On Hrotswitha of Gandersheim
Little is known about Hrotswitha of Gandersheim, but what little we know can be surmised from the survival of a portion of her work. She lived in the Abbey in Gandersheim, modern day Lower Saxony in Germany, during the Ottonian Dynasty, circa 935-1002 CE. Nothing substantial is known about her life – we don’t know who her family was, but it is widely speculated that she must have come from a noble family to have an education as extensive as hers. In addition, we do not know when she joined the Gandersheim Abbey as a nun, even approximately, whether it was in her youth or in later years.
Her work is remarkable for several reasons: first and foremost, she is the first female playwright that we know of, and the first female poet since Sappho; secondly, she was the first to attempt writing plays since the fall of Rome, an art form that was previously reserved only for men. Finally, she was a woman who was clearly well educated, not only in language, but in ancient literature, and theology as she was able to write Christian plays and poetry in Latin verse.
She mentions that she drew influence from Virgil, Horace, Plautus, and Terence as case studies; in addition, she states that despite the beliefs of ancient writers, Terence in particular, that she was not influenced by the pagan nature of their plays, and instead, sought to replicate the form to pave the way for Christian mythology to be preserved in a similar way. Hrotswitha’s plays, Gallicanus and Dulcitus, are concerned with the nature of chastity and the grace that women can attain if they are devoted to God.
In Hrotswitha’s plays, Gallicanus and Dulcitus, we see young women who are steadfast in their devotion to God, and will do everything in their power to remain faithful to their beliefs and to God. Though the circumstances between the plots are altogether different, there is a similarity between the success of God. There is a certain naivety that comes across in how the plays are handled, and between the two, there are – form wise – odd transitions.
The first of the two assigned plays for Hrotswitha, Gallicanus, is about the conversion of Gallicanus, a general that defeated the Scythians for Emperor Constantine. The general desires a reward fitting the task set before him, and he says he loves Constantine’s daughter, Constance, and that he desires the emperor’s daughter’s hand in marriage in payment for his efforts on behalf of the empire. Constantine says he must consult his daughter first, and when consulted, Constance disagrees to the prospect and devises a plan to get out of it; she is a virgin devoted to God, and to marry goes against her belief, so she places faith in God that he will design events to convert Gallicanus so the marriage agreement falls through.
The general goes off to battle aided by John and Paul, two men devoted to Constance, and they convert the general to Christianity when he sees he is about to lose the battle. Once he converts, the battle is easily won through a single conversation, and Gallicanus comes home victorious because of his newfound faith. As a result, he no longer wishes to pursue Constance’s hand in marriage, much to the relief of Constantine and Constance, and wishes to be baptized and celibate. Later, he is exiled and killed by Julian the Apostate. John and Paul are also put to death after denying a conversion back to Pagan ways. After the deed was done, the son of Julian the Apostate became possessed by the devil until he confessed the actions of his father. Upon confession, both Julian and the son are baptized and converted to Christianity.
There are several oddities where the play is concerned: firstly there are no scene descriptors, and no indication of stage directions for when characters enter or leave the scene. As a result of this, it can be difficult to conceptualize what is going on, and at times, unclear who is meant to be in the scene and not. In past attempts of producing the play on the stage, the lack of basic stage directions led to ridicule and outlandish interpretations according to The Plays of Roswitha: a Note on the Acting of the Plays, where Hrotswitha’s work was intentionally parodied for its idealist and slightly naive view of the power of belief and virtue, at least in practice. However, the lack of stage direction is no excuse to purposely misrepresent the intention of the play, and while at times the lack of stage direction makes the transitions between scenes coarse, it is not difficult to understand what is going on and could be fixed with a director treating the play with the respect it deserves.
Secondly, the portrayal of the conversions where Gallicanus, Julian the Apostate, and Julian’s son are concerned seem gratuitous as opposed to earned. That ‘sinners’ would so easily see the light and completely change character feels hollow, despite that the events portrayed are based on genuine historical figures. Gallicanus, otherwise known as St. Gallicanus, was a roman Martyr in Egypt under Julian. There is evidence in The Acts of Gallicanus, if the source is to be believed, that he was a roman general who fought the Persians, though in Hrotswitha’s play, it is the Scythians that Gallicanus fights. After his conversion to Christianity, he aided with founding a hospital and a church, and then lived as a hermit in the desert.
While the events may have happened, the portrayal of the conversion feels highly unlikely. In keeping with the historical account, combined with the extreme briefness of the play, not enough was portrayed to make the conversion believable. A valiant effort, of course, but with the ideology of keeping war out of the play – which Hrotswitha attributes to the fairness of her sex and her inability to understand war and write about it – meant that key character development moments were lost. It would be believable if we saw defeat after defeat of Gallicanus and witnessed him losing faith in the pagan gods to slowly turn to God with Paul and John near him to steer him to the light. However, these scenes were not included and the conflict is skipped, so the transition feels hollow as a result.
The second play by Hrotswitha is Dulcitus, which presents fewer logistical problems because the conflict is not brushed over. The play starts in-media-res with no indication of why the three sisters, Agape, Chionia, and Irena, are in the situation they are in or where they are from. The three sisters are presented to the Emperor Diocletian and ordered to be wedded on account of their ‘rare beauty’, and in order to do so, to renounce their vows to God in lieu of pagan worship; they are unwilling to do this and go so far as to state there is nothing that could move them to act against God. Diocletian does not understand, and moves from sister to sister hoping one of them sees ‘sense’ only to find each subsequent sister more obstinate than the last, and at last, vexed, orders them to be taken away. In the next scene, we encounter Governor Dulcitus who orders to inspect them and he too is moved by their beauty, and in an amusing exchange, states if he cannot woo them with prowess or charm that he shall woo them with torture.
In a fantastic turn of events, when the general approaches to make his advances on the sisters, he becomes instead enraptured by the sight of the pots and pans thinking he is engaging with the sisters instead. The sisters see God’s protection in this act, and the general becomes covered in soot. The soldiers, due to the soot, believe he has been possessed by the Devil and is not allowed an audience with Diocletian because they can no longer discern his identity. Eventually, it is figured out, and the women are blamed for working Christian magic on him. The punishment is to either pray to the pagan gods or be put to death. The two eldest sisters are burned at the stake. The youngest, Irena, is spared, but only so she can understand the threat is not a bluff. This plan backfires as she desires the same fate. She is then threatened with being thrown to a ‘house of ill-fame’ to be defiled, which she states does not constitute as being unfaithful since it was not the her spirit doing the sin. She escapes to the mountain, but in the end, is shot by an arrow.
This play, while more fantastical in nature, is more justified because each action follows from the previous in a meaningful way. While what happens to Dulcitus is off-stage, the narration of the sisters observing it suffices to inform what we cannot see, unlike in Gallicanus where we just get a brief explanation after we hear about the conversion. The magical element of the pots and pans scene, while delightfully absurd, still moves the plot forward. It’s less realistic than Gallicanus, but structure wise, it makes more sense. The scenes are divided in a more logical way which means it is a lot more clear who is in the scene at the very least.
In Hroswitha of Gandersheim and the Destiny of Women by A. Daniel Frankforter, Frankforter explores a brief biography of Hrotswitha and then examines and cross-references her beliefs of women with how they are portrayed in her own works. There is evidence that Hroswitha is very severe on women, particularly in referencing herself and her own capabilities as a woman, if her words are to be taken at face value.
“Impelled by your kindly interest and your express wish I come, bowing low like a reed, to submit this little work to your judgment. I wrote it indeed with that idea in my mind, although doubt as to its merits has made me withhold it until now. I hope you will revise it with the same careful attention that you would give to a work of your own, and that when you have succeeded in bringing it up to the proper standard you will return it to me, that I may learn what are its worst faults.”
~(Hrotswitha, Preface to the Plays of Hrotswitha)
In fact, she is so severe on herself and in her view of the abilities in women, Hrotswitha’s note seems more self-deprecating than anything else, and I can’t help but speculate if she states this to mitigate any backlash from those reading it at the time and to circumvent cruel criticism on account for her sex. I therefore wonder if, by prefacing her sex and her sex’s shortcomings, she was pre-emptively removing ammunition that could be used against her by acknowledging it first. If this is the case, one can only speculate of course, but if the intention of the severe stance on women was meant to be subversive as opposed to honest, if it allowed her more free reign than if she openly acknowledged her own skill as a historian and writer, then that was a very clever framing of the information presented. Perhaps she did believe every word she said – the framing of it is just different. From her perspective, it seems that women can have talent, but only if God personally helps out, while today’s perspective sees women as just as capable as men, at least in the context of writing and learning.
If Hroswitha’s words are taken at face value, however, it makes sense why the virgins in her plays are so absolutely devoted to God as it is the only way she can perceive of women being good. In her play, Dulcitus, the third sister, Irena, when threatened with the pleasure house states:
“Better far that my body should suffer outrage than my soul. [...] The wage of sin is death; the wage of suffering a crown. If the soul does not consent, there is no guilt.”
If the soul is not willing, there is no true damage done if her body is violated against her will. The uncompromising faith, while some may consider it foolish, seems more admirable than anything else. Despite the obvious cultural differences hundreds of years later, the message is still understandable, and when it comes down to it, to have so much conviction to be willing to die for what you believe is such a strength, God-given or otherwise, because it means when the word “no” is stated, it is truly meant with no willingness to concede. Whether Gallicanus and Dulcitus seem plausible or not is irrelevant when one compares it with the intention of each. Hrotswitha frames it as a matter of chastity and God bringing the women strength, but I would argue that it is faith that gives the women strength. All people have equal capacity to let God into their lives, and yet few truly do it because one has to let go of control and place that faith in divine protection instead. It takes a very strong character to be able to accomplish this, and to say women are inferior in the preface makes me sad because it is the women who are most admirable in the plays, but for their own merit.
[WORKS CITED]
Frankforter, A. Daniel. “Hroswitha of Gandersheim and the Destiny of Women.” The Historian, vol. 41, no. 2, 1979, pp. 295–314.
Gasquet, His Eminence Cardinal. "Introduction." Internet History Sourcebooks, n.d., https://sourcebooks.fordham.edu/basis/roswitha-toc.asp#gasquet-introduction.
Hrotswitha. "Dulcitus." Internet History Sourcebooks, n.d., https://sourcebooks.fordham.edu/basis/roswitha-dulcitius.asp.
Hrotswitha. "Gallicanus." Internet History Sourcebooks, https://sourcebooks.fordham.edu/basis/roswitha-gallicanus.asp.
Hrotswitha. "The Plays of Roswitha: Preface to the Plays of Hrotswitha, German Religous and Virgin of the Saxon Race." Internet History Sourcebooks, n.d., sourcebooks.fordham.edu/basis/roswitha-ros_pref.asp.
Hrotswitha. "The Plays of Roswitha: To Gerberg." Internet History Sourcebooks, n.d., https://sourcebooks.fordham.edu/basis/roswitha-gerberg.asp.
St. John, Christopher. "The Plays of Roswitha: A Note on the Acting of the Plays." Internet History Sourcebooks, n.d., https://sourcebooks.fordham.edu/basis/roswitha-perform_note.asp.
St. John, Christopher. "The Plays of Roswitha: Translator's Preface." Internet History Sourcebooks, n.d., https://sourcebooks.fordham.edu/basis/roswitha-trans_pref.asp.