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Alpharts Tod
Anonymous medieval German poem / From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Alpharts Tod (The Death of Alphart) is an anonymous late medieval Middle High German poem in the poetic cycle of the hero Dietrich von Bern, the counterpart of the historical Ostrogothic king Theodoric the Great in Germanic heroic legend. It is part of the so-called "historical" Dietrich material. It may have written as early as between 1245 and 1300, but it is only transmitted in a single manuscript from around 1470 or 1480. The place of composition is unknown.
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Alpharts Tod concerns the young hero Alphart, one of Dietrich's heroes and the nephew of Hildebrand, at the start of a war between Dietrich and his uncle Ermenrich. Alphart insists on riding out alone, and while he is brave and a powerful warrior, he eventually encounters Witege and Heime, two traitors who have switched sides to Ermenrich. They kill him in a dishonorable fashion; Ermenrich, meanwhile, fails to defeat Dietrich.