Hans Folz

Who was Hans Folz?

Hans Folz was a German author of the late medieval or early Renaissance period.

Folz was born in Worms. He was made a citizen of the city of Nuremberg, Germany in 1459 and master barber of the city in 1486. Folz was a reformer of the meistersangs, adding 27 new tones to those that had been allowed by the twelve "Alten Meister" up to that point. His Meisterlieder, of which he wrote about a thousand, were mostly devoted to religious questions. He also wrote twelve Fastnachtsspiele in the same style as Hans Rosenplüt, but with more subtle language.

Folz has been labelled as an anti-semite by Andrew Gow, who called him "a thorough-going Jew-hater" for his work Ein Spil von dem Herzogen von Burgund.

According to Albert Wimmer's Anthology of Medieval German Literature, "Folz's plays were trendsetters in the development of moderately dramatic plays".