Page - 143 - in The Power of Urban Water - Studies in premodern urbanism

Margit Dahm-Kruse 9 Water andUrbanStructures in theNarrativeWorldsof CourtlyNovels− Aesthetic andSymbolic Functions Abstract:Medieval poets used water as a complex metaphor for a wide range of purposes. Throughexamples taken from the 13th-centurynovels ‘HerzogErnst’ andKonradFleck’s ‘Flore undBlanscheflur’, thecontributionwill showthat literary textsoftenrefer to thebroadsymbolic andespecially religious implicationsgiven to theelementofwater.Bothepics containelabora- teddescriptionsofwaterworks as central elementswithindifferent urban structures andarchi- tectures. Thesedepictions ofwater refer to biblical images like theGardenof Edenor theHea- venly Jerusalemandtherefore transport specific spiritualconceptsofmeaning.At thesametime, a particular aesthetic and representative impact is given to them. The visualisation of artful controlledwater turnsout tobeahighly suitablepattern to signify technological skills, power, andcultural refinement. Thepoetical significanceof thesewaterworks lies in thecreationofan intriguing interaction of this worldly claim of validity and the ‘proper’ Christian meaning of water. Waterwith its potential to connect epistemic, symbolic, andmetaphysicalmeaning is of high significance in medieval literary texts. By drawing on examples from courtly novels of the 13th century, this essay will show how descriptions of water and waterworks create poetical meaning onvarious levels. The fictional textswill not be read as an epistemological approach to the existential, geo-historical or economic significance ofwaterwhichmight be reflected in the literarymedium,but rather asdocumentsof the rich symbolicmeaningandaesthetic func- tions given todescriptions anddepictionsofwater. Medieval culture in general displays a high affinity to symbolic and allegorical interpreta- tions of thematerial world. Like all of the natural elements, water is not only regarded as a natural phenomenon, but also as a religious symbol. Even more than the other natural ele- ments,water lends itself to symbolic usage. It is closely related to several spiritual concepts of meaning – first, and above all, it represents the transtemporal idea of spiritual purification which leads to the great significance ofwater in Christian liturgy in general and in baptism in particular,1 but also numerous other religious concepts, such as the water of life. As James Smith outlines in his recent study, in religious writing water is often used as a metaphor to come to termswithelusiveChristianconcepts suchas thepurity of the soulor thedivinegrace andwisdom.2Water is alsoused to represent sophisticated fieldsof knowledgeand theological concepts.BernhardofClairvaux, for example,used the imageryofwater todescribe the spread of spirituality in thehumanmind; furthermore, theTransubstantiationdetermines a close con- nection betweenwater and the blood of Christ.3 At the same time, the functional significance ofwater inmanydifferent areas of human life builds up several correlationswith its symbolic meaning.This simultaneityofmetaphysical andepistemicmeaning,orof abstractnessandma- teriality, canparticularly be seenwithin the realmof hygiene as aphysical aswell as spiritual matter. 1 Cf.Huber-Rebenich et al. 2017, 10. 2 Cf. Smith 2018; Smith 2017. 3 Cf.Miller 1986, 138–140.N.Miller presents in detail the complex imagery ofwater in several biblical passages, as well as in the theological discourse of the 13th century. A broad range of literary references to the symbolic meaningofwater aswater of life is collectedbyClassen 2011. OpenAccess.©2020Margit Dahm-Kruse, publishedbyDeGruyter. Thiswork is licensedunder theCreative CommonsAttribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives4.0 License. https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110677065-009