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DIETRICH OF See also: German popular See also: poetry to See also: Theodoric tha See also: Great
.
The legendary See also: history of Dietrich differs so widely from the See also: life of Theodoric that it has been suggested that the two were originally unconnected
.
See also: Medieval
chroniclers, however, repeatedly asserted the identity of Dietrich and Theodoric, although the more critical noted the anachronisms involved in making See also: Ermanaric (d
.
376) and See also: Attila (d
.
453) See also: con-temporary with Theodoric (b
.
455)
.
That the See also: legend is based on vague See also: historical reminiscences is proved by the retention of the names of Theodoric (Thiuda-reiks, Dietrich) and his See also: father Theudemir (Dietmar), by Dietrich's connexion with See also: Bern (See also: Verona) and Raben (See also: Ravenna)
.
Something of the See also: Gothic See also: king's character descended to Dietrich, familiarly called the Berner, the favourite of German medieval saga heroes, although his
See also: story did not leave the same mark on later German literature as did that of the Nibelungs
.
The See also: cycle of songs connected with his name in See also: South See also: Germany is partially preserved in the See also: Heldenbuch (q.v.) in Dietrich's Flucht, the Rabenschlacht and Alpharts See also: Tod; but it was reserved for an Icelandic author, writing in See also: Norway in the 13th century, to compile, with many romantic additions, a consecutive account of Dietrich
.
In this Norse See also: prose redaction, known as the Vilkina Saga, or more correctly the Thidrekssaga, is incorporated much extraneous See also: matter from the Nibelungen and See also: Wayland legends, in fact practically the whole of south German heroic tradition
.
There are traces of a See also: form of the Dietrich legend in which he was represented as starting out from See also: Byzantium, in accordance with historical tradition, for his See also: conquest of See also: Italy
.
But this early disappeared, and was superseded by the existing legend, in which, perhaps by an " epic See also: fusion " with his father Theudemir, he was associated with Attila, and then by an easy transition with Ermanaric
.
Dietrich was driven from his See also: kingdom of Bern by his See also: uncle Ermanaric
.
After years of exile at the See also: court of Attila he returned with a Hunnish army to Italy, and defeated Ermanaric in the Rabenschlacht, or See also: battle of Ravenna
.
Attila's two sons; with Dietrich's See also: brother, See also: fell in the fight, and Dietrich returned to Attila's court to answer for the See also: death of the See also: young princes
.
This very improbable renunciation of the advantages of his victory suggests that in the See also: original version of the story the Rabenschlacht was a defeat
.
In the poem of Ermenrichs Tod he is represented as slaying Ermanaric, as in fact Theodoric slew See also: Odoacer
.
" Otacher " replaces Ermanaric as his adversary in the Hildebrandslied, which relates how See also: thirty years after the earlier attempt he reconquered his Lombard kingdom
.
Dietrich's long residence at Attila's court represents the youth and early See also: man-See also: hood of Theodoric spent at the imperial court and fighting in the See also: Balkan peninsula, and, in accordance with epic See also: custom, the See also: period of exile was adorned with war-like exploits, with fights with dragons and giants, most of which had no essential connexion with the cycle
.
The romantic poems of See also: Konig Laurin, Sigenot, Eckenlied and See also: Virginal are based largely on See also: local traditions originally See also: independent of Dietrich
.
The court of Attila (Etzel) was a ready See also: bridge to the Nibelungen legend
.
In the final catastrophe he was at length compelled, after steadily holding aloof from the combat, to avenge the slaughter of his Amelungs by the Burgundians, and delivered Hagen bound into the hands of See also: Kriemhild
.
The flame breath which anger induced from him shows the influence of pure myth, but the tales of his demonic origin and of his being carried off by the devil in the shape of a black See also: horse may safely be put down to the clerical hostility to Theodoric's Arianism
.
Generally speaking, Dietrich of Bern was the wise and. just monarch as opposed to Ermanaric, the typical See also: tyrant of Geranic legend
.
He was invariably represented as slow of provocation and a friend of See also: peace, but once roused to battle not even Siegfried could withstand his onslaught
.
But probably Dietrich's fight with Siegfried in Kriemhild's See also: rose garden at See also: Worms is a See also: late addition to the Rosengarten myth
.
The chief heroes of the Dietrich cycle are his tutor and companion in arms, Hildebrand (see HILDEBRAND, See also: LAY ox), with his nephews the Wolfings Alphart and Wolfhart; Wittich, who renounced his allegiance to Dietrich and slew the sons of Attila; Heime and Biterolf
.
The contents of the poems dealing with the Dietrich cycle are summarized by See also: Uhland in Schriften zur Geschichte der Dichtung and See also: Sage (See also: Stuttgart, 1873)
.
The Thidrekssaga (ed
.
C
.
Unger, See also: Christiania, 1853) is translated into German by F
.
H. v. der Hagen in Altdeutsche and altnordische Heldensagen (vols. i. and ii
.
3rd ed., See also: Breslau, 1872)
.
A See also: summary of it forms the concluding chapter of T
.
See also: Hodgkin's Theodoric the Goth (1891)
.
The variations in the Dietrich legend in the Latin historians, in Old and See also: Middle High German literature, and in the See also: northern saga, can be studied in W
.
See also: Grimm's Deutsche Heldensage (2nd ed., Berlin, 1867)
.
There is a See also: good account in See also: English in F
.
E
.
See also: Sandbach's Heroic Saga-cycle of Dietrich of Bern (1906), forming No
.
15 of See also: Alfred Nutt's Popular Studies in See also: Mythology, and another in M
.
Bentinck See also: Smith's
See also: translation of Dr O
.
L
.
Jirlczek's Deutsche Heldensage (Northern Legends, See also: London, 1902)
.
For See also: modern German authorities and commentators see B
.
Symons, " Deutsche Heldensage " in H
.
See also: Paul's Grd. d. german
.
Phil
.
( Strassburg, new ed., 1905) ; also Goedeke, Geschichte der deutschen Dichtung (i . 241-246) . |
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