372 THE GERMAN PASSION-PLA Y 



that the consecrated Mary should marry, the summons 

 to all men of David's lineage, and the bursting into bud 

 of the aged Joseph's rod. 1 Joseph immediately after the 

 marriage goes off to work and Mary retires to her 

 4 oratory/ where Gabriel, followed by the columba de 

 throno, announces in florid language the conception. 2 

 Then follows the journey to Bethlehem with a comic 

 interlude. Joseph speaks of his wife as ' the Virgin,' 

 a statement not confirmed by appearances ; and, partly 

 on this account and partly because he has no money to 

 pay, all the innkeepers refuse to put them up. 3 Eefuge 

 is at last found in a tumble-down outhouse, where the 

 child is born. 4 Then we have the shepherds keeping 



1 See F, pp. 46-49. The incidents are in Pseudo-Mathew, chap, v., and the 

 Protevangelion, chap. viii. 



2 Exactly as in Diirer's Cut 8, where a water-pot is introduced to reconcile 

 Pseudo-Mathew, chap. vii. , with Protevangelion, chap. ix. In Wernher's Driu liet 

 von der Maget (1. 2115) the former account is followed, but Das alte Passional 

 (p. 14) slurs over the discrepancy. In an Advent song from Unterwessen, Gabriel 

 comes to the Virgin by night in her bedchamber, not in the oratory, but I have 

 found no other instance of this (see R, No. 7, p. 62). The Annunciation seems, 

 as I have already noted (see p. 290), at some places to have formed part of 

 the scenic ritual. Thus in a thirteenth - century BesanQon ritual cited by 

 Martene (Liber iv. cap. 10. 30) we read: "In Biscentina vero B. Magdalenae 

 parochial! Ecclesia dum idem Evangelium (Missus est angelus) in missa 

 cantatur, puella quaedam eleganter composita, et prius diligenter edocta, B. 

 Virginis personam gerens, respondeat diacono legenti, iisdem verbis quibus 

 Gabrieli Archangelo redemptionis nostrae mysterium annuntianti Beatissima 

 Virgo Maria respondit." Martene refers in the same section to other less note- 

 worthy rituals. 



3 See Q, pp. 146, 203, but often elsewhere in the greater passion-plays. 

 It was a peculiarly popular incident in the peasant-plays, and in them has 

 survived to the present day : see R, pp. 48, 64, 65, 92, 101-104, but especially the 

 Hosenheimer Dreikonigspiel, p. 169 ; also the fifteenth-century Weihnachtsspiel, 

 edited by Piderit, p. 97 ; Coventry Mysteries, pp. 145 et seq. ; and, with a variety 

 of comic incident, the Chester Plays, pp. 119 et seq. In the latter one of the 

 shepherds gives a pair of his wife's old hose, while in the German Weihnachtsspiel 

 it is Joseph's old hose which are used to wrap the child in. These hose appear 

 to be traditional, for we find Luther referring to them in a Christmas sermon on 

 Luke ii. 1-14. 



4 See F, p. 59, for 'das zerprochen haus,' exactly as in Diirer's Cut 10. 



