Christopher. The beautiful but imperious
Princess Hedwig, another of Otho's sisters, read Virgil with Ekkehard of
St. Gall, and taught the child Burchard Greek, while Otho's niece
Gerberga, Abbess of Gandersheim, was the instructress of the celebrated
Hrosvita, "the oldest German poetess." And this reminds us that at this
time the women-cloisters of Germany and the Netherlands were among the
most active centres of learning and book-production. The great monument
of feminine erudition and artistic skill, called the "Hortus
Deliciarum," was of a somewhat later time, but other examples still
exist, among them the beautiful Niederm?nster Gospels of the Abbess
Uota, now at Munich. A wood-cut by Albert D?rer prefixed to the first
edition of Hrosvita's works (N?rnberg, 1501) represents the nun Hrosvita
kneeling before the Emperor and beside the Archbishop Wilhelm of Mainz
presenting her book.[21] As to the literary labours of Hrosvita, this is
not the place to discuss them. She is simply an incidental figure in our
view of the brilliant Court of the Othos. A MS. of her works 500 years
after her death was found among the dust of the cloister-library at St.
Emmeram of Regensburg by Conrad Celtis, and, as we have seen, printed
for the first time in 1501.
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