Knecht Ruprecht

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Illustration of Knecht Ruprecht

Knecht Ruprecht (on the left) and Saint Nicholas

Knecht Ruprecht (German pronunciation:

Christkindl, and Der Weihnachtsmann but is virtually unknown outside the country.[1] He first appears in written sources in the 17th century, as a figure in a Nuremberg Christmas procession.[2]
: 155 

Background

The companions of Saint Nicholas are a group of closely related figures who accompany Saint Nicholas in territories formerly in the Holy Roman Empire or the countries that it influenced culturally.[3]: 146  These characters act as a foil to the benevolent Christmas gift-bringer, threatening to thrash or abduct disobedient children. Jacob Grimm (in Deutsche Mythologie) associated this character with the pre-Christian house spirit (kobold, elf) which could be either benevolent or malicious, but whose mischievous side was emphasized after Christianization.[4]

Various traditions

Knecht Ruprecht is Saint Nicholas' most familiar attendant in Germany.[

East Friesland, he was known as Bûr and Bullerclås.[3]: 146  Knecht Ruprecht first appears in written sources in the 17th century, as a figure in a Nuremberg Christmas procession.[2]: 155  Samuel Taylor Coleridge encountered a Knecht Ruprecht character in a 1798 visit to Ratzeburg, a town in northern Germany, which he described as "outfitted in 'high buskins, a white robe, a mask, and an enormous flax wig'".[5]: 99  Ruprecht otherwise is described as wearing a black or brown robe with a pointed hood, and sometimes walking with a limp because of a childhood injury, or carrying a long staff and a bag of ashes, or occasionally wearing little bells on his clothes.[3]: 146  Sometimes he rides on a white horse, and sometimes he is accompanied—by men with blackened faces dressed as old women, or by fairies.[3]
: 146 

According to

weasel words] Ruprecht began as a farmhand; in others, he is a wild foundling whom Saint Nicholas raises from childhood.[citation needed
]

According to tradition, Knecht Ruprecht asks children whether they can pray. If they can, they receive apples, nuts and gingerbread. If they cannot, he hits the children with his bag of ashes.[3]: 146  In other versions of the story, Knecht Ruprecht gives naughty children gifts such as lumps of coal, sticks, and stones, while well-behaving children receive sweets from Saint Nicholas.[citation needed] He is also reported to give naughty children a switch (stick) in their shoes for their parents to hit them with, instead of sweets, fruit and nuts, in the German tradition.[citation needed]

In related folk traditions more closely associated with certain regions in the High Alps, particularly the snowy villages south and west of Salzburg in Austria, the Knecht Ruprecht character functions as Saint Nicholas' assistant, rather than as the primary actor in the early December rituals; keeping a watchful eye on the benevolent saint during his journey. Both are, in turn, accompanied in these regions by an assortment of terrifying horned, goat-like creatures known as the Krampus, who seek out and terrorize misbehaving children identified by Saint Nicholas for punishment. The worst offenders are said to be whipped with birch switches, and sometimes stuffed in a hessian sack and thrown into an icy river for their bad deeds.[8]

In music and literature

German composer Robert Schumann features Knecht Ruprecht as the titular subject of one of the miniature piano pieces in his collection for children, Album for the Young, Op 68 (1848).[citation needed]

German poet and novelist, Theodor Storm, wrote the poem "Knecht Ruprecht" in 1862.[9]

In popular culture

In the German version of The Simpsons television show, the family dog is named Knecht Ruprecht rather than Santa's Little Helper.[10]

See also

Notes

  1. ^ Tom A. Jerman. Santa Claus Worldwide: A History of St. Nicholas and Other Holiday Gift-Bringers. p. 71.
  2. ^
    ISBN 0-7864-2958-5
    .
  3. ^ a b c d e f Thorpe, Benjamin (1852). Northern mythology: comprising the principal popular traditions and superstitions of Scandinavia, north Germany, and the Netherlands. Vol. 3. E. Lumley.
  4. ISBN 0-7864-0246-6
    .
  5. ISBN 9780307760227
    . Retrieved 1 January 2022.
  6. ^ a b Alexander Tille, Yule and Christmas: their place in the Germanic year (D. Nutt, 1899), 116.
  7. ISBN 9780342145362
    .
  8. ^ "Devils and maidens: Austria's Krampus parades". Travel.ninemsn.com. Archived from the original on 8 February 2013. Retrieved 13 December 2012.
  9. ISBN 9780738733340
  10. ISBN 9783897483231
    .

External links
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