1Proverbs ParaPhrase by a Minnesingerpaper on Wizlav von Rgens Ich warne dich vil iungher man ghe tzarte

written byJohanna Fldesi

2Contents

Preface ......................................................................................................................... 3

About Minnesingers and Minnesang .......................................................................... 3

Ich warne dich vil iungherman ghe tzarte by Wizlaw .............................................. 5Biography .......................................................................................................... 5Analysis ........................................................................................................... 5Biblical references ............................................................................................ 7Modern transcription of the piece ..................................................................... 8

Bibliography and sources ............................................................................................ 9

3PrefaceAt the time when it was decided that I am going to make an examconcert with my classmate, Esther Kro-

nenburg, I became pretty excited about graduating. It came out that both of us had been already thought of a programme before, and most of our ideas on the ensemble pieces matched very well. But this paper is not about one of those ensemble pieces, but a solo piece which is extremely exciting, interesting and above all, outstanding from its genre.

I chose Ich warne dich vil iungher man by Wizlav von Rgen III, which is a Minnesang piece. Among the fact that the piece is incredibly beautiful and unique in its genre, I chose this piece, because I would like to go on to my masters on the Minnesang repertory and I thought it would be a good experience to already make a little research on this topic. Later in this paper, I would like to discuss not only the piece itself, but the min-nesinger traditon shortly and give some information about the most important sources that remained.

About Minnesingers and MinnesangAccording to the Grove, Minnesang is the German tradition of courtly lyric and secular monophony that

flourished in the 12th, 13th and 14th centuries. Though it is in many ways merely the German branch of the genre represented by the troubadours and trouvres in France, it has substantial independent features. The musical history of Minnesang is a particularly controversial subject because the melodies survive largely in manuscripts from the 14th and 15th centuries.1

In Germany, as in northern France, secular song in the vernacular existed before the influence of the trou-badours made itself felt. The Minnesingers, the german equivalent of the troubadours and trouvres, and their name reflects their preoccupation with the subject of courtly love (Minne), a concept evidently taken over from their Provenal and French predecessors and contemporaries. Though the art of the Minnesingers obvi-ously owes much to French influences2, their subject matter was not totally restricted to courtly love. They adopted the poetic types, imitated the techniques and forms.3

French original German equivalent ExplanationChanson de toile Frauenstrophe Laments of woman over the absence or infidelity of loversAlba Tagelied Lovers part in songs announcing the dawning of the dayTenso and jeu parti Streitgedicht Dispute-poemCanson de crosada Kreuzlied Crusade-songsLai Leich Deals with adventure and romance, but also with sacred

subject matters

The other main difference is the presence of the Sprche4, which were often cast in the form of a fable and sometimes dealt with political, social, religious or moralizing questions.

But how did the Minnesinger tradition began and what might be its origin? There are different existing theories on this topic. One of the most known and mostly accepted theory is that on June 9, 1156, Frederick Barbarossa, famous alike in history and legend, the first Hohenstaufen to be emperor of the Holy Roman Empire, married Beatrix of Burgundy. Guit de Provins5, the trouvre, was attached to her retinue, and she and he have been jointly credited waith making French and Provenal song a living influence in Germany. Acceptence of the French concept of courtly love in Germany depended upon the existence of an aristocratic society that lived according to the code of chivalry. Such society came into existence in latter half of the 12th century. The imperial court also knew the Latin songs of the Archpoet, author of the Confession of Golias and perhaps the greatest of the vagabond poets. The Archpoets patron from about 1161 to 1166 was Reginald von Dassel, Archbishop of Cologne and Chancellor to Frederick Barbarossa. These cultural crosscurrents inevitably stimulated the development of German poetry, for example Henry VI was himself a Minnesinger.

1 Grove Music Online, entry on Minnesang by Burghard Kippenberg2 Such as the melodies of the early Minnesang compositions, which were translated from French to German and set on the original French melody.3 Hoppin, Richard H.: Mediaeval Music (Norton, 1978), Chapter XIII, pp 304-3054 Singular: Spruch5 Provins is a small town east and somewhat south of Paris, and is not to be confused with Provence.

4This is one of the the main difference between the French tradition and the German tradition: the aristocracy also composed Minnesang compositions. Minnesingers from the higher levels of aristocracy had their own courts and did not depend on patronage. We can find minnesingers among the members of the lesser nobility and they often travelled from court to court as some of the troubadours had done before them, such as Hein-rich von Veldeke (from the region near Maastricht), Wolfram von Eschenbach (Bavaria) and Walther von der Vogelweide (Tyrol). Several of these men were associated with Count Hermann of Thuringia6 or with the Ho-henstaufen emperors. There are some later Minnesingers, whose names should be mentioned, such as Meister Alexander (also known as wild), Konrad von Wrzburg, Heinrich von Meissen (better known as Frauenlob), and the most colorful figure of the Minnesingers and also the last one is Oswald von Wolkenstein.

Another theory can be originated from Jakob Grimm7 in the beginning 19th century doubted about this theory by asking: Why must German poetry be made to sprout from a foreign seed, when it is so robust that it can have been fathered only by an indigenous unit? There is no doubt that the German poetry has been influenced by many sources and seeds, such as the acknowledged French-Provenal poetry. But like that the minnesinger has been made to steal his provision from many sources. According to Philip S. Allens article The Origin of German Minnesang8: we have had theories of oriental influence through the convenient medium of the early crusaders and of the haughty Saracen. There are theories of Celtic influence, first through an early mingling of Celt and Teuton, later through French mediation. There are, as we should expect, theories of Provenal and French influence. Allen also mentions in his article an unpublished doctors dissertation some Slavic traces, which could make sense, since the composer of my minnesang piece which I am going to discuss later on was a Germanic-Slavic prince, Wizlav von Rgen III.

And here comes the theory, that I would come up with: I can hardly believe that folk music tradition and composed music existed in a way that they did not have any influence on eachother. The fact, that courtly arts and church music influenced the culture of the people on the societys lower levels and by that I mean lower than aristocracy and nobility cannot be denied. Later on, we will see that most of the minnesang melodies re-mained by oral tradition just like folk song and folk tradition. No certain information survives as to the earlier scribal stages that led to the relatively late manuscripts for the texts and the music of Minnesang. Probably the poets themselves or other singers and musicians collected repertory on single leaves or in volumes that were circulated and copied. Yet oral transmission must also have been extremely important.

Not too long ago I had the chance to do a research on folk ballads, and I figured out that the folk ballad as a tradition was influenced by the French courtly music genre, the Ballad, and was extremely popular in the 13th

and 14th centuries in whole Europe. If we take this as a begin point, we can assume that the same thing might have happened to the courtly culture throughout Europe. Also, the most important music manuscripts of the minnesinger repertory is from the 14th and 15th century. Folk tradition and composed music could not exist beside eachother without interactive influence. We can observe it nowadays, that composers are picking folk melodies, so why would not the minnesingers had done the same?

6 In 1161, his Father,the Count of Thuringia sent him and his to the court of Louis VII to recieve the education of French princes. Hermann became an enthusiastic admirer of French poetry and an equally enthusiastic patron of Minnesingers. 7 JaCob ludwig Carl griMM (also Karl, 4 January 1785-20 September 1863) was a German philologist, jurist and mythologist. He is best known with his brother, Wilhelm as one of the Brothers Grimm, editor of the Grimms Fairy Tales. He did a deep research on the literature of the Middle Ages and German Mythology. The first work Jacob Grimm published was an essay, ber den alt-deutschen Meistergesang (1811); in this essay he showed that Minnesang and Meistersang were really one form of poetry which were merely represented different stages of development.8 Philip S. Allen: The Origins of the Minnesang, source: Modern Philology, Vol. 3, No. 4 (Apr., 1906), pp 411-412

5Ich warne dich vil iungherman ghe tzarte by WizlavAfter discussing the origins of the minnesang I would not waste the time and the paper furthermore on the

several arguments of the origin of the Minnesingers and the tradition of the Minnesang. I will go on by giving a short biography about the minnesinger of my piece, and than analyse the song itself.

BiographyPrince Wizlav von Rgen III (c. 1265/8- 1325) was one of the last generation of the minnesingers, and he

was also a contemporary of Frauenlob9. As a German Minnesinger from the aristocracy, he belonged to the 5th generation of the Wizlawids10 and at the same time he was the Prince of Pomerania and Rgen. For a long time he was considered as Wizlav von Rgen IV, but since the beginning of the 19th century he has been identified with Wizlav III. However, more recently objections to the identification have been raised; Seibicke suggested that the author of these works is more likely to have been a professional singer than a high ranking nobleman.

He was the first of probably four sons and four daughters in marriage of Prince Wizlaw von Rgen II and Princess Agnes von Braunschweig-Lneburg. Relatively early, he recieved education in literature. The major part of his poems are from the time before his reign. Wizlaw shared the throne with his surviving brother, Prince Sambor from 1302. There was rivalry between the two brothers, and after Sambors death in 1304 he ruled alone. Wizlaw was married twice: his first wife was Margaret (her nationality is unknown), and after her death (around 1310) he married Agnes from the house of Lindow-Ruppin. It is possible that he wrote his minnelieder to Margaret. His first marriage was childless, but with Agnes they had two daughters (Euphemia and Agnes) and the long awaited successor, Prince Jaromar. Unfortunately Jaromar died around the age of 13 on 24 May 1325, not too long before his Fathers death (8 November 1325).

His extant compositions consist of fourteen Minnelieder, or love-songs, and thirteen Sprche11, songs of a non-lyric type, are attributed to him in the Jena manuscript12 seventeen of them have melodies in this source. Mostly monostrophic, and based on a miscellany of themes ranging from riddles to classical and biblical exempla. The Minnelieder are composed of traditional formulae and motifs, while religious and moralizing topics predominate in his poetry. He stated that he had learnt the art of poetry from der Ungelrte13, none of whose poetry survives. In a song from the early days of Wizlavs work he calls him as his teacher, and at the same time he complains about his teachers effort to make him learn the sehnenden Weise (the yearning way). As a member of a later generation of poets, he seems to have emulated the forms and themes of other masters, notably Gottfried von Neifen, Steinmar, Ulrich von Winterstetten and Reinmar von Zweter.

Frauenlob and another Sprche-composer, Der Goldener mention Wizlaw in their poems. Der Goldener wished to emphasize on Wizlaws modesty and goodness, while Frauenlob describes his style as geblmen Stil and highlights his sense for justice.

AnalysisThe genre of the song is Spruch, which is distinguished from the lyric Spruch also called Sangspruch or

Sangspruchdichtung. The Spruch treated predominantly of rational, didactic and pragmatic issues, for example, socio-political commentary, topics related to moral or religious teaching and philosophy, practical wisdom, biographical material, praise of patrons, begging and much else besides. The genre seems to go back to the earliest tradition of German lyric and probably became more widespread from the middle of the 12th century. It is easily distinguished from the Leich, which has a similar topic, but deals also with romantic and adven-tourous topics.

9 Also known as Heinrich von Meissen (c. 1260- 29 Nov 1318 ). German Minnesinger. Little is known of his life beyond what can be conjectured from his songs. He was the most famous Minnesinger of his day and he travelled widely throughout Germany but spent the last years in Mainz, where he was buried in the cathedral. According to an unfounded legend, Frauenlob established the first singing school of the Meistersingers, at Mainz.10 In the pre-Christian times, the chiefs of a territory were called kings, though the names of these so-called kings are not recorded in documents, so unfortunately there are only hints of them. The Slavic princes of Rgen, according to the legend, is said to live around 955, so if that is true, than all the later rulers of Rgen would have the same name. Wizlav is the last successor of the Wizlawids, descended from Kruto of Wagria.11 See extended definition in the Analysis. 12 Jenaer Liederhandschrift, fol. 72vb - 80vb13 His name also means umherziehender Literat = wandering writer.

614 The word Bar is probably a shortened form of Barat, a word taken from the language of fencing and denoting a skillful thrust. 15 Raw translation made by me.16 Carl Parrish: The Notation of Medieval Music (1978), pp 52-5317 We can observe a sort of mensural notation at the manucripts which contain Oswald von Wolkensteins compositions, but his monophonic compositions rhythm is still very much influenced by the rhyme of the lyrics and only at his polyphonic pieces are rather mensurated for the sake of being in time and the harmonies.18 Modal rhythM or rhytmic modes in the 13th century, a set of six short rhythmic patterns defined by music theorists and associ-ated particularly with the music of the Notre Dame school. In each mode, long and short values are arranged in a distinctive order similar to those of the poetic feet. (source: Oxford Music Online, entry on RhytMic Modes by Edward H. Roesner)19 See transcription after the Analysis, and the Biblical references.

We can easily judge that he follows the original stanza form, the so-called Bar form14, which is quite diffe-rent from that of the Minnelied. The Bar form as a term indicates a three-part form AAB. The sections are the following: the two Stollen (AA) are together the Aufgesang which is followed by the Abgesang (B). Though Bar form can exist in various ways in this case we can see the classical Bar form without any varation. The number of the syllables and the melody follows this form.

A Ich warne dich vil iungher man ghe tzartehalt milden mt.

105 15

A Vvaz dir da von hey les ghe schicht nu warte.daz du bist gt.

105 15

BDem valschen rate du vnt wiche.de heylighe vnt phan dich al ghe liche.ine scone sele in gho tes hohe riche.

91114

25

It is easy to judge the end of the texts lines in the manuscript, because they are divided by a points. Also at the dividing the Stollens and the Abgesang are marked with red initial letters. The end of the lines are rhy-ming with each other, and he uses cross-rhymes in the Stollens, but in the three lines of the Abgesang have the same ending syllables.

Ich warne dich vil iungher man ghe tzartehalt milden mt.Vvaz dir da von hey les ghe schicht nu warte.daz du bist gt.Dem valschen rate du vnt wiche.de heylighe vnt phan dich al ghe liche.ine scone sele in gho tes hohe riche.

I warn you, young man: remember that you have to be righteous.You can only expect to reach the sacrament, if your heart is good.The false advices lead you on the wrong way, but you have to know: the Saint chases away the Evil, and you might have place in the Holy Realm of God.15

The melody is noted in chant notation. According to Carl Parrishs The notation of Medieval Music, in the chapter he pays attention to Minnelieder16, he says that the matter of Minnesong rhythm is obscured by the fact that German scribes continued to write down these melodies in neumatic notation long after other countries adopted mensural notation17 for all music other than chant. Since the notation itself offers little in the way of a clue to rhythmical interpretation of this music, scholars have depended upon the rhythm of the poetry in trans-cribing Minnelied melodies. This has not been as easy in the German songs as in their French counterparts, because the French poetry is measured by syllables and the German is measured by the number of strong ac-cents, the number of unaccented syllables not being constant. Consequently, modal rhythms18 are not always applicable to Minnelieder. German melodies of the14th and 15th centuries, however, is considered unsuitable for modal rhythm, which had generally gone out of use in music by 1300. Also, the melismatic, flourishing style of the piece does not afford the usage of modal rhythm in interpretation. That is why I used in my trans-cription19 stemless notes, and the groups of the notes are indicated by square line above.

The melody is noted in C clef, or tenor clef in a 5-lined system, which means that it is not chant, which was always noted in a 4-lined system. Some other clefs were added to the basic C clef: the line of the G above the C and the octave is also marked in the score. These marks are a guidance for the performer in the score than having any serious musical meaning.

7The range of the voice is from f to C, which is quite wide and unusual for a minnesang composition. Most of the times the range of the voice in these compositions is narrow, perfectly fitting for its narrative style, and staying in the same register more or less. Both Stollen share the same melody, they stay in the f-G range, while as the Abgesang gets to the really serious matter of the text and talking about Heaven and God, is in a higher range from b to C, except for the last two words, hohe riche which is again in the lower register of the Stollens. All in all, the whole Spruch could be performed by an accompanying instrument playing a C-bourdon, we could take the C as the spine of the melody, and also call its mode C-Ionian plagal.

It is interesting how he treats the melismatic and syllabic melodic materials in the music to give a colourful and richer meaning to the text through the serious message of the poem. He uses the melismas to accent and paint words, such as the beginning melismas on both of the Stollens first word. The longest melisma is on the word ghotes takes place in the highest register of the whole piece, which might be a symbol for Heaven and the sacrament of God, while the shorter and much lower melodic material on hohe riche reminds us that we are still in this World, far away from Heaven. Also the length of the melisma on the word ghotes symbolize how great and infinite God is and his reign in Heaven.

Biblical referencesSince the lyrics have a religious and biblical links, we can find some similar texts in the Old Testament,

namely in the Proverbs. The Proverbs is according to the first verse of Chapter 1 The wise sayings of Solomon, the son of David, king of Israel. There are several verses from this book and also from some of the Psalms which Wizlaw probably knew these books of the Bible. The Proverbs along with Ecclesiastes are practical advices from Solomon to the people who want to follow Gods teachings could be called also as a daily advice from Bible.

If we take a look at the lyrics of Ich warne dich vil iungher man ghe tzarte, there are several verses that could be related and gathered together, forming a paraphrase to young people to reach the sacrament. Also the idea to live a holy life can be found in the New Testament. And some of these verses are probably the following:

Ich warne dich vil iungher man ghe tzarte halt milden mt.(I warn you, young man: remember that you have to be righteous.)

My son, keep my teaching in your memory, and my rules in your heart: for they will give you increase of days, years of life, and peace. Let not mercy and good faith go from you; let them be hanging round your neck, recorded on your heart; so you will have grace and a good name in the eyes of God and men. (Proverbs 3,1-4)

Vvaz dir da von hey les ghe schicht nu warte. daz du bist gt.(You can only expect to reach the sacrament, if your heart is good.)

So that you may go in the way of good men, and keep in the footsteps of the upright. For the upright will be living in the land, and the good will have it for their heritage. (Proverbs 2,20-21)Have no fear of the things which you will have to undergo: see, the Evil One will send some of you into prison, so that you may be put to the test; and you will have great trouble for ten days. Be true till death, and I will give you the crown of life. (Revelation 2,10)

Dem valschen rate du vnt wiche.de heylighe vnt phan dich al ghe liche.ine scone sele in gho tes hohe riche.(The false advices lead you on the wrong way, but you have to know: the Saint chases away the Evil, and you might have place in the Holy Realm of God.)

My son, if sinners would take you out of the right way, do not go with them. (Proverbs 1,10)For I am the Lord your God: for this reason, make and keep yourselves holy, for I am holy (3Moses 11,44)But be holy in every detail of your lives, as he, who-se servants you are, is holy; because it has been said in the Writings, You are to be holy, for I am holy. (1Peter 1,15-16)

8Stollen

Stollen

Abgesang

9bibliograPhy and sourCes

About Minnesingers and MinnesangHoppin, Richard H.: Mediaeval Music (Norton, 1978), Chapter XIII, pp 304-305Reese, Gustave: Music in the Middle Ages (Norton & Co, 1965), Chapter 8, pp 231-236Philip S. Allen: The Origins of the Minnesang, source: Modern Philology, Vol. 3, No. 4 (Apr., 1906), pp 411-412Grove Music Onlines entry on Minnesang by Burghard Kippenberg

Wizlavs biographyGrove Music Onlines entry on Wizlav von Rgen iii by Burghard Kippenberg Die Website zum slawischen Frstentum Rgen in Mittelalter: http://www.wizlaw.de/index.html

AnalysisGrove Music Onlines entries on

BaR foRM by Burghard KippenbergspuRch by Burghard Kippenberg RhythMic Modes by Edward H. Roesner

Parrish, Carl: The notation of Medieval Music (New York: Pendragon Press, 1978), the chapter on Secular monophonic notation (Minnelieder), pp 52-53