believed, Christianity was first preached in Britain. … Lord
Baltimore called his Newfoundland province Avalon and his
first settlement Verulam. The latter name, in course of time,
became corrupted into Ferulam, and then into the modern
Ferryland. At this spot, on the eastern coast of Newfoundland,
about 40 miles north of Cape Race, Lord Baltimore planted his
colony, and built a noble mansion, in which he resided with
his family during many years." But after expending some
£30,000 upon the establishment of his colony, Lord Baltimore
abandoned it, on account of the poor quality of the soil and
its exposure to the attacks of the French. Not long afterwards
he obtained his Maryland grant [see MARYLAND: A. D. 1632] and
resumed the enterprise under more favorable conditions. "Soon
after the departure of Lord Baltimore, Viscount Falkland,
Lord-Lieutenant of Ireland, hoping to permanently increase the
scanty population of Newfoundland, sent out a number of
emigrants from that country. At a later date, these were so
largely reinforced by settlers from Ireland that the Celtic
part of the population at this day is not far short of
equality in numbers with the Saxon portion. In 1638, Sir David
Kirke, one of Britain's bravest sea-captains, arrived in
Newfoundland and took up his abode at Ferryland, where Lord
Baltimore had lived. Sir David was armed with the powers of a
Count Palatine over the island, having obtained from Charles
I. a grant of the whole." This was by way of reward for his
exploit in taking Quebec
See CANADA: A. D. 1628-1635.
Kirke "governed wisely and used every effort to promote the
colonization of the country. His settlement prospered greatly.
The Civil War, however, broke out in England, and, Kirke being
a staunch loyalist, all his possessions in Newfoundland were
confiscated by the victorious Commonwealth. By the aid of
Claypole, Cromwell's son-in-law, Kirke eventually got the
sequestration removed, and, returning to Ferryland, died there
in 1655, at the age of 56. At this time Newfoundland contained
a population of 350 families, or nearly 2,000 inhabitants,
distributed in 15 small settlements along the eastern coast."
J. Hatton and M. Harvey,
Newfoundland,
chapter 2.
ALSO IN:
H. Kirke,
The First English Conquest of Canada,
chapters 3-4.
NEWFOUNDLAND: A. D. 1660-1688.
The French gain their footing.
"With the possession of Cape Breton, Acadia, and the vast
regions stretching from the gulf of the River St. Lawrence,
and the mighty lakes, Newfoundland obtained a new value in the
estimation of the government of France, as it formed one side
of the narrow entrance to its transatlantic dependencies:
consequently the pursuit of the fishery by its seamen was
encouraged, and every opportunity was improved to gain a
footing in the country itself. This encroaching tendency could
not, however, be manifested without a protest on the part of
the somewhat sluggish English, both by private individuals and
by the government. Charles I. … imposed a tribute of five
per cent. on the produce taken by foreigners in this fishery,
to which exaction the French, as well as others, were forced
to submit. During the distracted time of the Commonwealth, it
does not appear that the struggling government at home found
leisure to attend to these distant affairs, though the tribute
continued to be levied. The Restoration brought to England a
sovereign who owed much to the monarch of France, to whom he
was therefore attached by the ties of gratitude, and by the
desire to find a counterpoise to the refractory disposition of
which he was in continual apprehension among his own subjects.
It was not until 1675 that Louis XIV. prevailed on Charles to
give up the duty of five per cent., and by that time the
French had obtained a solid footing on the southern coast of
Newfoundland, so that, with Cape Breton in their possession,
they commanded both sides of the Gulf of St. Lawrence. Over a
territory of some 200 miles in extent, belonging to the
British sovereignty, they had built up imperceptibly an almost
undisputed dominion. At Placentia, situated in the bay of that
name, a strong fort was erected, sustained by other forts
standing at intervals along the shore, and at the same place a
royal government was established. How real was the authority
assumed, and how completely was the English sovereignty
ignored, needs no better proof than is furnished in an
ordinance issued by Louis in the year 1681, concerning the
marine of France. In this state paper, Newfoundland is
reckoned as situate in those seas which are free and common to
all French subjects, provided that they take a license from
the admiral for every voyage. …
{2355}
Thus that period which is regarded as among the most
humiliating in the annals of our nation,—when the king was a
pensioner of France, and his ministers received bribes from
the same quarter, witnessed the partial sliding under this
alien power of the most ancient of the colonial possessions of
the Crown. Not less than half of the inhabited coast of
Newfoundland was thus taken under that despotic rule, which,
while swaying the councils of England to the furtherance of
its ambitious designs, was labouring for the subjugation of
the European continent. The revolution of 1688 broke the spell
of this encroaching autocracy."
C. Pedley,
History of Newfoundland,
chapter 2.
NEWFOUNDLAND: A. D. 1694-1697.
French success in the war with England.
The Treaty of Ryswick and its unsatisfactory terms.
"On the accession of William III. to the throne of England
hostilities broke out between the rival nations. In William's
declaration of war against the French, Newfoundland holds a
prominent place among the alleged causes which led to the
rupture of pacific relations. The grievance was tersely set
forth in the royal manifesto: 'It was not long since the
French took license from the Governor of Newfoundland to fish
upon that coast, and paid a tribute for such licenses as an
acknowledgement of the sole right of the Crown of England to
that island; but of late the encroachments of the French, and
His Majesty's subjects trading and fishing there, had been
more like the invasions of an enemy than becoming friends, who
enjoyed the advantages of that trade only by permission.'
Newfoundland now became the scene of military skirmishes,
naval battles, and sieges by land and water." In 1692 the
English made an unsuccessful attack on Placentia. In 1694, a
French fleet, under the Chevalier Nesmond, intended for an
attack upon Boston and New York, stopped at Newfoundland on
the way and made a descent on the harbor and town of St.
John's. Nesmond "was repulsed, and instead of going on to
Boston he returned to France. A more determined effort at
conquest was made later in the same year. The new expedition
was under the command of Iberville and Brouillan, the former
being at the head of a Canadian force. The garrison of St.
John's was weak in numbers, and, in want of military stores,
could only make a feeble resistance; capitulating on easy
terms, the troops were shipped to England. The fort and town
were burned to the ground, and the victors next proceeded to
destroy all the other adjacent English settlements; Carbonear
and Bonavista alone proved too strong for them. The English
Government at once commenced dispositions for dislodging the
invaders; but before anything was attempted the treaty of
Ryswick was signed, in 1697. This treaty proved most
unfortunate for Newfoundland. It revived in the island the
same state of division between France and England which had
existed at the beginning of the war. The enemy retired from
St. John's and the other settlements which they had forcibly
occupied. Their claims upon Placentia and all the other
positions on the south-west coast were, however, confirmed.
The British inhabitants of Newfoundland were, therefore, once
more left open to French attacks, should hostilities be again
renewed between the rival powers."
J. Hatton and M. Harvey,
Newfoundland,
part 1, chapter 2.
ALSO IN:
F. Parkman,
Count Frontenac and New France under Louis XIV.,
chapter 18.
W. Kingsford,
History of Canada,
book 4, chapter 7 (volume 2).
NEWFOUNDLAND: A. D. 1705.
English settlements destroyed by the French.
See NEW ENGLAND: A. D. 1702-1710.
NEWFOUNDLAND: A. D. 1713.
Relinquished to Great Britain by the Treaty of Utrecht.
French fishing rights reserved.
In the 12th and 13th articles of the Treaty signed at Utrecht,
April 11, 1713, which terminated the War of the Spanish
Succession (commonly known in American history as Queen Anne's
War) it was stipulated that "All Nova Scotia or Acadié, with
its ancient boundaries, as also the city of Port Royal, now
called Annapolis Royal, … the island of Newfoundland, with
the adjacent islands, … the town and fortress of Placentia,
and whatever other places in the island are in possession of
the French, shall from this time forward belong of right
wholly to Great Britain. … That the subjects of France
should be allowed to catch fish and dry them on that part of
the island of Newfoundland which stretches from Cape Bonavista
to the northern point of the island, and from thence down the
western side as far as Point Riché; but that no fortifications
or any buildings should be erected there, besides Stages made
of Boards, and Huts necessary and usual for drying fish. …
But the island of Cape Breton, as also all others, both in the
mouth of the river of St. Lawrence and in the gulf of the same
name, shall hereafter belong of Right to the King of France,
who shall have liberty to fortify any place or places there."
R. Brown,
History of the Island of Cape Breton,
letter 9.
ALSO IN:
J. Hatton and M. Harvey,
Newfoundland,
part 1, chapters 3-4;
and part 3, chapter 7.
See, also, UTRECHT: A. D. 1712-1714.
NEWFOUNDLAND: A. D. 1744.
Attack on Placentia by the French.
See NEW ENGLAND: A. D. 1744.
NEWFOUNDLAND: A. D. 1748.
The islands of St. Pierre and Michelon ceded to France.
See NEW ENGLAND: A. D: 1745-1748.
NEWFOUNDLAND: A. D. 1763.
Ceded to England by the Treaty of Paris,
with rights of fishing reserved to France.
See SEVEN YEARS WAR: THE TREATIES;
also FISHERIES, NORTH AMERICAN: A. D. 1763.
NEWFOUNDLAND: A. D. 1778.
French fishery rights on the banks recognized
in the Franco-American Treaty.
See UNITED STATES OF AMERICA:
A. D. 1778 (FEBRUARY).
NEWFOUNDLAND: A. D. 1783.
American fishing rights conceded in the
Treaty of Peace with the United States.
See UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1783 (SEPTEMBER).
NEWFOUNDLAND: A. D. 1818.
Fisheries Treaty between Great Britain and the United States.
See FISHERIES, NORTH AMERICAN: A. D. 1814-1818.
NEWFOUNDLAND: A. D. 1854-1866.
Reciprocity Treaty with the United States.
See TARIFF LEGISLATION
(UNITED STATES AND CANADA): A. D. 1854-1866.
NEWFOUNDLAND: A. D. 1871.
The Treaty of Washington.
See ALABAMA CLAIMS: A. D. 1871.
NEWFOUNDLAND: A. D. 1877.
The Halifax Fishery award.
Termination of the Fishery Articles of the Treaty of Washington.
Renewed fishery disputes.
See FISHERIES, NORTH AMERICAN: A. D. 1877-1888.
----------NEWFOUNDLAND: End----------
NEWNHAM HALL.
See EDUCATION, MODERN: REFORMS, &c.: A. D. 1865-1883.
NEWPORT, England, The Treaty at.
See ENGLAND: A. D. 1648 (SEPTEMBER-NOVEMBER),
and (NOVEMBER-DECEMBER).
{2356}
----------NEWPORT, Rhode Island: Start--------
NEWPORT, Rhode Island: A. D. 1524.
Visited by Verrazano.
See AMERICA: A. D. 1523-1524.
NEWPORT, Rhode Island: A. D. 1639.
The first settlement.
See RHODE ISLAND: A. D. 1638-1640.
NEWPORT, Rhode Island: A. D. 1778.
Held by the British.
Failure of French-American attack.
See UNITED STATES OF AMERICA:
A. D. 1778 (JULY-NOVEMBER).
----------NEWPORT, Rhode Island: End--------
NEWSPAPERS.
See PRINTING AND THE PRESS: A. D. 1612-1650, and after.
NEWTON BUTLER, Battle of (1689).
See IRELAND: A. D. 1688-1689.
NEWTONIA, Battles of.
See UNITED STATES OF AMERICA:
A. D. 1862 (JULY-SEPTEMBER: MISSOURI-ARKANSAS);
and 1864 (MARCH-OCTOBER: ARKANSAS-MISSOURI).
NEY, Marshal, Campaigns and execution of.
See GERMANY: A. D. 1806 (OCTOBER),
1806-1807, 1807 (FEBRUARY-JUNE);
SPAIN: A. D. 1809;
RUSSIA: A. D. 1812;
GERMANY: A. D. 1813;
FRANCE: A. D. 1815, and 1815-1830.
NEZ PERCÉS, The.
See AMERICAN ABORIGINES: NEZ PERCÉS.
----------NIAGARA: Start--------
NIAGARA:
The name and its original applications.
"Colden wrote it [the name] 'O-ni-ag-a-ra,' in 1741, and he
must have received it from the Mohawks or Oneidas. It was the
name of a Seneca village at the mouth of the Niagara river;
located as early as 1650, near the site of Youngstown. It was
also the place where the Marquis de Nonville constructed a
fort in 1687, the building of which brought this locality
under the particular notice of the English. The name of this
Indian village in the dialect of the Senecas was 'Ne-ah'-gä,'
in Tuscarora 'O-ne-ä'-kars,' in Onondaga 'O-ne-ah'-gä,' in
Oneida 'O-ne-ah'-gäle,' and in Mohawk 'O-ne-a'-gä-rä.' These
names are but the same word under dialectical changes. It is
clear that Niagara was derived from some one of them, and thus
came direct from the Iroquois language. The signification of
the word is lost, unless it is derived, as some of the present
Iroquois suppose, from the word which signifies 'neck,' in
Seneca 'O-ne-ah'-ä,' in Onondaga 'O-ne-yä'-ä' and in Oneida
'O-ne-arle.' The name of this Indian village was bestowed by
the Iroquois upon Youngstown; upon the river Niagara, from the
falls to the Lake; and upon Lake Ontario."
L. H. Morgan,
League of the Iroquois,
book 3, chapter 3.
"It [the name Niagara] is the oldest of all the local
geographical terms which have come down to us from the
aborigines. It was not at first thus written by the English,
for with them it passed through almost every possible
alphabetical variation before its present orthography was
established. We find its germ in the 'On-gui-aah-ra' of the
Neutral Nation, as given by Father L'Allemant in a letter
dated in 1641, at the mission station of Sainte Marie, on Lake
Huron. … The name of the river next occurs on Sanson's map
of Canada, published in Paris in 1656, where it is spelled
'Ongiara.' Its first appearance as Niagara is on Coronelli's
map, published in Paris in 1688. From that time to the
present, the French have been consistent in their orthography,
the numerous variations alluded to occurring only among
English writers. The word was probably derived from the
Mohawks, through whom the French had their first intercourse
with the Iroquois. The Mohawks pronounced it Nyah,-ga-rah',
with the primary accent on the first syllable; and the
secondary on the last. … The corresponding Seneca name,
Nyah'-gaah, was always confined by the Iroquois to the section
of the river below the Falls, and to Lake Ontario. That
portion of the river above the Falls being sometimes called
Gni-gwaah-geh, one of their names for Lake Erie."
O. H. Marshall,
The Niagara Frontier
(Historical Writings, page 283).
NIAGARA: A. D. 1687-1688.
Fort constructed by De Nonville and destroyed a year later.
"We arrived there [at Niagara] on the morning of the 30th [of
July, 1687]. We immediately set about choosing a place, and
collecting stakes for the construction of the Fort which I had
resolved to build at the extremity of a tongue of land,
between the river Niagara and Lake Ontario, on the Iroquois
side. On the 31st of July and 1st of August we continued this
work, which was the more difficult from there being no wood on
the place suitable for making palisades, and from its being
necessary to draw them up the height. We performed this labor
so diligently that the fort was in a state of defence on the
last mentioned day. … The 2d day of August, the militia
having performed their allotted task, and the fort being in a
condition of defence in case of assault, they set out at noon,
in order to reach the end of the lake on their return to their
own country. On the morning of the 3d, being the next day, I
embarked for the purpose of joining the militia, leaving the
regular troops under the direction of M. de Vaudreuil to
finish what was the most essential, and to render the fort not
only capable of defence, but also of being occupied by a
detachment of 100 soldiers, which are to winter there under
the command of M. Troyes."
Marquis de Nonville,
Journal of Expedition against the Senecas
(translated in Historical Writings of O. H. Marshall, p. 173).
"De Nonville's journal removes the doubt which has been
entertained as to the location of this fortress, some having
supposed it to have been first built at Lewiston. … It
occupied the site of the present fort on the angle formed by
the junction of the Niagara with Lake Ontario. … De Nonville
left De Troyes with provisions and munitions for eight months.
A sickness soon after broke out in the garrison, by which they
nearly all perished, including their commander. … They were
so closely besieged by the Iroquois that they were unable to
supply themselves with fresh provisions. The fortress was soon
after abandoned and destroyed [1688], much to the regret of De
Nonville."
Marquis de Nonville,
Journal of Expedition against the Senecas
(translated in Historical Writings of O. H. Marshall, p. 173).
Foot-notes
ALSO IN:
F. Parkman,
Count Frontenac and New France under Louis XIV.,
pages 155 and 166.
NIAGARA: A. D. 1725-1726.
The stone fort built.
How the French gained their footing.
Joncaire's wigwam.
Captain Joncaire "had been taken prisoner when quite young by
the Iroquois, and adopted into one of their tribes. This was
the making of his fortune. He had grown up among them,
acquired their language, adapted himself to their habits, and
was considered by them as one of themselves. On returning to
civilized life he became a prime instrument in the hands of
the Canadian government, for managing and cajoling the
Indians. … When the French wanted to get a commanding site
for a post on the Iroquois lands, near Niagara, Joncaire was
the man to manage it.
{2357}
He craved a situation where he might put up a wigwam, and
dwell among his Iroquois brethren. It was granted, of course,
'for was he not a son of the tribe—was he not one of
themselves?' By degrees his wigwam grew into an important
trading post; ultimately it became Fort Niagara."
W. Irving,
Life of Washington,
volume 1, chapter 5.
"In 1725 the Fort of Niagara was commenced by Chaussegross de
Léry, on the spot where the wooden structure of de Denonville
formerly stood; it was built of stone and completed in 1726."
W. Kingsford,
History of Canada,
volume 2, page 516.
NIAGARA: A. D. 1755.
Abortive expedition against the fort, by the English.
See CANADA: A. D. 1755 (AUGUST-OCTOBER).
NIAGARA: A. D. 1756.
The fort rebuilt by Pouchot.
See CANADA: A. D. 1756.
NIAGARA: A. D. 1759.
The fort taken by the English.
See CANADA: A. D. 1759 (JULY-AUGUST).
NIAGARA: A. D. 1763.
The ambuscade and massacre at Devil's Hole.
See DEVIL'S HOLE.
NIAGARA: A. D. 1764.
Sir William Johnson's treaty with the Indians.
Cession of the Four Mile Strip' along both banks of the river.
See PONTIAC'S WAR.
NIAGARA: A. D. 1783.
Retention of the Fort by Great Britain
after peace with the United States.
See UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1784-1788.
NIAGARA: A. D. 1796.
Surrender of the fort by Great Britain.
See UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1794-1795.
NIAGARA: A. D. 1813.
Surprise and capture of the fort by the British.
See UNITED STATES OF AMERICA:
A. D. 1813 (DECEMBER).
----------NIAGARA: End--------
NIAGARA, OR LUNDY'S LANE, Battle of.
See UNITED STATES OF AMERICA:
A. D. 1814 (JULY-SEPTEMBER).
NIAGARA FRONTIER: A. D. 1812-1814.
The War.
Queenstown.
Buffalo.
Chippewa.
Lundy's Lane.
Fort Erie.
See UNITED STATES OF AMERICA:
A. D. 1812 (SEPTEMBER-NOVEMBER);
1813 (DECEMBER);
1814 (JULY-SEPTEMBER).
NIAGARA PEACE MISSION, The.
See UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1864 (JULY).
NIAGARA RIVER, Navigated by La Salle (1679).
See CANADA: A. D. 1669-1687.
NIBELUNGEN LIED, The.
"Of the bequests made to us of the [German] Popular Poetry of
the time of the Hohenstauffen, by far the most important, in
fact the most important literary memorial of any kind, is the
epic of between nine and ten thousand lines known as the
Nibelungen Lied. The manuscripts which have preserved for us
the poem come from about the year 1200. For full a thousand
years before that, however, many of the lays from which it was
composed had been in existence; some indeed proceed from a
still remoter antiquity, sung by primitive minstrels when the
Germans were at their wildest, untouched by Christianity or
civilization. These lays had been handed down orally, until at
length a poet of genius elaborated them and intrusted them to
parchment."
J. K. Hosmer,
Short History of German Literature,
part 1, chapter 1.
"In the year 1757, the Swiss Professor Bodmer printed an
ancient poetical manuscript, under the title of Chriemhilden
Rache und die Kluge (Chriemhilde's Revenge, and the Lament);
which may be considered as the first of a series, or stream of
publications and speculations still rolling on, with increased
current, to the present day. … Some fifteen years after
Bodmer's publication, which, for the rest, is not celebrated
as an editorial feat, one C. H. Müller undertook a Collection
of German Poems from the Twelfth, Thirteenth and Fourteenth
Centuries; wherein, among other articles, he reprinted
Bodmer's Chriemhilde and Klage, with a highly remarkable
addition prefixed to the former, essential indeed to the right
understanding of it; and the whole now stood before the world
as one Poem, under the name of the Nibelungen Lied, or Lay of
the Nibelungen. It has since been ascertained that the Klage
is a foreign inferior appendage; at best related only as
epilogue to the main work: meanwhile out of this Nibelungen,
such as it was, there soon proceeded new inquiries and kindred
enterprises. For much as the Poem, in the shape it here bore,
was defaced and marred, it failed not to attract observation:
to all open-minded lovers of poetry, especially where a strong
patriotic feeling existed, the singular antique Nibelungen was
an interesting appearance. Johannes Müller, in his famous
Swiss History, spoke of it in warm terms: subsequently, August
Wilhelm Schlegel, through the medium of the Deutsche Museum,
succeeded in awakening something like a universal popular
feeling on the subject; and, as a natural consequence, a whole
host of Editors and Critics, of deep and of shallow endeavour,
whose labours we yet see in progress. The Nibelungen has now
been investigated, translated, collated, commented upon, with
more or less result, to almost boundless lengths. … Apart
from its antiquarian value, and not only as by far the finest
monument of old German art; but intrinsically, and as a mere
detached composition, this Nibelungen has an excellence that
cannot but surprise us. With little preparation, any reader of
poetry, even in these days, might find it interesting. It is
not without a certain Unity of interest and purport, an
internal coherence and completeness; it is a Whole, and some
spirit of Music informs it: these are the highest
characteristics of a true Poem. Considering farther what
intellectual environment we now find it in, it is doubly to be
prized and wondered at; for it differs from those Hero-books,
as molten or carved metal does from rude agglomerated ore;
almost as some Shakspeare from his fellow Dramatist, whose
Tamburlaines and Island Princesses, themselves not destitute
of merit, first show us clearly in what pure loftiness and
loneliness the Hamlets and Tempests reign. The unknown Singer
of the Nibelungen, though no Shakspeare, must have had a deep
poetic soul; wherein things discontinuous and inanimate shaped
themselves together into life, and the Universe with its
wondrous purport stood significantly imaged; overarching, as
with heavenly firmaments and eternal harmonies, the little
scene where men strut and fret their hour, His Poem, unlike so
many old and new pretenders to that name, has a basis and
organic structure, a beginning, middle and end; there is one
great principle and idea set forth in it, round which all its
multifarious parts combine in living union. … With an
instinctive art, far different from acquired artifice, this
Poet of the Nibelungen, working in the same province with his
contemporaries of the Heldenbuch [Hero-book] on the same
material of tradition, has, in a wonderful degree, possessed
himself of what these could only strive after; and with his
'clear feeling of fictitious truth,' avoid as false the errors
and monstrous perplexities in which they vainly struggled.
{2358}
He is of another species than they; in language, in purity and
depth of feeling, in fineness of invention, stands quite apart
from them.' The language of the Heldenbuch … was a feeble
half-articulate child's-speech, the metre nothing better than
a miserable doggerel; whereas here in the old Frankish
(Oberdeutsch) dialect of the Nibelungen, we have a clear
decisive utterance, and in a real system of verse not without
essential regularity, great liveliness, and now and then even
harmony of rhythm. … No less striking than the verse and
language is the quality of the invention manifested here. Of
the Fable, or narrative material of the Nibelungen we should
say that it had high, almost the highest merit; so daintily
yet firmly is it put together; with such felicitous selection
of the beautiful, the essential, and no less felicitous
rejection of whatever was unbeautiful or even extraneous. The
reader is no longer afflicted with that chaotic brood of
Fire-drakes, Giants, and malicious turbaned Turks, so fatally
rife in the Heldenbuch: all this is swept away, or only hovers
in faint shadows afar off; and free field is open for
legitimate perennial interests. Yet neither is the Nibelungen
without its wonders; for it is poetry and not prose; here too,
a supernatural world encompasses the natural, and, though at
rare intervals and in calm manner, reveals itself there. …
The whole story of the Nibelungen is fateful, mysterious,
guided on by unseen influences; yet the actual marvels are
few, and done in the far distance; those Dwarfs, and Cloaks of
Darkness, and charmed Treasure-caves, are heard of rather than
beheld, the tidings of them seem to issue from unknown space.
Vain were it to inquire where that Nibelungen-land specially
is: its very name is Nebel-land or Nift-land, the land of
Darkness, of Invisibility. The 'Nibelungen Heroes' that muster
in thousands and tens of thousands, though they march to the
Rhine or Danube, and we see their strong limbs and shining
armour, we could almost fancy to be children of the air."
T. Carlyle,
The Nibelungen Lied
(Critical and Miscellaneous Essays, volume 3).
"The traditions of German heroic poetry extend over more than
300 years, and are drawn from various German tribes. King
Ostrogotha reigned over the Goths about the year 250, and was
the contemporary of the emperors Philip and Decius. Ermanaric
governed the Ostrogoths about 100 years later, and was a very
warlike king, ruling over a large extent of territory. The
invasion of the Huns drove him to despair, and he fell by his
own hand before the year 374. Soon after the year 400 the
Burgundians founded a mighty empire in the most fertile part
of the Upper Rhine, where Cæsar had already fought with the
Germans, near Spiers, Worms, and Mayence. The Roman Aëtius,
who ruled Gaul with the aid of his Hun allies, defeated the
Burgundians by means of these barbarians in a terrible battle
about the year 437; 20,000 men fell, amongst them their king
Gundicarius (Gunther). The Burgundians seemed to be
annihilated, and soon after retreated to Savoy. About the same
time Attila was king of the Huns and Ostrogoths to the terror
of the world. His name is Gothic, the arrangements of his
court were Gothic, and he reckoned among his knights
Theodomer; the king of the Ostrogoths. The West had just
learnt all the terror of this 'Scourge of God,' when news came
of his sudden death (453), and in the following year his
followers succumbed to the attacks of the Germans (454).
Twenty-two years later, Odoacer deposed the last shadow of a
Roman emperor; and again, twelve years later, Theodoric led
the Ostrogoths into Italy and Odoacer fell by his hand. About
the same period the Merovingian Clovis founded the kingdom of
the Franks; about the year 530 his sons destroyed the
Thuringian empire; and his grandson Theodebert extended his
kingdom so far, that, starting from Hungary, he planned an
attack on the Byzantine emperor. The Merovingians also offered
a successful resistance to the Vikings, who were the terror of
the North Sea, and who appeared even at the mouths of the
Rhine. From another quarter the Longobards in little more than
a century reached Italy, having started from Lüneburg, in the
neighbourhood of Brunswick, and their King Alboin took
possession of the crown of Italy in 568. These wonderful
transferences of power, and this rapid founding of new
empires, furnished the historical background of the German
hero-legends. The fact that the movement was originally
against Rome was forgotten; the migration was treated as a
mere incident in the internal history of the German nation.
There is no trace of chronology. … Legend adheres to the
fact of the enmity between Odoacer and Theodoric, but it
really confuses Theodoric with his father Theodomer,
transplants him accordingly to Attila's court, and supposes
that he was an exile there in hiding from the wrath of
Odoacer. Attila becomes the representative of everything
connected with the Huns. He is regarded as Ermanaric's and
Gunther's enemy, and as having destroyed the Burgundians.
These again are confused with a mythical race, the Nibelungen,
Siegfried's enemies, and thus arose the great and complicated
scheme of the Nibelungen legend. … This Middle High-German
Epic is like an old church, in the building of which many
architects have successively taken part. … Karl Lachmann
attempted the work of restoring the Nibelungen lied and
analysing its various elements, and accomplished the task, not
indeed faultlessly, yet on the whole correctly. He has pointed
out later interpolations, which hide the original sequence of
the story, and has divided the narrative which remains after
the removal of these accretions into twenty songs, some of
which are connected, while others embody isolated incidents of
the legend. Some of them, but certainly only a few, may be by
the same author. … We recognise in most of these songs such
differences in conception, treatment, and style, as point to
separate authorship. The whole may have been finished in about
twenty years, from 1190-1210. Lachmann's theory has indeed
been contested. Many students still believe that the poem, as
we have it, was the work of one hand; but on this hypothesis
no one has succeeded in explaining the strange contradictions
which pervade the work, parts of which show the highest art,
while the rest is valueless."
W. Scherer,
History of German Literature,
chapters 2 and 5 (volume 1).
ALSO IN:
B. Taylor,
Studies in German Literature,
chapter 4.