Otfrid of Weissenburg

Otfrid of White Castle (* 790, † 875 ), rarely also written Otfried, is the first known Old High German poet. The südrheinfränkische dialect used in his writings suggests that the author was from the south of today's Palatinate. The most important location for his education and his work was White Castle; now called Wissembourg France belongs city located in the northern Alsace directly on the border with southern Palatinate region.

Life

Otfrid was a monk, theologian and scholar an important personality in the East Frankish kingdom of the late Carolingian ruler Louis the German; the grandson of Charlemagne ruled from 840 to 876 From Otfrids youth is only known that he was already in early childhood as a puer oblatus - Latin for " (God) is transmitted Boy '- was placed in the care of the monastery of Wissembourg in the same place, to a certain religious education path. Around the year 830, he completed a period of study in the monastery of Fulda in Rabanus Maurus, the great Frankish scholar and abbot, who officiated in Fulda 822-841 / member 842. 830 Otfrid was ordained a priest.

Probably Otfrid later worked in a prominent position in the so-called court orchestra of the King; from about 847 he held in any case again in White Castle, where he appears as (certificates ) scribe, librarian, exegete and teacher of grammar.

Works

From the pen Otfrids comes a Bible Old High German epic, the Liber evangeliorum. The epic, written in südrheinfränkischen dialect is divided into five books and 140 chapters with a total of 7104 lines long. The Gospels poetry is preserved in four manuscripts; the most comprehensive is the Heidelberg manuscript ( Cod pal. lat. 52), which also contains the Nachgetragene Georg song. Next Otfrid authored a number of Latin Bible commentaries, which he had gathered from earlier comments.

It is important that Otfrid told the Gospels fabric in a different one of the three sacred languages ​​(Hebrew, Greek, Latin ), namely in German ( Frankish ) language, and thus pursued a language policy intent.

Otfrid introduced in his Diatessaron, one of the four Gospels summary text, the Latin rhyme instead of the old Germanic alliteration, and thus established a formal tradition that continues to this day.

Commemoration

In Otfrids likely region of origin, the Otfried - of - White Castle High School in Dahn and the Collège Otfried are named in Wissembourg after him.