Untitled - Centrostudirpinia.it

MTLDE. MINNE. MAZE. 893
to give her for sisters two unfeminine ideas, fridu and reht
(v. 23, 125); the Latin Caritas, Pax, Justitia would more fitly
have discharged the office of fates, and a German Sippa and Rehti
would have answered to them: Notker in Cap. 133 manages
better, when he translates Concordia, Fides, Pudicitia by Gemeinmuoti,
Triiva, Chiuski. I bring these examples to shew how
familiar such personifications were even in the 9- 10th cent. ; they
need not have been invented or introduced first by the MHG.
poets.
Minna, even in OHG. (p. 59), could signify not only caritas,
but amor and cupido ; and there is nothing offensive in Veldek s
Lavinia and Eneas addressing Venus as Minne (En. 10083.
10948) ;
in Hartmann, Wolfram and Walther, frou Minne appears
bodily (Iw. 1537. 1638. Parz. 288, 4. 30. 2915. Walth. 14,
10. 40, 26. 55, 16), and Hartmann, who is fond of interweaving
dialogue, has a talk with her, Iw. 2971 seq., a thing imitated in
Gute frau 328-46-80. A.frowe Maze (modus, meetness) occurs in
Walth. 46, 33; a frou Witze in Parz. 288, 14. 295, 8; examples
of frou Ere were given a page or two back, and of frou Scelde
p. 865-6. These personifications are brought in more sparingly
by Gotfried and Conrad, yet in the Trist. 10929 diu Maze cuts
out a garment, and just before that comes the fine passage (10900)
on Isot s figure : als si diu Minne draete ir selber z eime veder-
spil, dem Wunsche z einem endezil, da fur er niemer komen kan/
as if Yenus had made her for a toy to herself, and for utmost
bound to Wish, that he can never get beyond. Tristan 4807 has
diu gotinne Minne, and Parz. 291, 17 once frou Liebe as well as
frou Minne. Frou Ere is freq. in Frauenlob :
( da hat vrou Ere
ir wiinschelruot 41, 18; vroun Eren diener 134, 18; (
vroun
Eren bote 194, 8 ; she excludes unwip from her castle (vesten)
274, 18; vroun Eren straze 384-5 (see Suppl.).
In the 14- 15th cent, these fancies are carried to excess, and
degenerate into mere allegories : my ladies, the Virtues, instead
of coming in, one at a time, where they are wanted to deepen the
impressiveness of the story, intrude themselves into the plot of
the whole story, or at least of long formal introductions and
proems. And yet there is no denying, that in these preludes,
Christ! non consuta. [The author forgets the coat without seam YLTWV A&pa&os.
John 19, 23.]