Mechthild of Magdeburg

Mechthild of Magdeburg. b. near Magdeburg ca. 1207; d. ca. 1282. Mechthild became a Beguine (a lay sister) ca. 1230 and entered the convent of St Mary at Helfta, Saxony, ca. 1270. Various dates have been proposed for her death; Hans Neumann’s estimate of ca. 1282 has the widest currency. Mechthild wrote the mystical Das Fliessende Licht der Gottheit (‘The flowing light of the Godhead’) between ca. 1250 and ca.1282. One text, written in Low German, is in the library of the monastery of Einsiedeln, Switzerland, and a mid-14th-century translation into Middle High German survives, as does a more revised late-13th-century Latin version. The book includes visions, prayers, hymns, love poetry,...