Bibliotheca Arnamagnæana - 01.06.1999, Blaðsíða 152

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Part One
matter.”42 Being achronological, the concept is distinet from “Proto-
Germanic”, and in terms of geography wider than “Common Ger-
manic”.
The specific distinguishing feature is given in negative terms, the
crucial quality being that it is untouched by the bookish culture of
antiquity and of the Christian church.43 The Icelandic contribution to
Old Germanic literature is naturally of paramount importance, but since
the literary form of alliterative poetry seems to be a positive defining
criterion of what is inherently Germanic according to Heusler, he hesi-
tated before including prose texts in the Old Germanic heritage; the
Icelandic saga was thus left out in the first edition of Die altgerma-
nische Dichtung (1923), although it was included in the second (1941,
cf. p. 11).
Heusler maintained that it was essentially impossible to aim at a his-
tory of Old Germanic literature, even if due regard were paid to different
literary strata. Instead, he made a most valuable contribution to the
“form criticism”44 of Old Germanic literature, underlining common fea-
tures in works separated in space and time, in continuation of Svend
Grundtvig’s work (cf. pp. 89-92 above). Heusler, incidentally, insisted-
perhaps too strongly - that his categories differed from Grundtvig’s (cf.
Heusler 1902: 212-13 = 1969: 630-31). Most important is a series of
morphological concepts and terms, often hard to translate, but a very
useful framework for gathering the different poems into various well de-
fined types, having common characteristic formal qualities.45 The cru-
cial criterion in Heusler’s classification is taken from the use of speech
42 “Von einem ‘gemeingermanischen Zeitraum oder Zeitalter’ zu reden, dient der Klarheit
kaum” (Heusler 1941: 8).
43 [...] “das von Kirche und antiker Bildung nicht greifbar bestimmte Germanentum, des-
sen dichterische Spuren bis tief ins Mittelalter herabreichen” (Heusler 1941: 8). Cf. also:
“Die Frage: welche Dichtwerke sind ‘altgermanisch?’ konnen wir nicht nach Jahreszah-
len, nur nach Eigenschaften beantworten. Als altgermanisch im vollen Sinne wird man
gelten lassen die Werke, die von Weltlichen stammen, auGerkirchlichen Inhalt haben,
keine romische Kunstart nachahmen, nicht aus Biichem schopfen und fur buchfreie Wei-
tergabe bestimmt sind. Dazu das Merkmal der Form: der Stabreim; weit mehr als eine
ÅuBerlichkeit: mit ihm gehn gewisse Rhythmen und sprachliche Stilmittel Hånd in Hånd.
-Wo all dies zusammentrifft, da haben wir den engsten Kreis” (Heusler 1941: 6).
44 Heusler himself has qualified his viewpoint as “formgeschichtlich” (Heusler 1941: 11).
45 Heusler’s prose is unusually forceful and spirited; and in full accord with his concep-
tion of ‘Germanic’ he avoided the international vocabulary - to an even greater degree in
the second than in the first edition of Die altgermanische Dichtung.