GERMAN EPICS


German literature begins after the great migrations (_circa_ 600), and
its earliest samples are traditional songs of an epic character, like
the Hildebrandslied. Owing to diversities of race and speech, there
are in southern and northern Germany various epic cycles which cluster
around such heroes as Ermanrich the Goth, Dietrich von Bern, Theodoric
the East Goth, Attila the Hun, Gunther the Burgundian, Otfried the
Langobardian, and Sigfried--perchance a Frisian, or, as some
authorities claim, the famous Arminius who triumphed over the Romans.

The Hildebrandslied relates how Hildebrand, after spending thirty
years in Hungary, returns to North Italy, leaving behind him a wife
and infant son Hadubrand. A false rumor of Hildebrand's death reaches
Hungary when Hadubrand has achieved great renown as a warrior, so,
when in quest for adventure the young man meets his father, he deems
him an impostor and fights with him until the poem breaks off, leaving
us uncertain whether father or son was victorious. But later poets,
such as Kaspar von der Rhön, give the story a happy ending, thus
avoiding the tragic note struck in Sorab and Rustem (p. 410).

There existed so many of these ancient epic songs that Charlemagne
undertook to collect them, but Louis I, his all too pious son,
destroyed this collection on his accession to the throne, because,
forsooth, these epics glorified the pagan gods his ancestors had
worshipped!