Lorsch Bee Blessing
{{Short description|Prayer}}
File:Lorscher Bienensegen 1.jpg
File:Lorscher Bienensegen (Detail).tif
The Lorsch Bee Blessing (German: Lorscher Bienensegen) is a bee-keeping prayer intended to bring home honey bees in good health to their hives. It is believed to have been written in the 9th century, and was discovered in a manuscript (on fol. 58r of the Pal. lat. 220 in the Vatican Library, a copy of the Apocalypse of Paul) from the monastery in Lorsch, Germany, famous for the Lorsch Codex. Despite being a Christian prayer written in Old High German, it has remarkable similarities to the Anglo-Saxon and apparently pagan "For a Swarm of Bees" (Old English "wiþ ymbe") magic charm. It may reflect a common pre-Christian Germanic cultural heritage.Grendon (1909:209)
Text
=Old High German=
:Kirst, imbi ist hûcze
:Nû fliuc dû, vihu mînaz, hera
:Fridu frôno in munt godes
:gisunt heim zi comonne
:Sizi, sizi bîna
:Inbôt dir sancte Maria
:Hurolob ni habe dû
:Zi holce ni flûc dû
:Noh dû mir nindrinnês
:Noh dû mir nintuuinnêst
:Sizi vilu stillo
:Uuirki godes uuillon
=Translation=
:Christ, the bee swarm is out here!
:Now fly, you my animal, come.
:In the Lord's peace, in God's protection,
:come home in good health.
:Sit, sit bee.
:The command to you from the Holy Mary.
:You have no vacation;
:Don't fly into the woods;
:Neither should you slip away from me.
:Nor escape from me.
:Sit completely still.
:Do God's will.
Notes
{{Reflist}}
External links
- [http://bibliotheca-laureshamensis-digital.de/bav/bav_pal_lat_220?&ui_lang=eng Pal. lat. 220 (Vatican, Biblioteca Apostolica Vaticana)] – digital facsimile (Bibliotheca Laureshamensis - digital)
- Meinolf Schumacher: [https://pub.uni-bielefeld.de/download/2770205/2916227 Majas Ahnfrauen? Über Bienen in der mittelalterlichen Literatur]
References
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{{Citation |last=Grendon |first=Felix |title=The Anglo-Saxon Charms |year=1909|hdl=2027/njp.32101007059163 |hdl-access=free }}
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{{Commons category|Lorscher Bienensegen}}
{{Old German spells}}
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