The Volksliederarchiv Joe links to seems to be a rather commercialised site and at least partly devoted to what in German is called "volkstuemliche Musik", i.e. songs and tunes "in the folk mode" but really specially written for the contemporary market.

If you want reliable information and perhaps serious scholarship, try Deutsches Volksliedarchiv Freiburg, Germany's oldest and most respected institute devoted to folk music.

They run the Historisch-kritisches Liederlexikon which provides not just songs but their history. So far, there are just 181 songs, and the one this thread is concerned with is not among them, but it will turn up eventually as the HKL is a long-term project.