(b c1150; d before 30 Aug 1196). Swiss Minnesinger. He was of the aristocratic family of the Counts of Neuenburg, which had ancestors in the royal house of Burgundy. He lived at Burg Fenis, between the lakes of Biel and Neuchâtel (Neuenburg) in western Switzerland, and is mentioned several times in documents as ‘Rudolf II von Fenis-Neuenburg’. Together with Friedrich von Hûsen and Hendrik van Veldeke he belonged to an important group of Minnesinger who provided a link with trouvère song, absorbing and adopting elements of form and subject matter from Romance verse. This group laid the foundation for the period of high Minnesang in Germany, a period that reached its zenith with Walther von der Vogelweide. The derivativeness of his technique shows most in the style of certain images and metaphors and in his adoption of certain verse forms. Rudolf’s kinship with French culture comes through in the strongly intellectual tone of his songs, and particularly in his way of thinking in antitheses. Significantly, his mother and probably also his wife were of French origin, and his lands lay across border territory embracing both German and Romance languages. 25 song strophes are considered to be authentic, and are thought by scholars to belong to eight or nine lieder. No melodies survive for these songs; but three, possibly five, of the Old French and Provençal models on which he based songs provide melodies for his verse.
Text edition: Des Minnesangs Frühling, ed. K. Lachmann and M. Haupt (Leipzig, 1857, rev. 38/1988 by H. Moser and H. Tervooren), i, 166–77 [MF]Music edition: Singweisen zur Liebeslyrik der deutschen Frühe, ed. U. Aarburg (Düsseldorf, 1956) [A]
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Gewan ich ze minnen ie guoten wân, MF 80.1: from Folquet de Marseille ‘Sitot me sui a tart aperceubutz’, PC 155.21; A |
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Minne gebiutet mir daz ich singe, MF 80.25: from Gace Brule ‘De bone amour et de loial amie’, R.1102; A, also ed. E. Jammers, Ausgewählte Melodien des Minnesangs (Tübingen, 1963) |
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Nun ist niht mêre mîn gedinge, MF 84.10: from Peire Vidal ‘Pos tornatz sui en Proensa’, PC 364.37; A, also ed. R. Taylor, The Art of the Minnesinger, i (Cardiff, 1968) |
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Ich hân mir selben gemachet die swaere, MF 83.11: ?from Gace Brule ‘Tant m’a mené force de seignorage’, R.42; A |
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Mit sange wânde ich mîne sorge krenken, MF 81.30: ?also from Gace Brule ‘Tant m’a mené force de seignorage’, R.42; A |
C. von Kraus: Des Minnesangs Frühling: Untersuchungen (Leipzig, 1939/R), 203ff
R.-H. Blaser: Le Minnesinger Rodolphe de Neuchâtel et son oeuvre dans l’histoire du lyrisme allemand du Moyen Age (Neuchâtel, 1955)
U. Aarburg: ‘Melodien zum frühen deutschen Minnesang’, Der deutsche Minnesang: Aufsätze zu seiner Erforschung, i (Darmstadt, 1961/R), 378–421
H. Stadler: ‘Rudolf von Fenis and his Sources’, Oxford German Studies, viii (1973), 5–19
H. Tervooren: ‘Graf Rudolf von Fenis-Neuenberg’, Die deutsche Literatur des Mittelalters: Verfasserlexikon, ed. K. Ruh and others (Berlin, 2/1977–)
S.C. Van d’Elden: ‘Diversity Despite Similarity: two Middle High German Contrafacta of a Provençal Song’, Studia occitanica in memoriam Paul Remy, ed. H.-E. Keller and others, i (Kalamazoo, MI, 1986), 323–37
H.-H.S. Räkel: Der deutsche Minnesang (Munich, 1986), 82–91
H. Heinen: ‘Walther's Adaptation of a Song by Rudolf von Fenis’, Von Otfried von Weissenburg bis zum 15. Jahrhundert: Kalamazoo 1989, ed. A. Classen (Göppingen, 1991), 39–51
BURKHARD KIPPENBERG/LORENZ WELKER