Der steinerne Reiter (1923)

The story begins with a framing tale: somewhere in medieval Europe. On a mild spring day, a wedding is celebrated with a lively feast in a mountain village. An old man, a balladeer, points to a weathered stone sculpture resembling a rider. He then reminds those present that there was once a time in this region when celebrating a wedding could have dramatic consequences. For there was “the right of the first night.” The old man begins telling the story of the Lord of the Mountain. This all-powerful castle lord lived with his followers in his mighty fortress and ruled the village peasants and the common folk in the valley with an iron hand. When a wedding was to be held in the village, the castle lord rode up in grand style, promptly seized the bride, and insisted on his right to spend the first night with her. But the groom was unwilling to grant his liege lord this right and wanted to throw himself at him. As he tried to stab the aristocratic despot, however, he accidentally struck his bride and killed her. This set off a chain reaction, for the dead woman’s sister, a shepherdess who had foreseen evil incarnate in the person of the castle lord and for that reason had stayed away from the festivities, now wanted bloody revenge on the cause of all the misfortune. At her beloved sister’s deathbed, she swore a solemn oath. The young hunter, secretly in love with the shepherdess, tried to dissuade her from her ill-fated plan. But the shepherdess stubbornly pursued her intention and set off for the castle, a gloomy, asymmetrical, vaulted structure with winding corridors and stairways. There she meant to complete her murderous deed. But when she saw the castle lord before her, his head bowed in grief and tears of pain in his eyes, with the dagger already in her hand, her feelings turned for the better. In time, blind hatred became blind love, and the couple planned their own wedding. Meanwhile, driven by jealousy, the hunter had called on the villagers to join him in storming the castle, to get rid of the despot once and for all and bring him to justice. In the meantime, high above, the castle lord and the shepherdess were married. When one of his vassals touched his bride indecently, the castle lord’s blood boiled, and he promptly threw his entire retinue out of the hall. Meanwhile, the peasant rabble were crossing the moat and drawbridge and stormed into the fortress. Soon the castle lord fell into their hands and was taken to a hut, the village’s very own prisoner. Unaware that the shepherdess had changed her mind, the villagers celebrated her for her supposed clever plan to lull the despot into a false sense of security. Dressed in colorful clothes, the supposed heroine of the working people celebrated the tyrant’s downfall with her people. The next day, the castle lord was to face his “just sentence.” They intended to murder him outright. But the shepherdess slipped away from the jubilant celebrations, went to the hut, and freed her beloved, the castle lord. Then the two rode off quickly. But the hunter had grown suspicious and followed her. At a spot along the road, he confronted the two of them. Faced with a choice, the shepherdess decided to stay with the castle lord. “Better damned with him than blessed alone!” The hunter was thunderstruck. The mismatched couple rode away, and the hunter was knocked aside and fell into the abyss. As they fled toward the refuge castle, a thunderstorm suddenly broke out. The fugitives were struck by lightning, which turned the castle lord and the shepherdess to stone.