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rs, continued the work. In the year 996 we find the word Ostar-rich (_OEsterreich_) appearing for the first time. From 976 to 1246 the duchies were in the possession of the Babenberg family. In 1276 they were annexed by Rudolph of Habsburg. Ever since then they have constituted the central possession of the house of which he was the founder. Prior to the middle of the twelfth century Vienna appears to have been a town of little importance. In fact, the precise time when the name _Wien_ first occurs is in dispute. Giesebrecht discovered it in documents purporting to date from the beginning of the eleventh century, but the genuineness of the documents is doubted by most historians. The town is mentioned several times in the _Nibelungenlied_, and described as existing in the times of Etzel (Attila, king of the Huns). But this is undoubtedly the invention of popular fancy. The _Nibelungenlied_ was put into its present shape between the middle and the end of the twelfth century. The poet has changed more than one feature of the original saga, has blended, not unskillfully, primitive Teutonic myth with historic personages and events of the early Middle Ages, and has interpolated sayings and traditions of his own times. The Viennese of the twelfth century sought, with pardonable vanity, to invest their town with the sacredness of antiquity. But we can scarcely allow their claims. On the contrary, we must deny all continuity between the Vindobona of the fourth and the Wien of the twelfth century. The Roman castrum disappeared, the Babenberg capital appeared, but between the two there is an unexplored gulf. Yet this incipient Vienna, although only the capital of a ducal family that had a hard fight at times for existence, holds an honorable position in the annals of German literature. The Babenberg dukes were generous patrons of the Muses. Their court was frequented by minnesingers and knights-errant. Their praises were sung by Walther von der Vogelweide, Ulrich von Lichtenstein and others. Walther, in his ode to Duke Leopold, has almost anticipated Shakespeare, when he sings-- His largess, like the gentle rain, Refresheth land and folk. Vienna and the memorable Wartburg in Thuringia were the acknowledged centres of taste and good breeding. They were the courts of last resort in all questions of style, grammar and versification. It will not be necessary to follow the growth of Vienna in detail during the last si
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