Holland's Influence on English Language and Literature

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Chapter V Holland's Share in the Revival of Mediaeval Literature During the Nineteenth Century, as the Natural Consequence of the Study of Comparative Philology.

The great movement for comparative philology, started by Junius and continued by the school of Ten Kate and Huydecoper, did not remain without influence on the important results in the field, obtained by the famous school of the brothers Jacob and Wilhelm Grimm during the first half of the nineteenth century. The relationship of all the Germanic languages was now brought under the dominion of assured rules; the laws were discovered according to which the vowels and the consonants had been changing in the different languages, since in the course of history they departed from the original, and went their own way from dialects to separate languages. The study of comparative philology became more scientific and more systematic than ever before, and the interest in the literature of mediaeval time became greater than ever, because the comparison of the modern with the mediaeval languages was the most beautiful field for the application and further affirmation of the newly discovered laws of etymology, and for the thorough knowledge of nearly every one of our modern languages. Huydecoper saw this consequence, and he published the mediaeval Chronicle of Melis Stoke; the German school followed his example with

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many publications of the kind; and a new Dutch movement during the nineteenth century brought to light an abundance of mediaeval literature to which at first in our days full attention has begun to be paid.

At the same time this study of mediaeval literature showed more than anything before how central and important was the position of the Netherlands, even in the earliest centuries of the middle ages.

As far as Germany and its early mediaeval literature is concerned, these studies showed that the great hero of the ‘Nibelungenlied, so often called the Iliad of the Germans, was Siegfried, a Dutch prince from Santen in the Southern Netherlands, although it may be quite true as Dr. Jonckbloet says that the essential part of the story is probably much older than the settlement of the Franks in this country.¹

The same study of mediaeval literature shows that the princess Kudrun of the Kudrun-story, that Odyssey of Germany, was probably as Dr. Jonckbloet proves, although others may try to deny it, a Dutch princess from the neighborhood of Antwerp; that her lover Herwig was a prince from the Dutch province of Zealand, that Moorland is Holland, and that in no way can a clearer explanation be given of the story than by this supposition, as many names in the story show. The scenery of Lohengrin, the famous story of Wagner's grand opera, was near Antwerp, on the bank of the Scheldt; Elsa was princess of Brabant and the horrible Ortrud was a daughter of the Frisian king Radboud. The same studies show that the author of the Heliand, the great Christian epos of Germany, probably was, according to the best scholars, either the Dutch missionary Ludger or one of his pupils who wrote at his suggestion. From these

1 W.J.A. Jonckbloet. History of Dutch Literature, I, 19.

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studies we know that the Dutch nobleman Henric van Veldeke, who was born and educated in the province of Limburg in the Netherlands was the founder and the leading star of German lyric poetry, whom the great German poets of the thirteenth century were anxious to follow.

As far as France is concerned with its many mediaeval romances of chivalry, grouping around the Frankish kings, the study of mediaeval literature brought to light that the scenery of many of those romances is to be found in the Southern Netherlands, and that several of the authors of these romances even lived in the Southern Netherlands. The houses of the old Frankish kings were most closely connected with this country. Peppin of Herstal came from Herstal, a place in the Southern Netherlands. Charlemagne had one of his residences at Nimwegen. The beautiful ‘Ludwigs lied’ sings the victory of Ludwig the third in 1881 near Sancourt in the Southern Netherlands gained over the Northmen, and was probably written by Huebald from the monastery of St. Amand near Valenchijn in the Southern Netherlands. In several of those French romances we find true descriptions of nature and life as they were in the Southern Netherlands; so in the romance of de Raoul de Cambrai; so in that of Renaud of Montalban; in that of Ogier of Ardennes, in the romances of De Garin de Loharain as Dr. Te Winkel shows abundantly,¹ while the romance of Auberi de Bourgoing describes a fight between the Flemings and the Frisians.² Some of the best authors of those French romances lived in the Southern Netherlands. So for instance Chrétien de Troyes lived for a time at the court of Flanders.³

1 Dr. J. te Winkel, Jacob van Maerlant, p. 7.

2 Prof. G. Kalff, History of Dutch Literature, I, p. 95.

3 Ibid., p. 85.

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Adam de la Halle and Jean Bodel lived at Atrecht.¹ Of some other French romances there are quite independent conceptions in mediaeval Dutch, as for instance the Dutch version of Karel and Elegast, while the Dutch version of the Aiol has more than four hundred lines not to be found in the French original; the Dutch version of the famous animal epos Reinard is generally recognized as a quite independent conception, and on account of this beautiful conception, as the best animal epos in the world, while in the romance of the Swan, the main idea is that the dukes of Brabant were of a miraculous, heavenly descent.²

The literature of England during the three first centuries, after the Norman conquest in 1066, was nearly the same as that of France. From the conquest in 1066 till the recognition of the remodelled English language with its many French elements in the law courts in 1362, and in the schools in 1386, the predominant language in England was French; the romances, even those on old Celtic subjects, as the Arthur romances, were written and read in the French language, and composed for a considerable part in the Southern Netherlands, as for instance the first French Arthur romance, Le conte del Graal, was written by Chrétien de Troyes, who was living at the Flemish court about the year 1175.

Of such a kind were the connections of the Netherlands with the early mediaeval literature of Germany, France and England.

Was it remarkable that Dutch scholars of the nineteenth century felt themselves attracted to the study of mediaeval literature, with which their own country was so closely connected, and the study of

1 Ibid.

2 Jonckbloet, I, 21.

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which was to such a large extent prepared for by their own compatriots from the time of Junius till their own?

The great work of Junius, and of the school of Ten Kate and Huydecoper, kept alive the movement in the Netherlands all the time. Soon after the publishing of Melis Stoke's Rhyme chronicle by Huydecoper in 1772, the works of Jacob van Maerlant, the great master of mediaeval Dutch language and literature, attracted the attention of the best scholars. Now everybody can easily understand why the publishing of Maerlant's works was not completed in one year, or even in a few years, as they contain not less than one hundred and twenty-eight thousand lines, a quantity of which one hardly gets an idea by comparison for instance with Milton's Paradise Lost, which certainly is a long poem but nevertheless contains not more than eleven thousand lines. Only twelve years after Huydecoper published Melis Stoke's Rhyme chronicle, the first volume of Maerlant's Spieghel Historiael, his great work on the world's history, was printed in the year 1784 by the care of Dr. J.A. Clignett.¹ Since that year 1784, when the first work of Maerlant was printed, the studies on Maerlant, the printing of his works, the discovery and collection of all his manuscripts was in progress for more than a century, till in the year 1891 the last volume was published, and his complete works were put at the disposal of every student of mediaeval literature. Of the Spieghel Historiael, in the meantime, a second and beautiful edition was published during the years 1857-1863 by the care of Prof. M. de Vries and his oldest pupil E. Verwijs. A great number of Dutch scholars had coöperated during these hundred years, not only

1 J. te Winkel, Jacob van Maerlant, p. 518.

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in publishing the works of Maerlant, but in studying the history of mediaeval literature in connection with the comparative philology. Willem Bilderdijk (1756-1831), the great Dutch poet and scholar, Dr. J.H. Halbertsma, Dr. Hendrik van Wijn, the father of the History of Dutch literature, W.C. Ackersdijk, A.C.W. Staring, M. Siegenbeek, C.J. Meyer, L. Ph. van den Bergh and J. Clarisse, assisted by some German philologists as Hoffman von Fallersleben, F.J. Monen, E. Kansler and L. Tross, followed in the footsteps of Huydencoper and Clignett in close connection with, and profiting by, the beautiful results of the school of Jacob and Wilhelm Grimm.¹ To describe the services rendered by all these men would make this chapter too elaborate, but the work of at least one man may be especially mentioned here, viz., that of Dr. J.A. Jonckbloet. His work on the history of Dutch literature assures him forever of a prominent place among Dutch philologists, but it was his famous work on the History of Mediaeval Literature that especially gave him an European fame, and made his name immortal for all students of mediaeval literature. This history is still considered one of the great works of reference on the subject.²

1 J. te Winkel, Jacob van Maerlant, p. 498-526.

2 W.J.A. Jonckbloet, Geschiedenis der Middelnederlandsche Dichtkunst, 1854.