Courtoisie in Anglo-Norman Literature

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3 ee from the ewelfth to the sant fastirconh century, the _ influence of the F rench ideas of courtly love, at the same time — contrasting with the courtly mode of thought and expression a certain realism commonly found in Anglo-Norman works. T homas’ s version of Ti gan, the Work of Hue de Rotelande ahh

isidéred in decals; among didactic ccs appears:anivinpublished. Art of Love, and a final: chapter on religious verse touches on ee ieTd _ the connection between courtoisie and See OTany,religious: Po thought. . Hee a en eS Ce To ee

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Almost as strong as the feeling of family loyalty is the spirit of comradeship uniting Horn to his companions who, except for the time in Ireland, where he has the friendship of the king’s sons, share in his adventures throughout the story. With the exception of Wikele, there is a strong bond between them all, as appears,

for example, in the scene where they are knighted, and his friends ask that they may receive their swords at the hand of Horn. In certain respects, Horn seems much closer to the masculine ideal of the chansons de geste than to that of the romans couttois. Loyalty rather than love is the ruling motive of his life, influencing him even on occasions when it might not be expected to come into play. Trying to turn aside Rigmel’s offers of love, he urges the necessity of securing the consent of her father,? who has shown him so much kindness since he came to England as a ‘chaitif esgarant’.* His later attitude towards Rigmel is more important from this point of view. He takes leave of her before he goes to Ireland, with a definite agreement* that she is to remain faithful to him for seven years, after which, if he has not returned,

she will be free. And when the king of Ireland proposes that he should marty his daughter Lenburc, it is loyalty as much as love that keeps Horn faithful to Rigmel. He tells Godereche as he rejects his offer that it is because his love is pledged elsewhere and that he can never, as long as he lives, be faithless to his word.®

He feels bound to return to England and see if Rigmel has kept faith with him, but if she has not, he undertakes without fail to

come back to Ireland and marry Lenburc at once. It seems to be much the same to him which of them he marries, and in as far as

he considets anyone’s feelings, it is those of Godereche, whom he assutes of his friendship however things may turn out, undertaking to provide Godereche’s daughters with husbands as good as himself.* In all this, it may be noted, the feelings of the various

ladies are not considered for a moment.

1]]. 1833-35. BCE Dose la Roche, ed. P. Meyer and G. Huet (S,A.T..1921) ll. 2727 ff. 3 Cf. ll. 1168-71, 1211, 1114-6, 1803-6. * I. 2040-7.

5 Il. 3808-1

6 A ausi bons cum joe sui, si Deu plest, sis dorrai (\. 3827).

52

CouRTOISIE

IN ANGLO-NORMAN

LITERATURE

When Rigmel offers her love to Horn, one of the grounds on. which he excuses himself is that he is not yet knighted and has not given proof of valour, which denotes, not the desire of the courtly lover to show himself worthy of his lady, but the fact that prowess is of far more importance to Horn than love. When Wikele slanders him to Hunlaf, and the king proposes to him to swear his innocence, Horn refuses indignantly to prove his case except by the sword, the only argument fitting for a king’s son:! Rigmel pleads with him to take the oath and so clear het as well as himself from blame, but her wishes and even the

care of her reputation cannot make him depart from his idea of what a ptince’s conduct should be. Love he regards as a pastime or luxury to which he can turn his attention only when the real business of his life, the performance of deeds of prowess and the avenging of his father’s death, has been provided for. It does not need the memory of Rigmel to make him incapable of returning Lenburc’s love: all his desire is set on the ending of the prolonged peace, which he prays to God may soon be broken.? In pledging his love to Rigmel, when at last he consents to do so, he is not disinterested; he may not

want fine presents from Hunlaf, but he loses no time in asking Rigmel to speak to her father on his behalf and secure his help in the recovery of Horn’s kingdom.? The relation of the sexes is treated in a matter-of-fact way. Mattiage seems to be assumed as a natural outcome of love, though love is by no means a necessaty preliminary to marriage. Women are of interest as affecting the lives of the men rather than as individuals. The contrast between the author’s detailed description of Horn’s beauty and his brief sketches of the women is significant. Rigmel is introduced as a ‘danzele de grant pris’, more beautiful than any in Christendom: Gent aveit mut le cors e culoré le vis, and that is all we hear of her appearance. The queen of Ireland and her daughters, ... 4 mut out granz beautex,® Cil det fere serement ki tens est si ale,

Kz est vieill u est clop u il est mahaigné. Une ne vi fiz de rei a quil fust demaundé Ouil feist serement, kar coe sereit vilté, Taunt cun est sein del cors. sest de rien apelé. ll. 1941-5. 4]. 2891-2. 5 \l. 1807-9.

£1. 409.

5]. 2388,

BoEvE DE Haumrone,

Horn

are hardly described at all; the

& Gui DE WAREWIC

elder daughter,

353

Lenburc,

.. . aveit taunz bunter - Ne purreient par mei ja estre anumbrez+ Women ate not represented as actually inferior to men, for ‘there is no comparison between them. They are creatures of passion, swayed by instinct rather than reason, and incurably obstinate. At the sight of a handsome youth they are liable to be filled with sudden love from which no reasoning on the part of their male relatives, even when supplemented by blows, will turn them. As Herland the seneschal says, reflecting on the ways of woman: ‘Ouant veit bel bacheler de s'amur tost s’esprent E bien tost, ki Ren peist, si l’eime folement, Nel larreit pur nuli, pur ami ne parent,

Ja pur nient Pen fereit nuls hom chastiement, Kar si Pen chastiez ¢ batex durement, Tut averex coe perdu, taunt Pamera plus forment.* Their love is largely an affair of the senses, a sudden passion aroused by the sight of Horn’s beauty. The idea of beauty as the cause of love is characteristically courtois, but the type of love occasioned by the beauty of Horn is, at any rate for the minor characters in the story, too purely physical to be connected with courtoisie. ' To the women, love is all-important, and as in the chansons de geste, it is they who take the initiative, offering their own love as a favour, or begging to be loved, as the case may be. Rigmel, having finally prevailed on Herland to bring Horn to see her, as soon as he arrives and she has made him sit down beside her on a ‘coilte d’un paile escarimant’, offers him her love without more ado: Ne s’atendi Rigmel, einz ad parlé avant, Tut issi faitement cum joe vus ierc disant: “De vus est mut bien veir coe que tuit sunt vantant, Ke taunt bel ome nad en cest siecle vivant. Joe vus otrei m’amur, si Pestes otreiant, Par cest anel que tienc vus en sui setsissant’4 Horn’s excuse, that he is an orphan whose lands are confiscated, does not convince her; he is a king’s son, and blood counts for 1)1. 2389-90.

2 Il, 684-9.

3 Cf. ll. 475-8.

411. 1100-5.

54

CourTOISIE IN ANGLO-NoRMAN

LITERATURE

more than wealth. She assures him that he would find her both faithful and submissive, and urges him to accept the ring she offers.1 Horn replies that he would rather be burned alive than weat her ring before he has borne arms, and tells her somewhat

severely that she ought not to offer her ring to anyone whose merit she has not proved. When he has been knighted and shown his worth, and with her father’s help recovered his land, then it

will be time enough to talk of love. Meanwhile he refuses to commit himself, and after more advice to her about her own

conduct tells her with scant courtesy that he seems to have been there a long time and must go and serve the wine in the hall, and she is left disconsolate,? hardly hearing the songs with which her damsels try to console her.3

The tide, however, is turning, and his acceptance of the banner which she sends him to carry into battle against the Saracens marks the beginning of a new stage in their relations. They are gradually drawing nearer to one another, and the compact made between them before Horn leaves for Ireland is an agreement between people on a footing of equality. The course of their love is now only deflected by external obstacles raised by the traitor Wikele. The behaviour of Lenburc, the daughter of King Godereche, affords a parallel to that of Rigmel. She too makes advances and is given to understand that she is unduly forward. Struck by Horn’s appearance as he sits at meat, she sends him a goblet, with a request that he will drink the wine in it for her sake, only to receive a crushing answer, reproving her for offering so rich a gift to a complete stranger. When she hears who Horn (alias Gudmod) teally is, she has the generosity to admit that she could not, had she known that he loved Rigmel, have hoped to prevail against such a rival, and thereupon decides to spend the rest of her life in a convent, for the love of Horn more than for the glory of God, only, in the end,

to marry without a murmur the husband whom Horn provides for het. While Horn cannot in the main be considered as courtois in its

inspiration, the courtois spirit is less alien to it than to Boeve. An » 1

Kar pernex or de mei par amur cest anel, Si vus Pavez el dei par amur coe mriert bel. * Il, 1236-7.

(ll. 1141-2). 3 Il. 1247-8.

Borve DE HaumTone,

Horn

& GuI DE WAREWIC

$5

approximation, if a distant one, to the courtois style appears especially in the presentation of Horn himself and in the descriptions of the effects of love on Rigmel and Lenburc. Though Horn is in-some ways typical of the warriors of the chansons de geste, certain traits in his character belong rather to the type of the courtois hero. Everyone is struck by his humility. At the court of Hunlaf, although he excels all his companions in beauty and wisdom, he is not puffed up with pride: Mes pur coe niert de plus en nul sen orguille: Mut en fu de plusurs cum dut estre loé, Kar Pen trova mut poi de si beaus sanz fierté, Mes cist passout trestux homes de humilité Then later, in Ireland, people are astonished at his silence about his own deeds, in contrast to the boasting of others who have done less.? It is true that his humility has little reference to his love. Even when he refuses Rigmel’s love on the pretext that he is not worthy of it, it is obviously a mere excuse; he has not time for love until he has come nearer to his ideal, which is one of

military prowess and which draws its inspiration far more from the thought of his royal descent than from the love of woman. Of his many accomplishments, several, such as chess-playing, are too commonly found in the chansons de geste to be taken as distinctively courtois. More characteristic of the courtly hero is the emphasis given to his musical gifts, which are first developed under Herland’s tuition, at the court of Hunlaf.* In Ireland, he

entertains Lenburc and her brothers by his playing on the harp, an accomplishment which is expected from those of noble birth: A cel tens sorent tuit harpe bien manier: Cum plus fu gentilz home e plus sout del mester. Horn excels in it, and as they sit in Lenburc’s toom, with its

wonderfully painted ceiling, and floor strewn with sweet-smelling flowers, they watch him, amazed at his dexterity: 111, 397-400. 2 B diseient entr’ aus ke mut iert abstinant

Ki les passout trestuz e s’en iert si celaunt.

(ll. 2546-7).

and Il. 3858-61 cf. 1. 2687. 3 Nest estrument sux ciel dunt sacet hom mortal Dunt ne past tute gent dan Horn l’enperial. 411, 2824-5.

(. 375-6).

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CourTOISIE IN ANGLO-NORMAN

LITERATURE

Deus! ki dune Pesgardast cum la sout manier, Cum ces cordes tuchout, cum les feseit trembler, As guantes fez chanter, as quantes organer, De Parmonie del ciel i poust remembrer. Sur tux homes ki sunt fet cist a merveiller. Quant ses notes ot fait si la prent a munter, E tut par autres cordes les cordes fait soner. Mut se merveillent tuit qwil la sout si bailler+ It is by his physical beauty that Horn comes nearest to the couttly ideal. It is emphasized from the beginning, when, like the morning star, he outshines his companions.’ Alike at the English and the Irish courts, his beauty is unequalled. When he is sixteen, he appeats at the Whitsun festival dressed in a well-cut tunic and close-fitting hose, with a short cape flung back from his shoulders.* His beauty is such that he hardly seems mortal,* and when Rigmel first sees him she takes him for an angel from Heaven: Ouida ke fust angele ki ifust enveié Del seignur ki sus maint en haute majeste, SZ cum el Pesgarde taunt bel li ad semblé.® And again, when he arrives in Ireland, they think he can hardly be human: ‘U nasqui itiel home? est il d’iceste vie,

U est chose faee ki seit en tiel baillie?’® Love, as we have seen, holds a comparatively unimportant place in Horn’s life, but occasional passages occur in this connection which suggest on the writer’s part a certain familiarity with courtly ideas and phraseology. Perhaps the most important of these is in the account of the victorious attack against the Saracens when Hunlaf’s men, led by Horn, are spurred by the thought of their ladies to greater deeds of bravery.” Later, an 11]. 2831-8. 2 Mes Horn les passa tux cum esteile jornal Fet esteilles menus presceins de sun estal. (ll. 205-6). 31. 448-451. 4 Deu! taunt fu sa beauté par la sale notee, Et si dient par tut ke c’est chose faee, E ke one mes de Deu ne fu tiel figuree. ll. 452-4 and cf. 1. 752. 5 ll. 1056-8. ® ll. 2461-2,

"Il. 1573-5.

BoEvE DE HaumTone,

Horn

& GuI DE WAREWIC

57

appeal is made to Horn in the name of Rigmel to avenge the king’s son Egfer, whoma brageart has defeated in a stone-throwing competition.t It is true that his response to Egfer’s appeal seems to spring as much from loyalty to his master as from devotion to Rigmel, but the idea of the power which the lady’s name may have over het lover is none the less courtois. Finally, an important distinction is made by Horn between ‘fol amut’, a sudden caprice, and the love which is founded on reason. The servant sent by Lenburc to bring the goblet to Horn is charged by him with a stern message to his mistress: love not founded on treason burns itself out at once, like a fire of

straw,? an idea which seems to hint at the courtly doctrine of ‘amout voulu’, the theory that love is in some measure under the control of the reason and the will. Though the love of Rigmel and Lenburc is uncourtly in its essentials, since each of them takes the initiative with regard to Horn, this is not true of all the details of its presentation. Rigmel falls in love with Horn merely on the report of him that she has heard, and though this ‘amour par oui-dire’ is not unknown in the chansons de geste, it is perhaps a more common theme in courtois literature, beginning with the love of Jaufre Rudel.? Mote definitely in the courtly tradition is the account of the effect of love upon her, bald as it seems if put beside the Exeas or even, as we shall see, the work of Hue de Rotelande. She com-

plains to her maid Herselot of the strange sickness that is wasting her, though actually she suspects its nature: 1 Love, she tells Horn, has struck her with its dart, which she is

unable to dislodge,? and when he leaves her, after their first meeting, it is for a time in vain that she tries to forget her suffering. : Lenburc—mote sensitive than Rigmel, who in a similar situation regrets Horn’s pride rather than her own lack of it—is covered with confusion at his refusal of the goblet she has sent him.*® She too falls a victim to the sickness of love. Her mother,

seeing that she has lost her colour and guessing the reason,* first talks to her gently and then scolds and threatens, but Lenburc is not to be turned from her love: Kar l’amur de Gudmod Pad forment enlassee, Ne s’en poet desoster taunt en est eschauffee. La nut ne poet dormir, ne seir ne matinee, E quant ele le veit, sin est si effreeie Ke rien ke Pem liface ne i plest ne n’agree.® When Horn sings Baltof’s lay, she guesses who he is, but as soon as he can he breaks up the party and she is left alone in useless grief: Bele Lenbure remeint, mut la destreint amur,

Palir lifet le vis e perdre la colur, El sen aparceit bien quant veit el mireur, Bien siet ke mal li fait icele grant chalur® Horn, to sum up, is in many respects, as we have seen, a work

of the type of Boeve de Haumtone; but the figure of Horn himself shows certain more or less courtois traits, there is a slight attempt at analysing the feelings of the women, and scenes of courtly life ate described as though they were familiar to the readers or listeners and to the author himself. 1 Il, 7oo-14. 3 Cele s’envergunda ke tote en est rouie. (1. 2453). 4 E siet ke c'est amur ki la tuche e frie. (). 2468). 5H, 2514-18.

* I. 1147-8. 6 ll. 2884-7.

BoEvE DE Haumronge, Horn & Gur DE WAREWIC

59

II In Gui de Warewict we have at last something approaching a roman courtois. It offers a strong contrast to Boeve de Haumtone and Horn both in form and content. It is written in rhyming octosyllabic couplets (though with a good many short lines), and the subject-matter and its treatment, at least as regards the early part, are in the romantic rather than the epic tradition. It might seem as if the story of Gui de Warewic belonged more properly among the romances of adventure, but there is an historical foundation for at least one episode—the fight of the hero against the Danish champion Colebrand—and also for the close relations, as they are described in the poem, of the houses of Warwick and’ Wallingford. The fight between Gui and Colebrand at Winchester is regarded by Ward? as being the kernel of the romance, and attempts have been made to find in it a reflection of the battle of Brunanburh ; it seems likely, however, that

the Danish king Anlaf in Gai de Warewic represents a confusion of the Anlaf who fought against Athelstan at Brunanburh, and Olaf Tryggvason, from whom Ethelred, when at Andover in 994, sent the Bishop of Winchester to buy peace. Deutschbein® sees in the story of the fight not the result of popular tradition but a later, semi-learned development due to the probable monastic authorship of at least the second part of the poem, and designed to reflect credit on the houses of Warwick and Wallingford in the person of their alleged ancestor. Though it seems that Gui himself is ‘almost wholly a creature of fiction’,* the close connection, from the time of Thurkill of Warwick, of the two

houses of Warwick and Wallingford is an established fact.® The Anglo-Norman version (the foundation of the Middle English versions) seems to have been written with the intention of glorifying these two houses and may be the work of a monk of Oseney Abbey, which enjoyed the favour of them both, or of a writer connected with the Abbey;°* certainly the second part has a strongly ecclesiastical flavour. The poem which, from internal evidence as to the relations of the two families, Professor Ewett 1 Ed, A. Ewert. 2 Catalogue of Romances in the Dept. of MSS. in the British Museum (3 vols. London 1883— 1gio). I 471. 8 Studien zur Snok re Englands p. 220. “Sidney Lee in D.N.B 5 Rd. Ewert I p. v. 8 Ibid. p. vi.

Go

CouRTOISIE

IN ANGLO-NORMAN

LITERATURE

places between 1232 and 1242, is full of echoes of chansons de geste, romances, of lives of saints.t Yet in spite of the abundant commonplaces of medieval narrative literature, and of the innumetable and often extraneous adventures which made Professor Ker describe the Middle English version as ‘something of a trial for the most reckless and most “‘Gothic’’ reader’,? there is often a vividness in the narrative which holds the attention,

and much that is of interest in connection with courtoisie. The main outline of the story is as follows. A certain Roalt, Count of Warwick, had a daughter named Felice, as wise® as she

was beautiful, who though she was sought after by many suitors, would consent to marty none of them. He had also a seneschal, ‘corteis et sages’, with a son Gui, “corteis et sages’ like his father,

and beloved for his generosity and his beauty.* Gui falls in love with Felice on the occasion of a Whitsuntide festival when, sent

by her father to wait upon her, he is overcome by the sight of her beauty, and languishes with love until his condition becomes so desperate that he goes and throws himself on his knees before her, begging her to have mercy on him. The second time he does this she relents so far as to promise him her love when once he is knighted, but when this condition is fulfilled and he confidently presents himself once mote, Felice reproves him for his hastiness: the mere fact of having got his arms confers no merit; he must show that he is able to use them before he may claim her love. Accompanied by his tutor Heralt, Gui goes abroad to seek renown, and makes a sort of grand tour,° distinguishing himself in all the tournaments. After a year or so they return to Warwick, to the delight of everyone except Felice, who tells Gui that he has still not done enough: he must show himself peerless before she will consent to love him. Uncomplaining, Gui. sets out in search of fresh adventures, and returning after seven years arrives at last at Warwick, where he is joyfully received by the Count and his people; Felice, at length satisfied, allows him to

claim her and they are married with great splendour. 1 Kd. Ewert I pp. vii, viii and n.1. 2 Cambridge History of English Literature 1 293. 3 While some of the ladies of the chansons de geste are by no means without instruction —Mirabel, for example, knew fourteen languages (cf. Ajo/, Il. 5420 ff.)—few, if any, can have had bestowed on them the pains which were spent on the education of Felice: Ses meistres esteient venuz De Tulette, tax blancs chanuz, Ki l’aperneient d’astronomie, D’arismatike, de jeometrie. (ll. 65-8). “Il, 130-146, 5 Cf. M. Bateson Medieval England p. 311.

BorEvE DE HaumTone,

Horn

& GuI DE WAREWIC

61

The second part of the story now begins. A few weeks after his marriage Gui experiences a sudden conversion. Climbing up into a tower and looking out over the country one starlit summet’s night, he goes over his past life, reflecting on how much God has done for him and how little he has done for God. Felice arrives and asks the cause of his sadness, and he tells her

that he is going away to wander over the face of the earth, doing penance for his sins. In spite of her efforts to keep him, he sets off for the Holy Land as a pilgrim, leaving directions with her for the upbringing of their son, and is away for more than seven yeats, duting which time he is drawn into a number of fights on behalf of the innocent and oppressed. He finally returns to England, appearing at Winchester in time to defeat and slay, on behalf of Athelstan, the Danish champion Colebrant. After a Te Deum of thanksgiving, he puts on his pilgrim’s dress again, and deaf to the entreaties of Athelstan, to whom alone he has

disclosed his identity, takes his leave and returns to Warwick. The Count has been dead for many years; Gui’s old tutor Heralt has gone

abroad

in search of Rainbrun,

Gui’s

young

son,

kidnapped by Russian merchants, and Felice is spending her life in prayer and almsgiving, church-building and road-making, in the hope of one day finding Gui, whether alive or dead. Unrecognized by anyone,! Gui goes into the castle and shares the meal of the thirteen beggars for whom, in memory of her husband, Felice provides every day, and as soon as the meal is over, escapes, still unrecognized, into the forest of Arden, where he settles down in an empty hermitage. After nine months of prayer and fasting he falls ill and is visited by the archangel Michael who tells him that his soul will soon be fetched to Heaven. On the eve of his death, Gui sends his servant with a message to Felice and she attives with a great company just in time to see him alive. He is butied in the forest, as it proves impossible to remove his body, which after his death gives forth a sweet odour of miraculous healing power, and everyone departs except Felice, who remains behind and after fifty days also dies and is buried with great honour. The story thus falls into two parts, the first dealing with Gui’s love for Felice, and the adventures he undertakes in order to win her favour, and the second with his life after his conversion,

which is treated almost in a hagiographical spirit. It is the 1Cf. the story of Alexis.

62

CoURTOISIE

IN ANGLO-NORMAN

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beginning of the first part that is of particular interest in the present connection, offering as it does many courtois characteristics in the presentation of Gui and Felice and the development of Gui’s love. Felice, in the first instance, is represented as full of pride and unwilling to accept any of the dukes and counts who wish to marty her.1 When Gui first confesses his love she receives him harshly, asking how he can dare to speak of love to her, his lord’s daughter, who has already refused dukes and counts. She insists on prowess: ‘Nul vaslet ne voil amer Sil ne seit chevaler,

Bels e corteis e alosex, Preuz e hardiz, @armes preisez.”® That he should have been knighted is not enough; nor even that he should have given proof of his valour; she will have none but the best and will only consent to love him when he has shown himself to be the flower of chivalry: ‘Quant del tut serrez itel, Que meillur de vus nen ait suz ciel, De mei Pamur vus ert granté.’®

Implied in her attitude is the courtois theory of the connection of love and the will; she thinks of herself as free to give or withhold her love as she chooses. In contrast to Felice’s pride, Gui is distinguished by his humility. Instead of reproaching her, he endutes her severity with patience, and when, after he has satisfied her conditions, she still refuses to grant him her love, he departs meekly in obedience to her further commands: ‘Ore sat, fait il, que vus me gabe,

Quant ico me comandez, Que del mund seie le meillur; Igo wert ja a nul jur. En estrange terre men irrai, Pur vus certes mun poeir ferai,

De la mort ne serrai pas dotus; Se jo moerc, co ert pur vus.”4 TU. 71-4.

2, 621-4.

3 }l. 1077-9.

“Il. 1085-92.

BoEvE DE Haumrone,

Horn

& Gui DE WAREWIC

63

The discretion which leads him to conceal his love is partly due to his fear of the Count’s anger,! but there is a certain courtois element in it as well; he dares not disclose his love to

Felice herself and will not profane his secret by disclosing it to anyone else: Ne ki ose ren d’amur mustrer,

Ai peine Pose esgarder, Que nuls parcever ne se deust. Dunques pense que faire peust;

Mais ore se voldra il taisir,

Ai nul ne se voldra descovrir.® Most characteristically courtois is the account of the onset and the course of Gui’s love and the sufferings it entails. The sight of Felice’s beauty, on his first meeting with her, wounds him to the heart; he returns home ‘tut dolerus e adulé’, feeling that he has

been struck with a mortal sickness: Ke tel mal lui est avenu Dunt il quide bien morir, Al nul jur ne quide mais garir® He loses sleep and appetite: Dune leve quant il deit gesir, Dunques veille quant deit dormir, Beivre ne puet ne manger.‘

His symptoms are described in detail. He can find rest nowhere: Or se set, puis se releve,

Ore ne set il mes que faire, Quant Felice wosera requere.® He rends his clothes and tears his hair, and inveighs against Love, who has put such madness in his heart and yet has no pity for him. The poison of Felice’s glance has spread through his whole body:

Le

quer del venim est peri,

Dunt mes le cors nen ert gari.® His parents and the Count and the “chivaler du pavement’ are 11. 257-262. #1], 267-9.

211. 225-30. 5 Il. 378-380.

$I]. 240-2. Il. 461-2.

64

CouRTOISIE IN ANGLO-NORMAN

LITERATURE

full of concern, and the Count sends his physicians to diagnose the disease: Les mires a lui tost alerent,

Las e chaitif le troverent. He answers. their questions: Gui respunt: ‘Un chaleur ai grant, Asex plus chaud que feu ardant, Le cors mart tut e destruit;

Tele vie ai jur e nuit: Apres Pardur une freidur, Que pis me fait que la chalur, Que plus sui freiz que nest glace, Dunques ne sai quet jo face; Chascun menbre me chet d’altre,

Pasmer me fait treis fex u quatre. Itele est, seignurs, tote ma vie;

Ne sai mes que vus en die’* Having told him, as might be expected, that he has a fever, they

depart, leaving him to his sufferings. At last, feeling that life under such conditions is unendurable, he again presents himself before Felice and tells her that whether she likes it or not she has his heart in her keeping: ‘Mun quer od vus remaindra, V oillex u nun, issi serra.’ He is ‘palles et teint e confundu’, and falls down in a faint as soon as he has finished speaking; it is only when Felice, pitying his distress, promises him her love when he shall have been knighted that he begins to revive. For whatever may be the physical effects of unrequited love it acts as a moral stimulus and an inspiration to deeds of courage; it is his love that has given him the strength to risk her displeasure: ‘Suz ciel nad plus hardie chose Que est amur, qui amer ose.4 And as he tells her, it is the thought of Felice that later enables him to ovetcome his enemies and saves him from death:

“Venuz sui, ma bele amie, he tells her on his second return from abroad, il, 473-4.

Il. 477-88.

3 Il. 547-8.

4 Il. 509-10.

BoEVE DE HauMToNE,

Horn

& GuI DE WAREWIC

65

‘Par vus ai certes la vie;

Se ne fuissex, jo fuisse morz, Destruiz e malbailliz del cors.”* His distress of mind is also described in some detail, partly in his speeches to Felice and in his monologues, which show him on the whole as a courtly lover. Powerless against love, he calls in vain for mercy: ‘Amur, car m aleger cest mal, Qui mest par vus si mortal! Amur, en cest novelté

.

Me mustrex trop grant cruelté! Amur, mis mas el quer la rage, Un sul petit me resuage, Que me puisse reposer!?

Love is supreme and he is forced to confess himself vanquished: ‘Amur, maldite seies tu!

Trop ad en tei grant vertu; De vus ne me puis defendre, En vostre merci um’estut rendre.”

It is the power of love that drives him to visit Felice a second time in spite of the risk of being put to death by her father and in disobedience to her command. Love is responsible for his action, ‘S"ele me blasme tant ne quant, Trarrai amur a mun garant, Que amur me fist la venir, Par force ne poeie retenir.’

Love becomes the dominant principle of Gui’s life, overruling all ordinary ethical considerations, and making him ready to sacrifice not only his life but his conscience: ‘Sur tote rien amé vus at,

Pur la mort pas ne larrai Que nevus aim a tut dis,

Tant cum serrai home vifs. Suz ciel west icele rien, Fust co mal u fust co bien, Oue pur vostre amur ne feisse,

Pur la mort nel desdeisse.’® Vil. 1041-4. F

2 Il. 389-95.

31. 441-4.

41h. 511-4.

5 Il, 313-20,

66

CouRTOISIE

IN ANGLO-NORMAN

LITERATURE

His whole life is lived in reference to Felice, as he tells her at the time of his conversion:

‘Pur vus at fait maint grant desrei, Homes ocis, destruites citez,

Arrses abbeies de plusurs regnez, E quanquen cest mund fait ai Des Pure que a vus wmacointat, E de mal ¢ de ben, Nel vus voildrai celer rien,

E quanque ai mun cors pene, E quanque ai fait e doné, Pur vus Pai fait, ben le sacez.” As Iseut is for Tristan, so Felice is for Gui the sole motive of his

life: ‘Vus estes ma vie e ma mort,

Sanz vus wavrai jo confort; Assex vus aim plus de mei, Murrai pur vus a grant desrei .. In the early part of the story the relation of the sexes is presented from the courtly angle, and shows the typical disparity between the lady, who is supreme, and the lover, her humble

servant. Felice treats Gui with more or less severity until his first return from abroad, and it is not until he comes back the

second time that they appear on a footing of equality. ‘Las e chaitif e dolerus’, he comes

before her on the first

occasion kneeling before her as a suppliant, and imploring her to have pity on him: A geniluns devant li se mist, Mult pitusement si ii dist: ‘Felice, franche, pur Deu vus pri Que de mei, chaitif, aiex merci, Que ne vus troisse vers mei fere Ke vus nen oiex ma preiere.. .” When he appeals to her the second time he speaks in the same strain, putting his life in her hands: 1 Il, 7608-17. “Ul. 321-4; cf. Tristan ll. 1061-2; 2477-2482. 3 ]l, 301-6,

BorvE DE Haumrone,

Horn

& GuI DE WAREWIC

67

‘Merci vus sui venu requere;

Oscir me purrex e ben faire; Trespassé ai vox comandemenz, Quant sui venu sur vostre defens.”* The love is all on his side, and Gui himself recognizes the folly of loving only to be hated in return: ‘La mort ai deservi bien,

Quant cele qui me het sur tote rien, Aim plus que ne fax ma vie; Co me turnera a grant folie. Icelui est tenu a fol, Qui tel fes leve en sun col Quil ne put avant porter, Dune li estovera trebucher. Si ai jo fait; las, que frai? Cele desir que ja nen avrai.”* He teflects bitterly on her lack of interest in him, and on her insensibility, which contrasts so strongly with his own sufferings: ‘Abi! Felice, tant mar te vi! E en ta chambre te servi,

Mult me penai de vus servir; Le bien me sex mult mal merir. Jo vus aim, mes Wwamex mie;

— Leamur west pas dreit partie: Jo ai le mal e vus le ben, De quanque sent ne sentez rien...

The first part of the poem, then, expresses to a great extent the couttly point of view, but as the story proceeds the courtois inspiration is less in evidence. Not only is there a series of adventures which have nothing to do with courtoisie, but there is a change in the relation of Gui and Felice. On his final return before his marriage, she receives him almost humbly. He has been telling her of his adventures and of all the opportunities he has had of choosing a wife; she too might have married, she says, but would love no one but Gui, to whom she now gives herself unreservedly: 11. 533-6.

5 ll. 447-454.

2M, 415-424.

68

CourRTOISIE

IN ANGLO-NoRMAN

LITERATURE

‘Sire Gui, fait ele, vostre merci!

E jo verraiement le vus di Que mult ai requise esté Des plus riches del regné, Mes amer nul ne voleie Ne a nul jur mes ne fereie; Al vus me doins, si me ottrei,

Vostre plaisir facez de mei? The attitude to marriage is for the most part uncourtly, since it is regarded by both of them as being the natural fulfilment of their love. There is also the view, expressed by the Count, that martiage is a family obligation; he tells Felice that he cannot allow her to remain unmarried any longer (though he probably suspects that Gui’s return will have made her less unwilling to accept a husband): ‘Fille, fait il, pernex barun; N’avums nul heir si vus nun. Dux e cuntes vus unt requis,

Qui venuz sunt d’estrange pais; Nuls d’els ne voliex vus prendre. Cumben voldrez, fille, atendre??

The only suggestion of a courtly attitude towards marriage is in Felice’s unwillingness to grant Gui her love too soon. She has no intention of not ultimately marrying him, but she is afraid of the evil effects upon him of settling down too soon: ‘Sz sur totes riens vus amasse,

E Pamur de mei vus grantasse, Tant devendriex amerus Que tut en serriex perecus; Armes ne querriex mes porter,

Ne vostre pris eshalcier; Jo mesfereie, co mest avis, Se par mei perdisex vostre pris.’

‘This may seem akin to the idea expressed in Erec, of love as being a hindrance to prowess rather than as inspiring courage, an idea which is by no means courtly, but the important point here _, is sutely that love must not be rewarded too soon. It is the theory of the demoralizing effect of the permanent satisfaction of love in 1 ll. 7439-46.

2 Il. 7455-Go.

31. 1061-8,

BoEvE DE Haumrone, Horn & Gui DE WAREWIC marriage, in contrast unrequited, with its person and character, the courtois insistence

69

to the stimulus provided by love as yet constant demands on the lovet’s whole an idea which seems partly to account for on the separation of love and marriage.

The relation of the sexes, then, becomes less courtly as the

story proceeds, and in the second part the position seems at first to be completely reversed. Woman is represented not as a source of inspiration but as a hindrance to man, keeping him from his proper service, that of God. At the time of his conversion Gui recognizes that he has put Felice in the centre of his life, serving the creature instead of the Creator: ‘Puis que primes vus amat, Tanz malz pur vus sufferz ai, Ne qui que home fust unc né Qui tantes dolurs ait enduré Pur une femme cum jo ai pur tei.” If only he had served God half as well, his salvation would be secure: ‘$7 tant eurus eusse esté Que solement la meité

Fait eusse pur Deu qui nus cria, Que si grant honur presté ma, La gloire del ciel pur veir avreie, Ensemble od Deu saint serreie;

Mais pur lui une rien ne fis, Pur ¢o sui las e chaitif.’? Henceforward, it is not his love of Felice but his faith in God

that sustains him; he fights,-not for gain or glory but in defence of the oppressed. When through a plot of his enemies he wakes up one night, having fallen into a deep sleep after a battle, to find himself in his bed floating on the sea, he prays to God to help him, trusting in the fact that he has been fighting on the previous day to save a friend and not for the sake of his own advancement. His final battle against the Danish champion is fought for Athelstan and England, in the confidence that God is with him. Thus the second part of the story is apparently a revocation of the early part, since Gui recognizes that he has been following a mistaken ideal and sees his life henceforth in an entirely different 111. 7603-7.

2 ll, 7619-26,

70

CourRTOISIE IN ANGLO-NoRMAN

LITERATURE

light. André le Chapelain, however, and the other supporters of the doctrine that love is incompatible with marriage might have seen in the episode of Gui’s conversion an illustration of that doctrine, for it is only when he is safely married, and secure of Felice’s love, that he awakes to the fact that in living for her, and not for God, he has been squandering his energies.

CHAPTER ALEXANDER THE GREAT:

The

Alexander

V

LE ROMAN DE TOUTE CHEV_ALERIE

legend is represented

in Anglo-Norman

literature by the Roman de toute chevalerie, the wotk of Thomas, ot

more probably Eustace de Kent, written in the early thirteenth century! and the chief source of the Middle English King Alisaunder.

It is preserved in four MSS.,? of which the one in the Trinity Library, on which this chapter is based, is as yet unedited. The late Provost of Eton? gave 1250 as the approximate date of its execution, and suggested that the style of the writing and of the drawing and colouring—it is ornamented with one hundted and fifty-two pictures in fine outline—points to the workmanship of Saint Alban’s Abbey. Much of the poem is taken from the second and fourth branches of the Roman d’Alexandre by Lambert le Tort and Alexandre de Paris, in particular the episodes of the Fuerre de Gadres and of Alexandet’s division of his kingdom, while part of it goes back directly to the Epitome of Valerius’ translation of the romantic life of Alexander by Pseudo-Callisthenes, on which are based, among other passages, the account of the war against Porus, the episode of Candace, the return to Babylon and the

treason of Antipater. The author, however, does not hesitate to use his models with

some freedom; though he says he relates nothing for which he cannot give an authority, he interprets his sources to suit his own taste and that of his readers: 1Cf. Meyer Alexandre le Grand dans la littérature francaise du moyen age Il 294; Prof. F. P. Magoun The Gests of King Alexander of Macedon (Cambridge, Mass. 1929) p. 33, suggests c. 1280. As regards the author’s name, in the Cambridge MS. it appears as Eustace: Ki mon nun demande, Eustace ai non de Kent (F 22 b i), while in the corresponding line of the Paris MS. it is given as Thomas: Qui mun nun demande, Thomas ai non de Kent. However, in both MSS., in the rubric at the beginning of the passage, the reading is Eustace: MS. Paris 44d. La conclusion del livre Alixandre et de mestre Eustace qui translata le livre. MS. Trin. 0.9.34. La conclusion del livere Alisandte. F 2zaii. De maistre Eustace ki translata cest livere. The evidence therefore seems to point to Eustace as the correct form. 2 Trinity College, Cambridge, 0.9.34, Durham Cathedral C iv. 27 B, Bibliothéque Nationale 24364, a fragment of 32 lines in the Library of University College, Oxford, the tubrics of the Durham MS. and extracts from the Paris MS. wete published by Paul Meyer (op. Cit.) *M. R, James Cazalogue of the Western MSS. in the Library of Trinity College, Cambridge (3 vols. Cambridge, 1900-2) III 482-ff. 7

72

CouRTOISIE IN ANGLO-NoRMAN

LITERATURE

“Joe ne descrif nul fet dont n’ai autorité’, he declares,1 but he

writes with a view to effect rather than to historical accuracy— (not indeed that the sources at his command were historically accurate to begin with): ‘Pur pleisir as oianz’, he continues, ‘Pai un poi atiffé, E feint unes paroles por delit e por beauté.’ His work, by no means original—Paul Meyer describes it as ‘dépourvue d’originalité et de style’? and its author as ‘aussi érudit que dépourvu de jugement’—derives much of its interest ptecisely from the fact that the point of view is that of an Anglo-Norman writer of the thirteenth century. M. Meyer suggests the end of John’s reign or the early years of that of Henry III as the time of its composition,’ and from the rather ecclesiastical tone of some lines in the prologue concludes that the author was probably a clerk.‘ In support of this view may be mentioned the vigour and the wealth of illustration of his attack on women, to be considered later, but it is hard to recon-

cile with Eustace’s own description of himself as ‘jolif? and his denial of any claim to learning.* Moreover, in spite of the opening lines of the prologue, his aim is rather to amuse than to edify; he promises his readers ‘un deduit ... qi mult est delitus’, and like Thomas and the author of Amadas et Ydoine hopes to provide ‘assuagement as mals des amerus’.® The Roman de toute chevalerie relates the story of Alexandet’s birth and childhood, his campaigns in Asia Minor, Palestine and Egypt, the defeat and death of Darius, Alexandet’s victory over Porus, the marvels of India, the episode of Candace, queen of

Ethiopia, Alexandet’s arrival in Babylon, and finally his death at the hands of Antipater, followed by the lament of Aristotle over his pupil. The Cambridge MS., of which a considerable part is missing, begins in the middle of the account of the siege of Tyre, taken from the second branch of the Roman d’ Alexandre.

The taking of Gaza is followed by the story of Alexandetr’s battles against Darius, and his courteous treatment of Darius’s widow and daughters, and finally the death of Darius and 1F 29 b. 2 Op. cit. II 273. 3 [bid. II 294. *“On sait qu’en Angleterre les clercs ont pris 4 la littérature vulgaire une part plus considérable que sur le continent.’ Ibid. II 283. 5 De Officiis 11, XV. Cf. Meyer II 374. S Meyer op. cit. II 373.

1831) p. 48; Radet Alexandre le Grand (1931)

-

74

CourTOISIE IN ANGLO-NoRMAN

LITERATURE

be a fundamental difference between the largesse of the courtly hero, who is conscious of, if not actually aiming at, the popularity which his gesture will bring him, and that of the epic or feudal hero, whose generosity is, as it were, more objective, not spring-

ing from the desire of approval, but based on the recognition of his followers’ deserts. There is perhaps a hint of the former attitude in the account of Alexander’s largesse on the occasion of his being knighted: gifts were freely bestowed: N’i out nul Ren volsist nen donast volentiers. Par ceo se fist amer e loer tut premers, Kar em poet los conquerre par doner ses deners, Surketut se li hom est larges vianders.+ But ‘vianders’ is a word commonly used to describe the feudal lords of the chansons de geste, and Alexandet’s standpoint is more akin to that of the epic than to that of the courtly hero. After the defeat of Darius, the distribution of the spoil is mentioned as part of the business naturally following on victory; it is not a mark of particular generosity and does not expect or call for special praise: De )es princes e les barons fet Alisandre enterrer, E partir Pavoir e largement doner, E ceus Ril ad pris fet il enprisoner; La mere au ret Darie, e sa femme au vis cler, E ses deus filles fet ouoec lui mener; Nuit e jur en sa curt servir les fet e honurer. The last lines, describing his treatment of the Persian captives, raise the question of Alexandet’s attitude towards women. As represented by his biographers,* it would appear to have been in actual fact the reverse of courtois. He may have had that desire to escape from otdinary life which later characterizes the couttly lover, but when he fled from reality it was not by the way of romantic love but by making himself almost a god. It seems that his mother was the only woman for whom he cared, and that policy rather than love was the basis of his marriages.‘ i

Meyer op. cit. 1 218. MS. B.N. Il. 581-4.

= Ch. W.W. Tarn: Cambridge Ancient History VI 424; U. Wilcken Alexander (tr. G. C. Richards 1932) pp. 54, 105. 4 [bid.

the Great

ALEXANDER

THE GREAT

75

Thete is nothing to suggest that his treatment of Darius’ family was ptompted by anything warmer than the chivalrous feeling towards captive women which is common among the heroes of the chansons de geste (though certainly in the chansons de geste such feeling not seldom turns to love and the Christian warriors end by marrying the Saracen girls whom they have captured.) If Alexander’s remark, recorded by Plutarch, that the Persian

captives were “painful to the eyes’, is to be interpreted as meaning that he regarded women as a possible danger to that dominion ovet himself which he valued so highly, then he went beyond mere indifference, and took the view of love to which courtoisie

was to be diametrically opposed—that it was a demoralizing influence. This is the view supported by Eustace de Kent in the Roman, as he relates the story of Alexandet’s love for Candace. The tubric at the beginning: ‘De coe ke amant est avoegle en sei’,} illustrates his attitude. Love is all-powerful—an idea familiar enough to courtoisie, but it is not the effects of amour courtois that are here described; Alexander’s love is of the kind that

deprives a man of will and reason: Mervaille en est d’amur; nuls ne garde reison,

Mesure, ne honur quant vient a la setson. N’i ad si sage al mond, s’ele le tient en son lagon, Quel talent Ril ait, nel face estre bricon.? The relations of Candace and Alexander become progressively less courtois. At the beginning, the initiative comes from him, since it is he that opens the correspondence between them;? already she responds eagerly, however, for after his first letter she sends him rich presents and messages of friendship, and when he writes again, declaring his love, replies with an offer of martiage: ‘... Szre rets dreiturier, Nule rien ne coveit tant en mon desirer

Com ws prendre a seignor e ws moi a moiller. Sor tux hommes ws aim, et par amur requier Ke par aveir pusse Pamisté de ws aver.” For love is not to be its own reward; she holds out before him,

as an inducement to marry her, gifts of gold and precious stones, Ethiopian soldiers, a menagerie of animals to include six hundred Ra 36sa.

2. 36:a i.

2 Rig0\ bit.

“F, 30 bil.

76

CouRTOISIE IN ANGLO-NoRMAN

LITERATURE

rhinoceroses and two hundred unicorns, and finally, the whole of her kingdom, but all these things he refuses. So far they have not met, but Alexander wins the gratitude of her son Candeule, whose wife he rescues, and whom

he per-

suades to take him, disguised as Antigonus, to visit his mother. She recognizes him, and reproaches him with his refusal of her offer of marriage, which now, less confidently than before, she

makes a second time: ‘Saciez, Alisandre, de quer ws desireie, E verraie amie e drue ws serreie.

Si joe dame del mond par ws estre pocie, Mut par fusse lee si Pespeir en avoie. Quant ke ai al mond en vostre honur mettroie.”* To this Alexander gives no reply, his chief concern being how to get away as soon as possible, for Candace’s other son, married to Porus’ daughter, is threatening to avenge Porus’ death upon him. Candace, however, keeping his secret, protects him from her son and, for as long as she can persuade him to remain at her court,

treats him as her lover,? and honours him with gifts at his departure. On the whole, then, Candace is represented, like so many of the ladies of the chansons de geste, as trying to force her love upon someone who offers either passive or active resistance, and when she manages to keep Alexander, at considerable risk to himself, dallying at her court, her triumphant rematks furnish

Eustace with the text of a discourse on the wiles of women which is entirely uncourtois in its tone and which might, as Meyer pointed out, be taken as evidence of Eustace’s clerical status, were it not for his own remarks, which seem to point to a

different conclusion.+4 When first Candace sees through Alexander’s disguise, she cannot refrain from exulting over him, in a passage which seems to be Eustace’s own:

‘Ore ws tienc en prison e de ws frai com del men; N’aiez,’ coe dist, “vergonde, sire reis souereins, Si par aventure estes cheet en mes meins. N’estes le plus vaillanz, premers ne dereins, Ke femme ad enginné, , foe soiex certeins.’® 1P, 36 bii.

2R. 37 bi,

oF, 38 a1.

“See above, p. 72.

SP a7'date

ALEXANDER THE GREAT Both Adam

77

and Samson, as she tells him, were deceived by

women, and it is no disgrace to Alexander that he should have been caught in the same toils: ‘Encore est li mond de lur engin tut pleins; Si deceu ws ai, de coe nen valez meins.’ Eustace enlarges on the subject of women, taking the noncourtois view of them as the undoing of man, creatures endlessly cunning in the pursuit of their desires: De quai poet l’en a femme fere compareison? Plus est simple, quant veut, ke aignel ou colom, Plus cointe ke serpent, ardant come dragon,

Vezzie come gopil, cruele come leon, Pleine d’engin come diables, e mut a quor felon, It is not altogether woman’s fault, for she has a bad inheritance: Ja nul nen deit parler 8’ele fet traison Ou deceit son vassal ou meine ? son baron,

Chivaler ou vallet, damaisel ou clergon. De nature lur vient, de Eve ? ont le don,

~

Por ki Adam perdi tute sa discrecion, Le delit e la joie, la Deu promission, Ke ja ne fust perdue, ne fust le soen sermon; Humanité en out enfernal mansion2

Against Eve must be set the Virgin, in whom after all, woman was the instrument of our salvation: Mes par femme eumes, merci Deu, rancun,

Quant de la seinte Virgne prist incarnaciun, Si out humanité a enfern salvaciun.

Eve, however, is clearly uppermost in Eustace’s mind: Nequedent ki en femme met sa entenciun, Sovent deit en son quer estre en suspeciun,® and he adds to the list of those beguiled by women’s wiles the usual examples of “Joseph li beaus’, David and Absalom. The Candace episode is not, however, altogether lacking in courtly elements. Candace’s relation to Alexander is in the epic rather than the courtly tradition, and Eustace’s treatment of love IR. 36 ai.

® Ibid.

+ Po 36.2a1.

78

CourTOIsIE IN ANGLO-NoRMAN

LITERATURE

and women is of the anti-feminist type. But while Alexandet’s character has an epic rather than a romantic colouring, he is shown for one moment at least as the conventional lover. He has fallen in love with Candace merely on hearsay,1 and though this is not necessarily a courtois trait,? the account of his second letter to her contains an unmistakable suggestion of the courtly lover, who will die of love unless his lady has pity on him: Mande a la dame com 8amur Ienlace,

St plus tost nel socurt, de vivere nad espace.* This is courtly phraseology; and further, his love, or at least

his curiosity, are strong enough to bring him to her court at the risk of being discovered and killed as the slayer of Porus. Candace, too, though her behaviour is not that of a courtly lady, is described in a way that suggests the courtly ideal: NN’ out si riche reine en tut le mond d’aveir, De beauté, de curteisie, d’onur e de saveir.4

The description of her personal appearance as Alexander finds her on his arrival is of the slightest: Mut fut gente de cors, bele out la facon.® The detailed account of her clothing, however, is more in the

style of the romans courtois: En son chef out un cercle dor al ouere frison, D?un samit esteit covert son hermin pelicon,

Un mantel enveisé d’un vert cyclaton.® Especially there is a romantic if not a courtly tone in the description of her listening on this same occasion to a song about the loves of Dido and Eneas: E se fist vieller e harper un nouel son, Coment danz Eneas ama dame Didon, E coment s’en ala par mer od son dromon, Com ele Sem pleint sus as estres en som, E com au derain se arst en sa meison. Pensive en est Candace del soen de la chancon,? 1 Ne fut plus bele femme de cors ne de face; Sul de sa renomee trova vers lui tel grace Ke tant la paraime kilneset ke face. (F. 30 bi). 2 See above, pp. 57. “1B, 30D de R30

SF, 36a ii.

® Ibid.

Uke

Bie

Oba it

ALEXANDER THE GREAT

79

almost as though Eustace de Kent saw in Candace, and her vain attempt to keep Alexander’s love, a kind of prototype of the history of Dido, with which the Exeas, if not Virgil, must have made him familiar. It is thus only incidentally that the courtois point of view is expressed in the Roman de toute chevalerie, but it does appear now and then, and the poem is, moreover, important as the earliest form in which the romance of Alexander was introduced into England, besides offering an example of the medieval attitude towards classical history and literature described by Pauphilet in connection with the Eneas: ‘Refaire un ouvrage ancien selon Pimpression qu’on en a ressentie; composer de traits qui plaisent 4 Pimagination une figure idéale ‘de Pantiquité, et 4 la faveur de ces imitations et conventions exprimer sa propre conception de Phomme; refléter sa propre image dans le miroir antique, cela définit presque, déja, usage que les lettres frangaises, par la suite, ne cesseront de faire de Pantiquité.’! 1 Rom. LV (1929) 213.

CHAPTER VI

THE RoMANCES OF HUE DE ROTELANDE ; AMADAS ET YDOINE I.

The roman

JPOMEDON AND PROTHESEL.AUS

d’aventure, as distinct from stories with some

faintly historical colouring, is represented in Anglo-Norman literature by the two romances of Hue de Rotelande and the romance of Amadas et Ydoine. All three are concerned with love and adventure, but the two elements are variously combined.

In Hue de Rotelande’s work, adventure has a vety important if not the chief place, while in Amadas, particularly in the early part, which is all that remains of the Anglo-Norman version, the love interest predominates. All three romances, especially the last, are

to some extent courtois in tone, though in all of them courtoisie is modified in a greater or less degree by a spirit of realism. More is known about Hue de Rotelande than about many authors of medieval romances. He lived, so he states in Ipomedon, at Credehulle (i.e. Credenhill, near Hereford)? and his patron was Gilbert Fitz-Baderon, at whose command he wrote his second

romance, Protheselaus. Since Gilbert Fitz~-Baderon was no longer alive in 1190-1191, Protheselaus, which concludes with a panegytic on him,‘ must have been written before that date, while Ipomedon, which precedes it, contains a reference to the siege of Rouen in 1174, so that Hue’s work necessarily falls between those

two dates. His statements about his Latin sources® are probably not to be taken seriously. The question of his indebtedness to contempotaty works® is, however, of considerable interest, especially from

the point of view of a study of the influence of courtoisie. For though his use of classical names for his characters seems somewhat indiscriminate and the fact that the scene is laid in Apulia and Calabria—‘which might as well have been Illyria or Bohemia’”’—has no special significance, his work shows the influence 1 Ed. Kélbing and Koschwitz. 2 Ward Catalogue of Romances in the Department of MSS. in the British Musewm (3 vols. 1883-1910) I 728 ff.; Ipom. ed. Kélbing, intr. 3 Ed. F. Kluckow, (1924). 41]. 12698 ff. 5 Protheselaus \l. 12707 ff. ® Protheselaus, ed. Kluckow, intr., pp. 19 ff. 7W. P. Ker in C.H.E.L. I 286.

80_

Tue

ROMANCES

OF HUE

DE ROTELANDE

81

of the romans antiques, and notably of the Exeas, especially in the descriptions of love-symptoms. It is also clear that Hue was familiar with the Tristan story, particularly in the version of Thomas. In the case of Tristan he is dealing with a curious mixtute of elements, and his borrowing has the heterogeneous character of the original, being sometimes concerned with the more primitive elements in the story, sometimes with the more or less courtly transformation of those elements effected by Thomas. Ipomedon has been described, rather too favourably, perhaps, as ‘an excellent specimen of what may be called the secondary order of romance as cultivated by the best practitioners’. Ipomedon, the.son of Hermogenes, king of Apulia, while still a boy at his father’s court, hears of the beauty and charm of the young duchess of Calabria, known for her haughty disposition as La Fiere, and decides to go and offer her his services. He remains at her court, concealing his identity, for three years, at the end of which time he and La Fiere both suddenly become awate of the love that has been growing up between them. But she has sworn to marry none but the bravest knight in Christendom, and Ipomedon has apparently no interest in deeds of prowess, choosing rather to spend his time in hunting. Accordingly La Fiere, afraid to let herself love him, dismisses him while there is still

time. Ipomedon soon has the opportunity of proving that his supposed lack of physical courage is only apparent. La Fiere’s barons insist that she shall marry, and it is finally agreed, thanks to her uncle Meleager, king of Sicily, that a three days’ tournament shall be held, of which the victor shall take her as his wife.

Ipomedon, wearing each day a different suit of armour, wins the tournament, but goes away without claiming La Fiere, who is left disconsolate, only learning after his departure who the victor was. After some long time he again appears, and rescues her from a strange knight, Leonin, who is besieging her city and threatening to carry her off, but once more he does not claim her. Instead he gives himself out as the knight whom he has defeated, so that La Fiere prepares to flee, and only at the last minute is it discovered who he ts. The story ends happily with the marriage of Ipomedon and La Fiere. Like most Anglo-Norman works that are in any degree courtois, Ipomedon shows a mixture of the courtly and the nonAW). Po Ker in CAB

It 285.

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courtly. It is primarily a love-story, in that love, at any rate to begin with, is the chief interest in the hero’s life; it is for the sake of it that he embarks on adventures for which, in the early part of the story, he seems to have little natural inclination, in order to prove to La Fiere that he is the bravest of knights and therefore worthy of her. A further courtly characteristic (or at least romantic as opposed to epic) is the emphasis in the poem on the individual: Hue is concerned with Ipomedon as an individual and not as a member of a-family or other group. The relation of Ipomedon and his brother Capaneus, whose existence is revealed to him by their mother as she is dying, has a certain importance in the story, but otherwise family feeling is in abeyance. Ipomedon’s grief at his mother’s illness and death is only briefly described, and when he returns home after his father’s death he soon leaves again to seek for further adventures, untroubled by a sense of his obligations towards the people of Apulia. While the courtly element is thus very important, at the same time the story shows various non-courtly traits. In the first place, the relations of the sexes other than those of Ipomedon and La Fiere are treated far more in the style of the chansons de geste than of the romans courtois. The behaviour of La Fiere’s damsel Ismeine, who offers her love to Ipomedon and begs him to marty her, is typical of many of the heroines of the chansons de geste.! Ismeine has gone to the court of La Fiere’s uncle Meleager to ask for a champion to defend her mistress against the attack of Leonin, but the only one she can bring back is (apparently) a fool, in reality Ipomedon, who with his mania for concealment has assumed this disguise. She begins by feeling an intense scorn for such a poor defender, but on their journey to Calabria he delivers her from three knights—cousins of Leonin—and her love thereupon becoming as fierce as had previously been her scorn,” she ends by offering herself as his wife, and regardless of the plight of La Fiere, waiting meanwhile for the arrival of her defender, suggests that he should go straight back with her to her father, the Duke of Burgundy. While Ismeine is in some respects typical of the violent and 1 Cf. note to p. 45. 2 As Hue rather bitterly remarks: Celui, ke femme plus harra, Quant sun quer li rechangera, Pus ert cil de li amex plus. (ll. 8655-7).

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impulsive heroines of the chansons de geste, the brutality towards women characteristic of some of the epic heroes is found in Leonin and his relatives. Leonin is described as ‘un orgeillus”! who, without regard for the possible feelings of La Fiere, has simply announced his intention of marrying her.? Even the relations between Ipomedon and La Fiere go through vatious stages. In the beginning she dismisses him, thinking he is not good enough for her, but he has hardly left her presence before she repents of her pride, and in the course of a sleepless night decides, with that practical sense characteristic of so much Anglo-Norman literature, to make her feelings plain to him as soon as possible: ‘Meuz vaut un ‘tient?’ ge deus “avraz’’,’ she reflects, ‘Si ja mes le puz ver de lit, Ne mostrerei pas tel orgoil, Com hier seir fis, ainz ferai tant Ql verra bien a mon semblant E as regars, ke jeo ferai, Qe mult voluntiers Pamerail’® Though at first the love is. stronger on his side than on hers, it is not long before they are shown on a footing of equality. For instance, the description of La Fiere’s sleepless night has a pendant in that of Ipomedon’s insomnia. During his absence,’ each of them remains faithful to the other, and when at last they meet, it is not as lady and vassal but as a pair of lovers, each as tongue-tied as the other: La Fiere est el chastel venue,

Ipomedon tost la salue Od voix tremblante, il ne pot mes, Sis quers volette e li faut pres, Kar ¢est la custume entre amanz, Ki sunt esluignez plusurs anz, Quant une feix venent ensemble, Lur quer tressaut, fremit e tremble, E lur pensers venent e vunt, Al grant peine sevent, Ril funt. La Fiere esteit si esbaie,

K’a un sul mot ne respundie, 1), 7674.

2 Il. 7685-90.

31], 1092-8.

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Ainz Pesgarda pitusement; Mut s’entrebesent dulcement;

Lr quer al beser perdu ourent, Grant pece apres parler ne pourent After their marriage they are described as “amanz’, and they live happily, if not for ever after, at least ‘par plusurs ans’, for there is no trace of the courtly separation of love and marriage: on the contrary, love implies marriage. It is of a piece with Hue’s sense of the realities of life that though he is writing in some sense a love-story he does not idealize women. Indeed, he makes frequent thrusts at them, sometimes uttering his criticisms through the mouths of his female characters themselves. They are the criticisms commonly levelled against women by medieval misogynists. Women are creatures of impulse, swayed by instinct rather than reason.? Their likings are determined largely by a spirit of contradiction

which makes the unattainable appear supremely desirable, while what might be had for the asking is rejected with scorn; as La Fiere herself says: ‘Femme wert ja mes del tut sage, Nus tutes avum tel curage, Ke, certes, tux jurz cuveitum Co ke nus aver ne pouum,

Ne de ¢o gueres ne nus est, Ke nus pouum aver tut prest.’* Once they form a desire, it must be satisfied without delay, Kar femmes, ¢o dient la gent, Unt aukes hastif le talent, Kar ¢o keles fere voldreient, Serreit fet, u eles murreient.*

Women’s cunning in attaining their ends is such that men are helpless against them: Femme set ben fere sun bon, E dune ne sunt femmes mut pruz, Ke sz engignent nus trestux?® 1]1, 10419-34.

4 I], 6935-8.

* 1. 8706.

5 Il. 2574-6,

* IL. 5953-8.

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85

Ne serreit trové en une regne Une sule, al men ascient,

Kz d’un engign fallit nient La u treis cenz hummes faudreient Their passions, quickly roused, are as quickly transferred to another object; a woman is consistent neither in her love nor in her hatred,? and it is not, as Hue knows by experience, those who

have best deserved of them that are most favoured. Ipomedon’s love is at first more important to him than La Fiere’s is to her, but he is not wholly absorbed by it. His love may be the dominant motive in his life, but it is not the only one. From the beginning, he has a thirst for adventure, and the two interests of love and adventure run through the story. As a boy he is impatient of the life at his father’s court, and determines to seek experience elsewhete: ‘Tant ai ci esté e servi,

Ke jeo me tienge a vif honi. Joi parler de curtz estranges, Mes ke jeo voise nuz piex en fanges E ke deive tut sul aler,

Ne voil mes ici arester.’* “Les voyages forment la jeunesse’: ‘Mestre,’ he says to his master, quoting a proverb, .. » ‘Dus saver bien, ke dit Li sages homme en son reptt: Daffactement n’avra ja pris, Ki n’est fors d’une cort apris.”* His love of adventure comes out later in his refusal to too soon. Though his tastes may not originally have direction, once he turns his energies towards deeds he is second to none. He has been victorious in the

settle down lain in that of prowess three days’

tournament, and there is nothing, as his host tells him, to prevent

him from becoming ruler of Calabria and the husband of La Fiere, but Ipomedon is not yet ready.’ No doubt he is anxious not to claim his reward too soon, but he is no less anxious to

safeguard his independence, with which marriage might interfere. In the same way, after his father’s death, he refuses to be Ml, 1910-3.

711. 8654-60. ’

3 II. 243-8.

“Il, 249-52.

5 Il. 6645-50.

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crowned king, partly in order not to bind himself by the responsibilities which he would incur. Though Ipomedon is thus not the pure type of the courtly hero, the literature and the ideals of courtoisie are by no means unfamiliar to Hue de Rotelande, as he shows especially in his accounts of the origin and development of love, and in his representation of Ipomedon and of La Fiere. Ipomedon’s love for La Fiere is to some extent, perhaps, a case of love on hearsay,

for it is on hearing the knights at his father’s court talking of La Fiere and her beauty that he decides that he must go to the Calabrian court and serve her. However, love on hearsay is not distinctively courtois,? and besides, it is her court? almost as much as La Fiere herself that attracts Ipomedon. More unmistakably couttly is the account of his awakening, after three years, to the state of his feelings towards her.* One evening, after a successful day’s hunting, he is seated at supper with her, when their eyes meet in a long and steady gaze,® and even when the first spell is broken, Ipomedon’s eyes keep straying back to her face, for as the proverb says: Tost est Poil la, ou est Pamur, Le dei la, ou l’en sent dolur®

In the expression of his feeling there is more than a hint of the idea of love service, especially perhaps in the message which he sends to her after the tournament, telling her that he is her servant for all time: “La Fuere saluez, amis,’ he tells the messenger, © Dites lui, puis ke la conui, Tux jurz fui sons e er e sui E a tut dis la servirail’? 1]]. 7218-22,

® Cf. the knights’ description:

2 Cf. note on p. 57

E si n'a curt desuz la nue En nul lu trové ne venue D' Inde desques en Occident Ox autant iert d’affeitement. (ll. 217-220). “Cf. Protheselaus, ed. Kluckow, p. 37. < A une foiz issi ala, Qe la Fiere mult l’avisa, E ki meschin regarde a li, Si ge nul d’eus l’oil ne flechi: Mult s’entregardent longement. ® ll. 798-9.

(ll. 773-7).

71. 6304-7.

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OF HuE DE ROTELANDE

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Not only does he serve her by fighting, but he adopts for her sake the disguise of a fool—a theme clearly borrowed from Tristan} though there is here no obvious motive for it. Hearing that La Fiere is being threatened by Leonin, Ipomedon presents himself thus disguised at Meleaget’s court, with the request that the king will let him answer the first call for help from any lady or damsel in distress. Moreover, he admits the connection, so important in the theory of amour courtois, of love and suffering. After a severe reproof? from La Fiere he lies awake debating whether or not to remain any longer at her court and is tempted for a moment to wish for death; then, however, he reflects that his pain is mixed

with ‘joye et desport’ and that suffering is an essential accompaniment or part of love, for .. . Saunz dolur Ne puit Vem pas tenir amur.® La Fiere is the only woman whom Ipomedon loves. Fidelity as such is clearly not distinctively or peculiarly courtois, but the tone in which Ipomedon’s fidelity is described is at least not uncourtly: Ne Li vint pas a volenté Kil ja mes a’autre seit amé, Fors de la Fiere, Rert s’amie,

Ne quer autre amer en sa vie.* It is thus impossible that he should respond to the love which he inspires in Meleager’s queen. It is in connection with this episode that Hue de Rotelande gives one of the strongest proofs of his acquaintance with courtly literature. That he may take part unknown to anyone in the tournament of which La Fietre is to be 1 The scene when he appeats at the court and refers to certain past episodes (ll. 7816 ff.) seems based on passages in the Folie Tristan (Folie Tristan d’Oxford, ll. 319 ff., 377 ff.). Cf. Kluckow, p. 24 and cf. the words of a knight describing to La Fiere what Ipomedon has done; “Pur vus se fist rere le col, Pur vus se fist tenir pur fol, Pur Ja deredne pur vus feire;

Pur vus ad eu meint cuntreire, Pur vus ad suffert meinte peinel’ 2 He accepts it without complaint. ‘Trop me chastia leidement, Mes ele le fist pur mon bien? Si. 1233-4.

(ll. 10385-9). ,

(il. 1154-5).

4 ll, 3087-90.

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the prize, Ipomedon presents himself at Meleager’s court with the somewhat strange request that he may be given the title of ‘dru la reine’, waiting on the queen and supplying her with venison and leading her to and from her chamber, receiving a kiss as the price of his escort. Under cover of the hunting activities which are thought to occupy him exclusively he takes part in the tournament on each of the three days, relating every evening the story of the chase in which he is supposed to have spent his time, and laughed at by the knights of the court. Though his office of ‘dru la reine’ is only, as far as he is concerned,

an amusement and a means to an end, his request to wait upon the queen has in it something of the idea of love service, and of disinterested love: Ipomedon al roi ad dit: ‘Dor e d’aveir mest mut petit, Kar asex en ai en ma terre; Mes un autre vus voil requere: Dans rois, sil vus vent a pleisir, La reine pusse servir, E si, ke Pun wmapelt sun dru; Pur el ne sui a vus venu.” It is impossible not to be reminded of Lancelot’s service of Guenevete,? even though the relation between Ipomedon and the queen has for him so little importance and for her so much. La Fiere’s attitude to love is in some respects that of the lady of courtoisie. Pride—at least in the beginning of the story—is her outstanding characteristic, as her name betokens, to such a degree

that she is incapable of love.* In the early days of her acquaintance with Ipomedon her heart is as yet untouched; while everyone else praises his beauty, she alone remains unmoved: Unkes ne li remua chere,

R’ele neut pas quer com autre femme.’ But her pride where Ipomedon is concerned is of short duration. Almost from the first she is ready to love him, if she could only be convinced that he fulfils her ideal, and her sudden dismissal of 1]1. 3001-8. *Cf. Kolbing, ed. Ipom. p. vi, referring to his remark (Eng/. Ipom. p. xxix) ‘dass die Stellung

des Ipomedons als druz la reine auf den inneren Einfluss von Crestiens Chevaler de la Charette hinweist’; (quoted by Kluckow, disagreeing with it, ed. Proth, p. 36). 3], 156-9. 4 Il. 446-7.

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him follows on the growing consciousness of her real feelings towards him; she sees the necessity for her own peace of mind, as

well as his, of putting an end to their intimacy while there is still time. The description of the lovers’ symptoms and their reflections on the nature of love show undoubted reminiscences of the Eneas, thus going back ultimately to courtois or at least Ovidian influence. La Fiere’s confession of her love and of her lover’s name is clearly based on that of Lavinia to her mother. After her dismissal of Ipomedon, she has an alarming heart-attack: Vent a sun lit, si chet enverse,

Tut devent neire e teinte e perse, Treiz foiz se pasme en un randun Si Rele n’entent sens ne reisun? Ismeine asks anxiously what is the matter: ‘Pur Deu, ma dame, kavez vust?

“Ke ai? Ja me mor a estrus: Ne veex vus, ke jeo me muer? Metex vostre main a mon quer, Tastez: ne me bat nule veine!® Finally, syllable by syllable,* with the addition of a sigh which Ismeine mistakes for an extra syllable, La Fiere confesses the cause of her malady—her love for Ipomedon, the ‘vadlet estrange’. Both the lovers ate victims of insomnia;° they lose their colour and grow hot and cold alternately.* According to the courtois convention, their hearts are snatched away from their owners. On the evening of his dismissal, as La Fiere looks at him at supper, Ipomedon feels as if his heart were deserting its proper place,’ and when he departs he leaves it behind him, taking La Fiere’s in its stead: En hostage son quer i laist, Mes countre sel un autre en porte;

Dount il gueres ne se comforte; Sis sount ly quers entrechaunger.® 1 Cf. also ll. 939 ff. “ll. 1497 ff. Cf. Eneas, ll. 8550-8561. I], 1099; ff., 1257, 6871 ff., 8693.

2 I. 1463-6. Pl945 ff., 1116 H., 1258. * Il, 933-5.

8 Il. 1471-5. 8}. 1302-5.

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Both Ipomedon and La Fiere fall victims to love; none can stand against its power, and La Fiere, who had deliberately set herself against it, is as helpless as anyone else.t Love is no respecter of persons, but exacts obedience from all: Mut ad grant valur amur fine, Ki set danter rei e reine E prince e duc, cunte e barun, Vers lui ne valt sens ne resun.®

Hue is writing here of the love of Ismeine, which is certainly not courtly, and the last line applies rather to what might be called ordinary love, since courtly love, at least in one of its aspects, is

not independent of reason. Another remark on the power of love —this time in connection with La Fiere—is also fairly general in its application: Tote autre rien puet hom danter, Mes amour n'est ja mes dauntee: Cum I’en plus le sert et agree, Plus en avera feble guerdon. But Hue has a short analysis of the onset and course of love, imperceptibly growing from the sweetness of its beginnings to violent passion, which has a more definitely courtois tone: Mout par est douz Pentrer d’amurs, Mes poy et poy crest la docour, St doucement, ainz ge Pen sache, Qe tut le quer del ventre arache.*

This suggests the idea of love as a sweet sickness, and love may indeed be devastating in its effects on the body, but it nevertheless increases a man’s physical activity and provides a powerful stimulus to his mental and moral energies, as Ipomedon’s tutor recognizes: ‘]’en ai joie, ke vus amex, Kar a tuz jurz meulz en valdrez, Kar cil, kt aime par amur,

De plus conquert pris e-valur, Kil se peine d’estre tut dis Plus francs, plus pruz, de meulz apris.®

2 Il. 9093-6.

1 “Ta ai mult orgoil cumparé!” “Quel orguil, dame?’ ‘Quel? D’amer! Ore me fet amur trop penser.’ (Il. 1486-8). 3 I. 764-7. 41). 1251-4. 5 Il, 1593-8.

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Especially important from the point of view of courtoisie are the lovers’ analyses of their feelings as they lie awake in their beds on the night after they have first become awate of their love. The symmetry achieved by giving a monologue to each of the lovers occurs as well in the Eveas, in Partenopeus de Blois and in Ciiges.1 There is first La Fiere’s monologue.? Her love and her pride conflict; she is punished for the pride which made her swear to marry none but the best knight in Christendom by being overcome with love for an unknown valet: “Mz quers encontre moi estrive; Cel estrif mes a riens nateint, Kar amur amedeus nus veint: Tost nostre estrif ad abatu, Et mei e mon quer ad vencu.’* Her pride, and loyalty to her vow, had made her determined not to give way to the love for Ipomedon of which she had already felt the possibility. But pride, she reflects, may be carried too far.’ And yet, as she goes over the events of the previous evening, she feels that she could not properly have betrayed her feelings; it was for Ipomedon to ask for her love, not for her to offer it. And yet after all, would she not have been right, in view of the love which his gaze surely betokened, to confess her own love? She ends, as we saw, with the practical reflection that a bird in the hand is worth two in the bush, and the decision, which

proves to be too late, to see him the next day, and show him that she is ready to love him. Ipomedon, on his side, debates whether to stay at La Fiere’s

coutt or return home, since he has incurred her displeasure. It is true that she looked fixedly at him on the preceding evening, *Si ke unk ne cilla nient’, which might be interpreted as a sign of love, but perhaps it was not so much a look of benevolence as of pity for his ignorance,’ and he blames himself for not having known how to conceal his feelings. It is partly the sense of having, by his indiscretion in letting his love be seen, offended

against the code of courtoisie that is the cause of his unhappiness. In many respects Ipomedon comes fairly close to the courtois ideal. To begin with, emphasis is laid on his physical beauty: | 1G, Paris Journal des Savants (1902) 353 cS Kluckow, ed. Proth. p. 35). 2 Il. 956-1098. 1. 1016-20. 1. 678. 5 Il. 981-2. or 992-3. 711, 1160-1.

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when he comes to La Fiere’s court! and makes a rather bashful

entry, everyone gazes at him in admiration: I] out la face aukes vermaille Pur la hunte, ke il aveit:

Durement bien lui aveneit. De sa beauté, quant il entra, Tute la sale enlumina;

Sz cum le solail done au jor Clarté apres grant tenebror, Si revent leyns la clarté Et Palume (?) de sa bealté His hair is fair, his eyes “clers, bels et rians’, he has a nose formed

‘par grand estudie’, and a mouth so ‘vermeille et bele’, Tux jors vus fust vis, Rele offrist A beiser dame ou dameisele3

So the portrait, working downwards from his hair to his wellshaped feet, continues; Nature had combined in him her best effects. While Ipomedon’s appearance is described in the courtois manner, his character shows an interesting combination of opposing characteristics and ideals, in which on the whole the courtois strain predominates. On the one hand he exemplifies the courtois ideal; he is introduced as follows:

N’ out el munde si beau juvenceus Ne si aligné ne si beaus, Ne si curteys ne si vaillant, Si franc, si duz ne si soffrants He has been brought up in the courtois tradition by his master Tholomeu.® He is skilled in the social arts, both indoor and out-

door, belonging to his position; he acquits himself with distinction, whether as La Fiere’s cup-bearer or as her huntsman. From the moment of his arrival at her court, he shows his breeding: as he goes into the buttery, still wearing his cloak, his fellowservants laugh at his boorish manners, but they little know what a

39 7 dee 5

21 3g2 tt. un mestre si curteys, Ke el mund n’out si riche reys,

Sil. 412-13.

4 Il. 189-92.

|.

Ril nel soust mult bien servir.

(Il. 199-201).

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isin his mind, and when he takes off the cloak and hands it to the

butler with a graceful speech’ the laugh is turned against them: Eus memes tenent fous et nis E lui curteis e bien apris? But the occasion on which La Fiere is perhaps most impressed by his courtoisie is that of the hunting expedition when he shows so great a knowledge of hunting technique, and of the ritual for disposing of the quarry.’ It seemsclear that Huede Rotelande had in mind the arrival of Tristan in Cornwall, and his display of a technique superior to that of Mark’s huntsmen. Like Tristan, he is ‘valet de grant maniere, Corteis e affaité de bois’.t In this case Hue is adapting to his own purpose one of the most courtois passages of the I7zstan of Thomas, but in Ipomedon’s fondness for hunting expeditions, in preference to the ordinary sports of boys of his age, there is a suggestion of the more primitive parts of the Tristan story, such as the description of the life in the forest, and the references to Tristan’s power over animals. But it is not only in social accomplishments that he is skilled; his more individual, as opposed to his social talents have also been cultivated. His master Tholomeu has a fair amount of learning® and has brought him up in the same tradition: Li vadlet oncore sot assez, Et si fut il mult bien lettrez. De plus agu engin serra Une reison, melz entendra, Ke en clergie est auques baut.® His reserve, which he shows with regard to his love, and in

general, is again in the courtois tradition. As a boy, he is quick to listen but slow to give himself away: Plus pensa, qe ne fit semblant, Si ne respundi tant ne quant.” It is partly the thought that if he remains in Calabria he will be bound to betray his love that decides him to leave after La Fiere’s reproof, for if he is among strangers, he will be able to keep his own counsel: 11]. 494-8.

Pil. 325-6.

2 Il. 503-4.

6 I. 203-7; cf. Il. 1160 ff.

311. 643 ff.

4Cf. 1. 194.

7. 223-4.

94.

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‘Sz jeo suy loins, mes ge je pence, Assex i troveray defense, Kar nul ne savera, ne pur quei, Jeo suy si pensifs, for soul mey.”% It is his love of ‘le bel taisir’, characteristically courtois, that

prompts him to adopt the rdle of huntsman to the queen and then fight incognito in the tournament: silence, as he explains to Tholomeu, is the part of wisdom: ‘sovent fet cil ge sage, Ki set ben cuvrer sun curage; Meint home en tel liu se descovre,

Ke meulz li vaudreit celer s°ovre; Meins valt trop dire ke celer, Ki si savreit a mesurer; Le bel teisir est curteisie. Le fous, il parole tus tens,

Aukune feiz ahurte sens.” It is the kind of discretion that is carried to such disastrous lengths by Perceval when he refrains from asking the question that would have healed the Fisher King, though Perceval’s silence surely goes back to an older and more primitive tradition. Ipomedon’s pursuit of adventure and his thirst for prowess otiginate in his love, and in his sensitiveness to the opinion of La Fiere, which reflects that of her entourage. There is an interestting development in his attitude here. When first he comes to the court, in spite of his many qualities, he is looked at askance for his lack of interest in sports and jousting,? and his preference for solitary hunting expeditions. Hunting may be, as we have seen, an important feature of court life, but Ipomedon has a fondness, deplored by his fellow-knights, for going off by himself to the forest or the river-bank, instead of joining in the sports of his comrades, who suspect him of a lack of physical courage. La Fiere in particular laments® his want of prowess which from her point of view disqualifies him as a lover: “... Cul iert pruz, jeo Pameroie. Allas, ge doel, il ne Pest mie,

Mes mult est plein de curteisie,® implying that the two are distinct. Courtoisie, that is to say, can exist without prowess. La Fiere 1]], 1213-6,

7. 2619-24; 2628-30,

ll. 519 ff.

4. 529-30

ll. 725 ff. 8 ll. 682-45

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95

implies this on several occasions, including that of her nocturnal meditation on the eve of Ipomedon’s departure.! In her mind, and in the poem itself, there seems to be a conflict between two ideals of life and of masculine perfection. On the one hand, there is what may be called the original ideal of courtoisie, with the emphasis on beauty, both physical and moral, and on social accomplishments of various kinds; with this is combined a more individualistic strain, which seems clearly to show the influence of the Tristan story. On the other hand, the ideal of courtoisie appears in combination with that of chivalry, for which to excel in military exploits is essential. La Fiere herself is torn between the two ideals, and in the course of her reflections comes round

to the view that courtoisie pure and simple is after all enough; on the whole, however, the other ideal, which prompted her vow

to marry only the bravest knight in the world, and which is the general rule in the romans courtois, is uppermost in her mind. It is uppermost likewise in the mind of her maid Ismeine, who cannot believe that such beauty and wisdom as Ipomedon’s can exist without prowess.? That seems to be the idea of Hue de Rotelande himself. When he relates the strange fact of Ipomedon’s neglect of knightly exercises he is at a loss how to explain it,’ and does not blame La Fiere for feeling that he is unworthy of her love.* And in the conflict between the two conceptions, that of the original courtly ideal and that of the combination of the ideals of courtoisie and chivalry, which in some degree [pomedon illustrates, it is the latter that triumphs, since Ipomedon, stung by La Fiere’s reproach*® 7

‘, . . A grant reison Doit il par amur estre amex, Kar si beaus hom ne fust unke nez, Si curteis hom, mien escient, Ne nasquit unkes de base gent, Ne fut onges engendré, se crei, D’ autre homme, que de riche rei.’

=

‘II est si beaux, il est si sage,

is

“Il. 549-50.

é

(ll. 1000-6).

Si francs et si de bel curage, Mult par ert pruz,ja ne faldra.’

(Il. 1547-9).

Jeo ne sei pas, purquei le fist, Mes adonc issi le vout fere.

(ll. 532-3).

“Quidex vus, garcon, pur beanté

Pussez par amur estre amé,

Pur franchise ne pur largesce? Tut te covient autre pruesce: Mult est cist siecles fieble et tendre, Quant uns fous, gi n'ad qoi despendre, Ainz gil conquerge los et pris, Veit suspirant et tres pensifs, Ja ne se pensera de bien,

(ll. 877 #.)

96

CouRTOISIE IN ANGLO-NORMAN LITERATURE

and finding that her love is only to be had as the reward of prowess, changes his way of life, and then comes to find pleasure in that new way of life for its own sake; why, otherwise, should

he prolong his adventures long after he is entitled to claim La Fiere and refuse, on his father’s death, to remain at home to

govern his kingdom of Apulia?! To come now to La Fiere, she too approximates in many respects to the courtois ideal. Hue gives a full length portrait of her, a pendant to that of Ipomedon. Her hair, in two long plaits, is brighter than gold: Clere face out cum flur de lis, Bel nes e bouche od simple ris? Detailed descriptions of girls’ appearance, though comparatively tare, are not unknown in the chansons de geste; what distinguishes them from the descriptions of the romans courtois is perhaps the angle from which they are presented. Blancheflor in Garin le Loherain is not less fait than La Fiere, but she is described

objectively, and the reflections of the inhabitants of Paris as she makes her entry into the city are entirely detached: Dist Puns al autre: “Comme belle dame a ci! Elle devroit un rotaume tenir’3

It is very different with La Fiere; she is seen through the eyes of the bystanders, and the main point is their reaction to her beauty; her lips are described as, un pot espessettes,

Pur ben beser aukes grossettes; that, in fact, is their raison d’étre:

Jo ne quit mie ke nature Les oust fet de tele mesure, Fors sul pur beser ducement.* In her character too she has much of the lady of courtoisie; in ptivate she may give way to her feelings, but in public she shows the restraint and self-control on which courtly education lays so much stress, and presents thereby a strong contrast to the impulsive Ismeine. When after her night of uncertainty, following on her harsh words to Ipomedon, she finds in the morning 1Cf. ll. 2609 ff.

2 Ct. ll. 2245-6.

* Li Romans de Garin le Loherain, ed. P. Paris, I 299.

“1). 2247-51.

THE RoMANCES OF HUE DE ROTELANDE

97

that her change of heart is too late and that he has already gone, she does not allow her distress to appear, but is careful to conceal her feelings: La Fiere entendy la parole, Ne fist semblant, ne fut pas fole: Nient pur ceo, puys Rele fut nee, N’ert de novele si troblee,

Mes ele ne fist guers semblant, Ke ly en fuist ne tant ne quant In relation to Ipomedon, her attitude is to some extent courtois, especially at first, but other and more human elements are

present in her feeling, almost from the start, and soon predominate. This mixture of ideals is characteristic of the whole work. Love is not the only considerable interest in Ipomedon’s life, and he and La Fiere, from being in the relation of servant and sovereign lady gradually reach a footing of equality and end by being happily married. All this is uncourtly; on the other hand, love is presented, in the case of each of them, in a manner that

seems strongly influenced by courtoisie, and they both have much in common with the courtly ideal. Protheselaus, Hue de Rotelande’s other romance, is a sequel to Ipomedon. Its main theme, which recalls, if rather vaguely, that of

the Roman de Thebes, is the hostility of the two brothers Daunus and Protheselaus, sons of Ipomedon, and their final reconciliation. Protheselaus, whom his brother has deprived of his inheritance, the duchy of Calabria, is helped in his struggle to regain it by Medea, queen of Crete (the queen whom we have already met in Ipomedon, whete she is simply known as ‘la reine’), who loves Protheselaus for his father’s sake, before ever seeing him, and

who, in spite of theit enemies’ attempts to separate them, finally becomes his wife. The story is thus concerned with Protheselaus’ successive struggles against his various enemies and his final triumph. At one stage he is so dogged by misfortune that he comes near to thinking himself an “homme fatal’. He has to defend himself against armed attacks and also against the onslaught of the Pucelle de I’Isle, a lady who falls violently in love with him, and

on his refusal to marry her, proposes to keep him in prison for 1}l. 1427-1432.

98

CouRTOISIE

IN ANGLO-NORMAN

LITERATURE

life, from which fate he is saved by the friends who come to his help and by the fortunate transference of the Pucelle’s affections to someone

else. His most formidable enemy, however, who

otiginally poisons his brother’s mind against him, and tries to make him believe that Medea hates him, is a baron of Apulia named Pentalis. The incidents connected with Pentalis are interesting as a further proof of the influence of Tristan on Hue de Rotelande’s work, though that influence has here little connection with couttoisie. Both Tristan and Protheselaus receive a poisoned wound, Tristan from the Morholt’s sword, Protheselaus from the lance of Pentalis. Both of them, when their wounds seem incurable, set out to sea alone, Tristan with the reluctant consent

of Mark, Protheselaus by escaping the vigilance of his friends, and both of them are carried by the waves to the countty of a kinswoman of their enemy; Tristan reaches Ireland, whete he is healed by Queen Iseut, the Morholt’s sister, while Protheselaus is catried to the land of Sebile, the sister of Pentalis, who cures

him within two months. It seems clear that such similarities cannot be a matter of chance. Mote important from the point of view of courtoisie is the influence of the Exeas, which also seems beyond question (even the resemblances relating to matters unconnected with courtoisie? are of interest here as helping to prove that the Eveas did in fact influence the work of Hue de Rotelande). It is in great measure on elements going back to, or at least present in the Eveas that the claim of Protheselaus to be counted as in some degree courtois may be founded. The courtly and the non-courtly elements in the poem ate by no means easy to separate. While Protheselaus’ general attitude is uncouttly, in as far as love plays a subordinate, not an essential part in his life, yet his attitude towards Medea is now and then that of a courtly lover. In the characters of the women also there is a similar uniting of rather contradictory features: while Medea’s love for Protheselaus is to a great extent maternal, she shows both in herself and in relation to him a certain approach to the type of the courtly heroine; again, the Pucelle de l’Isle, aggressive and the teverse of couttois in her behaviour to Protheselaus,

appears in a very different light in relation to his friend Melander. 1 Kluckow (ed. Pro¢h.) p. 30, notes parallel descriptions of storms at sea and p. 36 the passage on Renumee (10994 ff.) ; cf. Eneas, ll. 1539 ff. (from Aen. iv).

THE RomANcES OF HuE DE ROTELANDE

99

While it is thus extremely difficult, if not impossible, to draw a cleat division where Hue de Rotelande himself has not done so,

yet certain ideas in connection with Protheselaus’ general attitude and with the treatment of love on the part of the women are plainly not courtois. So far, indeed, from the courtois element predominating in Protheselaus, the story is as much one of adventure as of love, and moreover, of adventure not undertaken primarily, as in the case of Ipomedon, in the service of love (if with a relish for adventure in itself at the same time). Protheselaus’ main object is to recover his lost inheritance; till he has done so, he will not spare time or

energy for love, as he explains to more than one importunate woman. Moreover, friendship as opposed to love has considerable importance in the story. When, for instance, after two months of treatment at the hands of Sebile his wound is healed and evetything is going well, he thinks continually of the friends whom he has left behind, and, when he is explaining to Sebile’s nephew Melander the cause of his frequent sighs, gives his separation from his friends as one of the chief reasons of his unhappiness.? The other and, indeed, the first source of his grief? is his apparently hopeless love for Medea whom through his enemies’ treachery he mistakenly believes to be seeking his destruction. On the whole, however, love matters more to the women than

to the men. This in itself is an uncourtly trait, for in courtoisie at its purest, the woman is in the position of receiving adoration and making some return or not, as she chooses, and though in the romans courtois the disparity between the sexes is much less, in as far as there is a disparity, it is still in favour of

the woman, whereas here the balance is the other way. Love on the part of the women is presented from various points of view. There is first Medea’s love for Protheselaus, in some tespects not uncourtly, but in which couttoisie is over-

shadowed by her maternal feeling. Romantic in its origin, it is plain that her love for Protheselaus is a transference of her tenderness for his father, whose position as ‘dru la reine’ she at least had taken seriously. She has never seen Protheselaus, but knows him to be like his father and that is enough.® The early account of her love is courtly in tone; she keeps her ll. 2536-41. 3]. 280-2.

TU 2845 te

100

CouRTOISIE

IN ANGLO-NORMAN

LITERATURE

passion secret until she can bear it no longer, and then she confesses it to her messenger Jonas: “Certes, Jonas, jaim durement.’ “Et qui??—Ne sai.’—‘Et dune coment Amex vus, si ne savex qui??— “Nun ver’ —‘U est?’—‘Nel sai de fi, Une nel vi.—‘Co est fol amer.’ ‘Nenal, jen ai bi parler. Gentile om est et pruz et sage Et curteis et de halt parage, Kar ilfu fiz Ipomedon, Al curteis, al vaillant, al bon. Pur la sue amur aim cestui,

Quant une mes noi joie de lui.’ — Nor, in passing, is it an uncourtly picture of het? as she presides over the festivities in honour of her birthday in which Melander and Protheselaus take part. She is represented as so beautiful that not even the most hardened could fail to love her. The description of her shows, incidentally, a departure from the conventional scheme of portraiture (which works downward from the head)? and enters into more than usual detail about her hair, ‘trainanz a terre, largement plein pé’.4 The main point about her love, however, is its maternal quality. As soon as she hears that Protheselaus has been disinherited she considers how she may help him to recover his land. The same attitude, tempered with a little natural jealousy, is expressed in her letter® to him in prison. She reproaches him with not having followed her advice, and now promises to come to his help with three thousand knights, unless indeed he is ‘plus ptest d’altre amet’, in which case she will stand aside. The essen-

tial thing is that he should be delivered; his welfare is the condition of her happiness.* Such disinterested concern for the lover’s welfare seems clearly in contradiction to the typical attitude of the lady of courtoisie. In the latter case, the lady’s position of superiority, whether it is due to rank or to personal merit— though one is hardly conceived without the other—entitles her ATi geiae $

. 2957-8.

at 2934 &.

. 7496ff.

% Baral Les Arts poétiques pp. 79-81.

“Certes, en joie ne pus vivre,

De ci que jo vus vei delivre.’

(ll. 7514-5).

THE

ROMANCES

OF HUE

DE ROTELANDE

IOI

to adoration without laying any considerable responsibilities upon her. Another type of love, with no pretensions whatever to courtoisie, is illustrated inthe episode of Candace,! a married woman who tries to force her love upon Protheselaus and failing to do so adopts the usual expedient of accusing him to her husband. Mote interesting is the case of the Pucelle de l’Isle, since she exemplifies successively the type of aggressive love to which Candace falls a victim and the type, intermediate between the aggressive and the courtois, represented by Lavinie in her attitude towards Eneas. Protheselaus reaches her territory after a succession of more or less romantic adventures. When she hears of his arrival from one of her foresters, both of whose sons

Protheselaus has killed but who nevertheless describes him as ‘pruz et preisez as atmes’,? she at once plans to marry him. She had often thought that a member of such a family would make a worthy husband,’ and now the forester’s report decides her; her hitherto rather vague dreams are crystallized* and she sets about getting Protheselaus into her power. Having enticed him into her castle and disarmed him, she offers him in his defenceless

condition the choice of marrying her or spending the rest of his life in prison.® Seeing that persuasion will not shake his fidelity to Medea, she becomes violently angry® and it is only with difficulty that his friends manage to save him from being hanged. While her attitude to Protheselaus is of the aggressive type found commonly enough in the chansons de geste and in many of the romances, towards his friend Melander her feelings and behaviour ate completely different. Her love for him is not altogether unlike that of Lavinie for Eneas. As she stands on the ramparts of the castle, watching his gallant bearing in the battle going on below, she is struck by the dart of love:? her colour comes and goes, and she spends a sleepless night.* Her confession of love, made under pledge of secrecy to her minstrel Jolif, shows something of the subtlety of Chretien in its juggling with words: Rls 70: ft. 4 Il, 6082-91. g

21, 6060, 3 1]. 6075-9. 5 ll. 6625-45. 6 Il. 6688-91. Amur un dart li enveia Qui forment l’anguisse et sumunt Que s’amur a Melander dunt. (ll. 8835-7). Cf. the account of Lavinie watching Eneas from the battlements (Eneas (ed. S. de Grave) Il. 8047 ff., esp. 1. 8057).

8 ll. 9674-6.

102

CouRTOISIE

IN ANGLO-NORMAN

LITERATURE

“Certes, Jolif, 7’aim durement.—

‘Oui, dame??— Nel sai.’—‘Et coment ? Nel savex vus??—‘Certes, jo non.’— “Dune wWamex vus pas a raison’— “Certes, si fax et si ne faz, Kar sens et grant folie chaz.’— ‘Sens, dame, cument??—‘Dirai vus:

Il nad en cest secle a estrus Un si tres bel hom par semblant, Tant bons, tant pruz ne tant vaillant.— ‘Dame, Sestes a lui amie,

Dune ne chacez pas la foliel— ‘Si faz. —‘Coment??>—‘Jol vus dirat, Kar nel conuis, mais jo ben sai All dit de gent, riches hom est; Mais ne quid pas quwil est si prest D?amer mei tant cum jo li faz. Et pur ¢o la folie chaz.” Her former arrogance,

which

made

her feel Protheselaus’

refusal of her love as an almost incomprehensible insult, is changed to humility. She fears that her love is unlikely to be returned;? and when she commissions Protheselaus to act as an

intermediary between her and Melander, she asks him to be circumspect and see what Melandet’s feelings are before committing her, that she may not have the shame of seeing her love rejected.? In its essence, such love is closer to the love of the chansons de

geste than to courtoisie, for it is still the woman who takes the initiative, even though she entreats rather than demands to be loved. It is a very different attitude from that of the ladies of the troubadouts, and very different from Guenevete’s insistence on Lancelot’s complete devotion and obedience. At the same time, with its new sensitiveness to the other’s point of view it is more subtle than the purely aggressive type of love. In the case of the Pucelle, she had been entirely unconcerned as to how Protheselaus might regard her advances, but now she is anxious lest Melander should judge her unfavourably. If Medea’s love for Protheselaus and that of the Pucelle for 1 ll. 9950-67; the opening lines ate almost identical with those of Medea’s confession to Jason. 2 Il. 9965-6. 3 ll. 105 30-5.

THE ROMANCES Melander

show

a mixtute

OF HuE DE ROTELANDE of vatious

elements,

103 the lovers’

symptoms (even in the case of lovers whose feeling is of the aggressive type) are described in the courtois style, or at least in the style of the Eveas. Ifthe Pucelle is wounded by a dart, Melander is caught in the toils of love.t The sleep of all the lovers is disturbed,? but the night of insomnia most fully described is one spent by Protheselaus in tossing this way and that, flinging the bedclothes

off and on, as

he wrestles with his love for

Medea whom he still believes to be his enemy: Amur Pasalt et il se turne,

Et Amur le repoint de la, I) tresailli, si returna Et pus se returna envers;

Il a ja le vis teint et pers. Le repos et le dormir pert, Sovent la noit Sest descovert Pur la chalor, pus se recovre Pur le freit et apres entrovre Son covertur et si salt sus. Among the symptoms of love are sighs and, rather surprisingly, yawns: Protheselaus on this same night ‘suspire et puis baaille’,* and earlier in the story it is Candace’s sighs and yawns® that make Protheselaus suspect her love. Medea, on the news of Protheselaus’ departure, falls into a faint from which her maid can hardly rouse her.* Protheselaus, in almost the identical words used by Ipomedon to his tutor, tells Melander that he is dying of love: ‘‘Jo mor, certes, pur trop amer,

Laltr’er vus dis que d’amur fine Aim et coveit tant la réine Ow a mes oilz vei enfin ma mort, Se par li wai hastif cunfort.” Besides the mote or less courtly elements traceable in the main to the influence of the roman antique and more particularly of 111. 10081 ff. (cf. Eneas, 1. 8060). 21. 1595, ll. 3496-7, 3508-9. 3 Il. 2763-72. 4 Cf. Eneas ll. 1231, 8077, 8455 5 Maint baal fait et maint suspir, \. 1691. Cf. Faral Recherches pp. 133-4. $Y. 3791 ff. 7. 2817, 2820-3. Cf. Tristan ll. 2481-2. En fin dites que jo sui morz Se jo par li n’aie conforz

104

CouRTOISIE IN ANGLO-NoRMAN

LITERATURE

the Eneas, there ate others of less determinate origin. Such are the various reflections on the nature and the power of love. There is the idea of love as uniting opposites; it is a mixture of good and evil, of sweet and bitter, bringing joy and sorrow, healing and slaying: Amur cunforte, Amur occit,

Li amanz plure, Pamant rit. Amur cunfunt, Amur socurt,

D? Amur crest joie et dol en surt. Amur rehaite, Amur coroce, Amur est amere et rest duce

Both Protheselaus and Melander have something of the courtly lover. The former has been led to believe that Medea hates him,

but still he does not waver in his fidelity to her; he has loved her before ever seeing her, and will love no one else, and though constancy in itself is not peculiar to courtoisie, its expression in this case—the use, for example, of the convention of the lover’s

heart remaining behind with the lady—is significant. Wherever he may go, Protheselaus declares, his heart will remain with

Medea.? He recognizes and accepts suffering as being inseparable from love, and remains unshaken by the Pucelle’s threats; any pains that he may bear for Medea’s sake will be welcome.’ Nor does he condemn her for her supposed hatred of himself; if he chooses to bestow his love where it is unacceptable, it is he who is to blame.* But his generosity does not spring entirely from his love; it is partly due to ethical considerations.® He reflects on the injustice of Medea’s supposed hatred of him; it is contrary to the law of God, which forbids one to do evil to one’s neighbour even in return for an injury, whereas, far from injuring Medea he has never ceased

to love

her; on

the

other hand, he

himself

would be breaking the divine commandment if he hated her in return, and he decides that in spite of her hostility he will always hold her as his sovereign lady. This sober, moralizing tone (entirely different from the blending of love and mysticism characteristic of certain aspects of courtoisie) recalls Gaston Paris’ description of the Anglo-Norman temperament and of the 111, 3816-21. a

3 ll, 6683-7.

Se jo vois en altre pais, Mis quers est ci od lui remis. Mis cors est aillurs, mis quers ci, Si serrai pres et loinz de li.

4 Il. 2784-5.

(ll. 3686-9).

5 Il. 2788-99.

THE ROMANCES

OF HUE DE ROTELANDE

105

prevalence in Anglo-Norman literature of works of edification. The episode of Melander’s love for the Pucelle de |’Isle is treated to begin with in the courtly manner. He is struck with love at the sight of her beauty, as she watches the fight from the battlements,? and presently, as he catches sight of her again, his love becomes so fierce that he is driven to leave the battlefield in search of solitude.® Towards the end of the episode, however, there appears that practical, not to say calculating common sense that recurs continually in Anglo-Norman literature, and makes of it such a peculiar mixture. The Pucelle insists that Melander shall marry hert—not that he had any other intention, for the idea of separating love and marriage is foreign to Hue de Rotelande— and the negotiations are concluded between them in an extremely matter-of-fact manner, in the presence of witnesses. The passage: may not be very important in itself, but its realism is significant as throwing light on Hue’s general attitude. Significant from the same point of view are his remarks about women in general. Such remarks are fewer in Prothese/aus than in Ipomedon, but they are equally severe. Women, especially if not appreciated, are passionate and vindictive, and he has some cynical comments on the ease with which wives, particularly inthis country, succeed in hoodwinking their husbands.® 1 La littérature normande avant l’annexion p. 22. 2). 9874-7. Amur li ad tost tel mal fait Et si li ad basti tel plait Dunt ja mais jugement n avra, Si par la pucele ne I’a. “ A lui est tant l’amur créue,

ll. 9882-5.

Tant le demaine, tant l’argue, De l’estur part léz un chemin,

Pres d’iloc entre en un gardin. (Il. 10006-9). Cf. the story of Cydipper and Acontius. S.H. Butcher Some aspects of the Greek genius: The: Dawn of Romanticism in Greck Poetry (ed. 3, 1904) p. 286. Cf. also in connection with the influence of the Greek romances: W. J. Courthope The connexion between ancient and modern: romance (1911). 4 Il. 10867-71. 2 Atant s’escreve de plurer Cum li quer li déust crever. Plasors de leger le plur trovent, De leger lor barons cummovent. Ne sai, si c’est pur lur franchise, Mais mult les unt en lur justize. Sveles dient: ‘Le cingne est neir’, Lor barons lor creent pur veir. Se dient: ‘La corneille est bloie’, Lor barons dient: ‘Dame, a joie!’ Celes qui-sunt en cest pais En deivent ben porter le pris. (ll. 2050-61).

106

CouURTOISIE

IN ANGLO-NoORMAN

LITERATURE

Such a spirit is nearer indeed to the fabliaux than to courtoisie. It only comes to the surface occasionally in Hue’s work, but when it does it is important, as tending to show that, though he is familiar with the language of courtoisie, he does not really express its point of view. He makes use of its conventions, but even in Ipomedon, the courtois outlook is not the only one, and in Protheselaus this is still more obvious. In the earlier work, he

pursues the parallel themes of love and adventure, and it is not easy to decide which is finally the more important, but in Protheselaus the balance is clearly in favour of adventure, and courtoisie has faded into the background, as though Hue de Rotelande had recognized that it was after all foreign to his temperament, and to that of his fellow-countrymen. Il. AMADAS ET YDOINE

The poem of Amadas et Ydoine} of which the only complete version is one written in the Picard dialect, derives ultimately, as Gaston Paris pointed out,? from an Anglo-Norman original, and might therefore be considered as belonging to Anglo-Norman literature. Since, however, it is only of the first part that there

remains an Anglo-Norman version, that is all that will be considered here. Of the Anglo-Norman manuscripts, the fragment of 1130 lines from the Vatican (V) corresponds to the first 972 lines of the Picard manuscript (P), while the two short fragments from Gottingen (G 1 and G 2) correspond to P 1101-1246 and P 1791-1928 respectively. From allusions in the work which show an acquaintance with romances dating from the second half of the twelfth century, and from references to Amadas et Ydoine in poems that may go back to the beginning of the thirteenth century, Reinhard places the date of composition between 1190 and 1220,° a little later, that is, than the time at which Hue de

Rotelande was writing. Though it too deals with love and adventure, the poem is very different in tone from Ipomedon and Protheselaus. In spite of some supernatural and traditional elements, and the exaggerated character of Amadas’ love-sickness, the story seems more 1Ed, 2 Sur pp. 386 3 Ed.

J. R. Reinhard. Amadas et Ydoine in An English Miscellany presented to Dr. Furnivall (Oxford 1901) ff. Amadas et Ydoine p. vii.

THE ROMANCES

OF HUE DE ROTELANDE

107

tealistic and less romantic than the poems of Hue de Rotelande. Amadas, it is true, rescues Ydoine from a fairy knight, but their

final union is made possible, not by any deed of prowess on Amadas’ part but quite peaceably and unromantically through the action of the Count of Nevers, Ydoine’s official husband,

who agrees to a separation. In the same way, the background of the story is no longer the rather fanciful setting of Ipomedon and Protheselaus, but actual places such as the towns of Dijon and Lucca, at whose inhabitants we get a glance. While Ipomedon and Protheselaus have a cettain flavour of the roman antique, Amadas et Ydoine is nearer to those romans d’aventure which teflect, if

only at a distance and in a distorted manner, the actual life of the twelfth and thirteenth centuries. From the literary point of view, the poem has a liveliness and a unity of composition that place it above the work of Hue de Rotelande. Amadas is the young son of the seneschal of the Duke of Burgundy. He is universally beloved by the knights of the coutt, the only fault they have to find with him being that he does not know what love is. In vain they urge him to choose some ‘dame de valur’ or ‘gentille pucele’; he hardly understands what they mean, so ignorant is he of the theory and practice of courtly love: Kar il ne sen sout entremettre,

Ne par aprendre ne par lettre Ne pout hunches saver de amur Ne une dulcur, ne une dulur, Ne tant dunt venist un suspir,

Ne une culur al vis pallir, Ne un curage, ne un pensé, Ne a larun un regard emblé His insensibility does not last long, however. One day, when the Duke is holding a banquet at Dijon, Amadas is sent with a special dish to Ydoine, the Duke’s daughter, who is holding a feast in het own apattments; she orders him to stay and carve for her, and he obeys, little knowing the torments that love has in stote for him. He must often have talked to her before, but on

this occasion he suddenly sees her in a new light and for the first time is really aware of her beauty. So great is his emotion that he drops the carving-knife on the table-cloth, and grows pale and Ve liire5=n32,

108

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faints. After a time his companions lead him home and he goes to bed, where he remains for some six months, oblivious of everything but his ‘duce dulur’. He loses sleep and appetite, and wastes away till he is little but skin and bone.! Finally he decides to confess his love, and buoyed up by the hope of touching Ydoine’s heart, drags himself back to the court and presents himself before her: Si cum Amurs cumande et rove,

La salue de un gref suspir De parfunt quer, lung a laisir, D?un regard aprés pitus, Simple, suef, dux, amerus? It is a long time before Ydoine realizes what he is trying to say, so involved is his style, but when at last she does understand, she decides that his reason must be affected, at least temporarily, for

him to dare to speak to her of love. Amadas retites disconsolate,® and goes back to bed for a full year, at the end of which time he makes a second attempt: hardly daring to look at her, he falls on his knees, begging her to have mercy on him‘ and trying, as a final argument, to throw on her the responsibility for his death if, as he threatens to do, he kills himself:

‘Kar unches en cest secle mes Franche dame ne damaisele,

Pur parage tant ne fust bele, Ne jist peché hune issi grant Ne si cruel ne si pesant Cum vus ferex sijo m’oci.’® This time Ydoine is infuriated —‘la charn li frit d’anguisse tute’ —and makes a violent reply: rather than love Amadas ‘par druerie’ she would prefer to be drawn by horses over hill and dale, and she threatens, if he ever speaks in such a way again, to 1V, ll. 425-7. 8 ‘

2'V. Ul. 534-8. Jo ne quid quo en tute Burguinne Sait un sul si mal bailli hume. Saisie l’at par un des pans Del mantel d'un jaspe blans. A grant potir ver sai la tire, Et cumence sun cunte a dire Pitusement, si a suspir

(V. ll. 680-1).

Quo grant dol est sul de l’oir. SV. ll. 828-33.

(V. ll. 773-8).

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have him so severely beaten as to break his bones. He is hardly out of the room before he faints with grief. After languishing for another year, he decides to speak once more and bring matters to a head, and if Ydoine fulfils her threat of having him beaten, he

will surely die and so end his sufferings. The first Anglo-Norman fragment ends here. Amadas, according to the Picard version, now tells Ydoine that if she does not comfort him in his anguish he will die, and finding her still inexorable, falls apparently lifeless at her feet. Afraid of the ‘blasme et mauvais cri’ which his death may bring upon her, and filled with remorse for her harsh behaviour, suddenly, as she

gazes pityingly at him, she in her turn falls a victim to the passion that is devouring him: St alume et esprent dou fu Dont ele voit celui morir: Al son mal li estuet partir. Par le commandement a’?Amours,

Pitiés et Francise et Paours Forgent mult tost un trencant dart:

Communement de la leur part Li ont lanciet par mi le cuer. When the Anglo-Norman version begins again she is giving a “suspit amerus’ which she has hardly time to finish before she too faints; but quickly recovering, she applies the appropriate remedy and revives Amadas with her kisses,? promises him her love, and outlines for him the conduct required of the perfect lover.? They pledge their love to one another, so the story continues in the Picard version, which we now have to follow once more;

Amadas is knighted and the next day, wearing Ydoine’s sleeve as atoken, sets off in search of adventure. He travels through France,

Northern Italy, Germany and Flanders, gaining renown wherever he goes, and at the end of three years decides to go back to Burgundy, but he and his companions have hardly set 1P. Il. 1099-1106. e

3G

Vus savez ben que duz baiser A cel puint at mut grant mester. Quant hom est pasmé de tristesce, De vanité et de feblesce, Si hom le baise asex suvent De fin curage ducement, De pamisuns plus tost revent. Il 1a1-134.

(G x ll. 47-53).

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out on the return journey when they meet a messenger from

Ydoine come to break to Amadas the news that she is about to marty the Count of Nevers. The shock is such that Amadas cannot at once take in what has been said; with the realization of it, his teason leaves him, and he turns on the messenger, who

barely escapes with his life. The last Anglo-Norman fragment ends with the oncoming of Amadas’ madness. In the rest of the story, the various obstacles that separate the two lovers are gradually removed. Amadas, who has been shut up for a year in one of his father’s castles, escapes and wanders away through France and Italy, finally reaching the town of Lucca, where the sport of baiting him as he goes through the streets is counted as one of the daily entertainments.? Here he is at length found by a messenger, sent in search of him by Ydoine who, when she hears of his plight, gets leave from her husband to go ona pilgrimage to Rome, and arriving in Lucca, restores Amadas to sanity by the sound of her name: Car autretant li fait d aie Li nons d Ydoine et d’amie Com uns des nons Nostre Signour Que nous tenons a creatour, Se pour ce non qua tort wa droit Des nons Damediu nus ne doit Faire nule comparison? She tells him how she was forced to marry the Count of Nevers (but with the aid of witchcraft defended herself against him) and goes on to Rome, the alleged object of her journey, leaving 1

E# toute raison li escape Qwil n'a si fol jusqu’a Halape. (P Il. 1799-1800.) 2 Cf. Tristan, who, in the madness which he simulates in order to get access to Isolt, is set upon by Mark’s servants: Cuntre lui current li valet. I Pescrient cum hom fet lu: “Veeg le fol! bul hu! hu! bul’ Li valet et li esquier De buis le cident arocher. (Folie Tristan d’Oxford ll. 248-52). It may be noted, however, that Amadas, driven mad by love, is true to the courtois tradition (even though, as we have seen, he has not adequate reason for despair from the point of view of a courtly lover); the action of Tristan, on the other hand, feigning madness and assuming an ignominious disguise, bears no relation to the couttois code.

3P ll. 3397-3403. The reservation in the last three lines would not have occuttred to Chrétien de Troyes.

4

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Amadas to wait for her at Lucca. She is returning with her escort when a strange knight appears, seizes her and carries her off, but finding himself pursued and the way blocked sets her down and mysteriously vanishes. Amadas meets them and they all enter Lucca, rejoicing at her escape. But they have hardly begun dinner when Ydoine is seized with a mottal sickness. In a long scene of farewell between herself and Amadas she makes plans for his future and uses all means in her power to turn him from his purpose of killing himself after her death and finally, to all appearance, dies, ‘a l’eure de soleil cougant’. Amadas, not sharing the common medieval view taken by Ydoine’s knights, Qu aprés la mort convient a vivre A ceus qui sont sainet delivre, Que ¢ est li usages du mont, remains behind after they have set out for Nevers and in the evening goes to the ancient cemetery outside the town where Ydoine is buried. Here his lamentations are broken in upon by a noise of men and horses, as two companies of knights and ‘nobles gens’ surround the enclosure and a horse leaps over the cemetery wall bearing on its back the strange knight, who has come to fetch Ydoine’s body. They engage in a long and fierce battle in which Amadas at.last defeats the knight, who confesses that Ydoine’s apparent death was the work of a magic ring which he had put on her finger, and goes off, leaving Amadas to remove the ring and rescue Ydoine from the tomb. After the few days needed for rest and for providing Ydoine with clothes (for she had given everything away before her ‘death’) they set out for home. On their return to Nevers, Ydoine succeeds in getting separated from the Count and she and Amadas, united at last, live happily for many yeats, with their “‘biaus enfans’, remaining always ‘vraie amie’ and ‘vrai ami’ to one another. Such is the outline of the story, of which we may now consider the early, that is to say, the Anglo-Norman part from the point of view of courtoisie. The courtly element is conspicuous, though whether the underlying spirit of the poem is in fact couttly may be doubted. To begin with those features which seem to show that the authot is writing from the couttois standpoint, the opening lines 1Cf. P ll. 4899-4907 with Tristan Il. 2903-10, where Iseut, thinking that she will perish at sea and never reach Tristan, is similarly concerned for her lovet’s fate.

Poll. $377-9-

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of the poem! suggest the type of public of whom he is thinking. As we saw in the case of Thomas, he addresses those who know

the ways of love, from their own experience or ‘sulunc les cuntes des auturs Et en latin et en rumanz’; he is writing, that is to say,

for cultivated readers, for a courtly public. With regard to the story itself, it is in the relation of the sexes as represented in the early part of the poem that we find the strongest courtois element. Here is the typical courtly disparity in favour of the woman, who appears in a position of superiority. Towatds men in general, when they are considered as possible suitors, Ydoine’s attitude is reserved and disdainful. Such was

her pride, De amur si surquidee estait, Si surquiddee et dedeinnuse, St fere et si orguilluse,? that there was not a man at whom

she would look, however

brave and handsome he might be or whatever his rank and fortune: Ele ne prisout hume vivant ae ele Ns amer de amur,® Par hee! de ee Tux les amerus despisait.* Her anger against Amadas, when he confesses his love, is intensified by the fact that she is the Duke’s daughter, while he is only the son of her father’s seneschal, and she feels no pity for him even when the whole court is lamenting his wretched state: Ni ad un sul, grant ne petit, Malle, femele, ki nel plaint,

De plaindre le nul ne se faint, Fors sul ewe, ki 1Ma mort.

Mut lui est po 4 Ses Phos Dunt a Postel languist a mort Finablement tut senz confort.® 1 Gaston Paris (Mélanges de littérature frangaise du moyen dge p. 334, 0. 2) was the first to note the resemblance between the opening lines of Amadas et Ydoine (1-20) and the end of Tristan (Thomas) (3125-44). The fact that, as Reinhard says (The Old French Romance of Amadas et Ydoine p. 43) ‘the intention confessed by Thomas is quite different from the thesis expressed in the last eight lines of (the prologue of) Amadas’, is unimportant in this connection.

2'V, ll. 200-2.

$V. ll. 210-1,

*V. ll. 218-9.

5V. ll. 960-3.

&V. ll. 966-8.

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If she is proud, Amadas is correspondingly humble. As he lies in bed, after the first onset of his malady, he assumes almost as a matter of coutse that Ydoine, who as yet has no suspicion of his feelings, will never return his love,! and when he makes his

confession it is as a suppliant, begging for metcy: Criant merci pitusement Od gref suspir et od voix base, Pitusement quo pas ne lasse, ~ Od grant potir od grant alaine, Bas et sex, od mut grant paine, Senz noiser, senz trop haut cri;

Par mil faiz li crie merci, Cume cil ki vait en fin sa mort, Si par li wat hastif confort. Both Amadas and Ydoine fulfil in various respects the courtly ideal of perfection for men and women. Amadas at the age of fifteen or sixteen is tall and well-grown,? skilled in all courtly accomplishments, generous—‘larges sur tute ren’—modest, friendly and helpful. The couttly ideal of conduct is outlined for him by Ydoine in her discourse on the mode of behaviour which, as her lover, he

must adopt.® The qualities she enumerates ate essentially courtly, a

Finement la tent pur amie, Pur sun ami ne se tent mie.

(V. ll. 449-500).

2'V. Il. 602-10. cf. p. 103 0.7 i o

Gent ert et alinné et granz De cors, de menbre et de fatture, De farme, de bele estature. De afaitement, de curtaisie, Dieschés, des tables, de eschermie, De tux deduiz, de chens, de oiseaus, Ert si apris li damiseus

Quo nul de lui plus ne savait. .

(V. ll. 68-70).

(V. ll. 73-7).

Ore vus penez d’estre amiable Et enseiné et mesurable, Franc et gentil a tute gent, Et pruz et larges ensement, Duz et humbles a acuinter, Estable et neent nuveler. Poi de surfait, et de mesure Saez a tute creature, Orguil eschiver et vilainie, Ture folage et estutie; Saez vaillant, curtais et sage, Beaus estes et de haut parage. Par draite nature devez D’armes estre mut alosez. (G x ll. 121-134).

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in the sense of being necessary for pleasant intercourse in polite society. Most of all, perhaps, she emphasizes moderation. Amadas

is to

be ‘mesurable’,t

that is, temperate

and self-

restrained, not foolishly proud? or arrogant,? but humble, and considerate of other people, faithful, and not carried away by every new thing.* The virtues to be cultivated are social virtues: he is to be pleasant in his manner and easy of approach,® coutteous to all and generous.® Finally, he is to win prowess in arms, for its own sake, perhaps, but also to satisfy the requirements of the courtly society, of which she is the mouthpiece. Ydoine herself has much of the courtly heroine. In the first place, she is a paragon of beauty, as the author describes her at the beginning of the story. Her long auburn hair reaches to her feet; her eyes are large, ‘veirs et jolifs’: Bel nes, bel vis, buche bele, Fresche culur, cume flur nuvele, E Le mentun, col et paetrine,

Out plus blanche quo flur a’espine.” Nature had fashioned her perfectly: Senz tutes teches estait faite Cum en or image purtraite.® The beauty of her face and form is an expression of her character; her gaze is

simple et sage, Que nul wi pot noter huntage, Ne un sul semblant de legerie, Ne un trespas de vilainie.® Here again, as in the description of Amadas, the emphasis is on the social virtues, including that of ‘mesure’, which is not mentioned but which is implicit in the account of her demeanour, with its courteous and discreet friendliness, never overstepping the bounds of good breeding. In her dealings with Amadas, she shows her wonted discretion and restraint. When he makes his first declaration of love, her

couttois training helps her to check the scathing reply which she would like to give: mG 3h 1225 127, a 2G. 7V. ll. 161-4.

fl breeete-ie Ss mag: 8 V. ll. 169-70.

7 130: Chinas ®V. ll. 157-160.

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. . . mut est franche et debonaire, Curtaise, enseinné et sage,

Sa ire refrainet en sun curage, Si Pasuage et amesure» It is true that on the occasion of his second visit she breaks into violent language, but this ‘parole estute’ the author regards as excessive, and later, when she thinks Amadas is dying and at last repents of her harshness towards him, she blames herself‘not only for her pride but for her folly—her lack of moderation and discernment: ‘Trop lui ai esté fere et dure Et orguilluse a desmesure, Cruele et vilaine fine, Plus que une mes ne fut meschine. Fait ai que fole et que devee Et que vilaine surquidee, Que nunsavante, que caitive.” Not only are there decided courtois elements in the treatment of Adamas and Ydoine, in themselves and in relation to one another; the representation of love, its nature, causes, and

effects is also, to some extent, in the courtly spirit. Love is inspired by beauty. As Adamas looks at Ydoine’s ‘beau vis’, it is no wonder that he is ‘mat et supris d’amut’: N’est pas mervail, car il la vit A cele faiz en tel delit, Si tresbele, si envaisee,

A si fine chere haitee Quo feme el mund w out ttant Beauté en sai ne bel semblant® So, too, Ydoine

finally recognizes that for his beauty alone

Amadas is worthy of love: Sulement pur la grant beautee Dunt Deu LPat tant illuminé,

Sur trestuz les humes del mund, Et pur les granz bens qu’en lui sunt, N’at sus cel si riche meschine, Fillie de rai ne de raine,

Nel poist amer a onur Par fine léauté 2amur 4 1V, Il. 620-623. Cf. A. A. Hentsch De /a littérature didactique du moyen dge s’adressant spécialement aux femmes (Cahors 1903). 2G 1 Ih. 25-31. 3 V, ll. 327-332. *G 1, I. 17-24.

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The sight of Ydoine’s beauty fills Amadas with mingled joy and grief, for love unites opposites, and Amadas feels a “duce dolur mellé a ire’. All quer li set la duce paine, La calur quo tost le alume De ducur et de amertume. He himself cannot understand his contradictory feelings.? Ydoine is at once the source of his joy and the author of his suffering, his friend and enemy: Ydoine, la bele figure, Owil tint sur tute creature

En sun curage pur amie Et de autre part enemie® The “duce paine’ of love is not a mere sentimental luxury; it is presented as a real affliction, expressing itself not only in mental but in physical distress, from sighing and blushing to more serious pathological symptoms. When at the beginning Amadas, struck by Ydoine’s beauty, drops the knife on the table-cloth, he changes colour and utters a deep though subdued sigh;* as he makes his first confession, he begins, according to the rules of Love, by sighing long and heavily,> and on the subsequent occasions his words are likewise prefaced or accompanied by sighs.* Ydoine, too, gives the first outward sign of her tardy love in the ‘suspir amerus’ which she draws as she looks at the unconscious Amadas, thereupon falling unconscious herself.’ Fainting-fits are of frequent occurrence: Amadas faints at the banquet when first he falls in love,® and continues to faint at intervals during the whole course of his love-sickness.® 1V. ll. 378-80. =

Al quer li set une si egre Anguisse, si cruel et fere, Quo mut est de estrange manere

Quo li desplaist et rens ne vout Tant cum ¢o dunt plus se dout, Sun desir li est a cuntraire, Ne set quo dire ne que faire. (V. Il. 288-94). $V. Il. 519-22. 4 >V. 1. 535. 7G irl. 3-5. * V. IL. 604, 898ff.

. un suspir a larun Pres par mi les vaines del quer. (V. ll. 350-1). SV. Il..603, 776, je cf. ll. 879, 892. BV, toaazo-

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The condition of Amadas as he lies in bed hardly able to eat or sleep has already been described. It may be noted that he suffers in silence, in the manner approved by the courtois code, which encoutages a cettain stoicism. When he first becomes aware of Ydoine, he is careful that no one shall hear his murmured prayer to het to have mercy on him;! and though he is later unable to conceal the fact of his sickness, he refuses to disclose the cause of

it. For once a secret is out, it is a secret no longer. When he does bting himself to confess his love, he does it in the approved couttois fashion, by allusion rather than direct statement, and his method of approach is described with a verbal ingenuity worthy of Chrétien.? It is a peculiar feature of love-sickness that its only cure is its cause; only Ydoine can heal Amadas. She holds his life and death in her hand, and if he dies, even though he kills himself, the

responsibility will be hers: ‘Ma vie est en vus et ma mort:

Peché ferex et mut grant tort, SZ me lesex murir issi.’* Apatt from teal physical symptoms, Amadas describes Ydoine’s power over him, and at the same time her indifference to that power, in physical terms, by a variation of the convention of the wandering heart. In this case, not only has the lover’s heart left his own body in the accepted manner, but the lady has refused it shelter, with the result that the poor thing is homeless: ‘Jo ai le giu si mal parti Quo vus me avex saché le quor Hors del ventre, dunt je mor,

Et si ne Paver pas ot vus; Ainz est perdi si entre nus:

Vus ne Pavez ne jo ne Pai.’® 1V, 1. 362-4. 3

Kar ¢0 est de amur la nature Ai descuverir en cuverture, En cuverant par raisun cuverte,

Descuverir parole auverte, Kar nul ne pot estre savant De amur, se il ne set en cuverant Tut sun curage descuverir E ben en descuverant cuverir. (V. Il. 577- 84). 3 Cf. Thomas Tristan ll. 1061-2, 2474-82, 2712; cf. Cross and Nitze Lancelot and Guenevere p. 87 n., and A. Hilka ‘Der Tristanroman des Thomasund die Disciplina Clericalis Zeitschrift fir franzdsische Sprache und Literatur XLV (1917) 38-46, suggesting as the ultimate source the Disciplina Clericalis. 4'V. ll. 799-801. 5 Il. 802-7.

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If, however, the physical effects of love are detrimental, it is

morally stimulating, as the knights of the court imply when, at the opening of the story they blame Amadas half-mockingly for his neglect of love, which is the only defect to be found in his otherwise, from the social point of view, perfect character. They remind him of the increase of vitality conferred by love, and of the moral and physical development which thereby results. If, they say of him, he were to love some ‘dame de valur’ or some ‘gentille pucele’: .. . de tus bens en amenderait, Plus curtais, plus francs serait,

Plus pruz, plus ardi, plus vaillant, De tutes rens plus enpernant2 Implied in their attitude is the view that if he chose to love, he could—that is, the courtly idea of “amour voulu’, love dependent on the will. In the same way, when Ydoine is first presented to the reader, her insensibility is shown as a moral blemish which she could remove if she liked. Love, however, considered now rather from the human than

the courtois point of view, may be stronger than the will. Amadas loves in spite of himself.? Love is irresistible, and can transform all ordinary values: D’estrange manere ovre Amur, Quant ben se paine en sun labur: De fine amertume fait mel, E de ducur savur de fel, De chaud frait, de frait chaut, De haut bas et de bas haut, De mal ben, de ben mal,

De grant desir ire mortal. The contradiction in the treatment of love, which becomes

evident as the story proceeds, runs through the poem as a whole, for though Amadas et Ydoine expresses in many ways the courtois attitude, there is another element in it which is in some measure

the reverse of courtois. The early phases of Amadas’ love are described with a good deal of courtly embellishment, but once his love is returned by Ydoine, the story changes its character, and deals henceforth with the various impediments to their 1V. Ul. 119-22.

2V. Ul. 323-6, 422-3.

SV. ll. 381-388.

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marriage; even in the early part of the story, with which we are here concerned, there are signs of a spirit that is opposed to couttoisie. Mattiage, far from being regarded as incompatible with love, is taken as a matter of course. It is true that Ydoine, as she sends

Amadas away to win renown, does not actually promise to marry him on his return, but it is clearly understood that she means to do so. And Amadas’ madness, brought on by the news of her approaching marriage with the Count of Nevers, shows that he regards her as lost to himself once she is the wife of another man. Already in the prologue the relation of the lovers is described as one of equality, with ‘grant leauté de ambes parts’; the story is one of mutual love between equals who remain faithful to each other throughout their lives. The disparity between them has already disappeared before we reach the point where the last AngloNorman manuscript breaks off. Ydoine has come to feel not only pity but a sense of responsibility, a consciousness that Amadas’ sufferings have given him a claim upon her and established an equality between her and himself. It is in the character of Amadas himself, and his conflicting feelings, that the opposition between the courtois and the noncouttois standpoints is most evident. Already in the account of the origin of his love there is a certain discrepancy. After the more or less conventional description of his falling in love, and a prophecy in the courtois manner of the mingled pleasure and pain which love has in store for him,! the author comments in a completely different style on the unaccountable nature of love and on how, after years of familiar intercourse, it may suddenly spting up between two people who all at once, in a flash of illumination, see one another with new eyes. There is no courtly phraseology in the passage;? it is a plain account of what may happen between any pair of people, irrespective of any particular 1V. ll. 270-98. 2 D’amer est estrange cose, Mervailes fait en poi de pose. Ki ben vudra esgarder, Mainte mervaile i pot noter; Quo il avint quo hom a vette Une dame et cunetie E ses murs et ses elemenz E ses faisances et ses talenz, E une feme averat veti Un hom et tant le averat cunu

/

Quo ben saverat ses qualitez Ei ses teches et ses buntez; De ammes parz se entrecunnistrunt. Hanté ensemble assez averunt Quo nul d’eus ne ait autre requis Ne a de certes ne a giu ne ris, E pois aprés, tut sait a cart, D’un sul semblant, d’un regart, S’entre amerunt desquo la mort Quo l’un senz Vautre nat confort (V. ll. 297-318).

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time of setting, an account of human rather than courtois relations. The human element in Amadas’ love is seen more clearly as the story goes on. He begins, in the courtly manner, by loving Ydoine to the exclusion of all other interests and acquiescing if not rejoicing in his sufferings. But almost from the start, he has misgivings about the wisdom of his conduct, and his submissiveness is qualified by a growing feeling of protest against the ignominy of loving with no hope of being loved in return: ‘Mut me est mun fol curage maistre, Quo tant me trait a nunsavance

E turne a si fole fesance Et desirer paine mortel, Senz confort ire cruel Quo tant me anguisse et tant me argue;

Senz estre dru tirer a drue, Senz amie estre ami: Mut ad ci mal gin parti.” As time passes, the conflict in his mind grows more intense and reaches its crisis after he has been lying sick of love for the greater part of two yeats. A tournament is being held at the Duke’s court, and Amadas, as he lies in bed, hears the voices of the

knights and squires going by beneath his window to take part in the sport. They are regretting his absence and the fact that he is sick and unable to display his prowess.? As he listens to their words he sees his position in a new light and is seized with a doubt as to whether after all he is not behaving like a fool.? The analysis of his feelings shows an interesting mixture of courtois and non-courtois elements. On the one hand, the fact that his

state of mind is analysed at all is characteristic of courtoisie, as is also the use of the monologue form? to expose the dilemma in which he finds himself; on the other hand, his revolt against the

tyranny of unrequited love, with his attempt to escape from its ‘prison lene’, is in direct opposition to the courtois spirit. The debate® is engaged between his youth and natural vigour on the one hand and his foolish love on the other. The natural vitality of youth impels him to leave his sick-bed and cease from tormenting himself, but not only is he now physically weak but 1V. ll. 454-62. 2V. ll. 1013-22, ®V. Ito24:8. 4V, Il. 1065-1110; 5Cf. the analysis of Tristan’s feelings at the time of his marriage with Iseult aux blanches

mains.

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his vitality is held in check by his ‘fol volair’, which robs life of all its savour as long as Ydoine remains inexorable: Sa juvence vout qu'il se leve Et quo il de ren ne se greve; Sa feblesce lui defent, Et sun fol volair ensement, Quo il ne desirt fors la mort, Si de sa amie nat confort. As the knights return at the end of the long summet’s day which Amadas has spent in taking stock of his position, they again lament over him; as he listens, his distress once mote becomes

acute and he is driven to seek some way out of a situation that is not only painful but ludicrous. He deplores the moral weakness and cowardice that prevent him from forcing an issue and either curing himself of his passion or prevailing upon Ydoine to return his love: “A mal ure fui engendré, Quant jo sui de si feble sens, St lasche, de si fol purpens, Quo jo ne mi puis castier Ne mun curage justiser De la rage dunt jo me mor, Ne vivre ne puis a nul for.* As things are, death is the only solution,? but even that is not so

easily found, for if he takes his own life it will be at the peril of his soul.4 The only way of courting death is to make a last attempt to move Ydoine, who, if that attempt fails, will have him beaten so severely that being already weak he will die on the spot, after which, he exclaims, his patience suddenly at an end and the couttois attitude abandoned, she may love whom she likes for all he cares: ‘Jo wi vai autre guarisun, Fors murir par cest achaisun. Puis aint ma dame u bas u haut,

Alprés mes jurz ren ne me chaut,”* than which it would be hard to find a less couttois remark. There is thus, as in the work of Hue de Rotelande, an opposi1, ll. 1037-42.

2V. I. 1066-72.

3'V, ll. 1082-5. 5 V. Il. 1107-10.

4V. ll, 1086-91.

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tion between the courtly and the non-courtly attitude, though the opposition shows itself differently in the two cases. In Ipomedon and Protheselaus there is a juxtaposition of varied or opposing elements; the two themes of love and adventure run through both poems, now one theme predominating, now the other, while the treatment of love itself approximates to the courtois type in some cases and departs from it in others. With Amadas et Ydoine, howevet, the different standpoints are not so

much in juxtaposition as in actual conflict, and the interesting thing is that the main conflict takes place in the mind of Amadas himself, coming to a climax when his common sense rebels against his position as a victim of love. It is a striking example of the way in which the doctrines and the outlook of courtoisie are interpreted in Anglo-Norman literature. The writers are well enough acquainted with courtois ideas and phraseology, so much is clear from a study of the romances which have just been analysed,but they cannot, or do not, accept whole-heartedly the courtois outlook.

CHaApter Lyric

VII

PoETRY

The degree to which courtoisie is present in the AngloNorman lyric is difficult to determine. The whole question of Provencal influence on lytic poetry in England is one of considerable difficulty. It has been investigated, as far as English literature is concerned, by Dr. Chaytor! and by the late J. Audiau,? whose chief concern is with Middle English but who deal incidentally with indications of troubadour influence on Anglo-Norman lyric poetry. It might have been expected that Anglo-Norman literature would be comparatively rich in lyric poetry going back to a fairly eatly date and showing the influence of the Provengal or Northern French schools, since, as we have seen, literary contacts between England and France, both north and south, were estab-

lished in the reign of Henry I], if not earlier. Such, however,is not the case. It may be that those lyrics which have been preserved teptesent only a small proportion of the total number, though the didactic and utilitarian spirit characteristic of Anglo-Norman works can hardly have been favourable to the lighter forms of literary composition;? the fact remains that, as Vising points out, ‘lytic poetry, other than religious, hardly exists inAnglo-Norman literature.’ Two groups of songs have been edited by Paul Meyer in the Romania, and one ot two poems have been published in other collections, but the total volume is very small and the literary value of the poems for the most part slight. Both the volume and the value would be increased if Gowet’s Cinkante Balades were to be included in Anglo-Norman poetry, but Gower, even when he is using the French language, belongs rather to English literature, and is conscious of writing French as a foreigner.’ Not only is Anglo-Norman lyric poetry extremely scanty; it is also very late in its appearance, since none of the poems which remain are earlier in date than the thirteenth 1H, J. Chaytor The Troubadours and England.

2 Les Troubadours et l’Angleterre.

3 Schofield English Literature from the Norman Conquest to Chaucer p. 133. 4 Anglo-Norman Language and Literature pp. 37-8. 5Cf. Traitié . . . pour essampler les amantz marietz, xviii, 24-7 (Works, ed. G. C. MacaulayI 391).

123

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centuty. In such poems as show courtly influence, it is thus not easy to be sure whence it derives. So many of the ideas and images ofiginating in Provencal poetry find their way into the work of the Northern French poets that parallels between the thought or imagery of an Anglo-Norman and a Provengal poet ate not necessarily a proof of direct influence, for the AngloNorman poet may have had a Northern writer as his model. However,

the exact source of courtois influence, when its

existence can be shown, is not perhaps of much importance. There is another and more serious difficulty arising from the late appearance of Anglo-Norman lyric poetry. It is already hard enough in the work of the earliest courtois writers to isolate what is distinctively courtois from what is of more general provenance. This difficulty becomes greater as the original exponents of the courtois standpoint are left further behind, and in reading AngloNorman lyrics it is impossible to say how far the writers are consciously influenced by the courtois tradition, either as regards _ideas ot expressions. By the latter part of the thirteenth century, ‘the ideas and the language of courtoisie had been in circulation for so long as to have lost much of their original freshness and _ passed into the common stock of literary clichés. Accordingly, - even where a poet—if the authors of Anglo-Norman lytic verse _ may be dignified by that name—makes use of the exaggerated terms employed by Provencal or Northern French couttois ~ poets, it by no means follows that he is trying to express the same - thoughts or feelings. The mere use of particular terms is not in _ itself a sufficient proof of a courtois turn of mind. Little of the - language of the troubadours or trouvéres themselves is of their own invention; it is the spirit in which they use it which is charactetistic, and in the case of the Anglo-Norman writers, even when they show an acquaintance with courtly phraseology, ‘much ‘of the spirit of courtoisie would seem to have evaporated. With these reservations in mind we may now examine such affinities with the chanson courtoise as appeat in Anglo-Norman lytic poetry, looking out particularly for similarities of thought and feeling. The Anglo-Norman lyric, as far as it represents the couttois attitude, expresses first of all the relation of the lover and his lady, a relation involving humble devotion on his side and a mixture of condescension and harshness on hers. This attitude on her part is to some extent justified, in the writers’ opinion, by the fact that she seems in many respects to embody

Lyric PoETRy

;

125

the courtly ideal of woman, both as regards moral and physical qualities. The other main theme is the complex nature of love, its blending of good and evil, or rather of pleasure and pain, and especially the joy of love which more than compensates the lover for the sufferings he has to endure. The idea of the lover as the faithful servant of his lady is expressed in the following lines, the opening of one of a set of seven songs: Jeo wi’en voys, dame [et] a Deu vous comaund,

Que vous honur et vostre compaignie. Ensi me dont |i\ceo que jeo demaund Cum je vous ai servi sanz tricherie E serviray tux les jours de ma vie The idea of entire devotion on the lover’s part appears in two poems from another group of songs. In one of them,? the lover declares that whether he is rewarded or not there is nothing he will not undertake in his lady’s service: Ne pur peines ne pur travaus Unke de ren ne me feins.? She holds him prisoner, and in mingled worship and supplication he begs her to have pity on him: ... Lujur a foynte meins

La pri cum amy certeins K’ele pense de sun prisun.A Another writer reminds his lady that she holds his heart in her keeping and that only she can heal the wound which her eyes have inflicted: Duze dame, des ore vus pri Pur cil ke dit est sire,

Ke deu mal aiex merci Ke tant mun quer empire: Mien n'est il pas! tu Pas seisi, St en seex le murel® The author of Longement me sui pené professes himself willing to 1 Rom. IV (1875) 378; Meyer comments on the regularity of the form—‘une chanson a trois couplets rimant abab baabbb’—and suggests that it may have been written in France. 2 Longement me sui pené, Rom. XV (1886) 252. $V. 17-18. “Il. 19-21. 5 De ma dame vuil chanter, Rom. 1V 375; Chaytot op. cit. pp. 148-9.

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die for his mistress: he is hers, body and soul, to dispose of as she

pleases:

Ai cele pur ki me moer Cors e alme e tut mun quer

Comand tut a sun pleisir} The poets comment without bitterness on their ladies’ harsh treatment of them. Even though it is undeserved, they do not complain, but accept it as something that cannot be altered. They are content to suffer for the lady’s sake, and there is also the feeling that her superior worth gives her a certain right to be atrogant. For by her moral and physical excellence, her beauty of mind and form, and her perfect poise, the lady approximates to the courtly ideal of woman. Her physical appearance, though it is described in detail by at least one poet, is not of particular importance in this connection. It reflects an ideal in accordance, certainly, with medizval taste, but not distinctively courtois, and indeed, not exclusively medieval. Incolouring, the lady is fair, with brilliant complexion.? This is the type portrayed, rather unexpectedly, by the poets of southern France, in as far as they give any detailed descriptions of the ladies they write about.? But the literary predilection for fairness as a criterion of beauty is much older than the troubadours, and goes back at least to classical times.* The insistence Tl. 49-51. f

Tant ad bele chevelure, Menue Ja recercelure, Tut en resplent un manoir. Si les flurs del] albespine Fuissent a roses assis, IN’ en ferunt colur plus fine Ke tad ma dame au cler vis;

(Quant le tens se renovele, ll. 54-6; Rom. XV 253).

(Ibid. ll. 73-6).

La char blanche plus ke cyne. (Ibid. 1. 79). ? Cf. Jeanroy: “Etudes sur l’ancienne poésie provengale’ II. Neauphilologische Mitteilungen XXIX 221-2. Cf. also R. Renier I/ tipo estetico della donna nel medio evo (Ancona 1885) pp.

2-11.

* For examples from classical poets cf. A. Baschet and F. S. Feuillet de Conches Les Semmes blondes selon les peintres de I’Ecole de Venise (1865) pp. 25-28; Ugo Foscolo Commento alla ‘Chioma di Berenice’, poema di Callimaco tradotto da Valerio Catullo—Considerazione decimaseconda: chiome bionde (Prose, acura di V. Cian (Scrittori d’Italia, Bari 1913), IL 319-27. On the practice, apparently widespread among medieval ladies, of dyeing the hair if Nature has made it dark, cf. Renier, op. cit., pp. 130-1, J. Houdoy La beauté des femmes dans la littérature et dans 1"art, du Xe au XVIe siecle (1876) p. 16. Both these writers quote in this connection St. Anselm’s De contemptu mundi (Migne P.L. CLVIL 696). The influence of the Song of Songs, so extraordinarily popular in the Middle Ages and which sets up a different ideal of beauty, seems less apparent in vernacular than in medieval Latin literature, notably the writings of the Cistercian school (and, to go to the other extreme, the poems of the Goliards).

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127

on grace and slenderness, which recurs constantly in Old French writers, may be taken as more characteristically medieval, but not necessarily as more courtois.? In any case, it is not emphasized and indeed barely mentioned, by the writers of Anglo-Norman lyric verse. Mote important as an expression of the courtois ideal is the account given by one poet of his lady’s appearance in as far as it expresses her disposition: Tant ad noble contenance Cele pur ki faz cest chant, Sage diz ¢ poi parlance, Duz regard e bel semblant. Mut est simple e poi riant... 3 The courtly quality of ‘mesure’ is implied in the description just quoted, and the writer goes on to mention the other virtues which she exemplifies, such as ‘franchise’ and ‘largesce’. Not only, however, is she beautiful and good in herself; her natural disposition has been developed by her courtly training, and her excellence is most clearly seen when she is considered not so much in herself as in her relations with other people. Courtoisie, inseparable as it is from a social background, is the ruling principle of her conduct: Deu! tant est de bonté pleine Ma dame al cors lunge e gent, E de parole certeine Beaus respunt [a] tute gent.

Bon mestre a ki ben aprent, Kar curtesie la meine, Franchise al cuer dreit [’aseine, Largesce sun cors t prent;

Meint hom pur lui joie enprent, Tant la trove sage e seyne.4 Jeanroy emphasizes the social consciousness which determines, in gteat measute, the troubadours’ conception of the ideal woman. It is in her social relations that she appears to full advantage: ‘sage en sa conduite et mesurée en ses projets, on la 1 Renier op. cit. p. 39; Jeanroy op. cit. p. 222, n. 2; Houdoy op. cit.p.56. Fliigel Psychology of Clothes (1930) p. 160.) 2 Tt is found commonly in the chansons de geste; c£. Jeantoy Joc. cit. 3 Quant le tens se renovele (Rom. XV 253), ll. 13-17. * Quant le tens se renovele, ll. 25-34.

(Cf. also J.C.

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LITERATURE

voit, en temps et lieu, plaisanter et rire, sourire avec grace, accueillir noblement, traiter chacun suivant son tang et ses mérites. . . Ce sont en somme les qualités de la parfaite femme du monde; et rien ne prouve mieux que la poésie dite courtoise fut bien réellement une poésie de salon.” The excellence of the lady seems, as it were, to make the poet’s sufferings worth while, unless indeed the relation of the lover and his mistress ought not rather to be considered from a different angle. It may be that the picture of the lady, with her surpassing beauty of face and form and still more of mind and heart, is in some measure a projection of the poet’s own feeling, an attempt to find a worthy object for his adoration. As Mme. Lot-Borodine expresses it, “au “fin coeur” en quéte de la perfection et qui veut s’agenouiller, il faut une divinité ou du moins une idole. On ne bridle l’encens que dans un temple.” For it is his own feeling in which the lover is primarily interested. In his professions of willingness to serve his lady to the uttermost, there is something besides disinterested devotion. It is not only for his lady’s sake but for his own that the poet is ready to suffer, and to endure the ‘duce maladie’. The pains of love ate not without their sweetness:? .... 4 mal west si pleisant Ke ja wen fle|rai semblant; Tut le preng par enveysure.4 In spite of his sufferings, the poet cannot separate himself from love: Ne puys, tant ke mort me fere, Amur guerpir, tant mest chere, Kar dedenz mun quer lai joynt® For whatever pain it may cause, it is better to have love, with its heightened sensibility, than to lead the placid but bovine existence of the loveless: Ore deit ben chescun entendre Cum amur est cher tresor;

Ki la pert sa joie est mendre, Kar meuz li vausit estre mort.® 1 Jeanroy op. cit. pp. 222-3. 2 Sur Jes origines et les fins du service d’amour pp. 227-8. 3 Longement me sui pené, \l. 13-16. 4 Tant cum plus ai mis ma cure (Rom XV 250), 1. 13. 5 Ibid., ll. 58-6o. ® Quant le tens se renovele, Il. 97-100.

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129

The effect of love on a man’s moral nature, with the demands it makes on him and the benefits it confers, is such as to outweigh

the suffering it entails. The stimulus to moral and physical excellence provided by love is the main theme of a short poem published by F. Michel. The writer imagines himself walking in a flowery orchard, thinking sadly of his ‘amye’ and wondering if she will ever accept his love, when he finds a paper giving a brief description of the power of the god of love: ... Li Deu de amur a bele seignurie Kant tous fine amanz ad en sa baillie, E les faux amans si des liens lie Qe a sei les tire de ben amer en partie. The last four lines of the poem are especially significant as being a concise statement of the ideal of courtly love. It is dependent on, and at the same time develops, nobility of character. It helps a man to fulfil the possibilities of his nature, strengthening his native qualities, correcting his faults, and enabling him to live with the utmost intensity of which he is capable: Amur se joint a dreite naturesse;

Kar leauté norist e donne pruesse, Curteisie voet, chasteté e largesse, E a ces soges tout udiveté e peresse. It is impossible from such a meagre collection of poems to draw any far-reaching conclusions on the subject of courtoisie in Anglo-Norman lyric poetry. As already suggested, the most significant fact is that such poetty is very scarce, for it is difficult not to see in the apparent neglect of secular lyric poetry a further illustration of the seriousness and the utilitarian bias which seem to be characteristic of the Anglo-Norman temperament. 1 Rapports. . . sur les anciens monuments de l’histoire et de la littérature de la France p. 113.

CuHapter VIII DocTrRINAL

LITERATURE

It is not easy to find a term which will describe all the works to be considered in this chapter. Some of them are included by Vising under the heading of didactic literature, while two are classed somewhat oddly as satirical or humorous pieces. The adjective ‘doctrinal’ may perhaps be used as an inclusive term, however, since they all deal, directly or indirectly, with the doctrine of love, with questions as to the type of the ideal lover, the relation between the lover and his lady, and the compatibility of love and marriage. Anglo-Norman doctrinal works seem to fall more or less into two groups, those in which the precepts of love are shown in action, as it were, by means of concrete examples, and those of a mote theoretical character. It is difficult, however, to draw a

hard and fast line between the two, for in several cases example and theory illustrate and explain one another, as in the work of all others belonging to this category and which has been desctibed as a kind of text-book of courtly love, the De Amore of

André le Chapelain. Written probably at the end of the twelfth centuty, and under the influence of Marie de Champagne, it expounds, as we saw, the theory of which Chrétien de Troyes’ Charrette supplies an illustration,! but actually it shows such a

peculiar blending of different points of view, including in some degree those of Ovid and of the medieval misogynist, that such a description of it is only partially true. In particular, the idea of love-setvice, the central conception of the Charrette as of the doctrine of courtly love, is not an essential part of André le Chapelain’s scheme,? according to which love, whatever its effects, is primarily ‘mentis insania’. It is certainly, however, a text-book of love, and extremely interesting for the light it throws on the conventions of medizval society.* Anglo-Norman literature, unlike that of France, hardly bears traces of a direct influence of the De Amore, but it includes

several works whose subject is the theory or the conduct of a love in some degree courtois. In some of these, the author expresses 1 Gaston Paris (Rom. XII (1883) 532). » Langdon-Davies A Short History of Women (1928) p. 244. 3 Bossuat Drouart la Vache (1926) p. viil.

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Doctrinal

LITERATURE

131

his own standpoint through the mouths of his characters, as in the Donnei des Amanz' and the poems of Blancheflour et Florence and Melior et Ydoine,? which raise the problem of the telative merits, as lovers, of the clerk and the knight. Besides a Lester to a Lady, giving advice as to the choice of a lover and how to behave towards him, there exist in Anglo-Norman two definitions of love—a short trilingual poem of three verses,? and a longer definition in prose*—and finally an allegorical poem® by an unknown author of the fourteenth century. The earliest of the writings in which the principles of courtly love are illustrated rather than described is the Donnei*® des Amanz, which is also the oldest specimen of this whole class of literature. Gaston Paris is inclined to place it at the end of the twelfth century. The author’s name does not appear, but from his erudition and from his desire to instruct his readers it seems safe to conclude that he is a clerk; he has the medieval (and not only medieval) distrust of literature which cannot be shown to have some didactic value, though it need not be of a very obvious kind.’ The poem consists mainly of the conversation of two lovers, which the poet is supposed to overhear; the lover assures the lady of his love and asks for her favour, to which she teplies that the circumstances are not propitious, meaning, according to Gaston Paris, that she will be able to indulge her love mote freely when she has a husband. To illustrate their arguments, the lovers tell three stories, not altogether to the point: the Aesopic fable of the man and the serpent, and the Indian tale of the man and the bird, for both of which the author has drawn largely on the Disciplina Clericalis of Petrus Alphonsus, and finally, the story of Iseut stealing out by night from Mark’s bed to meet Tristan. Thete are certain obviously courtois elements in the poem, of which perhaps the most important is the exclusiveness which makes the poet refuse to recognize any but the aristocratic and 1Ed. G. Paris (Rom. XXV 497 ff.). 2 Ed. P. Meyer (Rom. XXXVII (1908) 221 ff., 236 ff.), 3 Ed. P. Meyer (Rom. IV 383).

4 Ed. P. Studer (Mélanges . . . Thomas p. 434).

5 MS, Arundel 14, College of Arms. 8 “Ce mot a été emprunté vers le milieu du XIle siécle au ptov. domnei, tiré du vetbe domneiar,

“faite la cour

aux dames, faire amour”.

Les sens de donnei se sont variés et

étendus: le plus habituel, comme le plus ancien, est celui qu’il a dans notre texte de “conversation amouteuse, entretien galant’”’.’ Rom. XXV 523. 7 G. Paris, Rom. XXV 525. 8 Cf, chapter iii.

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LITERATURE

somewhat artificial world in which he moves and to which the realities of ordinary life, as symbolized by the ‘vilain’, are not to be admitted. Early on a spring day, the poet is walking barefoot in the dew listening to the songs of the birds. Going towards an enclosed garden, and looking at the apple trees in blossom, he shares in the general gladness and thinks of the goodness of God as reflected in the joy of His creatures, when all at once his happiness is spoilt by the thought of the ‘vilain’. For the ‘vilain’ stands for a way of life entirely opposed to the ideals of courtoisie, a way of life about which the courtly lover would rather not have to think, and which is incompatible, in particular, with the courtly virtue of joy: .. . mut est fel quer de vilein, E Ja sue vie est maudite,

Quant en joie ne se delite. Li suens deliz west fors grucer, Pendre surcilz, batre e tencer,

Aver tux jorz morne semblant, Hair deduiz, joie et chant. Contraire est mut la sue vie A\ Ja celeste armonie E as angeles de parais Ki devant Deu chantent tut diz Grumbling is as natural to the vilain as growling is to a dog: Li vilein n’ad de joie cure, Kar ¢o ne li cheut de nature. Vilein oblie sun grucer Quant chen ne set més rechiner. Further, the lover’s relation towards the lady is that of a humble servant, begging for pity. The sufferings which his love causes him have become so acute that he can no longer conceal them, and his passion must be disclosed: ‘Issi men vait changant tut dis Ceste dolur de mal en pix. Bel{e| amie, nel quer celer, Kar mau gré men TPestut mustrer.’? She is the cause of his distraught condition, of the 1], 26-36,

2 I, 63-6,

Il. 239-42.

DoctRINAL ¢

LITERATURE

a3

Lrant travail, Dunt je suspir, pens e tresail, E perd memerie a essiént.”

If she would, she could offer the remedy for his sickness; not only his peace of mind, but his happiness, his health, his fortune and his very life depend upon her, indifferent to them as she is: “Vus qui tenex el poin enclos E men travail e men repos, Tote ma joie e ma tristur, Mal e ben, mun ris [e| mun plur, E ma langur e ma santé, Ma richesce, ma poverté, Ensurquetut ma mort, ma vie,

De men travail ne vus cheut mie.* Such power is not without its responsibilities, and he argues that if she does not take pity on him and he therefore kills himself she will be guilty of murder, a suggestion to which she replies with characteristic common-sense: ‘Homicides ne serrai pas, Ke wai talent de vus tuér Ne mei ne vus fere huér.® This sense of practical reality appears in her whole attitude. She is actuated, in her refusal to grant her love, by the fear of

losing her good name. She would gladly give him proof of her favour, but she is afraid of what people might say,‘ and in losing her reputation she would lose her lover’s good opinion as well. It may be remarked that she has not much faith in his sincerity, for elsewhere she comments on the discrepancy often to be found between a man’s looks and feelings; a sad countenance does not prove a stricken heart: ‘Kar li alquant gettent suspir, Dolent, pleinent cum al morir, Vunt sovent a munt ea val,

E [i] al quer unt point de mal, Kar il nen eiment fors a gas.® 1 Il, 247-9.

2M. 355-62. Cf. also l. 384: ‘Ne estes vous ma mort, ma vie’? CE. Trestan ll. 1061-2, 247482, 2712, and Amadas et Ydoine, 1. 799.

3 I. 318-20.

4 IL. 296-8.

5 Il. 679-83.

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LITERATURE

She seems to be guided entirely by principles of worldly wisdom. Motives of prudence rather than the fear lest their love should be profaned make her insist that that love is to be kept secret. If what may be called the standards of courtly morality ate of little importance to her, she is still less troubled by any considerations of Christian ethics. As Gaston Paris says, ‘toute idée religieuse est étrangére 4 la conception de l’auteur, qui vante la joie et amour aux dépens de la vie morose des gens sérieux, et a celle de la demoiselle, qui est arrétée dans son désir

de complaire 4 son ami par la crainte du déshonneur et nullement par celle du péché.’ Two wotks that hold an intermediate position between the Donnei des Amanz and those of a more theoretical nature are the poems of Blancheflour et Florence and Melior et Ydoine. The theme of the relative merits as lovers of the clerk or the knight is treated already by Ovid;? it becomes a subject of debate in the Middle Ages, the earliest and perhaps the most important vetsion of it being the Latin poem De Phillide et Flora, which may go back as far as the beginning of the twelfth century and is anyhow probably older than the Concile de Remiremont, in which the same question is discussed. The oldest form of the debate in the vernacular is the Jugement d’ Amour, also known as Florence et Blanchefleur, belonging to the end of the twelfth or the beginning of the thirteenth century, and based on Phillis et Flora. 'The date of the two Anglo-Norman debates cannot be exactly determined, not their relation to one another, but it seems clear that they are later than the Continental versions; while Blancheflour et Florence is evidently the work of someone familiar with the Jugement d’Amour, Melior et Ydoine is based to some extent on the poem of Hueline et Aiglantine, of which only a fragment remains. The Anglo-Norman versions ate peculiar in that the poet represents himself as overhearing the conversation of the girls who are discussing the theme of clerk v. knight, and Blancheflour et Florence is unique in giving the final advantage to the knight. This, M. Faral suggests, may be due to the influence of lyric poetry; certainly ue form—the poem consists of seventy-two 1 Rom. XXV_ 529. 2 Amores II 8. 3 Raral Recherches; Les débats du clere et du chevalier dans la littérature des XIIe et XIIIe siécles. * Op. cit. p. 237: ‘La forme lyrique que présente Blancheflour semble étre en accord avec le caractére littéraire du début, qui décéle une imitation du_genre pastourelle. D’autre part, ce poéme, qui attribue le ‘beau se au chevalier, a, par le fond méme, certains | tapports avec les pastourelles o4 un chevalier se vante de quelque victoite amoureuse. .. .

DocrTRINAL

LITERATURE

135

vetses of six octosyllabic lines rhyming aabccb—suggests such influence, while the preference given to the knight is in keeping with the spirit of many of the pastourelles. The work appears originally to have been written in English by a man named Banastre and then translated into Anglo-Norman by a certain Brykehulle.1 It opens with the description of a garden, ‘plein d’amour et de joye’, in which the poet is walking, and which is filled with the harmony of every sort of instrument; the bed of the stream which flows through it is strewn with all kinds of jewels, and from the trees, a very miscellaneous collection, including hollies, fig trees, birches and olives, comes the melody of birds, from nightingales to puffins,? uttering Notes noveles de grant douceour; E si estoit en temps de may, Quant les herbes dounent odour E sont de trés fresche verdour. Beside the stream where they have been bathing, Florence and Blancheflour are sitting talking: Filles furent au prince ou roi, E ceo aparust en lur conrot Bien taille of beau visage.* Their talk turns on the question of love, and Florence asks Blancheflour whom she has chosen as her lover, to which Blancheflour, as soon as she has recovered from the confusion

induced by the mention of her lover,® replies that she loves a clerk—‘un clerc de grant savoit.’ Florence reproaches her companion for her mistake in choosing a man with whom marriage is impossible and whom she cannot honourably love.® She then draws an unpleasant picture Be

;

Banastre en englois le fist, E Brykbhulle cest escrit En franceois translata.

emer yatns

2 Il. 73-90. ‘N’était la forme versifiée on croirait lire quelqu’un de ces glossaires que l’on connait sous le nom de nominalia, et ou. les mots sont classés par matiétres. Des listes analogues se tencontrent dans les traités qu’on a composés en Angleterre pour faciliter l’étude du francais, p.e. dans le traité de Walter de Bibbysworth.’ Rom, XXXVII 224. 3 I. 92-95. 4}. 100-102. W A ceo Blancheflour enpaly, Puis devint vert, puis enrougi, E bien sovent la colour mue. (ll. 148-150). $I. 169-174. Cf. Faral Recherches p. 238: ‘il apparait que, conttairement aux versions antérieutes, les auteurs (of Blancheflour et Florence and Melior et Ydoine) pensaient aux prétres, et non plus aux clercs mondains que ne trégissait pas la loi de célibat’.

136

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of the clerk, as he sits in church, turning over with dirty hands

the pages of his missal.t His sole concern is with material comfort: ‘.. . com un pork manjue et boit; Ensi sa vie fine’ Florence’s own lover is a knight, a “chevaler .. . de haut honour’, for whom fighting is the breath of life; he goes off at once to take part in any tournament he hears of, and challenges any knight whom he meets. She concludes by reminding her sister that clerks ate often of low

birth. Blancheflour, much

annoyed,

retorts with a picture of the wretched condition of the knight on his return from a tournament, wherefore, she concludes:

‘bien batu e a fieble arroie’,

‘. .. por ceo ne preise Jeo mie

Lor bobaunce ne lor veidie A\ la value dun oef pelee.”® The dispute ends in a burst of teats, but not before they have decided to submit their case to the judgment of the god of Love. When the appointed day arrives, they set off, richly dressed and with jewels in their hair, to ride to Love’s castle. Only those may enter whom Love wishes to receive, and the ‘vilain’ need not

hope to be admitted. The two girls, however, ate welcomed, and taken into Love’s chamber where he lies on a bed of flowers. ... de si trés bele diverse coloures Qe ceo sembloit parays Plus ge autre terriene chose.’ He receives them, and Blancheflour explains their problem.® Love assembles his court of bitds and asks them to give their decision. The sparrow-hawk supports the knight, from his own experience and a study of the books on the art of love. The lark, on the other hand, is in favour of the clerk, as being the fount of 2 4 211, 232-4. 3 :

‘E of ses meins que taunt sount noirs Maigne graeauz e tropeirs, E sur Dieu reschine.’ (ll. 181-3). Mes d’une chose soiex certein,

Qe chascon fiz de vilein

A Pentree serra destourbee. (Il. 283-5). 41. 302-4.

Eee

Bee

DoctrinaL LITERATURE

137

learning, in matters of love as in other branches of knowledge, and offers to defend this view in combat. The popinjay takes up the challenge on behalf of the knight, and in the combat which follows defeats the lark, whereupon Blancheflour dies of grief,

while Florence goes away in triumph. The arguments are not of a very exalted character on either side. Florence values as much as anything the material and social advantages which accrue to her from the prowess of her knight: when he has been victotious in a tournament and unhotsed a knight, he brings the horse to het! and she shates in the praise which he wins: ‘Lors le gree de la criée AA mon ami est donée Entierement, saunz feintise.’? Blancheflour, on the other hand, praises the clerk as a lover mainly because he does not run the same risk of being incapacitated as does the knight. . The arguments for and against the clerk and knight are further elaborated in Mesior et Ydoine. Here the setting is somewhat different. The whole action takes place in the garden in which the poet finds himself,? and the discussion begins, not between two gitls only, but among a company of ladies, assembled in a manner which almost suggests a court of love. After twelve lines on the advantages of travel and its educational value, the author describes the orchard (near Lincoln) where a group of ladies are discussing matters of love, talking this time not so much of their actual expetiences as of hypothetical cases, and considering the question, from the theoretical point of view, of the telative merits of the clerk and the knight. As the rubric says, ici troverex quel vaut mieux a amer

gentil clere ou chivaler. The discussion is opened by a lady asking advice as to the choice of a lover: ‘Jeo serrot par amur a amer Sz loial amur purroi trover, Mes jeo ne sai quel vaut meux a amer, Gentil clere ou chivaler.’* 1], 199. 3 Cf. Faral op. cit. p. 238.

2 Il, 202-4. 4. 59-62.

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CouRTOISIE IN ANGLO-NORMAN LITERATURE

Another replies in favour of knights, as being ‘hommes monde’: ‘Mult sunt dignes a’avoir amur Les chivalers de graunt valur, Car il sevent a dreit parler E courtoisement dauneer.»

du

A third lady, with some hesitation, puts in a word for the clerks,

and appeals to the assembled company of girls to settle the matter: ‘Qe dite vous, mes damoiseals, Qe damur savex les quereles??? In response to this challenge, Ydoine states the case on behalf of the knights; they know how to love ‘sanz feintise e sanz fauser’, whereas the clerks are flighty and not to be relied on.? At this, Melior leaps to her feet in anger, to defend the cen whose love is sweeter than anything under the sun: ‘Soutz ciel n’i ad si douce rien Come amur de clerc, ceo sachex bien. Amur de clere est trie chose;

Si come est la flour de rose Plus noble ge west de autre flour, Asi est de clere Pamur Plus noble, plus fin, verroiment,

Qe nule autre manere de gent.’* Ydoine replies with a contrasting picture of the knight, in splendid attire, and the clerk, ‘haut tonduz et rés’”® and bashful in

manner. The knight, she goes on, wins prowess in tournaments, and sends her the spoil, whereas the clerk’s prowess consists in turning the pages of his psalter.* To this Melior retorts with a list of the presents to be expected from a clerk, and contrasts his well-preserved condition with the sad state of the knight on his WH eh

. 111-8,

8

a 79-80.

bars

‘Ja ne seit il si grant mestre, I] ne fra nule autre rien Pur vostre amur, sachez bien, Fors en la glise, devaunt l’auter, Fere e dire sun sauter, Tourner les foilles cea e laa (sic); Ceo est la prowesse q’il fera.’

ECE E

(ll. 160-6),

DocrrinaL LITERATURE

139

return from the tournament, wounded and impoverished, having had to sell his estates to meet his expenses. Ydoine points out the - dishonour entailed in being loved by a clerk, whereas the love of knights brings no shame with it. Melior accuses the knight of taking bribes and giving corrupt judgment “en enquest e en assise’ and Ydoine then suggests presenting the case for judgment to the birds of the wood close by. She chooses the mavis as her spokesman and Ydoine the nightingale, and the turtle-dove is to pronounce the sentence. After short speeches by the mavis and the nightingale, the turtle-dove gives judgment in favour of the clerks. Knights, he agrees, ate worthy of love, but they are inconstant, and they boast of their prowess in love, whereas clerks are discreet: ‘“Meux veulent la mort. suffrir Qe lur amur descovrir.’ And finally, he uses the argument of Phillis et Flora and the Jugement d’Amour and represents the clerk as the fountain of knowledge and of all good things. Ydoine objects to this sentence, and the mavis and nightingale are armed with flowers, each by the lady whose cause he is defending. This time the nightingale is victorious, on behalf of the clerks: Mieuz est li clers a amer Qe li orgoillouse chivaler® On the whole, though the result of the combats is different, the arguments used in the two poems are very similar, and mainly of a materialistic nature. In Melor et Ydoine as in Blancheflour et Florence the knight’s love is recommended for the material iS

‘Venir poent assez sovent Saunz mesparlaunce de la gent; Car il apent a chivaler A gentilles dames aquointer; Ceo poent il fere asex sovent

Sanz mesparlaunce de la gent.’

(ll. 215-20).

21, 240. 4

3]. 327-8. ‘Uncore vous die autre rien,

Qe de clers vient tuit nostre bien: Trestout le sen de nostre vie,

Queintise e curtoisie, Valour e amur e druerie, Crest escrit de clergie.’

>I. 403-4.

(ll. 329-34).

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LITERATURE

advantages it brings with it, in providing which, however, the clerk may equal or excel his rival. In both poems, the knight, returning from the tournament, wounded and, in Mesor et Ydoine, penniless, is represented with a crude realism,! not found in the Continental Jugement d’ Amour. Faral is perhaps not unduly hard on the Anglo-Norman poems when he describes them as degenerate versions of the original.debate.? The other works to be considered in this chapter discuss rather than illustrate the theory of love. Besides a definition of love in the form of a short trilingual poem, written in the fourteenth century,* there is a prose definition’ belonging to the same period. It is in three sections, the first of them being the definition proper, the second a list of the qualities to look for in choosing a friend, and the third a set of precepts for the conduct of lovers. It is perhaps significant that directions for lovers and for friends are given in the same work, and that in the rules for the conduct of !

‘Kar, quant il vendra d’un tornois, Bien batu e a fieble arroie, Of los oex ensenglaunteex E ses jaumbes e ses braz Nafrez, fiebles, feintz e laas, E tot le corps deberdillez, Si sa dolour voex asswager, Chaude fiens dois aparailler, Que ton ami soit cocheex.’ Blancheflour et Florence (Ul. 217-225). ‘Quant de turnoiment est repeiré, Batue, ledement defoulee, En fens covient qe l’en li couche;

Ai peine n’avera fraunche la bouche.’

4 2 Recherches p. 239. :

Melior et Ydoine (Ul. 199-202). Amor est quedam mentis insania Que vagum hominem ducit per devia; Sitit delicias et bibit tristia, Crebris doloribus commiscens gaudia. Amur est une pensée enragiée Ke le udif humme meyne par veie deveye, Ke a seyf de delices et ne beyt ke tristesce.

Love is a selkud wodenesse That the idel man ledeth by wildernesse, That thurstes of wilful{nesse}, And drinket sorwenesse, And with lomful sorewes menget his blitheness. P. Meyer ‘Mélanges de poésie anglo-normande’ Rom. IV 382. Cf. also a reference by Paul Meyer (Rom. IV 384) to a definition of love (4 lines) by John of Garland, characterizing it as ‘insania mentis’, etc. 4Ed P. Studer (Mélanges ... Thomas p. 433).

DocrrinaL

lovers, the terms

LITERATURE

141

‘amant’ and ‘amy’ are apparently used as

synonyms.t Certain courtois ideas are to be found in this treatise, as for

instance the representation of love as a law to itself: “Amut est seingnur de lui mesmes, e ne est al comandement de nuly, ne al ptiere ne al consail de nuly’. Courtly, too, is the account of its

otigin (coming from the heart and ‘conveyee par la vewe’,.. . ‘conveyee de l’oeil santz savoir de medisantz’) and of its nature. It is a disease, but one of which the patient has no wish to be cuted: ‘une pleisante mal[a]die que ard et destruit son mestte, et ne puit a cely que li ad desplete.’ On the other hand, it is in some degree a natural force, independent of reason, having nothing in common with the ‘amout voulu’ of courtoisie: ‘amour est un naturele desir de quoer; encountre lui sen ne reson ne purtra valoit’. What is most significant, perhaps, and furthest removed from the courtly idea of love-service, is the assumption of equality in the relation of the lover and his lady. They are not to have sectets from one another: ‘cat ou soen amy deit hom son conseil

treter, ge leal amy ou leal amye ne deit riens a son amy celiet’. Their property is to be common, ‘car hounte serreit que un setteit riches et li altre povers’. If either sees the other in fault, he ot she is bound to give advice, ‘car amonestier et estre amonesté droite lei est d’amisté’. Each is to keep the other’s counsel and to defend him or her when absent. They are to be in fact, ‘per a pet’. The author, as Studer points out, is inspired by good sense rather than romantic feeling: ‘il fait appel au bon sens plutét qu’a l’autorité des anciens, et ses conseils s’adaptent a la moralité bourgeoise plutdét qu’a Vidéalisme chevaleresque’.? Equally practical is the tone of the Letter to a lady containing admonitions concerning behaviour to a lover.® ‘The letter, which is dated 1299, is addressed by the author, presumably a clerk, to the ‘tresnoble Dame Desyree’, to whom the writer gives advice on the selection of a lover and her conduct towards him when he has been chosen. Cf. A. Pages Auzias March et ses prédécesseurs p. 330,00 the development of the theory of (courtly) medieval love under the influence of Atistotle’s idea of friendship: ‘L’amitié se tapproche de l’amour jusqu’a se confondre avec lui, et on applique a celui-ci tout ce qu’ Aristote avait écrit de celle-la’. Cf. in Wright Spec. ofLyric Poetry (1842) p. 18, the poem “Cyl ge vodra oyt mes chauns’ on friendship but which sets out to teach (1. 7) ‘la lessoun a Jeals amantz and cf.1. 65 (on friendship): “Uncore y a en fyn amour chose ge molt me agree.’ 2 Mélanges Thomas p. 434. $id.) 2Koch.

142

CourTOISIE

IN ANGLO-NoRMAN

LITERATURE

The writer regards himself as responsible for the lady’s welfare, especially in matters of love—‘vus . . . suy tenuz counceyler en totes choses ke valier vus pount, nomement en amouts, pat quey multes nobles Dames gentilez e sages meyntefoyz sunt decuz e maumenés’—and he charges her, as she is anxious to obey the god of love, only to choose a lover in accordance with the advice he is about to give: jo vus maunke.. . ke ia chiualer, Clerk, ne Esquier, ne nul ametz, si il ne soyt de les manets e les condiciouns les queus io maunke en Escrist. Kar saunz ces poyntz ne poet amour longement endurer, ne ia Dame bon amur esprouet’.

After enumerating the six characteristics which she must look for, the writer tells the lady how she may test her potential lovet’s possession of them, and finally draws up the form of the compact which after a sufficient lapse of time may be made between them. The picture here given of the ideal lover conforms in great measute to the couttois code. It is briefly summarized as follows: the man whom the lady chooses must be ‘de gentil manere en touz poyns, coy, de meure porture, celaunt sour totes choses, leus principaument, e pus, ma dame, ke vus eyme sur totes autres e plus ke reyn ke soyt desouz la nowe deux’. From the detailed description which follows of the ways in which these qualities will show themselves, it is clear that the ideal in the author’s mind is that of the ‘homme du monde’. It is the effect of the lovet’s virtues on those around him that is emphasized; his virtues ate social virtues, and it is primarily as a member of society, not simply as an individual, that he is represented. He is to be courteous in his behaviour to all,! liberal with his money while avoiding extravagance,? and careful about the society which he frequents. His demeanour should be modest and restrained, neither too lively nor too retiring. As a lover, he must be discreet and keep his own counsel and that of his friends. He must fulfil the promises that he makes to his lady, and be willing to suffer inconvenience and harm in order to keep his 1 ‘de bel apeel a checon homme, auttesi ben a pouetes com Riches.’ (Ll. 19 ff.). 2 “fraunk soulun co ke il pout despendte a touz ceaus ke valet ly porunt ou en feet, ou en dist, noun pas foularge, ne trop eschars. (Il. 25 ff.). 3 “Veez,... si il parle trop volenters e saunz enchesoun e saunz estre atesounné pat autre,

ou il seyt trop janglaunt e trop wakeraunt de ses pees, ke il ne sache tener en vn leu, ou trop

movaunt de ses meyns, ttop gay de ses oez en regardant, trop voluntrif ou nounchalers de

sey meymes, ou de auttes contenauncez trop sauages: cely ne deuez amet.’ (Il. 39 ff.),

DocrrinaL LITERATURE

143

word, and his devotion must be so exclusive that he will be ready

to sacrifice the friendship of other women. The lady’s position of superiority is assumed from the beginning; the choice rests with her, and the lover has to fulfil her conditions during a long period of probation before she will accept him. On the principle that only what is hardly won will be properly valued, she is to be so discouraging in her manner that he will almost despair of gaining her favour: ‘kaunt il vus prie de amouts e dist ke il vus eyme, fetez vus mout estrange e durement le blamez de cele priere e reprouez si harogeousement, ke il ne quide vos amurs conquere pur teyn ke soyt’.1 She must test him for seven yeats, and only in the seventh year of theit acquaintance may she receive him, ifhe has proved himself satisfactory, as her accredited lover. When the time comes for them to make a formal pact of love, the lady is to have one of her friends with her to act as a witness: ‘pernez de ly un serment devaunt acoune cumpayne en la quelle vus affyez de ben celer vostte conseyl. Kar co ly fra mout plus sa surté tenyt, sy il entent ke autre ke vus le sache’.? This note of realism, not to say commercialism, runs through

the whole document. When the lady is putting the lover to the test, she is to see if he is willing to hand over to her any jewels that other ladies may have given to him, though she had better not accept them.? She is to mention casually in his presence, though without addressing herself to him, various things that she wants, and if the man is a true lover her wants will be

supplied without a word. And finally in the sixth year of his probation she is to ask him to do something that involves expense and personal inconvenience: ‘pus apres dites ly ke il face acune chose put vus ke il ne put fere saunz meschef de cots ou de chateus, si cum aler a la court de Rome ou alyours loungteyn pays a ses coustages, demeyne pur l’amour de vus’.* Such is the final test; it is only after she has proved his sincerity by

seeing if his passion is able to loosen his purse-strings that she is

to offer him her love—if she receives proper security: ‘dites ke ne le voylez amer, sy il ne voyle obliger soun cors e ses chateuz e

oil Saf

1

3, . . ‘Syl eyt joueus ke autres dames ou damoysels ly unt doné, agardez sil les vus voyle doner e de sa fraunche volunté profeter, esiil le face, cestun signe ke il vus eyme, mes ne le pernez pas, nomement au comencement de vostre amur. Kar cel ly mettera en plus fort espeyt de petdte vos amouts.’ (Il. 105 ff.). 411. 120 ff.

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CourRTOISIE IN ANGLO-NoRMAN

LITERATURE

kaunt ke a ly apent, a vostre volenté, e a co feyre surté tele come ly deviserez.’ In spite of much that is courtly, both in thought and expression, the Letter shows a fundamental if veiled cynicism that looks forward to works like the Ouinze Joyes du Mariage rather than backward to the earlier literature of courtoisie. The blending of courtois and non-courtois elements is seen, better perhaps than in any of the other works of this type, in a long allegorical poem of the fourteenth century. As it is so far unpublished,? it may be permitted to quote from it at some length. It is an account of a conversation between the poet and the god of Love, whose castle he visits in a dream, and who explains to him the precepts of love. The writer dreams that he is riding through a forest on a spring day, and comes to a tower, in front of which is a blind boy, naked except for the armour on one of his legs. The child’s hair is yellow like gold, and he wears a crown of tare jewels; he has brightly-coloured wings of various shades, and carries a dart in one hand, a fire-brand in the other,

and a box of ointment slung over one arm. As he speaks, roses fly out of his mouth, like sparks from a fire when it is stirred. In front of the castle is a moat, full of serpents. Also outside the castle stands an old man dressed in black, with two youths,

spying on the castle by means of a kind of mangonel fitted with a mirror. The poet salutes the child? and asks his name, but Love, for that is who the child is, tells him they are already acquainted, and recites the list of his subjects, from emperors and kings downwards; the poet recognizes him, and professes his readiness to setve him. The answets given by Love to the seties of questions put to him ate a kind of outline of the art of love. The poet begins by inquiting about the child’s blindness, and learns that he was born with it; it is Love’s lack of sight which accounts for people loving beneath their

rank; if he could, he would match them more

suitably. The boy explains the meaning of his leg-armour: love te 126 08 2MS. Arundel XIV (College of Arms). Vising tefets to it (Anglo-Norman Language and Literature p. 63) as being the work of Walter de Henley, but actually there is no indication of the author’s name.

S231

Vera

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145

induces prowess, for the lover feels himself unworthy and sets himself to win glory for his lady’s sake: ‘Quant il entent qu il est amé d’une dame de tiel bounté, il se purpense en suspirant

ke il ne vaut taunt ne quant; forment s’esmaye, ne scie(n)t quoi fere, mais met sa peine de moy plere, et me requert nyt € jor

ke li face taunt de honor ke parmy moy puisse valer @’attiendre affaire soun voler. Par ma vertu et moun poer al se comence a porpenser

que nul ne deit estre amys si il ne pust entrer em pris.” Concerning his dart, Love tells the poet that he has already felt it. He describes his usual procedure: the dart inflicts the wound in the first place, then the fire-brand aggravates it further until the lover’s only hope is in Love himself; at this point Love anoints him with the ointment that he carries, and the lover, thus comforted, vows never to abandon Love’s service, Once

the ointment is applied, Sa ne soit il si maumys il sera tout seyn et tut sanné saunz sentir mal ou grefte; car, tut autre mys en ubly, de joye sera repleny, en ceo prent un volunté que, por nul mal ou por grefté, ne voelt lesser soun enprise,

taunt luy plest moun service.’* The ring, a diamond, is a symbol of marriage, on which the child insists as a necessary condition of love, making a sharp distinction between virtuous love and the reverse, and again insisting upon marriage. The roses flying out of the boy’s mouth are the sweet words of lovers to one another in the early stage of their acquaintance, 1F. 232 v. 1-2.

akin 233) Vetee

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LITERATURE

through which they are led on unsuspecting to incur the pains of love: ces sount les paroles et le dys ke l’amye et Pamys entreparlent a comencement, quant ils ne sievent mye coment

ils serrount del dart persé et del tisoun enbracé;

car Sils seussent al primer, quant ils comencent d’amer, ke apres lour deust avenir, sachés, les uns vuillent guenchir: mais ils troevent taunt doucz delitz en lor parols et en lor dys, k’yl entendent toutdiz amer, Saunz peyne ou anguise endurer. The serpents in the moat, who occasionally catch one of the flowers and destroy it, are the envious people who delight to seize on lovers’ words and tear them to pieces. The castle of Love, the child explains, is built on loyalty, and the tower itself is ‘loial coer’. The old man and the youths lurking outside are Love’s enemies, Falsehood and his two sons, Treason and Mistrust, and

the engine with the mirror which they have directed against the castle, and by which alone they can spy on Love’s movements, is Jealousy. For, contrary to the poet’s expectation,? Jealousy proceeds, not from Love but from Mistrust, and is the enemy of Love. . At this point, the poet, full of compunction for the jealousy to which

he himself, in his ignorance, has given way, entreats

Love’s help against this vice, and promises to serve him faithfully. Love accordingly expounds his precepts: ‘Beaux amys, et jeo otray; pus que vous avetz talent de moy servir loyalment, jeo vous dirray bonement quant que a fine amaunt apent.® TRE 234 Vewe 2 F, 236 r. 1; cf. André le Chapelain De Amore pp. 145, 310. 2 F236 va 20

DoctRINAL

LITERATURE

147

The first point is loyalty, ‘le fundement de bounteé’; a loyal heart will help the lover to resist the wiles of Falsehood. The second point is courtesy: ‘gui que voelt aver amye ne covient pas qu il se ublie a eschivre affaire vilaignie; toutdys parler courtaysement a fyne amaunt tres bien apent.” The lover’s courtesy will appear especially in his attitude towards women, whom, like the lover in the Roman de la Rose, he is to

honout and defend: ‘Toutes femmes deit honorer, toutditz le bien de eux parler, car tiel que vount femmes blamaunt en fount trope desavenaunt, car nul ne trovera enchaisoun de femes dire si ben noun, Much of the slandez directed against women is simply an excuse on the part of faithless lovers to get rid of them. Thirdly, the lover is to be discreet: ‘Le tier poynt de fyne amaunt si est d’estre bien celaunt,

not so much from courtly as from practical considerations; to shate one’s secrets with a friend is to put oneself in that friend’s power: ‘Quant luy amaunt ad monstré soun counsel et sa volunte, et ses maux et sa grevete,

aun que seit de luy privé, il se fet subget a luy, ke ja ne sera si hardy de nulle ren vers luy mesprendre. Por ceo devés bien entendre que miel vault vostre counsail celer que de vous mettre en autre daunger.’

Fourthly, Love insists on chastity. To love worthily is anyhow extremely difficult, and for a man who lets his imagination entice him into ‘lecherie et ordure’ it becomes impossible: Gk, 237) tends

148

CouRTOISIE IN ANGLO-NORMAN

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‘car, quant il mettra sa cure en lecherie et en ordure,

il wavra leiser de penser coment il porra(y) bien amer; car sachiex, il ny a nul si sage, soit iljoevene ou de grant age,

Ril wavra assex a faire d’amour bien server et plaire.”* The lover, therefore, who wishes to excel in the art of love, will

be wise not to dissipate his energy. Finally, the lover is recommended to make sure of the state of the lady’s feelings; for with what, in a spirit of protection, the author represents as becoming modesty, she will be afraid to disclose her love: ‘Chescun est pleyne de bounte, et ad potir de fauceté, gue nulle de elles ne voelt moustrer la pensee de soun coer tauntques elle sache qu’elle est ame, et quelle se seit de tout donee.’ But once the lover is certain, he is to do all in his power to please her, and must defend her honour at all costs.

Somewhat abruptly, Love now brings his advice to an end, telling the poet that it is his own fault if he does not know how to win love and how to give it. The poet’s dream is over, and he ends with a conclusion, in a semi-religious vein, on the relation

of love and religion. There is a certain obvious resemblance between this poem and the Roman de la Rose. The poet is represented as the servant of Love, who explains to him the precepts that the ‘fin amaunt’ must follow, insisting among other things on courtesy in speech and in behaviour, especially in relation to women.? Further courtois elements are the lover’s feeling of unworthiness and his attempt to remedy that condition by acquiring military prowess. Moreover, the representation of the pains of love, DH O23 7 Wiel Ke 2 Cf. R. de la Rose (ed. E. Langlois (S.A.T.) 5 vols. 1914-24) II ll. 2115-9: ‘Toutes fames serf e eneure, En eus servir poine e labeure;

E se tu oz nul mesdisant Qui aille fames despisant, Blasme le e di qu’il se taise.’

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the wound of the dart, inflamed by the fire-brand,! and finally

healed by the ointment which Love himself must apply, are more ot less, if not in all points, in the courtois or Ovidian tradition.*

In spite, however, of much that is courtois, especially in the setting and in what may be called the ornaments of the poem, its spirit is that of everyday life and morality. The author’s main idea is that love (of which he recognizes the physical aspect no less, if not rather mote, than the spiritual) can be sanctified by marriage, and that the service of God and the service of love are not incompatible. Far from separating love and marriage, he refuses to have one without the other, and can imagine no state more blissful than that of married love: car ly un ad Pautre prise por seinte eglise, mest avys, et il ount bien espleitee lur temps en ceo qu'il ount ame. Quant par Dieu et ses vertu un char et un saunk, sount devenur, ne say mie deviser gw ils porroient plus demaunder,

luy amys et la amye, gue demorer en tel vie; a’estre mys de Dien servir ne lor porreit milx avenir.® While love outside marriage is sinful, as he says very plainly, the love which has been blessed by the Church is pleasing to God and is no impediment in the way of His service: Il me est avis por bin amer, ki ge voelt a dreyt user, pust Diex plere et servir PE 233)V~ Ts Por la plaie mieles overir un tisoun me voex tenir, por enbracer deyns le boute. 2On the otigin of the idea of Love healing the wounds he has inflicted, cf. Faral Recherches (in connection with Eneas, ll. 7972 ff. and 7987 ff.) pp. 144-5: The idea is not to be found in Ovid or elsewhete, but cf. Amores, II, ix, 7: Quid? non Haemonius, quem cuspide perculit, heros Confossum medica postmodo juvit ope? ‘Il est probable que le trouveur francais est parti de 1a pour attribuer a l’Amour (Ovide ne faisait que la lui demander) la méme attitude qu’a Achille, blessant, puis soignarir Téléphe, et pour faire de l’archer un médecin.’ h.1234,t.. I.

150

CourTOISIE IN ANGLO-NORMAN LITERATURE et a la foye saunz fine venir. Ceo nous otroye luy Salveour que morust por nostre amour. Amen.

Such is the conclusion of the poem. The authot’s object has been to show that ‘bone amout’, by which he understands married love, has no connection with sin, and the last two lines, with their

appeal to the Saviour as being the supreme example of love, ate less, perhaps, a conventional ending than a suggestion that human love is a reflection of the Divine. Nor, as we have seen, is

there any contradiction between mattiage and love. The author is well aware of the courtois doctrine which separates the two and according to which jealousy is a necessary stimulus to, if not actually an ingredient of love. But, consciously reacting against it, he uses his knowledge of the courtois code mainly to combat it, extolling the security of possession conferred by marriage as something far superior to the perpetual uncertainty by which the courtly lover is beset and preferring to the vicissitudes of unsatisfied desire the more solid, if more pedestrian joys of married life.

CHAPTER RELIGIOUS

IX VERSE

The possible relation between courtois literature and contemporary religious thought has already been touched upon. It is a question of particular interest in connection with Anglo-Norman literature, of which paraphrases of the Bible, lives of saints, and other works of devotional or theological content form so large

a patt.

The field of religious literature may seem unlikely ground in which to find traces of courtoisie. At first sight, Christianity and couttoisie are widely divergent and even, as we have seen, antagonistic in their outlook. The essence of courtly love is the adoring attitude of the lover towards his lady, and even allowing for poetical exaggeration, the supremacy which courtly love attributes to the creature must seem from the religious point of view to be a usurpation of what can properly belong only to the Creator. Certainly, if the feelings that inspire respectively the Christian mystic and the courtly lover are compared in relation to their object and, which indeed follows from this, in relation to their essential nature, the resemblances between them may prove to be less than some critics! have supposed. But while, as we saw before, there exists a fundamental difference between the stand-

points of Christianity and courtoisie, it seems established beyond dispute that the two cannot be wholly separated, and that in certain spheres of thought they react on one another. This would seem to be the case, in patticular, with regard to Mariolatry, if the cult of the Virgin Mary may be so described. In the first place, the honour recognized as due to the Mother of Christ appears to have influenced to some extent people’s attitude towatds women in general,? while the worship of the Virgin and the aspect in which she appeared to the men of the twelfth and thirteenth centuries may in their turn have been partly determined by the prevailing doctrines of courtly love. In the Middle Ages, it is the worship of Mary that is largely the means of counteracting that ascetic tendency which is seen 1E.g. E. V. Anichkov Joachim de Flore. 2 This subject is treated, with caution, by Dr. Coulton; cf. Five Centuries of Pore ed, 2 (Cambridge 1929) I 174. 151

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perhaps at its height among the Fathers of the Desert, but which remains a strong element in medieval thought. In the Gospels, men and women ate treated as human souls, equal in the sight of God, and even Saint Paul insists on the fact that in Christ there is

neither male nor female.t But the teaching of the early centuries of Christianity, with its growing emphasis on virginity, while trying to overlook differences of sex, is driven back upon them, since from one point of view, woman tepresents an obstacle in the way of an ideal and becomes a soutce of danger to the individual man. It was

a woman who occasioned the Fall, and,

following theit mother’s example, the daughters of Eve are but too often the cause of man’s undoing. Women may, however, be regarded in another light. If they ate daughters of Eve they ate equally daughters of Mary; if a woman was the occasion of man’s sin, a woman was also the

instrument of his redemption, a fact which is symbolized by the salutation of Gabriel when,

at the Annunciation,

he turned

‘Eva’ into ‘Ave’.? The worship of Mary goes back at least to the Council of Ephesus, and while it can be traced all through the Middle Ages, it is becoming much more marked by the twelfth century. It is in the religious sculpture of that century that the Virgin, who had hitherto always been represented with her Son, now appears alone for the first time. Over the door of Souillac Abbey, in the department of Lot, she is shown rescuing the soul of Theophilus, the medieval Faust, from the power of the Devil, and the celebrated scenes at Senlis of her death and resurrection and her coronation belong to the end of the century.? The Salve Regina comes to be widely used at this time, and the Ave Maria is introduced into the liturgy.* It is partly due to the influence of Saint Bernard, whose figure dominates the spiritual life of the twelfth century, that greater emphasis comes to be laid about that time on the worship 1 Ga/. III 28. 2 B.g, De la bounté des femmes, ed. P. Meyer (Rom. XV 315) Le noun Eve fu tost turné, Qe de Eva fist l’angle ave. (ll. 37-8). Cf. Saint Bernard: Super ‘Missus est’? homiliae IL para. 3 (Migne P.L, CLXXXIII 62) Eve’s teprtoach is taken away by Marty ,‘quia ecce si vit cecidit per feminam, jam non erigitur nisi per feminam’. 3 Male L’art religieux du XIIe siecle en France ed. 3 (1928) pp. 433-6. 4 H.P.J.M. Ahsmann Le culte de la Sainte Vierge pp. 17-18.

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of the Virgin. “Véritable chevalier de Marie’) as he has been called, his fervent devotion to her was so well-known as to pass before long into the sphere of legend, and stories became current of mitacles performed for him by the Virgin in reward of his faithful service.? All the Cistercian houses were under the patronage of the Virgin, and in the next century the Cistercians and Premonstratensians wete joined in their devotion to her by the Dominicans

and Franciscans.

The Dominicans,

who

did

much to encourage the liturgical development of the worship of Mary, were often known as ‘les fréres de Marie’, while the devo-

tion of Saint Francis appeared in his own life and in the lives of the Franciscan tertiaries, who included among them Saint Louis.* The reverence paid to the Virgin is not without its effect on the status of women in general, at least in literature; for her sake, of whom Christ has condescended to be born, all honour is to be

paid to them: E dunk devom plus obeier Femme par droit e bien server Qe nul home ge soit vivant, Ja ne sect il st puissaunt.4 While, however, it seems fairly certain that the worship of the Virgin encouraged if it did not actually help to produce the couttois attitude towards women, it is more than likely that the wotship of Mary is itself affected in some degree by the courtois standpoint, and that there is thus almost a transference of the courtois attitude into the sphere of religion. It is surely significant in this connection that in the twelfth century the worship of the Virgin changes its character: ‘c’est au xiie si¢cle que le culte de la Vierge, jusque-la si grave, commence a se nuancer de tendresse’. . . “elle apparait comme un idéal de beauté, de pureté, comme la grande Médiatrice entre Dieu et les hommes’.® In the twelfth century she still appeats as a queen, somewhat remote in 1H. Vacandatd Vie de Saint Bernard (1895, 2 vols. ) II 79; cf. also Pourtat La spiritualité chrétienne (1918-28, 4 vols.) II 76-89. 2Albetic des Ttois-Fontaines (Chronique; Monum. pita By hist., XXII, 828) tells how one night when he was alone in prayer in the church of Saint-Bénigne at Dijon angels sang for him the Salve Regina (MAle op. cit. p. 427 and n. 2). Thete is also the well-known legend which Vacandatd (op. cit. II 78) relates as follows: “On a ptétendu qu’un jour la statue de l’église Saint-Vorles, devant laquelle il récitait lVAve maris stella, s était animée aumoment ot il pronongait les mots: Monstra te esse Matrem, et que Martie, pressant son sein maternel, avait fait jaillir sur les levres de son dévot serviteur trois gouttes du lait qui jadis avait nourri Jésus’. Act. Sanct. 20 aotit, V 206; (teference given by Male Joc. cit.) 3 Ahsmann op, cif p. 34. 4 Bounté des femmes (Rom. XV 315) ll. 174-7. 5 Male op. cit. pp. 426, 427.

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her majesty. So she is represented at the door of Saint Anne at Notre-Dame de Paris, and in the ‘belle verriére’ of Chartres. But

as the thirteenth century advances, the artists’ conception of her becomes increasingly gracious and human, and we have the Virgin of the northern porch of Notre-Dame de Paris, ‘la Vierge tayonnante d’orgueil maternel’, and finally the Vierge dorée of Amiens.1 There is much to be said for Ruskin’s advice to those whose time in Amiens is limited, that they should approach the Cathedral from the south, by the transept door, the Porte de la Vierge dorée, where stands what Ruskin calls ‘the pretty French Madonna... with... her gay soubrette’s smile’? Ruskin seems to have been captivated by her almost against his will, but, soubrette or not, there is no doubt that she haunted his

imagination to the end of his life.* And surely she is more than that, with her graceful pose and her ‘sourire séculaire’,* subtle and perhaps faintly coquettish, and the suggestion of amused detachment in her face as she looks at the Child, who in his turn

looks up at her with an expression not altogether unlike her own. She might well be the sister of some of the ladies of the romances, not perhaps of the patient Enid or the proud Guenevere, but of Laudine, among the women of Chrétien de Troyes, and of some of the heroines of the Anglo-Norman romans d’aventure, such as Ydoine or Felice or Hue de Rotelande’s ‘La Fiere’. It is not surprising that literature as well as sculpture should illustrate the reciprocal influence of the courtois and the religious attitudes, and that the poems which we have now to consider should offer in certain passages a curious blending of couttoisie and religion which assumes vatious forms. Some of them seem to show, in their presentation of the Virgin, an influence of the

secular on the religious standpoint. Others again are of interest because of their treatment of the problem of love. The thirteenth century Plainte de la Vierge® tends to exalt the Virgin Mary not only for her own sake but indirectly as being a woman. Three other poems® on the Passion are remarkable for 1 Male L’art religieux du XIIIe siecle en France ed. 5 (1923) pp. 236-7. * The Bible of Amiens ch. IV: Interpretations Separate Travellers’ Edition (Orpington 1881) 4) 10. 3 Cf. Proust Pastiches e¢ Mélanges (1919) pp. 118-119. 4 Ibid. p. 117. 5 Ed. F. J. Tanquerey Les Plaintes de la Vierge en anglo-francais. 6 i, Plainte Nostre Dame, attributed to N. Bozon, ed. F. J. Tanquetey (Plaintes de la Vierge pp. 125 ff.), and Wright (Chronicle ofPierre de Langtoft Il 438.) ii. Un rois jadis estait ge avait une amye (Vising, no. 355), probably also by Bozon, ed. T. Wright (Chronicle ofPierre de Langtoft II 426), cf. P. Meyer (Rom. XIII (1884) 507, 530). iii. Chansun de la Passion, ed. R. Reinsch.

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155

their portrayal of divine in terms of humanlove. Inthe allegorical poem of the Chateau d’Amour,. Grosseteste uses for the exposition of theological truths the ideas and the language, if not of couttoisie, at least of chivalry. Moreover, both the Chdteau @’Amour and the anonymous poem of the P/ainte d’Amour show? affinities with the courtois point of view in the importance which they give to love; and finally, a long poem on the love of God,* and three short works—a

Chancon de Nostre Seignur,’ a

prayer to Christ,° and a song to the Virgin,® all approach the problem of love and reach conclusions more in harmony with the spirit of courtoisie than might at first appear. To begin with the first group of poems, the Plauinte de la Verge’ describes the Passion in terms of Mary’s anguish even more than of Christ’s sufferings, and the whole story is told from -het point of view, almost as though the tilting of the balance in woman’s

favour, characteristic of courtoisie, had affected not

only secular but religious literature, showing its influence in wotks such as this whose inspiration might seem to have nothing to do with courtoisie. When the writer, speaking through the mouth of St. Bernard, asks the Virgin to describe the ending of the scene on Calvary, he appeals to her not only because she and Saint John were the only two who stayed to the last, but also because she is better able to do it than anyone else. It is the same point of view as that of the author of the Genese Notre Dame,’ when he is explaining that Mary Magdalene was the first to see the risen Lord because of the keenness of sympathy with which, as a woman, she was endowed. When he is describ-

ing the Descent from the Cross, he represents the Virgin as a supreme example of the power of love, which transforms human weakness, and writes of her in terms that would hardly be out of place in a roman couttois: A merveille feblex est Ke susporte sun fiz mort Mes amur Pad tant achaufé Ke sun cors li est tut fort. 1 Ed. J. Murray. 3° Poeme sur l’amour de Dieu, ed. Meyet.

2 Ed. Vising. 4 Ed. Stengel and cf. Rom. XIII 518.

5, Ed. Reinsch. ® Piéce en couplets coués sur l’amour de la Vierge, ed. Meyer. 7 Based on St. Betnard’s Planctus; of. F. J. Tanquerey Plaintes de la Vierge, esp. pp. 5~12. ® MS. Cot. Dom. A xi (Brit. Mus.) F. 76.

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LITERATURE

Amur li est en vie e mort, Amur la meine ca e la;

Mult est le lien de amur fort: La dame mult ben le mustra One of the poems on the Passion, Bozon’s Plainte Nostre Dame opens in a style as suitable for addressing an earthly as the heavenly lady; in fact, were it not for the first line, there would be

nothing to show that it is not simply expressing earthly love: ‘Reine corounee, flur de Parais,

De haute chose enprendre me suy entremis, Quant parol od ma dame, ki suy tant cheitifs: Mes une fole baudur me ad le quer suspris.’* In another poemon the Passion,® probably also by Bozon, the penetration of the secular into the sphere of religion is more matked, though it is true that the inspiration is here rather chivalrous than courtois. Christ is represented as a king, freeing his ‘amye’, namely the human race, from the power of the Devil, whom he defeats in single combat.’ Though he could have won her back at once with the help of his army, he will owe her rescue to none but himself: II out si ordené qe nul luy fust de cost, Kar soul volait avoir Pamur de s’amye. The imagery is cutious: the Virgin, giving birth to Christ and watching over him in his early years, is represented as a maiden arming her knight for the battle: La damoisele 1his de mut estraunge armure:

Pur as fe de vied de ee mist la ta 1}, 969-976. 2F, J. Tanquetey op. cit.p es Cf. the secular tone of the opening verse of a poem on the Joys of Mary (Reinsch: ae n. Spr. LXIIL 56): Ky eyme leal amie, Bon guerdon avera. La duce Marie Ke Le fiz Den porta Ne est pas femme big A lui mustre sa chere,

Envers ky amurs ad.

3T, Wright Chronicle of Pierre de Langtoft 11 426.

“Cf. the celebrated passage in the Ancren Riwle, telling how Christ, ‘as a noble wooer, after many messengets, and many good deeds, came to prove his love, and showed by his

knightly prowess that he was worthy of love, as knights were sometimes wont to do. He

engaged in a toutnament and had, for his lady’s love, his shield everywhere pierced in battle, like a valorous knight’. (Ed. J. Morton (King’s Classics 1905) p. 296.)

RELIGIOUS VERSE

157

Ses plates furent de os, ge sisterent a mesure; La S aalipth de say, la pele ha desure. La seas de 1haber estoit yface i. Qe privement en chaumbre lascea la pucele. His whole life is a battle against the Devil, culminating in the Passion, with Satan’s discovery that his foe is the King himself, after which Christ rescues his captive ‘amie’ from the dungeon where she languishes, and, ‘curtoise chevaler’ as he is, grants her his pardon. The tone of the poem is not, however, really couttois, since inevitably Christ appears as the deliverer of the human soul and it is in terms of the knight as protector of the weak, not of the knight as lover, trying to win his lady’s favour by a display of prowess, that the Saviour is represented. The Chansun de la Passion, however, shows an obvious parallel-

ism between the relation of Christ and the soul and that of the lover and his lady. In poems of this type, it is extremely hard to separate the various elements whose fusion they represent. The idea of the soul as the bride of Christ is one of the leading themes of medieval mysticism. It is based to a considerable extent on the Christian allegorical interpretation of the Song of Solomon and reaches what is probably its highest expression in Saint Bernard’s Sermons on that book, but it has a long history,? going back to the time of Origen. While Jewish theology sees in the poem a prophetic account of the history of the Jewish nation, medieval thought interprets it as an allegory of the relations of Christ to the individual soul or to the Church and ‘the union of the soul with God is represented under the image of the spiritual espousals, to which all the erotic imagery of the Song of Solomon is referred’. In itself the theme is obviously independent of courtoisie and even in direct contradiction to it, since of necessity the relation of Christ to the soul must be one of condescension, while the

couttly lover is in the position of an adoring suppliant. The remarkable thing about this Chansun de la Passion is precisely that Christ is represented rather in His human than in His divine 1See p. 154n. 6. 2S. J. Hales Cantica Canticorum: eighty-six sermons on the Song of Solomon, tt. S. J. Eales (1895) Introductory Essay pp. xii-xiv.

3 De diligendo Deo: The Book of St. Bernard on the Love of God, ed, with a translation by

G. Gardner (1916) Intr. p. 15.

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LITERATURE

aspect, offering in virtue of the equality wrought by love! to give Himself in the service of the human

soul, his “duce amie’,

challenging her in the refrain that ends each verse to find another lover who will serve her as well, and craving her love as His reward: Eya ore, ma duce amie,

Ke je ai plus cher ke ma vie: Kar por tei mener a port,

Beu le beivre entuché de mort: Si poex trover nul amant, Ke por vus face autretant, Lessex moy e amex lui; En joye vivex ambedui. Even towards the end of the poem, when he offers to make her . his bride, there is a note of supplication suggesting the attitude towards his lady of the human if not the courtly lover, rather than the relation of the Saviour to the human soul: Fiz sui au roi de majesté, Si demand ta amisté Et a espose te voil aver, Ne me devez pas refuser, Si poex trover nul amant. Roi sui puissant e amiable, Beaus e franc e charitable. Si a mot volex fei tenir, Au cel te frai a moi venir, St poex trover2 Two of the poems so far quoted ate probably the work of a Franciscan, in the person of Bozon, and it is again in the writings of Franciscans or of men connected with them that we find cutious parallels with some of the ideas most essential to the courtois system. Such parallels are particularly noticeable in connection with the doctrine of love. For love is the central point of the 1Cf. St. Bernard: Serm. in Cant. 59, Migne P.L.

CLXX XIII 1062: ‘Amor ... dominum

nescit . . . neminem suspicit amor, sed ne despicit quidem. Omnes ex aequo intuetur, qui perfecte se amant, et in se ipso celsos humilesque contemperat’. Cf. also Serm. in Cant. 83. A thoroughly uncourtois point of view, though actually, since it lessens the distance between Christ and the human soul, it makes it more possible to think of courtoisie in connection with the poem.

2 With the exception of the third verse, of eight lines, each verse has four lines, after

which occur two or more words of the refrain. In the MS. (Lambeth Palace, 522) the poem is written as though in prose (Reinsch Arch. n. Spr., LXIII 95).

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159

life and teaching of Saint Francis, and it is the foundation of the philosophy of Saint Bonaventura, for whom the universe is full of the foot-prints of God, of mirrors reflecting the Divine image: creatura mundi est quasi quidam liber in quo relucet, repraesentatur et legitur Trinitas fabricatrix+ Vt is also the basis of Duns Scotus’ conception of God. From the words of the Fourth Gospel: Deus charitas est, he attives at the doctrine that love is the cause,

not only of the Creation,? in which God’s love as it were ovetflows, but also, quite independently of the Fall, of the Incarnation,? by which it became possible for God’s own love to be in some degree reciprocated by a being who was himself God, and so capable of returning the measute of the Divine love. The doctrine of love as all-important is implied in Grosseteste’s Chateau d’ Amour. Gtosseteste, though not himself a Franciscan, was intimately connected with the Order, to whose members he lectured and whose pursuit of learning he did much to encoutage. The founder of the school of experimental philosophy represented by Adam Marsh and Roger Bacon, he was ‘undoubtedly the most influential man at Oxford, and probably the greatest scholar of his time’.t Besides theology and philosophy, he was skilled in law and medicine, and was one of the few Englishmen of his time with a knowledge of Greek and Hebrew. He wrote not only on theological subjects, but was also the author of scientific treatises, including the De Sphaera, a wotk on asttonomy. His interest in matters of practical life appears in two of his Anglo-Norman writings, the Rewles Seynt Roberd, which he wrote

for the assistance of the Countess of Lincoln in the government of her house and estates, and the translation, which is also attti-

buted to him, of Walter de Henley’s Treatise on Husbandry His other Anglo-Norman

work, the Chdéteau d’ Amour, has

1 Breviloquium, II, 12, 1; quoted by Gilson: La philosophie de Saint Bonaventure (1924) p. 206. Cf. Gilson Saint Francois et la pensée médiévale p. 90. 2*Dieu est d’abord en soi-méme et essentiellement amour. Etant amour, eten méme temps le bien suptéme, il s’aime nécessaitement. Mais un tel amour excede en quelque sorte Vinfini lui-méme et se multiplie en se répandant autour de soi. Dieu ne se veut donc pas seulement soi-méme, il veut encore d’auttes étres qui l’aimeront, parce qu’il s’aimeta en eux.’

Gilson Saint Francois et la penste méditvale p. 92.

3 Dieu s’aime en soi; puis il s’aime en d’auttes qui l’aimeront, et ce seront les hommes; mais comment ne prévoirait-il pas dés lors existence d’un homme capable de l’aimer d’un amout infini comme celui dont il s’aime lui-méme, patce que cet homme serait en méme temps un Dieu?’ = Ibid. 4A. G. Little (Cambridge Med. Hist. V1 744).

5 J. Murtay Le Chateau d’ Amour intt., pp. 17-19; cf. F. S. Stevenson Robert Grosseteste (1899).

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IN ANGLO-NORMAN

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been called the Paradise Lost of the Middle Ages. It describes the Creation and the Fall, and especially the work of Redemption, in which the Virgin, who is the Castle of Love in which Christ came to dwell, has a considerable share. Grosseteste develops the text: Intravit Jesus in quoddam castellum, but giving the words an allegorical meaning. He takes up the theme of the four daughters of God, based on the verse of the eighty-fourth psalm: M7sericordia et veritas obviaverunt sibi; justitia et pax osculatae sunt and

then, as an explanation of the titles bestowed on Christ in the ninth chapter of Isaiah,* tells the story of the Redemption, presenting it from the point of view of chivalry, since Christ comes to the rescue of man, whom Truth and Righteousness have condemned. Grosseteste also shows that awareness of the legal aspect of the case, which seems to be characteristically AngloNorman: man, in the person of Adam, had renounced God and so come under the rule of the Devil. God could simply, by an act of His will, have deprived the Devil of man’s allegiance, but He pteferred to observe the legal forms of (feudal) justice, and so Jesus Christ—at once the representative of God and the champion of mankind—by his sinless life defeated the Devil in single combat, finally triumphing in the Resurrection and so enabling man to return to his rightful lord. )

The idea of love runs as an undercurrent through the poem.

The Virgin, the Castle of Love, is supremely metciful: Mere de pité, Pucele pleine de bonté. En vus fu donk nostre creance, Mes ores est nostre esperance,

Ke pur nus le depriez, Par ki sumes rechatez.4 If the courtois ideal of woman is perhaps coloured by the prevailing attitude towards the Virgin, it may also be, as we saw before, that on Mary have been bestowed some of the attributes of the lady of courtoisie. For Grosseteste, her beauty, which

exceeds that of all other creatures, is equalled by her gracious kindness: 1 Luke x 38. 2 This had already served to good purpose, as the text of a discourse of St. Bernatd’s. 3 Isaiah IX 6. 4]. 1195-1200.

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E tant cum ele ad de beauté

Sz en ad franchise e bonteé. A nul wescondit ses amurs

Ne ses solaz ne ses sucurs> He describes the Castle of Love with its three storeys of different colours, of which the highest, of a glowing red, symbolizes charity, the true charity which fills the whole being and is the condition of a good life. For, as Grosseteste insists further on, outward citcumstances do not determine the nature of the

innet life, and a man with great possessions may nevertheless be free from pride and serve God in humility, provided he has love in his heart: : E si poet Deu mult bien servir E sun voleir acomplir, Pus Ril vit en humilité, En dreiture e en charité,

Kar Dampnedeu wad rien tant chier Cum fin amur de cuer entier? Love is everywhere: the creation of man in the image of God is itself an expression of the Creator’s love: Amur plus ne li pout mustrer Ke apres sei meimes former.® And it is Christ, as the embodiment of love, who, in the dispute between his sisters Mercy and Truth, Righteousness and Peace,

intervenes in favour of man, offering to die for him and, leaving the ninety and nine sheep, to go after that which is lost: Ki de cel Seignur pensast Ke tant de amur li mustrast,

Ke aprés sei le vout former, E pus pur li se vout doner, Einz li detist li cuer crever, Ke sun comant trespasser4

Love is thus made the motive power directing, as it were, both God and man. The suptemacy of love is presented again in the P/ainte @’ Amour, though from a different standpoint. The poem,® one of 1], 1725-8.

2 I. 993-8.

5 Cf, P. Meyer Rom. XII Vamour de Jésus’. M

3 ll. 79-80.

411, 491-6.

507: ‘il offre la pure expression des idées franciscaines sur

162

CouRTOISIE

IN ANGLO-NORMAN

LITERATURE

the finest in Anglo-Norman literature, is a picture of the deplorable state of the world, and especially of the Church and the religious orders, since Love has been banished from his dwelling in the hearts of men: ‘Amur, Amur, ou estes vous?’

asks the poet. “Certes, sire, en poi de lins,

Car jeo ne os.’ ‘E pur quey nosex estre ve, Vus ke estes si bien conu De bon los??

Love’s former glory is vanished, and he wanders homeless about the world: ‘Jeo vois vacrant de lu en lu Quere mon hostel cum desconu En touz pais. Ki me voudreit herberger Le ciel li dorret pur louer, Mon beau pais.” For it is only with Christ that Love’s real home is to be found: “S72 vus me volex enbracer, Ne vus estuet trop traveiller Pur moi quere. Vus me troverez ou Jhesu Crist ; La est ma chambre e mon lit Tut hors de guere.’® Like Grosseteste, the author? puts love at the centre of the universe, making of it the origin both of the Creation and the Redemption: ‘En nos livres avum trové

Ke par vus fist la Trinité Ciel e tere. 1 Verse LXXXYV. ACLAIV: ® Vising (Anglo-Norman Language and Literature that Professor Tanquetey disagrees with this view: p. xvi, n. 2: ‘la langue nous semble sensiblement xive siécle, et nous ne croyons pas Nicole Bozon

p. 72) suggests that itis by Bozon, but notes cf. L’évolution duverbe en anglo-francais (1915) plus ancienne que celle du second tiers du capable d’avoir écrit ce poéme qui dénote

un talent trés supérieur a celui de l’auteur des Vies des Saints et du Char d’Orgueil’,

RELIGIOUS

VERSE

163

Vus feites Deu a nus descendre, Vus li priastes de char prendre, E il vus granta. Par vostre priere il vout soffrir Peine e dolur e puis morir, E ceo nus sauva.” By the author of a poem on the love of God, edited by Paul Meyer, love is postulated as the source of all vittue and of life itself, for ‘he that loveth not is dead though he live’: Et saint Johan dit: ‘Que wayme mye Il maynt en mort et est sanz vye.’ Dunke est leal amour la vie Que alme morte vivifie.® As the courtly lover’s devotion to his lady is the source of his vitality, without which life would have little significance, so the love of God is creative in relation to the universe and to the individual soul. It is only by love—which is itself called forth by the love of God—that the soul can be saved; fear, indeed, co-

operates with love in the work of salvation, and by itself suffices to hold man back from sinning, but for the redemption of his soul, fear, which is negative, is not enough and love, as George

Herbert says, must ‘do the deed’: Car potir ne sauve alme mye Sz ele weit amour en compaignie, Mes amour ad le poer, Tot saunz potir, Pame sauver 4 All this is mainly scriptural, certainly, but we are on the border-line between religion and courtoisie, and it is a somewhat shadowy one, as though each of these attitudes to life, if they may be so described, represented an attempt to solve the same problem along different lines. No courtois writer would fail to

endorse the statement with which the poem we are considering begins:

Amur si est sanz dotance De chekune vertue la nessance.®

Not would he disagree with the writer’s claim that true love must be disinterested: 1Verses VI-VII. 4 ll. 641-4.

2 Rom, XXIX (1900) 5. 5. 12-3,

3 il, 17-20.

164

CouRTOISIE IN ANGLO-NORMAN

LITERATURE

. celui ayme veratment Que ayme quant nul bien actent Finally there seems to be a conscious blending of the points of view of religion and courtoisie in two poems, a Chansun de Nosire Seignur® and another addressed to the Virgin.’ Their authors try to rise above the limitations of earthly love and to find protection against that transitoriness of created things which leaves human love at the mercy of change, by setting their affections on things above and, in their devotion to Christ and his mother, taking refuge in the love of the eternal. The opening lines of these poems are in the courtly spirit: Nuyldent ne deyt mounter S*il Pamer aprys en prys } | Qar ce est trebele enpryse; nothing in these words, taken alone, gives any indication of a standpoint other than that of the courtly lover, who cannot conceive of any fullness of life without love, and for whom love is a necessary preliminary to and accompaniment of physical, mental, and spiritual development. And yet the poem, according to Paul Meyer, is really in praise of the Virgin. Equally characteristic of the courtly point of view are the opening lines of the Chancun de Nostre Seignur: Cuard est ke amer ne ose,

Vileyn ke ne veut amer. Sanz amour ne se repose Quer de homme ne le penser, Mes folie est de amer chose Ke durée ne put aver, Exynz deschet a chef de pose, Apres wi ad ke solacer. Charnel amour est folie Ke veut amer sagementA Here again love is the essential condition of life, if it is to have any intensity, and it is only the faint-hearted or the obtuse who refuse themselves to Love’s apprenticeship. But already in this first verse there is mote than a hint that satisfaction is not to be AIL) a5=6; 2 Cuard est ke amer ne ose ed. Stengel: Cod. Dighy 86 p. 128; cf. Rom. XIII 518. > Rom. XIII 531. 4 Rom, XVII 518.

a

RELIGIOUS

VERSE

165

found in human love, and the writer goes on to show where the true solution lies, namely in rising above earthly passion to the love of Christ in whom alone the heart of man can find peace: “Thou hast made us for Thyself, and our heart is restless until it find test in Thee.’ Such sublimation of love’s object is the logical outcome of the doctrine of courtly love, of which unsatisfied desire is the dominant motive, and in which the attitude of the lover to the

beloved is one of complete surrender constantly renewed. One way of achieving this surrender, entire and yet never final, was to turn the lady into something approaching a goddess; the idealization of love involves the idealization of love’s object: this is the attitude of mind which leads to the poetty of the ‘dolce stil nuovo’ and finds its highest expression in Dante’s Vita Nuova. The other solution was to transfer to the Creator the love hitherto addressed to the creature: ‘la créature .. . est un support trop fragile pour soutenit le poids écrasant du désir humain’.t And so, in place of the earthly lover, the poet turns his gaze to the Virgin, of, as in the case of the song just quoted, to Christ Himself,

whom he represents as the supreme Lover, exemplifying to

perfection the qualities of the “fin amant’:

[Ci/] Ke veot amur sans pesanse Un amy luy sat [¢eo| mustrer Ki est d(e) [une] s7 grant pussance, Ke) a lué ne puet riens arester; Reys est e gentil de neyssanse, En beaute wad {il| point de per Ne en saver [c’est| sans dutansce, Suef est e tres duz de quer? Such is the answer to the question asked by the author of a little poem in one of the Cambridge collections of Anglo-Notman manuscripts: 1M, Lot-Botodine Sur les origines et les fins du service d’amour p. 241. 2 Cf, the similar tone, and the use of courtly (?) phraseology, in a Prayer to Christ (Arch. n. Spr. LXIII 89): Pardonez moi quant ke ai pechié par penser E me donez grace de vus forment amer,

Ke le dux amur de vus me face ublier

Les joyes de cest siecle, por vous desirer, De lagu dart de vostre amur trespercer mun quer, Ke rien, ke vus despleise, puisse mes amer Fors de vostre amur tuit dis languir e penser.

3 Cf, Chaytor The Troubadours and England p. 57.

(il. 69-75).

166

CouURTOISIE

IN ANGLO-NORMAN

LITERATURE

Mon quer me dist que doi amer, Mes i¢o ne sai ou empler Amour que tut temps puet durer;

Pur ceo sui en languor. Qui mei savera enseigner Ou ficherai nm’amoure There is that longing for permanence which haunts Saint Augustine, a longing which is bound up with that other longing, characteristic of the troubadours, ‘the artist’s demand for intense

living, for a complete satisfaction of hungry capacities—an ecstasy, and a permanent ecstasy, of life, love and joy’. 1B, I. Watkin in A Monument to Saint Augustine (1930) p. 106.

CONCLUSION

We must now sum up the conclusions to which the study of our texts seems to point and attempt an answer to some of the questions with which we began. How far does Anglo-Norman literature display the characteristics of the courtois literature of the Continent? In particular, how far do the conceptions which we find expressed in it of love and of the relation of the sexes appear to be in harmony with the spirit of courtoisie as this appears in France? As we have seen, there can be no doubt that Anglo-Norman writers are familiar with the courtois idea of love as implying on the lover’s part a devotion that is almost worship, and they are acquainted with the technique of describing the beginnings of love, its course and its effects, whether these manifest themselves

in physical symptoms

or in perturbation of mind. It may be

questioned, however, whether their attitude towards love and

the relation of the sexes is fundamentally courtois. Rather it would seem as though the influence exercised on Anglo-Norman literature by that of France, undoubted as it is, remains in this respect superficial. If the writers of Anglo-Norman romances illustrate the idea of love-service, especially in the early part of their stories where the passion is just declaring itself, that is by no means their only way of representing love. It may begin in one-sided adoration, but sooner or later it develops into a relation in which the joy and the suffering is equal on the part of the man and of the woman. Logically enough, such love finds its natural satisfaction in the companionship of marriage. All the heroes (except Tristan, whose story must always stand apart) end by marrying the heroines and, so we ate left to assume, live happily ever after, or

at any rate to a ripe old age, leaving behind them children to catry on their memory. This doctrine, with its vatious implications, of marriage as the

fulfilment of love is not only regularly exemplified in the romances, but also, as we saw, developed at length in a didactic

work on the art of love, where it forms an essential part of the poet’s teaching. Indeed, the point of view of the author of that work, and his attitude towards amour courtois, may fairly 1Cf, Chapter VII. 167

168

CourRTOISIE

IN ANGLO-NORMAN

LITERATURE

be taken as typical of the outlook of Anglo-Norman writers in general. They move at ease among the conventions of courtoisie, but beneath their interest in courtois ideas and phraseology is a strong and almost prosaic sense of the realities of everyday life. Thus the idea of marriage separated from love remains foreign to them, and family feeling has its place, sometimes a large one, in the romances, particularly in that of Horm, whose hero feels the

claims of his kindred pressing more closely upon him than those of the princess Rigmel. It is perhaps this same sense of practical reality which partly accounts for the difference in style between most of the Anglo-Norman romances and those of Chrétien de Troyes, for example. If we except Thomas, whose subtlety as it appears in I77stan is more than equal to Chrétien’s, Hue de Rotelande in his Ipomedon, and to some extent the author of Amadas et Ydoine, the Anglo-Norman writers show compatatively little interest in the analysis of emotional states; they are more concerned with the outward effects of those states, and

with the development of the story, than with the study, for its own sake, of the conflict of feeling in the minds of their characters. The doctrine of amour courtois, with its strongly idealistic element and its detachment from the tealities of ordinary life, is not likely to be fully assimilated by minds with so decided a bent towards the practical. The markedly utilitarian attitude displayed by Anglo-Norman writers, whether it be in relation to the things of this world or of the next, does not conduce to an understanding of the courtois point of view, but finds its expression rather in the moralizing and didactic works that form the bulk of Anglo-Norman literature. It must be admitted, in conclusion, that while courtoisie is

undoubtedly present in Anglo-Norman literature, it is hardly, for the most part, the courtoisie of the troubadours or of the French couttois writers, but something more pedestrian. Such a result has a twofold interest. On the one hand, the modified form in

which courtoisie presents itself would seem to point to the fact that already in the England of the twelfth and thirteenth centuries, with its cutiously mixed population, there was beginning to show itself that sense of concrete reality apparently so typical of the Englishman of modern times.t On the other hand, the fact 1‘Ce quil yade plus profond et central dans le catactére anglais, c’est une énergie fortement appliquée au téel, et en prise ditecte avec lui’, L. Cazamian Ce gu’il faut connaitre de Vame anglaise (1927) p. 21.

hy

CONCLUSION

169

that couttoisie does so decidedly appear in Anglo-Norman literature shows that people writing in England must have had a considerable acquaintance with the literary fashions of the Continent, and suggests that the work of Anglo-Norman writers may offer a fruitful field to the student of comparative literature. 1Cf. O. H. Prior Rom, XLIX 185.

BIBLIOGRAPHY Note.—Unless

otherwise stated, French works mentioned here or

in the footnotes are published in Paris, English works in London. I, MopERN

Works

H. P. J. M. Axusmann: Le culte de la Sainte Vierge et la littérature frangaise profane du moyen age. Utrecht 1930. J. A. F. ANGiApDE: Les troubadouts, leurs vies—leurs

ceuvres—leur

influence (ed. 2) 1919. J. Auprau: Les troubadours et Angleterre (nouvelle édition). 1927. C. E. Bazzr: Il sentimento cristiano nella lirica trovadorica d’amore (Rivista d'Italia (1911) 971-988). H. J. Caayror: The troubadouts and England. Cambridge 1923. W. W. Comrort: Character types in the Old French chansons de geste (Publ. M. L. A. America XXI (1906) 279-434).

J. Couter: Le troubadour Guilhem Montanhagol. Toulouse 1898. T. P. Cross and W. A. Nrrze: Lancelot and Guenevere; a study on the otigins of courtly love. Chicago 1930. M. DeurscHsBein: Studien zur Sagengeschichte Englands. Cothen 1906. H. Dupin: La courtoisie au moyen age, d’aprés les textes du xiie et du xilie siécle. 1931. E. Fart: Les arts poétiques du xiie et du xiiie siécle (Bibliothéque de VEcole des Hautes Etudes, fasc. 238) 1924. Recherches sur les sources latines des contes et romans courtois du moyen age. 1913. Les romans courtois (Bédier et Hazard Histoire de la littérature francaise 1 15-25).

La poésie lyrique (Ibid. pp. 44-52). FauriEt: André le Chapelain (Hist. litt. de la France XXI 320-332). 1847.

L. M. Gay: Hue de Rotelande’s ‘Ipomedon’ and Chrétien de Troyes (P.M.L.A. XXXII (1917) 468-491). KE. Gixson: L’amout et son objet (L’esprit de la philosophie médiévale, 2e série) Gifford Lectures. 1932. Saint Frangois et la pensée médiévale (L’influence de Saint Francois d’Assise sur la civilisation italienne. Conférences . pat MM.P. Sabatier, A. Masseron, H. Hauvette, H. Focillon, E.

Gilson, E. Jordan). 1926. La théologie mystique de Saint Bernard. 1934. K. Hey: Die Theorie der Minne in den dltesten Minneromanen Frankreichs (EK. Wechssler: Marburger Beitrage zur romanischen Philologie, Heft 4) Marburg a.L. 1911. 170

BIBLIOGRAPHY

I7I

E. Horprrner: La chanson de geste et les débuts du roman courtois (Mélanges de linguistique et de littérature offerts 4 M. Jeanroy,

PP- 427-437). 1928.

A. Jeanroy: Etudes sur l’ancienne poésie provengale (Neuphilologische Mitteilungen X XIX (1928) 209-250; zbid. XXX (1929) 1-19). La poésie lyrique des troubadouts (2 vols.). 1934. La poésie provengale au moyen age. III. La chanson (Rev. des deux mondes, 5¢ période, XIII (1903) 661-91).

La premiére génération des troubadours

(Rom.

LVI

(1930)

481-525).

T. Kraspes: Die Frau im altfranzésischen Karls-Epos (E. M. Stengel: Ausgaben und Abhandlungen aus dem Gebiete der romanischen Philologie, 18). Marburg 1884. VERNON Lez: Medieval Love (Euphorion: being studies of the antique and the medizval in the Renaissance) ed. 2, 1885.

M. Lor-Boropinz: La femme et l’amour au xiie siécle d’aprés les poémes de Chrétien de Troyes. 1909. Sur les origines et les fins du service d’amout (Mélanges de linguistique et de littérature offerts 4 M.A. Jeanroy, pp. 223-242). 1928.

Tristan et Lancelot

(Medieval

Studies in memory

of G. S.

Loomis, pp. 21-47). Paris and New York 1927.

P. Meyer: Alexandre le Grand dans la littérature frangaise du moyen age (2 vols.). 1886. L. F. Morr: The system of courtly love studied as an introduction to the Vita Nuova of Dante. 1896. EB. Mourzr: Review of Novati: Un nuovo ed un vecchio frammento del Tristran di Tommaso: Studj di filologia romanza, 1887 (Rom. XVIII (1889) 175-180). W. A. Nertson: Origins and sources of the Court of Love. Cambridge, Mass. 1899.

F, Novati: Un nuovo ed un vecchio frammento del Tristran di 'Tommaso (Studj di filologia romanza pubblicati da E. Monaci, II 369-514). Rome

1887).

A. NyGren: Agape and Eros, tr. A. G. Hebert. 1932. A. Packs. Auzias March et ses prédécesseurs. Essai sur la poésie amoureuse et philosophique en Catalogne aux xive et xve siécles. I9II. G. Panes: L’esprit normand en Angleterre: La littérature francaise en Angleterre (La poésie du moyen age, deuxiéme série, ed. 3). 1906. La littérature normande avant l’annexion (912-1204). Discours lu a la séance publique de la Société des Antiquaires de Normandie, 1 déc. 1898. 1899. Poémes et légendes du moyen Age. 1900.

72

CourTOISIE IN ANGLO-NorMAN

LITERATURE

Les anciennes versions frangaises de l’Art d’aimer et des Remédes

d’Amour

d’Ovide,

1884

(La poésie du moyen Age, premiére

série, ed. 6). 1906.

Chrétien Legouis et autres traducteuts ou imitateurs d’Ovide(Hist. litt. de la France X-XIX 455-525). 1885.

Les cours d’amour du moyen age, étude d’histoire littéraire, par E. Trojel (Journal des Savants (1888) 664-675, 727-736). 1888. Mélanges de littérature francaise du moyen 4ge, publiés par M. Roques (including article on C/iges from the Journal des Savants 1902). 1912. Etudes sur les romans de la Table Ronde: Lancelot du Lac. II. Le Conte de la Charrette (Rom. XII 459-534). 1883. E. E. Power: The position of women (The Legacy of the Middle Ages, ed. C. G. Crump and E. F. Jacob). Oxford 1926. J. R. Remuarp: The Old French Romance of Amadas et Ydoine. Durham, N.C. 1927. D. ScuetupKo: Uber den Frauenkult der Troubadours (Neaphil. Mitteil. XXXV (1934) 3-40). W. H. Scuorrerp: English Literature from the Norman Conquest to Chaucer. 1906. J. E. Sprncarn: Bibliography at the end of Vosslet’s Medieval Culture, vol. 2. 1929. J. A. SyMonps: The Dantesque and Platonic ideals of love. (Contemporary Review LVIII (1890) 412-426). F, J. Tanquerey: Chrétien de Troyes est-il l’auteur de Guillaume d’ Angleterre? Rom, LVI (1931) 75-116. H. O. Taytor: The Medieval Mind, ed. 4, 2 vols. 1925.

KE. Vinaver: Malory. Oxford. 1929. P. J. Vistnc: Anglo-Norman Language and Literature. 1923. K. Vosster. Die philosophischen Grundlagen zum ‘siissen neuen Stil’ des Guido Guinicelli, Guido Cavalcanti und Dante Alighieri. Heidelberg 1904. E. WecuHssLeR: Das Kulturproblem des Minnesangs. Halle a.S. 1909.

II. Texts

I. ANGLO-NORMAN HemVESS.

Eustace de Kent: Le Roman de toute chevalerie. Trinity College, Cambridge, 0.9.34.

Genése Notre Dame. Brit. Mus. Cot. Dom. A xi. Anonymous poem on the Art of Love. College of Arms, Arundel xiv.

BIBLIOGRAPHY

Er

it. Printed (a) Narrative

Thomas: Le Roman de Tristan, ed. Bédier (Société des anciens textes francais (S.A.T.)). 2 vols. 1902, 1905. La Folie Tristan, ed. Bédier: Les deux pobmes dela Folie Tristan (S.A.T.) 1907. Horn, al Brede and E. M. Stengel: Das anglonormannische Lied vom wackern Ritter Horn (Ausgaben und Abhandlungen aus dem Gebiete der romanischen Philologie, pt. 8). Marburg 1883. Hue de Rotelande: Ipomedon, ed. E. K6lbing and E. Koschwitz. Breslau 1389.

; Penciliu ed. F. Kluckow (Gesellschaft fiir tomanische Literatur, vol. 45). G6ttingen 1924. Amadas et Ydoine, ed. J. R. Reinhard (Classiques francais du moyen age (CP MLA.) LI’).: 1926. Boeve de Haumtone, ed. A. Stimming: Der anglonormannische Boeve de Haumtone (Bibliotheca normannica vii). Halle 1899. Gui de Warewic, ed. A. Ewert (C.F.M.A.) 2 vols. 1932, 1933.

(b) Works on the theory and practice of love Le Donnei des Amants, ed. Gaston Paris Rom. XXV (1896) 497-541. Définition de l’amour, ed. Meyer ‘Mélanges de poésie anglo-normande’ Rom. IV (1875) 382-4.

Une définition d’amour en prose anglo-normande, ed. P. Studer (Mélanges de philologie et d’histoire offerts 4 M. A. Thomas). 1927. A letter to a lady containing admonitions concerning behaviour to a lover, ed. J. Koch ‘Anglonormannische Texte im M.S. Arundel 220 des Britischen Museums’ Zeitschrift fiir romanische Philologie LIV (1934)

20. Blancheflour et Florence, ed. P. Meyer “Notice du MS. 25970 de la Bibliothéque Phillipps’ Row. XX XVII (1908) 221-234. Melior et Ydoine, ed. P. Meyer Rom. XX XVII 236-244. (c) Religious and didactic Poéme sur l’amour de Dieu et sur la haine du péché. Meyer “Notice du MS. Rawlinson Poetry 241 (Oxford)’ Rom. XXIX

(1900) 5-21.

Le Chateau d’ Amour, ed. J. Murray. 1918. Changun de nostre signur, ed. Stengel (Codicem manu scriptum Digby 86, p. 128. Halle 1871).

Chansun de la Passion, ed. Reinsch Archiv fir das Studium der neuneren Sprachen und Literaturen (Arch. n. Spr.) LXII (1880) 89-91. Prayer to Christ, ed. Reinsch Arch. n. Spr., UXT

89-91.

174

CourToIsiE

1N ANGLO-NoRMAN LITERATURE

De la bounté des femmes, ed. Meyer ‘Les manuscrits

francais de Cam-

bridge’ Rom. XV (1886) 315-321 and Stengel Cod. Dighy 86, pp. 22-26 with the title: De wn valet qui soutint dames e dammaiseles. Pitce en couplets coués sur l’amour de la Verge, ed. Meyer ‘Notices et extraits du MS. 8336 de la bibliothéque de Sir Thomas Phillipps’

Rom. XIMII (1884) 531. Plaintes de la Vierge en anglo-frangais, xiiie et xive siécles, ed. F. J. Tanquerey. 1921. Bozon: Un roi jadis estait qe avait un amye, ed. 'T. Wright: Chronicle of Pierre de Langtoft II 426. La Plainte d’ Amour, ed. J. Vising (Géteborgs Hégskolas Arsskrift, Bd. xi; commentary, Bd. xili) 1905, 1907. (d) Lyric and allegoric

Chansons, ed. P. Meyer: () ‘Mélanges de poésie anglo-normande’ Rom. IV (1875) 374-380. (ii) ‘Les manuscrits frangais de Cambridge. II. Bibliotheque de VPUniversité’ Rom. XV (1886) 246-255.

Poéme allégorique, ed. P. Meyer ‘Les manuscrits frangais de Cambridge’ Rom. XV 241-246.

Ex un verger m entrai, ed. F, Michel: Rapports . . . sur les anciens monuments de l’histoire et de la littérature de la France qui se trouvent dans les Bibliothéques de l’Angleterre et de I’Ecosse. 1838. 2.

OLD

FRENCH

Aliscans, ed. G. Rolin (Altfranzésische Bibliothek xv). 1897. Béroul: Roman de Tristan, ed. E. Muret (C.F.M.A.). 1928. La Chastelaine de Vergi, ed. G. Raynaud (C.F.M.A.) ed 2, 1912. Chrétien de Troyes: Samtliche Werke ed. W. Foerster. Halle 1884-1899. (I. Cliges; II. Yvain; III. Erec; I. V Lancelot (La Charrette); Guillaume d’Angleterre). Drouart la Vache: Li livres d’amours, ed. R. Bossuat. 1926.

Eneas, ed. J. Salverda de Grave (C.F.M.A.), 2 vols. 1925, 1929. Fierabras, ed. F. Guessard (Anciens Poétes de la France (A.P.F.) ). 1860. Gaydon, ed. F. Guessard (A.P.F.), 1862.

Guillaume de Lorris and Jeun de Meung: Le Roman de la Rose, ed. E. Langlois (S.A.T.) 5 vols. 1914-1924.

Jean Renart: Le Lai de l’Ombre, ed. J. Bédier (S.A.T.). 1913. Marie de France: Les Las, ed. E. Hoepfiner, 2 vols. Strasbourg. 1925.

Parise la Duchesse, ed. F. Guessard (A.P.F.). 1860. Piramus et Tisbé, ed. C. de Boer (C.F.M.A.). 1921. Recueil général des jeux-partis francais, ed. A. Langfors, A. Jeanroy and L. Brandin (S.A.T.) 2 vols. 1926. Thibaut de Champagne: Chansons, ed. A. Wallenskdld (S.A.T.). 1925,

BIBLIOGRAPHY

175

3. PROVENCAL

Bernard de Ventadour: Lieder, ed. C. Appel. Halle a.S. 1915. Cercamon: Poésies, ed. A. Jeanroy (C.F.M.A.), 1922.

Guilhem de Cabastanh: ed. A. Langfors (C.F.M.A.). 1924. Guillaume IX, duc d’Aquitaine: Chansons, ed. Jeanroy (C.F.M.A.). 1913. Jaufre Rudel: Chansons, ed. Jeanroy (C.F.M.A.). 1915. Jausbert de Puycibot: Poésies, ed. W. P. Shepard (C.F.M.A.). 1924. Peire Vidal: Poésies, ed. J. Anglade (C.F.M.A.). 1923. F. J. M. Raynouard: Choix des poésies originales des troubadours, vol. 2. 1817.

Le Roman de Flamenca, ed. P. Meyer (Bibl. fr. du moyen Age) ed. 2. 1901. 4. MEDIEVAL

LATIN

Andreas Capellanus: De amore libri tres recensuit E. Trojel. Hauniae 1892.

Pseudo-Dionysius: Dionysius the Areopagite on the Divine Names and the Mystical Theology, tr. C. E. Rolt. 1920. St. Bernard: Opera omnia .. . post Horstium denuo recognita... curis D. Joannis Mabillon (Migne P.L. CLXXXII-CLXXXV).

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