Thus the tale, in its altered shape, henceforth continued—no longer, however, as a truly national, but rather as a local Thuringian one— until it was given national prominence once more, in our century, by Rückert. This was in 1816, after the overthrow of Napoleon's dominion, which had destroyed the old German Empire. Since then it has generally been believed that the mythic Man in the Kyffhäuser Mountain had always been identified, in the legend, with Barbarossa. But this is now shown to be an error. If we wanted to dig deeper in fabulous lore, some curious additional points might be given. One of the German folk-tales had it that some day a great battle would be fought on the Walser Field, where the famed withered tree-a pear tree-stands. On that tree the Kaiser was to hang his shield, and this battle was to herald in the World's End. A Twilight of the Gods, so to say, in heathen Teutonic prophecy. The bad are to be annihilated by the good; Truth and Right will be victorious. The political meaning of the tale here quite disappears. The great massacre, which is to take place, has only a religious significance. Though clothed in Christian garb, the original pagan kernel of the legend is, however, fully discernibleeven as in the christianised Nibelungenlied the Germanic heathens are recognisable, who in the corresponding Nibelung lays of the Norse Edda have no alloy yet at all from the later religion. An Asiatic tradition has been quoted from the fourteenth century, to this effect, that the Dominion of the World would some day fall to a prince who would succeed in hanging his shield on a certain withered tree. The Tatars related that this tree stood in Tauris, that is, the Crimea. Other Oriental races spoke of it as standing in the grove of Mamre. of Mamre. It has been pointed out that this myth has some contact with the Hellenic one of the golden fleece which hangs in a sacred grove on a tree, and the acquisition of which was to confer glory, riches, and power. However, it must not be forgotten that the tale about the withered tree, on which the coming Emperor's shield is to be hung, is an earlier one in Germany itself. Moreover, in the Crimea, which until the eighteenth century was still called Gothia in the official documents of the Greek Church, a population of Gothic descent had remained from olden times. Specimens of its Teutonic speech are traceable down to 1750. The ransomed prisoner from the Turkish galleys, a native of the Crimea, who in the middle of last century furnished these samples of Teutonic language to a learned Jesuit, declared that he knew nothing about Christianity, his countrymen worshipping an ancient tree. Can this have been a longforgotten symbol of the World Ash, the Teutonic Tree of Existence? And have we here, perhaps, the origin of the tale about the withered See The Goths, by Henry Bradley (London, 1888). tree 'which is to grow green and to bear fruit once more,' when the Restorer of German power hangs his shield on it? As Regenbogen has it, who mixes up this myth with the peaceful recovery of the Holy Sepulchre : Sô wirt daz urliug alsô groz, niemant kan es gestillen; Sô kumt sich keiser Vriderich, der hêr und ouch der milt Daz nimmer swert dar umb gezogen wirt. Actually, on the famous Walserfeld where the great battle was to take place, there stood, until quite recent days, a withered pear tree which in the folk-tale was connected with the old prophecy. After the re-establishment of the German Empire under William the First of Prussia, the tree was felled overnight-owing, it is said, to a suggestion made to the peasant proprietor by Ultramontanes. The cutting down of the old tree was considered almost a sacrilegious act at the time by those who cherish folk-lore traditions. But some observed that the withered trunk might well have gone, seeing that the prophecy had been fulfilled. There are, however, others who do not see such fulfilment in the foundation of an Empire shorn of its Austrian provinces, which had been an integral part of Germany from olden times down to 1866. Taking all in all, it is manifest that the 'Barbarossa' myth is quite a late graft upon the stem of the original tale about Kaiser Friedrich the Second, the enlightened adversary of priestcraft, the antagonist of the Papacy, the expected Reformer of the Church, and Disestablisher of Monkhood. Many of the sayings attributed to him, which show him in the light of a man who would readily have assented, had he lived in our days, to the doctrines of Darwin, Huxley, and Häckel, would find little countenance, at present, in high quarters at Berlin. It remains a fact, nevertheless, that 600 years ago an elected ruler stood at the head of the German Empire, who held such advanced views, and that his cherished memory had for centuries sunk deep into the people's mind. Considering this earlier and long-sustained conception of the folk-tale, the recent Imperial celebration on the Kyffhäuser may be said to rest on an historical error. KARL BLIND. The Editor of THE NINETEENTH CENTURY cannot undertake INDEX TO VOL. XL The titles of articles are printed in italics ABD - - Arbitration with, 320-337 The Cry for Fraudulent Money in, America, hospital system of, 611-613 - modern cruelty to, 293–305 Armenians, our pity for the, distrusted troubles of the, caused by English Armstrong (Lord), beginnings of, 463 Asia, the two competitors for supremacy Attila, ravages of, in Gaul, 372-373 BAB, The, and Babism, 56-66 Babel, The Modern, 782-796 CEC Balfour's 'Foundations of Belief' and Barbarossa, legend of, 1010-1011 Bayreuth, The Influence of, 360-366 Bejas, an ancient people of the Soudan, Bellamont (Lord), duel of, with Lord Benson (Archbishop), anecdote of, 281 Besant (Mrs.), The Conditions of Life Bewick (Thomas), anecdote of, 467 Biography, On the Ethics of Sup- Birchenough (Mrs.), Noticeable Books: Birrell (Mr.), criticism of his essay on Blind (Karl), A Mistaken Imperial Blunt (Wilfrid Scawen), Turkish Mis- Blyth (Mrs.), Sketches made in On the Selling of, 937-943 Burnett (Frances Hodgson), her' Lady CHA Chartered Company, Nature versus Chesterfield, A Seventeenth Century, Chevalier (Albert), the comic singer, China, From the Emperor of, to King China, official corruption in, 896-903 Clancy (J. J.), The Financial Griev- Dicey (Edward), his recent article on Dillon (William), The Battle of the Douglas (Professor Robert K.), Some CONOMISTS, commercial fallacies Clarke (Rev. Father), The Training ECONO of a Jesuit, 211-225 Cleveland (Grover), the late President of the United States, his policy on Colonies, scheme for the improvement Continental Alliances, England and Coolgardie' mining region, 712 Coquet river, Northumberland, scenery County Councils and Rural Educa- Courthope (Professor W. J.), Life in 273 Courtney (Leonard H.), his Free-trade Creyke (Mrs. Walter), Sailing for beneath the Ocean, 881-895 Currency question, the, in America, see Cyprus Convention, the double-dealing Education, Rural, County Councils - Local Support of, 919-924 -the Duke of Newcastle's Commission, the Bill of 1870, 704-705 Empire, Commercial Union of the, England, Russia, Persia, and, 1-18 Englishmen, manners of, compared ERMANY, Sketches made in, 383– The Woman Movement in, 97-104 and England, The Commercial Germany, reception of Li Hung Chang Ghost, a so-called, explained, 471–472 Gladstone (W. E.), his speech on the - - Irish Land Bill of 1870, 345 The Massacres in Turkey, 677-680 Goldfields of Western Australia, charac- Graham (R. B. Cunninghame), Alvar Greek language, origin and purpose of KINGender of St. Mark's, noticed, ́ING (K. Douglas), her 'Scripture 770-771 Kropotkin (Prince), Recent Science, Kyffhäuser, the, mistaken Imperial LABOUR Disputes, Arbitration in, 743-758 Land Purchase in Ireland, 829-837 Land question in Ireland, twenty-five Language, a universal, needed, 782- Latin, how it ceased to be the language Lecky (Mrs.), A Warning to Im- Leigh (Hon. Dudley), Horse Ambu- Li Hung Chang, 226-245 Lilly (W. S.), Noticeable Book: Cecil's Lippi, Fra Filippo, 643–653 Low (Sidney), The Decline of Cob- - The Olney Doctrine and America's |