Lübeck's Dance of Death

The Old Text from 1463

What follows is what remains of the text from 1463. The painting is generally assumed to have been created by Bernd Notke.

Painting with text below.

The first 108 lines are taken from the dance of death in Tallinn, Estonia. The next 72 lines are missing and then follow the lines that Jacob von Melle wrote down in 1701.

To make things worse, Jacob von Melle has apparently shuffled some of the verses, but I shall return to that subject in the notes to each picture.

The preacher, who introduces the dance, does not appear in the painting in Lübeck, so I have used a clip from the painting in Tallinn instead. The rest of the pictures are photos taken between the two world wars by Wilhelm Castelli. These pictures are available several places but I have chosen the ones in Bernt Notke und sein Kreis by Walter Paatz, Berlin 1939. For some reason Paatz has removed the text below the painting.

The dance of death below the dance of death organ.

Notice, that "u" and "v" has been interchanged at places to make the text more accessible and the abbreviation "vñ" has been resolved into "unde". Headings and punctuation has been added.

I have tried to translate the text, but notice the many similarities between Medieval Low German and Modern English. Words like "to", "do", "he", "help", "mine", "is", "spare" "water" and "god" are the same - and countless words are very similar: scal/shall, mi/me, hadde/had, respijt/respite, grot/great, pin/pain, wat/what, dat/that, olth/old, junck/young, essche/ask, jw/you etc. etc.

The best way to start is to jump directly into the dance by clicking the pictures below:

Click to see picture and text.

Sources of the Low German text

Lübeck

Our only source for the text from Lübeck is Jacob von Melle, who wrote the text down in 1701, when the old painting was replaced. The text is preserved in two handwritten books, the one is "Ausführliche Beschreibung der kayserlichen, freyen, und des H. Römischen Reichs Stadt Lübeck" and the other "Lubeca religiosa".(1)
The former of these two manuscripts can be read here: Jacob von Melle: Ausführliche Beschreibung […] Lübeck
Jacob von Melle's transcription was published for the first time in 1783 by Ludewig Suhl in the book »Der Todtentanz nach einem 320 Jahre alten Gemaehlde in der St. Marienkirche zu Lübeck […]«.
In 1866 Wilhelm Mantels published Der Todtentanz in der Marienkirche zu Lübeck. Mantels pointed out that Jakob von Melle's transcription was disordered, and he arranged the text in the sequence that is still believed to be the correct one.
The book has been digitized here: Der Todtentanz in der Marienkirche zu Lübeck, but can also be bought as a modern facsimile reprint, where Hartmut Freytag has added a section with the newest (i.e the latest years) research, the text from Tallinn, translations into modern (High) German and much more.
The ultimate best source is Der Totentanz der Marienkirche in Lübeck und der Nikolaikirche in Reval (Tallinn) published by Hartmut Freytag, newest edition 2002. This is by far the best book on the subject - with more facts and less nonsense than any other book.

Tallinn

The first person to edit Tallinn's dance of death was Karl Russwurm in 1838. His article was published in three parts that can be read as three pdf-files: part 1, part 2, part 3.
Russwurm also included Jakob von Melle's transcript, and he wondered at the strange order. It was the same observation Mantels made 28 years later in 1866, but Mantels did not (at the time) know about the painting in Tallinn.
Tallinn's text was published several times towards the end of the 19th century. One of them was Gotthard v. Hansen: Die Kirchen und ehemaligen Klöster Revals, 1873 (reprinted 1976).
This book can be accessed on Google Books (and elsewhere): Die Kirchen und ehemaligen Klöster Revals (page 22).
The best source is once again Hartmut Freytag's Der Totentanz der Marienkirche in Lübeck und der Nikolaikirche in Reval (Tallinn), which has close-ups of the text-bands of the painting.
Another source is the reprint of Mantels' Der Todtentanz in der Marienkirche zu Lübeck, where Freytag (among other things) has added a section about Tallinn's text with a translation into German.

In This Section

Click the little pictures or the list of dancers in the left column at the top of this page.
Jacob von Melle (wrote down the text)
Wilhelm Mantels (edited the text)
Bernd Notke (Assumed to have created the painting)
- Did Bernt Notke paint the dances of death in Lübeck and Tallinn?
- St. George and the Dragon in Stockholm's cathedral (attributed to Notke)
  - Is St. George and the dragon an allegory over the battle of Brunkeberg?
  - Has Bernt Notke created St. George and the dragon?
- The Mass of St. Gregory in Marienkirche in Lübeck (attributed to Notke)
- The Trinity altarpiece in Lübeck (attributed to Notke)
- The Triumphal Cross in Lübeck's Cathedral

First
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Footnotes: (1)

After the 2^nd World War, Lubeca religiosa was among the millions of German books that were distributed all over the Soviet Union as spoils of war.

In 1996 the president of Georgia, Eduard Shevardnadze, decreed that Georgia's share of the spoils should be returned. Among the 1,850 books that were thus returned to Lübeck was Lubeca religiosa, although it is not entirely clear whether the book returned was Jacob von Melle's autograph or a very old copy.

For details, see this external link: Aus Georgien zurück, Ein Beispiel für Restitution von Bibliotheksgut. Thanks to Mischa von Perger for alerting me to this story.