Chapter V: Appendix

NOTE ON THE "ORDO VAGORUM" AND THE "ARCHIPOETA."

_See Section vii. pp. 16-23, above._

It seems desirable that I should enlarge upon some topics which I treated somewhat summarily in Section vii. I assumed that the Wandering Scholars regarded themselves as a kind of Guild or Order; and for this assumption the Songs Nos. 1, 2, 3, translated in Section xiii. are a sufficient warrant. Yet the case might be considerably strengthened. In the _Sequentia falsi evangelii secundum marcam argenti_[36] we read of the _Gens Lusorum_ or Tribe of Gamesters, which corresponds to the _Secta Decii_,[37] the _Ordo Vagorum_, and the _Familia Goliae_. Again, in Wright's _Walter Mapes_[38] there is an epistle written from England by one Richardus Goliardus to _Omnibus in Gallia Goliae discipulis_, introducing a friend, asking for information _ordo vester qualis est_, and giving for the reason of this request _ne magis in ordine indiscrete vivam_. He addresses his French comrades as _pueri Goliae_, and winds up with good wishes for the _socios sanctae confratriae_. Proofs might be multiplied that the Wandering Students in Germany also regarded themselves as a confraternity, with special rules and ordinances. Of this, the curious parody of an episcopal letter, issued in 1209 by _Surianus, Praesul et Archiprimas_, to the _vagi clerici_ of Austria, Styria, Bavaria, and Moravia is a notable example.[39]

I have treated Golias as the eponymous hero of this tribe, the chief of this confraternity. But it ought to be said that the name Golias occurs principally in English MSS., where the Goliardic poems are ascribed to _Golias Episcopus._ Elsewhere the same personage is spoken of as _Primas_, which is a title of dignity applying to a prelate with jurisdiction superior even to that of an archbishop. Grimm[40] quotes this phrase from a German chronicle: _Primas vagus multos versus edidit magistrates_. In the _Sequentia falsi evangelii_[41] we find twice repeated _Primas autem qui dicitur vilissimus_. The Venetian codex from which Grimm drew some of his texts[42] attributes the _Dispute of Thetis and Lyaeus_ and the _Advice against Matrimony_, both of which passed in England under the name of Golias and afterwards of Walter Map, to _Primas Presbyter_.

With regard to this Primas, it is important to mention that Fra Salimbene in his Chronicle[43] gives a succinct account of him under the date 1233. It runs as follows: _Fuit his temporibus Primas canonicus eoloniensis, magnus trutannus et magnus trufator, et maximus versificator et velox, qui, si dedisset cor suum ad diligendum Deum, magnus in litteratura divina fuisset, et utilis valde_ _Ecclesiae Dei. Cujus Apocalypsim, quam fecerat, vidi, et alia scripta plura_. After this passage follow some anecdotes, with quotations of verses extemporised by Primas, and lastly the whole of the Confession, translated by me at p. 55 above. Thus Salimbene, who was almost a contemporary author, attributes to Primas two of the most important poems which passed in England under the name of Golias, while the Venetian MS. ascribes two others of the same class to Primas Presbyter. It is also very noteworthy that Salimbene expressly calls this Primas a Canon of Cologne.

That this poet, whoever he was, had attained to celebrity in Italy (as well as in Germany) under the title of Primas, appears also from the following passage of a treatise by Thomas of Capua[44] on the Art of Writing: _Dictaminum vero tria sunt genera auctoribus diffinita, prosaicum scilicet, metricum et rithmicum; prosaicum ut Cassiodori, metricum ut Virgilii, rithmicum ut Primatis_. Boccaccio was in all probability referring to the same Primas in the tale he told about _Primasso_,[45] who is described as a man of European reputation, and a great and rapid versifier. It is curious that just as Giraldus seems to have accepted _Golias_ as the real name of this poet,[46] so Fra Salimbene, Thomas of Capua, and Boccaccio appear to use _Primas_ as a Christian name.

The matter becomes still more complicated when we find, as we do, some of the same poems attributed in France to Walter of Lille, in England to Walter Map, and further current under yet another title of dignity, that of _Archipoeta_.[47]

We can hardly avoid the conclusion that by Golias Episcopus, Primas, and Archipoeta one and the same person, occupying a prominent post in the Order, was denoted. He was the head of the Goliardic family, the Primate of the Wandering Students' Order, the Archpoet of these lettered minstrels. The rare excellence of the compositions ascribed to him caused them to be spread abroad, multiplied, and imitated in such fashion that it is now impossible to feel any certainty about the personality which underlay these titles.

Though we seem frequently upon the point of touching the real man, he constantly eludes our grasp. Who he was, whether he was one or many, remains a mystery. Whether the poems which bear one or other of his changing titles were really the work of a single writer, is also a matter for fruitless conjecture. We may take it for granted that he was not Walter Map; for Map was not a Canon of Cologne, not a follower of Reinald von Dassel, not a mark for the severe scorn of Giraldus. Similar reasoning renders it more than improbable that the Golias of Giraldus, the Primas of Salimbene, and the petitioner to Reinald should have been Walter of Lille.[48]

At the same time it is singular that the name of Walter should twice occur in Goliardic poems of a good period. One of these is the famous and beautiful lament:--

"Versa est in luctum--eithara Waltheri."

This exists in the MS. of the _Carmina Burana_, but not in the Paris MS. of Walter's poems edited by Mueldner.

It contains allusions to the poet's ejection from his place in the Church--a misfortune which actually befell Walter of Lille. Grimm has printed another poem, _Saepe de miseria,_ in which the name of Walter occurs.[49] It is introduced thus:

"Hoc Gualtherus sub-prior
Jubet in decretis."

Are we to infer from the designation _Sub-prior_ that the Walter of this poem held a post in the Order inferior to that of the Primas?

It is of importance in this connection to bear in mind that five of the poems attributed in English MSS. to Golias and Walter Map, namely, _Missus sum in vineam_, _Multiformis hominum_, _Fallax est et mobilis_, _A tauro torrida_, _Heliconis rivulo_, _Tanto viro locuturi_, among which is the famous Apocalypse ascribed by Salimbene to Primas, are given to Walter of Lille in the Paris MS. edited by Mueldner.[50] They are distinguished by a marked unity of style; and what is also significant, a lyric in this Paris MS., _Dum Gualterus aegrotaret_, introduces the poet's name in the same way as the _Versa est in luctum_ of the _Carmina Burana_. Therefore, without identifying Walter of Lille with the Primas, Archipoeta, and Golias, we must allow that his place in Goliardic literature is very considerable. But I am inclined to think that the weight of evidence favours chiefly the ascription of serious and satiric pieces to his pen. It is probable that the Archipoeta, the follower of Reinald von Dassel, the man who composed the most vigorous Goliardic poem we possess, and gave the impulse of his genius to that style of writing, was not the Walter of the _Versa est in luctum_ or of _Dum Gualterus aegrotaret_. That Walter must have been somewhat his junior; and it is not unreasonable to assume that he was Walter of Lille, who may perhaps be further identified with the _Gualtherus sub-prior_ of the poem on the author's poverty. This Walter's Latin designation, _Gualtherus de Insula_, helps, as I have observed above,[51] to explain the attribution of the Goliardic poems in general to Walter Map by English scribes of the fifteenth century.

After all, it is safer to indulge in no constructive speculations where the matter of inquiry is both vague and meagre. One thing appears tolerably manifest; that many hands of very various dexterity contributed to form the whole body of songs which we call Goliardic. It is also clear that the Clerici Vagi considered themselves a confraternity, and that they burlesqued the institutions of a religious order, pretending to honour and obey a primate or bishop, to whom the nickname of Golias was given at the period in which they flourished most. Viewed in his literary capacity, this chief was further designated as the Archpoet. Of his personality we know as little as we do of that of Homer.

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote 36: Grimm's _Gedichte des Mittelalters_, p. 232.]

[Footnote 37: _Carm. Bur._, p. 254.]

[Footnote 38: Page 69.]

[Footnote 39: Giesebrecht in _Allg. Monatschrift_. Jan. 1853. p. 35.]

[Footnote 40: Op. cit., p. 182.]

[Footnote 41: Ib., p. 232.]

[Footnote 42: Ib., pp. 238, 239.]

[Footnote 43: Published at Parma, 1857.]

[Footnote 44: See Novati, _Carmina Medii Aevi_, p. 8, note.]

[Footnote 45: _Decameron_, i, 7.]

[Footnote 46: See above, p. 21.]

[Footnote 47: Grimm, op. cit., p. 189 et seq.]

[Footnote 48: Giesebrecht identifies Walter of Lille with the Archipoeta. But he seems to be unacquainted with Salimbene's Chronicle, and I agree with Hubatsch that he has not made out his point.]

[Footnote 49: Op. cit., p. 235, also in _Carm. Bur._, p. 74.]

[Footnote 50: Hannover, 1859.]

[Footnote 51: Page 23.]

BOOKS ON GOLIARDIC LITERATURE.

Carmina Burana. Stuttgart. 1847.

Thomas Wright. The Latin Poems commonly attributed to Walter Mapes.
Camden Society. 1841.
---- Anecdota Literaria. London. 1844.
---- Early Mysteries, etc. London. 1844.

Edelstand du Meril. Poesies Populaires Latines Anterieures au Douzieme
Siecle. Paris. 1843.
---- Poesies Populaires Latines du Moyen Age. Paris. 1847.
---- Poesies Inedites du Moyen Age. Paris. 1854.

Jacob Grimm. Gedichte des Mittelalters auf Koenig Friedrich I., den
Staufer. Berlin. 1843.

H. Hagen. Carmina Medii Aevi Max. Part. Inedita. Bern. 1877.

F. Novati. Carmina Medii Aevi. Firenze. 1883.

Mone. Anzeiger, vii.

W. Mueldener. Die Zehn Gedichte von Walther von Lille. Hannover. 1859,

Champollion-Figeac. Hilarii Versus et Ludi. Paris. 1838.

Gaudeamus. Leipzig. 1879.

Carmina Clericorum. Heilbronn. 1880.

A.P. Von Baernstein. Carmina Burana Selecta. 1880.
---- Ubi sunt qui ante nos? Wuertzburg. 1881.

Giesebrecht. Die Vaganten. Allg. Monatscrift fuer W. und K. 1853.

O. Hubatsch. Die Lateinischen Vagantenlieder. Goerlitz. 1870.

A. Bartoli. I Precursori del Rinascimento, Firenze. 1876.

Allgemeines Deutsches Commersbuch.

TABLE OF SONGS TRANSLATED IN THIS VOLUME.

N.B.--In order to facilitate the comparison between my translations and the originals, I have made the following table. The first column gives the number of the song and the second the page in this book; the third column gives the beginning of each song in English; the fourth gives the beginning of each song in Latin. The references in the fifth column are to the little anthology called _Gaudeamus_ (Leipzig, Teubner, 1879); those in the sixth column are to the printed edition of the Benedictbeuern Codex, which goes by the title of _Carmina Burana_ (Stuttgart, auf Kosten das Literarischen Vereins, Hering & Co. printers, 1847).

+-------------------------------------------------------------------+
|No.|Page.| English. | Latin. |Gaud.|Car. |
| | | | | |Bur. |
+---+-----+------------------------+--------------------+-----+-----+
| | | | |Page |Page |
| 1 | 42 | At the mandate | Cum in orbem | 3 | 251 |
| 2 | 47 | Once, it was | Olim nostrum | 6 | .. |
| 3 | 50 | I a wandering | Exul ego | 178 | 50 |
| 4 | 52 | We in our | Nos vagabunduli | 195 | .. |
| 5 | 55 | Boiling in my | Aestuans | 34 | 67 |
| 6 | 63 | Spring is coming | Ver redit | 88 | 178 |
| 7 | 64 | These hours of | Tempus est | 100 | 211 |
| 8 | 66 | Take your pleasure | Congaudentes | 90 | 166 |
| 9 | 67 | Winter's untruth | Vetus error | 86 | .. |
|10 | 68 | Winter, now | Cedit hiems | 85 | 177 |
|11 | 69 | Now the fields | Jam jam virent | 89 | 184 |
|12 | 70 | Spring returns | Ecce gratum | 84 | 83 |
|13 | 71 | Vernal hours | Vernum tempus | 81 | .. |
|14 | 72 | Hail thou | Salve ver | .. | 193 |
|15 | 74 | Summer sweet | Dum aestas | 97 | 196 |
|16 | 75 | The blithe young year | Anni novi | .. | 145 |
|17 | 76 | Now the sun | Omnia sol | 109 | 177 |
|18 | 77 | In the spring | Veris dulcis | .. | 195 |
|19 | 78 | With so sweet | De pollicito | 103 | 206 |
|20 | 79 | Wide the lime-tree | Late pandit | .. | 185 |
|21 | 80 | Yonder choir of | Ecce chorus | .. | 118 |
|22 | 82 | Meadows bloom | Virent prata | 98 | 189 |
|23 | 84 | Cast aside | Omittamus studia | 82 | 137 |
|24 | 87 | There went out | Exiit diluculo | 120 | 155 |
|25 | 87 | In the summer's | Aestivali sub | 125 | 145 |
|26 | 89 | All the woods | Florent omnes | 93 | 182 |
|27 | 91 | When the lamp | Dum Dianae | .. | 124 |
|28 | 95 | In the spring-time | Anni parte | .. | 155 |
|29 | 99 | On their steeds | Equitabant | .. | 162 |
|30 |106 | Take thou | Suscipe Flos | .. | 217 |
|31 |107 | Come to me | Veni veni | 102 | 208 |
|32 |109 | Lydia bright | Lydia bella | 96 | .. |
|33 |111 | When a young man | Si puer cum | 116 | 215 |
|34 |112 | Rudely blows | Saevit aurae | .. | 148 |
|35 |114 | Love rules | Amor tenet | 91 | 150 |
|36 |117 | List, my girl | Non contrecto | 118 | 150 |
|37 |118 | Think no evil | Ludo cum | 104 | 151 |
|38 |120 | With song I | Sic mea fata | 117 | 229 |
|39 |121 | False the tongue | Lingua mendax | 111 | 230 |
|40 |124 | A mortal anguish | Humor letalis | 114 | 169 |
|41 |127 | Up to this time | Huc usque | 119 | .. |
|42 |129 | Oh, of love | O comes | .. | 225 |
|43 |130 | Sweet native | Dulce solum | 110 | 168 |
|44 |132 | Oh, my father | Hecs pater | 175 | 172 |
|45 |136 | Wine the good | Vinum bonum | 17 | .. |
|46 |137 | In dulci jubilo | In dulci jubilo | 201 | .. |
[52]|47 |139 | Ho all ye | .... | .. | .. |
|48 |140 | Laurel-crowned | Lauriger Horatius | 74 | .. |
|49 |141 | Sweet in | Dulce cum | 74 | .. |
|50 |142 | Ho! comrades | O consacii | 87 | 198 |
|51 |144 | Laying truth bare | Denudata | 57 | 232 |
|52 |151 | Topers in and | Potatores | 27 | 240 |
|53 |154 | Time was | Olim latus | 188 | 173 |
|54 |155 | While a boor | Rusticus dum | 189 | .. |
|55 |158 | I am the Abbot | Ego sum Abbas | 73 | 254 |
[53]|56 |159 | Hear, O thou | Audi Tellus | .. | .. |
|57 |161 | While life's | Dum juventus | 135 | 8 |
|58 |162 | This vile world | Iste mundus | .. | 5 |
|59 |164 | De contemptu | Scribere proposni | 129 | .. |
|60 |165 | Let us live then | Gaudeamus igitur | 1 | .. |
+-------------------------------------------------------------------+

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote 52: The original of this song will be found in Geiger, _Humanismus und Renaissance_, p. 414.]

[Footnote 53: The original will be found in Moll, _Hymnarium_, p. 138.]