Classical, predominantly Roman, culture had continued to influence most Germanic tribes, especially the Ostrogoths but also the Franks under Merovingian rule, following the late classical and early medieval Christianization of Europe. However the first major reorientation of the Roman Catholic Middle Ages to its classical inheritance took place later, from the second half of the eighth to the beginning of the tenth century, under the Carolingians. Charlemagne (768-814, crowned emperor 800) initiated this cultural renewal, the so-called ‘‘Carolingian Renaissance.’’ Reaching back to late antiquity in particular, it led to a synthesis of Germanic traditions, classical culture, and Christianity. Charlemagne undertook a far-reaching reform of the educational system, as part ofhis attempt to emulate the former Roman emperors and to gain preeminence for the Frankish state in western Europe, as a counterweight to the Byzantine empire in the east. He attracted scholars from across Europe to his court, including the Anglo-Saxon Alcuin (ca. 730-804), the Lombard Paul the Deacon (ca. 720 - ca. 799), and the Visigoth Theodulf (ca. 760-821). Alcuin, the most significant scholar of his age, wrote theological treatises and textbooks on grammar, rhetoric, and dialectic as well as on lyric verse and fables. Yet his main legacy lies in advancing education by rediscovering classical achievements (especially the concept of the septem artes liberales [seven liberal arts] as constituting the basic curriculum), which exerted a lasting influence throughout the Middle Ages. Monasteries and cathedral schools played an important role, in particular the Benedictine abbey of Fulda and its abbot, the first Germanic theologian and polyhistorian Hrabanus Maurus (ca. 776/ 84-856, abbot 822-42), the most influential scholar of the late Carolingian era.
Collections of glosses and interlinear versions had already been created around 760, but under Charlemagne and his successors numerous works of Roman literature were
Copied. A new script that followed Roman models - the Caroline minuscule - was invented, and Vergil and the Roman historians served as models for poetic and historical writings. Einhard (ca. 770-840), a Frankish scholar, followed Vitruvius in his concern for architectural construction and Suetonius in his Vita Caroli Magni (Life of Charlemagne). Biblical poetry such as the Old Saxon Heliand (ca. 830) and the Old High German Book of the Gospels, which Otfrid von Weifienburg completed around 865, was influenced by Fulda, and thus by late classical traditions. Notker I of St. Gall (Notker Balbulus, ca. 840-912), who composed the Gesta Karoli (Deeds of Charles [III]) and the Vita Sancti Galli (Life of St. Gall), was the major lyric poet of the early Middle Ages who invented the genre of Latin sequences. Early Romanesque architecture, such as the palace chapel in Aachen and the monastery of Lorsch, followed late classical and early Christian models, as did the visual arts of illuminations, frescoes, small-scale sculpture, jewelry-making, coins, and gems.
Subsequently the Frankish lands were divided, the German empire was established, and the Saxon house of the Ottonians came to power (first quarter of the tenth to the first quarter of the eleventh century). A renewed, more pronounced orientation toward classical antiquity began under Otto I (936-73, crowned emperor 962) and his successors, which extended into the first years of the reign of the Salian Henry II (1039-56, crowned emperor 1046). The expression renovatio imperii Romanorum (renewal of the Roman empire) was used, but Greco-Byzantine influences were also acknowledged. This so-called ‘‘Ottonian Renaissance’’ did, however, retain a greater independence from antiquity than that of the Carolingians. In northern Germany, the chapterhouse of Magdeburg and the monastery at Corvey on the Weser River were centers of spirituality, as were the monasteries of St. Gall and Reichenau on Lake Constance in the South. Literature was composed mostly in Latin. In Saxony, Hrots-vitha von Gandersheim (ca. 935 - ca. 975) modeled her six plays in rhythmic prose on Terence, although she approached his work from a Christian perspective. Widukind von Corvey (died 1004), who wrote the chronicle Resgestae Saxonicae (Saxon deeds), was another important Saxon author. Key figures in St. Gall were Ekkehard I (after 900-73), Notker III (Notker Labeo or Notker Teutonicus, ca. 950-1022), and Ekkehard IV (ca. 980-1060). The Waltharius, written or transmitted by Ekkehard I, renders the lost Old High German Waltharilied (Song of Waltharius) in Latin hexameters and often echoes Vergil. The polyhistorian Notker III was the only poet of his generation to translate into German, composing, for instance, a treatise on music in the tradition of Boethius, as well as writing in Latin. Ekkehard IV distinguished himself as a linguist, lyric poet, and chronicler of the monastery of St. Gall. On the island of Reichenau, Hermann von Reichenau (1007-54) wrote among other works a history of the world (Chronica) from the birth of Christ up to his own time. The Ecbasis cuiusdam captivi (The escape of a certain prisoner) (ca. 936), the oldest animal epic in German literature, uses motifs from Aesop’s fables and the Physiologus and regularly quotes Vergil, Horace, Ovid, and other Roman writers. In all likelihood it was the work of a monk from Toul in Lothringia. Traditions stemming from late antiquity were continued in architecture in, for example, the cathedral and imperial palace of Magdeburg and in Bamberg Cathedral, but also in illumination (which was now flourishing on the Reichenau) and in jewelry-making.
Under the Frankish dynasty of the Salians from the second quarter of the eleventh to the first quarter of the twelfth century, the power of the monarchy was strengthened. Subsequently, the emperor, the German nobles, and the papacy started to vie for supremacy in the empire during the investiture struggle. These disputes between church and state were conducted in part utilizing Roman rhetoric and dialectic. Most literary production was of a spiritual nature, as part of the movement toward religious renewal and monastic reform. Echoes of classical poetry can be found in the Latin verse epic Ruodlieb (mid-eleventh century), composed in leonine (rhyming) hexameters, and in the Latin-German Hohelied (High song) poetry and exegesis of Williram von Ebersberg (1048-85). The Romanesque architecture and plastic arts of the eleventh and twelfth centuries employed Roman models and techniques: the cathedrals of Speyer, Worms, and Mainz are based on the Roman basilica and use round arches, columns, pillars, barrel vaults, cupolas, and portals. In sculpture, simple imitation, such as crafting reliefs, was widespread, while metalwork most closely followed antique models.
Medieval culture reached its zenith between the mid-twelfth and the mid-thirteenth centuries during a period of change and innovation in Europe, the ‘‘twelfth century (or Hohenstaufen, after the ruling family) renaissance.’’ This Swabian dynasty saw the empire as extending across Germany, Italy, and Burgundy, and as independent of the papacy, in accordance with a theory developed since the late tenth century and systematized from the end of the eleventh century. Partly based on Jerome and Orosius, four empires were seen to follow one after the other: the Babylonian, that of the Medes and Persians, the Greek, and the Roman. The theory then states that the rule of the Roman Empire - the final one before the world comes to an end - had been passed on by the Romans to the Franks and then on to the Germans, through the translatio imperii (passing on of the empire). Roman law was researched extensively, increasingly so in the late medieval and early modern period, and its influence is still palpable today. In 1157 during the reign of Frederick I (Barbarossa, 1152-90, crowned emperor 1155), the empire was first called Sacrum imperium, as well as simply imperium or imperium Romanum; later Sacrum imperium Romanum (Holy Roman empire) was commonly used. Frederick II (1212-50, crowned emperor 1220) even replicated elements of the emperor cults of late antiquity and introduced religious overtones to his rule.
As a consequence of the Crusades, medieval culture at its high point became better acquainted with Byzantine and Arabic, and through them Greek, culture. Following Augustine and Boethius, the theology and philosophy of the early Middle Ages had been characterized more by Neoplatonic, and less by Aristotelian, influences. But Aristotle’s works, which had been translated from Greek into Arabic, were now again made more widely accessible by translating the Arabic itself into Latin. Albertus Magnus (ca. 1193-1280), the most significant German scholar of this period, wrote theological and scientific treatises. Through them and his pupil Thomas Aquinas, he ensured that a Christianized Aristotelian approach provided the foundation for the flourishing of Scholasticism. Supported by the knights, the literature of the Hohenstaufen period turned to worldly, and in particular courtly, concerns, with its most important works composed in German. Epic verse was the dominant genre, beginning with the Alexanderlied (Song of Alexander), written around 1130/50 by Lamprecht, a priest from Trier, after a French model. The Eneit of Heinrich von Veldeke (between 1140 and 1150 - before 1210) followed the French Roman d’Eneas as well as using Vergil’s own Aeneid, showing the way for the courtly and artful epic of the high Middle Ages. The poem presents exemplary knightly behavior, fulfilling the requirements of courtly ceremony, itself founded on the hohe Minne (courtly love): in a departure from Vergil, increased attention is paid to Aeneas’ love for Lavinia, which is juxtaposed to the hero’s passionate relationship with Dido. This epic was completed around 1200 at the court of the Count of Thuringia, a center for the reception of classical literature. From Thuringia, we also have the Trojaroman (Story of Troy) of Herbort von Fritzlar (after 1190) after Benoit de Sainte-Maures’ Roman de Troie, and the rendition of Ovid’s Metamorphoses in German rhyming couplets by Albrecht von Halberstadt (ca. 1210/17). Ovidian influences are also at work in goliardic verse (Archipoeta [born ca. 1130/40]), in the Carmina Burana (mid-thirteenth century), in the works of Minnesanger (minnesingers), and in the Latin animal epic Ysengrimus (Fox), a satire on courtly and monastic lives (1146-8). Otto von Freising’s (ca. 1114-58) universal history Chronica sive Historia de duabus civitatibus (Chronicle or history of two states), modeled on Augustine, marks the high point of medieval historiography. Classical influences were less visible in architecture and sculpture, although stones from antique buildings were increasingly reused. However, a bronze head of Frederick I, the Head of Cappenberg, cast soon after 1155, portrays him wearing the fillet and laurel crown of a Roman emperor, and under Frederick II larger-scale sculpture developed at a greater pace.
The Gothic style, which was predominant in Europe from the thirteenth to the fifteenth century, was less closely connected to antiquity. Although architects retained the basic shape of the basilica of the early Christian Roman church, classical decorative architectural elements and imagery were only employed in a limited way. A clear indication is the shift from the round to the pointed arch. Sculpture, drawing, and painting only occasionally looked back to antiquity, and even then in only rudimentary fashion. There were, however, many illustrations to classical texts, as demanded by their subject matter, and antique models for sepulchral sculpture and epitaphs gained in importance. Latin itself continued to play a crucial role during the late Middle Ages. With the rise of the urban centers and their citizens, it now came to be taught more in the Latin schools of the towns than in the monastic and cathedral schools.
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