Peter of Duisburg (Dusburg) used stylistic means characteristic of literary language. They included also metaphors and comparisons. An often mentioned figure in Duisburg’s chronicle is Duke Świętopełk, who is presented as an evil ruler hostile to Christianity. His conduct is compared to the behavior of two animals - the fox and the lion. He was attributed such character traits as cunning, deceit, falsehood and vileness, which are defining features of the fox. The position of the lion in the Middle Ages was special. It was often used in comparisons carrying predominantly positive meanings, but also some negative as well. In Duisburg’s chronicle, too, the lion is used to describe both positive and negative personal traits. In reference to the duke and his son Mściwoj comparisons to the lion drew by Peter of Duisburg were of negative character. In these fragments the lion symbolizes the devil; here Peter of Duisburg drew on the comparison found in the First Epistle of St Paul.
The copy of Christherre-Chronik in the University Library of Nicolaus Copernicus University in Torun is one of 95 copies of the work preserved and available now in Europe. As it was settled by R. Plate, the manuscript was created at the end of the 14th century, probably outside the Teutonic Order. Apart from Christherre-Chronik the manuscript includes The Chronicle of the World by Rudolf von Ems. The manuscript was kept in Tapiau between 1468 and 1474, and in 1541 in Königsberg. Probably in Tapiau shortly before 1541 the inner sides of the cover were lined with documents from Ostroda. It seems that originally the code was kept in Malbork, and not in the castle in Ostroda as it was previously thought. Acquiring Christherre-Chronik by the Teutonic Knights may be the evidence of the reception of the knowledge of the Old Testament, which became quite common among some groups in the Teutonic Order in the face of the crisis in the Teutonic State from the turn of the 14th and 15th centuries.
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