Grim humor in the tale of the wolf’s death

Abstract

Contrary to other episodes of the Ysengrimus, the final episode in the seventh book of the Flemish animal epic is not based upon a known animal fable. The narrative core seems to be the story of the death of the prophet Muhammad as told by Embrico of Mainz. In this article I argue that the poet of the Ysengrimus may also have used elements from Ovid’s tale of Pentheus and the maenads in the third book of the Metamorphoses, just as the wolf’s eschatological prophesy might be an intertextual play on the storm scene in the first book of the Aeneid. Following this, I elaborate some clues that lend support to the idea, previously presented in the literature, that the portrayal of the sow Salaura refers to Hildegard of Bingen and her visions, publicly acknowledged by Pope Eugenius III during the Synod in Trier in 1147–1148, just before the completion of Ysengrimus.