Konig Rother, Salman und Morolf, the Munchner Oswald and Grauer Rock (otherwise known as Orendel) have had a troubled position in the literary history of medieval Germany. Forced into a normative generic framework as either 'Minstrel Epic' (Spielmannsepik) or 'Bridal-quest Epic' (Brautwerbungsepik), these texts have been viewed conventionally according to an essentially teleological classification or a schematic ideal. Bowden challenges the premises of such a view with a detailed history of the textual scholarship, and revaluates these so called 'Bridal quests' on their own terms, offering detailed and suggestive readings of each work without the distortions or limitations inherent in the traditional interpretative model. Sarah Bowden is Powys Roberts Research Fellow at St Hugh's College, Oxford.

Arthurian Literature has established its position as the home for a great diversity of new research into Arthurian matters. It delivers fascinating material across genres, periods, and theoretical issues. TIMES LITERARY SUPPLEMENT Guest Editors: Sarah Bowden, Susanne Friede and Andreas Hammer This special issue focuses on space and place in Arthurian literature, from a wide range of European traditions. Topics addressed include the connections between quest space and individual spirituality in the Vulgate Queste and Malory's Morte Darthur; penitence in Hartmann's Iwein and Gregorius; parallels in sacred spaces in the Matter of Britain and medieval Ireland; political prophecy in Sir Gawain and the Green Knight and The Awntyrs off Arthure A; syntagmatic and paradigmatic spaces in Chrétien's Perceval; spatial significance in Wigalois and Prosa Lancelot; the political meaning of the tomb of King Lot and the rebel kings in Malory's Morte Darthur; and sexual spaces in twelfth-century French romance.

The twin themes of punishment and penance considered through both historical and literary medieval German texts. The supposed brutality of medieval punishment looms large in the popular contemporary imagination, yet this perception can obscure the diverse and nuanced reactions of medieval society to violent or criminal acts. This collectionaddresses the ways in which different approaches to punishment are depicted and discussed in written texts, focusing in particular on the often complex intersection - semantic, theoretical and theological - between punishment andpenitential practices, both self-imposed and imposed by others. Often in dialogue with theoretical approaches (for example, those of Rene Girard or Michel Foucault), individual essays explore a range of themes: the intersection ofthe literary representation of acts of punishment and penance with historical experience; the ways in which acts of punishment and penance engage the wishes and desires of those inflecting or witnessing them; legal and theological implications; the symbolic and communicative capital of the body. They focus on a range of texts (romance, lyric, mystical writing, saints' lives) written in German, from the twelfth to the sixteenth century. Sarah Bowden is Lecturer in German at King's College London; Annette Volfing is Professor of Medieval German Studies at the University of Oxford and Fellow of Oriel College. Contributors: Sarah Bowden, Bjoern Buschbeck, Sebastian Coxon, Racha Kirakosian, Andreas Krass, Henrike Manuwald, Katharina Mertens-Fleury, Jamie Page, Aimut Suerbaum, Annette Volfing.

Konig Rother, Salman und Morolf, the Munchner Oswald and Grauer Rock (otherwise known as Orendel) have had a troubled position in the literary history of medieval Germany. Forced into a normative generic framework as either 'Minstrel Epic' (Spielmannsepik) or 'Bridal-quest Epic' (Brautwerbungsepik), these texts have been viewed conventionally according to an essentially teleological classification or a schematic ideal. Bowden challenges the premises of such a view with a detailed history of the textual scholarship, and revaluates these so called 'Bridal quests' on their own terms, offering detailed and suggestive readings of each work without the distortions or limitations inherent in the traditional interpretative model. Sarah Bowden is Powys Roberts Research Fellow at St Hugh's College, Oxford.