The Influence of India And Persia On the Poetry of Germany

of Sanskrit scholarship in Europe, but also gave the first direct impulse to the Oriental movement which in the first half of the nineteenth century manifests itself so strikingly both in English as well as in German literature, especially in the work of the poets. In Germany this movement came just at the time when the idea of a universal literature had taken hold of the minds of the leading literary men, and so it was very natural that the pioneer and prophet of this great idea should also be the first to introduce into German poetry the new ivest-ostliche Richtnng. Herder's theological studies turned his attention to the East at an early age. As -is well known, he always had a fervid admiration for the Hebrew poets, but we have evidence to show, that, even before the year 1771, when Jones' Traitt sur la potsie orientale appeared, he had widened the sphere of his Oriental studies and had become interested in Sa'dl.1 Rhymed paraphrases made by him of some stories from the Gulistan date from the period 1761-1764,2 and, as occasional references prove, Sa'dl continued to hold his attention until the appearance, in 1792, of the fourth Collection of the Zerstreute Blatter, which contains the bulk of Herder's translation from Persian and Sanskrit literature, and which therefore will have to occupy our attention.2 1 See the edition by Meyer (KDNL. vol. 74) i. 1. pp. 164, 165. - Given by Redlich in the edition by Suphan, vol. 26, p. 435 seq. 2 We may state ...