The “Jests of Poggio Bracciolini” (1381–1459), a man to whom we owe the recovery of Quintilian, eight orations of Cicero, twelve comedies of Plautus, and other classics, also furnished Murner with matter for the Eulenspiegel. In fact, Murner and his successors must have very diligently sought out all the literature of the class likely to serve their purpose in adding to the adventures of their own hero. Thus several stories are adapted from the “Cento Novelle Antiche” (printed at Bologna, 1525), from Morlini (Naples, 1520), from Bebel, and from François Villon.
There are a few books later than Eulenspiegel having a family resemblance to it; of these the Schimpf und Ernst (“Abuse and Seriousness”) of John Pauli Pfedersheimer, published in 1522, is the most noted. The following is the title of the first edition: “Schimpf vn̄ | Ernst | heiset | das Buch mit namē | durchlaufft e d’ welthandlung mit | ernstlichen vnd kurtzweiligen exem- | plen, parabolen vnd hystorien | nützlich vnd gut zu besse- | rung der menschen.” This title is in an oblong tablet surrounded with woodcuts. Below is Herodias bringing the head of John the Baptist to her father; to the right is Adam and Eve; to the left, Bishop Martin; and at the top is St. George with the dragon. Sheets run from A-X iiii, 124 pages in folio, double columns. Colophon: “Getruckt zu Strassburg von Johannes | Grieninger, vnd volendet vff vnser lieben frawentag der geburt, | in dem iar nach der geburt Christi vnsers herren. Tausend | fünf hundert vnd zwei vnd zwantzig.” Then follows sheet Y, with six pages of contents. Copies in the Royal Libraries at Dresden, Berlin, and München. Forty-nine editions are specified by Lappenberg in “Ulenspiegel” (pp. 368–378), besides several translations. Pauli, in turn, has borrowed from Eulenspiegel, and that he understood the spirit of the book is plain from a reference he makes to it.
Another work akin to the Owlglass is the popular folk-book of Friar Rush, which is sufficiently well known to need no further description here. Mr. Thoms has reprinted it in his “Collection of Early Prose Romances.” Claus Narr von Ranstedt is another successor to Eulenspiegel. This worthy was court-fool to the Elector of Saxony from 1486 to 1532; thus a contemporary to Murner, who, indeed, mentions him in the treatise, “Whether the King of England be a liar or Dr. Luther?” The earliest edition appears to be of 1572, and its author was Master Wolfgang Büttner, Priest of Volfferstet. In the preface, Büttner sneers at Eulenspiegel, and asks why the pure words and good sayings of this good man should not be preferred and esteemed rather than the shameless stories of Owlglass.
Noteworthy also is a book containing the adventures of Hans Clauert of Trebbin, who in a humble manner, yet not without humour, follows in the footsteps of Owlglass. The only edition of it which I have seen is an undated folk-book, published in the series of Otto Wigand at Leipzig. This hero goes to Hungary and other places; but his adventures contain none of the satiric intention evident in the Owlglass. With these elucidatory remarks touching Owlglass, and the literature of which his adventures form the completest example, I bid the reader
A HEARTY FAREWELL.
[29]. The curious reader will find this duly set forth in Mr. Kemble’s critical history of the Salomon and Marcolphus tale (Salomon and Saturnus, p. 70). And in the preface to Dr. Luther’s “Table Talk,” where this application is made, Stangwald complains of the great number of people who prefer Marcolphus, Eulenspiegel, and such books, to these Colloquia Lutheri.
