dots-menu
×

Home  »  A Harvest of German Verse  »  Walter von der Vogelweide (1170–1228)

Margarete Münsterberg, ed., trans. A Harvest of German Verse. 1916.

By Give Me Welcome All with Cheer

Walter von der Vogelweide (1170–1228)

GIVE me welcome all with cheer!

Harken, what my tidings fair shall be.

All that you were wont to hear

Is a very trifle: now ask me.

But give me my reward!

Then, if that be good,

I shall tell what you will hear with joyful mood.

Take care, and honours fit accord!

To German ladies I shall say

Such happy tidings as will please them well,

And bring the world beneath their sway;

For no great thanks my tale I’ll tell.

Ah, what should I ask?

They’re too great, I find.

So I am but modest, pray that they be kind:

Gracious welcome be their task.

In many countries I have fared,

I have seen the best with eager eye.

Woe betide me if I dared

Force my heart that it should ever try

Other lands to love

For their foreign ways.

Should I lie, what profit were false praise?

German manners all above!

From the Elbe to the Rhine,

Back unto Hungarian ground,

There, I wot, the noblest shine

That upon the world are found.

If looks and bearings fair

My eyes can judge aright,

Any woman here surpasses in my sight

High-born ladies fine elsewhere!

German men are nobly bred,

Angels are the women of the land.

He who chides them is misled.

Other truth I cannot understand.

He who on his way

Seeketh virtue, loving chaste,

Come into our land, for there is joy to waste.

May I live there long, I pray!