SOURCE: Zeydel, Edwin H. “Brant's Literary Work Prior to the Narrenschiff” and “Brant, the Writer, Humanist, and Man: A Summary.” In Sebastian Brant, pp. 64-73; 122-33. New York: Twayne, 1967.

[In the following essays, Zeydel examines Brant's poetical exercises and broadsides, which the critic argues reveal similar religious and social concerns as those presented in his Latin prose and The Ship of Fools. He also assesses Brant's place in literary history as he presents the principal aspects of Brant's views and works.]

I. LITERARY APPRENTICESHIP

Perhaps soon after he had secured his baccalaureate in 1477 Brant began composing occasional verses, announcements, and letters—all now lost or unidentifiable—to accompany volumes published during the early years of printing in Basel. Such an early date for this activity is likely since Heynlin, who probably recommended him to the printers, spent most of his time in Basel between 1474 and 1478 and soon had come to know Brant well. The absence of specific references to Brant in the books of those days may mean merely that, being still an unknown tyro, he worked anonymously.

Among his oldest extant literary works are Latin exercises in distich form—broadsides—commenting on unusual happenings of the day. Several fairly early efforts of this kind, though in all likelihood not the earliest, are preserved in his Varia Carmina: two on floods of the Rhine in the Basel area in 1480; another, already mentioned in Chapter 1, on a solar eclipse of 1485 (in German as well as in Latin); and a fourth, in two Latin versions, on a hailstorm in 1487. They may be considered a crude form of early journalism.

Both poems of 1480 are Humanistic and pedantic products, typical of their time. The first, eighteen lines in length, asks Neptune what he is up to, warns him of dire consequences, and contains references to Deucalion, the dryads and fauns, Panis (deity of the staff of life), Ceres, Bromius (i.e., Bacchus, protector of the vineyard), and Pales (the ancient Italic god of the field). The second, a single distich, is a sort of chronogram (the letters of the words adding up to the date of composition, e.g., a = 1, b = 2, etc.). It is addressed to Pales, whose festival was observed April 21, the time of the flood.¹

The fourth poem in two versions, like the third a chronogram, refers to a storm that occurred July 6, 1487. It records the loosening of tiles and bricks and the destruction of roofs. In the first version, the hail is personified and taken to task for its perfidy, as Neptune was in the poem mentioned above.² In general, the Latin of all these early efforts, like the German translation of the third, is faulty.

Early, too, is Brant's poem on his election as king of the carnival in 1482. He writes: “As king I live in hope, though fate may be invidious. / Though you, Fortune, have been able to make a poet king, / yet you cannot bring it about that such a one be king for long. … After you have taken away everything I will still remain / such a poet, poor as I am among the poor.”³

Several mediocre early political poems, incorporated in the Varia Carmina, should also be added: two on Maximilian's election to the kingship, and the hyperbolic lines on his capture at Bruges. The following lines occur in the first poem on Maximilian's election: “Another of Caesarian seed has been sent from heaven. / You, Maximilian, are the bringer of peace to the world.” And the second one states: “The Roman king shall not be opposed. / You, Maximilian, shall be the One adornment of the Empire.”⁴

In the poem cursing the people of Bruges for making Maximilian prisoner, Brant fulminates: “Let no good faith be shown them, may they perish! Let that be the condition. / Let them suffer with penance the punishment they deserve. / It is proper and lawful for this city to endure the plow. / Let their accursed property be levelled to the ground. … Thus the ancient Germans deemed it honorable, / thus ancient virtue and power admonish the Empire.”⁵

The first definite indication of Brant's collaboration with a printer is found in editions of two works of St. Augustine already referred to in Chapter 1: The City of God and The Trinity. They were published by Amerbach in 1489; each contains a poem by Brant. A third volume, consisting of Sermons, followed in 1494, and with a poem by Brant. In 1498 these poems were fused into a single undistinguished carmen of one hundred and six lines entitled “Ad divum Aurelium Augustum” and incorporated in the Varia Carmina. In 1493 Brant also helped Amerbach with a three-volume edition of the works of St. Ambrose, contributing a sixty-eight-line poem that is reproduced in a revised form in the Varia Carmina.

It is not known when the early hymn “Ave praeclara,” a translation from the Latin into the vernacular, first appeared.⁶ However, we do know the publication date of four other translations, all of which were popular medieval works: Thesmophagia (1790); and Cato, Facetus, and Moretus (all in 1796).⁷ As has been pointed out, internal evidence of a linguistic nature indicates a very early date for the hymn and also earlier dates of composition, namely, prior to 1490 for the last three. For that reason, these works deserve further discussion.

“Ave praeclara” is in the form of a sequence. Composed in sixteen strophes of varying length—from two to twelve lines—and with rhyme schemes that favor the feminine (wercken-stercken; zieren-füren, geben-schweben-leben), the poem's form is superior to its style and diction.⁸ As a translation it is inferior to Brant's later rendering of “Ave, salve” “Ave praeclara,” however, has a literary history. The oldest text, framed by an engraved border, is in St. Gall, but the better known and superior one, used by Zarncke in his edition of the Narrenschiff, was printed in Tübingen and is accompanied by music and by a woodcut depicting the Virgin over a cross. This Tübingen version, with some changes, appears in the Gesangbüchlein of Michael Vehe (Leipzig, 1537) under the title “Ein geistlich Prosa.” In this form it is reproduced by Phillip Wackernagel in two editions of his Deutsches Kirchenlied (first edition, Stuttgart, 1841).

As to the four German translations on behavior—if their writing actually antedates the Narrenschiff (between the late 1480's and 1490)⁹—they indicate an inchoate interest in subject matter closely related to the Narrenschiff and have a style foreshadowing it. The didactic-satirical vein found in the latter can also be detected in these translations. Cato, a poem of six hundred and sixty-seven lines in the conventional free four-beat iambic couplets, preceded in the Furter edition of 1496¹⁰ by eight Latin distichs, and followed by two more, suggests many topics found in the Narrenschiff; lines 376-99, for example, presage subjects dealt with in Chapters 6, 9, 41, and 97 of Brant's chief work. Facetus, some one hundred and fifty lines shorter than Cato and followed by eleven Latin distichs, is little more than a supplement of Cato; lines 3-4 state this: “As I am able, I add to Cato's teachings.”¹¹ The purpose again is to teach manners, good breeding, and common sense (gut sytten, zucht, vernunfft alltag) by affirmative or negative precept. Moretus has the identical purpose and about the same length. It contains a Latin preface of eight distichs addressed to Brant's son Onuphrius, who was about ten when this work was published, and who is urged to benefit by its teachings. In one respect it differs from the two preceding works. It specifically details the qualities desirable in men of various professions and walks of life—clergy, layman, judge, physician, soldier. Cato, too, when published, was addressed to Onuphrius.

Brant's translations, so far as they could be compared with the Latin originals, seem as literal as may be reasonably expected. In the dedicatory Latin lines on Moretus to his son Onuphrius he emphasizes this: “I strove to render the Latin word for word” … (scripta latina / Ex verbo verbum reddere nisus). As for content, therefore, little Brantian originality can be sought or found in them.

As in the case of “Ave praeclara,” the literary history of these translations is worthy of attention. Of Cato, as Brant wrote it, at least sixteen editions followed the original up to 1517, published in Basel (Bergmann, 1498; Lamparter, ca. 1506), Strasbourg, Nuremberg, and Augsburg, as well as elsewhere. Facetus was also issued at least sixteen times up to 1518 in various places, including Mainz and Leipzig, but Moretus four times up to 1508—in Basel, Constance, and Strasbourg. Of Thesmophagia (1490, 748 lines)¹² there seems to have been no second printing; it appears to be the only one of these four poems published (without any indication of a printer) soon after it was written.

Brant's first, and only somewhat original, textbook, Expositiones sive declarationes …, a work done hurriedly on the basis of the lecture notes of one of his students, has been discussed in Chapter 1. Among the many later editions referred to there, it is of interest to find that the second, also under Furter's imprint (1500), is provided with some verses of Brant addressed ad studiosos iuris. Furter also published a third, fourth, and fifth edition (1503-1505). Besides, editions appeared in Angermünde (1514), Paris (1518), Lyons (1518), and a late one in Venice (1584). The work won universal acclaim not easy to achieve in those days.

Brant's other early text, the Decretum Gratiani …, was provided with glosses by an Italian professor and with a woodcut representing Gratianus,¹³ a poem by Brant, and the prose epilogue already referred to. This work, too, went through several printings, the most important of which was the 1500 edition of Amerbach and Froben. This contains—behind the index—the same woodcut, also three distichs by Brant, and the epilogue found in the first edition of 1493. The redaction, completed shortly before Brant left Basel, contains a dedication by him to the archbishop of Besançon, Francis of Luxemburg.

II. PREPARATION FOR MAJOR WORKS

A collection of Decretals in five books ordained by Pope Gregory IX before the middle of the thirteenth century, edited with parallel passages from Scripture and published by Froben in 1494 (second edition by Froben and Amberbach, 1500), contains a poem by Brant. We may assume that, in addition, he was largely responsible for the editing. He praises the work as being a credit to Basel. It is possible that it was Brant who suggested publication to Froben, as he often did in the case of works that were to his liking. As we saw, he was rarely known to lend his name to a project he did not wholeheartedly approve.

The brief verses or broadsides on disasters or natural phenomena like floods, eclipses, or hailstorms were followed in the 1490's by others with accompanying woodcuts. But some of these later ones are different in that they associate the natural phenomena with human events, usually with a warning that such an extraordinary happening is to be interpreted as a portent.¹⁴ The idea can be traced to the ancient historians. Brant may have encountered it in Livy. Often, too, these broadsides occur in both Latin and German, like the one of 1485. That Brant addressed various types of readers on various levels, depending on interest and intellectual horizon, is shown also by the broadsides written in both languages. The Latin version differs from the German. Whereas in the former, for instance, the Church is stressed, it usually plays only a minor part in the latter.

One such broadside in two languages, printed by Bergmann, and already mentioned is Von dem Donnerstein gefallen … vor Ensisheim (the Latin republished in two versions in the Varia Carmina as De fulgetra immani … and Fulgetrae immanis … iaculatae in naeniam mortis optimi imperatoris Friderici consolationemque … Divi Maximiliani explanatio). It tells of a meteor that fell in 1492 on a suburb of Basel. This is interpreted by Brant as a portent—indicated in the second title, warning of the death of Emperor Frederick III and foreboding evil for King Charles VIII of France, the foe of Maximilian.

The original woodcut shows, on the left, a town labeled Ensisheim, on the right another, Battenheim. A man on a horse and one on foot are fleeing in panic. Amid lightning a huge rock is falling from a cloud. The execution of the woodblock is crude. The German version, an acrostic, has been reproduced twice with textual variants, once in Berler's Chronicle, and again by Peter Merian.¹⁵

A broadside of a different nature, which does not deal with a freak of nature, although it again sheds glory on Maximilian, deals with the victory of the Germans over the French at Salins in 1493 (Von der erlichen schlacht …). Signed by the author, as is almost every work of Brant from about 1490 on, it informs us that its author wrote the one hundred and fifty-nine lines in a single hour.¹⁶ Its quality makes this not incredible. Bergmann was its printer.

Different is the broadside Vita sancti Onofrii of 1494 (Bergmann), reproduced in the Varia Carmina (forty lines) and accompanied by a ten-line comparison of the labors of Onofrius and Hercules. Onofrius (or Onuphrius) was one of Brant's favorite saints whose hermit life he sometimes envied. Indeed, he named his eldest son for him and in the Varia Carmina also dedicated to him a three-hundred-line poem written in complicated Greek and Roman meters, which he pedantically identifies in every case, as was the Humanist custom. One strophe is described as “distrophon dicolon ex Heroico et dactylico Archilochio dimetro catalectico.” The poem ends pleasantly with the eight-line “monocolon ex dactylico Adonio dimetro catalectico:” “Gentle Onofrius, / pray zealously for me / who sing of your / splendid deeds: / Avoiding lowlier / places, / bring it about that I may become the equal of you / in my hour of death.”¹⁷ In the same poem Brant pleads: “So I pray to you, blessed Onofrius, / remember your Sebastian.” (Ergo te precor, beate Onofri, / Sis memor tui Sebastiani).

Another broadside of a religious nature is a twenty-four-line German version of an old so-called Verbum bonum (i.e., Ave). It begins “Let us sing the word Ave” (Das wort ave lond uns singen). It is a product of the early 1490's and bears Brant's name in the title.¹⁸ The cut represents the Virgin with the child in her arms, and two angels bearing a crown. There are also a prayer in prose and musical notations.

Brant also wrote other religious poetry before embarking upon a different course in his Narrenschiff. One of the most ambitious poems of this kind is his Rosarium ex floribus vitae passionisque domini nostri Jesu Christi consertum … (Rosary woven of the flowers of the life and passion of our Lord Jesus Christ …). After being published separately, probably in 1492, this Sapphic and adonic piece of fifty strophes (preceded by an introduction) was reprinted in the Varia Carmina. A feeble German version is also extant;¹⁹ it probably appeared simultaneously with the Latin. In this poem, each strophe representing an ave of the rosary, the life of Christ is related from birth to death with what Schmidt (I, 266) calls “an austere nobility.” But the flaws in Brant's pedestrian achievement remain.

Religious overtones are also present in the Froben edition of Rhetorica Divina (1492) of William, Bishop of Paris, for which Brant supplied verse proclaiming that prayers are, after all, far better than the orations of the ancients.

Reference has been made to Brant's first collection of poems, brought out by Bergmann in 1494. It is also religious in nature, “in praise of the Virgin Mary and many saints.” Each of the eighteen poems of this now extremely rare work is headed by a woodcut, reminding one of the Narrenschiff in this respect. These poems are little more than exercises. Brant was undoubtedly a religious man, but he shows little real warmth toward his subject here. Artificiality and a concern for the technical features of his verse—and even these not always metrically correct—seem to have been paramount in his striving as a Humanist for technical finesse. His word order is forced and sometimes difficult to unravel, his conceits are far-fetched and pedantic, and although he does not attempt centos, the reminiscences of Classical authors are more numerous than original turns of phrase. However, since all these faults were not unusual among the Humanists, it would be unfair to blame him entirely for the common practices of his day, especially since these very practices were considered an essential part of good poetry by those learned contemporaries for whom he was writing.

For a book on the conquest of Granada, achieved in 1492 by Ferdinand the Catholic, the friend and sponsor of Columbus, Brant composed a congratulatory poem in fourteen distichs, “In Bethicum triumphum,” published in 1494, in which he expresses the wish that Germany, too, might have a king like Ferdinand. “Then,” he exclaims, “the whole world would soon be subject to our laws.”²⁰ But perhaps with the feeling that the enthusiasm prompting these words may have carried him too far, he adds that Maximilian, too, would be only too happy to achieve such glory if he had more loyal followers. He fails to remind his readers, however, that Ferdinand not only had loyal followers but also a world power to back him up.

This book appeared in 1494 under Bergmann's imprint and seems to have been inspired by Brant. It is accompanied by a work of Carlo Verardus, as well as by a drama, and the famous Columbus letter to Raphael Sanchez, “De insulis nuper inventis,” published twice by Bergmann. The publication of the letter in this work, with which we know Brant was involved, proves that he was familiar with the discoveries of Columbus. Indeed, he may well have induced Bergmann to publish the volume. Shortly thereafter he alluded to these discoveries in Chapter 66 of the Narrenschiff, saying it is better to lead a Christian life than to travel to parts unknown.²¹

Tritheim's De scriptoribus ecclesiasticis, published in 1494 by Bergmann and also mentioned in Chapter 1, contains articles on many men of Brant's acquaintance, among them Heynlin, Wimpheling, Geiler, as well as Brant himself. Concerning Brant, Tritheim writes that through his learning and literary activity he has added remarkable glory to the famous German city of Basel.²² Tritheim's work, though published under his name, was actually a product of cooperative endeavor. Brant, for instance, contributed a glowing article on Reuchlin, whom he praises as learned in Hebrew, Greek, Latin, French, and German, as a writer of works of lasting quality on ecclesiastical and secular subjects, and as a translator of Greek Classical writers such as Homer, Xenophon, and Socrates into Latin as well as German.²³ Besides, Brant supplied nine conventional distichs for the colophon.

In the case of a few of the major and incidental writings preceding the Narrenschiff heretofore discussed, some bearing the date of 1494, composition and even publication may have occurred slightly later. But we assume that they were already in the hands of the printer when the Narrenschiff appeared at Shrovetide.

The period of Brant's literary life that has been discussed in this chapter, approximately the first fifteen years of his activity in this field, may be considered as the time of his apprenticeship and preparation for the two major works that were to follow—the Narrenschiff in 1494 and the Latin treatise on Jerusalem, De Origine et conversatione bonorum Regum … in 1495. It was a wide range of writing that engaged his attention. As many as a dozen different types or genres can be distinguished. They will be discussed in detail.

If, at first glance, these various literary undertakings seem heterogeneous, more careful examination shows that, … they all fit into a pattern that dovetails with the scheme of the Narrenschiff and the Latin De Origine et conversatione. … The broadsides and their illustrations contain the same sort of informal comment on contemporary matters as does the Narrenschiff. The didacticism found in other types is of the same brand as that in both major works and serves an identical purpose. Not only would it inform; it would admonish readers of their obligations to the Church, the body politic, and society—primary purposes of Brant's literary activity. Finally, the religious motivation, inextricably interwoven with moral and political concerns in Brant's philosophy, is at the bottom of all his thought. It dominates both major works.

[T]hese writings also served another important end. They show Brant as a pioneer in seeking new subject matter for literary treatment in an era when social changes demanded novel themes. The courtly literature produced by the small knightly class had in Brant's time lost its audience and appeal. A literature addressed to wider circles became necessary. This literature, whether in Latin or in German, would have to win adherents in much broader circles, among the clergy high and low, the scholars, and, most important, the emerging middle class.

Brant was anxious to reach all these and wrote on their various levels: here paratactic, brief, and serial; there in involved, complex clauses; here emphasizing one set of interests; there another.

As Brant developed it, this new literature was characterized by homely satire; moral preachment; didacticism; frequent recourse to the Classical tradition of Greek and Roman antiquity (to which many Humanists felt linked as by an unbroken chain), but set within a strictly Christian framework; contemporary appeal; and concern for the glory and welfare of Church and State, which could only be impeded by the folly of its people. Both Church and State together formed the concept of the “eternal” Holy Roman Empire.

If for Church and State we substitute religious denomination and political region, it may be said that much of the literature of Germany during the next one hundred years was built upon these foundations.

.....

I. THE WRITER

It would be difficult to find a writer during the last five hundred years who has been so grossly misinterpreted as Brant. Ever since serious study of him was begun by Zarncke in 1854, misconceptions have been numerous. One of the most serious concerns his masterpiece, the Narrenschiff (the only one of his numerous works singled out by scholars for close study). It was condemned for its lack of any consistent idea and its complete formlessness. M. O'C Walshe's recent utterance, which even distorts his intention, is typical of this reaction: “In the Narrenschiff Brant showed himself totally incapable of organizing a narrative event to the extent of maintaining the most elementary consistency in the story.”²⁴

I was one of the first to give Brant more credit. In 1945 I asked “whether the Narrenschiff … does not deserve a little more consideration as a work of literature.”²⁵ Now, thanks to the research of Gaier, we are learning that Hutten was right when he lauded Brant for writing German poetry according to a new set of rules. In form as well as content, the Narrenschiff is seen to be a well-planned, consistently executed work deserving the praise of Brant's contemporaries. Its importance as a satire of late fifteenth-century life, skilfully constructed in the Roman style, in accordance with the rules of Roman rhetoric, can hardly be overestimated. In everyday language and striking pictures it showed the people the danger of their folly and endeavored to bring them to their senses and to the right mode of living, so as to save them, the Empire, and the Christian faith from destruction. It is one of the notable literary achievements of its time. Gaier thinks that critics have overlooked the unique quality of the German version as opposed to Locher's Latin version. The original German assigns a religious aspect to folly, based upon a concept of harmony missing in Locher. Brant's “wise man” (wis man) is conceived as a microcosmic image of the divine, and his qualities as such may some day impregnate his environment—with the attendant destruction of folly. In no other pre-Renaissance work can such a world view be found.

After more than a hundred years of misjudgment a Brant revival seems to be taking place. Zeydel's only English translation has proved popular, as two new editions attest. Lemmer's new redaction of the original and his publication of the woodcuts, Gaier's novel approach, and Wuttke's plans for an edition of the letters and other works are indications of this trend. Literary criticism in general must follow.

It is a natural impression today that the Narrenschiff was the only work of Brant to achieve marked success. On the contrary, many of his writings attracted wide interest in their day, even those in Latin. His early legal textbooks, as well as his edition of Gazalupis, went through numerous printings and revisions over a period of more than one hundred years, attracting printers as far away as Paris, Lyons, and Venice. His German translation of the Latin Cato was reprinted well over a dozen times within some twenty years, as was the equally popular Facetus, which by 1518 was known through local editions in Reutlingen, Ulm, Augsburg, Nuremberg, and Leipzig. The Varia Carmina proved so popular that within three months of the appearance of the original Basel edition Grüninger published a pirated edition in Strasbourg. Brant's Latin redaction of Aesop, the German Layen Spiegel, and the Lives of the Saints, as well as the Hortus Animae mostly in German, enjoyed equal popularity.

It is to be noted that of the eleven works just mentioned only five are entirely in Latin; the rest are in German. In view especially of the overwhelming popularity of the Narrenschiff in High and Low German, as well as of Cato and Facetus, we may judge that Brant was far better known, in Central Europe at least, as a German author than as a Latinist.

All of Brant's works enjoyed a measure of success in their day. But he was less successful in a number of his writings of the type known as suasoria—the suasive writings. To this category belong the many broadsides aimed at arousing the Emperor and the princes to action against the Turks and in the Holy Land, the still more numerous eulogistic poems addressed to Maximilian and animated by the same burning desire, as well as the treatise De origine et conversatione. … These products of Brant's pen served to show where he stood on matters of imperial foreign policy; but they hardly succeeded in spurring Maximilian, not to mention the princes, to deeds. Although it is true that Brant enjoyed the favor of his monarch, his eloquence could not supply the manpower or the funds to undertake a campaign as costly as a holy war.

The fact that the broadsides are usually composed in both Latin and German indicates that Brant was interested in reaching wider circles. His aim was probably to make such a holy war a popular cause. Since all the broadsides, and even many of the longer Latin writings, among them De origine et conversatione …, and Aesop, were accompanied by woodcut illustrations, we can be sure not only that Basel was well supplied with facilities for such work, but also that Brant hoped to appeal to as many people as possible regardless of language or literacy. Even the appearance of a German translation of De origine et conversatione … twenty-three years after the original Latin edition has some significance, although Brant probably had little or nothing to do with the belated publication by a Swiss translator. It appeared in Strasbourg under the imprint of a publisher with whom Brant had worked.

II. THE HUMANIST

Now if Brant's literary success was attributable more to his German than to his Latin writings, how can he be classed with the Humanists, who were certainly not known for works in the vernacular? Before answering this question, it is necessary to examine German Humanism during Brant's lifetime, and his attitude toward it.

Humanism had, of course, been born in Italy as early as the fourteenth century and had developed to a considerable extent before being brought north. It did not take root in Germany until about the time of Brant's youth, shortly after the middle of the fifteenth century.

Three main factors seem to have influenced early German Humanism, especially that of Alsace, and given it direction. These factors are: (1) The new religion of devotio moderna, which came from the Netherlands and was introduced by the schoolman Dringenberg in Schlettstadt. (2) As a corollary to this, the Nominalist-Realist quarrel, especially Heynlin's Realist role in it. (3) The Latin prose works of Petrarch, whom Brant admired and some of whose works he edited.

Devotio moderna, closely related to docta ignorantia, came to the German Humanists especially from Nicolaus Cusanus, one of the key figures of the Basel Church Council, the decrees of which Brant had edited in 1499. Heynlin practiced it, and Brant learned it from him. An idea of its nature can be had from some of its tenets, such as: “happy [is] simplicity which leaves the difficult paths of problems, and walks on the plain and firm road of the commandments of God” (beata simplicitas quae difficiles quaestionum relinquit vias et plana ac firma pergit semita mandatorum Dei); or “beware then, son, of dealing curiously with these matters that transcend your knowledge” (cave ergo, fili, de istis curiose tractare quae tuam scientiam excedunt); or “grace teaches … that we seek of everything and in all knowledge the fruit of what is useful, and the praise and honor of God” (gratia docet … de omni re et in omni scientia utilitatis fructum atque Dei laudem et honorem quaerere); or finally “human reason is weak and can err, but true faith cannot be wrong” (ratio humana debilis est et falli potest, fides autem vera falli non potest).²⁶

Here is the root of that refusal to deal in speculative philosophy in which Brant and the other early German Humanists, particularly those who opposed Nominalism, like Heynlin, joined. Docta ignorantia and its religious offshoot, with their symbolic blending of theism and pantheism, or, as Stadelmann (p. 74) puts it, “concave mysticism,” became a hallmark of Alsatian Humanism.

The attraction to Petrarch that Brant felt, and Petrarch's impact upon him have already been mentioned. As we saw, Brant edited several of his Latin prose works. But coming to his notice somewhat later in life, Petrarch exercised less influence in initiating Brant's Humanism than he did in giving that Humanism purpose and enthusiastic determination.

In the north, the Italian character of Humanism changed, in part at least because of a different attitude toward the Classics. In Italy they (the Latin Classics in particular) were looked upon as a natural indigenous heritage, whereas in the northern countries they represented a foreign importation, a supplement to native traditions.

In Italy Humanism was regarded as an educational ideal, and Humanist learning as an end in itself, an aristocratic but sometimes frivolous ornament that was meant to lend distinction to the scholar. In the north, however, and in Germany in particular, Humanism served—at least at first—not as an end, but as a means of revealing new horizons and, more important, of living a more pious life by achieving a better understanding of one's faith. The German brand, too, proved more democratic than its Italian counterpart. Whereas the Italian Humanist, for instance, combed the monasteries of Europe for Classical manuscripts, his German colleague showed more interest in the new art of printing, to the end that knowledge might be disseminated through books.

In spite of these differences, however, the impact of Italian Humanism upon Germany is undeniable. To realize it, we must turn to such a famous Italian Humanist as Laurentius Valla (Lorenzo della Valle), who died in the year Brant was born. He opposed the hegemony of the old traditional disciplines. In his De voluptate, the German Humanist could find the bases for the protest against lax morals voiced by Heynlin and Brant; in Elegantiae Latini Sermonis encouragement for their endeavor to write better Latin. Like Reuchlin and Brant, Valla had reservations about jurisprudence.

There can be no question that Brant had enjoyed good training in Latin before he left home in 1475, although Reuchlin, his senior by two years, and Erasmus, some nine years younger, possessed a better knowledge of the Classics and a deeper appreciation of their ideals. Partly owing to Heynlin's influence, he devoted much time to both Latin and Greek during his early years in Basel, Reuchlin being one of his teachers, with perhaps the decisive influence on him in the direction of Humanism. The disparaging, biting remarks about Brant's Latin made by an anonymous correspondent in 1480 and quoted in Chapter 1, should not be taken seriously. We must also be cautious in interpreting Brant's reply to him when he writes: “I never said that I was a poet; I am not even a student of poetry.”²⁷ Brant must be interpreted merely as saying that by 1480 he had become immersed in the study of law. It does not signify that he had abandoned the Classics, Latin or Greek.

In time he became better versed, even in Greek, than is generally realized. He was secretly proud of his Latin. It can be seen that he resents the same anonymous writer's slur on his “crude” Latin poems and would leave their criticism to others (id aliorum relinqui judicio). He also criticizes the Latin of his correspondent, who “writes a barbarous style” (usque adeo barbaras); “of little eloquence” (eloquentiae parvae); “so that it seems like stupid babbling” (ut balbutientes ineptire videantur). Locher, we found, was enthusiastic about Brant's teaching of the Latin classics in 1487—an activity which apparently continued (perhaps desultorily) even after 1496. And, we recall, Brant edited Virgil and Terence.

He was born into the first generation of German Humanism. And indeed he reveals the limitations of that generation insofar as Humanism is concerned. These also characterize his friend Wimpheling, who was about seven years his senior. Wimpheling, too, was an ardent advocate of Latin. Unlike Brant, he wrote almost all his works, over fifty in number, in that tongue. Whenever the opportunity offered, he advocated the use of Latin in serious writing. This becomes manifest in such major educational writings as Adolescentia, De integritate, and Diatriba. But Wimpheling's reasons for studying Latin and using it as a means of communication were typical of his generation. He aimed thereby to be able to enjoy free interchange of ideas with other clerics throughout Europe, to have full access to the Vulgate Bible and the writings of the Church fathers, and thus to become a better Christian.

The question naturally arises why Wimpheling did not then limit his studies to Christian sources, instead of going back to some of the Classical writers of Roman times? His answer was: Because they wrote a purer Latin style than the later writers (especially the Scholastics) had cultivated. And besides, poets like Virgil and philosophers like Seneca, standing on the threshold of the Christian era, possessed in his view traits that were not un-Christian and that opened new vistas. But he abhorred paganism in any form and consequently rejected poets like Terence and Horace.

Reuchlin, also one of Brant's oldest, most steadfast friends, belongs to the same generation and shared the beliefs common to the early German Humanists. He had a better knowledge than Brant of the Classics, especially Greek, and a better appreciation of their real value. Like Brant he turned reluctantly from the Classics to law because he had scruples about jurisprudence, which he voiced in De verbo mirifico. Above all, he was a good Christian, and as did Wimpheling and Brant, had the purpose of helping and furthering the Church in everything he undertook. Brant admired Reuchlin for his erudition, his interest in the cabala of the Hebrews, as expressed in De verbo mirifico. He also looked up to him as a writer of comedy.

On the other hand, most of the early German Humanists, having special predilections, possessed a strong feeling of cultural nationalism, Brant in particular because he spent his life on the frontier of Germanic civilization. Some, among them Celtes and Tritheim, went so far as to forge history in order to enhance the ethnic and literary prestige of the Germanic peoples. Wimpheling opposed French territorial ambitions along the Rhine, especially in Alsace and northern Italy; and Brant pictured Emperor Maximilian as the master of the entire civilized Christian world and dreamed of a stronger constitution for Germany. He wanted to revive the Crusades and stir up more feeling against the Turks.

It is precisely this cultural nationalism that prompted Brant to write as much as he did in the vernacular. As was said before, he wanted to reach the masses and to convey to them the ideas that he and his Humanist friends cherished. Far from being against Humanism, Brant shared the motives of the other German Humanists, though he did not despise the pagan authors—not even Catullus or Terence. To a very limited degree, his striving can be compared with that of Luther and his followers, who in some respects subscribed to Humanism. In theology and religion Brant was, of course, diametrically opposed to Luther, but he, like Murner, agreed with Luther that it was essential to reach the people in their own tongue through the new art of the printing press.

To a certain extent Brant was perhaps still influenced by late Scholasticism in its blending of Church dogma with Aristotelian metaphysics, particularly as regards the treatment of form and matter, actus and potentia. But this influence is not pervasive. Already during his youth Scholasticism and its schools were breaking down. The quarrel between Nominalists and Realists had been carried on in dead earnest by the Scholastics. But exceptionally Brant, the Realist, felt friendly toward and even intimate with such Nominalists as Hugonis and Reuchlin. And he and his associates never shared the Scholastic addiction to logic and logomachy.

On the whole Brant was a representative, though not in all respects a typical one, of early German Humanism. He was an enthusiastic student and teacher of the Classics. He edited the writings of two Roman authors. As Humanists were supposed to do, he composed Latin poetry. He was notably active in printing, publishing, and editing. He was at least interested in the voyages of Columbus and actively engaged in the study of geography, a Humanist occupation which he shared with Celtes and Pirckheimer. He strongly advocated cultural nationalism. A devout Christian and adherent of the old faith, he wrote tirelessly in the vernacular to enlighten the common folk in these matters. He was no less active in impressing his political philosophy upon the people.

The generation of Humanists that succeeded Brant, represented by his pupil Locher and by Heinrich Bebel, blazed new trails. They strongly advocated better Classical Latin in speech and writing, a goal which Brant, in Valla's tradition, vaguely strove for. More important, as we have seen, they urged the study of the Latin language, so that the Classics might be read for their own enjoyment and for the sake of endowing man's spirit with new freedom. This point of view aroused the suspicion and hostility of some members of the older generation because it was considered un-Christian. This helps to explain Brant's later coolness toward his favorite pupil and Wimpheling's dislike of that “apostate.”

III. OUTSTANDING CHARACTERISTICS OF BRANT

In the course of our discussion one characteristic of Brant was stressed—his concern to adjust his language to the cultural level of the audience being addressed. Here a bilingual writer like Brant, audience-conscious as he was, faced problems of which present-day writers can hardly be aware. He tells each audience just what he feels it could and should know. The German readers of the Narrenschiff, for instance, to whom he stresses religion, are not given all the political and historical reasons why he must admonish them. They are told that folly leads to perdition, but that the wise man, deriving his wisdom from heaven, may gradually displace the fool. The fear of the possible downfall of the Empire through folly and lack of ordo is largely reserved for the Latin readers of his prefaces to Locher's translation and his poem “De corrupto ordine vivendi. …”

Another feature of Brant is his keen sense of form and of the rules of rhetoric. This explains his success with the Roman type of satire in the Narrenschiff, as well as his skilful handling of the historical events (as he saw them) in the treatise De origine et conversatione … and in the poem “De corrupto ordine vivendi. …”

Turning from purely formalistic and stylistic matters to questions of content, and looking at Brant's works as a whole, one is surprised to find remarkable uniformity of theme. A topical list of the subjects and views aired by him can be boiled down to a few headings, most of which are somehow related or contiguous. The reason for this is not difficult to find. To Brant religion, politics, and publicistic activity were all expressions or manifestations of a single world view which to Brant was a matter of life and death.

By and large Brant's principal thesis, though not infrequently only implied, is the hegemony of the Church, the inviolability of Church dogma, and a deep love for the Virgin Mary, together with a firm belief in the immaculate conception. The corollary, no less important, is the position of the Empire in the temporal world, not on a par with, but immediately below, the Church. The Pope takes the highest place in the hierarchy of rulers, the Emperor the second place. Equally important is the leadership, among nations, of the German people as the subjects of this Empire, which takes precedence over all other bodies politic. The important role played by Brant's teachers Heynlin, Von Andlau, and Hugonis in inculcating these convictions should be borne in mind.

Leaving the ecclesiastical and purely political scene, we note that Brant is no less concerned with the morals and manners of the people. He decries their lack of wisdom and their cultivation of folly, fearing that these may contribute to the decline of the Christian faith and to the loss of temporal world leadership on the part of the German nation. Moral teaching, supported by satire, and attention to the lessons of the Bible, the ancient writers, and history are the best means of overcoming these faults. Brant constantly reminds his audience that even foibles and idiosyncracies will lead to worse errors. One of the best means of disseminating truth is through books; indeed, that is to his mind the chief virtue of the new art of printing.

As for Humanism, Brant's commitment had become so strong in his mature years that he went to extremes to train his son Onuphrius as a Humanist. And unwittingly his teaching of the Classics contributed in a positive way to the rearing of the more liberal generation of Humanists represented by Locher.

Again and again Brant stressed his fear that the end of the world—the Christian world as he knew it—was close at hand; sometimes he even feared that the whole world would be destroyed. It might come, he thought, through natural causes, as the result of a great disaster, often foreboded by such phenomena as floods, storms, or meteors. Or it might result from further inroads of the Turks. He believed every prophet of doom. This prompted him to urge the Emperor repeatedly to wage a holy war, or to initiate a crusade for the reconquest of the Holy Land. The keynote, then, of Brant's attitude toward the world is not contempt but concern for it, and a burning desire to teach people to live in it more wisely.

However, we must not overlook some inconsistencies in Brant's world picture. Though worried about the state of the world, he is on the whole an advocate of the status quo. He is deeply interested in history but, like many of his contemporaries, he is devoid of historical perspective. He was a notorious Germanophile but was looked upon in Strasbourg as romanissimus—quite Gallic. Though a Humanist, he avoided some of his confreres in later life, among them Locher and even Reuchlin. His stand with regard to superstition is equivocal.²⁸

The question of Brant's feeling with respect to the unrest in the Church caused by the activity of Luther and his adherents has been referred to. In dealing with this it must be recalled that in his official position in Strasbourg he was never entirely free to express his personal opinion. Moreover, the Lutheran Reformation, or Revolt—whichever term one may prefer—had at the time of Brant's death not brought about a full break with the Mother Church, although most signs pointed in that direction. Although Brant probably saw the handwriting on the wall, he expressed only vague fears of what might happen. To some this was not enough. Murner, for instance, who during Brant's last days was turning ever more against Luther, censured his friend for not taking a firm enough stand against the enemies of the Church.

As for Luther himself, actually only one point of agreement between him and Brant has been noted: they both wanted to reach the people through the vernacular. There the similarity ends. One thing is certain, however. Brant's philosophy, religious and political, told him that Lutheranism was bound to spell disaster for every ideal and hope he cherished.

It should be remembered that Brant was not prone to reason about religious convictions. The aversion to philosophical speculation, which through Cusanus Heynlin had instilled in him, was one of his outstanding characteristics. Like Heynlin, he limited himself to everyday morality, Humanistic education, and practical religiosity. His thinking in these matters is perhaps most clearly expressed in the first of his epigrams: “Do not allow yourself to be led astray from the faith / if someone wants to argue about it. / Rather believe plainly and simply / as the Holy Church teaches you. / Do not accept the overly subtle doctrine / that your reason cannot understand. / The little sheep often floats to the shore / where the elephant has trouble and drowns. / No one should ask too many questions / about his faith or his wife; / then in the end he will have no regrets.”²⁹

This humble advice—docta ignorantia—describes Brant's position on matters of faith and stamps him as a stanch adherent of orthodoxy. He had been adverse to new, unorthodox teachings as early as 1494, when he wrote his Narrenschiff. A passage in Chapter 11 of that work, which sounds almost prophetic in the light of what happened some twenty-five years later, runs:

I fear the day is near when you
Will hear new teachings, new belief,
Far more than pleasing, more than lief …(30)

But it was too late. Brant was powerless to set back the clock. The lament written shortly before his death … that great changes will occur in fruit, fish, birds, beast, and men was only too well founded, at least so far as men were concerned.

Although his beloved Onuphrius, the precocious son of a learned father, was reared in the only traditions that his sire could comprehend, he must have been more strongly exposed and more susceptible to the changes affecting the religious life of wide areas of northern Europe. Not many years after his father's death, Onuphrius declared his adherence to Protestantism.

Notes

1. Both epigrams are printed by Zarncke, p. 194.

2. Both versions can be found in Zarncke, p. 194.

3. Zarncke prints this thirty-line poem on pp. 190ff. The pertinent passages read: “Spe rex vivo quidem, sors licet invideat. / Cum regem fortuna potes fecisse poetam, / Non tamen efficies, rex sit ut ille diu. … Omnia cum demes forsan tamen ille manebo, / Pauperibus vates pauper ut ante fui.”

4. Zarncke prints both versions, pp. 181ff. From the first: “Alter Caesareo sed semine missus ab alto, / Maximiliane quidem pacifer orbis ades.” From the second: “Nil modo Romano fas est obsistere regi, / Unum eris imperii, Maximiliane, decus.”

5. Zarncke, p. 186: “Nulla fides his sit, pereant! haec foedera sunto! / Supplicio poenas quas meruere luant. / Phas et iura sinunt urbs haec patiatur aratrum / Aequaturque solo terra nefanda suo … / Germani antiqui sic sic iuvat esse decori, / Imperio virtus pristina visque monet.”

6. Schmidt in his bibliographical index (II, 350) leaves the question of date open.

7. The original Latin Cato is by a cleric, probably of very early date (eighth century?) and was translated into German for the first time in the thirteenth century. On Facetus and Thesmophagia see note 34 to Chapter 1. Brant's translation of Moretus seems to have been the first; at least, no previous translations are known. The dedication to Onuphrius was added for publication.

8. Lines 90-95 of the last strophe read: “Den gloub mit wercken stercken / Und zieren, unsz zu füren / zu selgem end behend, / nach disem ellend / uns werd geben das wir schweben / by dir und leben.” This is from the version used by Zarncke. (“To strengthen faith with works / And adorn it, to lead us / quickly to a blessed end. After this wretched exile / May it be granted us to stay / With thee and live there”). Musical notes for “Ave praeclara” are to be found in Heitz's Flugblätter des Sebastian Brant.

9. In Chapter 1, p. 39 the probable chronological sequence in which these works were translated was given, viz., Cato, Facetus, Moretus, and Thesmophagia. To the “internal evidence” adduced there can be added the usage of the word narr. In Cato, tor (dor) is used interchangeably with narr and in a general meaning not yet consonant with its use in the Narrenschiff. In Facetus, too there is no suggestion of the sense found in the Narrenschiff. It means simply a dull-witted person. Cf. lines 108 and 484 (Zarncke, pp. 138 and 141). But in Moretus, narr is not only used more frequently (and tor not at all), but also to contrast with wysz (“wise man”). Cf. 11. 342-53, Zarncke, p. 145. Moreover, if Cato, Facetus, and Moretus were actually produced in translation when they were published (Cato probably in 1496, the other two more definitely in that year), their great similarity would make a single publisher likely. But this is not the case. Furter published Cato; Bergmann, the other two.

10. I follow Schmidt as regards the date: “vers 1496” (II, 347). For no apparent reason Weller calls this a later edition, assigning it to 1502. Goedeke, Grundriss, I, 388, is under the impression, erroneous I think, that Bergmann's edition of 1498 is the oldest.

11. Zarncke p. 137: “Nach mym vermögen wirt gemert / Was Catho nyt hat alls gelert.”

12. In 1880 Hugo Lemcke published both the original and Brant's translation.

13. Stockmeyer and Reber in their Beiträge zur Basler Buchdrukkergeschichte (Basel, 1840), p. 49, take this woodcut to be a likeness of Brant himself.

14. In the Narrenschiff, Chapter 65, Brant seems to speak against astrology and the belief in portents, but in his edition of the Revelations of Methodius (an early Greek bishop and martyr), first published by Furter in 1498, he expresses the opposite view. Perhaps, however, in the Narrenschiff his opposition is directed more against fools who misuse portents and revelations for their own specific purposes. This is indicated by the opening lines: “Fool he who'd promise more than he / Can keep with full propriety, / More e'en than he'd desire to do. / Physicians well may promise you, / But many fools will promise more / Than all the world can hold in store.” (“Der ist ein narr der me verheiszt / Dann er jn sym vermögen weisszt / Oder dann er zu tun hat mut / Verheissen ist den ärtzten gut / Aber eyn narr verheisszt eyn tag / Me dann all welt geleysten mag.” However, he goes on to scoff at “worsagen … vogelgschrey … treümerbuch … der schwartzen kunst” (“fortune telling … bird cries … dream book … necromancy”), ll. 46ff. Eberth, in Die Sprichwörter des Sebastian Brant, believes that Brant was never superstitious.

15. Berler's Chronicle is in the Code historique et diplomatique de la ville de Strasbourg, II, 103. Merian is cited in Poggendorf's Annalen der Physik, CXXII (1864), 182. The several woodcuts prepared for this broadside, as well as for some fifteen others, are reproduced in Paul Heitz's Flugblätter des Sebastian Brant.

16. Reprinted in Rochus von Liliencron, Die historischen Volkslieder der Deutschen II, 310ff., No. 183. The woodcut is reproduced by Heitz. See note 8 above …

17. Zarncke, p. 182: “Mitis Onofri, / Sedulus ora, / Qui tua psallo / Facta decora: / Fac loca vitans / Inferiora / Par tibi fiam / Mortis in hora.”

18. This poem was reprinted in the periodical Alsatia in 1875, p. 61. The woodcut that went with it, as well as the one to the poem on Onufrius just discussed, has been reproduced by Heitz.

19. Published in Der ewigen wiszheit Betbüchlein (Basel, 1518) and republished by Wackernagel, Das deutsche Kirchenlied II, 1099 (the first volume, p. 226, contains the Latin version).

20. Zarncke, p. 184: “O patria, o felix Germania si tibi reges / Aut fortuna pares aut deus ipse daret. / Credo equidem cunctus nostris sub legibus orbis / Iamdudum foret.”

21. See Zeydel, “Sebastian Brant and the Discovery of America,” in The Journal of English and Germanic Philology, XLIII, 410ff.

22. Fol. 134 v.: “qui sua eruditione atque lucubratione Basileam inclytam Germaniae urbem mirum in modum exornat.”

23. Fol. 133 v.: “Trium principalium linguarum Hebraicae scilicet sit et Chaldaicae: Graecae pariter et latinae interpres peritissimus. Gallicanae etiam atque politioris linguae nostrae vernaculae imprimis clarus. Etiam in divinis scripturis secretariusque in saecularibus libris eruditissimus. … multa praeterea utilitati nostrae communi e graeco in latinum vertit opuscula: Xenophontis apologiam per Socrate. … Monomachiam Iliados Homeri de Paridis et Menelai duello in lingua Germanica metrice.”

24. Medieval German Literature: A Survey (Harvard University Press, 1962), p. 288.

25. Studies in Philology XLVIII, 30.

26. Quoted from Rudolf Stadelmann, Vom Geist des ausgehenden Mittelalters: Studien zur Geschichte der Weltanschauung von Nicolaus Cusanus bis Sebastian Franck (Deutsche Vierteljahrschrift, Buchreihe, 15. Band ([Halle, 1929]), p. 76. For other literature on the subject see Paul Mesterwerdt, Die Anfänge des Erasmus: Humanismus und Devotio moderna (Leipzig, 1917); and Gerhard Ritter, Studien zur Spätscholastik (three parts, 1921-1927: Sitzungsberichte der Heidelberger Akademie. Philosophisch-historische Klasse).

27. Strobel, Das Narrenschiff, pp. 5ff., and Zarncke, p. xxii: “Ego equidem non modo non poetam me esse usquam praedicavi, sed ne poetriae quidem discipulum.”

28. Zarncke, p. 186.

29. Strobel, Beiträge zur deutschen Litteratur und Litterärgeschichte, p. 37, and Zarncke, pp. 154ff.: “Nit lasz vom glauben dich abfüren, / Ob man davon will disputieren; / Sonder glaub schlecht einfeltiglich, / Wie die heilig Kürch thut lehren dich. / Nimb dich der scharpffen Lehr nit an, / Die dein Vernunfft nit mag verstahn. / Das Schäfflin schwembt offt usz an Stad, / da der Helffant ertrinckht mitt schad, / Niemandts nachfragen soll zu gnow / dem glauben unnd seiner Ehefraw, / dasz es zu letst ihn nit gerauw.”

30. “Ich vörcht es kumen bald die tag / Das man me nuwer mär werd jnn / Dann uns gefall und sug zu synn. …”

Selected Bibliography

Heitz, P., ed. Des Sebastian Brant Flugblätter, ed., Franz Schultz (Strasbourg, 1915).

Das Narrenschiff. A. W. Strobel (Quedlinburg and Leipzig), 1839 [Bibliothek der gesamten deutschen National-literatur, 17].

Das Narrenschiff. Friedrich Zarncke (Leipzig, 1854), pp. 267ff.

Schmidt, C. Histoire littéraire de l'Alsace, I (Paris, 1879), 189-333 (Bibliography, II, 340-73).

Strobel, A. W. “Einige Nachrichten über Sebastian Brants Lebensumstände und Schriften,” In Beiträge zur deutschen Litteratur und Litterärgeschichte (Paris and Strasbourg), 1827.

Zarncke, F. Zur Vorgeschichte des Narrenschiffs: 1. Mitteilung in Serapeum XXIX (1868), 49-54; 2. Mitteilung: Leipzig, 1871.

Zeydel, E. H. “Notes on Sebastian Brant's Narrenschiff,” Modern Language Notes, LVIII (1943), 340-46.

———. “Some Literary Aspects of Sebastian Brant's Narrenschiff,” Studies in Philology, XLII (1945), 21-30.