Mother speaks to daughter. Literary historical reflections on a feminist theme

Recent scholarship has argued that Middle High German authors painted a negative picture of mother-daughter relationships in which the older women subject the younger ones to the materialistic and political goals of patriarchal society. By contrast, the evidence in the Nibelungenlied, in Gottfried von Strassburgs Tristan, in the anonymous Kudrun, and also in a number of late-medieval texts demonstrates that often mother-daughter relationships were determined by strong emotional bonds, especially as the mothers attempt to help their daughters to find personal happiness in their marriages. Likewise, the poets present images of daughters who fully trust their mothers and enjoy their full support. Certainly, medieval marriage politics entirely privileged the family as a social entity irrespective of individual preferences, but the literary projections support the conclusion that many poets idealized emotional relationships between parents and children and outlined ways for the latter to achieve personal happiness.