Meanwhile our first enigmatic set of Markgraves, or Deputy-Markgraves,
at Brandenburg, are likewise faring ill. Whoever these valiant
steel-gray gentlemen might be (which Dryasdust does not the least know,
and only makes you more uncertain the more he pretends to tell), one
thing is very evident, they had no peaceable possession of the place,
nor for above a hundred years, a constant one on any terms. The Wends
were highly disinclined to conversion and obedience: once and again, and
still again, they burst up; got temporary hold of Brandenburg, hoping to
keep it; and did frightful heterodoxies there. So that to our distressed
imagination those poor "Markgraves of Witekind descent," our first set
in Brandenburg, become altogether shadowy, intermittent, enigmatic,
painfully actual as they once were. Take one instance, omitting others;
which happily proves to be the finish of that first shadowy line, and
introduces us to a new set very slightly more substantial.
END OF THE FIRST SHADOWY LINE.
In the year 1023, near a century after Henry the Fowler's feat, the
Wends bursting up in never-imagined fury, get hold of Brandenburg
again,--for the third and, one would fain hope, the last time. The
reason was, words spoken by the then Markgraf of Brandenburg, Dietrich
or Theodoric, last of the Witekind Markgraves; who hearing that a Cousin
of his (Markgraf or Deputy-Markgraf like himself) was about wedding his
daughter to "Mistevoi King of the Wends," said too earnestly: "Don't!
Will you give your daughter to a dog?" Word "dog" was used, says my
authority. [See Michaelis _Chur und Furstlichen Hauser,_ i. 257-259:
Pauli, _Allgemeine Preussische Staats-Geschichte_ (Halle, 1760-1769), i.
1-182 (the "standard work" on Prussian History; in eight watery quartos,
intolerable to human nature): Kloss, _Vuterlandische Gemalde_ (Berlin,
1833), i. 59-108 (a Bookseller's compilation, with some curious
Excerpts):--under which lie modern Sagittarius, ancient Adam of Bremen,
_Ditmarus Merseburgensis, Witichindus Corbeiensis, Arnoldus Lubecensis,_
&c. &c. to all lengths and breadths.] Which threw King Mistevoi into a
paroxysm, and raised the Wends. Their butchery of the German population
in poor Brandenburg, especially of the Priests; their burning of the
Cathedral, and of Church and State generally, may be conceived. The
HARLUNGSBERG,--in our time MARIENBERG, pleasant Hill near Brandenburg,
with its gardens, vines, and whitened cottages:--on the top of this
Harlungsherg the Wends "set up their god Triglaph;" a three-headed
Monster of which I have seen prints, beyond measure ugly. Something like
three whale's-cubs combined by boiling, or a triple porpoise dead-drunk
(for the dull eyes are inexpressible, as well as the amorphous shape):
ugliest and stupidest of all false gods. This these victorious Wends
set up on the Harlungsberg, Year 1023; and worshipped after their sort,
benighted mortals,--with joy, for a time. The Cathedral was in ashes,
Priests all slain or fled, shadowy Markgraves the like; Church and State
lay in ashes; and Triglaph, like a Triple Porpoise under the influence
of laudanum, stood (I know not whether on his head or on his tail)
aloft on the Harlungsberg, as the Supreme of this Universe, for the time
being.
SECOND SHADOWY LINE.
Whereupon the DITMARSCH-STADE Markgrafs (as some designate them) had to
interfere, these shadowy Deputies of the Witekind breed having vanished
in that manner. The Ditmarschers recovered the place; and with some
fighting, did in the main at least keep Triglaph and the Wends out of
it in time coming. The Wends were fiercely troublesome, and fought much;
but I think they never actually got hold of Brandenburg again. They were
beginning to get notions of conversion: well preached to and well beaten
upon, you cannot hold out forever. Even Mistevoi at one time professed
tendencies to Christianity; perhaps partly for his Bride's sake,--the
dog, we may call him, in a milder sense! But he relapsed dreadfully,
after that insult; and his son worse. On the other hand, Mistevoi's
grandson was so zealous he went about with the Missionary Preachers,
and interpreted their German into Wendish: "Oh, my poor Wends, will
you hear, then, will you understand? This solid Earth is but a shadow:
Heaven forever or else Hell forever, that is the reality!" SUCH
"difference between right and wrong" no Wend had heard of before: quite
tremendously "important if true!"--And doubtless it impressed many.
There are heavy Ditmarsch strokes for the unimpressible. By degrees all
got converted, though many were killed first; and, one way or other, the
Wends are preparing to efface themselves as a distinct people.
This STADE-AND-DITMARSCH family (of Anglish or Saxon breed, if that is
an advantage) seem generally to have furnished the SALZWEDEL Office as
well, of which Brandenburg was an offshoot, done by deputy, usually
also of their kin. They lasted in Brandenburg rather more than a hundred
years;--with little or no Book-History that is good to read; their
History inarticulate rather, and stamped beneficently on the face of
things. Otto is a common name among them. One of their sisters, too,
Adelheid (Adelaide, NOBLENESS) had a strange adventure with "Ludwig the
Springer:" romantic mythic man, famous in the German world, over whom my
readers and I must not pause at this time.
In Salzwedel, in Ditmarsch, or wherever stationed, they had a toilsome
fighting life: sore difficulties with their DITMARSCHERS too, with the
plundering Danish populations; Markgraf after Markgraf getting killed in
the business. "ERSCHLAGEN, slain fighting with the Heathen," say the
old Books, and pass on to another. Of all which there is now silence
forever. So many years men fought and planned and struggled there, all
forgotten now except by the gods; and silently gave away their life,
before those countries could become fencible and habitable! Nay, my
friend, it is our lot too: and if we would win honor in this Universe,
the rumor of Histories and Morning Newspapers,--which have to become
wholly zero, one day, and fall dumb as stones, and which were not
perhaps very wise even while speaking,--will help us little!--
SUBSTANTIAL MARKGRAVES: GLIMPSE OF THE CONTEMPORARY KAISERS.
The Ditmarsch-Stade kindred, much slain in battle with the Heathen, and
otherwise beaten upon, died out, about the year 1130 (earlier perhaps,
perhaps later, for all is shadowy still); and were succeeded in the
Salzwedel part of their function by a kindred called "of Ascanien and
Ballenstadt;" the ASCANIER or ANALT Markgraves; whose History, and
that of Brandenburg, becomes henceforth articulate to us; a History not
doubtful or shadowy any longer; but ascertainable, if reckoned worth
ascertaining. Who succeeded in Ditmarsch, let us by no means inquire.
The Empire itself was in some disorder at this time, more abstruse
of aspect than usual; and these Northern Markgrafs, already become
important people, and deep in general politics, had their own share in
the confusion that was going.
It was about this same time that a second line of Kaisers had died out:
the FRANKISH or SALIC line, who had succeeded to the SAXON, of Henry
the Fowler's blood. For the Empire too, though elective, had always a
tendency to become hereditary, and go in lines: if the last Kaiser left
a son not unfit, who so likely as the son? But he needed to be fit,
otherwise it would not answer,--otherwise it might be worse for him!
There were great labors in the Empire too, as well as on the Sclavic
frontier of it: brave men fighting against anarchy (actually set in
pitched fight against it, and not always strong enough),--toiling sore,
according to their faculty, to pull the innumerable crooked things
straight. Some agreed well with the Pope,--as Henry II., who founded
Bamberg Bishopric, and much else of the like; [Kohler, pp. 102-104. See,
for instance, _Description de la Table d'Aute1 en or fin, donnee a
la Cathedrale de Bale, par l'Empereur Henri II. en 1019_ (Porentruy,
1838).] "a sore saint for the crown," as was said of David I.,
his Scotch congener, by a descendant. Others disagreed very much
indeed;--Henry IV.'s scene at Canossa, with Pope Hildebrand and the
pious Countess (year 1077, Kaiser of the Holy Roman Empire waiting,
three days, in the snow, to kiss the foot of excommunicative
Hildebrand), has impressed itself on all memories! Poor Henry rallied
out of that abasement, and dealt a stroke or two on Hildebrand; but fell
still lower before long, his very Son going against him; and came almost
to actual want of bread, had not the Bishop of Liege been good to him.
Nay, after death, he lay four years waiting vainly even for burial,--but
indeed cared little about that.
Certainly this Son of his, Kaiser Henry V., does not shine in filial
piety: but probably the poor lad himself was hard bested. He also came
to die, A.D. 1125, still little over forty, and was the last of the
Frankish Kaisers. He "left the REICHS-INSIGNIEN [Crown, Sceptre and
Coronation gear] to his Widow and young Friedrich of Hohenstauffen," a
sister's son of his,--hoping the said Friedrich might, partly by that
help, follow as Kaiser. Which Friedrich could not do; being wheedled,
both the Widow and he, out of their insignia, under false pretences, and
otherwise left in the lurch. Not Friedrich, but one Lothar, a stirring
man who had grown potent in the Saxon countries, was elected Kaiser.
In the end, after waiting till Lothar was done, Friedrich's race
did succeed, and with brilliancy,--Kaiser Barbarossa being that same
Friedrich's son. In regard to which dim complicacies, take this Excerpt
from the imbroglio of Manuscripts, before they go into the fire:--
"By no means to be forgotten that the Widow we here speak of, Kaiser
Henry V.'s Widow, who brought no heir to Henry V., was our English
Henry Beauclerc's daughter,--granddaughter therefore of William
Conqueror,--the same who, having (in 1127, the second year of her
widowhood) married Godefroi Count of Anjou, produced our Henry II. and
our Plantagenets; and thereby, through her victorious Controversies with
King Stephen (that noble peer whose breeches stood him so cheap),
became very celebrated as 'the Empress Maud,' in our old History-Books.
Mathildis, Dowager of Kaiser Henry V., to whom he gave his
Reichs-Insignia at dying: she is the 'Empress Maud' of English Books;
and relates herself in this manner to the Hohenstauffen Dynasty, and
intricate German vicissitudes. Be thankful for any hook whatever on
which to hang half an acre of thrums in fixed position, out of your way;
the smallest flint-spark, in a world all black and unrememberable, will
be welcome."--
And so we return to Brandenburg and the "ASCANIEN and BALLENSTADT"
series of Markgraves.