TILL EULENSPIEGEL (1347-1547)

German peasant trickster whose merry pranks were the source of numerous folk and literary tales.

The historical Till is said to have been born at Kneitlingen, Brunswick and to have died in 1350 at Mölln, Schleswig-Holstein where his gravestone has been pointed out since the 16th century.

Anecdotes associated with his name were printed about 1500 in one or more Low German language versions. The earliest extant text is a High German version, Ein kurtzweilig lesen von Dyl Vlenspiegel (Antwerp, 1515; An Amusing Book about Till Eulenspiegel); the sole surviving copy is in the British Museum, London.

The jest and practical jokes which generally depend on a pun are broadly farcical, often brutal, sometimes obscene; but they have a serious theme. In the figure of Eulenspiegel, the individual gets his own back on society; the stupid yet cunning peasant demonstrates his superiority to the narrow, dishonest, condescending townsman, as well as to the clergy and nobility.

The Low German text, or parts of it, was translated into Dutch and English (c.1520), French (1532) and Latin (1558). A later Engish version Here beginneth a merye Jest of a man that was called Howleglas appeared c. 1560.

Eulenspiegel has been the subject of musical and literary works, notably Richard Strauss´s symphonic poem Till Eulenspiegels lustige Streiche (1894; Till Eulenspiegel´s Merry Pranks) and Gerhart Hauptmann´s epic poem Till Eulenspiegel (1928).