WESSOBRUNN PRAYER. - The so-called "Wessobrunn Prayer" is contained in a codex of the library of the convent of Wessobrunn in Upper Bavaria (founded in 753), now preserved in Munich.
The codex dates from the year 814; the prayer bears the Latin title De Poeta and is written in Old Bavarian dialect, but with traces of Anglo-Saxon or Old Saxon in the verse portion, explicable by its French origin and the influences of the Fulda literary milieu. It consists of an initial part containing nine verses, of which the first five, which deal with the cosmological problem, develop according to the style and movements of ancient pagan Germanic poetry (notable indeed are the analogies of this song with a stanza of the Old Norse Voluspá, which is the first song of the Edda) the theme of Gen. 1:2 and Ps. 89:2. The remaining four verses, fragmentary, probably allude to the episode of the fall of the Angels, as a premise to the narration of the origin of the world and of man, which in all likelihood were to have constituted the subject matter of the song. The second part contains a prayer in prose (from which, however, some metrically certain verses can be extracted), which is a glorification of God as Creator: a typical and common motif of this early Christian poetry in Germanic lands, begun by the Anglo-Saxon Caedmon (v.).
Bibliography4 worksW. von Unwerth-Th. Siebs, Gesch. der deutsch. Liter. bis zur Mitte des XI. Joh., Berlin and Leipzig 1920, p. 148 ff.; C. v. Kraus, Das Wesso
BIBL.: W. von Unwerth-Th. Siebs, Gesch. der deutsch. Liter. bis zur Mitte des XI. Joh., Berlin and Leipzig 1920, p. 148 ff.; C. v. Kraus, Das Wessobrunner Gebet, Munich 1922; G. Ehrmann, Gesch. der deutsch. Liter. bis zum Ausgang des Mittelalters, I, 2nd ed., ibid. 1932, p. 137 ff.; G. Barsecke, Vorund Frühgesch. des deutsch. Schrifttums, I, Halle 1940, p. 73 ff.
Lupi, Sergio. “Wessobrunner Gebet.” In Enciclopedia Cattolica, vol. XII, coll. 1672–1673. Città del Vaticano: Ente per l’Enciclopedia Cattolica e per il Libro Cattolico, 1954. https://azioneromana.com/article/wessobrunner-gebet.
MLA
Lupi, Sergio. “Wessobrunner Gebet.” Enciclopedia Cattolica, vol. XII, Ente per l’Enciclopedia Cattolica e per il Libro Cattolico, 1954, coll. 1672–1673. Azione Romana, https://azioneromana.com/article/wessobrunner-gebet.
BibTeX
@incollection{ec12_wessobrunner_gebet,
author = {Lupi, Sergio},
title = {Wessobrunner Gebet},
booktitle = {Enciclopedia Cattolica},
volume = {XII},
pages = {1672--1673},
note = {Cited by column},
publisher = {Ente per l’Enciclopedia Cattolica e per il Libro Cattolico},
address = {Città del Vaticano},
year = {1954},
url = {https://azioneromana.com/article/wessobrunner-gebet}
}
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