Hrosvit

Hrotsvitha of Gandersheim (Latin: Hrotsvitha Gandeshemensis; c. 935 – after 973) was a 10th-century German secular canoness, dramatist and poet who lived at Gandersheim Abbey (in modern-day Bad Gandersheim, Lower Saxony), established by the Ottonian dynasty. She wrote in Latin, and is considered by some to be the first person since antiquity to compose drama in the Latin West. She has been called "the most remarkable woman of her time".

Hrotsvitha's name appears variously in the forms Hrosvite, Hroswitha, Hroswithe, Rhotswitha, Roswit and is modernized as Roswitha but the proper pronunciation is Hrotsuit. The name is Old Saxon for "strong honour", which she rather adventurously re-interpreted to mean "a clarion voice".

Hrotsvitha's family lineage, at what time she entered the nunnery, and what reasons led her to take the veil are unknown. There is no direct evidence concerning the dates of her birth, consecration, and death. Hrotsvitha’s biography largely depends on her own accounts or results of inferential reasoning. For instance, in her historical poem, “Carmen de Primordiis Coenobii Gandersheimensis”, she tells us that she entered the world a long while after the death of Saxon duke Otto the Illustrious (the father of King Henry the Fowler), which occurred in 912.

From the overall disposition of her works, scholars are sure she lived at Gandersheim, and they infer that she was born into the Saxon nobility. Due to the depth of her point of view in her writings, it is widely believed that she took the veil later in life. Some scholars also infer that she may have personal experience with the love and renunciation that permeates her work.

She studied under Rikkardis and Gerberga, a daughter of Duke Henry I of Bavaria and niece of Emperor Otto the Great (912–973), who became Abbess of Gandersheim in 956. Hrotsvitha was noted for her great learning and was introduced to Roman writers by Gerberga. Hrotsvitha's work shows familiarity not only with the Church fathers, but also with classical poets, including Virgil, Horace, Ovid, Plautus and Terence (on whom her own verse was modeled). Several of her plays draw on the so-called apocryphal gospels. Her works form part of the Ottonian Renaissance.

...
Wikipedia