Tuesday, February 7, 2023

It is the 7th of February, 2023. Welcome to the Christian History Almanac brought to you by 1517 at 1517.org; I’m Dan van Voorhis.

I don’t know if you work up this morning and thought, “I’m curious about medieval German Nun-poetesses.” Or maybe, you are very sophisticated and thought, “sure, Hrotswitha was a one-of-a-kind nun-poetess in Medieval Europe, but were their others?”. And if that’s the case- oh boy, I have a show for you. Also, if the idea of a medieval nun-poetess has never crossed your mind, I also have a show for you. It’s the same for both of you. Come along.  

I don’t think I’ve done a show on Hrotswitha yet… she was a nun in the 900s who was born into privilege and used her education to become one of the first women poets and playwrights since antiquity. She was connected to the Ottonian dynasty and was celebrated for her writing and piety. I'll get on it when an anniversary comes up for her next.

But today, I want to tell you about the much less celebrated Frau Ava- a kind of anti-Hrotswitha, at least in her circumstances, education, and work. But where Hrotswitha would write in Latin for the educated, Frau Ava was the first female poet to write in the common German tongue- and to write epics based on the New Testament.

We don’t know when Frau Ava was born in modern-day Austria in the 11th century. We know she was married to a lesser lord and had two sons. Her husband and oldest son went off on a Crusade and were killed. We think her husband was a lesser lord because when he died, the overlord took the land on which she lived. So here she is, with no husband and no land. And certainly, no dowry to be married to another man. There would be very little she could do- one option would be to join a monastery. She traveled to Melk in lower Austria on the Danube to join the Benedictines there, but they would require her to give up her young son. She sent him into the care of the Benedictine Monks, and he would be given room, board, and an education. Ava would first live in almost complete solitude as an anchorite in a small walled room with only one opening for light. For years she would fast, sleep in freezing temperatures and pray. As her young son grew older and read Latin, he would come to console her with stories from the New Testament- many revolving around the women who were ministered to by Jesus.

It was from her sons telling of the Bible stories in Latin that she began to compose the first vernacular epic poems in German about the life of Christ and the church- and this as a woman with no formal education. Her five books include the life of John the Baptist, the Life of Jesus, the Gifts of the Holy Spirit, the Antichrist, and the final judgment. These works are the first of any in German literature by a woman in the vernacular, and they are comprised of rhyming couplets for ease of memorization.

Besides the grieving and sick women who are given attention in Frau Ava’s work, so is the theme of blindness. One historian suggests that this may have been because of her own blindness- living as an anchorite in a small room with only a candle for her writing and reading. Her works traveled with her son, who manually transcribed the work in a manuscript that was eventually transcribed into Middle High German in the later Middle Ages. She has become a source of pride in Austria with an annual literary prize named after her, and where she lived the last days of her life, now called the “Ava Tower,” is preserved for posterity. It is said she died there on this the 7th of February in 1127.

The last word for today comes from 2 Corinthians 4: 

7 But we have this treasure in jars of clay to show that this all-surpassing power is from God and not from us. 8 We are hard pressed on every side, but not crushed; perplexed, but not in despair; 9 persecuted, but not abandoned; struck down, but not destroyed. 10 We always carry around in our body the death of Jesus, so that the life of Jesus may also be revealed in our body. 11 For we who are alive are always being given over to death for Jesus’ sake, so that his life may also be revealed in our mortal body. 12 So then, death is at work in us, but life is at work in you.

This has been the Christian History Almanac for the 7th of February 2023, brought to you by 1517 at 1517.org.

The show is produced by a man also familiar with solitude and sleeping in freezing conditions- he lives in Random Lake, Wisconsin- he is Christopher Gillespie.

The show is written and read by a man who thinks when it drops into the 40s. He might freeze to death- I’m Dan van Voorhis.

You can catch us here every day- and remember that the rumors of grace, forgiveness, and the redemption of all things are true…. Everything is going to be ok.