HERZELOYDE'S DRAGON-DREAM

BY A. T. F ~ T T O

IN medieval German poetry there are some memorable dreams. In Meier Helmbrecht there are the old farmer's dreams of the terrible punishments that will overtake his son if the latter embarks on a life of crime. He dreams that young Helmbrecht holds two lights in his hand which burn with such brilliance that they light up the countryside for d e s around-he dreamt it of a man last year whom this year he saw blind. He as0 dreams his son is hanging in a tree, and that a crow and a raven are partin his hair from either side.' In

and her own, symbolized by the rending of her falcon by two eagles.2 In Gottfried's Tristun we see the dream ofjealous Marjodoc, in WhichTristan- at that moment in the arms of Isolde-is symbolized as a mighty boar that ranges from the forest into the King's bed-chamber and soils the royal linen with his foam.3 And in Parzivul we have the dream of Herzeloyde in which she senses the death of her husband and at the same time the & m e loss of her son, symbolized as a Dragon, through his abandoning her?

Each of these dreams is vivid, immediate and, for us, beautiful--Helm- brecht's dreams not less so because they are sinister-and each is an 'Angst- traum'.' In Tristun and in three of the four dreams in Meier Helmbrecht the audience is left with the dream:6 but in the NibeZungmZied and in Purzivul the poet offers clues for an interpretation. In the NibeZungenfied the clue is given through Kriemhild's mother as soon as she has been told the dream:' but in Parzival the mystery of the dream is allowed to hang over it for seven books -a young life-time-before the identity of the Dragon is stated authorita- tively through the mouth of that great interpreter, Trevrizent? Wolfram thus has the best of the two worlds of mystery and clarity. Yet of clarity only up to a point. It is established that the Dragon is Parzival. But is it clear why Parzival, who becomes the pattern of a medieval Christian king, should be a Dragon, which is normally the symbol of Evil, Antichrist and (worst of all) Heresy? In the following attempt to elucidate this paradox two aims will be fol-

lowed. The first, of course, will be to try to interpret the relevant portions of the text of Parzival. The second will be to inquire incidentally into ways of interpreting medieval animal symbolism, the fixination of which is ~erennial.~

the Nibdungenlied there is Kriemhild's dream o H her hture husband's tragedy,

103,25 Diu vrouwe umb einen mitten tac eins angestl3chen slges pflac. ir kom ein vorhtlicher schric.

16

HERZELOYDB’S DRAGON-DREAM 17

si diihte wie ein stemen blic si gein den liiften vuorte, dB si mit creften ruorte manc viurh donerstrlle. die vlugen a1 zemde gein ir: do sungelt unde sanc von ginstem ir z6pfe lanc. mit crache gap der doner duz: brinnende zaher was sin guz. ir lip si d l n2ch wider vant, d6 zucte ein grife ir zeswen hant: daz wart ir verkzrt hie mite. si dGhte wunderlkher site, wie si wm-e eins wurmes amme, der s9t zervuorte ir wamme, und wie ein trache ir briiste siige, und daz der gkhes von ir vliige, s6 daz si in nimmer mB gesach. daz herze er ir Gz dem lPbe brach: die vorhte muosen ir ougen sehen.

One noontide the lady lay in troubled sleep. She received a dreadful shock. It seemed to her as though a meteor wafted her to the upper air where a host of thunderbolts assailed her, flying at her all at once so that her long tresses hissed and crackled with sparks. The thunder roared pouring tears of fire. As she came to herself again, a griffin snatched at her right hand, when all was changed thus: she marvelled at how she was now mothering a serpent which then rent her womb and how a dragon sucked at her breast and flew swiftly away so that she never glimpsed it again-it tore her heart from her body. Such terrors had she to behold. . . .

The signs and portents will be taken for granted (they are ‘draconian’, see p. 22, below), and attention will be concentrated on the leading symbol, the Dragon. wurmes anticipates trache as a stylistic variation, as tier anticipates trache in Trevrizent’s clue at 476,27 f. : du w m e daz tier daz si dd souc, unt der trache der von ir dd vlouc. As a curiosity one can note in passing that Albrecht von Scharfenberg, whoseJiingerer Titurel sometimes offers such illuminating commentary on passages in Parzival, takes up only one line of this arresting dream: 1076,6 ir zeswer armgerucket [ggetzucket] wart, and even then does not name the Griffin (104, S), let alone the Dragon who dominates the dream. Albrecht in this way seems to focus attention on the loss of Gahmuret.“

The first task is to attempt to discover what Wolfram intends with trache in other contexts in which the word occurs, and whether such intentions throw light on the Dragon in Herzeloyde’s dream, apart from the obvious aspect that as the dream states and Trevrizent confirms (476, 23 K ) , the Dragon alias Parzival caused his mother’s death.

B

18 HBRZBLOYDB’S DRAGON-DREAM

One context need not engage us fbr long. In Book IX, in Trevrizent’s account of the magico-medical treatment of Amfortas’s wound, on which Gottfried comments so scathingly, ache is employed in a double sense. Dragon’s blood is cited as the origin of the herb ttackonte‘‘ whose beneficent properties it was vainly ho ed might be enhanced by the revolution of the

of Mars and upiter in the ascmdant and of the waning moon (483, 6 fE). e of context &om that of the dream; but

we note (i) that draconian Duence in Purzz’val is not necessarily evil, and consequently (ii) that astrological+xm-medical symbolism could remain impervious to Christian influence in the high Middle Ages as it remains impervious to the dominant influences of our day.

Apart from a third context that concerns Parzival in the main but also Orilus de Lalander, all other Dragon contexts in the poem concern this Orilus. In Book VI, as Parzival charges to attack Orilus, he descries a lifelike Dragon on the latter’s shield, another on his helmet and numerous Dragons with eyes of ruby on his tabard and housings:

einen trachen als er lebte. ein ander trache strebte Qfh helme gebunden; an den selben stunden manec guldh trache cleine (mit mangem edelen steine muosen die geheret sh: ir ougen when rubln) Gf der decke und an dem d t .

~n his account of the ensuing combat, Wolfiam refers ironically to the pleni- tude of Dragons on Orilus’s harness and implies an inability of the Dragon on his helmet to ward off Parzival’s blows:

sympathetic constellation o P Draco, as an antidote to the malignant influence

This is clear IT y a different

262,4 Of des schilde vand er

263, 14 pds gedient hie Parzival, daz er sich alsus weren kan wol hundert trachen und eincs man. ein trache wart verdret, she wunden gedret, der bf Oriluses helme lac, so durchliuhtec daz der tac volleclkhe durch in schein, wart drab geslagen manc edcl stein.

At 275,21, Orilus’s sister Cunneware would have reco r d the knight who stood before her more easily as Orilus or his brother e b , had the Dragons

HERZELOYDE’S DRAGON-DREAM I9

on his tabard not been so marred by battle. Finally, when Orilus is taken to his pavilion we are told that a Dragon, i.e. Dragon-pennant, held down by four guy-ropes, was flying above it, the a p j l or crown of the pavilion gripped in his claws as though he were alive and in the act bearing the pavilion off with him to the upper air:

278, 11 einhalp an des kuneges rinc iiber eins brunnen ursprinc stuont ir poulh Of dem plh, als oben ein trache in shen cl%n het des ganzen apfels halben teil. den trachen zugen vier wintseil, reht als er lebende dii vliige und den poulh gein den lufien zuge. dh bP erkande ez Orilus: wan s k u wiipen waren sus.

If, as I shall argue below, the Dragon stands for kingship and empire, can Orilus’s Dragon-device be interpreted in terms of his known character? In his Perceval, Chrttien does not give him an escutcheon; but he depicts him as an arrogant and overbearing knight and bestows on him a type-name to match: ‘Li Orguelleus de la lande’ (3813)-‘The Proud Knight de la Lande’.l Wolfram was aware of the meaning of this name and he enhanced Orilus’s arrogance in various ways. Orilus and his brother Lhelfn are the two most formidable opponents of Parzival and of Arthur’s circle. Liheh, indeed, had wrested two kingdoms from Parzival’s lieutenants during Parzival’s helpless infancy, and was thus a great power. In his maturity as a knight, Orilus slew the young knight-aspirant Schionatulander and bragged of it to his wife Jeschute. Thus we are faced with a thoroughly aggressive and haughty pair, though standing within the pale of courtly society. We are not told Lihelm’s escutcheon directly; but by implication it is the Dragon, since, as was seen above, Cunneware was ready to receive the vizored Orilus as either of her two brothers. Cadets displayed their seniors’ arms at this time without differencing, yet it is a little surprising that Orilus, a duke in his own right, should do (Gahmuret, by his own choice a ‘lackland’, naturally dis- plays his elder brother’s pantel till, as a knight-errant, i.e. soldier of fortune, he assumes the Anchor.) Nevertheless, this formidable pair of ‘empire-builders’ or aggressors displays the Dragon, and we note that although a knight’s device may be legitimately multiplied on his tabard and housing, Wolfram clearly implies excess in those of the proud Orilus-is it not an example and an expression of u n m h e for which he will pay? In keeping with this implica- tion, too, is Orilus’s painful awareness of his inferior rank as compared with that of his wife. He begins his tirade against Jeschute, whom he summarily convicts of adultery with Parzival, with a reminder of this inferiority:

20 HBBZBLOYDB’S DRAGON-DBBAM

13 3,29 aber sprach der viirste s2n ‘vrouwe, ich & iu niht e th : irn welt iuch daer site sc% amen: ir liezet kiineginne namen und heizt durch mich ein herzogin: der koufgft mir ungewin.. . .’

and he then dwells with relish on how he unhorsed her kingly brother Erec under the walls of Erec’s own city of ICarn?n~’~ An with a ‘vrouwe, ir wert mir gar ze h&‘-‘Madam, you are getting above yourseIf” (r36,24), he prepares to degrade her publicly to the status of a common woman caught in the act.l5 Duke Orilus is an overdone, d a t e d Dragon-it will be seen below that Dragon-standards were physically inflatable-who, when it comes to the test, is duly deflated by the true Dragon, Parzival. Orilus’s pride is humbled. It is thus appropriate and prophetic at the conclusion of Orilus’s tirade, and not a little ironic, when Wolfram has him say:

137~14 ‘vrouwe, nu sulen wir dten. kcem ich an in, des wurde ich eil, der hie nam iuwerre minne tef ich bestuende in do& durch aventiur, ob s in item =be viur, als eines wil % en trachen.’

Parzival, in harmony with his shape in Herzeloyde’s dream, is that dragon, and his time will come. It appears that Wo&m has consciously worked out his imagery.

The question now arises whether Wolfram could have had his dream from a mediival dream-book.

If the dream-literature of the Middle Ages, especially in Latin, had already been edited, sifted and codified, some aspects of this inquiry might have been taken for granted. But in t h i s field, so important for the interpretation of poetry16-and perhaps even for political history-we are only at the be- ginning. ’

The pre-eminence of Artemidoros’ Oneirokritika (Greek, of the second century AD.) in its own day and subsequently in Byzantium is widely accepted, and we can assume that its indirect influence in Western Christen- dom during the Middle Ages was appreciable. But no one has yet claimed, let alone demonstrated, direct influence of the Oneirokritika.18 The earliest Latin version of this work that has come to my notice is &om the beginning of the seventeenth cent~ry.’~ At Oneirokricika II, 13 there stands: ‘A&wv paui%a oqpatwi 61a ~b b a d v [Kal bpxom]. . . .’ ‘On account of its (great) strength the Dragon signifies the Emperor [and the senior official]. . . .’ The interpolation K a l &xma would seem at first sight to derive &om the imper-

H E R Z E L O Y D E ’ S DRAGON-DREAM 21

tinence of some wielder of the stylus luxuriating in his Byzantinism: but it may well be inspired by the legitimate attempt of an early editor to accom- modate this Dragon with some of the seven Dragon-birth dreams reported by Artemidoros later at IV, 67-dreams which he says he collected at first hand together with their ‘sequels’.’’ Of the seven sons thus foretold-that all seven Dragons should stand for sons is a statistical marvel-the first became a famous rhetor, the second a hierophant, the third an excellent prophet; thus three ‘top people’ of Classical society. And of the others the fourth was a renowned seducer, the fifth was distinguished by decapitation for highway robbery, the sixth became a runaway, but the seventh, poor wretch, could claim no distinction whatever, since he was a lame hunchback. All of these ‘sequels’ are accounted for ‘post-factually’ by this or that serpentine aspect.

On the evidence of Artemidoros, Dragon-birth dreams seem to have been frequent among pregnant women, though for obvious reasons few could aspire to bring future emperors into the world. Applying to Dr L. Veszy- Wagner for information, I fully expected to harvest a crop of modern Dragon-birth dreams, especially after having been led on by a statement in a departmental conversation that pregnant women are inclined to dream that they are soon to give birth to something bigger and better than their hus- bands, which as a man I took for hard psychological coin. But Dr Veszy- Wagner, who had inquired into this subject, informs me that such dreams are unknown to her and that a pregnant woman, if she dreams at all, is more likely to dream from indigestion than from the quickening of her unborn child, and that by far the most frequent type of dream pregnant women have is one to the effect that they have overlain their child after birth.”

If we ask ourselves why pregnant women in Artemidoros’ day dreamed so frequently of Dragons, but none (or very few) today, the answer must be that dreaming to some extent is socially conditioned. It is here that an idea of Lessing’s,’’ at the first glance a period-piece of the Aujklurung, comes into its own. Attempting to account for the well-known dreams of Greek and Roman ladies who had imperial or famous sons begotten on them by Dragons, of which the constellation Nectanebus-Olympias-Alexander is the one most familiar to medievalists, Lessing observes in his Laokoon: ‘Die Schlange war ein Zeichen der Gottheit; und die schonen Bildsaden und GemZhlde eines Bacchus, eines Apollo, eines Merkurius, eines Hercules waren selten ohne Schlange. Die ehrlichen Weiber hatten des Tages ihre Augen an dem Gotte geweidet, und der verwirrende Traum erweckte das Bild des Thieres. . . . Denn eine Ursache musste es wohl haben, w a r m die ehebrecherische Phan- tasie nur immer eine Schlange war’.23 To continue in this rationalistic spirit, from which nothing is hidden: the women of Antiquity knew that Dragon-dreams could be auspicious for their offspring ; ambitious women will have sought to induce such dreams, with such statues as Lessing has des-

22 HBRZELOYDB’S DRAGON-DREAM

cribed to focus upon; and the alarming menus of Classical banquets will from time to time have rovided indigestion.

On the basis of like father, like son’, K. Lucae, who cited the for oing P

passage from L,~okoon,2~ sou ht to account for Hedoyde’s Dragon L through knowledge on W o P fram‘s part of a version of pseudo-Callisthena’ Alexander legend, according to which, as hinted above, Olympias was tricked into thinking that she had conceived Alexander from a god in Dragon-form, whereas his sire was really the exiled sorcerer-king Nectanebus. Olympias bore Alexander amid portents of thunder and lightning, and Lucae argues that Wolfiam used these portents, too, for the beginning of Herzeloyde’s dream. In his modest and very suggestive short note on this dream, Dr H. R. Hesse points out that in folklore fiery portents in the air are ‘ d r a ~ ~ n i a n ’ ~ ~ and Mr C. J. Lofinark communicated chis to me indepen- dently, supporting his view with earlier material.26 But the notion ‘Dragon father, Dragon cannot of itself be said to account for a Dragon-birth dream: it is too rationalistic. As will be seen, thae are two other notable Dragondreams portending the birth of a hero from widely divergent tradi- tions of poetry, besides Wolfram's, and if my argument concerning a passage in the Apocalypse prevails, there are four in all. Yet the symbolism of Alexan- der’s conception and birth is consonant with that of Herzeloyde’s dream and so will have helped to consolidate it in Wolfiam’s imagination, since he can scarcely have failed to know of it.z8

In our present state of knowledge it cannot be excluded that a prototype of Herzeloyde’s dream will be found one day in a medieval dreambook. But it is by consulting other poetic accounts of heroes’ births that most light is gained

And in any case one would have to ask what might be the source of such a hypothetical prototype.”

Each of two other poetic examples when compared with Wolfiam’s brings out and confirms an aspect of his. Clytemnestra’s in Aeschylus’ Choephoroe underlines the danger of the Dragon to the mother: in different ways their sons killed Clytemnestra and Herdoyde. In the Kirgiz epic of Maws, Chiyirdi’s dream portends that, like Herzeloyde’s, her son will rule a great kingdom. Herzeloyde’s Dragon-dream is therefore very rich, since it combines the overlapping aspects of the Dragon’s ‘danger’ and his m j e s

Clytemnestra’s dram was first brought into the discussion by Dr Hesse. The two adjacent passages in Professor George Thomson’s rendering are lines 521 E and 538 & Orestes converses with the Chorus:

%

Ch. The wicked woman Has sent these gifis because her heart w a s tossed In dreams and rambling terrors of the night.

Or. Did she declare the nature of her vision? Ch. She said she dreamed to her was born a

H E R Z E L O Y D E ’ S DRAGON-DREAM 23 ~~ _ _ _ _ ~

Or. What followed then? how did her story end? Ch. She nursed it like a child in swaddling-clothes. Or. What nurture did it crave-a new-born serpent? Ch. She dreamed she gave it breast and suckled it. Or. With paps unwounded by so vile a thing? Ch. Amidst her milk it drew a curd of Or. Ah, this should be no idle apparition. . . . Or. I pray this Earth, I pray my father’s tomb,

That this vision may prove oracular.34 As I interpret it, it tallies well. Since, issuing from whence I saw the light, The serpent-chiId was wrapt in swaddling-clothes And since it mouthed the breast that nourished me, With kindly milk mingling a curd of blood, Whereat she cried in terror, it must be That, even as she gave that monster life, So she must die a violent death, and I, The dragon of her dream, shall murder her.35

It is fascinating that Orestes should first interpret the dream in words then in deeds. Clytemnestra’s Dragon-birth dream is not a true pregnancy dream, but only retrospectively so. In this regard Chiyirdi’s is nearer to Herzeloyde’s.

In a version of Manas by the great Kirgiz bard Sagymbay Orozbakov (1867-1930), there is the following:

A fair apple large as a bowl, A toothsome apple honey-sweet- When she eats it her belly swells, And from her womb, hissing, there comes Full sixty fathom An azhidar ! When, roused to fury, he draws breath He sucks in the Universe!36 Gazing in terror she is aghast: Uncoiled, that Dragon’s shape Measures a hundred yards and more !37

Chiyirdi will not conceive until two years have passed?* but her dream looks forward to the time when after prodigious pangs she gives birth to the Chingis-like world-conquerer, Manas. Manas is the national hero of the Kirgiz, and the Dragon-symbol must therefore be taken as positive. But the Kirgiz, hemmed in on all sides by great powers, took pleasure in the terror which Manas inspired among other nations-in their epics-and this aspect is also expressed in Chiyirdi’s dream. As J. S. P. Tatlock so pithily said when

24 RERZBLOYDB’S DRAGON-DREAM

discussing the Dragon-standards of t h i s coutltry, the Dragon is a good &end but a bad enemy.39

Discussin the Birth of Manas elsewhere:’ I had to ask myself whether Sagymbay t ad not consciously or unconsciously made use of a Dra on- symbol fiom one of the settled civilizations of Asia. The Kirgiz worf for ‘Dragon’-ujiduur (‘dragon’, ‘bugbear‘)-is of Persian ori But it seems

obvious possible ‘source’ for a Kirgiz bard is the very ositive and at times

as in the legends of European antiquity already referred to:’ Dragons may sire heroes and princes, in books devoted in part to Chinese dragon-lore no pregnancy-dream of a Dragon has been The situation of Chiyirdi’s dream in the East thus closely resembles that of Herzeloyde in the West: at the conscious level the Dragon-symbol has local associations of em~ire ; ‘~ but in its as ects as render of the womb of a mother-tebe it derives fiom

Chiyirdi’s dreams in this respect would seem to be fitndamental despite the great gap that divides them in time and space; so that the commentary which they offer each other in t h ~ s aspect, as with Clytemnestra’s in the other, is the best I know.

A third context now re uires examination, which although it is in prose can nevertheless be calk 1 ‘poetic’ because it is visionary-the Twelfth Chapter of the Apocalypse. To cite it in this connexion leads deep into the problematical, often paradoxical nature of medieval symbolism, both in general and in the passage from Purxivul under discussion. And, as it happens, this third context is closely interwoven with Heneloyde’s dream.

Not long after Herzeloyde dreams her dream, a fortnight to be precise, she gives birth to her son and herselfrecalls as she nurses him that the Queen of Heaven gave the breast to Jesus (I 13,17 E). Wolfkam, then, momentarily evokes the analogy between the Virgin with the infant Christ and Herzeloyde with the infant Parzival, who is destined to be IGng of the Graal. Listeners with only fair memories will have been reminded here of the Twelfth Chapter of the Apocalypse of St. John:

12, I Et signum magnum apparuit in calo; mulier amicta sole, et h a sub pedibus eius, et in capite eius corona stellarum duodecim. Et in utero habens clamat parturiens et cruciabatur ut pariat. Et visum est aliud signum in -10; et ecce draco magnus rufus habens capita septem tt comua decem, et in capitibus eius diademata septem; et cauda eius trahebat tertiam partem stellarum cali et misit us in terram; et draco stetit ante mulierem, uat erat paritura, ut, cum peperisset, filium eius

virga ferrea; at raptus est filius eius ad Deum et ad thronum eius. . . .

that in Persia this dragon, like other dragons, always sym re ohzes Evil?’ An

quite charming Chinese Imperial Dragon. But althoug E: in Chinese legend,

deeper leve f s of the psyche. The resemblances between Herzeloyde’s and

devoraret. Et peperit fi f ium m a d u m qui recturus erat omnes gentes in

HERZELOYDE’S DRAGON-DREAM 25

This visionary scene is clearly derived from a vision or dream of a pregnancy which is to end in the birth of a world-conqueror, and the scene is adapted to prophesy of one whose kingdom nevertheless is not of this world. For the Woman is unmistakably the Virgin and her Babe the Infant Christ. The symbols of worldly power, the sun and the and the un-Christian rod of iron, are plain. The Dragon whom I assume to have symbolized the central figure of thc world-conqueror in the ‘source’ is neatly converted into the latter’s antagonist in order to conform to the all but exclusive role in Scriptural imagery of the Dragon as Satan, Evil or the Kingdoms of This world. This identification is actually provided at Apoc. 20, 2.

Did Wolfram not link the two imminent births mentally, all the more so in that the Virgin and Child were present in his thoughts? And was he not struck by the incongruity of the Dragon? Or are the two Dragons perhaps not incongruous, or not entirely so, and is Parzival until his reconversion perhaps to be placed beside Orilus as one affiicted with Pride, though, unlike Orilus, he was destined to become a Tur t le -d~ve?~~

To make this comparison is rather tempting. The Dragon Parzival caused his mother’s death, one of the ‘sins’ laid at his door in Book IX, like that of his aggression against Ither. Yet one fears to force the issue. One remembers that such symbols are determined by context, as was seen in the astrological example. In scriptural and derived contexts, the Dragon stands almost always for Evil and Error?’ But even within the scriptural tradition, sym- bolism varies within different minor contexts. In answer to the gift of an article in which I tried to show that the Lion in Iwein stood for Christ in battle against Satan symbolized (at first) by a Dragon:’ Professor Helmut Brackert wittily sent me an illumination of Christ as warrior trampling a lion under one foot and a dragon under the other, with the quotation: Super aspidem et basiliscum ambulabis et conculcabis leonem et draconem (Ps. g o / g ~ , 13). The Lion, too, in his context can stand for Evil and suffer defeat from Christ. In view of how the Scriptures came into being it would be surprising if all ‘symbols’ were consistent for all contexts (though early exegetists thought otherwise). But, as has been said, the Dragon happens to be one of the most consistcntly used symbols, whereas the Lion has at least two conflicting aspects: so that if the Lion, as at Ps. g o / g ~ , 13, is coupled with the Dragon he can be evil, even though he stands elsewhere for Christ. Similarly it is known that the East Roman emperors of the fourth century bore a purple Dragon to battle as their standard, yet this did not prevent Constantine I1 from celebrating his victory over Magnentius (conceived as an Enemy of the State) in 353 with a medallion in which he tramples a Dragon beneath his horse’s h0oves.4~ The contexts of standards and medallions were discrete, there was no conflict of meaning. Thus, I surmise, it may also have been at the end of Book I1 of Parzival. Parzival, though proud towards his Maker

26 HBRZBLOYDB’S DRAGON-DREAM

and originally an aggressive young man, is not just another Orilus. But this, again, is not to say that a scriptural and wordy use of the Dragon- symbol could never cohere. Since many churchmen regarded h g h p and empire as evil, there are inevitably contexts in which the D tural tradition and the secular Dragon appear as oncgranted t in secular symbolism the Dragon can and does si& kingship and empire, which has yet to be established.

The point is therefore a very delicate one. My feeling is that to read the Dragon of Herzeloyde’s dream entirely in terms of Ordus’s Dragonhood would be to rob him of his majesty?O while to read him as an Apocalyptic, that is, wholly evil Dragon is impossible. It is arguable, on the other hand, that both Orilus and young Parzival provide examples of Homicidal Error.

Had Wolfram found the Dragon in a dream-book or in legend as por- tending the birth of a great king and warrior, he would have found sup ort

dream on the basis of such symbolism. As used by the Germanic tribes, the Dragon standard is depicted on Trajan’s

column, erected in 113 A.D. At least by the fourth century the Dragon was adopted as the standard of the Roman cohort under the Eagle, standard of the Legion; whence is not The Emperor of East Rome had as his imperial standard in the fourth century a PurFle Dragon.’ Such standards at t h i s time resembled what we call ‘wind-socks or a sort of kite:53 they bellied out in the wind, which, rushing through the ‘body’, inflated the terrible fanged ‘face’ and so set up a hissing worthy of a live s-’~ The Dragon ling- ered on as an imperial emblem of war and ceremony in Byzantium down to Wolfi-am’s day and after.55 With so many comings and goings horn Byzan- tium by knights, diplomats, princesses and merchants, it is inconceivable that Wolfram, the aflicionado of martial and courtly display, should not have known of it.

More important for Parzival, however, the Dragon-standard was revived in England by the Angevin Richard I, possibly under the pseudo-Arthurian influence of Geoffiey of Monmouth’s Historia regun B r i t ~ n n i r e . ~ ~ Richard displayed the Dragon beneath the walls of Messina in 1190, and he took it with him to Palestine?’ Richard’s nephew Otto Iv took a Dragon-standard to the field at Bouvines in 1214: it was, like Arthur’s in the Historia re m, golden in colour, but in texture it apparently resembled those o f f “ the Romans, swelling up in the wind and with gaping jaws.’* Writing to his patron Otto N c. 1212, Gervase of Tilbury summarizes what Geoffrey has to say on the two gold Dragons of Utherpendragon and adds:

illud apud Anglos vedum draconem habens cum capite aureo, quod vicinis expertum et aganis sub awnculo tuo, illustri regc Ricardo, in ultramarinis partibus terrifile fUit.S

r Of scrip

for it in the secular symbolism around him. Or he could have imagine B his

HERZELOYDB’S DRAGON-DREAM 27

In the early thirteenth century the Count of Flanders also had a Dragon- standard mounted on a four-wheeled car.6o

It would be surprising if Wolfram had no indirect knowledge of the great Latin book on Arthur of the day, namely Geoffrey of Monmouth‘s Historia regum. But however that may be, there is no contradiction between Wolfram’s and Geoffrey’s attribution of a device to Arthur’s family, though Wolfram’s has some curious features. In the Historia, Utherpendragon sees an undeniably ‘draconian’ portent in the sky, a dazzling star with a dragon on one of its rays (VIII, 14). Merlin interprets it as a sign that Utherpen- dragon will be king (VIII, IS). Utherpendragon then has two Dragons made of gold, One he presents to the see of Winchester, the other he takes to his wars (VIII, 17). Arthur inherits this emblem: he has a Dragon-crest on his helmet (IX, 4, and at the rear of his army he sets up his Dragon-standard among his bodyguard as a rallying-point (X, 6) . In a dream he sees a Dragon defeat a Bear in combat, which is interpreted as meaning that Arthur (the Dragon) will prevail over a giant (the Bear), and so it comes to pass (X, 2 f.). Wolfram for his part attributes not a truche but a gampildn to Arthur’s lineage-not to Arthur himself directly, but through Arthur’s son Ilintit and his maternal nephew Gawan (383, I fX; 575, 26 E). Why this oblique approach to Arthur’s device? Was it because Wolfram had used up the Dragon on Herzeloyde’s dream and Orilus’s coat-of-arms? If so, it was a neat solution of the difficulty to make it ‘a little one’ (like the illegitimate baby in the anecdote) and then attach it to Arthur’s youthful son?

Revived English custom among the Angevin kings, who are sometimes important for Wolfram,6’ and authoritative Arthurian tradition, supported more remotely by the custom of imperial Byzantium, and even by some aspects of scriptural symbolism, combine to bear out the notion that the Dragon in Herzeloyde’s dream as well as signifying her slayer stands for a great hero, king and conqueror.

It would now be time to ask whether or to what extent symbols like that of the Dragon can migrate from sphere to sphere with essentially unchanged signification, i.e. between dreams, visions, heraldry (in the widest sense), poetry, sculpture and manuscript illustration, were not the implications too vast. For they have never been studied systematically on this ~cale.6~ In order to make any progress at all, scholars merely assume some sort of continuum, and the more guardedly they do so, the better. But as far as dreams and heraldry as conveyed in poetry are concerned, there are some pointers. Marjodoc dreams of Tristan as a Boar, and Tristan’s shield at his knighting displays the B0ar.6~ In the Filostrato and in Chaucer’s re-narration of it in Troihs, Troilus dreams jealously of Diomede as a Boar, and Diomede’s helmet displays appropriately enough his ancestor Meleager’s Calydonian

28 HBBZBLOYDB’S DRAGON-DBBAM

B0ar.6~ One might have expected Parzival, then, to have displayed the Dragon or his mother to have dreamt of him as an Angevin Lco ud?

Such a pattern could not arise in Patlival because of what Wo&m chose to inherit from Chr6tien. For as he tells the story, Parzival was ‘deceived of his kingly style of life’ in the sphere of heraldry, By his intemperate slaying of Ither he acquires a shield that is redder than fire (perhaps as red as blood?) and bare o u deuice, in keeping with what is to be his incognito ‘det

into Book IX-another sign that he is ri for spiritual regeneration.6’ We know that when at last Parzival doca gplay a device it will not be the Dragon-Dragons can be lefi to the Oriluses and Liihelhs of this world- but a Turtledove. Even if Parzival is not yet included at 8m,2 E :

rote ritter’,6’ whic d accompanies him into Book VIII but, sigdiautly, not

KyGt iedoch erkante dd$ des griles wpen an der schar: si vuorten turteltQben gar.. . .

-nevertheless, as Graal King, he will soon be the supreme bearer of that escutcheon.

Working back &om this device, we can see that the Turtledove would have been merely odd-not magnificently portentous-as the dominant symbol of his mother’s dream. For a big-boned boy who caused his mother severe pangs;69 for one who w a s to be a great warrior; for a son who was destined to be lord of a great empire that w a s to stretch as far as the lands of Prester John, albeit a spiritual empire, like that of the Babe in the Apocalypse: the Dragon w a s better suited for the dream, even though he was never to figure on Parzival’s shield.

A by-product of this inquiry into the Dragon-spbol of Heneloyde’s dream is some information on the possible nature of Orilus’s pennant above hs pavilion (278, 11 &, vide supru). With four guy-ropes to hold it down and with the Dragon’s claws grippin half of the ‘apfel , it is surely a three-

Otto IV.’O And Mr Lofinark is surely right to adduce Willehlm 409, 18 f. (composed after the Battle of Bouvines) as further evidence that, at least before he died, Wolfiam knew the wind-in&ted Dragon-standard:

dimensional wind-sock like those of t% e Emperors Constantius Augustus and

nu kom vlokzende als ein trache Cliboris von Tananarke. . . .

(Cliboris of Tananarke came flapping like a Dragon. . . . i.e. all puffed up and

I should be little surprised if kquiry by those who are equip ed to undertake

their tongues and roll their eyes under pressure of the wind, are not more

glowering.)

it did not show that Dragons of this type, that hiss and gna SK their teeth, loll

HERZBLOYDE’S DRAGON-DREAM 29

ancient than the fourth century A.D. and widespread over a long period between the Pacific and the Mediterranean. Be that as it may, in parts of Western Europe Dragon-standards were ‘in’ again whilst Wolfiam was growing up and writing; and having seen or heard of one he was vividly impressed by its picturesque and kinetic qualities. Though it comes later in 1244, our Henry III’s instructions for the fabrication of a Dragon-standard contain some useful pointers for the interpretation of the Dragon passages in PurxivaE. It was used repeatedly in what Wolfram would have styled ‘volkw&e’-national battles-against the Welsh :

Fieri eciam faciat unum draconem in mod0 unius vexilli de quodam rubeo samitto, qui ubique sit auro extencellatus, cujus lingua sit facta tanquam ignis coniburens et continue apparenter moveatur, et ejus oculi fiant de saphiris vel de lapidibus eidem convenientibus. . . .’ ’*

’ 517 ff. Str. 13.

NOTES

’ 13511 103,25 A., quoted below. The term ‘nightmare’ is inappropriate. After telling the first dream Old Helmbrecht implies blinding: but before it (577) and elsewhere (598)

he bids his son ask those who know the meaning. ’ Str. 14. * 476,27 f., quoted on p. 17, below.

See the footnotes to my Auckland Winter Lecture (1965) ‘Poetry and the Hunt in Medieval Germany’, printed in AUMLA (No. is, May 1966), pp. 33 A.

lo I think Dr H. R. Hesse, ‘Herzeloiden Traum’, GRM, vol. XLIII (1962), p. 309 undoubtedly right in interoretine Herzelovde’s ‘right hand’ as ‘Gahmuret’. Following Deinert. MI C. T. Lofmark in a writtencom&nnication’considek Purr. 104, 7-8 to be a later addiGon of Wolfram’s, iince it spoils the unity of the dream. In my opinion there is a lot to be said for this. The occasion could have been when Wolflam was accommodating his ‘Urparzival’ to the brilliant new-creation of the Gahmuret episodes, for which there was no ‘source’ in the Perreval-or elsewhere.

6pm6vriov: drakontea/drakontium. See E. Martin, Kommentar. l2 CE Chrktien’s proud lady ‘La Orguelleuse’, Wolfram’s Orgeluse. l3 I am leaning here on Mr G. D. Davies, who will be presenting a thesis in London on medieval

German heraldic terms with their factual background. Mr Davies writes: ‘In Wolfram’s time cadets of noble families often differenced the arms of their father; but in Germany systems of differencing coats-of- arms were chaotic and not universally observed.’ He adds that in Germany at this time and later heraldry was in a state of confusion. Further: ‘There could have been no objection to Orilus and Lahelin bearing the same device on their shields so long as the colours were different; but surely Cunneware would have known which colours were borne by which brother.’

l4 This is in effect a side-blow at Hartmann in the ‘agonistic’ spirit of Purr. 143.21 A. The later of the two writers, Wolfram can ‘presuppose’ Hartmann’s Erec and use it ‘cyclically’ in order to enrich and enhance his own narrative.

See m y article ‘Enid‘s Best Dress’, Elcphorion vol. LIV (1g60), pp. 437 E l6 MI J. Kent is embarking on a study of medieval German dreams and their interpretation, together

with an examination of the relationship of their symbolism to symbolism in other spheres. See W. Schmitt, ‘Das Traumbuch des Hans Lobenzweig’ Archivfiir Kulturgeschichte, XLVIII (1966),

pp. 181 fT. Professor E d Ploss, in his suggestive article ‘Byzantinische Traumsymbolik und Kriemhildr

Falkentraum’, CRM, vol. XXXIX (1958) is careful not to do so. Instead, he has recourse to a ‘Schicht’. without saying what ‘Schicht’ that is. I would have very little hesitation in saying that this ‘Schicht’ is the oral and sub-oral poetic tradition of the Eurasian Continent stretching back towards the Tenth Mil- lennium B.C. !

l9 Artemidori Daldiuni et Achtnetis Sereimi Oneirocriticu, Paris, 1603 (reprinted 1849). aoArtemidori Daldiuni oneirocriticon libri V, rec. R. A. Pack, Lkpzig, 1963.

30 HERZBLOYDB’S DRAGON-DREAM

a1 I am grateful to Dr verzy-wagna for the rcimulating intcrpicw in which this information Wa.3 imparted. It is not without interest. rhaps, that since this w a written the wife ofa coll that four months before the birth o her child she had a &id drevn that she was gi*%

infant or foetus is reprucntcd as a worm.

hu told me

strous worm. In a latcr, Dr Vefzy-Wagner has sina drawn attention to S. Fnud, Dreams, pt. II (Standard ed.. London, 1960, Vol. V) p. 357. for mention of dmm

az It is with an apology that I make my nearest appmrch to the mpin tield of interest dour Gratubnd. 23 Samtliche Schrificn, ed. K. Lachmam and F. Mundru, vol. IX, Staitgan, 1893, pp. 13-16 a4 ‘obcr den T r a m der Hcdoydc im Fkzival’, Zfa. voL Ds (IS@), pp. 1z9 tE z5 Op. cit., p. 309, quoting thc article ‘Dncbe’ L Mackcnscn. in the HcmduriimrbVck &( dcwdrrhm

A b a laubetu, fol. II (1929/30). atMc Lofinark quotes Kurath and Kuhn. Middle &dish Dittionmv. k b && (3) ‘a comet or hooting

star’ c. A.D. 1200 f i r thc conception of a or &met as a ‘eying dragon’ $ h c w d a m ) ; a d hG further refers to Geiriadur Prifvsgol Cymru (the new authoritative Wtth Dictionary) I (A-FTysuc) (1967) sub druig (a) ‘dragon’, (b) ‘warrior’-& Lofmark to the rehaace of meaning (6) far Pkval- (d) ‘sheet-lightning‘, ‘lightning unaccompanied r&uadcr’. ‘meteorite’ (fourteenth and fifrccnth century). This belief was no doubt widespread in medieval Eur

In primitive folk-tda conception i s often rcpr-tcd aa f o E k n g the intrusion of a arpent Had primitive women been gifted with the logic of a Lusing or even of a Lucae, they wodd artatrly have gestated more large serpents than appears to have been the cue.

z8 T h e theme is w d suited to striking iconographical illustration. See D. J. A. Ross’s ‘Olympk and the Serpent’, oumd $the Warburg and Courrauld Inrrihtfes, vol. XXVI (1963), pp. I ff. An authority on the legend ot!Alexandcr, Professor Ross has informed me that he a n d no example from anywhere in Europe and Asia in which Olympias drum that she will give birth to a Dragon.

29 The well-known pioneering psychoanalytial rtudy ‘Dcc Mythus von d n Gcburt d a Hcldar’. Schrijlen zur angewandten Seelmkunde, hng. Sigm. Freud. H& 5 (I-), by Otto W, does not ate any Dra on birth dreams; nor in the d o n entitled ‘Jesuc’ does it quote the Apoalypst.

3fIt &ht w d be Profaor Ploss’s ‘Schicht’, in which cafe w e should be back again with poetry and legend.

31 op. d., p. 307. 32 T f K d V Gpdncovr’ (60.5~. 33 Manas drew blood from his mother’s brast, but as a babe. not Jhgoa It was a hero’s draught, like

34 Vision: TO beipov.

s6 Whereas in many regions, including Europe, the dragon is most +our when breathing out, among those of Turkic speech he seems most dangerous when bzubiog h, 6. the story of ‘Emerald- Phoenix’ in Th. Menzcl, Tiirkische M a c h . vol. I (1923). p. 1a5: ‘Er [& DcacheJ keuchte infolge da halbstiindigen Weges und bcgann nun den Atem einzuziehen. um sic N vachluclen. Doch der Prinz stemmte seine F h s e fest in die Erde und blieb wic angewurzclt SechQ Dcr Drache,zog nun so den Atem ein, dass er selbst Berge weggerisscn und in den Rachcn bekommcll Mtk. . . . = 0. Spies, Tiirkische Marchen (Wrchen der Wcltlitcatuc. Hmg. Von der Le

37 Manastin balalfk tbgf, Frunze, 194 , pp. 7 f.: G r d f n f n l3.E: Ayakta bolgon ak alma./Abdan Jirin bal alma,/Alma jer ih‘ toluptur./Artfnan &t@p ffkfrlp,/Altimd kubk unmu./A&w boluptur./A€nulantp or tartsa/Ay aalamdi soruptur./Konip Coolirp ncz bolup,/Uzarrplir llz &p,/Sir jux ofux kcz bolup. The Kirgiz Homer reems to nod here, since, uncoiled, the dragon ir rhortcr than when coiled. A cheap way out would be to speak of ‘cpische Zahlen’.

that of Herakles from H m , who at the pain cast him to the ground.

35 h t t i p m o ~ ~ e d s o e y b / ~ ~ t r ~ YIV.

SChia. 1961). p. 36.

38 By contrast the birth in Parzlual lies only a formight ahead (112.5).

*O In an article entitled ‘The Birth of Muur’. to appear in Asia Major, vol. Xnr, pt. 2 (1969). ** This is the impreasion of Professor Mary Boyce. I myself could 6nd no ‘positive’ dragon in Firdousi. 4z See above, p. 21. 43 E.g. E. Ingersoll, Dragons and dra on-lore, New York, 1928; C. Gould, Mythical monsterx, London.

1886. There is in Chjna a widcspreabrype of tale in which a woman’ conceives supernaturally, gives birth to one or more dragons, aud is revered after her death: sec W. B k h u d , T y p m chinesischer Vofks- marchen, in FF Communications, No. no, Helsinki, 1937 (No. 60). All but one of the sources quoted in Chinese, but the editor givu an analysis of the mot& in German. In the discusion neither a hero nor an empire is mentioned. The tale is considered to be of South Chinese origin and evcn then &ved from non-chinesc tribes. It is connected with the on& of ‘Dragon’ tribes and veneration of an a n c u t r ~ . ethnographically a very different matter from the case in hand. The only motif of those quoted which touches Chiyirdi ’s Dream at all is that, in one variant, conception occun through the eating of a plum which ripened out of season. But prodigious births naturally attract supuaaturaI concrprions in fok tala.

‘The Dragons of WCSKX and Wales’. Speculrrm. 001. Wr (1933), p. 227.

44 See below. p. 26.

HERZELOYDE’S DRAGON-DREAM 31

45 In Dai Sechen’s dream of Temujin, the future Chingis-khan, when he comes to woo Dai Sechen’s daughter Borte, the falcon that symbolizes Chingis holds the sun and the moon in his talons (Secret History ofthe Mongols. para. 63).

46 See below, p:. 28. 47 Reallexikonfur Antike und Christentam, hrsg. Th. Klauser, vol. IV (~gsg), sub ‘Drachen’, pp. 226 A: 4a ‘Der iventiure meine’ in Hartmanu’s Iwein’ in Mediaeval Studies presented to Frederick Norman,

London, 1965, PP. 97 K *9 Klauser, tit., p. 24.

I respect Mr Lofmark’s view, expressed in correspondence, that the Dragon is part of Parzival’s true nature, which is in the ascendant in his youth. but that Parzival can also be the true Turtledove.

51 Vegetius, De re militari, I, 23; 11, 7. 5 2 Ammianus Marcellinus, XVI, 12. 39: Quo agnito per purpureum signum draconis, surnmitati hastae

lon ’oris aptatum, vclut senectutispandentis exuvias (the reference is to Caesar, 357 AD.). NHG Drarhe = ‘kite’ is derived by Kluge-Betz, Etym. wb. d. dt. Spracke, from fishermen’s kites

brought back by Dutch seamen from the South Seas; but this cannot be their ultimate origin. Cf. below, p. 28.

54 Ammianus Marcellinus, op. cit., XVI, 10, 7: purpureis subtegminibus texti, circumdedere dracones, hastarum aureis gemmatisque summitatibus illigati, kiatu vast0 pe$abiles, et ideo velut ira perciti sibilantes, caudarumque volumina reliqumtes in venfum (A.D. 355).

5 5 See A. Vogt, Constantin VII Porphyroge‘ndte. L e J i m des Cire‘monies, vol. I (1967). Chap. I, p. 8. and Commenfaire, vol. I (1967), p. 49.

56 See J. S. P. Tatlock, op. cit., p. 234. P. E. Schramm, Herrschaftszeichen und Staatssymbolih (Schriften d. Mon. Germ. Hist. 13/19,vol. II (1955). pp. 662 A:, argues from Bohemund‘s Serpent-banner planted on the walls of conquered Antioch in 1w8, as reported by Anna Comnena, that the Angevins will have had the Dragon through the Norman line.

5 7 Tatlock, op. tit., p. 226. s8 Op. cit., p. 235. 59 Tatlo&, op. cit., p. 235. 6o LOC. cit. 61 The gabilun at Kudrun 101, I is non-heraldic: the capelun on a shield at Rother 4943 is scarcely

heraldic at that date but rather displayed in order to inspire terror. Swans are displayed by the same warrior at 4951.

62 Their importance, however, has been exaggerated by hunters after parallels with Wolfram’s Anschevin.

63 Professor F. P. Pickering undertook a first systematic investigation of the interrelation between common elements in medieval literature and the pictorial arts in his Literafur und Darstellende Kunst im Mittelalter (1966).

64 See my ‘Venus, Adonis-and the Boar’, MLII , vol. XLI (1946). p. 357. 65 Ibid. 66 Purz. 118.2: an klinecllcher w o r e betrogen. 67 Cf. Parz. 398.4: wan daz der vor ein ritter sckein,/bi rdtem wdpen unerkant. 6 8 Iwein’s spiritual regeneration also takes place during his personal-and heraldic-incognito-phase. 69 Pam. 112, 6: Diu vrouwe eins kindelins geZuc,/eins suns, der siilher lide was,/dat si vil k h dran genus. ‘O See above, p. 26. ‘I1 Tatlock, o p dt., p. 226. * Mv gratefid thanks are due to Mr Carl 1. Lofmark for having read the draft of this contribution and

for thi&y fruitful suggestions he made.-My thanks are also &e to the Staff of the Warburg Insti- tute in London for permission to borrow books on dream-literature.