Hartmann von Aue

Hartmann von Aue was a German poet of the late twelfth and early thirteenth centuries, a knight of dependent status who wrote in Middle High German. Together with Wolfram von Eschenbach and Gottfried von Strassburg, he forms the trio of great epic poets of the language around 1200, and he was among the first to bring the Arthurian court romance into German. He matters because his texts are almost the only window onto his life, since few documents from his time mention him.

His biography has to be reconstructed from the prologues of his works and from what other writers say about him. He describes himself as a vassal, in a position between service to a lord and the nobility, and his Latin and his command of French suggest schooling in a cathedral school. He probably came from Swabia, although Aue was a very common place name and no specific home has been identified. His patron is also unknown; the Zähringer family is the most likely candidate, given its ties to France. The dates are uncertain: his birth is usually placed around 1160 or 1170, and his death is debated, since Gottfried presents him as still alive around 1210 while Heinrich von dem Türlin mourns him around 1220.

His narrative works include Erec and Iwein, adapted from romances by Chrétien de Troyes, and two religious tales, Gregorius and Poor Heinrich. In Erec he does not follow his French model closely. His religious poems and his songs, of which eighteen survive, show a tension between the chivalric ideal and an ascetic life, which he tries to reconcile by seeking a middle way. His reputation rests mainly on opening the path for the German Arthurian romance and on the lasting appeal of Poor Heinrich, which inspired versions by Longfellow, Rossetti and Gerhart Hauptmann.