GOFFREDO of STRASBURGO. - The foremost representative of chivalric poetry in Germany, he lived at the end of the twelfth century and died between 1210 and 1220. He composed the finest epic poem of the German Middle Ages: Tristano e Isotta (about 20,000 lines, left unfinished), whose legend—already versified by the French trouvères of the century and, somewhat everywhere in Europe, and by Eilhart V. Oberge around 1190 in Germany—he drew from the French Thomas.
His chief merit was the deeper investigation to which he subjected the erotic element of the legend. His gifts include most subtle psychological analysis, fluency of thought, the melodious harmony of language and rhyme, and masterly allegory (of which he provided the first example in Germany); but in him the glorification of love is unfortunately not dissociated from sensual pleasures. Ulrico di Túrheim and, more successfully, Enrico di Freiberg continued the narrative down to the burial of the heroes. Some lyrics by him also survive; a Lauda della Vergine Maria, however, is not his.
The editio princeps is corrupt. Many editions followed; outstanding is W. Hertz’s New High German version (4th ed., Stuttgart 1904).