Gottfried von Strassburg

Gottfried's work is regarded, alongside the Nibelungenlied and Wolfram von Eschenbach's Parzival, as one of the great narrative masterpieces of the German Middle Ages.

It would seem, however, that he was a man of good birth and position, who filled an important municipal office in his native city of Strasbourg, but since he is always referred to in German as Meister (master) and not Herr (sir), it seems safe to assume he was not a knight, a conclusion supported by the rather dismissive attitude toward knightly exploits shown in Tristan.

Gottfried draws more on the learned tradition of medieval humanism than on the chivalric ethos shared by his major literary contemporaries.

That his home was in Strasbourg is supported by the fact that the earliest manuscripts of Tristan, dating from the first half of the 13th century, show features of Alemannic and specifically Alsatian dialect.

He explains that he bases himself on Thomas because he "told the tale correctly", distancing himself from the less courtly versions of the story represented by Béroul in Old French and Eilhart von Oberge in Middle High German.

It is clear that while Gottfried's statement of his reliance on and debt to Thomas is correct, he both expanded on his source and refined the story psychologically.

The discovery in 1995 of the Carlisle Fragment of Thomas's Tristan, which includes material from one of the central parts of the story, the Love Grotto episode, promises a better understanding of Gottfried's use of his source.

Thomas's source, in turn, is a now lost Old French Tristan story, reconstructed by Joseph Bédier, which derives ultimately from Celtic legend.

Tristan grows up in Parmenie, passed off as the son of Riwalin's marshal Rual li Fointeant, becoming the perfect courtier.

Once at sea, the ship is struck by a tempest, the crew conclude that they are being punished by God for abducting Tristan, so they set him ashore in a country that turns out to be Cornwall.

Her mother and her kinswoman Brangaene intervene and Tristan explains the purpose of his journey, which leads to a reconciliation between Ireland and Cornwall.

This is followed by a series of intrigues in which the lovers attempt to dupe Marke, starting with the wedding night, when the virgin Brangaene substitutes for Isolde in the marriage bed.

In Thomas's poem, which is preserved from around this point, Tristan marries Isolde of the White Hands, though the marriage is never consummated.

Much of critics' difficulty in interpreting the work was entirely intentional on the part of Gottfried; his extensive use of irony in the text is clearly the greatest cause of disagreement over the meaning of his poem.

Does the use of religious language imagery for the lovers mean that they represent an alternative religion, or is this simply a technique to communicate their exemplary role and the sublime nature of their love?

That Tristan is not knightly represents a rejection of the norms of feudal society; he allows himself to be guided by love and physical passion rather than chivalry.

One of the most important passages in Tristan, one which owes nothing to Thomas, is the so-called literary excursus, in which Gottfried names and discusses the merits of a number of contemporary lyric and narrative poets.

Conversely, he criticises, without naming him directly, Wolfram von Eschenbach for the obscurity of his style and the uncouthness of his vocabulary.

Gottfried's work was rediscovered in the late 18th century, and is the source of Richard Wagner's opera Tristan und Isolde (1865).