Friedrich von Hausen was a respected member of the court of Emperor Friedrich I (Barbarossa) and a well-known love poet among the German minnesingers. He is considered the leader of a circle of composers from the Rhine area, near the Staufer courts in southwest Germany, that also included Emperor Heinrich VI, Bernger von Horheim, Bligger von Steinach, Ulrich von Gutenburg, and Count Otto von Botenlauben. These poets came either from the class of ministeriales (aristocrats who had risen since the eleventh century from servants to nobles) or from the traditional aristocracy. None was a professional poet, dependent on a patron's munificence; they composed their songs to entertain and to discuss courtly love.

Friedrich is acclaimed for having established the ideal of hohe minne (courtly love) in Germany through his poetic compositions and for being a source of inspiration for the other minnesingers dedicated to this ideal. Heinrich von...