Template:1350-05-23-Magdeburg

1350, May 23 – 1350, September 29

A poem about how the Black Death strikes Magdeburg, a great mortality arises for almost four months and a plague pit is opened at Rottersdorf. This time is remembered as a time of misery, connected to the return of the "false Waldemar", an impostor pretending to be former Margrave of Brandenburg and the earthquake of January 1348

Ik mach schriven wol vorwar: / na godes bort schach dusent jar / dreihundert unde veftich / und warde went an sestich / dat god sines tornes hand / streckede hir in dutsche land, / dat in den tein jaren / wart clage noch ervaren. / dat clagent maket al de dot. / ein stervent wart hr also grot / dat men alle dage / sach weinen und clagen / [p. 3] isliken umme sinen mach. / men mende, ed were de leste dach. / dat stervent hof hir in der stadt / an der hochtit trinitat / und stund na sunte Michels dage. / da weinen jammer unde clage / was hir so gemeine, / dat grot unde kleine / jammer mochen schouwen / an mannen unde vrouwen / und an cleinen kinde / ok an den ingesinde. / de seiken men ungern laven / wolde, noch de doden graven. / mit wagenen unde karen / sach man to kerkhove varen / so vele der doden lute; / to Rottersdorp he nute / dar weren grote kulen, / dar inne de doden vulen. / neiman dat getelen kann, / wat vrouwen storve edder man. / […] / dat men noch alle dage / de lude horte clage, / wen se beginnen rogen / und ore dage wrogen. / se spreken, sodan ungemach / in der werlde nu geschach, / alse wi hebben levet: / [p. 4] de erde heft gebevet, / greve Wodenberch de dode man, / sprak men, he we up irstan.

I will write down the following: / After God's birth a thousand years / three hundred and fifty / and that lasted until sixty / that God stretched out the hand of his wrath / here to the German lands / that in the ten years / there was much to mourn. / The mourning was because of death. / Dying was so great here / that every day / weeping was seen and lamentation was made by everyone for his own. / People thought it was Judgement Day. / Dying began here in the city / on the Feast of Trinity / and ended around St Michael's Day. / Weeping, wailing and lamentation / was so widespread here that great and small experienced misery, men and women / and even small children and servants. / The sick were not cared for / nor did people want to bury the dead. / With wagons and carts / one saw many dead people travelling to the churchyard / out to Rottersdorf, / there were large mounds / into which the dead were allowed to fall. / No one can put into words / how many men and women died / [...] / one always heard people lamenting / when they were shaken up / because they were asked about their lives / they spoke: At that time only disaster happened in the world / when they lived: / [p. 4] the earth shook / and Count Waldemar, the dead man / was said to have risen again. (Translation: Martin Bauch)

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