Heinrichlied: the Discovery

The beginning of the friendship between Adalbert Kehr and Joseph Konrad Josephson is easy to understand: they were both young men full of fiery dreams, immersed in dusty old books. Kehr, fresh from his studies in philology at the University of Marburg, found himself a lonely government post at an old abbey in Silesia, a tedious clerkship which he enlivened by exploring the abbey's old library; Josephson, who was already beginning to introduce himself as Konrad Joseph, had just taken over his father's used book stall in Munich (he quickly moved the Judaica to a back room), and had hopes of making his shop the center of Munich's revolutionary community.

They met in Gotha in 1875, at the conference where the ADAV of Ferdinand Lasalle merged with the SDAP of Bebel and Liebknecht to become the the SAPD, Sozialistische Arbeiterpartei Deutschlands, the Socialist Workers' Party of Germany, the soon-to-be outlawed ancestor of today's German Socialists.

The two young men had little to do with the actual business of the conference--Kehr had simply traveled on his own to Gotha, and Josephson's role was only slightly more official--he was the self-appointed representative of the tiny SDAP cell in Munich. Thrilled simply to be there, they watched the conference from the margins, where their friendship blossomed. They listened respectfully to the grizzled veterans of 1848, they argued about Stirner and Feuerbach, and they recapitulated, over many beers, the debates between the Eisenachers and the Lassaleans. One night, as the conference was drawing to a close, they staged a impromptu skit they called "The Love Life and Death of Ferdinand Lassale." Kehr, putting on a monocle and an debonair attitude, played Lassale, and Josephson, wrapping himself in a series of scarves, played several countesses and daughters of conservative diplomats, not to mention their husbands and fathers. The skit, performed in a beer-hall basement, was well-received by its audience, primarily a contingent of Marxist miners from Cologne. Their fiction ended, unlike history, with Lassale winning all his duels and deposing the aristocracy--only to die by the knife of a jealous mistress, in bed, a climactic moment in several ways.

After the skit, Kehr heard one of the miners remark to another that there was nothing he liked better than watching little Jews make fun of big Jews. Kehr had no idea what the fellow was talking about.

The next morning they both left Gotha, laughing about their hangovers, and promising to correspond.

There is no doubt that Kehr was the lonelier of the pair. More than a hundred years later, when Roger McManus read their letters, he could feel the emptiness of Grüssau Abbey in every page, every long dense page that Kehr wrote. The old Benedictine abbey had been secularized decades earlier, during the Napoleonic wars, and had become, by the time Adalbert Kehr arrived, an outpost of the Prussian bureaucracy. The church itself, under a dour pastor, served the spiritual needs, such as they were, of the local farmers, while the other buildings remained largely unoccupied, except for one office, where Kehr was expected to monitor both the agricultural and the mineralogical production of the region. The local lead mines having closed down some years before, Kehr's duties included the preparation of weekly reports filled with row after row of zeroes, a task in which his predecessor had taken much pride, working late into the evening nearly every night of the week. The study of philology has many benefits, however, including a dramatic improvement in the speed of one's hand, and Kehr, armed with a new "reservoir pen" imported from England, found that he was able to acquit himself of his official charge in an hour or two each day, except for harvest season, when there was some actual work to be done. Which left Adalbert Kehr, most days, with fourteen waking hours of idleness, and no one to talk to, except the narrow-minded pastor, and the parishioners, who regarded him as something between a cop and a spy.

Luckily, there was an abbey to explore. Kehr found room after room of old books, boxes, papers, records of who knows what. Most were from the last thirty years or so--in one room, Kehr found the carefully bound reports of his predecessor, looking as if they had never been read, which was sad, in a way, but only to be expected. In another room he found diplomatic dispatches, sent from various embassies to Berlin apparently, all dated in the months leading up to the recent war with the French--had they been moved here during the war for safekeeping? And then forgotten?

And occasionally--it seemed always to be behind a stack of the most dreary governmental reports imaginable--Kehr would find something that seemed to be older, a book in Latin, or a vellum scroll, or a sheet of music, that gave him hope that he might have found a fragment, a trace, some palimpsest of the old library of the Benedictines.

After his return from Gotha, Kehr, strangely energized, set himself an ambitious task: to sort and organize the contents of Grüssau Abbey. His first letters to Joseph Konrad Josephson were filled with an almost heroic sense of mission--even to the point of comparing his work, with only a hint of ironic self-deprecation, to the fifth Labor of Hercules. Soon, unlike Hercules (who cleansed the Augean stables in a single day) but much like his clerical predecessor, Kehr found himself working late each night, moving, stacking, sorting, reading, and indexing room after room of documents. In one overflowing room he put all the agricultural and mineralogical production reports; another he filled with railroad switching schedules, and a third with proposals for sewage systems. Soon there were rooms devoted to forestry maps, overdue bridge maintenance notices, textile production quotas, and complaints about the telegraph service. In a very large room, chosen precisely for its leaky roof and moldy floor, Kehr put the innumerable files of the all the young men who had emigrated to America to escape the Prussian draft. He found a good dry room for the diplomatic dispatches (how he hoped they would embarrass someone someday!), a better room for the sheets of handwritten music that seemed to be scattered promiscuously among nearly every other kind of document, and he saved the best location of all, a dry cool cellar under what seemed like the old priory, for anything that seemed older than the First Silesian War.

Even Roger McManus, reading of these exertions more than a century later, was touched by tenderness with which Adalbert Kehr described his reconstruction, in that secret cellar, of the Benedictine library: in a typical letter, Kehr would acknowledge, quickly, the reports of Joseph Konrad Josephson's busy life as a radical entrepreneur in Munich; decline, politely, the invitation to critique his friend's latest attempt to reconcile Marx and Proudhon; and then would fill page after page with reverential inventories of Latin bibles, illuminated manuscripts, annales, and most exciting of all, the occasional fragment of Middle High German verse.

And then, in one letter, there was no small talk at all, no acknowledgment of Josephson's world, let alone his previous letter: Kehr simply announced his discovery of the the Heinrichlied, a manuscript in exquisitely balanced nibelungenstrophes, an epic poem that embodied a rare conjunction of artist and subject--and unknown poet of genius and hero of equal rank: Henry IV, Holy Roman Emperor.

The Song of Henry

In 1992 Roger McManus, an appraiser of rare books based in Victoria, British Columbia, published The Song of Henry: A Modern English Translation of the Heinrichlied, Germany's Forgotten National Epic, a vigorous and sometimes bawdy account of the reign of Holy Roman Emperor Henry IV, who beat back the pernicious influence of the Catholic Church and forged the kingdom that became the modern nation-state of Germany.

In numerous interviews and live appearances McManus told reporters and book buyers the same intriguing story: how his translation was based, in turn, on an unpublished 19th Century translation, into modern German prose, of the now-lost 11th century verse; how he had discovered the German text among the possessions of Jakob Josephson, one of the founders of Victoria's Jewish community; and how McManus still felt a bond with the Josephson family, despite the recent legal problems, because they had once owned a bookstore in Munich--an antiquarian bookstore--exactly the sort of shop McManus himself wished someday to own.

McManus would tell how the Josephson family had closed the bookstore and left Munich in 1924, shortly after the Beer Hall Putsch, which McManus would describe with just enough detail to ignite a glimmer of fear in the mind of his audience. He would tell how the move to Canada had broken the heart of Jakob's father, Joseph Konrad Josephson, an atheist, anarchist, Wagnerian, and ardent German nationalist--a fully assimilated and secular Jew who had always dismissed the antisemitism of his comrades and neighbors with a shrug; how this Joseph Konrad Josephson (in the Munich book business, not surprisingly, he had called himself Konrad Joseph) had died on May 12, 1925, one week after his first glimpse of the Pacific Ocean, on the same day that Paul Von Hindenburg became President of Germany; and how the family had kept a box of Konrad Joseph's papers hidden in an attic, where they developed a shameful reputation, whispered among the younger generations, as "Grandpa Joseph's Nazi papers"--though of course Joseph Konrad Josephson was never and could never have been a Nazi--and not simply because he was a Jew, McManus would say, but because he was an idealist, like Wagner, and idealism, however deluded, should never be a source of shame.

Then McManus would tell how Joseph's son Jakob, who led the family to Canada (and not incidentally, back into observant Judaism), decided to get out of bookselling and established the family instead in the far less controversial trade of printing. With a sigh McManus would explain how the sale of the printing business in 1984 to a Swedish conglomerate (by then Josephson Graphics specialized in the high-speed production of four-color mail-order catalogues) had brought some wealth and much dissension to the extended Josephson family; and how McManus, ignorant at the time of this complex family history, had been called in after the death of Jakob, at age 91, to appraise the dusty attic where were stored the remnants of Konrad Joseph's Munich bookstore.

Those old books were fascinating, absolutely fascinating, but unfortunately, in the professional opinion of McManus, they possessed more historical interest than market value, so he helped arrange a donation to the German Studies department of a Lutheran college in Nebraska, which proved to be a wise tax strategy for those members of Jakob's family who had settled in the United States--at this point McManus would offer, in apologetic tones, a joke about "mentioning the U.S. tax code in polite conversation." As the laughter subsided McManus would sadly tell his audience that it was these same cousins, the "American Josephsons," who had later brought a lawsuit against him, a matter he could not discuss, on the advice of his attorney.

But McManus could say, because the world needed to know, that he had been given, by three of Jakob's four daughters, the chest of Konrad Joseph's "Nazi" papers. The three daughters had insisted on two conditions: first, that he destroy the contents, and second--

McManus had stopped the daughters right there: "You do not hire an appraiser to be a garbageman," he had said. "You know that I will read and study everything in that chest. I will take detailed notes."

The daughters had nodded their heads. "You may keep your notes," they said. "But eventually," they insisted, "you must destroy everything that is in this chest."

McManus had reluctantly agreed, and asked about the second condition.

"That if you discover anything that shows our grandfather to be a Nazi collaborator, you will never mention it to a living soul."

Then McManus would proudly tell his audience that he had kept both promises. On the day before the first review copies of "The Song of Henry" were sent, by overnight courier, to the critics, he had shredded, and then burned, in an industrial furnace, every last paper from the chest. And as for the second condition, that was easy: there were no secrets to keep, for the papers had showed that Joseph Konrad Josephson had hated the Nazis as much as he loved Germany.

At this point an astute reporter, or a dyspeptic member of the audience, might ask McManus how the public could know if he were not keeping his second promise right now: by lying to protect the name of Konrad Joseph, or Joseph Konrad Josephson, or whatever his name was.

McManus would respond with another joke: "Well it seems that one way or another, I must be honest man!"

Bertha Disbands the Rabbit Warriors with a Kiss

Speyer, Bischofhaus, All Souls Day, 1076

Are we in the Bischofhaus in Speyer? Is the bishop's house the place where the Salian emperors, Conrad and his son Henry and his son Henry, accompanied by their entourage, always stay when they visit their favorite church, Dom zu Speyer, the largest cathedral in Christendom, if you don't count Byzantium? Do the emperors always tell the bishop that one of these days they will build themselves a palace, a proper Kaiserpfalz, here in Speyer? Do the bishops always reply that it is no burden, none whatsoever, indeed it is an honor, to host the imperial cortege?

Where has Henry been for the past two weeks? Has he been camping in Oppenheim, across the river from Tribur, where the princes of Germany have assembled to discuss what to do about King Henry and the Pope, who has imprisoned the king in the damp dungeon of anathema, or the political equivalent thereof, a campsite in Oppenheim, on the other side of the Rhine?

Has Henry's host and good friend, Rüdiger, the bishop of Speyer, been the go-between in the awkward negotiations, ferrying back and forth across the melodious Rhine, Tribur to Oppenheim, Oppenheim to Tribur, between the excommunicated king and the devout princes of Germany, so anxious to avoid contamination of their souls?

And now, at last, has the Fürstentag, the Parliament of Princes, come to an end?

Does our scene begin with Bertha of Savoy, Henry's delicate queen, organizing her household for the move back to Goslar? Are we in the bishop's kitchen? Who is there? Is that Bruno, the Saxon monk? Is he still hanging around the royal family? Shouldn't he go back to Rome, or at least back to his monastery? Who is toddling around the floor, trying to chase a cat? Is that Conrad, the little Duke of Lower Lotharingia? Who catches Conrad as he scoots by, and chastens him with an affectionate tickle? Is that Eustacia, Bertha's serva vecchia, the beloved maidservant who was Bertha's own nanny it seems so many years ago? And who is that other woman, so heavy but so sure of herself in this kitchen? Who else could she be but the bishop's cook?

Does a hunchbacked beggar come to the door, asking for alms or a meal? Does Bruno take charge for a moment, as the only adult male present, and shoo the beggar away? Does he then complain to Bertha that their host, the bishop, is far too permissive, that he has allowed the beggars of Speyer too much freedom and familiarity, too much access, in short, to his kitchen door and the scraps of his table? Does Eustacia begin to tease Bruno? Does she ask him why he doesn't like the bishop? Because the bishop is too good? Too rich? Too successful? Too handsome? Does the bishop's cook join in the teasing? Or does she just smile and watch, her hands upon her hips?

What does Bertha do as Bruno blushes? Does she smile serenely at his discomfort, giving him hope one moment and despair the next?

Is it now that Rüdiger returns? Does he appear at the doorway of the kitchen, in the company of the hunchbacked beggar, for whom he orders his cook to prepare a meal? Does the bishop's cook, with a mocking look at Bruno, take the beggar into one of the side kitchens? Is the Bischofhaus so grand that it has kitchens within its kitchens? Does Eustacia discreetly take Conrad away, saying It's time for his nap? Does she give a sharp look at Bruno, as if to say, You too, you should make up some excuse to leave Bertha alone with the bishop? Is her wrinkled old face expressive enough to convey such a complex message without words? Does Bruno reluctantly do what she has suggested? Does he stammer and say I must go to my room and pray? Does he look over his shoulder, longingly, as he departs?

When they are alone, does Bertha thank Rüdiger for his hospitality? Is he a handsome, athletic, yet scholarly man? Does he have the grace and self-confidence of someone with large private fortune who has devoted himself to good works? Is he exactly the sort of man she would be attracted to, if she were not hopelessly in love with husband, the king?

Does Bruno find a nook in the next room, and seclude himself there, listening?

Does Bertha tell Rüdiger that her family will be leaving now, and returning to Goslar? Does Rüdiger tell Bertha that he is afraid she must remain here at Speyer, but of course his hospitality will continue with unabated pleasure? How does Bertha react to this news?

How about the eavesdropping Bruno? What does he think of remaining here in Speyer, in the house of the handsome bishop? Can we see his reaction through the shadows that fall dramatically upon his hidden face? Or do we deduce his emotion from our intimate knowledge of his character and motivations? Or from the graphic properties of the moody shadows?

Does Bertha ask Rüdiger what he means when he says, must remain?

Does Rüdiger explain that Henry has signed an agreement with the Princes of Germany? Does he say it's called the Promise of Oppenheim, and that among its provisions--

Is Rüdiger interrupted, at that very moment, by the sound of King Henry arriving? Does Henry come in through the front door of the Bischofhaus with his advisors? Are the Rabbit Warriors following him, tentatively, and in some confusion? Does Bertha rush from the kitchen to see what is going on? As she hurries to the Great Hall, does she pass Bruno, in his hidey nook? Does she look at him with puzzlement, but only for a moment? Does the brevity of her glance break his heart? Can we see it in his face? How long do we linger on this delicate moment, a man realizing just how unrequited is his love, now that a noisy angry king has stomped into the next room?

Or does Bertha hurry past Bruno, never even seeing his face in the shadows?

When Bertha, followed by Rüdiger, enters the Great Hall, is Henry denouncing his advisors for betraying him? Is he saying that he will go to war, tomorrow--that he will attack the Pope! the Saxons! the Bavarians! the Thuringians! the godless Saracens! and even those insufferable Byzantines! all at once? Is Henry saying he will soon be the only Roman Emperor? Does Henry boast that he will be the new Alexander, king of the known world?

Does Henry even know who Alexander the Great was?

Are Henry's advisors protesting feebly against the king's ragings? Do they whimper this war would be suicidal, mad, doomed? Who are these advisors? Does Bertha know them? Does she recognize her old friend Count Udalric, and Bishop Rupert of Bamberg, and that Otto, the one who is Bishop of Constance, not the one who is Bishop of Regensburg? Has Bertha ever been able to tell the two Ottos apart?

Has the entire household now gathered around the edges of the Great Hall to watch the spectacle of the king's tantrum? Are little Conrad and Eustacia looking down from the balcony? Are the cook, the hunchbacked beggar, and Bruno the Mendicant peaking from the hallway that leads to the kitchen? What combination of pity, terror, awe and disdain does each of them feel?

Does Bertha whisper a question to Bishop Rüdiger? Is she asking him what has happened to make her husband so upset? Does he reply, his lips close to her ear, that Henry has agreed to give up his army and wait patiently in Speyer until the Assembly at Augsburg, the one where the princes will be joined by the Pope, and now, after the long ride home and a few drinks at a nearby inn, Henry has worked himself into a fury, at himself and his advisors, because he cannot bring himself to disband the Rabbit Warriors, his brethren of the battlefield?

Does Bertha nod her head in quiet understanding? Does she know what she must do?

Does she step forward, crossing the fray, walking heedlessly between invective-spewing king and wheedling defensive cleric? Does she continue on, without acknowledging either husband or bishop, and approach one of the Rabbit Warriors, who is standing uncomfortably against a wall?

Is it Immanuel, the smallest of the Rabbit Warriors, known in his language as Schwager, the God-Who-Is-With-Us? Does she quietly, but not whispering, no, her voice is soft but clear, thank Immanuel for his brave service? Does she kiss him on his rough cheek and wish him well?

Does she do the same for the other Rabbit Warriors? For Florianus, known as Schulze the Flower-of-Manhood? For Andrius, known as Ruck the Strong? For Phillipus, known as Geng the Horse-Lover? For Stephanus, known as Grahlert the Garland-Headed? And for Benecius, the largest of Rabbit Warriors, known far and wide as Feller the Blessed? Does she thank each one, and kiss each one on his rough cheek?

Do they each, in response to her soft kiss, kneel humbly before her?

Does Henry fall silent at her display of quiet dignity? Do the assembled bishops bow their heads in reverence at her courtly ritual? Does Eustacia pat Conrad's hair, as if to say, That's your mother, you should be proud? Does the cook weep openly? Does the hunchbacked beggar suppress a tear? Does Bruno fall in love all over again, forgiving Bertha yet once more for barely noticing that he is alive?

And then, in solemn procession, one by one, do all the Rabbit Warriors stand and walk out the door, the Hasekrieger Alemanni, heroes of a bygone age who have each heard whispered in his ear the secret command of a beautiful queen? Does not their exit deserve a recessional composed for full orchestra by a great German composer, if only the world would survive long enough for German music to become the very paradigm of musical greatness?

And now, when the Rabbit Warriors are finally gone, does Bruno, wiping away his tears, catch Henry exchanging a conspiratorial glance with the hunchbacked beggar?

Or is Bruno just imagining things?

---

Next in the Main Story:
Road Under Construction
Next in Bertha's Tale:
Road Under Construction

Pont de l'Europe

We're off the autobahn now, heading on the B28 highway toward toward the Rhine river--and Strasbourg, France. You know something, I'm actually kind of excited about driving across a national boundary in contemporary Europe, now that it's all unified. I've never done it before, and I'm curious as to what actually happens. And I'm even more curious as to what Bruno and Lambert think of the unification of Europe. I tell the two monks what I know about the border situation, and how I expect we won't even have to stop when we go across Rhine into France.

"So how does that compare," I say, "to your experience? You know, the borders of 1076?"

"We don't worry about borders," comes a voice from the wayback seat. "My husband is King of the Romans."

It's Bertha. This is the first time she has spoken directly to me since we left Speyer. "Right," I say, jumping on the chance to get a conversation going. "Of course. But still, aren't there some--"

"My Enrico is also King of Germany, King of Burgundy, and King of Italy."

Enrico? Who's Enrico? Does she mean Henry...?

"And when we get to Canossa, the pope will anoint him Emperor."

"Absolutely," I say, trying to catch her eye in the rear view mirror. "But aren't there, you know, a lot of princes, dukes, counts, whatever, with their own territories, their own armies...?"

"My son is Duke of Lower Lotharingia," says Bertha. There's something final in her tone, as if Conrad's dukedom is all I need to know on the subject of rival principalities.

"That's great," I say, nodding my head. "You... uh... you must be proud of him...."

What the hell is Conrad is doing? I look around, as best I can, in the mirror. The Duke of whatever-it-is had better still be in his kindersitz!

"Lower Lotharingia," says Bruno, "is basically what you would call the Low Countries. That's--"

"I know what they are," I say. "Belgium, Netherlands, Luxembourg. Benelux."

"Very good!" says Lambert, his voice dripping with unctuous superiority, "Except that Luxembourg would be part of Upper Lotharingia."

Okay, I give up. We're going to stop in Strasbourg and get a hotel room. I'm going to get a good night's sleep before I try talking to these people again. How long has it been since I slept? really slept? not counting those semi-hallucinatory hours aboard the jumbo jet, half-dreaming yet excruciatingly aware of the passage of time? I'm too busy driving to figure it out.

As we get closer to the village of Kehl, the B28 highway follows a little river--I figure it must be a tributary of the Rhine, except that it looks more like a canal, sometimes even a drainage ditch. It's the the kind of waterway that the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers would love: dredged, routed, measured and rationalized. The little river's name? I have no idea. I see a sign or two, but I think better about asking Bruno or Lambert--the signs might mean "No Littering" or "Fishing Only for Senior Citizens" and I don't want to accumulate any more American Idiot points this afternoon.

Then we veer left, heading toward France. Around us sprawls the industrial fringe of Kehl--railyards and warehouses. Next thing I know we're crossing the Rhine--on a dreary old causeway that must be the Europa Brücke/Pont de l'Europe. For a symbol of peace, reconciliation and unity, the bridge is very utilitarian, even boring--it looks like it was rebuilt in a hurry at the end of World War II, which it probably was. There's a nice pedestrian bridge, though, one of those soaring Calatrava rip-offs--a few hundred meters to the south.

And then, just as I expected, it's clear sailing. The border crossing is like driving through those tollboths outside Chicago, where you don't need to stop--except it was even easier, because you don't need that thingey...

And then I see that something is wrong.

Burned out buildings.

Police tape.

Armed troops, with sub-machine guns, guarding workers boarding up smashed windows.

"What the hell happened here?" I say.

"The anti-OTAN riots," says Lambert. "I think you call it NATO."

"Don't you watch TV?" says Bruno. "It happened last week. The Black Bloc anarchists set fire to the custom house during the summit."

I pull over to the first parking spot I can find.

"C'mon," I say. "You mean there were riots--buildings burning--right here--at this symbol of European unity?" I don't care how stupid I sound--I want to know.

"Like I said," says Bruno, "Don't you watch TV? Did you even know your president was here?"

"Of course I knew," I say. "It was all over the news. But I kept turning off the TV--it was all about Michelle Obama and Carla Bruni--their clothes, their make-up, their hair, whether they really got along or not..."

"American TV is fucking stupid." Once again, a female voice comes from the wayback seat. I look back. Now that we're parked, I can actually turn my head. Bertha has taken the Duke of Lower Lotharingia out of his kindersitz and holds him defiantly in her lap.

"I read about it in a magazine," says Bertha. "You have the second-stupidest TV shows in the world."

---

Next in Main Story:
Bertha Disbands the Rabbit Warriors with a Kiss
Next in the Blogger's Tale:
Road Under Construction

Europa Brücke

We're heading down the A5, south of Baden-Baden, planning to swing over to Strasbourg to meet Henry and his entourage, which apparently includes some vehicles that can't handle the 60 km/h minimum here on the autobahn. We missed Exit 51, I won't go into why exactly, so now what we're gonna do is take Exit 54-Appenweier to merge onto B28 toward Kehl. A few kilometers longer, no big deal.

Lambert, checking the GPS unit, reports that we will cross the Rhine on the the Europa Brücke. The Pont de l'Europe.

"What?" I say. "You mean we'll cross two bridges?"

Lambert looks at me like I'm an idiot. Bruno leans forward and fills me in. It's the same bridge, The Bridge of Europe, with two different names, in French and German. Bruno and Lambert don't actually laugh at me, but I can tell they're feeling mighty smug.

Okay guys, I think, clenching my teeth, if I had been able to look at the GPS myself, I would have figured it out right away. But hey, I'm driving this minivan! We're going 120k here, as I swing off the autobahn and onto B28. It just sounded like two different bridges, the way he said it, that's all.

"So its like a symbol," I say. "After all the wars between France and Germany...."

No response. I guess my comment is so obvious they can't think of anything to add....

---

Next in Main Story:
Henry Refuses to Become a Symbol
Next in the Blogger's Tale:
Pont de l'Europe

Henry Refuses to Become a Symbol

Source: Heinrichlied (Song of Henry), author unknown.

Now let us tell how Henry feasted at Utrecht, at the palace of William, the loyal Prince-Bishop of those lands, where Henry had come in haste to settle the succession of the fallen duke, Godfrey the Hunchback, who had been stabbed in the asshole while shitting. Boldly and fairly did Henry dispose of this matter, for he did name his own son, Conrad, to be the Duke of Lower Lotharingia, and he did also appoint a vice-duke to manage the Hunchback's lands, for Conrad was but two years of age, and not ready to battle against the West Frisians, which was part of the job description. The duchy secured, Henry called for a feast. There in the palace they did assemble, his loyal vassal lords and his brave fighting men, the Rabbit Warriors of the Alemanni, joined by a goodly assortment of German abbots and bishops, strong men all, who could eat and drink and service the kebsweiber, unlike the eunuchs who pass for clergy in Rome, except that at this particular feast there were no kebsweiber to be serviced, for it was Holy Saturday, and Henry had declared that holy weekend must be respected.

When the first pig had been consumed by the hungry virile assembly, Henry rose and bade them to postpone their drunkenness, for they had much to discuss. And straightaway, without wasting anyone's time, they did plow through the agenda, for Henry was a decisive leader, who knew how to run a meeting.

First they did discuss the whereabouts of the evil countess Matilda, the pope's whore, who had ventured into Lower Lotharingia to claim both her husband's body and his lands. Feller the Blessed of the Rabbit Warriors did then report that Matilda had retreated to Cluny, after burying her murdered husband in Verdun. Henry thereupon demanded to know whether Matilda had taken credit for her husband's murder. To this just and angry query from the King did Rupert, archbishop of Bamberg, reply. Rupert told how Matilda was spreading a most implausible rumor--that the honorable Robert of Flanders had ordered the foul deed--but that she was doing so in such manner, her sentences unfinished, her words saying one thing and her eyes another, her voice smooth as duck butter and her smile chilled as the winter night air, that all who heard her speak did know that she and the Pope had been the ones behind the cowardly blade.

Then did Henry demand a show of hands from all the clergy present, asking which of them would, at Easter mass tomorrow, denounce Hildebrand from the pulpit as a false Pope and smite him with the mighty sword of anathema, for having dared to excommunicate your beloved King who stands before you. As soon as Henry spoke did William, bishop of Utrecht raise his hand, for he was, after all, the gathering's host and Henry's most trusted advisor and in fact he was the one who had devised the plan to denounce the Pope on Easter from every pulpit in Germany, what a statement that would be! For a long moment the bold and upright arm of William reached alone toward heaven above the feasting multitude, but soon enough it was joined by the hands of Siegfried, archibishop of Mainz, Burchard, bishop of Lausanne, and the two Ottos, the one who was bishop of Regensburg and the other one, who was bishop of Constance. Finally did Pibo of Toul, who had been whispering something to Count Eberhardt, most timidly raise his hand.

Then did Henry call upon timorous Pibo, and ask him to share with the entire group whatever he had been whispering. And so did Pibo rise and tell all present how dire he thought the situation was and what he thought the King ought to do about it. For had not the Pope's power been growing throughout the land since he had first bludgeoned the King with the harsh rod of anathema? Then of the gathering at Augsburg did timid Pibo speak, reminding all present that it was scheduled for less than one year hence, and that all the princes of Germany, including the rebellious princes of Saxony and Bavaria and Thuringia, were planning to journey to Augsburg, there to meet with the Pope and convene under his blessing. The craven Pibo, insisting that he meant no disrespect, then asked if anyone present doubted that Augsurg promised to be the end of King Henry's reign, not to mention his very life? And thus, Pibo inquired, should not King Henry immediately attempt to go to Italy and meet with the Pope, there to make mortify himself and beg the Pope's absolution, in a place where the Pope would not be backed up by the armies of the Saxons?

Truth be told, this cowering Pibo, bishop of Toul, had a point. Even among the ferocious Rabbit Warriors there was nodding of heads. But then did King Henry silence the murmurs and doubts, with the following speech, generally regarded as a high point in the rhetorical history of his reign:

How would I be remembered, asked the King, were I to follow the advice of Pibo, bishop of Toul? In the memory of my children? Of my grandchildren? In the memory the world a thousand years hence? What would the people of that age think of the fourth Henry, king of the Romans? Let us pretend, for a moment, that in the memory of that age I did do what Pibo suggests. Let us pretend that I did go to Italy, that I did meet the Pope in one of his retreats, Lucca, perhaps, or one of the other castles kept by his whore Matilda. And there I did make penance, and did crawl on my knees, and did beg his absolution?

Now let us further pretend that by abasing myself so I saved my Kingdom, and outwitted the rebellious princes of Saxony and Bavaria and Thuringia, and that on that very day did the Pope anoint me Holy Roman Emperor, Imperator et Patricius, heir to the great Kaisers Augustus and Charlemagne? Let us even suppose, looking back from a thousand years hence, that my reign thereafter was glorious, that I did defeat the Normans in the Sicily and the Saracens in Jerusalem.

So how would I be remembered? How would the schoolboys of that distant age tell me apart from all the other Henrys who by then will have worn this crown?

I will tell you, Pibo. I will tell you how those schoolboys would remember me: they would remember only that the fourth Henry was the one who went to Lucca, or wherever, and crawled before the Pope. They will remember only that the power of empire knelt before the ambitions of a false monk. The name of Lucca, or whatever castle of the Lombard bitch it might be, will have become the symbol of my shame. They will mock me and spit upon my statues and say, if only Henry had been strong.

And so I say to you Pibo, cowardly bishop of Toul: No, that cannot be.

And the hall was silent then, for all were thinking of the glorious warlike deaths which awaited them and the honor they would have in heaven, despite what the Gregorians said about war and violence. And then did they drink, for they had much drunkenness to attain, and weak-shouldered Pibo did slip out without having another tankard, making some excuse about having to get to his cathedral in time for Easter morning mass.

When all were good and drunk, so drunk that one of the Rabbit Warriors of the Alemanni, Grahlert the Garland-Headed, was rebuking Henry for the lack of kebsweiber, with a familiarity born not of presumption or lack of discipline but from the bloody brotherhood of the battlefield, there did appear a beggar in their midst. Who is this beggar? asked Henry, but all around the Rabbit Warriors were too drunk to answer. Henry did then say to all, in his voice of command, which pierced through their drunkenness and would have sent them into battle if Henry had so desired, to be quiet for a moment and tell him who the beggar was. What beggar? said the Rabbit Warriors, with one impulse if not with one voice. That beggar, said Henry, that beggar right there.

Then they did all become quiet and look at the beggar, whose rags were most foul and whose frame was twisted and puny, which is the sort of thing a bold fighting man notices when he is drunk and told to look at a beggar.

But before anyone could approach him, the beggar stepped toward Henry and said, cousin, do you not know me? For I am Godfrey the Hunchback, your loyal vassal, and I say to you I am here, alive before you, and it is the assassin's body, not mine, that lies rotting in my grave.

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Next in Main Story:
Pont de l'Europe
Next in Henry's Tale:
Road Under Construction

Matilda Hears A Nasty Rumor

Scene: An inn outside the Abbey of Cluny. Date: April 1, 1076.

With feverish urgency, desperate to kneel beside Beatrice, her mother, who lies upon her final sickbed with only weeks to live, maybe days--who knows the hour except that it is coming soon!--Matilda of Canossa, countess of Tuscany, hurries home. She begs her men to let her ride all night, but they say no, it is too dangerous, the moon is hidden by the clouds and the army of King Henry might be waiting, like bandits, around the next bend. Reluctantly she agrees to stop at the Abbey of Cluny, that pleasant vale of holiness amid the violent hills of Burgundy.

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Hugh, the abbot, receives her with open arms. Matilda knows that Hugh, sometimes known as Hugo, or even Ugo, is the King's godfather, but such is piety of the Abbot, and the Abbey, that Matilda places herself in his protection with utter confidence. Hugh then does Matilda a great honor--he takes her inside the cloister, to the altar of the great church, so that she can pray to the Lord her God that He keep her mother alive until she returns home. Throughout the cloister the monks begin to buzz, not in actual words of course, for they have all taken vows of silence, but a buzz of involuntary murmurs and surprised breaths and rustling linen, not unlike the noise and chatter that will spread among the woodland creatures when the end of world approaches, for never in the memory of these holy monks has a woman entered the cloister. Matilda does not sense the buzzing, so intent is she upon her prayers, begging God that she might be permitted, one more time, to share the Holy Eucharist with her dear dying mother.

After her vespers, with a heart reconciled to God's plan, whatever that might be, Matilda retires to the little inn outside the Abbey, for a woman of Matilda's holiness and nobility would never dream of making her bed inside the cloister. The inn turns out to be a most pleasant place, with simple but charming amenities, which should not be surprising, for many queens and duchesses and marquesses have stayed there, while dropping off their younger sons at Cluny to begin their monkish careers. Two young girls, daughters of the inn-keeper, help Matilda to unpack and air out her things, and as night falls they bring her a lit candle and the quill from a freshly killed goose.

Her window faces a small courtyard. Matilda opens the shutters, and the heavy tallow smoke finds its way to the gentle night air. Matilda sits down to write a letter to Pope Gregory VII. Her quill moves rapidly: she tells her great friend of the delays and vexations that have beset her urgent journey, her concern for her dying mother, the hospitality at Cluny, and the last days of her husband, Godfrey the Hunchback, Duke of Lower Lotharingia. Though her tone is sombre, here she conveys a note of joy: for the Hunchback, inspired by her tender nursing, had repented of his opposition to the Pope just moments before his death.

Outside her window the girls are sweeping the courtyard, giggling as they work, making a game of their chores. Matilda listens, and smiles for a moment at their carefree yet dutiful lives.

Turning back to her letter she tells the Pope of the Hunchback's funeral in Verdun, and the intervention of the King in the inheritance of her husband's duchy. How selfless it is of Matilda to forget for a moment her own personal sorrows and concentrate instead on the great struggle of the day, the contest between the Pope and the reprobate King, her cousin! Her report on these matters is mixed: she has managed to keep the bishopric of Verdun in pro-papal hands, but the King has decided that the Duchy of Lower Lotharingia will go neither to her, the Hunchback's widow, nor to Godfrey of Buillion, his nephew and chosen heir, but to the King's own two-year-old son, Conrad.

The giggling of the girls outside catches her ear: now it seems secretive, whispered, almost naughty. Setting down her quill, Matilda goes to the window and listens. The older girl is telling her sister a story of some kind. With a start, Matilda realizes that the story is about herself.

She is the Pope's whore, says the older girl.

Her sister gasps.

She hired a man to kill her husband. Do you want to know how they did it? How they killed him? Do you really want to know?

From the window Matilda can see in the shadows the younger girl nodding, timid but eager. The older girl leans forward and whispers something softly in her ear. The young girl shrieks and jumps up.

No! They didn't!

Yes, they did! The cook told me!

Matilda quietly closes the shutters, and returns to the writing table. As the heavy tallow smoke fills the room, she asks the Pope to join her in prayer that the innocent child Conrad will not be corrupted by his father's evil ways.

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Next in Main Story:
Monastic Sign Language on the Autobahn
Next in Matilda's Tale:
Under Construction