ACKNOWLEDGMENT

This book has been published with the aid of a gram

from the Mediaeval Moral Teaching Fund
of the Mediaeval Studies Foundation.

Library and Archives Canada Cataloguing in Publication

In the garden of evil : the vices and culture in the Middle Ages
/ edited by Richard Newhauser.

(Papers in mediaeval studies ; 18)

Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN 0-88844-818-X

1. Deadly sins. 2. Theology-History-Middle Ages, 600-1500.

3. Civilization, Medieval. I. Newhauser, Richard, 1947- II. Pontifical
Institute of Mediaeval Studies. ill. Series.

BV4625.I52 2005 241'.3 C2005-903288-X

© 2005
Pontifical Institute of Mediaeval Studies
59 Queen's Park Crescent East
Toronto, Ontario, Canada MSS 2C4

PRINTED IN CANADA
 12

Catalogues of Demons as Catalogues of Vices

in Medieval German Literature
· Des Teufels Netz and the Alexander Romance
by Ulrich von Etzenbach

MEINOLF SCHUMACHER
Germanistik, Bergische Universität Wuppertal
Translated by Edward Potter

I
A young postdoc who had just received his doctorate in law, Johann
Walfang Goethe had not yet been in Weimar for four months when,
on February 23, 1776, he took part in a theatrical event put on by the
court society there which was called a redoute in the language of the
time. This term meant a form of masked ball or masquerade which
took place in closed rooms. 1 Later, Goethe would often devise masques
for these masked balls and would one day bring these masquerades onto
the stages of the world's theaters in the first act of Faust II in the long
scene entitled "Spacious Hall with Adjoining Chambers." In that scene,
the "herald" announces the game of the allegorical representation of
society with the words: "Do not think that you are within German
borders / with dances of demons, of fools, and dances of death; / a
merry celebration awaits you" (vv. 5065-67). 2
Goethe's first masque in Weimar was also to become a "merry celebra-
tion," although it was a "devil's dance," which, in contrast to the "wild
[Roman] carnival" (cf. Faust II, v. 5060), was a supposedly "German" (v.
5065) peculiarity, a peculiarity which Goethe research tends to charac-
terize as "medieval."3 Karl Wilhelm Friedrich von Lyncker remembered

1. See Claudia Schnitzer, Höfische Maskeraden: Funktion und Ausstattung von

Verkleidungsdivertissements an deutschen Höfen der Frühen Neuzeit (Tübingen,
1999); for Weimar, cf. Gabriele Busch-Salmen, Walter Salmen, and Christoph
Michel, Der Weimarer Musenhof (Stuttgart and Weimar, 1998), 133-35 ("Bälle und
Redouten-Maskenzüge").
2. Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, Sämtliche Werke, Briefe, Tagebücher und Ge-
spräche, vol. 1/7, Faust, ed. Albrecht Schöne (Frankfurt am Main, 1994), 1:217.
3. Wilhelm Emrich, Die Symbolik von Faust IL· Sinn und Vorformen, S'h ed.
(Königstein, 1981), 140: "Die Bedeutung der Mummenschanz beleuchtet Goethe
278 1 I THE VICES IN HISTORY AND CONTEXT

the occasion in 1776: "In the following winter, a redoute was given in
which a parade of demons appeared. Each vice was represented by one
of the demons: for example, miserliness, voracity, gluttony, and various
others. This masquerade was considered very offensive, and Goethe,
who had organized it, was vehemently criticized for it." 4 lmmediately
thereafter (in a letter dated March 1, 1776), Goethe's servant and secre-
tary of many years, Philipp Seidel, expressed thoroughly positive senti-
ments about this devil's performance, in which his "Doctor" played the
"demon of pride": "lt was worth seeing. lt represented the temptations
of Antony the Great, who sat in a cave in front of a book and a skull;
then one demon after the other came and frightened him and attempted
to torment him and drive him mad; each demon represented a vice,
for which he was the demonic representation; my Doctor was the de-
mon of pride, and he came in, puffed-up, on stilts, with wings made
out of peacocks' tail feathers .... Everything was natural and horrific,
not frivolous. "5
The term "frivolous" is an exact characterization of the reproach
with which Goethe was met following this "masquerade." lt must have
seemed highly "offensive," and especially to a Protestant society, for
someone to make light of the concept of demons of vice, a concept
which included special (sub)demons who were in a particular way re-
sponsible for separate sins (cf. Seidel's phrase about the "vice, of which
he was the demonic representation"). This concept, after all, was a con-
stituent of the early modern Protestant literary genre of the so-called
"devil books," which train their satirical sights on "drinking demons,"
"cursing demons," "gambling demons," and, of course, the "demon of
pride" as well. 6 Catholics were no less likely to have been incensed
than Protestants, for in the temptation of Antony the Great, the
masque of this redoute parodied one of the earliest scenes in the hagio-
graphic literature of Christianity, in which this, the most famous of all
ascetics, is tempted by the devil in the form of various animals. The

bereits in der Eröffnungsrede des Herolds ... durch die ausdrückliche Abhebung
der Mummenschanz als römischen Karneval gegen die mittelalterlich-deutschen
Teufels-, Narren- und Totentänze."
4. Goethe: Begegnungen und Gespräche, ed. Ernst Grumach and Renate
Grumach (Berlin, 1965), 1:406. Cf. Robert Steiger, Goethes Leben von Tag zu Tag:
Eine dokumentarische Chronik (Zurich and Munich, 1983), 2:23.
S. Goethe, ed. Grumach and Grumach, 1:406.
6. See Hans-Jürgen Bachorski, "Teufelbücher," in Literaturlexikon, ed. Walther
Killy (Gütersloh, 1993), 14:420-22. Cf. Joachim Westphal, Hojfartsteufel, in Teufel-
bücher in Auswahl, ed. Ria Stambaugh, vol. 3 (Berlin and New York, 1973).
 12 Catalogues of Demons as Catalogues of Vices 1 279

biography of Antony by Athanasius, which, like the rest of the litera-

ture on the desert fathers, was as highly esteemed by the Middle Ages
as it was by early modern Catholicism (and, with some qualification,
also by Luther),7 does not specifically assign the various appearances
taken on by the Evil One to separate vices. This is, however, the case
in the ascetic writings of the desert theologian Evagrius Ponticus with
his teachings on the sinful "thoughts," which influenced the western
teachings on the deadly sins via the Latin writings of John Cassian. A
differentiated "hierarchy of devils" with a system of subdemons based
on the division of labor, as a (parodistic) analogy to the "celestial hier-
archy" of angels, did not develop until relatively late. 8 If it says in the
biography of Antony (Chapter 9), "But changes of the form of evil are
easy for the devil," then this touches on the motif of the devil's diverse
arts of transformation, 9 which gave rise to his being described as mille-
artifex.10 From the very beginning, this concept of the devil's "arts" in-
troduced an aspect of theatricality into demonology, which is mani-
fested in Goethe's procession of demons at Weimar only in a carnival-
esque final form. Deceiving and betraying behind many masks, the devil
was always regarded as the most evil of all actors.11 There are grounds
for the supposition, given the pluralization of demons who are in a par-
ticular way responsible for specific sins or who are identical with these
specific sins, that such roles-perhaps under the influence of the monas-
tic conception of the demons of vice-had become independent and had
virtually ontologized themselves.

7. Cf. Klaus Klein, "Frühchristliche Eremiten im Spätmittelalter und in der

Reformationszeit. Zu Überlieferung und Rezeption der deutschen Vitaspatrum-
Prosa," in Literatur und Laienbildung im Spätmitte/alter und in der Reformations-
zeit, ed. Ludger Grenzmann and Karl Stackmann (Stuttgart, 1984), 686-95.
8. Cf. Isabel Grübel, Die Hierarchie der Teufel: Studien zum christlichen Teufels-
bild und zur Allegorisierung des Bösen in Theologie, Literatur und Kunst zwischen
Frühmitte/alter und Gegenreformation (Munich, 1991).
9. Cf. the Latin version in PL 73:132A: "Dixit, et ad hortantis vocem audien-
tium turba consentit, quia innumeras diabolus habet artes nocendi."
10. See Meinolf Schumacher, "Der Teufel als Tausendkünstler. Ein wort·
geschichtlicher Beitrag," Mitte/lateinisches Jahrbuch 27 (1992): 65-76.
11. See Helmar Schramm, Karneval des Denkens: Theatralität im Spiegel philo-
sophischer Texte des 16. und 17. Jahrhunderts (Berlin, 1996), 86-95 ("Theater der
Teufel"); Brigitte Spreitzer, "Wie bist du vom Himmel gefallen.„ ':·Einschlagstellen
des Diabolischen in der Literatur des späteren Mittelalters (Vienna, 1995), 21-93
("Der große Simulator").
280 1 I THE VICES IN H!STORY AND CONTEXT

II
lt is within this context that the question becomes interesting whether
or not catalogues of demons existed in the Middle Ages which were for-
mulated concurrently with catalogues of vices. To answer such a ques-
tion, this paper will take as its evidence works of literature which were
written during the period between the monastic theology of late anti-
quity and the early modern devil literature, whereby I, as a scholar of
works central to German culture, will place Middle High German liter-
ary texts in the forefront of my investigation. The writers of these texts
probably did not have any official theological doctrine at their disposal,
if one leaves out of consideration some statements by Thomas Aquinas
(in De ordinatione malorum angelorum), who specifically denies the pos-
sibility of a hierarchy of demons, and yet clearly accords them a certain
"division of labor." 12 Nonetheless, there was apparently a need among
vernacular authors to refer to recognized authorities; Pope Gtegory the
Great came to serve in this role in the Renner by Hugo von Trimberg:
Saint Gregory writes the following about that / in one of his books: /
"Know that every transgression / has its own demon / who spurs a person
on to it and who nurses it / when he has · b'vercome that person" (vv.
24105-10).13
The Stricker formulates the same thought in a religious Bispelrede, al-
though without any such-doubtlessly fictional-reference to sources.
In this poem, a legal aspect is added; it is the same demon who pro-
vokes a sin, notes it down, and brings the accusation against it (rüeget):
"To each grave sin belongs / its (own) demon, / who governs it and
provokes it I and who also writes it down and prosecutes it" (vv. 2577-
80).14
This motif of writing down the sins suggests that there is a connection
here between the specialization with regard to particular types of sins
and a type of "individual care" given to each person by the demon's

12. Cf. Thomas Aquinas, Summa theologiae, la, quaest. 109, art. 2, resp„ in
Opera omnia iussu impensaque Leonis XIII P.M. edita (Rome, 1889), 5:507: "Res-
pondeo dicendum quod, cum actio sequatur naturam rei, quorumcumque naturae
. sunt ordinatae, oportet quod etiam actiones sub invicem ordinentur."
13. Hugo von Trirnberg, Der Renner, ed. Gustav Ehrismann (Berlin, 1970), 3:
93-94. Cf. Lutz Rosenplenter, Zitat undAutoritätenberufung im Renner Hugos von
Trimberg: Ein Beitrag zur Bildung des Laien im Spätmittelalter (Frankfurt am Main
and Bern, 1982), 253-55.
14. Der Stricker, Die bisher unveröffentlichten geistlichen Bfspelreden, ed. Ute
Schwab (Göttingen, 1959), 80-81.
 12 Catalogues of Demons as Catalogues of Vices 1 281

negative counterpart of a guardian angel. The sins in question are not

itemized in the work of Hugo von Trimberg nor in the work of the
Stricker; however, the terminology of a "misdeed" or a "grave sin"
clearly points to serious transgressions, as they were collected in easily
remembered catalogues of "capital sins" or "deadly sins," but which do
not, by any means, always have to appear in the widespread numerical
grouping of seven. The Minorite preacher Berthold of Regensburg, for
instance, rails against luxuria by declaring that the demons who are
responsible for this sin are the most hideous of all:
Some demons are, over and above that, uglier than others. For some de-
mons tempt one to be proud, others tempt one to murder, still others to
greed; some tempt one to one sin, others to another. Now, just think
about how beautiful the bright sun is in comparison to the filthiest toad
that you have ever seen: this toad is nonetheless still beautiful in compari-
son to the impure devil. However impure all demons might be, the demons
who tempt one to unchasteness are indeed ten times more impure than the
other demons. They are much more impure than those who tempt one to
murder or to pride or to any other sin. 15
Further instances taken from sermon literature, which would prove
especially promising in this respect-such as vision texts as well as the
broad field of religious drama-cannot be treated here; I will concentrate
on two langer works of literature: one didactic text and one epic.

III
The anonymous didactic poem Des Teufels Netz 16 from the early fif-
teenth century seems, from the very imagery in the title, to be appro-
priate to our topic. In it, a pious hermit actually forces the devil to
provide him with information about his arts of persuasion, his very
"ropes and nets." This compels the devil to warn the hermit-and all the
listeners and readers-about himself. Most of all, he is annoyed because

15. Berthold of Regensburg, Vollständige Ausgabe seiner Predigten, ed. Franz

Pfeiffer and Joseph Strobl (Vienna, 1862; reprint, Berlin, 1965), 1:413.
16. Des Teufels Netz: Satirisch-didaktisches Gedicht aus der ersten Hälfte des fünf
zehnten Jahrhunderts, ed. K.A. Barack (Stuttgart, 1863). Cf. Franz-Josef Schweitzer,
Tugend und Laster in illustrierten didaktischen Dichtungen des späten Mittelalters:
Studien zu Hans Vintlers "Blumen der Tugend" und zu "Des Teufels Netz," (Hildes-
heim, 1993); Hildegard Elisabeth Keller, "Die 'minnende Seele' in des Teufels Netz:
Geschlechterpolemik kontrafaziert," in Text im Kontext: Anleitung zur Lektüre
deutscher Texte der frühen Neuzeit, ed. Alexander Schwarz and Laure Abplanalp
(Bern, 1997), 109-25.
282 1 l THE VICES IN H!STORY AND CONTEXT

he must expose his "minions": Sol ich verraten all min knecht, / Das
dunkt mich hüt noch iemer reht (vv. 412-13). With the help of these
minions, the devil pulls his great net through the world:
1 make a net / in which 1 catch the whole world. / This is very important
to me. / This net is pulled by seven minions I who allow no one to escape
fromme. I Even now there is no one / (who can escape them). (vv. 238-44;
p. 9)
These seven minions of the devil include the six capital vices, Hoffart
(pride), Nid und Hasz (envy and hatred), Gitikait (avarice), Fraszhait
(gluttony), Zorn (anger), Unkünschait (lust); as din sibender man (v. 939),
Manslacht (manslaughter) is named. These minions are followed by a
trio of sins, Beslüsz das herz!, Beslüsz den mund!, and Beslüsz den sekel!,
which are a hindrance to confession and penance, as weil as the last of
the traditional "deadly sins," Trcekeit (sloth). These vices, eleven alto-
gether, are the "minions" of the devil, his man (men) and his gesellen
Gourneymen or associates). These are personifications of vices that have
a close connection to the devil. But does this make them devils them-
selves? lt seems reasonable to perceive them as a plurality of dernons,
especially when the devil, speaking to the hermit, ends his lengthy
review of the stations of society with words that are reminiscent of the
conclusion of a sermon:
1 can hesitate no longer; / 1 suppose 1 must leave you now. I There are
many others I have my eye on. / Since it is now the case / that 1 have to
tell and report everything to you, / how I and my associates / bring about
the downfall of the world, / and how we roam the land / with nets and
snares, / then reap the benefits of it and be wary! / With that, I leave you.
Amen. (vv. 13144-54; p. 419)
With the exception of il heading in manuscript C relating to the trio of
sins just rnentioned-Von den dreyen bosen gaisten oder tüfeln (occurring
before v. 1044)-the personified sins are never unequivocally "demonized"
in this work. lt is possible that the gesellen who torment the damned in
hell (v. 315) are identical with the "sins that are personified in the devil-
ish associates," 17 yet this is not stated explicitly. One rnust, therefore,
draw the conclusion that the catalogue of vices in The Devil's Net is not
a catalogue of demons, as weil.
This assertion is true at the textual level (as the text is presented to us
in Barack's edition). Des Teufels Netz is, however, one of the illustrated

17. Anke Ehlers, Des Teufels Netz: Untersuchungen zum Gattungsproblem (Stutt-
gart, 1973), 26.
 12 Catalogues of Demons as Catalogues of Vices 1 283

didactic poems of the late Middle Ages. Since the Strasbourg manuscript
D, which is illustrated with 62 colored pen-and-ink drawings, does not
include the section dealing with the vices, none of the deadly sins are
illustrated in it. The Donaueschingen manuscript A, on the other hand,
begins with a cover picture (fol. lv):
Seven grotesque animal forms are depicted. These probably represent the
first seven minions of the devil, the personified capital vices. Four of them
are pulling on a net in which twelve people representing various stations
in society can be seen. Three other minions-two sitting on a bench, the
third standing next to them-are playing on horns or on percussion
instruments. 18
For our topic, the crucial factor is that the seven figures who are
hauling in the large fishing net and playing their instruments, who
doubtlessly represent the "deadly sins," are depicted with the traditional
attributes of demons. The caption of the picture on this page confirms
this identification with the statement that the devil draws all stations in
society to himself with this net, "which the devils pull": Ain sege wie
d'tüfel all stät an sich züht die ziehend die tüfel. The captions of the
pictures in this manuscript are of interest even in the many cases in
which the drawings were never completed. In these cases, they could be
read as instructions for the artist regarding what he would have had to
depict. The following, for example, is found written there: Der tritt tüfel
gitikait (fol. 7r), or Der ander tüfel ist zorn (fol. llr); there is even a
suggestion of the devil compounds which would become so popular in
the early modern period: Du manslacht tüfel (the murder-devils [fol. 14r
and 14v]).19 The person who was responsible for the conception of the
illustrations in this manuscript clearly understood the vices to be
demons~ Thus, a phenomenon which is characteristic of the relationship
between ward and image in general can be remarked here: illuminations
in manuscripts often "illustrate" not merely the text by seamlessly
translating its statements into another medium, but they also go beyond
.the text by commenting on it and supplementing it. In this way, the
catalogue of vices in The Devil's Net becomes, by means of the illumina-
tions-both the single illumination that was completed and the many
that were only planned-a catalogue of demons.

18. Ibid„ 32.

19. Ibid„ 35-37: "Die Bildlücken und ihre Stellung zum Text."
284 1 I THE VICES IN HISTORY AND CONTEXT

IV
One might find it strange to choose a romance about Alexander the
Great as an example of Middle High German epic poetry. The extensive
Alexander romance by Ulrich von Etzenbach,20 probably composed
between 1270 and 1287 at the Bohemian royal court and in some cases
illuminated,21 is considered to be evidence of the "knightly" or
"courtly" stylization of the (pseudo-) classical tradition of its subject
matter, which is why catalogues of demons or of vices are not, from the
outset, to be expected here. The many prayers of the poet at the
beginning of the work as weil as in the introductions to and conclusions
of each of the books, especially those prayers that orient themselves
along the lines of Wolfram's Willehalm, lend the romance a strong
religious character, yet they are not of much use for the topic of our
investigation. One does not come across anything regarding demons
until the tenth (and last) book, which was long criticized as muddled
and epigonic for its motley assortment of the most disparate subjects
taken from the material concerning Alexander, but which has
nevertheless in recent years been more positively received by
the scholarly community for the very reason of its supposed
dismantling of a unified plot or narrative development. lt does,
however, indeed suggest that the conception of the book was worked
out in detail when we see that, after Alexander's famous voyage to the
bottom of the sea in the diving bell and his trip to heaven flying on a
griffin, 22 a scouting expedition into the world under the earth is on the
agenda as weil, and not only out of curiosity.

20. Ulrich von Etzenbach (Eschenbach), Alexander, ed. W endelin T oischer

(Stuttgart, 1888; reprint, Hildesheim, 1974). Cf. Claudia Medert, Der "Alexander"
Ulrichs von Etzenbach: Studien zur Erzählstruktur und Gattungsproblematik (Göt-
tingen, 1989); Hans-Joachim Behr, Literatur als Machtlegitimation: Studien zur ·
Funktion der deutschsprachigen Dichtung am böhmischen Königshof im 13. Jahr·
hundert (Munich, 1989), 143-75; Benedikt Konrad Vollmann, "Ulrich von Etzen-
bach, Alexander," in Positionen des Romans im späten Mittelalter, ed. Walter Haug
and Burghart Wachinger (Tübingen, 1991), 54-66.
21. See Norbert H. Ott, "Ulrichs von Etzenbach Alexander illustriert: Zum
Alexanderstoff in den Weltchroniken und zur Entwicklung einer deutschen Alex-
ander-Ikonographie im 14. Jahrhundert," in Zur deutschen Literatur und Sprache
des 14. Jahrhunderts: Dubliner Colloquium 1981, ed. Walter Haug, Timothy R.
Jackson, and Johannes Janota (Heidelberg, 1983), 155-72.
22. See Hartmut Kugler, "Alexanders Greifenflug: Eine Episode qes Alexander-
romans im deutschen Mittelalter," Internationales Archiv für Sozialgeschichte der
Literatur 12 (1987): 1-25.
 12 Catalogues of Demons as Catalogues of Vices 1 285

Brave Alexander / asked the wise scholars / how he could reach further,
! for he had heard ! that there was a world under them ! that had up until
then refused him service, / and this was not acceptable to him. (vv. 24833-
39; p. 660)
With regard to the underworld, this quotation demonstrates that the
sweeping claims made about the "paradigm shift in the pattern of be-
havior from conquest to discovery," 23 which has been posited for the
tenth book, cannot be confirmed. lt is, rat.her, unbearable for the con-
queror of the world, who has made his way to the ends of the earth,
that yet another world should exist "which refuses him service." His
scholars enlighten him on the subject of this "land" in a medieval-
theological sense:
The scholars said: "We have read I that beneath us are to be found ! only
the children of hell; / because of their great pride ! they were expelled
from heaven / because they wanted to deem themselves I equal to their
powerful Creator. / Only by dying ! can one reach that place. / Their
country is helL" (vv. 24840-49; pp. 660-61)
Despite the clear statement that, "one can only enter hell by dying,"
Alexander is determined to reach that place alive, and for this reason,
he informs himself more about hell. The wirt (lord) of hell (v. 24861)
is accordingly called "Leviathan," and he is equally as wicked as his
geselschaft (associates, v. 24864), the diabolical doormen (portena3re, v.
24866), who belong both to hell and to the world (sust werbent sie hie
und phlegen dort, v. 24869):
The gate is well locked. I In front of it I Stands evil Greed, / the cause of
all disgrace, / with a gaping mouth / that is always open / as if she were
saying, "I will never become full; / 1 could devour the whole world." /
Next to her sit Unchasteness / and impure Desire. / Unchasteness gives
rise to a wicked reputation; / Desire leaves beautiful Joy, / who was
honorable, ! and lays herself down instead in contemptible filth. (vv.
24871-84; p. 662)
The image from the world of nature used to represent this last vice has
traditionally been the pig, which leaves the beautiful meadow (of mar-
riage) in order to wallow in the mud (of prostitution or concubinage)

23. Hartmut Kugler, "Alexander und die Macht des Entdeckens: Das 10. Buch
im Alexanderroman Ulrichs von Etzenbach," in The Problematics of Power: Eas·
tern and Western Representations of Alexander the Great, ed. Margaret Bridges and
J. Christoph Bürgel (Bern, 1996), 33.
286 1 I THE VICES IN HISTORY AND CONTEXT

(vv. 24855-88). 24 After avaritia (avarice) and the two sexual transgres-
sions-probably luxuria (voluptuousness) and adulterium (adultery) (or
Libido [lust])-follow Unzuht (probably superbia [pride] here) and Unge-
nuht as gula (gluttony) (and probably also ebrietas [drunkenness]) in the
description of this well-locked gate of hell: "One always notices Superbia
I as she rages and quarrels. I Gula is only interested / in ~xcessive eat-
ing and drinking" (vv. 24891-94; p. 662). Odium (hatred), lra (anger),
lnvidia (envy), and Discordia (discord) follow: "Hatred, Rage, and Envy
I are standing at the door I as well as Discord; / they do harm to each
other frequently there / and hit and fight / each other often" (vv.
24899-904; p. 662). Despite the admonition of the scholars to keep far
away from this place (lieber herre, waz wolt ir dar?, v. 24923), Alexander
truly wants to find the demons, in order to drag them up to the earth
and defeat them in combat: "I want to free the world I from them in
combat I and destroy their power" (vv. 24935-37; p. 663).
The further course of Ulrich's Alexander romance is basically the
story of the failure of this intention. The prince of hell, Leviathan,
who gets wind of the plan, turns to God for help with the argument
that, if hell is now to be conquered, heaven would soon no langer be
safe either from Alexander's thirst for conquest (ist daz er betwinget
mich, /er beginnet vil lthte suochen dich, vv. 24959-60) . Ulrich reports
nothing about an answer from God to the devil. The reader does, how-
ever, learn-by means of a reference to Galtherus (v. 24979)-that Levia-
than then complained about the excessive behavior of Alexander to a
personified "Nature" (daz der künic unmaze gert, v. 24991); he succeeds
with this subordinate authority-as vicaria Dei-to whom God appa-
rently referred the deyil:
Natura replied, I "Since he [Alexander] is breaking my laws, / he is also
acting against God. / Since he is destroying the bounds which I have set,
/ I will kill him, as I am now informing you, / and put an end to his
arrogance." The demons were pleased about this, / and they all shouted:
"Ho, ho, ho!" (vv. 24998-506; pp. 664-65)
The decision is carried out: at the instigation of Leviathan, Antipater
perpetrates the murder by poisoning Alexander. Alexander's death is
thus the consequence of his disregard for the natural boundaries which
human beings are subject to.

24. See Meinolf Schumacher, Sündenschmutz und Herzensreinheit: Studien zur

Metaphorik der Sünde in lateinischer und deutscher Literatur des Mittelalters
(Munich, 1996), 366-74.
 12 Catalogues of Demons as Catalogues of Vices 1 287

Ulrich's reference to Galtherus raises the question of how this source,

which is clearly identified in this passage as Walter (Gautier) of Chatil-
lon's hexameter poem Alexandreis, is being used here. A description of
the underworld with a catalogue of personified vices can already be
found there in the tenth book (10.31-54). 25 In spite of the similar, if
not identical catalogue of vices-after acquisitive greed as the "mother
of the others," follow, in this text, superbia, Libido, ebrietas and gula, ira,
proditio, dolus, detractio, livor, lrypocrisis, and adulatio-the differences
between Walter and Ulrich quickly become apparent. Walter "imitates
the classical style" by harking back to particular phrases found in Ovid,
Virgil, and Lucan; he takes great pains to fashion a "classical" under-
world, into which, however, he incorporates medieval Christian person-
ifications of vices. In doing so, he was able to take up the famous conci-
lium of the powers of hell in the work of Claudian (In Rufinum, 1.25-
40). 26 Although Ulrich von Etzenbach is clearly within this tradition,
he does away with many of the classical aspects of his model. This trim-
ming extends even into the development of the plot. In Walter's text,

25. Walter of Ch~tillon, Alexandreis, ed. Marvin L. Colker (Padua, ·1978), 254-
55: "Ante fores Herebi Stigiae sub menibus ur bis / Liuentes habitant terrarum
monstra sorores, / Inter quas antris aliarum mater opacis I Abscondit loculos et
coctum mille caminis / Faucibus infusum siccis ingutturat aurum, / Explerique
nequit sitis insatiabilis ardor. I Subsannans alias cunctis supereminet una / Dedig-
nata parem flagrante Superbia uultu. / Mersa iacens ardente luto torquetur et
ardet I Pube tenus totis exhausta Libido medullis. I Nauseat Ebrietas, Gula
deliciosa ligurrit / Et mendica suos consumit morsibus artus. / Immemor Ira sui
est et quo rapit impetus illuc / Ebria discurrit et se sociasque flagellat. / Prodicio-
que, Doli comes, et Detractio, macri / Filia Liuoris, que cum bene facta negare
/ Non possit, quocumque modo peruertere temptat / Et minuit laudes quas non
abscondere fasest. I Has colit Ypocrisis marcenti liuida uultu / Sedes et summus
hodie processus in .aula / Pestis adulandi, bibulis studiosa potentum / Auribus
instillans animae letale uenenum. / Huic aulae uicio tanta est concessa potestas
/ Vt rerum dominis humanas subtrahat aures."
26. Claudianus, Carmina, ed. John Barrie Hall (Leipzig, 1985), 14: "inuidiae
quondam stimulis incanduit atrox / Allecto, placidas late cum cerneret urbes. /
protinus infernas ad limina taetra sorores, / concilium deforme, uocat. glomeran-
tur in unum I innumerae pestes Erebi, quascumque sinistro / Nox genuit fetu:
nutrix Discordia belli, / imperiosa Farnes, leto uicina Senectus / inpatiensque sui
Morbus Liuorque secundis I anxius et scisso maerens uelamine Luctus /et Timor
et caeco praeceps Audacia uultu / et Luxus populator opum, quem semper adhae-
rens / infelix humili gressu comitatur Egestas, / foedaque Auaritiae conplexae
pectora matris / insomnes longo ueniunt examine Curae. / conplentur uario fer-
rata sedilia coetu I toruaque conlectis stipatur curia monstris."
288 1 l THE VICES IN HISTORY AND CONTEXT

it is the personification of Nature who lodges the complaint about

Alexander's conduct with Leviathan's underworld council; in Ulrich's
work, as we have seen, the initiative is taken by Leviathan, who appears
completely in the role in which medieval society would have imagined
the prince of hell, Lucifer. The characterization of his "society" as tiuvel
and the representation of them as a howling mob (h6 h6 h6!) make it
clear, as well, that the Styx of the Alexandreis has been turned into the
medieval Christian hell in the German romance.
This means, on the one hand, that Alexander consciously takes on the
devil in Ulrich von Etzenbach's text. If any type of paradigm shift is
recognizable here, then it is less a question of a shift from conquest to
discovery than a question of a shift from conquest to the improvement
of the world. Alexander is determined to liberate the world from evil-
and it is precisely here that he transgresses the boundaries set for him
by nature. This history of Alexander allows us to comprehend a central
portion of narrative anthropology which practically anticipates one of
the subjects of modern utopian criticism: on the one hand, people are
supposed to combat evil, yet at the same time, it is the highest degree
of hubris to imagine that evil can be defeated. In Leviathan's erroneous
fear that Alexander could be the promised Messiah who will destroy
hell (vv. 24964-76; cf. Walter, Alex., 10.82-104), there is a suggestion,
couched in biblical language, of the idea that only God has the right to
annihilate the evil in the world.
Second, the transformation of the underworld into hell brings about
a change in the function of the allegories .which have been borrowed
from various literary models. Where~s Natura goes from being a central
character in Walter's text to being a somewhat pale authority over
norms of conduct set by God, the integration of the personifications of
vices into the depiction of hell is effected by means of the statement
made by Alexander's scholars, which was cited above, that the inhabi-
tants of hell were all "hellish children," die durch irn übermuot grozen
/von dem himel sint gestozen (vv. 24843-44). The vices as Claudian's and
Walter's "dreadful sisters," who mark the entrance to hell in Ulrich's
text (cf. Virgil, Aeneid, 6.273-81), are accordingly demons seen as fallen
angels. They all have the attributes of demons, for they belong both to
the world and to hell, and they tempt one "here" to sins which they
punish "there": sus werben sie hie und phlegen dort (v. 24869). Thus, a
highly literary allegory in the Latin version becomes in the vernacular
version a concept of faith that is comprehensible in terms of medieval
religion. Y et it is precisely the idea of the demon associated with a
particular vice which renders the poetic catalogue of vices a concept
which fits realistically into the medieval view of the world: such vices
 12 Catalogues of Demons as Catalogues of Vices 1 289

can indeed be found in hell under the earth, but they are in_fact devils, ·
and in that case, this is not at all astonishing. In this respect, the
conception of devils as vices in the work of Ulrich von Etzenbach also
has the function of diminishing the difference between fiction and the
concept of faith.

V
For the poets of the Middle Ages, the catalogues of vices and also those
of virtues were already predetermined by the ethical as well as by the
theological and catechetical traditions. In this connection-perhaps
already for mnemonic reasons-the numerical organization of the vices
into groups of eight, seven, or other numbers, along with a tendency
toward allegorization, becomes apparent early on: the deadly sins as
metaphorical animals or diseases are to be found among these numerical
organizations of the vices, as are the personifications of the vices as
living things similar to human beings which, for the most part, are to
be found in metaphoric contexts such as the context of kinship (as
mothers and daughters), the context of power (as queens and maids), or
in the context of combat (as in the case of the Psychomachia), whereby
the metaphorical models are often suggested by the allegorical interpre-
tation of biblical passages. To what extent such personifications were
"believed" to have existed in any way can at best only be determined in
each individual case; comparisons could be drawn in this regard to the
personified divinities in antiquity such as Fortuna and also to Hamartia
in the work of the apostle Paul. 27
The plurality of the personified vices was accommodated by the fact
that evil spirits always appear in !arge numbers. Even though the un-
clean spirits of the New Testament are not (sub)devils, they were indeed
soon declared such by the fathers of the church; their fate was therefore
the same as that of the pagan divinities (both good and evil), which
were, of course, in part personified divinities. In scholarly literature, the
pagan gods and the other persortifications admittedly lived on, yet it
would have been extremely difficult to include them in the religious
conception of the world: as a literary personification, Natura as the
vicaria Dei poses no prob lern; but where should one situate her between
God and the devil in a religious system? In the Middle Ages, there was
apparently a need to understand such personifications "realistically"
outside the realm of poetic license. Just as the conception of a large

27. See Günter Röhser, Metaphorik und Personifikation der Sünde: Antike Sünden-
vorstellungen und paulinische Hamartia (Tübingen, 1987), 131-77.
290 j l THE VICES IN HlSTORY AND CONTEXT

number of devils allowed the unclean spirits of the New Testament and
the pagan gods to be integrated into the religious conception of the
world, so too could the allegorical literary figures be integrated in the
same manner. This did not, admittedly, lead to the ecclesiastical accep-
tance of these concepts as dogma, even though the passages in the works
of the Strickerand of Hugo von Trimberg (which attest to an endeavor
for a theologically less ambiguous statement by recognized authorities)
could lead one to believe so. And on top of that, many writers take the
liberty of allowing figures to appear who are not to be found in any
catechism; this is the case with Natura in the work of Alan of Lille, as
well as with Natura and the vices in the work of Walter, and with the
metaphorical minions in the work of the author of 7be Devil's Net. lt
is precisely this last didactic work of literature that demonstrates that
the vernacular is not a decisive factor regarding the tendency to make
such literary forms "fall into agreement with theology." For each of the
langer Middle High German works which we have looked at as exam-
ples, we have obtained different results: whereas the demonization of
the vices does not occur in 7be Devil's Net umil the (actual and planned)
illumination of the text, this demonization of the vices is already
present in Ulrich's Alexander romance on the level of the text itself-it
took place at the intertextual level during Ulrich's adaptation of Wal-
ter's work, which served as his literary model. ·
The Virgil passage which mentioned the mille nocendi artes (Aen.,
7.338) and the phrase Tausendkünstler Qack-of-all-trades) which is based
on it do not, incidentally, appear in this context. In any case, neither of
these Middle High German works confirms the conjecture which was
mentioned at the beginning of this paper, at least not in a philologically
explicit manner, the conjecture being that the catalogues of demons
connected with particular vices were associated directly with the deceit-
ful arts of transformation of the one Devil with his many roles and
masks. This, however, does not preclude the possibility that catalogues
of demons were later applied as catalogues of vices to such scenes as the
terriptation of Saint Antony, scenes which were formerly about the
harmful performances of the diabolical milleartifex. Goethe's procession
of demons in Weimar in 1776 is a late example of this application.
 Contents
Introduction Vll
Acknowledgments XX
List of Illustrations XXl
Abbreviations XXlV

I . THE VICES IN HISTORY AND CONTEXT

1. Evagrius Ponticus and the "Eight Generic Logismoi" 3
COLUMBA STEWART, OSB
2. Gregory, Cassian, and the Cardinal Vices 35
CAROLE STRAW
3. Vir inconstans: Moral Theology as Palaeopsychology 59
EDWARD PETERS
4. "The Darkness and the Obscurity of Sins": Representing Vice
in the Thirteenth-Century Bibles moralisees 74
GERALD B. GUEST
5. The Seven Deadly Sins Between Pastoral Care and Scholastic
Theology: The Summa de vitiis by John of Rupella 104
Sn..V ANA VECCHIO (translated by Helen T ook)
6. "Motions of the Heart" and Sins: The Specchio de' peccati
by Domenico Cavalca, OP 128
CARLA CASAGRANDE (translated by Helen T ook)
7. Preaching the Seven Deadly Sins 145
SIEGFRIED WENZEL
8. "lt is a freletee of flessh": Excuses for Sin, Pastoral Rhetoric,
and Moral Agency 170
EDWIN D. CRAUN
9. The Lechery That Dare Not Speak Its Name: Sodomy and
the Vices in Medieval England 193
RUTH MAZO KARRAS
10. Sin and the Vices in the Middle English Mystics 206
MICHAEL KUCZYNSKI
11. Visuality and Moral Culture in the Late Middle Ages:
The Emblematic Conflictus and Its Literary Representatives,
the Etymachia, Qui vicerit dabo, and In campo mundi 234
NIGEL HARRIS and RICHARD NEWHAUSER
12. Catalogues of Demons as Catalogues of Vices in Medieval
German Literature: Des Teufels Netz and the Alexander
Romance by Ulrich von Etzenbach 277
MEINOLF SCHUMACHER (translated by Edward Potter)
vi 1 IN THE GARDEN OF EVIL

II. SALIGIA - THE LIST OF VICES

13. "Initium omnis peccati est superbia": Jean Gerson's Analysis

of Pride in His Mystical Theology, Pastoral Thought, and
Hamartiology 293
M.W.F. STONE
14. Avaritia and Paupertas: On the Place of the Early Franciscans
in the History of A varice 324
RICHARD NEWHAUSER
15. On the Track of Lust: Luxuria, Ockham, and the Scientists 349
BONNIE KENT
16. Gendering Anger: lra, Furor, and Discourses of Power and
Masculinity in the Eleventh and Twelfth Centuries 371
RICHARD E. BARTON
17. Between Sin and Pleasure: Drunkenness in France
at the End of the Middle Ages 393
MIREILLE VINCENT-CASSY (translated by Erika Pavelka)
18. The Art of Denunciai:ion: Medieval Moralists on Envy
and Detraction 431
F.N.M. DIEKSTRA
19. Acedia and Burn-out Syndrome: From an Occupational
Vice of the Early Monks to a Psychological Concept
in Secularized Professional Life 455
RAINER E. }EHL (translated by Andrea Nemeth-Newhauser)

BIBLIOGRAPHY
Primary Sources 477
Secondary Material 497

INDICES
Subjects 539
Names 556

CONTRIBUTORS 567