Radegund and/or Venantius Fortunatus
Sep. 16th, 2006 04:46 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
ricardienneLooking up sources for "The Wander" this afternoon, I found an amazing poem: "The Fall of Thuringia". I don't think it will be useful for my essay right now, but… I wish it were. The book listed it as by one Venantius Fortunatus, but more research has indicated that it could well be by (Saint) Radegund, who was a friend of Fortunatus, or perhaps was a collaboration between the two of them. Anyway, I can't find a text of it on the internets (ah, Natty, how you have corrupted me!), so I'm going to type up the one from my book. It's probably at least somewhat illegal, so this should be locked, I guess.
Sad condition brought on by war, life's evil fate! How suddenly proud kingdoms fall to their ruin! Roos which happily stood for ages lie wasted and burnt in the vast destruction. The palace which once flourished with courtly elegance is not roofed with gloomy embers instead of arches. A pale ash has smothered the lofty buildings wich used to gleam and shine, adorned with gold. Royalty has been forced into captivity under an enemy lord; its proud glory has fallen and been humbled. The crowd of glittering attendants which stood there in better days is covered with dust; they have met their fatal day. The famous throng of mighty ministers has no tombs and lacks the honor due to death. A woman, white as milk, lies prostrate on the ground; in her beloved's hair glows the ragin, conquering gold of flames. Alas, unburid corpses hideously cover the battlefield: an entire people thus lies in one grave. Troy is no longer alone in lamenting her ruins; the land of Thuringia has suffered the same calamity. The mother with torn hair is bound and taken away: she would not say a sad farewell to her household gods, nor plant kisses on the captured doorpost, nor look at places she will never see again. The wife's naked foot has trodden on her husband's blood. The gentle sister passed by her brother as he was lying there. Snatched from his mother's embrace, the boy has been hanged by the neck and no one cried or lamented at his funeral. For the boy to lose his life this way is a milder fate: his sobbing mother has wasted her loving tears.
A foreign woman, I am not equal to the grief; in my overwhelming sorrow I cannot swim in a lake of tears. Each person has had his own grief, but I alone have all. This sorrow is both private and public for me. Fortune took care of those whomeht enemy destroyed; I alone survive them all to weep. Not only must I mourn those close to me who died, but also weep for those whom kind life detains. My eyes often press tears down my wet face; and though my murmurs are secret, my care does not stay silent. Gladly I watch to see if the wind will announce that one of my kinsmen is safe, but none of their shadows appears. You whose sight comforted me with its tender love, hostile fate has taken from my embrace; or, since you are gone and my sorrow does not vex you, is it that the bitterness of slaughter carried away your sweet love? Amalfrid, from you earliest years remember what, I, your Radegunde, meant to you: son of my father's brother, my kind cousin, remember how much you loved me when you were a sweet child. You alone stood for my dead father and mother, my sister and brother. As a baby, I was held in your loving hands; I hung, alas, upon your soft kisses and was caressed with your gentle words. Scarcely an hour passed when you did not return to me; now centuries flee by and I do not hear your words. Cousin, in my stricked heart, I used to wonder frantically how or when or whence you could be recalled. If your father or mother or affairs of state kept you, to me you were still late, although you hurrid. That lot was a sign, dearest, that I would soon be without you. Impassioned love cannot possess for long. I used to be anxious and troubled if one house did not cover us both; if you went outside, I imagined you had gone far away. Now east darkens you and West darkens me; I am held by the Ocean's waves and you by the waves of the East. And the whole earth lies between us lovers. Those whom no place ever kept apart before, the world now separates. However far the earth extends is the distance which has divorced me from my love; if the plains stretched further, you would have gone on an even longer journey. Dwell now where kinsmen's better prayers hold onto you; and be more prosperous than the land of Thuringia permitted.
I am tortured the more, weighed down by heavy sorrows, wondering why you have not wanted to send me some sign of yourself. I do not see you whom I desire. A letter might have depicted your face, a portrait restored the man whom distance keeps from me. By the flattering power of a portrait one may bring back ancestors and those close to one, just as your father's ruddy complexion plays in your handsome face. Believe me, cousin, if only you wrote something, you would not be completely absent; if you sent a page, a part of my brother would speak to me. Everone has some solace, but I have no consolation for my tears. It is unjust that the more I love, the less I have. If some search for their servants out of a sense of duty, why, I beg you, am I, a kinswoman joined to you by blood, forgotten? To ransom a family slave, the master himself often struggles through the Alps, through waters frozen by cold and snow. He enters shadowy caves carved in the rocks; no frost can extinguish the burning love he feels. With none to guide him, the lover runs barefoot and seizes his own booty in the teeth of the enemy opposition. Though he is wounded, he crosses the hostile lines to recover the object of his longing: love never spares itself. But waiting in suspense for you through all these hours, my mind scarcely enjous a moment's rest from care. If the air whispers, I ask it where you live; if the overhanging clouds wing by, I ask them the place. Does warlike Persia or Byzantium choose you; or the wealth of the royal city of Alexandria lead you away? Do you live near Jerusalem's citadel where the Virgin Mary gave birth to Christ God? No letter in your hand has come to tell me; my grief is heavier, therefore, I wish a bird would come and bring me happy news! If a monastery's sacred cloisters did not keep me, I would have arrived unexpectedly in the regious where you dwell. I would have been ready to cross the storm-tossed seas in a boat. Gladly I would be moved on the waves by winder winds; bravely I would float on the risen flood. A lover would not tremble at what a sailor fears. In the menacing storms, if a wave shattered the ship, I would seek you by rowing across the sea carried on a plank. If my luckless fate forbade me to seize hold of it, I would come to you exhausted by simply swimming. When I saw you again, I would deny the journey's dangers -- your sweetness would at once remove the burden of shipwreck. Or, if my ultimate fate were to have my sorrowing life snatchd away, the sand would give me a grave dug by your hands. I would die before your kind eyes, a lifeless corpse, in order to bring you to my exequies. You, who reject my living tears, would cry then, and bury me; you, who refuse to write me now, would then lament.
Cousin, why do I flee from remembering, why do I popstpone my mourning? Deep grief, why are you silent about my brother's murder? How could an innocent man have fallen into that dreadful ambush; and was he snatched from the world when there had been a pledge of faith? Alas for me, by referring to the dead, I renew my tears; when I talk of those lamentable events, I suffer again. When my brother hastens longingly to see your faces, kinsmen, his love is not fulfilled as long as mine blocks the way. When he shrank from hurting me, he inflicted wounds on himself: that he was afraid to cause pain is the reason for present sorrow. As a young man, his beard soft with down, he was killed. I did not see his grim funeral; his sister, I was not there. Not only did I lose him, I did not even close his loving eyes. I did not say a last farewell, casting myself on top of him. I did not warm his cold heart with my hot tears, nor bear kisses away from the dying lips I loved. I did not cling to his neck in a sad embrace and weep. I did not cherish his body in my hapless bosom and cry. Life was being denied him: why couldn't a sister seize the breath in a last kiss as it left her brother's mouth? The things I embroidered for him when he was alive, I would have sent for his bier; or isn't my love allowed to adorn a dead brother? Believe me, brother, I am the wicked one; I am the person answerable for your safety. I alone was the cause of your death, and I never gave you a grave. I left my homeland once, but twice remained a captive. I endured my enemies again while my brother lay dead. Father, mother, unce, kinsmen, you whom I would weep for in the grave, this grief restored him to you. Since my brother's funeral, no day is empty of tears; he has carried my joys to their ghosts with him. Thus wretchedness has consumed my dear kinsmen; and my royal father's blood, was it the beginning of a succession of murders?
Cousin, the evils I have suffered I would not tell you now. Wounded like this, I am not heartened by your words. Glad kinsman, please write me a letter quickly, so your loving tongue may lighten my grievous misfortune. MY care for you is for your sisters too; I cherish tme in my heart with the love that comes from a blood-tie. I am not permitted to embrace the precious limbs of my parents, nor plant a sister's eager kisses on my brother's eyes. If as I hope, they dwell in heaven, I ask you to greet them for me; and bring them dear kisses according to my prayers. I beg you to commend me to the kings of the Franks who look after me with a mother's love. Breathe and live long: may my salvation bloom out of your honor.
Christ, hear my prayers. May loving eyes look upon this page; may a letter come back to me with a pen's sweet strokes. I have had my hopes delatyed and tormented for so long. May my prayers succeed and the swift dispatch of a letter comfort me.
The more I think about, this is kind of a weird poem: half lament and half love-letter. And just like my "Wanderer" the Christianity is rather vague. Hmmm. Maybe I can use it after all.
Sad condition brought on by war, life's evil fate! How suddenly proud kingdoms fall to their ruin! Roos which happily stood for ages lie wasted and burnt in the vast destruction. The palace which once flourished with courtly elegance is not roofed with gloomy embers instead of arches. A pale ash has smothered the lofty buildings wich used to gleam and shine, adorned with gold. Royalty has been forced into captivity under an enemy lord; its proud glory has fallen and been humbled. The crowd of glittering attendants which stood there in better days is covered with dust; they have met their fatal day. The famous throng of mighty ministers has no tombs and lacks the honor due to death. A woman, white as milk, lies prostrate on the ground; in her beloved's hair glows the ragin, conquering gold of flames. Alas, unburid corpses hideously cover the battlefield: an entire people thus lies in one grave. Troy is no longer alone in lamenting her ruins; the land of Thuringia has suffered the same calamity. The mother with torn hair is bound and taken away: she would not say a sad farewell to her household gods, nor plant kisses on the captured doorpost, nor look at places she will never see again. The wife's naked foot has trodden on her husband's blood. The gentle sister passed by her brother as he was lying there. Snatched from his mother's embrace, the boy has been hanged by the neck and no one cried or lamented at his funeral. For the boy to lose his life this way is a milder fate: his sobbing mother has wasted her loving tears.
A foreign woman, I am not equal to the grief; in my overwhelming sorrow I cannot swim in a lake of tears. Each person has had his own grief, but I alone have all. This sorrow is both private and public for me. Fortune took care of those whomeht enemy destroyed; I alone survive them all to weep. Not only must I mourn those close to me who died, but also weep for those whom kind life detains. My eyes often press tears down my wet face; and though my murmurs are secret, my care does not stay silent. Gladly I watch to see if the wind will announce that one of my kinsmen is safe, but none of their shadows appears. You whose sight comforted me with its tender love, hostile fate has taken from my embrace; or, since you are gone and my sorrow does not vex you, is it that the bitterness of slaughter carried away your sweet love? Amalfrid, from you earliest years remember what, I, your Radegunde, meant to you: son of my father's brother, my kind cousin, remember how much you loved me when you were a sweet child. You alone stood for my dead father and mother, my sister and brother. As a baby, I was held in your loving hands; I hung, alas, upon your soft kisses and was caressed with your gentle words. Scarcely an hour passed when you did not return to me; now centuries flee by and I do not hear your words. Cousin, in my stricked heart, I used to wonder frantically how or when or whence you could be recalled. If your father or mother or affairs of state kept you, to me you were still late, although you hurrid. That lot was a sign, dearest, that I would soon be without you. Impassioned love cannot possess for long. I used to be anxious and troubled if one house did not cover us both; if you went outside, I imagined you had gone far away. Now east darkens you and West darkens me; I am held by the Ocean's waves and you by the waves of the East. And the whole earth lies between us lovers. Those whom no place ever kept apart before, the world now separates. However far the earth extends is the distance which has divorced me from my love; if the plains stretched further, you would have gone on an even longer journey. Dwell now where kinsmen's better prayers hold onto you; and be more prosperous than the land of Thuringia permitted.
I am tortured the more, weighed down by heavy sorrows, wondering why you have not wanted to send me some sign of yourself. I do not see you whom I desire. A letter might have depicted your face, a portrait restored the man whom distance keeps from me. By the flattering power of a portrait one may bring back ancestors and those close to one, just as your father's ruddy complexion plays in your handsome face. Believe me, cousin, if only you wrote something, you would not be completely absent; if you sent a page, a part of my brother would speak to me. Everone has some solace, but I have no consolation for my tears. It is unjust that the more I love, the less I have. If some search for their servants out of a sense of duty, why, I beg you, am I, a kinswoman joined to you by blood, forgotten? To ransom a family slave, the master himself often struggles through the Alps, through waters frozen by cold and snow. He enters shadowy caves carved in the rocks; no frost can extinguish the burning love he feels. With none to guide him, the lover runs barefoot and seizes his own booty in the teeth of the enemy opposition. Though he is wounded, he crosses the hostile lines to recover the object of his longing: love never spares itself. But waiting in suspense for you through all these hours, my mind scarcely enjous a moment's rest from care. If the air whispers, I ask it where you live; if the overhanging clouds wing by, I ask them the place. Does warlike Persia or Byzantium choose you; or the wealth of the royal city of Alexandria lead you away? Do you live near Jerusalem's citadel where the Virgin Mary gave birth to Christ God? No letter in your hand has come to tell me; my grief is heavier, therefore, I wish a bird would come and bring me happy news! If a monastery's sacred cloisters did not keep me, I would have arrived unexpectedly in the regious where you dwell. I would have been ready to cross the storm-tossed seas in a boat. Gladly I would be moved on the waves by winder winds; bravely I would float on the risen flood. A lover would not tremble at what a sailor fears. In the menacing storms, if a wave shattered the ship, I would seek you by rowing across the sea carried on a plank. If my luckless fate forbade me to seize hold of it, I would come to you exhausted by simply swimming. When I saw you again, I would deny the journey's dangers -- your sweetness would at once remove the burden of shipwreck. Or, if my ultimate fate were to have my sorrowing life snatchd away, the sand would give me a grave dug by your hands. I would die before your kind eyes, a lifeless corpse, in order to bring you to my exequies. You, who reject my living tears, would cry then, and bury me; you, who refuse to write me now, would then lament.
Cousin, why do I flee from remembering, why do I popstpone my mourning? Deep grief, why are you silent about my brother's murder? How could an innocent man have fallen into that dreadful ambush; and was he snatched from the world when there had been a pledge of faith? Alas for me, by referring to the dead, I renew my tears; when I talk of those lamentable events, I suffer again. When my brother hastens longingly to see your faces, kinsmen, his love is not fulfilled as long as mine blocks the way. When he shrank from hurting me, he inflicted wounds on himself: that he was afraid to cause pain is the reason for present sorrow. As a young man, his beard soft with down, he was killed. I did not see his grim funeral; his sister, I was not there. Not only did I lose him, I did not even close his loving eyes. I did not say a last farewell, casting myself on top of him. I did not warm his cold heart with my hot tears, nor bear kisses away from the dying lips I loved. I did not cling to his neck in a sad embrace and weep. I did not cherish his body in my hapless bosom and cry. Life was being denied him: why couldn't a sister seize the breath in a last kiss as it left her brother's mouth? The things I embroidered for him when he was alive, I would have sent for his bier; or isn't my love allowed to adorn a dead brother? Believe me, brother, I am the wicked one; I am the person answerable for your safety. I alone was the cause of your death, and I never gave you a grave. I left my homeland once, but twice remained a captive. I endured my enemies again while my brother lay dead. Father, mother, unce, kinsmen, you whom I would weep for in the grave, this grief restored him to you. Since my brother's funeral, no day is empty of tears; he has carried my joys to their ghosts with him. Thus wretchedness has consumed my dear kinsmen; and my royal father's blood, was it the beginning of a succession of murders?
Cousin, the evils I have suffered I would not tell you now. Wounded like this, I am not heartened by your words. Glad kinsman, please write me a letter quickly, so your loving tongue may lighten my grievous misfortune. MY care for you is for your sisters too; I cherish tme in my heart with the love that comes from a blood-tie. I am not permitted to embrace the precious limbs of my parents, nor plant a sister's eager kisses on my brother's eyes. If as I hope, they dwell in heaven, I ask you to greet them for me; and bring them dear kisses according to my prayers. I beg you to commend me to the kings of the Franks who look after me with a mother's love. Breathe and live long: may my salvation bloom out of your honor.
Christ, hear my prayers. May loving eyes look upon this page; may a letter come back to me with a pen's sweet strokes. I have had my hopes delatyed and tormented for so long. May my prayers succeed and the swift dispatch of a letter comfort me.
The more I think about, this is kind of a weird poem: half lament and half love-letter. And just like my "Wanderer" the Christianity is rather vague. Hmmm. Maybe I can use it after all.
