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Born: September 29, 1681 - Wandersleben, near Arnstadt, Thuringia, Germany
Died: August 6, 1721 - |
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The librettist and literary theorist, Christian Friedrich Hunold (pseudonym: ‘Menantes'), established with his libretto Der blutige und sterbende Jesus, set by Reinhard Keiser in 1704, the Protestant Passion oratorio. He is also credited with introducing the symbolical 'daugher of Zion', who turns up in several Bach cantatas and the St Matthew Passion (BWV 244). Hunold's most important work, the theoretical study Die allerneueste Art, zur reinen und galanten Poesie zu gelangen (1707), is, strictly speaking, plagiarism: he based it on the ideas Erdmann Neumeister had developed in his lectures at the University of Leipzig.
Most of his career Hunold spent at the Hamburg opera and as a teacher of poetry and rhethoric at the University of Halle. In Hamburg he worked as a librettist, sometimes for R. Keiser. During his time in Halle, he wrote the texts for a number of Bach's congratulatory cantatas performed in honour of Prince Leopold of Anhalt-Cöthen (BWV 66a, BWV 134a, parts of BWV 204, and BWV Anh 5, BWV Anh 6, BWV Anh 7) and the congratulatory poem of the Hofkapelle in 1719. |
