nation’s learning in successive periods.’ Mostof the information on Basse’s venture given in the following pages is from Dammann’sbook, and from inspection of the actual volumes (listed in the appendix to this article)in the Widener Library, Harvard. For biographical information on the various scholarsinvolved I have relied on the AdB 1875-1912.

Its guiding principles were threefold: nationality, completeness andcanonicity. As the announcement put it:

Von den frühesten Denkmalen, die uns erhalten sind, bis auf die neuereZeit soll kein Werk, das auf Klassizität Anspruch macht oder in unsrerNationalliteratur für das Studium unsrer Sprache von Wichtigkeit oder zurKenntnis der nationalen Bildung einzelner Perioden von Bedeutung ist, indieser Bibliothek fehlen.1

The phraseology is significant at almost every turn. The notion of ‘classi-cal status’ or Klassizität is remarkable in that it is applied, not to thecanon of classical antiquity but to a vernacular with its medieval epicsand romances. The notion of Nationalliteratur or ‘national literature’ hasby now obviously gained wide acceptance, but is as yet a neologism andspelled in hyphenated form. What is old-fashioned in this appellation isthat ‘literature’ is not yet used in the post-Romantic meaning, as a bodyof writing remarkable and valuable by virtue of its artistic and poeticalmerits, but that the term obviously covers the entire field of belles lettres,in the traditionally-established but obsolescent meaning: any text impor-tant for linguistic or intellectual reasons.

Also worth highlighting is the appellation of Bibliothek. The ideal ofcompleteness (‘no work should be omitted’) is a librarian’s one, andemphasizes that a series of books, broadcast into a nationwide market,constitutes a ‘library’ – a term traditionally used, not only for a givencollection of books, but also for the space in which that collection isplaced together. In the latter sense, the term Bibliothek is metaphorical, or,to use a more fashionable word, ‘virtual’. Printed matter (periodicals,series) as a virtual place of congregation: that metaphor is on the rise inthese decades and illustrates the important role that the printing presswas beginning to play in creating national ‘imagined communities’. Peri-odicals might have names like ‘Magazine’, ‘Atheneaum’, ‘Museum’, ‘Fo-

THE NATION’S CANON AND THE BOOK TRADE 307

2 Such names are superimposed on older ones that echo the origin of the periodicalas a newsletter, or else periodicals that play on a notion of mediating social gossip(Spectator, Observer, Tatler).

rum’ or indeed ‘Library’,2 and signal by such names that they unite adispersed readership into a virtual concourse. And in many cases, the‘imagined community’ constituted thereby (the insistent use of the first-person plural our is noteworthy) is explicitly signalled as a national one:nation-wide in its geographical dispersal, united in its common interestand reading. Thus, the idea of publication plays subliminally but insis-tently on the related concepts of a public and of the public spaces andspheres where that public congregates.

The publisher, Basse, was trying to move with the times. The firmhad been active since the early nineteenth century and had become noto-rious in the early 1820s for trying to cash in on the success of Goethe’sWilhelm Meister by publishing forgeries spuriously credited to the author ofthe Wanderjahre. In a way, the roots of the Basse publishing house wereclose to the murky ‘underworld’ of the book trade where seditious libels(anti-Napoleonic in this case) went hand in hand with cheap novelettesof dubious moral calibre. However, after the firm had been taken overby Gottfried Basse, it attempted to catch the wave of national and liter-ary historicism that was sweeping Germany, and to which it contributedthe new wide dissemination potential of their large-volume printing tech-niques. Basse himself was among the early adopters of lithographic tech-nique. His publications were printed on cheap woodpulp paper, recentlyinvented. His position in Germany is comparable, in this respect, to thatof the publisher Duffy in Ireland from the 1840s onwards, one of thefirst to use stereotype print on cheap paper; with his high output andsocial penetration, Duffy became the premier publisher for Irishnationalism, ranging from devotional Catholic literature to the Irishnationalist newspaper The Nation, the best-selling anthology The Spirit ofthe Nation and the tellingly-named series ‘The Library of Ireland’ (cf.Leerssen 1996, 3).

Between bibliophile and national enthusiasm: Text SocietiesNational Literature was begining to be a commercially promising pub-lishing venture and aimed at wider readership circles. The commercialplatform had to wedge itself into a market that was dominated by twoother modes of book dissemination: that of the scholarly publications

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3 For the Flemish society, see the contribution by Pauwels. As is pointed out inMarita Mathijsen’s contribution, the Dutch Maetschappij was inspired by the LiterarischerVerein of Stuttgart. See also Fischer 1914 and more generally Arnold 1991.

often produced by printing houses with university links, and that of theprivate bibliophile association. Text Societies had an important roleeverywhere in Europe from the early 1800s onwards. In Central andEastern Europe, there were the matica rading (and publishing) societies,or the Gelehrte Gesellschaft of Dorpat (present-day Tallinn). Britain isparticularly rich in examples of bibliophile-antiquarian book clubs: thusthe Camden Society for the publication of Early Historical and LiteraryRemains (founded 1838), the Percy Society (founded 1840) and theBannatyne Club (on which, see Ferris 2005); following in the footstepsof the old private associations of bibliophile collectors of facsimiles(such as the Roxburghe Club) they paved the way at the same time formore academic associations such as the Early English Texts Society(founded in 1864). In Ireland there was the Irish Archaeological Society,with links to the Royal Irish Academy, and its slightly more down-marketcounterpart the Ossianic Society (which worked, significantly, with theaforementioned publisher James Duffy; cf. generally Murray 2000). Simi-larly poised between academic learning and private collecting was theBelgian Maetschappij der Vlaemsche Bibliophilen. In Holland, the more aca-demic Vereeniging ter bevordering der oude Nederlandsche letterkunde fits thesame European pattern.3 Just how ‘national’ such Texts Societies couldbecome, can be seen from the case of the Société des ancien textes français,founded on the model of the Early English Texts Society with PaulinParis as the first president. Its first annoucement declares its na-tional-mindedness in terms that must be seen in the bitter post-1871climate to be fully appreciated:

Nous faisons appel (...) à tous ceux qui aiment la France de tous les temps,à tous ceux qui croient qu'un peuple qui répudie son passé prépare mal sonavenir, et à tous ceux qui savent que la conscience nationale n'est pleine etvivante que si elle relie dans un sentiment profond de solidarité les gé-nérations présentes à celles qui se sont éteintes

Again, the 1877 report by Paulin Paris’s son Gaston Paris (1839-1903)links the memory of Roland’s heroic defeat at Roncesvaux to post-1871revanchisme, when he explains that the Société’s members pay their dues


4 Quoted Ridoux 2001, 412: ‘We call upon all those who love the France of allages, all those who believe that a nation which repudiates its past is ill-placed to pre-pare its future, and to all those who know that the national conscience can only be fulland alive if it joins, in deeply-felt solidarity, the present generations with the deadones.’ ‘because they have been told that the Société des anciens textes français is a nationalundertaking; that its aim is to make the Old France better known; that it wants to putan end to the situation where Germany is the European country that prints most ofthe monuments of our ancient language and literature; that it needs the support of allthose who realize that the piety towards our ancestors is the strongest cement thatbinds a nation, of all those to whom the intellectual and academic standing of ourcountry amidst other nations is a point of honour, of all those who love, across thecenturies of its history, that douce France for which one was willing to die bravely evenat Roncesvaux.’

(...) parce qu’on leur a dit: La Société des anciens textes français est une oeuvrenationale; elle a pour but de faire mieux connaître la vieille France; elle veutque l’Allemagne ne soit plus le pays d’Europe où il s’imprime le plus demonuments de notre langue et de notre littérature d’autrefois; (...) elle abesoin de l’appui (...) de tous ceux qui qui savent que la piété envers lesaïeux est le plus fort ciment d’une nation, de tous ceux qui sont jaloux durang intellectuel et scientifique de notre pays entre les autres peuples, detous ceux qui aiment dans tous les siècles de son histoire cette ‘Francedouce’ pour laquelle on savait déjà si bien mourir à Roncevaux.4

Thus the establishment of a national-literary society had the evidentadded motivation and effect of mobilizing readers in a nationalist senseby means of historicist literacy. That link between literary historicism,sociability and nationalism is as strong in the emerging nations of Centraland Eastern Europe, with their matica’s and chitaliste, as it is in the morewell-established countries of Western Europe with their book clubs andbibliophile societies. These societies in themselves form an intermediarylayer between the high-prestige academic editions, often sponsored bygovernment agencies or national academies and carried out by the coun-try’s leading scholars, and new associations uniting a wider readership ofamateurs, with roots in the exclusive, bibliophile connoisseur-clubs ofthe previous generation but branching out into a middle-class constitu-ency. From there it is a small step to the proverbial type of prestigious-looking book sets in showy uniform bindings which would, by the endof the century, be displayed in the drawing room bookcases of the edu-cated bourgeoisie. By the end of the nineteenth century, Europe’sBildungsbürgertum would have no hesitation in considering these medievaltexts as Basse had first presented them in 1835: ‘classics’ in the canon ofa ‘national literature’, by now firmly established after having been dis-

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5 Keller (1812-1883) was a former student of Uhland and a specialist in the rela-tions between medieval Germany and the Latin world. He edited two texts for Basseas an aspiring young scholar in 1841, but also Li Romans des sept sages and other medi-eval French texts, the Romancero del Cid, translated Kudrun, became professor anduniversity librarian at Tübingen in 1844 and ultimately rector of that university in1858.

seminated and revived in various modern adapations, canonized in thehandbooks of Literary History and enshrined in the school curricula.This also made commercial publication of the Classics of National Liter-ature a profitable enterprise.

But in the 1830s and 1840s, the middle position for wide-dissemina-tion publication was as yet tenuous between the austere and technicaleditions of academics, and the facsimile reprints destined only for a smallcircle of associates. Enterprises like Basse’s Bibliothek were ahead of theirtime, and found it difficult to carve out a viable commercial-popularmarket share alongside the high-prestige academic publication and thethriving Text Edition Societies. It is a telling fact that one of the earlycollaborators, Adalbert Keller,5 was later elected president of one of theforemost philological Texts Societies of Germany, the Literarischer Vereinof Stuttgart (founded in 1838, with an output of some 200 volumes inthe course of the century).

Academic Professionalization and Philological Pecking ordersBasse was eager to enlist authoritative philologists who would give aca-demic prestige to his venture. The edition of early national texts hadbecome a matter of considerable academic importance, and philologicalediting was therefore riddled with professional jealousy and competition.

In the decades between 1800 and 1820, we see the establishment ofthe first university chairs of literature and literary history alongside theolder chairs of Rhetoric and Belles Lettres – often given to scholars incombination with an appointment as university librarian. Accordingly, wesee the study of literature move from the classical and classicist canon tothe archival material found and opened up by the philologists; and wesee this emergent discipline work in close association with the olderdisciplines of jurisprudence and classical studies, and develop a new styleof literary history-writing that combines the old antiquarian disquisitionswith the methods of romantic historiography.


6 Among the existing studies of emerging Germanistik, see Bluhm 1997, Kolk 1990,Schmidt 2000, Wyss 1979.

Thus the suddenly burgeoning concept and paradigm of the ‘nationalliterature’ coincides not only with the incipience of the European nation-state but also with the professionalization of literary and historical schol-arship in that state’s newly provided or refurbished academic institutions.However, much as the nationalization of literature involved conflictsbetween competing nationalities, so too the professionalization of literaryand philological scholarship involved bitter demarcation quarrels.

The most famous of these is the show-down between Jacob Grimm(1785-1863) and August Heinrich von der Hagen (1780-1856).6 Thelatter, less famous nowadays, was the first to publish an edition of theNibelungen, in 1807, with a famously nationalistic, rousing preface, ad-dressing the German nation at the nadir of its infamy (the Holy RomanEmpire having just been abolished under Napoleonic pressure), andoffering the heroic ancestral tale to the public as a promise of nationalresurgence. Hagen went on to be appointed supernumerary professor ofGerman literature at Berlin when that University was founded in 1810;as such he was the first to pursue the study of old German within anacademic appointment. He was called to Breslau in 1811 but recalled toBerlin as ordinary professor in 1821, and later published further versionsof the Nibelungen, as well as an edition of the corpus of courtly lovepoets, Minnesänger. However, his editorial procedure was consideredhasty and shallow by the more slow-working and painstaking Grimm,who appears also to have suffered from a severe dose of sour grapes(Grimm was a subaltern drudge in the Kassel court library, and his ownprofessional advance did not come until 1830 when he was appointed toa chair at Göttingen). Specifically around the Nibelungen a veritable edito-rial war took place (cf. generally Ehrismann 1975). Grimm’s ally Lach-mann, a highly respected classical and biblical scholar, denouncedHagen’s edition and went on to provide his own counterversion (charac-teristically claiming, in ‘critical’-editorial fashion, that the text was a com-posite of various older episodes and could be deconstructed into itscomponent parts). Quarrels also arose over the question to which extentthe text should be made palatable to contemporary readers by moderniz-ing or updating it. Lachmann and Grimm scorned this as an unscholarlyand populist adulteration of the original’s integrity. The sheer bulk andintensity of the nineteenth-century German reception of the Nibelungen

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7 Thus on the title page; in the original: ‘wohlfeile Ausgabe des alten Heldenliedesin der Ursprache mit der alterthümlichen Schrift gedruckt, so wie eine volksmässigeErneuung desselben’.

was thus impelled by the unabating ardour of scholarly rivalry; to theextent that, when the fourth centenary of Gutenberg invention of printwas celebrated in 1840, the national-bibliophile prestige publication tomark the occasion was Lachmann’s Zwanzig alte Lieder von den Nibelungen,Zur vierhundertjährigen Jubelfeier der Erfindung der Buchdruckerkunst, and Vonder Hagen countered two years later with Der Nibelungen Lied in der altenvollendeten Gestalt, with many illustrations and aimed at the wider public.Von der Hagen called it ‘an inexpensive edition of the ancient epic poemin its original language printed in the traditional letters, and also a popu-lar update’ – the phrase containing a dig at Lachmann’s and Grimm’sacademic habit of printing German, not in the usual ‘Gothic’ Frakturfont, but in roman lettering and without capitalization of nouns.7 (Norwas this a purely German aberration. The choice of old-style or modernfont also played a role among English philologists in what is now knownas the ‘Anglo-Saxon controversy’: cf. Aarsleff 1967).

Thus, even within the shared national and nationalistic ambience ofGerman philology, the appropriation of ancient texts was a matter ofardent competition. Although there was a veritable damburst of newmaterial being retrieved for publication, there was still a sense of ‘limitedsupply’, and scholars competed for the honour of bringing out a text orauthor. A goldrush-style race for the best and most prestigious sourcestook place. In competing presentations of ancient texts like the Edda,Otfried, Reynard the Fox, Kudrun or Heliand the philologist jostled forprimacy. Manuscripts or fragments were jealously kept from sight so asto thwart the work of rivals; tips as to newly discovered documents weresnatched up so as to take the wind out of a competitors’ sails; letterswere mysteriously misdelivered, queries went unanswered owing tocurious ‘misunderstandings’, and the reviews that the scholars gave toeach others’ work were carping and partizan. Editorial technique wasalways a Procrustes’s bed: diplomatic editions were criticized for being afacile, antiquarian reproduction of the original; critical editions wereaccused of interventionist meddling in the text. And if there was nointernational rivalry (as was often the case, given the national indistinct-ness of textual material like Reynard the Fox, or authors like Veldeke; cfLeerssen 2006), then there was always the contested high ground of


academic respectability as opposed to amateurish populism. Scholarswere always torn between the ambition for academic, or else widersocial-political recognition.

Unfortunately for Basse, the top philologists (Benecke, Lachmann,the Grimm brothers, Hagen) seem to have found it slightly beneath theirdignity to work for a publisher aiming for the popular end of the market.The most famous names that Basse was able to enlist were those ofHans Ferdinand Massmann, in later years Ludwig Ettmüller, and (aonce-off occasion) Franz Josef Mone. Massmann (1797-1874) edited fivevolumes for Basse’s series between 1837 and 1843; at that time he held achair of Old German literature at the Munich military academy, havingpreviously been entrusted with a mission to Milan in 1833 by the Bavar-ian government concerning the Gothic fragments discovered there byAngelo Mai. Besides the Basse volumes he brought out editions ofGottfried von Strasburg’s Tristan und Isolde and Tacitus’ Germania. Mass-mann is a good example of the interaction between academic and politi-cal nationalism: he was an egregious exponent of the nationalist sportsclubs founded by Friedrich Jahn under the name of Turnvereine, andindeed started his career at the Munich military academy as gymnasticsinstructor; he was also the inventor of the movement’s slogan Frisch,fromm, froh, frei. Ludwig Ettmüller (1802-1877) published six volumeswith Basse between 1839 and 1852, while a teacher of German literatureat the Zurich Gymnasium (he would be appointed professor at Zurichuniversity in 1863). He gave a number of medieval text editions, notablyof Veldeke’s Eneit and of Kudrun (which, in Lachmannian style, he editedas a cluster of interlinked Lieder). Ettmüller’s work was strongly pan-Germanic, and stressed links with Anglo-Saxon and with Nordic material(Völuspá, Edda). Mone, finally (1796-1871), published a collection ofancient plays for Basse’s Bibliothek. An adept of Grimm, he started hiscareer as university librarian and history professor at Heidelberg, brieflytaught at the University of Louvain (where he brought out a history ofNetherlandic literature) and ended his career as archive director in Karls-ruhe.

Even in its twilight years, the series was still able to pull in some ablephilologists: Heinrich Rückert and Karl Bartsch. They edited three vol-umes each during the 1850s. Rückert (1823-1875) held a professorialchair at Breslau as of 1852, and was known for his sweeping historio-graphical works; Bartsch (1832-1888) was appointed professor of Ger-

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8 Grimm 1864-90, 5: 285: ‘Which text of, say, Wulfilas’s Gothic Bible, or Otfried,does Mr. Basse propose to furnish? Does he have scholars at his disposal for freshcritical renditions of those works? The prospectus breathes no word of it. So hecannot include [i.e. plagiaristically reprint, JL] existing editions like Wulfilas, Otfried, orfor that matter Parsifal, Yvain, the Nibelungen and many others. And that renders hisseries title, tasteless as it is anyway, wholly unseemly.’

9 An intriguing presence in the series is that of Albert Schulz (1802-1893), a privatescholar who wrote under the pen-name ‘San-Marte’ and who more or less single-handedly filled the entire ‘second series’ between 1842 and 1872 (when he brought out

man Philology at Rostock in 1858 after having previously been librarianof the (then recently founded) Germanic National Museum of Nurem-berg.

Despite such collaborators, however, Basse’s venture flapped itswings rather than that it flew. It was looked upon with scorn by the high-minded scientific philologists, who remembered Basse as a lower-eche-lon publisher of cheap reading, and who felt that the business of philo-logical retrieval and editing was demeaned by this series. Letters fromWilhelm Grimm and Lachmann were stand-offish to the point of rude-ness, reviews cool to hostile; witness Jacob Grimm’s reaction to Basse’soriginal prospectus:

Welchen text z.b. des Ulfilas und Otfried denkt hr. Basse zu liefern? (...) hater gelehrte für neue critische bearbeitungen beider werke zur hand? davonverlautet das geringste nicht. er wird also von Ulfilas, von Otfried, wie vonParzival, Iwein, den Nibelungen und einer menge andern ablassen müssen;dann aber bleibt der an sich schon geschmacklose titel seiner sammlungvollends unschicklich.8

The suspicious tone in this dour notice was amplified in an unfortunatescandal in 1838, when Basse’s associate Ziemann (1807-1842, editor ofthe series’ first volume Gudrun; an admirer of Grimm and Lachmann butcold-shouldered by them) was publicly accused of plagiarism by Lach-mann’s protégé Wilhelm Wackernagel; an incident which illustrates howclosely interconnected the concepts of authorial originality and profes-sional authority were by now.

The series never quite managed to ovecome its reputation linkingcommercialism and amateurishness. Massmann and Ettmüller were B-listcelebrities in the junior stages of their careers, and dropped the connec-tion after a while; Mone, Rückert and Bartsch were working from periph-eral universities. The Bibliothek was an uneven mixture of canonicalclassics and MS oddities, of professional academics, local erudites,9 and


the final volumes and the entire enterprise wound down). Schulz’s main interest wasmedieval romance, especially the matière de Bretagne; a comparative essay on the spreadof Arthurian themes from Wales to the Continent had won a prize at the Abergavennyeisteddfod of 1839. On this Celtological cross-current, see Williams 1859; other entrantsfor the same prize essay are mentioned there and in Constantine 2007.

occasionally cranks like Karl Roth, who imposed his own eccentric or-thography and typography on the long-suffering printer.

Seen as a whole, however, the sum of many decades of doggedpersistence and never-quite-making-it, Basse’s Bibliothek der gesammtendeutschen National-Literatur testifies to the triumph of the national-literaryparadigm: the idea that each nation has, in its own language, a literaryinheritance that is uniquely its own, and that this canon can be called anational literature. What is more, the series bespeaks a sense that this na-tional canon is a matter of contemporary, public interest for the generalreading public and that it can be, and should be, made available in print.Yet, while the series exemplifies the interesting conjunction between therise of medieval philology, the rise of nationalism and the rise of thecommerical book-trade, it also proves that the appropriation of the na-tional past was a process where national and professional jealousiesplaced a heavy mortgage on the materials that were coming to light.

Appendix: The ‘Bibliothek der gesammten deutschen National-Literatur’As can be seen from the list below, the publication frequency is uneven.22 volumes appeared 1835-1845; a further 13 volumes 1847-1853; fi-nally (after a lapse of four years) a final 4 volumes 1858-1861. The peakyear was 1839 when 5 volumes appeared.

first series1 Kudrun (A. Ziemann, 1835)2 Theuerdank (C. Haltaus, 1836)3 Deutsche Gedichte des 12. Jahrhunderts (H.F. Massmann, 1837)4 Kaiserchronik (H.F. Massmann, 1849)5 Herbort’s von Fritzlar Liet von Troye (G.K. Frommann, 1837)6 Eraclius (H.F. Massmann, 1842)7 Die deutschen Abschwörungs-, Glaubens-, Beicht- und Betformeln (Massmann, 1839)8 Liederbuch der Clara Hätzlerin (C. Haltaus, 1840)9 Sanct Alexius Leben (H.F. Massmann, 1843)10 Deutsche Interlinearversionen der Psalmen (E.G. Graff, 1839)11a Deütsche Predigten des XII. und XIII. Jahrhundertes (K. Roth, 1839)11b Deutsche Predigten des XIII. und XIV. Jh. (H. Leyser, 1838)

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12 Flore und Blanschefleur (E. Sommer, 1846)13 Otte mit dem Barte von Cuonrat von Würzeburc (K.A. Hahn, 1838)14 Etter Heini uss dem Schwizerland (H.M. Kottinger, 1847)15 Auswahl der Minnesänger für Vorlesungen & zum Schulgebrauch (K. Volckmar,

1845)16 Frauenlob (L. Ettmüller, 1843)17 Das Narrenschiff von Sebastian Brant (A. Walther, 1839)18 Kleinere gedichte von dem Stricker (K.A. Hahn, 1839)19 Heinrich’s von Krolewiz ûz Missen Vater unser (G.Chr.Fr. Lisch, 1839)20 Gedichte des XII. und XIII. Jahrhunderts (K.A. Hahn, 1840)21 Altteütsche Schauspiele (F.J. Mone, 1841)22 Dyocletianus Leben von Hans von Bühel (A. Keller, 1841)23 Gesta Romanorum, das ist Der Rœmer Tat (A. Keller, 1841)24 Der jüngere Titurel (K.A. Hahn, 1842)25 Annolied (H.E. Bezzenberger, 1848)26 Jacob Ruffs Adam und Heva (H.M. Kottinger, 1848)27 Theophilus, der Faust des Mittelalters (L. Ettmüller, 1849)28 Engla and Seaxna scôpas and bôceras (L. Ettmüller, 1850)29 Vorda vealhstôd Engla and Seaxna (L. Ettmüller, 1851)30 Der wälsche Gast des Thomasin von Zirclaria (H. Rückert, 1852)31 Dat Spil fan der Upstandinge (L. Ettmüller, 1851)32 Das Passional (Fr.K. Köpke, 1852)33 Des Fürsten von Rügen Wizlâw’s des Vierten Sprüche und Lieder (L. Ettmuller,

1852)34 Bruder Philipps des Carthusers Marienleben (H. Rückert, 1853)35 Karl der Grosse von dem Stricker (K. Bartsch, 1857) 36 Lohengrin (H. Rückert, 1858)37 Die Erlösung (K. Bartsch, 1858)38 Albrecht von Halberstadt und Ovid im Mittelalter (K. Bartsch, 1861)39 Heinrich und Kunegunde von Ebernand von Erfurt (R. Bechstein, 1860)

second series1 F.J. Mone, Untersuchungen zur geschichte der teutschen heldensage, 1836.2 A. Schulz, Die Arthur-Sage und die Mährchen des Rothen Buchs von Hergest, 1842.3 A. Schulz, Beiträge zur bretonischen und celtisch-germanischen Heldensage1847.4 A. Schulz, Zur Waffenkunde des lteren deutschen Mittelalters, 1867.5 A. Schulz, Über Wolfram’s von Eschenbach Rittergedicht Wilhelm von Orange, 1871.6 A. Schulz, Rückblicke auf Dichtungen und Sagen des deutschen Mittelalters, 1872.

third series1 A. Ziemann, Mittelhochdeutsches Wörterbuch zum Handgebrauch, 1838. 2 A. Schulz, Reimregister zu den Werken Wolframs von Eschenbach, 1867.


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stützung seiner Majestät des Königs von Bayern herausgegeben durch die Commission derKönigl. Akademie der Wissenschaften.56 vols; Leipzig: Duncker & Humblot;also online at http://mdz2.bib-bvb.de/~adb/.

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Ferris, Ina. 2005. Printing the Past: Walter Scott’s Bannatyne Club and theAntiquarian Document. Romanticism 11.2: 143-160.

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Grimm, Jacob. 1864-90. Kleinere Schriften. 8 vols; Berlin & Gütersloh.Kolk, Rainer. 1990. Berlin oder Leipzig? Eine Studie zur sozialen Organisation der

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Wyss, Ulrich. 1979. Die wilde Philologie: Jacob Grimm und der Historismus. München:Beck.

The Case for LatviaDisinformation Campaigns

Against a Small Nation Fourteen Hard Questions and Straight

Answers about a Baltic CountryJukka Rislakki

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What do we know about Latvia and the Latvians? A Baltic (not Balkan) nation that emerged from fi fty years under the Soviet Union – interrupted by a brief but brutal Nazi-German occupation and a devastating war – now a member of the European Union and NATO. Yes, but what else? Relentless accusations keep appearing, especially in Russian media, often repeated in the West: “Latvian soldiers single-handedly saved Lenin’s revolution in 1917”, “Latvians killed Tsar Nikolai II and the Royal family”, “Latvia was a thoroughly anti-Semitic country and Latvians started

killing Jews even before the Germans arrived in 1941”, “Nazi revival is rampant in today’s Latvia”, “The Russian minority is persecuted in Latvia. . .”

True, false or in-between? The Finnish journalist and author Jukka Rislakki examines charges like these and provides an outline of Latvia’s recent history while attempting to separate documented historical fact from misinformation and deliberate disinformation. His analysis helps to explain why the Baltic States (population 7 million) consistently top the enemy lists in public opinion polls of Russia (143 million). His knowledge of the Baltic languages allows him to make use of local sources and up-to-date historical research. He is a former Baltic States correspondent for Finland’s largest daily newspaper Helsingin Sanomat and the author of several books on Finnish and Latvian history. As a neutral, experienced and often critical observer, Rislakki is uniquely qualifi ed for the task of separating truth from fi ction.

Amsterdam/New York, NY, 2008 295 pp.

(On the Boundary of Two Worlds. Identity, Freedom,

and Moral Imagination in the Baltics 15)

Bound € 60 / US$ 90ISBN: 9789042024236

Paper € 29 / US$ 44ISBN: 9789042024243

USA/Canada: 295 North Michigan Avenue - Suite 1B, Kenilworth, NJ 07033, USA. Call Toll-free (US only): 1-800-225-3998All other countries: Tijnmuiden 7, 1046 AK Amsterdam, The Netherlands Tel. +31-20-611 48 21 Fax +31-20-447 29 79Please note that the exchange rate is subject to fluctuations

Exile Cultures, Misplaced Identities

Edited by Paul Allatson and Jo McCormack

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Exile Cultures, Misplaced Identities takes a transnational and transcultural approach to exile and its capacities to alter the ways we think about place and identity in the contemporary world. The edited collection brings together researchers on exile in international perspective from three continents who explore questions of exilic identity along multiple geopolitical and cultural axes—Cuba, the USA and Australia; Colombia and the USA; Algeria and France; Italy, France and Mexico; non-Han minorities and Han majorities in China; China, Tibet and India; Japan and China; New Caledonia, Vietnam

and France; Hungary, the USSR, and Australia; and Germany, before and after unifi cation. The international and crosscultural span of this collection represents an important addition to the fi elds of exile criticism and cultural identity studies. Exile Cultures, Misplaced Identities will be of interest to readers, scholars and students of exile, diasporic and transmigration studies, international studies, postcolonial studies, cultural studies, language studies, and comparative literary studies.


(Critical Studies 30) Bound € 64 / US$ 96

ISBN: 9789042024069


Borderless BeckettBeckett sans frontières

Edited by / Édité par Minako Okamuro, Naoya Mori, Bruno Clément, Sjef Houppermans, Angela Moorjani and

Anthony Uhlmann

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SBT/A 19 features selected papers from the Borderless Beckett / Beckett sans frontières Symposium held in Tokyo at Waseda University in 2006. The essays penned by eminent and young scholars from around the world examine the many ways Beckett’s art crosses borders: coupling reality and dream, life and death, as in Japanese Noh drama, or transgressing distinctions between limits and limitlessness; humans, animals, virtual bodies, and stones; French and English; words and silence; and the received frameworks of philosophy and aesthetics.

The highlight of the volume is the contribution by Nobel Laureate J. M. Coetzee, the special guest of the Symposium. His article entitled “Eight Ways of Looking at Samuel Beckett” introduces a variety of novel approaches to Beckett, ranging from a comparative analysis of his work and Melville’s Moby Dick to a biographical observation concerning Beckett’s application for a lectureship at a South African university. Other highlights include innovative essays by the plenary speakers and panelists – Enoch Brater, Mary Bryden, Bruno Clément, Steven Connor, S. E. Gontarski, Evelyne Grossman, and Angela Moorjani – and an illuminating section on Beckett’s television dramas.

The Borderless Beckett volume renews our awareness of the admirable quality and wide range of approaches that characterize Beckett studies.


(Samuel Beckett Today/Aujourd’hui 19) Bound € 94 / US$ 141

ISBN: 9789042023932


Names of NihilArvydas Šliogeris

Translated from Lithuanian by Robertas Beinartas Preface by Leonidas Donskis

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In this book, probably for the fi rst time in Western philosophy, an attempt has been made to point out and systematically explicate the problem scope of the Nothing (which is called Nihil in the book) and to try to explain the springhead of the excessive negativity, inherent only in the human being, or in other words, the springhead of the human’s natural nihilism. Nihilism is treated here not as a posture, pose, or an ideological attitude, but as the spread of the human metaphysical nucleus, of Nihil. Nihilistic annihilation, manifesting itself as the road of the naming of Nihil and of the production of thingly crystals

(artifi cial world) as a result of that naming, usually is called “history”. Names of Nihil (language phenomena), being the antithesis of Nihil, falsify and cover up Nihil itself, turning it into “supreme” being, e.g. into “the One”, “God”, “Substance”, “Matter”, “Spirit”, ad infi nitum. This book should be interesting not only to philosophers or humanitarians, but also to all those who concern themselves with the total human condition.

Amsterdam/New York, NY, 2008 X-136 pp.

(On the Boundary of Two Worlds: Identity, Freedom,

and Moral Imagination in the Baltics 14)

Paper € 30 / US$ 45ISBN: 9789042024021


Baader-Meinhof Returns

History and Cultural Memory of German Left-Wing Terrorism

Edited by Gerrit-Jan Berendse

and Ingo Cornils

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This volume is dedicated to the study of artistic and historical documents that recall German left-wing terrorism in the 1970s. It is intended to contribute to a better understanding of this violent epoch in Germany’s recent past and the many ways it is remembered.

The cultural memory of the RAF past is a useful device to disentangle the complex relationship between terror and the arts. This bond has become a particular pressing matter in an era of

a new, so-called global terrorism when the culture industry is obviously fascinated with terror.

Fourteen scholars of visual cultures and contemporary literature offer in-depth investigations into the artistic process of engaging with West Germany’s era of political violence in the 1970s. The assessments are framed by two essays from historians: one looks back at the previously ignored anti-Semitic context of 1970s terrorism, the other offers a thought-provoking epilogue on the extension of the so-called Stammheim syndrome to the debate on the treatment of prisoners in Guantánamo Bay. The contributions on cultural memory argue that any future memory of German left-wing terrorism will need to acknowledge the inseparable bond between terror and the artistic response it produces.


(German Monitor 70) Bound € 70 / US$ 105

ISBN: 9789042023918


Territories of EvilEdited by Nancy Billias

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Evil is not only an abstract concept to be analyzed intellectually, but a concrete reality that we all experience and wrestle with on an ongoing basis. To truly understand evil we must always approach it from both angles: the intellective and the phenomenological. This same assertion resounds through each of the papers in this volume, in which an interdisciplinary and international group (including nurses, psychologists, philosophers, professors of literature, history, computer studies, and all sorts of social science) presented papers on cannibalism, the Holocaust, terrorism, physical and emotional abuse,

virtual and actual violence, and depravity in a variety of media, from fi lm to literature to animé to the Internet. Conference participants discussed villains and victims, dictators and anti-heroes, from 921 AD to the present, and considered the future of evil from a number of theoretical perspectives. Personal encounters with evil were described and analyzed, from interviews with political leaders to the problems of locating and destroying land mines in previous war zones. The theme of responsibility and thinking for the future is very much at the heart of these papers: how to approach evil as a question to be explored, critiqued, interrogated, refl ected upon, owned. The authors urge an attitude of openness to new interpretations, new perspectives, new understanding. This may not be a comfortable process; it may in fact be quite disturbing. But ultimately, it may be the only way forward towards a truly ethical response. The papers in this collection provide a wealth of food for thought on this most important question.

Amsterdam/New York, NY, 2008 VII-254 pp.

(At the Interface/Probing the Boundaries 45)

Paperback € 52 / US$ 78ISBN: 9789042023697
