The Lorelei ( ; or , or ; also found as ''Loreleï'', ''Lore Lay'', ''Lore-Ley'', ''Lurley'', ''Lurelei'' and ''Lurlei'' throughout history) is a , steep

slate Slate is a fine-grained, foliated, homogeneous, metamorphic rock derived from an original shale-type sedimentary rock composed of clay or volcanic ash through low-grade, regional metamorphism. It is the finest-grained foliated metamorphic ro ...

rock on the right bank of the River

Rhine The Rhine ( ) is one of the List of rivers of Europe, major rivers in Europe. The river begins in the Swiss canton of Graubünden in the southeastern Swiss Alps. It forms part of the Swiss-Liechtenstein border, then part of the Austria–Swit ...

in the Rhine Gorge (or

Middle Rhine Middle Rhine (, ; kilometres 529 to 660 of the Rhine) is the section of the Rhine between Bingen and Bonn in Germany. It flows through the Rhine Gorge (), a formation created by erosion, which happened at about the same rate as an uplift i ...

) at

Sankt Goarshausen Sankt Goarshausen (abbreviated St. Goarshausen) is a town located in the Rhein-Lahn-Kreis in Nassau on the eastern shore of the Rhine, in the section known as the Rhine Gorge, directly across the river from Sankt Goar, in the German state Rhi ...

in Germany, part of the Upper Middle Rhine Valley UNESCO

World Heritage Site World Heritage Sites are landmarks and areas with legal protection under an treaty, international treaty administered by UNESCO for having cultural, historical, or scientific significance. The sites are judged to contain "cultural and natural ...

. The 1930s Loreley Amphitheatre is on top of the rock. It has been an infamous fluvial disaster site since its first records during the 10th century, with a varied mythos, ranging from dwarfs to a siren trying to explain the high number of ship wrecks and the loud echo inside the passage.

Etymology

The name comes from the old German words , Rhine dialect for "murmuring", and the Old German term "rock". The translation of the name would therefore be "murmur rock" or "murmuring rock". The heavy currents, and a small

waterfall A waterfall is any point in a river or stream where water flows over a vertical drop or a series of steep drops. Waterfalls also occur where meltwater drops over the edge of a tabular iceberg or ice shelf. Waterfalls can be formed in seve ...

in the area (still visible in the early 19th century) created a murmuring sound, and this combined with the special echo the rock produces to act as a sort of amplifier, giving the rock its name. The murmuring is hard to hear today owing to the urbanization of the area. Other theories attribute the name to the many boating accidents on the rock, by combining the German verb ('to lurk, lie in wait') with the same "ley" ending, with the translation "lurking rock". After the German spelling reform of 1901, in almost all German terms, the letter "y" was changed to the letter "i".

Original folklore and modern myth

The rock and the murmur it creates have inspired various tales. An old legend envisioned dwarfs living in caves in the rock. In 1801, German author Clemens Brentano composed his ballad ''Zu Bacharach am Rheine'' as part of a fragmentary continuation of his novel ''Godwi oder Das steinerne Bild der Mutter''. It first told the story of an enchanting woman associated with the rock. In the poem, the beautiful Lore Lay, betrayed by her sweetheart, is accused of bewitching men and causing their death. Rather than sentence her to death, the bishop consigns her to a nunnery. On the way thereto, accompanied by three knights, she comes to the Lorelei rock. She asks permission to climb it and view the Rhine once again. She does so, and, thinking that she sees her love in the Rhine, falls to her death; the rock ever afterward retaining an echo of her name. Brentano had taken inspiration from

Ovid Publius Ovidius Naso (; 20 March 43 BC – AD 17/18), known in English as Ovid ( ), was a Augustan literature (ancient Rome), Roman poet who lived during the reign of Augustus. He was a younger contemporary of Virgil and Horace, with whom he i ...

and the

Echo In audio signal processing and acoustics, an echo is a reflection of sound that arrives at the listener with a delay after the direct sound. The delay is directly proportional to the distance of the reflecting surface from the source and the lis ...

myth. In 1824,

Heinrich Heine Christian Johann Heinrich Heine (; ; born Harry Heine; 13 December 1797 – 17 February 1856) was an outstanding poet, writer, and literary criticism, literary critic of 19th-century German Romanticism. He is best known outside Germany for his ...

seized on and adapted Brentano's theme in one of his most famous poems, "Die Lorelei". It describes the eponymous female as a sort of siren who, sitting on the cliff above the Rhine and combing her golden hair, unwittingly distracted shipmen with her beauty and song, causing them to crash on the rocks. In 1837 Heine's lyrics were set to music by Friedrich Silcher in the

art song An art song is a Western world, Western vocal music Musical composition, composition, usually written for one voice with piano accompaniment, and usually in the classical music, classical art music tradition. By extension, the term "art song" is ...

"Lorelei" that became well known in German-speaking lands. A setting by

Franz Liszt Franz Liszt (22 October 1811 – 31 July 1886) was a Hungarian composer, virtuoso pianist, conductor and teacher of the Romantic music, Romantic period. With a diverse List of compositions by Franz Liszt, body of work spanning more than six ...

was also favored and dozens of other musicians have set the poem to music. During the Nazi regime and World War II, Heinrich Heine (born as a Jew) became discredited as author of the lyrics, in an effort to dismiss and hide Jewish contribution to German art. Loreley also appears in the poem "Waldesgespräch" which appears as a dialog in Joseph von Eichendorff's first novel, ' (1812); that poem was set by Robert Schumann in his ''Liederkreis'', Op. 39. The Lorelei character, although originally imagined by Brentano, passed into German popular culture in the form described in the Heine–Silcher song and is commonly but mistakenly believed to have originated in an old folk tale. The French writer

Guillaume Apollinaire Guillaume Apollinaire (; ; born Kostrowicki; 26 August 1880 – 9 November 1918) was a French poet, playwright, short story writer, novelist and art critic of Poland, Polish descent. Apollinaire is considered one of the foremost poets of the ...

took up the theme again in his poem "La Loreley", from the collection '' Alcools'' which is later cited in Symphony No. 14 (3rd movement) of

Dmitri Shostakovich Dmitri Dmitriyevich Shostakovich, group=n (9 August 1975) was a Soviet-era Russian composer and pianist who became internationally known after the premiere of his First Symphony in 1926 and thereafter was regarded as a major composer. Shostak ...

. The character continues to be referenced in pop culture, such as the 1969 Townes Van Zandt title track for " Our Mother The Mountain,"

Roxy Music Roxy Music are an English rock music, rock band formed in 1970 by Bryan Ferry (lead vocals/keyboards/principal songwriter) and Graham Simpson (musician), Graham Simpson (bass). By the time the band recorded their Roxy Music (album), first albu ...

's 1973 " Editions of You" and the 1998 Eagle-Eye Cherry single "When Mermaids Cry."

Accidents

A barge carrying 2,400 tons of sulphuric acid capsized on 13 January 2011, near the Lorelei rock, blocking traffic on one of Europe's busiest waterways.

Gallery

File:Lorelei-2002-jhw.jpg, Lorelei rock in the Rhine Gorge File:Lorelei rock sign.JPG, Sign on the bank of the Rhine File:LoreleyEisgang1928-29.jpg, Ice at the Lorelei in the winter of 1928/29 File:Loreley in fog.JPG, Lorelei in fog File:Tankerunglück Loreley 01-2011.jpg, Ship accident near the Lorelei, January 2011 File:Loreleyblick Maria Ruh 2020.jpg, Lorelei seen from the viewpoint Maria Ruh, Urbar File:Lorelei rock1.jpg, Lorelei viewed from the river

References

External links

Loreley Information about the Lorelei rock and surrounding area

–