TheCarmen de bello Saxonico (German:Lied vom Sachsenkrieg; English:Song of the Saxon War) is aLatinepic in 757hexameters divided between three books that recounts the first phase of theSaxon Rebellion against the EmperorHenry IV that began in 1073. Its account is limited geographically to theHarz region and ends with theBattle of Spier in October 1075. It is strongly pro-imperial in tone, and complements the pro-Saxon histories ofBruno the Saxon andLambert of Hersfeld. It was composed within months of the events it describes, but the only existing manuscript copy dates from the sixteenth century.G. H. Pertz published a first critical edition in 1851.
The anonymous author made use of several classical writers, includingVirgil,Horace,Lucan,Ovid andSedulius. He also had access toVenantius Fortunatus and the unnamedPoeta Saxo, and had connections in the imperial court. Lampert of Hersfeld was once proposed as its author, but this suggestion was quickly dispelled. Today, it is commonly thought that the same anonymous poet composed theVita Heinrici IV imperatoris, a biography of Henry IV written some three decades later. His familiarity with local geography hints that he may have been a royalist Saxon, like thePoeta Saxo of two centuries earlier.