Waltharius

Waltharius, a Latin poem founded on German popular tradition, relates the exploits of the west Gothic hero Walter of Aquitaine.

Our knowledge of the author, Ekkehard, a monk of St. Gall, is due to a later Ekkehard, known as Ekkehard IV (d. 1060), who gives some account of him in the Casus Sancti Galli (cap. 80). If Ekkehart IV's account, much discussed among scholars, is true, which seems to be confirmed by another monk of St. Gall, Herimannus, the author of the later (ca 1075) life of St Wiborada of St Gall where he cites verse 51 of the Waltharius, the poem was written by Ekkehard, generally distinguished as Ekkehard I, for his master Geraldus in his schooldays, probably therefore not later than 920, since he was probably no longer young when he became deacon (in charge of ten monks) in 957. He died in 973.

Waltharius was dedicated by Geraldus to Erchanbald, bishop of Strasbourg (fl. 965-991), but manuscripts of it were in circulation before that time. Ekkehard IV stated that he corrected the Latin of the poem, the Germanisms of which offended his patron Aribo, archbishop of Mainz. The poem was probably based on epic songs now lost, so that if the author was still in his teens when he wrote it he must have possessed considerable and precocious powers.

Waltharius was the son of Alphere, ruler of Aquitaine, which in the 5th century, when the legend developed, was the centre of the Visigothic kingdom of Toulouse. When Attila invaded the west, the western princes are represented as making no resistance. They purchased peace by offering tribute and hostages. King Gibicho, here described as a Frankish king, gave Hagano as a hostage (of Trojan race, but not, as in the Nibelungenlied, a kinsman of the royal house) in place of his infant son Guntharius; the Burgundian king Herirīcus, his daughter Hiltgunt; and Alphere, his son Waltharius.

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