Similar use is made of the ring in other German romances. (1.) 'Der edle Moringer' (MS. of 14th century) asks his wife to wait seven years for him, while he visits the land of St Thomas. He is warned by an angel, at the expiration of that period, that he will lose her if he does not go back, bewails himself to his patron, and is conveyed home in a sleep. He begs an alms at his castle-gate in the name of God, St Thomas, and the noble Moringer; is admitted to his wife's presence; sings a lay describing his own case, which moves the lady much; throws into a beaker of wine, which she sets before him, the ring by which she was married to him, sends the cup back to her, and is recognized. Böhme, No 6, p. 32; Uhland, No 298, p. 773. (2.) In the older Hildebrandslied, which is of the 14th century, or earlier, the hero, returning after an absence of thirty-two years, drops his ring into a cup of wine presented to him by his wife. Böhme, No 1, p. 1; Uhland, No 132, p. 330. (3.) Wolfdietrich drops Ortnit's ring into a cup of wine sent him by Liebgart, who has been adjudged to the Graf von Biterne in consideration of his having, as he pretended, slain the dragon. The cup is returned to the empress, the ring identified, the pretension refuted, and Liebgart given to Ortnit's avenger. Wolfdietrich B, ed. Jänicke, I, 280 ff, stanzas 767-785. (4.) King Rother (whose history has passages of the strongest resemblance to Horn's), coming to retrieve his wife, who has been kidnapped and carried back to her father, lands below Constantinople, at a woody and hilly place, and assumes a pilgrim's disguise. On his way to the city he meets a man who tells him that Ymelot of Babylon has invaded Greece, and taken Constantin, his wife's father, prisoner; and that Constantin, to save his life, has consented to give his daughter to the heathen king's son. Rother steals into the hall, and even under the table at which the royal party are sitting, and contrives to slip his ring into the hand of his distressed young queen, who, thus assured of his presence, immediately recovers her spirits. Massmann, Deutsche Gedichte des zwœlften Jahrhunderts, Theil ii, p. 213, vv. 3687-3878.
One of the best and oldest stories of the kind we are engaged with is transmitted by Cæsarius of Heisterbach in his Dialogus Miraculorum, of the first quarter of the 13th century. Gerard, a soldier living in Holenbach ("his grandchildren are still alive, and there is hardly a man in the town who does not know about this"), being, like Moringer, devoted to St Thomas of India, was impelled to visit his shrine. He broke a ring and gave one half to his wife, saying, Expect me back in five years, and marry whom you wish if I do not come then. The journey, which would be long enough any way, was providentially protracted. He reached the shrine at last, and said his prayers, and then remembered that that was the last day of his fifth year. Alas, my wife will marry again, he thought; and quite right he was, for the wedding was even then preparing. A devil, acting under the orders of St Thomas, set Gerard down at his own door. He found his wife supping with her second partner, and dropped his half ring into her cup. She took it out, fitted it to the half which had been given her, rushed into his arms, and bade good-by to the new bridegroom. Ed. Strange, II, 131.
A tradition closely resembling this has been found in Switzerland, Gerard and St Thomas being exchanged for Wernhart von Strättlingen and St Michael. Menzel's Odin, p. 96.
Another of the most remarkable tales of this class is exquisitely told by Boccaccio in the Decamerone, G. x, N. ix. Messer Torello, going to the crusade, begs his wife to wait a year, a month, and a day before she marries again. The lady assures him that she will never be another man's wife; but he replies that a woman young, beautiful, and of high family, as she is, will not be allowed to have her way. With her parting embrace she gives him a ring from her finger, saying, If I die before I see you again, remember me when you look on this. The Christians were wasted by an excessive mortality, and those who escaped the ravages of disease fell into the hands of Saladin, and were imprisoned by him in various cities, Torello in Alexandria. Here he was recognized by Saladin, whom he had entertained with the most delicate and splendid hospitality a few months before, when the soldan was travelling through Italy in disguise. Saladin's return for this courtesy was so magnificent as almost to put Lombardy out of Torello's head,[170] and besides he trusted that his wife had been informed of his safety by a letter which he had sent. This was not so, however, and the death of another Torello was reported in Italy as his, in consequence of which his supposed widow was solicited in marriage, and was obliged to consent to take another husband after the time should have expired which she had promised to wait. A week before the last day, Torello learned that the ship which carried his letter had been wrecked, and the thought that his wife would now marry again drove him almost mad. Saladin extracted from him the cause of his distress, and promised that he should yet be at home before the time was out, which Torello, who had heard that such things had often been done, was ready to believe. And in fact, by means of one of his necromancers, Saladin caused Torello to be transported to Pavia in one night—the night before the new nuptials. Torello appeared at the banquet the next day in the guise of a Saracen, under the escort of an uncle of his, a churchman, and at the right moment sent word to the lady that it was a custom in his country for a bride to send her cup filled with wine to any stranger who might be present, and for him to drink half and cover the cup, and for her to drink the rest. To this the lady graciously assented. Torello drank out most of the wine, dropped in the ring which his wife had given him when they parted, and covered the cup. The lady, upon lifting the cover, saw the ring, knew her husband, and, upsetting the table in her ecstasy, threw herself into Torello's arms.
Tales of this description still maintain themselves in popular tradition. 'Der Ring ehelicher Treue,' Gottschalk, Deutsche Volksmärchen, II, 135, relates how Kuno von Falkenstein, going on a crusade, breaks his ring and gives one half to his wife, begging her to wait seven years before she marries again. He has the adventures of Henry of Brunswick, with differences, and, like Moringer, sings a lay describing his own case. The new bridegroom hands him a cup; he drops in his half ring, and passes the cup to the bride. The two halves join of themselves.[171] Other examples, not without variations and deficiencies, in details, are afforded by 'Der getheilte Trauring,' Schmitz, Sagen u. Legenden des Eifler Volkes, p. 82; 'Bodman,' Uhland, in Pfeiffer's Germania, IV, 73-76; 'Graf Hubert von Kalw,' Meier, Deutsche Sagen, u.s.w., aus Schwaben, p. 332, No 369, Grimms, Deutsche Sagen, No 524; 'Der Bärenhäuter,' Grimms, K.u.H. märchen, No 101; 'Berthold von Neuhaus,' in Kern's Schlesische Sagen-Chronik, p. 93.
A story of the same kind is interwoven with an exceedingly impressive adventure related of Richard Sans-Peur in Les Chroniques de Normandie, Rouen, 1487, chap. lvii, cited in Michel, Chronique des Ducs de Normandie par Benoit, II, 336 ff. A second is told of Guillaume Martel, seigneur de Bacqueville; still others of a seigneur Gilbert de Lomblon, a comrade of St. Louis in his first crusade. Amélie de Bosquet, La Normandie romanesque et merveilleuse, pp. 465-68, 470.
A Picard ballad, existing in two versions, partly cited by Rathery in the Moniteur Universel for August 26, 1853, tells of a Sire de Créqui, who, going beyond seas with, his sovereign, breaks his ring and gives half to his young wife; is gone ten years, and made captive by the Turks, who condemn him to death on account of his adhesion to Christ; and is transported to his château on the eve of the day of his doom. This very day his wife is to take another husband, sorely against her will. Créqui appears in the rags of a beggar, and legitimates himself by producing his half of the ring (which, in a way not explained by Rathery, has been brought back by a swan).
'Le Retour du Mari,' Puymaigre, Chants populaires messins, p. 20, has also some traits of ballads of this class. A bridegroom has to go on a campaign the very day of his nuptials. The campaign lasts seven years, and the day of his return his wife is about to remarry. He is invited to the wedding supper, and towards the close of it proposes to play cards to see who shall have the bride. The guests are surprised. The soldier says he will have the bride without winning her at cards or dice, and, turning to the lady, asks, Where are the rings I gave you at your wedding seven years ago? She will go for them; and here the story breaks off.[172]
The same hard fortune is that of Costantino, a young Albanian, who is called to the service of his king three days after his marriage. He gives back her ring to his wife, and tells her he must go to the wars for nine years. Should he not return in nine years and nine days, he bids her marry. The young wife says nothing, waits her nine years and nine days, and then, since she is much sought for, her father wishes her to marry. She says nothing, again, and they prepare for the bridal. Costantino, sleeping in the king's palace, has a bad dream, which makes him heave a sigh that comes to his sovereign's ear. The king summons all his soldiers, and inquires who heaved that sigh. Costantino confesses it was he, and says it was because his wife was marrying. The king orders him to take the swiftest horse and make for his home. Costantino meets his father, and learns that his dream is true, presses on to the church, arrives at the door at the same time as the bridal procession, and offers himself for a bride's-man. When they come to the exchange of rings, Costantino contrives that his ring shall remain on the bride's finger. She knows the ring; her tears burst forth. Costantino declares himself as having been already crowned with the lady.[173] Camarda, Appendice al Saggio di Grammatologia, etc., 90-97, a Calabrian-Albanese copy. There is a Sicilian, but incomplete, in Vigo, Canti popolari siciliani, p. 342 ff, ed. 1857, p. 695 ff, ed. 1870-74.
With this belongs a ballad, very common in Greece, which, however, has for the most part lost even more of what was in all probability the original catastrophe. '[a]Αναγνωρισμος],' Chasiotis, Popular Songs of Epirus, p. 88, No 27, comes nearer the common story than other versions.[174] A man who had been twelve years a slave after being a bridegroom of three days, dreams that his wife is marrying, runs to the cellar, and begins to sing dirges. The king hears, and is moved. "If it is one of the servants, increase his pay; if a slave, set him free." The slave tells his story (in three lines); the king bids him take a swift gray. The slave asks the horses, which is a swift gray. Only one answers, an old steed with forty wounds. "I am a swift gray; tie two or three handkerchiefs around your head, and tie yourself to my back!"[175] He comes upon his father pruning the vineyard. "Whose sheep are those feeding in the meadows?" "My lost son's." He comes to his mother. "What bride are they marrying?" "My lost son's." "Shall I get to them in church while they are crowning?" "If you have a fast horse, you will find them crowning; if you have a bad horse, you will find them at table." He finds them at church, and calls out, A bad way ye have: why do ye not bring out the bride, so that strangers may give her the cup? A good way we have, they answer, we who bring out the bride, and strangers give her the cup. Then he takes out his ring, while he is about to present the cup to the bride. The bride can read; she stands and reads (his name), and bids the company begone, for her mate has come, the first crowned.