III. Theory of the Origin and Source of the Ballad
[unedited for now- proofed enough to be somewhat readable in most places]
[This chapter begins on page 221. Page numbers are at the bottom above the solid line, which is the end of each page. Footnotes are below the dotted line at the bottom of each page.
The font characters for Russian (and some foreign language) words and names will be made as best possible with English fonts- therefore they will be incorrect.
I've left of the segment on Finnish versions (Kemppinen was Finnish) because it is outside the scope of my excerpts focusing on English language variants.
R. Matteson 2014]
III. THE THEORY OF THE ORIGIN AND SOURCE OF THE BALLAD
1. The Origin of Folk Poems in General
The present view is that every folk poem was originally the subjective creation of an individual poet[1]. Each ballad, each product of folk poetry, whether it has a minor theme and a limited geographical distribution or a cosmopolitan theme that has come to be classed as world literature, has always had its individual initial performer, its original poet living in a particular time and place, and whose authorship is always revealed in some way or other by his work; in other words, he can be traced both historically and geographically. However, it is not always an easy task to search for the origin of a ballad that has travelled widely across the frontiers of nationality and language; its manifold features become confusing and it is often difficult to decide what is original, and. what again a later addition or modification[2].
The variant analysis presented in this research work shows how the ballad acquires in each new cultural area of adoption a more or less new content and form, so much so that each new form may almost be regarded as a new ballad in comparison with the forms of other cultural areas. For instance, from within the geographical boundaries of a ballad a random selection of
its extreme forms will produce specimens which to the uninitiated are totally unrelated. The more clearly defined the cultural boundaries crossed by the ballad the greater, it seems, is the transformation. Conversely, its migration over less clearly demarcated, cultural frontiers produces slighter changes in its form.
At times the folk ballad may be transposed from one language into another, yet the plot is transformed as easily as in the translation of a poem[3]. The prose products of folk poetry on the other hand retain their original form more tenaciously. The individual who first performs in his own language the
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1 Vide Setiil;i ++2-76; Tarkiainen 57; Tarkiainen KSVK 1,100-12; Kallas 39-40; Kemppinen sK 204-5; Hocgart 152-63; we's 193-5; christophersen 3-5.
2 Cf. Taylor, Prouerb Z+-+5, particularly 36.
3 Cf. Kemppinen SK zrr.
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folk poem of another cultural or linguistic area follows the general practice of singers of folk poems: he adapts it to his own environment, his own period, and even to his own personal taste; he may leave out something that is unfamiliar, strange and difficult to understand and on the other hand add familiar and local traits. But the basic features, basic motives and basic idea of the poem, the very things that have inspired him to >>translate>> the poem into his own language, remain as evidence of a theme that is related in greater or lesser degree to the original theme. The translation, in such cases, is both imitative and creative versification.
Accepting all this, we can, for each new form of the ballad of the false knight introduced in the variant analysis, pose the questions: by whom and when was this new form introduced? And, arriving at the initial source of the ballad: by whom and when was this ballad composed? Where the problem involves an old folk poem sung in hundreds and thousands of variants it is naturally impossible to answer these accurately enough to name the historical author, unless literary sources are found. But, to the scholar, the ballad or some other product of folk poetry illustrates the social background of the poet; he can place the cultural milieu introduced by the ballad in its historical setting.
It is this observation that brings the scholar closer in his search to the original singer of the poem; sometimes it even enables him to prove that the poem is the work of a man or a woman, that love or hate was his consuming passion[1], that the poet was learned or of humble birth, etc. [2]; in other words, from the poem we can trace its creator, even if we cannot name him[3]. This brings us to the realisation that we cannot really speak of a difference between a folk poem and a literary composition as far as origins are concerned; each surviving folk poem was originally the creation of an individual artist. The greater the artist or his composition the more enduring and the more widely-known the work became. This is true of art today[4].
When an artistic creation, let us say one that has survived for a thousand years as folk poetry in ballad or some other song form, has lived for centuries and through different eras it is only natural in most cases that its original idea and factual content should fade into obscurity, grow strange and even incomprehensible to the singer of later times. This is particularly true of mythical subjects. The man of later times no longer knows the content of the myth or the mythical being described in the poem and he substitutes a new creature
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1 Vide Kemppinen SK zo4-5.
2 Vide Kemppinen SK ezo, 253-4.
3 Setiilii 44g: >>Each folk poem has its first, albeit unknown, author.>>
4 Cf. John Meier KV I-XXXII; Anglia LVII,45-53 Iel Andersson, Budkaalen 1944; 2, 1- 17.
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or person more familiar to him personally. This is just what has happened with the false knight: his original name and legend have grown obscure and been forgotten in the course of the years and in the later transformations of the ballad he seems to appear as a very ordinary human being. The problem for the scholar, then, can be likened to that of the archeologist: he must dig down through the cultural deposits of the different eras until, gradually, he approaches the object of his search, the sources of the poem.
In our attempts to reach the source of the ballad we shall have for clues the popular variants of the ballad studied, i.e. the folk poems themselves. Only the completest possible sum of the popular variants, showing the vivid and motley variety of epithets and other details and the all-embracing series of popular fancies, can be considered reliable and be admitted by the scholar
as true evidence for scientific presentation [1]. The sum of the popular variants of each ballad or folk poem is the main field of the scholar's work, one which he must know well. The methods of folklore study, on the other hand, which govern the way in which the variant material (both in analysis and synthesis; the quality and character of the synthesis are determined by the task appointed at any given time) and auxiliary research must be employed to bring to light the scientific truth, have begun of late to assume a still more empirical character, superseding vague allegorical and other unverified attempts at explanation. The variant analysis of this ballad shows clearly how deficient any account of the ballad story would be were it based on some individual variant, version or form. The following chapter (Various Theories of the Source of the Ballad of the False Knight) will shon' the diversity of the views reached from deficient material. It is thus only with the guidance of the entire mass of the popular variants that we may be able to ascertain what kind of man this knight is who has had lavished upon him in the various variants of the ballad throughout the world hundreds of names, who is made to do now one thing now another in his efforts to tempt and destroy the maid. We can also trace his cultural background and historico-cultural period. However, before turning to a solution of these questions let us review in brief the findings of earlier investigations into the source of the ballad of the false
knight.
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1 In this I agree with Walter Anderson's stand on the desirability of amassing an absolute variant material; vide his study Der Schwank vom alten Hildebrand, Eine rcrgleichende Studie. Acta et Commentationes Universitatis Tartuensis (Dorpatensis) B: Humaniora XXI 1; XXIII 1. Tartu 1931.
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2. Various Theories of the Source of the Ballad of the False Knight
Historical Events Theories
Charles Kirkpatrick Sharpe[1] maintains in his ballad collection (published in 1823) that the Carline Sands of the May Collin ballad is a place called Carlinseugh on the Forfarshire coast and that the Fause Sir John of the ballad is Sir John Colquhoun who met his tragic end in 1633. William Motherwell[2] in 1827 and Robert Chambers[3] in 1829 mention that the young maid of the
ballad May, Collean >>was a daughter of the family of Kennedy of Colzean>>, and the scene of the events was Carlton Castle, about two miles south of Girvan in Ayrshire. The local inhabitants have even been able to point out the place where John Cathcart (Fause Sir John of the ballad) drowned his wife and finally himself.
In the fifth annual issue of Anzeiger, 1836, Frid. Willem[4] gives a notes a worthy piece of information. He writes:
>>Es gab ehemals eine alte adelige Familie in Flandern, van Halewyn, und. ein Dorf dieses Namens besteht noch. So erwihnt Sanderus lde Gandauenr, lib. I,45] einen Georgius Halewino, toparchus Haewini, eques Flandrus, vetustae et nobilissimae stirpis, ut ait Harduinus. Unde tanquam ex equo Trojano prodierunt plutimi viri, armis, magistratibus, maximis rempubl meritis. f ch bezweifle jedoch sehr, dass dieses Geschlecht hier in Betracht kommen drirfe; ich halte vielmehr Halewln fiir den alten Mannesnamen Adelwin, und erklzire ihn von Adel und Win (Freund).>>[5]
Very close to Willems's view is the the theory advanced by E. de Coussemaker[6], who associates the ballad with the name Halewijn. He bases himself on M. Kerwyn de Lettenhove's Histoire de Flandre[7], according to which the ballad preserves in its name the memory of a dreadful Saxon war. An earl's son fighting in that war was styled d'Allowin: Praedo impiissimus - German Alles; he was the son of Eilolph and his name was Adhilek. When the war was over St. Amandus led Allowin to the church at Ghent where, after sacrific-
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1 Sharpe No. 17, Ed. by Laing 45; Ed. by Goldsmid 46.
2 Motherwell 67.
3 Robert chambers SB 232; vide also child ESB II, 272; Allingham 383; Buchan ABS II, 295; Field, Midwest Folklore I (1951),115: >>Pretty Polly. . . seem to be inter-related historically.>>
4 Anzeiger V, 450.
5 Vide also Willems 120.
6 Coussemaker 148.
7 Lettenhove 23; Baecker 61.
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ing his beard and hair at the altar of St. Peter, he became a christian. Later this formidable warrior was called St. Bavon[1].
On the subject of Polish ballads Jan Karlowicz[2] mentions, in connection with a variant (SP 127), an article entitled Krosno by Sygmund Wasilewski [Lwowiania V]. The article discusses an event occurring on the River Vistula, >>the memory of which will for ever be preserved among the people in their songs and tales>>. According to the article the theme of the ballad is a true
event in which a Polish soldier tempted the daughter of a rich burgher from Krosno, carried her off and robbed and drowned her. However, according to Karlowicz neither the time of the event nor the surname of the girl are mentioned in confirmation.
The Russian scholar LI. B. IIIeNHb considers (1887)[3] that the ballad is one of the most recent products of Russian folk poetry, that its theme is probably an account of a true event and that the story was circulated throughout the country by soldiers who had heard it in camp in the neighbourhoocl the scene of the event.
In his studies of the Finnish form of the ballad Antti Aarne in his investigation Miehentappaja neidon runo (The Poem of the Man-slaying Maid devotes serious attention to the information volunteered by the singer (FF 162) that the ballad is the story of a true event that took place in the province of Savo. This would make Savo the place of origin or the ballad. Aarne conducted
extensive studies in an endeavour to clear up the mystery of the bloody deed, but his efforts were unsuccessful[4]. For instance, he even examined, parish registers. Finally he came round to the generally accepted, view that the poem originated in Western Finland.
Antti Aarne has also written a study (1922) of the Estonian form of the ballad (his investigation Miehentappaja neidon runo was published in 1921). He mentions that the ballad[5] may be based on some ancient event of Estonian history, which would give it a purely Estonian derivation, or that the theme might have been borrowed from some other country.
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1 A church at Ghent is named after him. It must be noted that the name Halewyn is encountered in Flemish folk poetry in other ballads also, e.g. coussemaker No. 46 Haleryln cn het kleltne kind; Lootens et Feys No. 38 Mi Adel en Hir Alewijin; Dietsche Warande V,62 Het Reuzenlied Halewyn; Dietsche warande V, 63 Harewyn en het kreine kind.
2 Wisla IX,670.
3 IIIefisr I 1,492.
4 Aarne MN 85. - Cf. Salminen KRH 145-7; Salminen SMH 257-8.
5 Aarne ML 252.
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The Sexual Murderer Theories
In Igor the German philologist Paul Kretschmer[1] published a fairly detailed report on the Ulinger ballad, citing a Styrian variant (Erk-Bohme I No. 41 g : GG B7). Kretschmer concludes that the ballad is simply a story of a sexual murderer[2]. It may be noted at the same time that he associates the ballad with the Bluebeard story. The German criminologist Erich Wulffen also produced a lengthy article, Das Kriminelle im deutschen Volksmrirchen[3], in which like Kretschmer he concludes that the Bluebeard story (and thus also the Ulinger ballad) is concerned with a sexual murder and, as he adds, with anthropophagy[4].
Sexual murder, referring to the knight of the ballad under review, is also mentioned by Johannes Bolte and Georg Polivka[5] and G. J. Geers[6]. Paul de Keyser's theory of an Halewijn complex, introduced in the light of Sigmund Freud's psychoanalysis, may perhaps also be included in this group[7].
The Bluebeard Theories
Ever since 1812 when the Brothers Grimm published their collection of fairy-tales, Kinder- und Hausmrirchen, an opinion iterated especially in German folklore studies is that the original source of the Ulinger ballad lies in the Bluebeard story[8]. The connection between the ballad and this story has already been hinted at in the sexual murder theories. As early as 1817 the German, Joseph George Meinert, wrote of the Der Brautmdrder ballad as follows: >>Vielleicht Queiie der Dichtungen vorn Blaubart, deren eine in den beliebten Kinder- und lfausmd"rchen, gesammelt durch die Brtider Grimm, Berlin, I Bd.
N. 62, erzahlt wird.>[9] Similar views of the ballad's source were later propounded by Anton Birlinger in 1860[10], Ludwig Uhland, who in 1869[11] listed in association with ballad variants the variants of the Bluebeard story, Franz M. Bohme in 1877[12], Hermann Frischbier and J. sembrzyckiin 1893 [13], Eduard
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1 Mittheilungen der Anthropologischen Gesellsclmft in wien xxxr,6z-7o.
2 Ibid. 68: The kn$ht is >ein einfacher Lustmcirder>>.
3 Archiu filr Kriminal- Anthropologie und Kriminalistik XXXVIII, g4o-7o.
4 Ibid. 357.
5 Grimm, Anmerkungen lr4o9-lo.
6 Nederlandsch Tijdvhrffi uoor Volkskunde zi,z-g, ro2-ro.
7 Ibid. 27,t65-74
8 Grimm, Mtirchen No. 46 Fitchers Vogel (lst edition No. 6s Blaubart\.
9 Meinert I,438.
10 Germania Y1372- 5.
11 Uhland S IV,65 (the year refers to the year in which Uhland's works were published posthumously).
12 Bcihme 63, 66; Brk-Brjhme Irr33.
13 Frischbier-Sembrzycki r36.
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Roese in 1911[1], Arthur Rossat in 1917[2], Sandor solvmossy 1923[3], Jiri Horak I923[4], Josef st. Kubin 1925[5], paul Aipers 1927[6], Frans Gielge 1934[7], Paul Bauerle 1934[8] and finally Marie Ramondt in 1948 in her comparative article Heer Halewijn en Blauwbaard[9].
In 1930 appeared a study by the German Emil Heckmann, Blaubart, Ein Beitrag zur uergleichenden Mrirchenforschung. Heckmann reaches a conclusion very important from the point of view of ballad study. He claims that the European form of the Bluebeard story, such as it appears in the collection of Charles Perrault[10], was partly inspired by the oldest Germanic forms of the ballad of the false knight and partly by the old Oriental theme[11]. According to Heckmann the siaughter of the maid in particular derives from a popular ballad. The result of his study thus directly contradicts eariier theories placing the source of the bailad in a fairy-tale. In the same year as the publication of Heckmann's work a University teacher from Halle, Karl Voretzsch, published an article[12] introducing an approximately similar view of the Bluebeard story to that held by Heckmann. Voretzsch calls the Ulinger ballad, expressly a >free theme>[13]; a iittle later he goes on to say: >>Der Sinn der tsallade
scheint offen zu liegen.>>
An attempt has been made to show a historical person as the hero of perrault's story of La Barbe-Bleue. Among others credited with inspiring the tale is a nobleman of Brittany, Gilles de Laval Marschall von Retz, beheaded in 1440. But this theory is little more tenable than the theories attributing the ballad of the false knight to historical events[14]. Near Nantes, a short distance
to the north of the town, rise the ruins of an old castle built on the edge of a small lake. It is called the castle of Raoul Blaubart, and, seven sorrowing trees
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1 Roese Br - z.
2 Schrifien der Schweizerischen Geseilschaft fiir Volkskunde XIII,6B.
3 Solymossy, Ethnographia-Nipitet XXXIV/XXXV,Br.
4 Vjbor slouenskej poezie l,udouej T,n7-8.
5 Kubin r45.
6 Niederdeutsche,(eitschrift lttir Votkskunde y,tg - zo.
7 Gielge r3.
8 Bduerle 7, footnote ir{o. 4.
9 Miscellanea J. Gessler rg48 II,ro3o-43.
10 Perrault tot La Barhe-Bleue.
11 Heckmann rB, tZ7_ 42.
12 Handwiirterbuch des deutschen Miirchens 1,266- 7o.
13 Ibid. r,z69.
14 Cf. Grimm, Anmerkungen I, 409 fBossard,Gilles de Rais (rBB5)1 Lemire, La Barbe-bleue de la ldgende et de l'histoire (1886); Sibillot, Folklore de France IV, 354; Volkskunde XVII, 75].
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are said to have grown among its ruins as a memorial to the seven women killed by the knight for their curiosity[1].
The Blood-collecting and Knight's Illness Theories
In his collection of fairy-tales published in 1856 the Swiss, Ernst Ludwig Rochhoiz[2], writing about the ballad Das Guggibader-Lied (GG 57), noted how sickness used to be regarded as Divine retribution, and only atonement in blood could provide a remedy[3] for serious diseases. Rochholz refers expressly to rhe possibility that the knight of both the fairy-tale and the ballad was suffering from leprosy and to cleanse himself of this dreadful disease he needed the blood of many an innocent woman. Fried. Wilhelm Schuster wrote in 1865[4] that we may be concerned either with a knight rvho tried to recover from his ailment by means of the maid's blood or with a bandit who killed the maid of noble birth because of her valuable clothes. Franz M. Bohme on the other hand writes in his annotations to the ballad[5]: >>Was war das Motiv zu demJungfrauenmorde? Nicht Eifersucht, wie es aus einigen Texten scheinen konnte , sondern der Aberglaube: dass das Blut von unschuldigen Madchen den Aussatz heile.> The Swiss, Ludr,vig Tobler, mentions[6] that the delousing (lausen) of the knight's head may have been necessitated by the fact >>dass der Reiter eine Hautkrankheit (Grind) an sich hatte, zu deren Heilung er das Blut von Jungfrauen suchte>>. Dr. Focke, a physician of Diisseldorf, however, considers that the deiousing was merely to soothe the knight and assist him to sleep, just as a mother soothes her small child by gently scratching its head[7]. Mention may finally be made also of Nlaurits Sabbe's opinion that the sick knight was required to wash in the blood of a maiden or child [8].
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1 Uhland S 6S; Erk-Bcihme r4B'
2 Rochholz 4-4.
3 Sin was also conceived of as an illness u,hich only the blood of Jesus Christ, the Son of
the God, coulcl redeem: r John t:7; Heb. gi t+; r Peter I: Igi Ret'elation r: 5; for the porver
of blood see Deuteronomion tz: z3; Leuiticus r7i rt.
4 Schuster 435.
5 Erk-Brihme I,r4B.
6 Tobler II,r7r.
7 Die Medizinische Welt rgz},rt+g. - I rnyself remember from my childhood in Karelia how one could often see, especially on a peaceful Sunday, people performing the same soothing service for each other; it was some sort of endearment or a sign of love. - Vide also Solymossy,
Ethnographia- N ip dlet XXXN/XXXV, 7 7.
8 Volkskunde XIII,TBB.
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mann von Aue, who based his most famous work, Der arme Heinrich, on the folk story in question, lived at about the same time (about 1165 about 1210) as the Ulinger ballad seems to have appeared, as will be seen later(p. 264).
In connection with the publication of an East Prussian variant (GG 229) belonging to the Nicolai Form Johannes Bolte[1] introduces a theory that the killing of the knight's beloved is caused by a sudden attack of jealousy in him, which blinds the sickly man when the maid begins to repent of having followed him. She says she might have become an empress had she obeyed her parents and not gone with him. It is possible to apply the theory to the Nicolai Fornt, which does not mention the knight's having charmed several women.
The Witchcraft and Enticement Theories
The introduction of the variant (GG 36) noted down by Anton Birlinger from Swabia[2] produces a theory which, although it belongs in part to the so-called blood-collecting theories, for its killing motif must be classed as a kind of mythical witchcraft theory. According to this theory the knight of the ballad is a fearsome wizard who has already killed eleven maids and in order to practice his sorcery at will must stilt kill a twelfth. On the other hand the Transsylvanian fairy-tale , Der betrogene Betrfiger[3], makes this robber a young lady-killer who had made a pact with the devil: had he succeeded in killing twelve maids he would by the pact have gained power over all maidens. According to a third variant (GG 82, Tyrolean variant) the devil would have been obliged to serve the knight for the latter's lifetime had the knight succeeded in claiming a twelfth victim[4].
In the search for the derivation of the ballad of the false knight folklorist literature has examined the feature of the ballad describing how the knight succeeds in enticing the maid to follow him. The seductive factors are singing, music, whistling, blowing a horn, etc. Otto Bockel[5] therefore considers the hypnotic power of song to be the basic element giving the ballad its mythical tone. The supernatural elements of the ballad (bovennatuurlijke element) also attracted Gerrit Kalff in his extensive study[6] of folk poetry of the Middle Ages. As examples of such supernatural elements he mentions the knight's
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1 Altpreussische Monatsschrift neue Folge XXYIII,635.
2 Birlinger-Buck I,368.
3 Holz 93.
4 Anzeiger "MF XXX,335.
5 Bcickel DdV r13; Brickel PdV zoo.
6 Kalff 64.
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horn and ointment vessel. Jar. de vries[1], John Meier[2], Karl spiess[3], Marta Pohla[4] and werner Danckert[5] also regard the knight of our ballad as being of demonic origin, though they do not explain in greater detail the kind of myth to which the ballad belongs. True werner Danckert compares Halewijn with the mythical Pied Piper. Halewijn has also been compared with the Horant of the Gudrun poem who charmed Hilde[6] with his song. It must be remembered, however, that Harewijn's fairy music charmed only those who heard him play or sing whereas Horant's[7] divine singing was in the same category as that of orpheus of antiquity or the Finnish Vainamoinen, whose song[8] charmed the whole of living nature[9].
The Judith and Holofernes Theory
In 1879 the Norwegian, Sophus Bugge, published his article Bidrag til den nordiske Balladedigtnings Historie[10]. The second chapter of this study is headed Holofernes. In this chapter Bugge propounds the theory that the Harewijn ballad is an adaptation of the Judith and Holofernes story of the Apocrypha. His premise is that the knight's names used in the old Germanic forms of the ballad are variants of the name Holofernes: German Ulinger, Adelger, Ollegehr= Danish Olmor, Oldemor, Hollemen: Norwe gian Rullball, Rulleman, Ruleman= Biblical Olevern < Holevern < Holofernes. He also introduces very important points of comparison between the various forms of the ballad and the Book of Judith. For instance the numerous variants of the ballad teil how the maid clothes herself for her departure; accordins to some variants she even puts
a crown on her head. This is also done by Judith (Xg; XVI: ro colrigauit cincinnos suos mitra).[11] The knight of several Scottish variants comes from strange northern lands: so also does Holofernes (xvl: 5 venit Assur ex montibus a'b Aquilone). The action of the ballad and the maid's departure from
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1 Nederlandsch Tijdschrift uoor Volkskunde zJ,r2,_25, 6Z- lS.
2 John Meier DV II,g7.
3 Das deutsche Votkstied 33, 118.
4 Studien zur Volksliettforschung, Heft 4 (1940), 23, 44-51.
5 Danckert 71, 204-10.
6 Kalff 56; Holz gg.
7 Gudrun 8g-g6; Kudrun 77- 90.
8 Kaleuala, 41st poem; Ganander zz-'6.
9 CI. also Estonian poems: Neus No. 78; Bcickel pdV 197_g.
10 Bugge, Bidrag 12- g; vide also Arkiu.ft)r norcliskfilologi VII,rzr.
11 In quoting from the Book of Judith I have followed the text and division of lines of the Latin vulgate version (Bibtia sacra, Yurgatae Editionis, venetiis MDCXC); the Septuagint version, some of the codices and the Finnish translation of the Apocrypha, based on these, have different groupings of the lines.
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home take place at night in most of the forms; Judith too leaves her home at night (VIII:32 stabitis vos ad portam nocte ista, et ego exeam cum Abra mea). Several of the ballad forms relate how the knight lifted the maid onto his steed and rode off with her; Bugge explains[1] that this may be due to a misunderstanding of the word elevaverunt (X: 20 Et cum in faciem eius intendisset, adorauit eum, prosternens se super terram. Et eleuauerunt eam serui Holofernis, iubente domino suo) [2]. In several German versions knight and maid ride for three days (or three hours) before they reach the scene of the final action; Judith kills Holofernes in his camp on the fourth day after her departure. In some of the ballad variants knight and rnaid ride into a deep valley (GG rg) with a spring; the camp of Holofernes is in the valley of Bethulia which contains a spring where Judith bathes (XII : / et exibat noctibus in vallem Bethuliae, et baptizabat se in fonte aquae). In German variants the knight allows the maid three cries and she calls for God, Jesus and her brothers; Judith prays to the God of Israel (XIII: 7 confirma me Domine Deus Israel). In several forms of the ballad the maid cuts off the knight's head, washes it or casts it into water; Judith does the same (XIII: ro et abscidit caput eius..., et euoluit corpus eius truncum). The words >>Zy narn het hoofd al by het haer>> of the Flemish variants also have their counterpart (XIII: g apprehendit comam capitis eius). In Flemish variants the head of the knight is placed on a table; the head of Holofernes, cut off by Judith, is raised up on the city walls (XIV: t audite me fratres, suspendite caput hoc super muros nostros). The points of comparison are extremely interesting and apposite and many scholars have examined Bugge's thesis in detail, e.g. Chitd[3],Holz[4], Gabriel[5] Humberts and William J. Entwistle[6]. The latter considers Bugge's opinion perfectly correct. On the other hand, however, the points of comparison are quite fortuitous, taken very much at random from various local features of the ballad. Furthermore the story of Judith in the Apocrlpha contains no such important feature as the seductive song, music or other enticement, the feature which is one of the most essential original motifs of the ballad; in fact Judith arrives at the knight's camp as an avenger, the sworn saviour of her country, her deed planned beforehand. This is why the story of Judith does not contain
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1 Bugge, Bidrag zt.
2 Bugge refers here also to an old Gerrnan Judith story according to which Holofernes, immediately upon seeing Judith, became possessed of a passionate desire for her and told his men to carry her olf to his tent, which they did. Vide Miillenhoff-Scherer No. XXXVII Judith; Diemer rr5 ff.
3 Child I,5r-4.
4 Holz Bl-g.
5 Humbert roz.
6 Entwistle 84, z59-6o.
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the interesting b motif of the ballad either, the maid's extrication, once she is aware of the knight's intentions, from the situation in which she has inadvertently been involved. The story of Judith and Holofernes and the ballad of Lady Isabel and the False Knight are not identical.
The Hallowe'en Theory
In 1946 (when I had already started on the preliminary work for my research) the Dutchman, E. Smedes, published an article of great interest and value to the present work[1]. In this he reviews the Halewijn ballad in the light of ancient Celtic civilization, associating the name Halewijn with HattlLue'en and Hallow-da1t. He suggests that the Halewijn of the ballad derives from these names of festivals and that the ballad in general describes the atmosphere of the Celtic Hallowe'en Smedes concludes his meritorious study with a summary in which he says [2]:
>>Als resultaat van dit onderzoek meen ik dus het volgende te lnogen concluderen.
1. Het Halewi.jnslied geeft de sfeer weer van het Keltische Samain of Halloweenfeest.
2. Oud-keltische religieuze voorstellingen omtrent de verhouding van den mens tegenover de bewoners van de Sidh, omtrent het koppensnellen en de verering van het Hoofd vormen de inhoud van de ballade.
3. Het is dus v66rchristelijk van inhoud, maar moet dateren van de tijd, toen de oude benaming Samain vervangen was door die van Halloween.
4. Het moet dus afkomstig zijn van de Britse eilanden en is waarschijnlijk in Vlaanderen gekomen tijdens de intensieve betrekkingen, die tussen de Vlaamse textielindustrie en de Engelse wolproducenten bestonden geduren de 13e en 14e eeuw.))
I attach great value to Smedes's article. He considers that he has solved the Halewijn problem, but I should like to point out that at least the following difficult points require explanation in this theory:
(1) Hallowe'en and Hallowdal are Germanic words (English), not Celtic.
(2) Hallowe'en is Mod. E; at the time the ballad was composed the corresponding word may have had the form halue-euen, halwe-euen, hallowe-eaen or hale-euen[3]. The intermediate sound a did not disappear from words of this form until late ME fat the end of the 15th century] and early Mod. E fin the 16th century] when e.g. the forms e'en < even, e'er < ever, ne'er < never and, o'er < over developed[4].
------------------
1 De Gids tog,70-94; vide also Gusta'e cohen, fale Romanic studies XXrI,z6.
2 Gids rog,go.
3 Stratmann-Bradley 320 - 1.
4 Joseph and Elizabeth Wright 110 221. - The forms al halwes, allehalwes, alle haleuyn, hoii halwen, al halowene and alle halowen which appear in ME in 1375-80 refer to saints martyrs of the Christian Church (Toulmin Smith 3, 11, 17, 29, 351, 397).
)233(
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(3) The text of the ballad might just as easily refer to the vernal Beltane festival or to springtime as to the autumnal feast of Hallowe'en; the first stanza of Child No. 4 A runs as follows:
Fair lady Isabel sits in her bower sewing,
Aye as the gowans grow gay.
There she heard an ellknight blawing his horn.
The first morning in May.
(4) The oldest and most original basic elements of the ballad were not common to the Celtic areas, as the variant analysis of the present study proves; they are encountered only among the Scots and, very much obscured, among the Manx forms; the ballad forms sung by the Irish, Bretons and Asturians are entirely different from the Scottish. It does seem that the oldest basic elements originate from the Continent, whence they have wandered. via scandinavia to scotland and from there down to England.
(5) The ballad is evidently older than supposed by smedes.
3. The Solution of the Problem
The False Knight is not a Human Being
Every folk poem is a child of its own time[1], reflecting the ideas and culture of its era. Following the ballad of the false knight back to the world of ideas it represents we find ourselves in an age when man still believed in fairies and spirits. But he was already acquiring faith and confidence in human reason and intellect, thus equipping himself for victory in the struggle with the simple and primitive mythical being. The doctrines of the Christian Church, already vaguely accepted at that time, seem to have contributed to this awakening. All this notwithstanding, the false knight of the ballad is still a typical supernatural agent capable of charming a human being with his music[2]. There is, however, no question of a god of song and music in the manner of Orpheus or Vaincimdinen; this spirit, whose sweet music had a seductive effect on man, is of another kind. As the principal character of the ballad is a charming elf knight of this sort it must be considered probable that Celtic
-----------
1 Cf. Kemppinen SK 26o; Setzila 433.
2 When speaking of the Finnish forrn of the ballad of the false knight, the poem of the Manslaying Maid, Matti Kuusi calls the ballad >>a relatively recent composition>> and assumes that the feature of inducing sleep by means of song and music has entered. the ballad from other poems (Kuusi 187).
)234(
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mythology- somehow vaguely shadows the background of the composition even if it does not reflect the atmosphere of the Hallowe'en and, Hallowday festivals as such and is not directly associated as such with these names. Friedrich Pfister presents that even in Germanic folklore the elves derive from Celtic mythology[1].
Celtic cultural history and mythology relate innumerable instances of how enchanting music is an essential feature of the world of fairies, so much so that this secret community is impossible to imagine without it. Robert Kirk, in his book rhe secret commonwearth of Erues, Four, & Fairies[2], has given an excellent picture of the mythical concepts still prevailing among the celts in the 17th century. According to Kirk's book oldcerts had very definite notions about the appearance of fairies, their behaviour, speech, span of life, the times of the year when they could be encountered and the effects on man of
meeting with a spirit. It is interesting to compare the singing, praying, whistling, handsome knight of the ballad with the Celtic elf knight described in the legend of St. Patrick (st. patrick, according to the legend, converted the Irish to Christianity and is their patron saint) : wandering in his time about Ireland st' Patrick once sat down to rest on a grassy hillock [3] with his companion, the King of ulida, the king's nobremln and the great Musician Caeilte;
>. . .nor were they long there belbre they saw draw near them a scoldg or 'non-warrior' that wore a fair green mantle having in it a fibula of silver; a shirt of yellow silk next his skin, over and outside that again a tunic of soft satin, and with a timpan of the best slung on his back. 'whence comest thou, scorog?' asked the king. 'out or the sidh of the Daghda's son Bodhb Derg, out of Ireland's southern part. What moved thee out of the south, and who art thou thyself?' - 'I am cascorach, son of cainchinn that is ollave to the tuatha dd danann, and am myself the makings of an ollave [i.e. an aspirant to the grade]. what started me was the dcsign to acquire knowledge, and information, and lore for recital, and the Fianna's mighty deeds of vatour, from caeilte son of Ronan., Then he took his timpan and made for them music and minstrelsy, so that he set them slumbering off to sleep.>>
The music of Cascorach apparently sounded pleasant also in the ears of St. Patrick for he said later that the music *orrrJ have been good had it not been spoilt by the spell wrought by an elf, heard in the back-ground. But for
--------------------
1 Pfister 121- 2 Handwdrterbuch des deutschen Abergraubens II, 1285.
2. Kirk 5-65.
3 Cf. also Child No. 2 A:
The elphin knight sirs on yon hill,
Ba, ba, ba, lilli ba.
He blaws his horn both lowd and shril.
The wind hath blown my plaid awa.
)235(
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the noises off by the elf the song would have been impossible to distinguish from celestial euphony[1].
Another musician, Red Conan o'Rfferty, played his harp so bewitchingly at T'ara's Hall that all who heard it were lulled to sleep. O'Donnell then said to Manannan MacLir[2], the greatest wizard of the Tuatha de Danann, that since he learnt of the declaration of heavenly mercy he had heard nothing sweeter than elfin singing; they must surely be the most musical rascals with a great command of melodies (cf. the German variants of the ballad: the knight sang with three kinds of voice) that he had ever heard (cf. also with the knight's harp-playing GSc z andkanteie [Finnish 3- or 5-string harp] music in the Finnish variants)[3].
Similar must have been the singer and musician about whom the father, mother and sister warn the king's daughter, saying:
>>Nedn myn dochter vol van rom
Die derwaerds gaet komt noyt wed'rom
Wel re zynder dood gebleven met vedl weedom.>>[4]
However, the brother says:
>>'t En let my niet rvaer dat gy gaet
Als gy uw'eer maer wel bewaert
En daer van en i,r,'il ik niet zyn vervaert.>)
Or:
>>Tes mi al eender waer ghi gaet,
Als die crone di rechte staet.>>[5]
The crown refers here as in the Slavonic variants to the maiden's wreath, the symbol of virginal chastity[6], whose preservation was at stake when the maid went off with the knight. In those times it was held that a maid lost her honour if she went off with an elf.[7] According to an old German form the maid was so fascinated by the knight's song as soon as she heard it that she exclaimed:
>>Ach kcjnnt' ich singen so sehre,
Ich giib' meine Treu und Ehre.>>
---------------------
1 O'Grady II.r87-92.
2 For Manannan Maclir see Joyce, Histol z5B,
3 o'Grady Ir,3rr ff; see also Grupp r4z, t4B, $7; Joyce, Ilisto4tt 254*8; Andersson,
Strdkharpan r -28, 42 - r2Z, 2t2-72, 272- 323.
4 Thys (No. 15).
5 Duyse No. r D.
6 Duyse 3.
7 De Gids 109,81.
)236(
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To which the knight replies:
>>Giebst du mir deine Ehre,
Das Singen will ich dich lehren.>> [1]
As far as I can see it is from this very feature of the ballad that the theories derive according to which the principal motif of the ballad is the story of a sexual murderer; the knight of the ballad is seen not as a mythical being but as a man of evil intention who lures the maid away [2].
It seems obvious that the false knight of the ballad is a typical singing and
playing, wicked, dangerous being, an agent to be feared. Why, then, is he given
the name Heer Halewijn in the ballad as we know it today? Or is this name
perhaps, like numerous other appellations and epithets describing the false
knight, only a late forrnation preserving a suggestion of the mythical being
whose concept and name have largely faded from memory through the centuries in which the variants were recorded? The latter probability may also
be applicable to the personal and place names, resembling the Halewijn of
the ballad, in use at the beginning of the present millennium and at the end
of the previous millennium in sorne regions of the Lower Rhine and Northern
France. Forstemann's Altdeutsches namenbuch[3] makes mention of a roth century
man called Haleuinus ( Haleaincus ( Haleuingus. There is a place called
Halewijn near Ghent in Flanders and in the D6partement du Nord in France
there is a Hallouin written in ro66 as Haluin and in 1144 as Haluwin[4]. As
mentioned, both these personal and place names as well as the Halewijn of
the ballad may have a common semantic root word, which they all resemble;
but the mythical nature of the baltad knight precludes the derivation of his
name from ordinary place and personal names [5]. No theories of historical
personages and events seem to apply to him; such hypotheses as there are
of this nature remain local in character and unverified, advanced only through
their introducer's limited knowledge of the variants of the ballad[6]. Stories
and tales of historical persons as well as place and other names contained in
the poems can be used as evidence in the research only alter great deliberation
--------------------
1 Wolfram No. 33 (GG z5).
2 Among these concepts must perhaps be included the opinion of the Finn Martti Haavio:
>>The poem of the man-slaying maid has an implacable and high moral tone>> (Suomen Kulttuuri-
historia I,325)' It does seem that the r,vriter has not perceived the basic essence of the ballad
nor the demonic character of the knight.
3 Forstemann I,595-6.
4 Petri 186.
5 For the mythicism of the ballad compare Angtia XXIII,z.
6 Cf. Set2ilii 417-22.
)237(
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The various formsof the ballad of the false knight contain almost without exception plentifulplace names from the areas concerned but these are hardly of any value to aninvestigation of the source of the ballad.
The Folk Poem's View of the False Knight
It is obvious that the name Halewijn as such, despite its ancient sound,
cannot lead to a satisfactory solution. We must therefore return to the principle
of complete material introduced by me at the beginning of the present study
and see what the folk poem generally calls the knight and what epithets it
employs to describe him. We shall see how the folk poem quite consistently
portrays him, from the birthplace of the ballad right out to the limits of its
spread, as an unknoz.an, outlandish stranger from afar. This feature alone precludes
comparison with local and historical personages. The characteristic traits and
descriptions of the knight can be divided into two main groups: ( r ) general
basic features contained in world literature and (z) special fbatures contained
in individual variants which, collected and placed side by side, constitute
a whole which is fully descriptive of the knight. Selecting some of the most
important features of both groups on the basis of the variant analysis it will
be observed that
(r) in his general basic features thefalse knight is (see Variant Anaysis):
- a nocturnal rider or some other wanderer of the night;
- night is his time of action;
he charms the maid with his song, music, whistling or promises;
- he entices the maid to become his own;
- he tries to persuade the maid to follow him into wonderland;
- he takes the maid to the shore of asea,lakerpondrriuerror someother water,
or to aforest or some other desolate and lone$t place in order to kill her;
- he is of an awe-inspiring strangeness and foreign mien;
- he has alreadl carried off maryt maids and none of them has returned;
- having killed hirn the maid considers her deed jwtified;
(2) in his special features the false knight is
(auberkdnig Halew2n (GF-D z);
- der Elf (GG zgz);
- der Wassermann (GG 186);
ttu elf knight (GSc r ; NAS B, 2o) i
- a bloody knight (GSc 5);
)238(
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--the false-hearted tnan or /oier (NAS
53,55-56, 67,72, Bz,84, Bg_go,97,
tr, [r3], 17, Z4-35, Z7_-SB,4r,49,
ro3, ro5-ro8, r 12, rr+_[r 16], r r7,
BB, 95, lzo);
84-86);
Ioo, [roz], I ro- r r r, r rg, leS);
r4-[lz4f ;
the false-hearted knigltt (NAS 14,
7r -72, 85-86, 95*96, r rB);
28, 4s, [+6], [+B], 54, s7, 6o-63, 68,
the false knight (GSc B; NAS rg);
- a scornful old dog or a dirfit dog (NAS
- Kojosen koira (the dog of Kojonen) (FF
- a perjured man (FE 67);
- a boy who wanders about the world taking daughters from their parents (Sp r);
- a villain (NAS 5o-5r, [52], rzo);
- afalse-ltearted uillain (NAS 4, 40, 92, ror , rzr);
- old aillain (ir[AS 97);
- a fake-eyed villun (NAS 4z);
-- Willie, William [ obscured villain, [1]] NAS 2t -22, 52, 36, 45, 65, 6g-[7o], 74, 77, Bo, 83, 9r, 93 _g4,
- le galant (RF 14, rB, 35);
tlte false-ltearted beast (NAS 1)
the false-hearted youth (NAS
a uagabond (SC 3a);
- a false-ltearted deceiuer (NAS rr3);
- a ruffianz (GE r; NAS B);
- a rebel (I\AS r);
- a vile rebel (NAS g);
- a false-hearted wretch (NAS 26, lz}_3o], 33, 39, Br, 99, ro4, ro9);
- an old wretch (NAS 75);
- a king or knight from be2ond the Rhine (GG zo 1_zo2).t
tlte king of the Rtine (GG zo3);
- a knight from ouer the sea (NAS r r9);
- a -ferry-man or sailor lcf. the ferrJ)-man of Hades,Kharon] (RF zo-_s+rRl 25,
34; SC 4z; SP r74, rgz; SR 56-58, 6+-6S);
- the knight -from over the grelt Danube fcf. Tuonela's (Hadu) black streamf ;
when the maid asks about the knight's home country he says that it is over
there where the Danube gleams grey; there his friends are awaiting them
(SP Br);
tlre knigltt wrto takes the maid into a deep rauine fcf. Gehennal (sp 69_7o,
Bz, gB, r35; NAS rz;);
---------------
1 See Brewster 3r.
2 See Spitzer Sp XLI,5zz.
)239(
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- Heer Halewyn, Heer uan Haelewijn, Halewyn, Halewijn, Herolewijn (GF - D r-ro, 16-17);
- Renaud (WB r ; RF 7, 24-25, zg);
- Renard (WB z);
- Renauld (RF r ) ;
- Dion (RF zo);
- fuIanon poika, Mannun poikar (son of Mantu, son of Manala n-, Hades) (FF 77, Bo, Bg, 9r -g2);
- Hannu (or Hannus) Saaren Saksalainen (Hannu, the German from the Island; the knight's homeland is saari lthe Istand)) (FF r31- r4o, rrg-r3o, tg2- rg6, t4g, t+S-r47, r5T, 16r, r5B-r59, r3r, r4r -r42, r44r 75, 16o);
- saroin ManniL (Man qf Saari lMan of the Islandl, Man of sarajas lMan of tlte Original Stol) (FF 49, 5z); Vietrikka ("f. Russian sempeHutd), Vietrikkti aereuri (Vietrihkd the Ruddjt; cf. German der rote Mann), etc. (FF GB, 70,73-74,76, BB, go, g5);
Vietra (cf. Russian Bemep, Swedish ucider, and English weather) (FF ro); - Limoi, Liimoi (it seems that the name points to the people of Pohjota Ithe Northl: >Pahat linnat liimottavat/Pohjan ukset ummottavat.>) [Lonnrot
I,gg+l) (FF +9, 46-48, 58);
- Kauko, Kaukamoin etc. (FF ++, 50,57, ror, ro4-ro6, rrr, ,6S);
- Rottlinger or Rotlinger (GG r 15, r r9);
- Rtifaaren Brun (GSw a);
- en saarter man (GSw 5);
- Blark Pdtar (FH z5) ;
- a false black priesr (NAS 5B);
- a gipslt (SSl r -S);
- a green hunter (SC S, 9-ro, r2-r3, 16 - 22r 24,2g-gz);
- the description of the knight's complexion and. strangeness has sometimes
been transferred to the maid too and she has been portrayed. as ein schwar+
braunes Madchen (GG r rB, tz4, re6), Rot Aennchen (GG fi7), Roth Annchen(GG
rg4), Braune Aennele (GG gg), Brun Annelt (GG 64), Brauns Madichen (GG gfl,
the brownlt-red little ladlt (FH S);
- the mysterious bird which \,varns the maid is also ein schwargbraunes
Vagelein (GG r7+);
the knight's eles are a deathll colour (GG rzg);
the maid believes she is dealing with the deuil (BLi 4);
--------------
1 When Elsa and Martti Ffaavio explain (Elsa and Martti lfaavio 2g2-il that the names
Saroin manni, Manon poika, Hanon poika, Mannun poika, mi,es kaaala - matala (the trericherous man,
the low man) etc. are obscured forms of Lalmanti in the Poem of Inkeri (Inkerin uirsi) it does
seem that the writers have not perceived the meaning of the names.
)240(
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- the knight is a false knight outwitted (NAS 15);
the knight comes from the northern rands (GE r; GSc 7; NAS 3, 16);
the knight is Suein ,hfordmann (G1\ r, 3);
-- the knight comesifrom the deuit (Sp rg8);
* the knight is a person who belieues in euil spirits (with faith like a dog,
Finnish: ritari ot koiranuskolainen) (Sp 3o);
* not one who has followeri the knight has returned (GF_D B);
the knight is der Teufet (GG z 12, 2r7, zzt);
durins the silent night ride the maid, alarmed, asks the knight his
religion, for she suspects she is in the deui|s companlt (sp +s; BLi a);
-- the knight says he is the deail ald, the rnaid would have iost her life had
rrot tlre cock crowed and the da2 dawned (SR rg);
- at dawn the knight must depart (RI 3o; SC +S);
the man laughs like the deuil (GD rg);
the knight leads the maid into the sea, to the flowers of the sea, to the
flowers floating on the water (RI z5);
* the knight carries the maid off to the Danubs so that the river might take
her (SC 35);
- the maid makes the beds on the uaters and rvhen she kills the knight the
water of the sea turns bloody (FE +S etc.; Fl. 5,6,23,56,59,6r_66 etc.);
- the maid escapes into the sea, lake, riuer or well, or a watersprite in the
shape of an ox takes her into the water (FE 4s, Bo, 83, 85, 89, ror, r 25, r2g-r3o;
FF ++ -+6);
- the rnaid is warnecl that if she accompanies the knight she will have
to swint in water (SP I zB) ;
the knight's seuered head speaks (GF__I) r_16; Sp B, 5);
the dying knight tells the rnaid to place his sword Uy t i, right ieg so
that his blood brothers w'ill recognise hinr in passing (sp 3, s-6);
- he has a messenger (GF -D 5);
-- he has armour-bearers (GF-D 5);
- he has a seruant-maid (GF--D ,S);
-- he has a famifit to which belong a lfather, mother, brothers and sl.rters (the
fbatrrre is universal; see Variant Anat2sis).
So consistently has oral transmission preserved the above-mentioned names,
epithets and features in the cliflerent regions, for perhaps nearly a thousand
years, that they must be nti.mbered among the basic features of the ballad
of' the false knight, the features that in one forrn or another portray the prin-
cipal character of the ballad. We can conclude that at the tirne the ballad
originated a mythicai being still lived in the consciousness of the people, in
their traditions, one whom the names, epithets and features of the ballad
--------------
16. Lady Isabel
)241(
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fit. Accepting this, who was the nocturnal rider Heer Halewijn (Flemish, Heer: - gentleman or crowd), what is the tradition on which the ballad is based?
The answer to this question lies, I feel, first and foremost in the field of comparative philology. I have discussed the matter with Finnish philologists, and when I listed the names, epithets and features which I had been able to trace in my study of the fatse knight, Dr. Tauno F. Mustanoja suggested to me that Hatewijn might be the same person as Herlewin of the Wild Hunt (Chasse
Sauvage). The German philologist Hermann M. Flasdieck also, although modestly in a footnote[1], hints at the possibility that Peter von Blois' (1178) Herlewinus (Herlewini) might have a close connection with the Southern Dutch Halewijn ballad, and he continnes: >>...weiteren Ausfuhrungen iiber den angedeuteten Zusammenhang mit dem holl. Halewijn wird die Forschuns
mit Interesse entgegensehen.>>
Who then is this Herlewin that philologists suggest might be connected with the ballad of the Jake knight and to whom the analysis of the ballad has led us?
The Evidence of Philology
The problem of Herlewin and the semantic solution to the entire Romanic-Germanic word, family to which Herlewin seems to belong has recently aroused special interest among philologists. The semantic bases of'the concept are probably not fully clarified even now. Also open is the question of whether the concept with which Herlewin is associated is of Romanic or Celtic origin [2]. The Austrian-American philologist Leo Spitzer has decided that Herlewin is
the same as friend of Herla (member of the Wild Host), rascal < demon, deuil[3].
Kemp Malone, on the other hand, like the Spitzer's with their concentration
on the ending -win, -wine (friend, friends), concludes that Herlewine means the
household of Herla[4]. The words belong to the large Romanic-Germanic fanih
of words already represented in OFr. by Mesnie Hellequin (family of Hell[5] .
Halequin, Helequin, Hellekin, herlequin, herlekin[6], etc., and in English by the
word.s Harlequin, harlicken, harlaken(e), harlakin, arlequin[7] , etc. All these have
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1 Flasdieck, Anglia LXVI,5g-6o, {botnote No. z.
2 Cf. Krogmann 146-6r; Flasdieck, Anglia LXVI, 59-69.
3 Spitzer SP XLI,5z3; Spitzer MH ro7-te; Spitzer NM LII,r3-4'
4 Malone ES XVII,r4z-3; for -win : Freund, see also Willems l2o, and belc're p. 224.
5 Cohen, Bulletin XXXIV,33.
6 Godefroy IV,4o5, 447 -8.
7 Murray V r,g3; Grimm, Wiirterbuch IY z,41o; Pinloche zo6; Josef Miiller III,z6z.
)242(
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the general popular meaning of some kind of demonic being, a nocturnal rider
and lris ltost (Herlekinleute, die Leute des Herlekin[1]), a member of the aerial riders
(membre de la chasse adrienne, diable < Latin diabolus), a knight who must wander
during the night until cock-crow (cf. SR ry)[2], the devil, the Eail One, Satan[3].
The ending -kin, -quin, as distinct from the word Herlewin and its suffix -win,
must be noted in several of the above-mentioned words. They have been
explained by Kemp Malone as denoting the word king[4] herlekin and its newer
form Harlequin : Herleking : king Herla.
According to comparative philology the forms and concepls Herlewin and
Herlekin (German Harlekin) seem to have become confused in popular beliefs:
they were often indentified with each other, at least later. This seems to have
happened also in the ballad. The false knight is found mostly as a, sln 0f tlu
family or as a member of a parQ (in addition to the Halewijn form see also e.g.
the Slavic, Romanic and Fenno-Baltic forms). But he is often also a king or
some other independent knight (old Germanic forms, German and Scottish
forms). In both cases he is generally given in popular beliefs the same charac-
teristics as those which research has proved to belong to Harlequin, who is
well'known from theatrical language (Italian arlecchino < alichino[5]).
In addition to the foregoing it is of particularly great importance to the
study of the ballad of the false knight that comparative philology has been
able to prove the existence of an identical etymological root for Herlewin
and another large family of words. This large word-family was extensively
known as far back as the Middle Ages in France, Italy, Spain, Portugal,
England and other places. Its members generally proved identical with or
were the same semantically as the designations or epithets applied to the false
knight in the popular variants of the ballad. Among the representatives of
this family of words may be mentioned here the Catalonian arlot (pimp),
English harlot (a uagabond, beggar, rlgue, rascal, uillain, lowfellow, kna,ue, ruffian,
deuil), the Italian proper nour arnaldo (and words close to it) and the MFr.
arnaud, renaud (sill1, fool, idiot, stupid) and arloultn (pimp)[6]. We can see from this
that it cannot be mere chance that the usual epithet applied to the knight
of the Scottish-American variants is uillain or rffian and to the knight of the
French variants Renaud. Popular beliefs really were concerned with the same
being that comparative philology describes in the Herlewin designation, a con-
-----------
1 Driesen 22.
2 Spitzer MH 207-9.
3 Driesen gS, rS7 {botnote.
r Malone ES XVII,r4z.
; Dante, Inferno, songs XXI-XXII; Flasdieck, An.qlia LXI,z6r.
6 Spitzer MH ro7-rz; Spitzer SP XLI,5zt-5.
)243(
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cept which the names Halewijn, Herolewijn in the Flemish ballad variants
approach even in sound.
We have already mentioned (p. z4g) that the false knight is most frequently
represented in the ballad as some offpring of the devil's family, the devil's son.
According to Spitzer it has been possible to prove that the words arlot, harlot,
arnaud, renaud, aillain, rffian, etc. also mean etymologically some kind of boy[1].
The false knight of the ballad is thus the devil's son, son of the family of Manata. But in order to prove his identity I wish to make a more consistent comparison
between these two figures: the false knight of the ballad, as we know him from
his names, epithets and characteristics in the popular variants of the ballad
and, on the other hand, Herlewin, Herlekin and Harlekin as we know them from philology.
The False Knight of the Ballad:
Heer Halewijn (Flemish-Dutch variants);
Halewijn, Herolewijn (Flemish-Dutch variants);
Heere van Haelewyn (GF -D r), Heer van Haelewijn (GF -D B); a knight of a certain house including father, mother, brothers, sisters, servant girl, messenger) armour-bearers, etc. (different forms of the ballad); a crowd, companlt on their way to Kazan where the mountains are skulls and human bones, the meadows hair of the dead and the rivers are blood [the procession of the dead which has become obscured into a military procession] (Great Russian Steppe Form); a procession of Masurians
coming from the mountains (SP 31, 118);
Herlewin, Herlekin, Harlekin:
Monsieur de Harlay (Driesen 15-6);
Herlewin, Herlekin, Harlekin (Spitzer SP XLI, 521-5; Malone ES 12 XVII, 141-4; (Spitzer MH 107-12; Spitzer NN LII, 13-4);
Mesnie Hellequin, das wilde Heer, die Leute des Herlekin, milites Herleuini, familia Herlechini (Driesen 22, 29; Spitzer SP XLI, 5ze; Malone ES XVII, 142; Flasdieck, AngliaLXI, 250, 297-8 [2]);
----------
1 Spitzer SP XLI,5zz footnote. - Cf. Mannun poika of the Finnish variants (cf. also Lem-
min poika, Lemminkainen of the Finnish folk poems; vide below pp. z4B_ 257 The Eaiclence of the
Finnish Poems).
2 Vide bibliographical references concerning these studies.
)244(
______________
The False Knight of the Ballad:
der Ttufll (GG zrz, 2r7, zer; SR
r_9); the maid has a presentiment
that she is on a nocturnal ride
with the deuil (polish variants;
BLi +);
Mannun poika.(FF 77, Bo, Bg, g r _gz) ;
Manon poika (FF 67);" tf,e 6Jr.
knight in several for*s of the
ballad belongs to some kind of
ldeail's] fami$t as he has a father,
mother, brothers and sisters
(several forms of the ballad);
,(aub_erkdnig Halerytn (GF-Dz) ; aking
who has arrived rto* be2ond the
Rltine. (German variants)-; a king
or knigltt fr0n7 laer the sea (Scottish-
American variants);
der, Elf . (GG l4,z); the etf knight
(Scottish-American varia"nts) ;'
tlze false-ltearted knight (Scottish-
American variants);
a syrrflt_ lU ns NAS BB); a dirty
dzg (N$S 95); Kojosen koira (tie
dog qf Kojonen) (FF Ba*86);
Herlewin, Herlekin, Harlekin:
der Teufel (Driesen VI; Flasd,ieck,
4!Sl:;o LXI,z47, zSil ; Oberteufei
(Driesen r 19); Aticltino (Dante,
IryfernoL, songs XXI-XXII; Flas-
dieck, Anglia LXI,z6r; Iiriesen
Igoj Spitzer Sp XLI,Szz); deuil
(Spitzer SP XLI,5 zz -i);
al'lot, atlot-a have developed from
the meanings ruffian < deail to
become general designations for
boy (Spitzer SP XLI,5zz footnote);
ein widerwrirtiger Kiabe (Driesen
lg_5); cltasse galopine (Spitzer Sp
XLI,5z5);
Kti:?_s .!Ier!e!\ (Driesen 9z); Konig
Harilo, Herle king (Flasdieck, Anglil
!_X],s30) ; Her(e)ta qrning - tl;rg
Herla (Malone ES XVII t42) i
Erlecltinus, Arlechinus, arlequin, Erl_
k1lnig (Flasdieck , Anglia LXI,zBo);
Feen (Flasdieck, Anglia LXI,za5ji
Fde (Cohen, Bulletzz XXXIV,j;i;
der Hiille Kdnig (Driesen fi)'i Fee
(Driesen 5+)i ier gri)sste puin au,
F.een1lc!ry (Driesen 55; Flasdieck,
Anglia LXI,z45-6);- -
falsclter Harlekin (Flasdieck, Anglia
L.-I,?!r).; faux [< faulxJ hetef,uin
(Flasdieck, Anglia LXI,i4r) i
Arnaldo, arnaud and renaud belong to
the family of words whose *i*_
bers often denote something im_
pure, unclean, evil or negative;
some of the words have been
preserved as the names of dogs and
even in the meaning of a iom cat
(Spitzer MH ro7) ; Herlethingi fa_
milia. . . mit Hunden (FlasJie"ck,
Anglia LXI,z5z); Harlequin mask
:4fdt:': dog Cerbenzs (Flasdieck,
Anglia LXI,z3B, zBS);
----------
1. Dante and Virgil were guided through Hades by ten deuils, one of them cailed Atichino
[> arlecchino] cf. Catalonian arlot, English harlot, French arnaud, renaud.
)245(
______________________
The False Knight of the Ballad:
false-hearted beast (NAS r);
villain (Scottish-American variants) ;
ruffian (NAS 8);
Rottlinger, Rotlinger (GG II5, rr9);
green hunter (SC S) ; Rot Aennchen
[epithet has become obscured
and been transferred to the maid]
(GG r 67); Roth Annclten (GG r9a) ;
the brownlt-red little ladl; (FH $;
Vietrikka uereuti lrogue ruddl\ (Finn-
ish variants);
a false black priest (NAS 5B); en svarter man (GSw 5); black Pdttir (FH
z5); gipv (SSl r -5) ;
nocturnal rider (universal feature); the knight says that he is the deuil,
and the girl would have lost her
head had the cock not crowed
and the morning dawned (SR tg);
the knight charms the maid with his
music (universal feature);
the knight carries the maid into the sea,
lake , riaer , swamp , spring, etc. accord-
ing to the type of waters existing
in the locality where the poem
has been sung (universal feature,
vide the Sea Redaction of the com-
parative analysis and particularly
SSI Io).
Herlewin, Herlekin, Harlekin:
Harlequin mask : beast's head (Flas-
dieck, Anglia LXI,z3B);
aillain (Spitzer SP XLI,5zr);
ruffian (Spitzer SP XLI,5zz);
der rote Mann, der rote Jtiger (Driesen
92 -3); Warum heisst der Herr-
scher der Luftd?imonen gerade
der rote Mann? Weil er eine rote
Luft- oder Feuergestalt ist (Driesen
9s);
Der Herlekin - Kapupnmantel (Dtie'
sen z4o- r) ;
member of the aerial riders, knight who
must wander fui night until cockcrow
(Spitzer MH Iog); Harlequin's
people appear b1t night while small
bells tinkle (Driesen 53 -5; Flas-
dieck, Anglia LXI,zB3) ; unsicltt'
bare nrichtliche Musikanten (Flas-
dieck, Anglia LXI,z56) ;
Harlequin's folk, Herlekinleute, entice
people with wonderful, enchanting
music (Driesen 35, 37, rz4; Flas-
dieck, Anglia LXI,z45-6, zSd;
Der rote Mann, der Ki)nig der Luftdrimo-
nen, ist besonders gelurchtet, weil
er die Leute ins Meer stiir<t (Drie-
sen gz).
It consequently seems obvious that the false knight of the popular ballad is the same being as the Herlewin of popular tradition; and since thefalse knight of the ballad = the devil's son it follows that the Herlewin concept was also associated originally with the devil' s son concept (cf. Dant e's Alichino) ; in other words : Herlewin: the deuil's son.The task of comparative philology is now to discover whether the Herlewin concept is Romanic or Celtic in origin. To put it another
) 246 (
_________________________
way the problem becomes merely a question of whether the concept Herlewin, denoting the son of Hades, just as Lemminkciinen, Mannun poika and Vietrikkri uereuci are Finnish names for the son of Manala, is Romanic or Celtic in origin.
In the light of the present study the tradition of the son of Hades seems to be
very old and widely spread; the Lemminkciinen arrd Herleuin traditions both
seern to be offshoots of the ancient Son of Hades tradition which has persisted
right up to the present day. However, it will be well to note, especially as
regards the Herlewin tradition that features exist in the oldest forms of the
ballad which point to old Celtic culture.
The concept Herlewin-Herlekin appears in literature for the first time in the 12th century, in the Ecclesiastical History of Ordericus Vitalis, written about
1123-41. Although strongly influenced by Christianity the historian tells of
the vision and adventure experienced by a cleric of English extraction, Gual-
chelm (Gauchelin), on his way home on New Year's night in rogr in Saint-
Aubin, Normandy. The cleric Gualchelm saw the nocturnal rider and his
host in accordance with the popular tradition. In describing the company
Ordericus Vitalis uses the designationfamilia Herlechini (< OFr. mesnie Hette-
quin) when he lets the cleric say of the vision:
>Haec sine rJr,rbio familia Iferlechini est; a multis eam olim visam auclivi; sed incredulus
relationes derisi, quia certa indicia nunquam de talibus vidi. Nunc vero manes rnortuorum
rteraciter video; sed nerno mihi credet, curn visa retulero, nisi certrrm specimen terrigenis
exhibuero.>> [1]
Of the same concept the Anglo-French cleric Peter of Blois, in 1178, uses
the designation milites Herlewini; Walter Map, also writing at that time (1181/82), uses the name Herlething lHerlechingl[2]. The term thus appears in literature
at least 45o years before the origination of the Harlequin-Arlecchino comedy[3].
The analitical section of the present study has shown that the ballad ori-
ginated somewhere in the area constituted by the present provinces of north-
eastern France and the territory between them and the Lower Rhine, inhabited
by the Flemines and the Walloons. It is therefore important that the philo-
logists have also decided that approximately the same district is the home
of the Herlewin tradition, and have proved that the tradition has survived
there until our day, just as the ballad has done too. It suffices here to refer to
Driesena and Gustave Cohen as fur as philology is concerned. The former
-----------
1 Malone ES xvII,r4zl Driesen 24-go1' spitzer sP XLI,5zz; spitzer MH ro8; Hand-
wiirterbuch des deutschen Aberglaubens Y,t77Z-4: Flasdieck, Anglia T,XI,z5z-5 (r'ide further
bibliographical references concerning the studies mentioned).
2 Malone ES XVII,r4z; Spitzer SP XLI,5zz-3; Spitzer MH ro8.
3 Driesen uz.
4 Driesen 3o.
)241(
____________________
has studied the question on the spot and has ascertained that the tradition still lives there. The latter, knowing his home district, writes of the matter:
>>La legende (d.e mesnie Hellequin - d.e witde jager) semble donc plus rdpandue dans la partie
wallonne que dans la partie flamande de la Belgique, mais ce peut 6tre I'effet d.'une enqu$te
insuffisante. Qroi qu'il en soit, elle existe et dans le temps, du XIIe au XXe sirdcle et dans les
lieux du Canada I la Flandre et i la Wallonie, en passant pat 7a France de I'Ouest, d.u Centre,
de l'Est et du Nord, pas une faille dans la robe sans couture cle la tradition.>> [1]
Having thus come to prove the identity of the baltad of the Jalse knight
with the Herlewin concept dating from The very middle of the Middle Ages,
I inquired of the Westphalian Volkskundiiche Kommi:sion whether a semantic
connection could possibly be considered between the words Halewijn and
Herlewin.In reply to my inquiry Dr. Felix Wortmann states in his letter (Janu-
aty 19, I952) that he can see no such connection, but he adds: >>Rein iautlich
wzire es wohl moglich, dass der siidniederlandische Halewijn, Halleutijn einem
Herlewin : Harlequan entspricht. In der Gegend von Paris sprach das niedere
Volk vom r3.-r6. Jahrhundert er voy Konsonant wie ar.>>[2]
1 Coh.n, Bulletin de I'Acaddmie roltale de Belgique XXXIV,46-7; vide also Cohen. Yale
Rornanic studies XXrI,zr -B; cohen, Mdlanges de Hoepffier 113-5; cohen, melanges de Huguet 52-B; Flasdieck, Anglia LXI,z55-6.
2 Cf. Handwrirterbuch des deutschen Aberglaubens y, 1773.
)248(
________________________
The Origin and Rendering of the Ballad
At the beginning of the present millennium the ring or round dance, i.e. singing combined with dancing spread from France. The songs were then divided into stanzas, taking on a rhythm that one could dance to while the
singer was singing. The stanzas often contained a refrain which the dancers
joined in singing[4]. It is the round dance (carole, Balkan koro and. kolo<Greek
clzoros, Latin corolla, clrlna, German reigen[5]) that balladry, chanson lyico-dpique,
must evidently thank for its existence, for ballad poetry seems to have developed
simultaneously[6]. Scandinavian schoiars are of the opinion that baliadry
and the round dance came to the Northern countries from France with the
Vikings and that both reached the Scandinavian countries as early as the
rzth century[7]. Griiner-Nielsen maintains that the heyday of the Danish
ballad was I200-I35o[8]. The first recorded fragment of an Icelandic ballad
dates from the year 1221 [9]. The migration of the ballad and the round dance
to Germanic areas seems to have occurred in approximately the same periods
--------------
4 Anglia LVII,r34-5 $ 22; ibid. rr4-33; Wells rq3-2o5; Hodgart 75; Christophersen
3-9; Sachs 27r.
5 Sachs z7r; Wells rgn.
6 schitck I,r13; zoder 16z; Doncieux, Reuue'fp yr,z6r; Ker nB Il,ror.
7 Ek NK 5o: Ek, studier 33; schrick I,rr3-4; Griiner-Nielsen rB; Ker DB II,ro5, rog;
Norlind 45-6, 6c; Liestol 4.
8 Gniner-Nielsen rB.
9 Schrick I,tt4.
17. Lady Isabel
)257(
__________________
that Andreas Heusler, in speaking of old Germanic poetry[1], calls the second and third Celtic waves. By the former he means the cultural influence exerted by the Celts in the 9th-12th centuries on the northern Vikings: the third
wave refers to the effect of the Breton epic, matiire de Bretagne, via France, on
Germanic poetry in the 12th and 13th centureis.[2].
But when and where were ballads sung and round dances performed? The
question takes us back to Celtic times. On May 1 the Beltane fires[3] were lit
at night throughout the Celtic world, and in Germanic areas too, as far as
Sweden and Austria. The fires were supposed to keep off the witches and
evil spirits who became especially active on that particular night towards
dawn. John Macananty's Courtship is a ballad sung in Ireland; it tells how the
north Irish god Macananfit, during the short and dusky night of May I, per-
suades a young maiden to follow him to the seashore, just as the false knight
tempts the king's daughter:
On the first day of May, at the close of the day,
As I stood in the shade of a green spreading tree,
A young lover a courting a maiden I spied;
I drew very nigh them to hear and see.
The dress that he wore was a velvet so green,
All trimmed with gold lace, and as bright as the sea I
And he said, >>Love, I'll make you my own fairy queen,
If you are but willing to go with me.>>
>>Lisses and forts shall be at your command,
Mountains and valleys the land and the sea,
And the billows that roar along the sea-shore,
If you are but willing to go with me.>>
Etc.[4]
The Beltane fires are at the same time a form of sun-worship, of which
Frazer says: >>Bal-tein signifies the fire of Baal. Baal or Ball is the only word
in Gaelic for a globe. This festival was probably in honour of the sun, whose
return, in his apparent annual course, they celebrated, on account of his
having such a visible influence, by his genial rvarmth, on the productions of
the earth.>>[5] Marie Trevelyan, on the origin of the fires says: >The Boltan,
--------------
1 Heusler 20.
2 Danckert 204-5. - Tobias Norlind says in his work Suensk folkmusik och.folkdans, p.
65: >>De utliindska strcimmingarna voro under rroo- och rzoo-talet franska, under r3oo- och
r4oo-talet tyska.>>
3 Frazer VII I,146-6o; Mogk 15-6, 24-6.
4 Joyce, Music No. 39r.
5 Frazer VII 1, 150 footnote No. 1.
)258(
___________________
or sacred fire of the Druids, was obtained, direct from the sun, and by means of it all the hearth fires in Britain were rekindled. These fires were accompanied by feasts in honour of Bel, or Beli, the Celtic deity of light, and on Druidical
days they were carried out with much pomp and ceremony.>>[1] There was
singing and dancing round the fires and. the Maypole[2]. The ceremonies (in-
lormation referring to these is available from as early as the years 963 and 1018 [3]) naturally varied somewhat in different places, but the main principle
was everywhere worship of the sun, Iight and nature for the furthering of
fertility and. to upp.ur" evil spirits. The chief demonic agents capable of
affecting *rr urJ ,h. "o.rrre of his life were the different spirits' There are
innumerable exarnples of these supernatural beings in fairy-tales and stories'
It is clear that balladry too availed itself of these thernes, and these ballads
were sung at the festivals mentioned. The first of these Western mythical
ballad themes is perhap s Le roi Renaud, in wfiich the knight meets on the moor
a host of d.ancini .trr.r. The daughter of the elf king asks the knight to join
in the dance with her. He refuses, saying that he is on his way to his bride
(or morning prayers), for this is his wedding day. The elf princess gives the
knight the choice ofjoining the dance, contracting an illness of 7 years'duration,
or d,eath (cf. the three choices of death offered. in the ballad of the fatse knight) ;
the knight chooses death and the elf touches him on the chin and shoulders'
within three days both the knight and his bride and mother die (further
points of comparison between Le roi Renaud and' Halewijn are: in Le roi Renaud
the principal characters are a knight and the elf king's daughter, in Halewijn
they are the false knight and. the king's daughter; the point of departure of
each ballad is the tempting of a human being by a spirit; in both the action
takes place at night or at dawn)[4]. But although these two ballads harte such
close points of "}rtr..t they differ completely in their leading principle: the
knighi of Le roi Renaud is completely in the por'er of the elf princess and under
her supernaturar infiuence while the king's d.aughter in the ballad of the false
knight is, by contrast, a human being of a later time, reliant as it were on her
own wisdom, who overcomes the spirit. It is this that prompts me to decide
that the baltad of the false knight is chronologically younger'
In the period imrnediately following the first anival of the tenets of Christ-
--------------
1 Travelyan 22; vide also Hubert 292 - 3oo ; O Stritteabh 6in 333- 4 ; Marti 74 ; MacCulloch
RAC 264-8; Sjoestedt 9-rB; Ludwig Reinhardt 39.
2 E. K. Chambers I,r16-45;
3 Hole 86-7 Ftazer VII r,r59'
4 For the ballad Le roi Renaud and its history, see Gaston Patis, Revue critique II, 287--tz:'
ll,ego- r ; E. J. B. Rathery , Reuue critique II,zB7 -9o; Doncieux 84 No' 7; Ker DB II,ro4-5'
ro8-ro1 F,k, Studier 3I -5; Pohl 4+-5r'
)260(
____________________________
ianity in Western and Central Europe belief in mythical and demonic pagan spirits was still deeply rooted in the people. But it was nevertheless receding under the influence of the Christian faith. Man could vanquish spirits with the new spell, the Mass of the Christian Church. In the light ofthis what could provide a better setting for songs of a maiden and her bravery in slaying the dangerous demon than the springtime feast when fires were burnt to keep off evil spirits. Since the ballad was also sung as the accompaniment to a dance fashionable
at popular festivals, its rapid and wide spread is easy to understand. The
refrains of the Scottish variants (GSc r) indicate that the ballad was sung
at May I celebrations[1]. In addition, the spirit of the ballad's action in the
regional variants suggests a summer season; the Scottish-American and Slavic
variants in particular make mention of the dawn of a summer's night, important from the standpoint of a belief in spirits. It is either before dawn or at
dawn that the maid kills the knight or returns home.
Research has given us clear proof of the fact that Herlewin, identified in the present study with the false knight of the ballad, belongs to the supernatural beings which are especially active in the night and against whom folk beliefs
placed people on their guard [2].
The oldest recordings of the Halewijn Form, the leaflets of Thys and Paemel
(GF-D r), mention that the ballad is sung to the melody of the Credo (Op de
W2<e : Van den Credo). The Credo is a part of the music of the Mass of the Roman
Catholic Church. In its entirety the Mass consists of:
(1) Kyrie,
(2) Gloria,
(3) Credo,
(4) Sanctus,
(5) Agnus Dei.[3]
The ballad thus derives its melody from the ecclesiastical music of the Mass. That the mblody of Halewijnis related to the initial melody of Credo -I [Graduale
romanum, Editio Vaticana] has been proved by many nineteenth century
scholars by means of accurate specimens of melody and comparisons, e.g. by
-----------
1 Vide also Pineau 268.
2 Driesen 55, to4, zg6-7; Flasdieck, Anglia LXI, 242.
3 It may be mentioned by way of comparison that the Finnish folk song Ldksin minri kesii-
2dnd kii2miitin (One summer night), of peculiar charm, is related in its melody to the Bene-
dictine Agnus Dei rnelody fGraduale Romanum (Benedictine): Graduale: Ordinarium missae:
Dominicis infra annum: Agnus Dei (so-called Agnus Dei of Mass II); vide Messusiiuelmistii,
Porvoo 1951, p. 22.
)261(
_______________________
Willems[1], Coussemaker[2], Gevaert[3], Fdtis[4] and Fleischer[5]. Later research concurs in their findings[6]. In Flanders and Brabant the Credo melody has survived until very recent times[7]. It may even be alive today. For instance,
A. de Cock tells of how he himself sang it at the age of 15- 16, and among
those whose interest was aroused in its ecclesiastical melody was a priests.
The Ctedo melody in question was known very early in the Middle Ages in
the Northern Provinces of France and in the Flemish districts. The historian
of the Mass, Johannes Brinktrine, writes of the arrival of the Credo in Gallic
and German[8]:
>>IJnter dem Einfluss der antiadoptianistischen Synoden von Friaul (wahrscheinlich 796)
und von Aachen (798) kam das Credo auch in Gallien und in Deutschland in die heilige Messe.
Man fertigte aber eine neue iibersetzung an und sang es nicht wie in Spanien vor dem Pateir
noster, sondern nach dem Evangelium. Im Jahre Bro sandte Karl der Grosse in der Angele-
genheit des Credo eigene Gesandte nach Rom. Papst Leo III. gestattete, dass das Credo in
der Messe gesungen wurde, wi.inschte aber die Auslassung des Filioque. Trotzdem wurde es
mit diesem Zusatz weitergesungen. Offiziell wurde es in die r6mische Liturgie ror4 durch
Papst Benedikt VIII. aufgenomtnen, und zwar auf Veranlassung Heinrichs II., der von diesem
Papst zum Kaiser gekrdnt wurde.>> :
Oskar Fleischer mentions[10] having found in Naples [Bibl. nazionale VI
G zgl a manuscript of a Sidus Solare hymn dating from the r rth- rzth century.
This hymn is related in melody to the Credo in question. The Credo conse-
quently seems to have been known over a fairly wide area[11]. A thirteenth
century Breton ballad of three monks[12] also has a connected melody. The
Credo was also known to the Anglo-Saxons as a charm against spirits and
demonic forces, at any rate in the roth century IMS Regius 12 D XVII, ff.
I23b-I25a (10th century), (Leechbook)[13], against elf-sickness and elf-disease:
-----------------
1 Willems No. 49.
2 Coussemaker l4B and Coussemaker H Io3 and addition on page XLIV No. 45 Halew2n
sur la m6lodie du Credo.
3 Gevaert I,136.
4 FCtis 5B-9.
5 Fleischer rg-23.
6 John Meier DV ll,roz [Walter Wiora's study].
7 Fleischer 2r; Willems rrg.
8 Volkskunde XVIII,39.
9 Brinktrine rrg-2o.
10 Fleischer 2r; Duyse 14.
11 Cf. Tiersot, Histoi.re g2-g.
12 Villemarqu6 XIV, melody specimenl Fleischer ze; John Meier DV Il,roz.
13 Storms 223 No. 17.
)262(
________________
>>Take bishop's wort, fennel lupine, the lower part of enchanter's nightshade, and lichen from a hallowed crucifix and incense, take a handful of each. Tie all the herbs in a cloth and
dip them three tirnes into hallowed baptismal water.
I{ave three Masses sung over them, one Omnibus Sanctis, the second Contra Tribulationem,
the third Pro Infirmis.
Then put live coals in a chafing dish and lay the herbs on them. Smoke the man with those
herbs before g a.m. and at night.
And sing the Litan2 and the Creed and the Lord's Pra2er (Pater Noster).
And inscribe the sign of the cross on each limb.
And take a small handful of herbs of the same sort, hallor,ved in the same way, and boil
them in milk; drop a little hallowed water on them three times and let him take some of it
before his food.
He lvill soon be better.>>
As generally with charms, here too an item of valuable old folklore is pre-
served, furnishing the explanation of why the ballad of the elfin knight, the
knight Herlewin, composed at the same time, was sung to the very melody
of the Credo; the Credo was a part of the Mass,, and Mass was understood to be
a charm against evil spirits, devils, clemons. With the ballad sung to the
melody of the Mass a vernal seasonal festival thus belonged in ^way to the ritual
of expelling evii spirits, with arms supplied b,v the new creed, the Christian
faith[1].
The melodic setting of the ballad takes us back to comparatively early centuries, as was mentioned above. But the musical features of the ballad include
another flactor which iikewise leads us back through the ages. I mean the
music with which the knight tempted the maiden: he sang eA music ot blew a
horn, plalted a harp or kantele, or he whistled. It will suffice in this respect to refer
to the study of popular music and musical instruments. Here we can see that
speciai spirit melodies (water-sprite melodies) rvere known of old. They were
sung or played by spirits or could be played by man on the instruments men'
tioned. Tobias Norlind brings up a point which is very interesting from the
point of view of the present research, i.e. that the harp (SiS") was the fashion-
able instrurnent of the 12th century and that a water-sprite melody quoted
by him may have been played on the harp[2].
To sum up, we may say of the origin of the ballad:
(1) It was probably composed in the Low Frankish linguistic area by an individual poet, perhaps by a minstrel.
(2) The elements of the ballad are mythical and associated with the popular beliefs of the time of its birth; myths which the ballad and ballad study have
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1 Even in the Finnish view the Bible was a wonder-working talisman, >>the chestfull of words>>
2 Norlincl NK lo8; for old instruments see also Andersson, Strdkharpan 1-28, 42-123, 212-72,273-323.
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brought to light were still believed in, and this remained the case to some extent long afterwards. It shows how deeply these myths were rooted in the soul of the peoples. But, on the other hand, the Catholic Mass was already known by the time the ballad originated and it was used as a charm against evil spirits. This may be why the ballad of the false knight was also sung to a melody of the Mass. The fact that the king's daughter is capable of over-coming and slaying the devil must also, perhaps, be regarded as a manner of thinking introduced by the church.
(3) The ballad seems to have originated under Celtic influence as Germanic poetry[1]. It does seem probable, however, that the Herlewin tradition as a whole, on which the ballad is based, is, like the Finnish Lemminkriinen tradition and the theme of the ballad of the Maid to be Ransomed, associated with the ancient Manala myth.
It may have been clear throughout the present work that folk beliefs and
folk poetry are not identical; poetry, even when its contents are elements
concerned with beliefs, is simply poetry, art created originally by a individual.
This applies to the ballad of the false knight and to the other ballads which
the present study has found to deal with the same beliefs on which the ballad
of the false knight has been created.
The Time of Origination of the Ballad
The earliest recordings of the ballad of the false knight on which the year is noted, or which can be otherwise fixed chronologically, are the manuscript of the Dane, Karen Brahe, (GD 1) of 1550, Cancionero de Romances fol. 191 (RS 1) also of 1550, Friedrich Gutknecht's pamphlet of the Ulinger ballad (GG 19) of about 1550/65 and Mattheus Franck's pamphlet of Adelger (GG 20) of approximately 1560l70. But, as has already been proved in the comparative analysis, all these are late formations compared with the Halewijn Form, the form with the oldest features. The Spanish Rico Franco version especially is the result of a major modif ication, and the original ballad must have been considerably older. It has been stated of the German Ulinger ballad, associated with the name Uodalger, that it originated as early as the 13th century[2]. E. Schroder writes on the origination of the baltad that it is >>unmoglich diesseits 1300 entstanden sein: es ist vielleicht ein Jahrhundert alter>>[3]. Udelge, a form close to the name (Jodalger, is still preserved in version GG 65.
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1 Cf. Krogmann 146-6r.
2 Handwrirterbuch des deutschen Marchens I,269; Das deutsche Volkslied 24, 87; (eitschrffi fiir
deutsches Ahertum 67,zBB.
3 ZeitschriJt fiir deutsches Altertum 67,z88.
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Other indications of the time of composition of the ballad which have emerged from this study are:
Halevinus appears in documents as a man's name as far back as the 10th century.
Halewijn-Haluin as a place name dates back to 1066.
Halequin-Harlequin-mesnie Hellequin occur in literature in the year 1091 in an account of a nocturnal adventure.
Textual analysis leads us to approximately the 12th century.
The content of the ballad leads us to the old Herlewin tradition, a flourishing tradition prior to the 12th century.
The round dance and the ballad song sung as its accompaniment had arrived in the Northern Countries by the 12th century.
These pointers suggest that the ballad probably originated between the years 1100 and 1200. It was originally sung primarily as the song accompanying the round dance at the castles of the nobility, and by this time several different forms of the ballad had already appeared through the modifications of the story introduced by the minstrels.
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