The moral results of this sanguinary fighting were, however, important and perhaps justified the sacrifice of so many valuable soldiers. Enghien’s pertinacity had not achieved a decision with the sword, but Mercy had been so severely punished that he was unable to interfere with his opponent’s new plan of campaign. This, which was carried out by the united armies and by reinforcements from France, while Turenne’s cavalry screened them by bold demonstrations on the Tauber, led to nothing less than the conquest of the Rhine Valley from Basel to Coblenz, a task which was achieved so rapidly that the Army of France and its victorious young leader were free to return to France in two months from the time of their appearance in Turenne’s quarters at Breisach.
FREIDANK (Vrîdanc), the name by which a Middle High German didactic poet of the early 13th century is known. It has been disputed whether the word, which is equivalent to “free-thought,” is to be regarded as the poet’s real name or only as a pseudonym; the latter is probably the case. Little is known of Freidank’s life. He accompanied Frederick II. on his crusade to the Holy Land, where, in the years 1228-1229, a portion at least of his work was composed; and it is said that on his tomb (if indeed it was not the tomb of another Freidank) at Treviso there was inscribed, with allusion to the character of his style, “he always spoke and never sang.” Wilhelm Grimm originated the hypothesis that Freidank was to be identified with Walther von der Vogelweide; but this is no longer tenable. Freidank’s work bears the name of Bescheidenheit, i.e. “practical wisdom,” “correct judgment,” and consists of a collection of proverbs, pithy sayings, and moral and satirical reflections, arranged under general heads. Its popularity till the end of the 16th century is shown by the great number of MSS. extant.
Sebastian Brant published the Bescheidenheit in a modified form in 1508. Wilhelm Grimm’s edition appeared in 1834 (2nd ed. 1860), H. F. Bezzenberger’s in 1872. A later edition is by F. Sandvoss (1877). The old Latin translation, Fridangi Discretio, was printed by C. Lemcke in 1868; and there are two translations into modern German, A. Bacmeister’s (1861) and K. Simrock’s (1867). See also F. Pfeiffer, Über Freidank (Zur deutschen Literaturgeschichte, 1855), and H. Paul, Über die ursprüngliche Anordnung von Freidanks Bescheidenheit (1870).
FREIENWALDE, a town of Germany, in the kingdom of Prussia, on the Oder, 28 m. N.E. of Berlin, on the Frankfort-Angermünde railway. Pop. (1905) 7995. It has a small palace, built by the Great Elector, an Evangelical and a Roman Catholic church, and manufactures of furniture, machinery, &c. The neighbouring forests and its medicinal springs make it a favourite summer resort of the inhabitants of Berlin. A new tower commands a fine view of the Oderbruch (see [Oder]). Freienwalde, which must be distinguished from the smaller town of the same name in Pomerania, first appears as a town in 1364.
FREIESLEBENITE, a rare mineral consisting of sulphantimonite of silver and lead, (Pb, Ag2)5Sb4S11. The monoclinic crystals are prismatic in habit, with deeply striated prism and dome faces. The colour is steel-grey, and the lustre metallic; hardness 2½, specific gravity 6.2. It occurs with argentite, chalybite and galena in the silver veins of the Himmelsfürst mine at Freiberg, Saxony, where it has been known since 1720. The species was named after J. K. Freiesleben, who had earlier called it Schilf-Glaserz. Other localities are Hiendelaencina near Guadalajara in Spain, Kapnik-Bánya in Hungary, and Guanajuato in Mexico. A species separated from freieslebenite by V. von Zepharovich in 1871, because of differences in crystalline form, is known as diaphorite (from διαφορά, “difference”); it is very similar to freieslebenite in appearance and has perhaps the same chemical composition (or possibly Ag2PbSb2S5), but is orthorhombic in crystallization. A third mineral also very similar to freieslebenite in appearance is the orthorhombic andorite, AgPbSb3S6, which is mined as a silver ore at Oruro in Bolivia.
FREIGHT, (pronounced like “weight”; derived from the Dutch vracht or vrecht, in Fr. fret, the Eng. “fraught” being the same word, and formerly used for the same thing, but now only as an adjective = “laden”), the lading or cargo of a ship, and the hire paid for their transport (see [Affreightment]); from the original sense of water-transport of goods the word has also come to be used for land-transit (particularly in America, by railroad), and by analogy for any load or burden.