Finally, I desire to call attention here to the fact that, while a few selections from Lessing, Goethe, and Schiller are given, by way of illustrating their early work in its relation to the literary renascence, no attempt is made to deal adequately with the classical literature of the eighteenth century. The book extends to the classics. I must admit that the limit thus set is a little vague, and from a theoretical point of view not quite satisfactory; but practical considerations decided in favor of it. To have done justice to the classics, on the scale adopted for the rest of the book, would have required an additional hundred pages, devoted to long extracts from works which, for the most part, have been carefully edited for American students, are commonly read in schools and colleges, and could be presumed to be familiar to most users of the Anthology. As the additional matter would thus have been largely useless, it seemed to me that the ideal gain in symmetry would be more than offset by the increased bulk and cost of the book, which was already large enough. I hold of course that anthologies have their use in the study of literary history; but it would be a mistake, in my judgment, for any student to take up a volume of selections without having first read the more important works of Lessing, Goethe, and Schiller.
CALVIN THOMAS.
Columbia University.
Parts I and II are in separate and independent files. If you choose not to download both, make sure your download does include the file whose name ends in .css.
[ CONTENTS OF PART FIRST]
Part I
| PAGE | ||
| [I.] | The Lay of Hildebrand | 3 |
| [II.] | The Merseburg Charms | 5 |
| [III.] | The Wessobrunn Prayer | 6 |
| [IV.] | The Muspilli | 7 |
| [V.] | The Heliand | 8 |
| [VI.] | The Old Saxon Genesis | 13 |
| [VII.] | Otfried’s Book of the Gospels | 15 |
| [VIII.] | The Lay of Ludwig | 22 |
| [IX.] | Waltharius Manu Fortis | 24 |
| [X.] | Rudlieb | 32 |
| [XI.] | Ezzo’s Lay of the Miracles of Christ | 35 |
| [XII.] | Heinrich von Melk | 36 |
| [XIII.] | The Arnstein Hymn to the Virgin | 38 |
| [XIV.] | Lamprecht’s Lay of Alexander | 41 |
| [XV.] | Konrad’s Lay of Roland | 45 |
| [XVI.] | King Rother | 50 |
| [XVII.] | Duke Ernst | 54 |
| [XVIII.] | The Lay of the Nibelungs | 58 |
| [XIX.] | Gudrun | 73 |
| [XX.] | The Earlier Minnesingers | 83 |
| [XXI.] | Walter von der Vogelweide | 88 |
| [XXII.] | Heinrich von Veldeke’s Eneid | 96 |
| [XXIII.] | Hartmann von Aue | 100 |
| [XXIV.] | Wolfram von Eschenbach | 110 |
| [XXV.] | Gottfried von Strassburg | 119 |
| [XXVI.] | Konrad von Würzburg | 128 |
| [XXVII.] | Later Minnesingers | 132 |
| [XXVIII.] | Poems of the Dietrich-Saga | 139 |
| [XXIX.] | Meyer Helmbrecht | 148 |
| [XXX.] | Thomasin of Zirclaere | 154 |
| [XXXI.] | Der Stricker | 157 |
| [XXXII.] | Freidank | 160 |
| [XXXIII.] | Play of the Ten Virgins | 162 |
| [XXXIV.] | Easter Plays | 164 |
| [XXXV.] | Reynard the Fox | 171 |
| [XXXVI.] | Peter Suchenwirt | 177 |
| [XXXVII.] | Brant’s Ship of Fools | 179 |
| [XXXVIII.] | Folk-songs of the Fifteenth Century | 182 |
| [XXXIX.] | Late Medieval Religious Prose | 189 |