The Ritter (Knight) Hartmann Von Aue, who is considered today one of the three Greatest Imperial Poets, was a Crusader, a songwriter, and the author of several narrative poems, among them the profoundly beautiful Epic of True Love, Der arme Heinrich (if you have not read this great work, I encourage you to at least familiarize yourself with the story).

Herr Hartmann was very much a man of his times, especially in his view of women. In modern times we are taught to look down on the Sacred Ages, with their alleged oppression of women, yet it is precisely in modern times that we see women oppressed, and forced from their natural complementarity with men. The true Sacretemporal view of women as in a very true sense equal and complementary is most beautifully expressed these few lines of Hartmann’s profound poetry:

Glory be unto her whose word
    Sends her dear lord to bitter fight;
  Although he conquer by his sword.
    She to the praise has equal right;
  He with the sword in battle, she at home with prayer.
    Both win the victory, and both the glory share.