JOHANNES VON TEPL

born c. 1350, Tepl or Schttwa, Bohemia [now in Czech Republic] died c. 1415, Prague also called Johannes Von Saaz Bohemian author of the remarkable dialogue Der Ackermann aus Bhmen (c. 1400; Death and the Ploughman), the first important prose work in the German language. After taking a degree at Prague University, he was appointed, probably before 1378, a notary in Saaz ( Zatec), and he became headmaster of the grammar school there in 1383. In 1411 he became a notary of Prague New Town, where he remained until his death. In the Ackermannwhich, though described in a Latin dedication as an exercise in rhetoric, probably arose from the death of the author's first wife in 1400a plowman, representing Man, bitterly accuses Death of unjust dealings toward humanity. Death's counterarguments reconcile the plowman to the necessity of his activities, though he still champions human nobility against Death's more negative view. God, the judge, awards Death the victory but Man the honour. The complex structure and elaborately artificial but vigorous rhythmical prose of this work make itdespite the uncertain state of the textunique in medieval German literature. The older view of the Ackermann as the chief representative of a Bohemian Renaissance has come to be seriously questioned; despite Renaissance features, the work is widely regarded as essentially medieval in thought and even in technique.