Exploration and Discovery of the Self in the Twelfth Century: Spanish/Latin and Middle High German Perspectives. Petrus AlfonsVs Dialogus contra Iudaeos and Hartmann von Aue 's Klagebüchlein

Many attempts have been made to determine the meaning of the Twelfth-Century Renaissance and hence of the innovations characteristic of that epoch. We can be certain that previous claims on the Italian Renaissance having been the "first" period when the individual emerged can no longer be maintained. Looking at the dialogue treatises by die Spaniard Petrus Alfonsi {Dialogus contra Iudeos) and by the German Hartmann von Aue (Klagebiichlein), we face an enormous opportunity to discover early literary and philosophical attempts to explore the meaning of the self and to situate the individual within the context of internal explorations pitting the body against the heart (Hartmann) and the newly converted Christian against the former Jew (Alfonsi). Undoubtedly, there are many courtly romances and other narratives, and also coundess philosophical treatises in which questions regarding an individual's performance and ideas about this world were raised already well before 1300, i.e., shortly before the emergence of the Italian Renaissance. But, as this study indicates, the contributions by Alfonsi and Hartmann are of a unique character and need to be viewed in tandem with each other despite many differences in language, purpose, and narrative foundation. In each case, the focus rests on the self, that is, on its internal conflicts and tensions, certainly clear indications of the early development of a personal identity and form of self-awareness.