Isabella von Egypten, Kaiser Karl des Fünften erste Jugendliebe

Isabella von Egypten, Kaiser Karl des Fünften erste Jugendliebe, a Novelle by L. J. (Achim) von Arnim, published in Vier Novellen (1812). Isabella, an orphaned gipsy princess living in poverty in Flanders, meets by chance the Erzherzog Karl (the future Karl V), and falls in love with him. She invokes magic to assist her, digging up from the foot of the gallows a mandrake, ‘Cornelius Nepos’, who provides her with the wealth necessary to approach Karl. She sees in her union with him an opportunity of redemption of the gipsy nation through their future offspring. Karl and Isabella meet and she arouses in him a love equal to hers, but their union is at first thwarted by a ‘golem’, a magic soulless double of Isabella. This rival is, however, disposed of, and the love of Karl and Isabella is consummated. She flees, and in Bohemia bears Karl's son, to whom she gives the name Lrak (an anagram of Karl).