[70] “A festis follorum ubi baculus accipitur omnino abstineatur.... Idem fortius monachis et monialibus prohibemus.”
[71] On the subject of all these burlesques and popular feasts and ceremonies, the reader may consult Flögel’s “Geschichte des Grotesk-Komischen,” of which a new and enlarged edition has recently been given by Dr. Friedrich W. Ebeling, 8vo., Leipzig, 1862. Much interesting information on the subject was collected by Du Tilliot, in his “Memoires pour servir à l’Histoire de la Fête des Fous,” 8vo., Lausanne, 1751. See also Rigollot, in the work quoted above, and a popular article on the same subject will be found in my “Archæological Album.”
[72] “Monnaies inconnues des Evêques des Innocens, des Fous,” &c., Paris, 1837.
[73] This earliest known version is in German verse, and was printed in 1515. An English version, in prose, was printed in 1620, and is reprinted in Thoms’s “Collection of Early Prose Romances.”
[74] The title of this English translation is, “Here beginneht a merye Jest of a man that was called Howleglas, and of many marveylous thinges and jestes that he dyd in his lyfe, in Eastlande, and in many other places.” It was printed by Coplande, supposed about 1520. An edition of Eulenspiegel in English, by Mr. Kenneth Mackenzie, has recently been published by Messrs. Trübner & Co., of Paternoster Row.
[75] It was reprinted by Von der Hagen, in a little volume entitled “Narrenbuch; herausgegeben durch Friedrich Heinrich von der Hagen.” 12mo., Halle, 1811.
[76] I am obliged to pass over this part of the subject very rapidly. For the history of that remarkable book, the “Cent Nouvelles Nouvelles,” I would refer the reader to the preface to my own edition, “Les Cent Nouvelles Nouvelles, publiées d’après le seul manuscrit connu, avec Introduction et Notes, par M. Thomas Wright.” 2 vols, 12mo., Paris, 1858.
[77] A neat and useful edition of these two jest-books, with the other most curious books of the same class, published during the Elizabethan period, has recently been published in two volumes, by Mr. W. C. Hazlitt.
[78] “Infinitus jam erat numerus qui victum ex Lutheranis libris quæritantes, in speciem bibliopolarum longe lateque per Germaniæ provincias vagabantur.”—Eck., p. 58.
[79] Several editions of the writings of Hrotsvitha, texts and translations, have been published of late years both in Germany and in France, of which I may point out the following as most useful and complete—“Théatre de Hrotsvitha, Religieuse Allemande du x^e siècle....par Charles Magnin,” 8vo., Paris, 1845; “Hrotsvithæ Gandeshemensis, virginis et monialis Germanicæ, gente Saxonica ortæ, Comœdias sex, ad fidem codicis Emmeranensis typis expressas edidit.... J. Benedixen,” 16mo., Lubecæ, 1857; “Die Werke der Hrotsvitha: Herausgegeben von Dr. K. A. Barack,” 8vo., Nürnberg, 1858.