Chanson de geste

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The Song of Roland
in one picture.

The chanson de geste (

romances. They reached their highest point of acceptance in the period 1150–1250.[3]

Composed in verse, these narrative poems of moderate length (averaging 4000 lines

minstrels or jongleurs. More than one hundred chansons de geste have survived in approximately three hundred manuscripts[5]
that date from the 12th to the 15th century.

Origins

Since the 19th century, much critical debate has centered on the origins of the chansons de geste, and particularly on explaining the length of time between the composition of the chansons and the actual historical events which they reference.

Gormont et Isembart:[6] the first half of the Chanson de Guillaume may date from as early as the 11th century;[7][8] Gormont et Isembart may date from as early as 1068, according to one expert;[9] and The Song of Roland probably dates from after 1086[10] to c.1100.[6][11]

Three early theories of the origin of chansons de geste believe in the continued existence of epic material (either as lyric poems, epic poems or prose narrations) in these intervening two or three centuries.

François Raynouard and German Romanticists like Jacob Grimm posited the spontaneous creation of lyric poems by the people as a whole at the time of the historic battles, which were later put together to form the epics.[13] This was the basis for the "cantilena" theory of epic origin, which was elaborated by Gaston Paris, although he maintained that single authors, rather than the multitude, were responsible for the songs.[14]

This theory was also supported by Robert Fawtier and by

Merovingian tales, posited a Germanic origin for the French poems.[14] A different theory, introduced by the medievalist Paul Meyer, suggested the poems were based on old prose narrations of the original events.[12][15]

Another theory (largely discredited today[16]), developed by Joseph Bédier, posited that the early chansons were recent creations, not earlier than the year 1000, developed by singers who, emulating the songs of "saints' lives" sung in front of churches (and collaborating with the church clerics[16]), created epic stories based on the heroes whose shrines and tombs dotted the great pilgrimage routes, as a way of drawing pilgrims to these churches.[17] Critics have also suggested that knowledge by clerics of ancient Latin epics may have played a role in their composition.[15][17]

Subsequent criticism has vacillated between "traditionalists" (chansons created as part of a popular tradition) and "individualists" (chansons created by a unique author),

oral composition have also been suggested to shed light on the oral composition of the chansons, although this view is not without its critics[19] who maintain the importance of writing not only in the preservation of the texts, but also in their composition, especially for the more sophisticated poems.[19]

Subject matter and structure

Composed in Old French and apparently intended for oral performance by jongleurs, the chansons de geste narrate legendary incidents (sometimes based on real events) in the history of France during the 8th, 9th and 10th centuries, the age of Charles Martel, Charlemagne and Louis the Pious, with emphasis on their conflicts with the Moors and Saracens, and also disputes between kings and their vassals.

The traditional subject matter of the chansons de geste became known as the

romances concerned with the Matter of Britain, that is, King Arthur and his knights; and with the so-called Matter of Rome, covering the Trojan War, the conquests of Alexander the Great, the life of Julius Cæsar and some of his Imperial successors, who were given medieval makeovers as exemplars of chivalry.[20]

A key theme of the chansons de geste, which set them off from the romances (which tended to explore the role of the "individual"), is their critique and celebration of community/collectivity (their epic heroes are portrayed as figures in the destiny of the nation and Christianity)[21] and their representation of the complexities of feudal relations and service.

The subject matter of the chansons evolved over time, according to public taste. Alongside the great battles and scenes of historic prowess of the early chansons there began to appear other themes. Realistic elements (money, urban scenes) and elements from the new court culture (female characters, the role of love) began to appear.

Hugues Capet).[23]

The poems contain an assortment of character types; the repertoire of valiant hero, brave traitor, shifty or cowardly traitor,

Pèlerinage de Charlemagne
.

The

narrative structure of the chanson de geste has been compared to the one in the Nibelungenlied and in creole legends by Henri Wittmann[24] on the basis of common narreme structure as first developed in the work of Eugene Dorfman[25] and Jean-Pierre Tusseau[26]

Versification

Early chansons de geste were typically composed in ten-syllable lines grouped in assonanced (meaning that the last stressed vowel is the same in each line throughout the stanza, but the last consonant differs from line to line) stanzas (called laisses). These stanzas are of variable length.

An example from the

Chanson de Roland
illustrates the technique of the ten-syllable assonanced form. The assonance in this stanza is on e:

Later chansons were composed in monorhyme stanzas, in which the last syllable of each line rhymes fully throughout the stanza. Later chansons also tended to be composed using alexandrines (twelve-syllable) lines, instead of ten-syllable lines (some early chansons, such as Girart de Vienne, were even adapted into a twelve-syllable version).

The following example of the twelve-syllable rhymed form is from the opening lines of Les Chétifs, a chanson in the Crusade cycle. The rhyme is on ie:

These forms of versification were substantially different than the forms found in the

romances (romans) which were written in octosyllabic rhymed couplets
.

Composition and performance

The public of the chansons de geste—the lay (secular) public of the 11th to the 13th centuries—was largely illiterate,[27] except for (at least to the end of the 12th century) members of the great courts and (in the south) smaller noble families.[28] Thus, the chansons were primarily an oral medium.

Opinions vary greatly on whether the early chansons were first written down and then read from manuscripts (although

clerics or illiterate jongleurs working within an oral tradition? As an indication of the role played by orality in the tradition of the chanson de geste, lines and sometimes whole stanzas, especially in the earlier examples, are noticeably formulaic
in nature, making it possible both for the poet to construct a poem in performance and for the audience to grasp a new theme with ease.

Scholarly opinions differ on the exact manner of recitation, but it is generally believed that the chansons de geste were originally sung (whereas the medieval romances were probably spoken)[30] by poets, minstrels or jongleurs, who would sometimes accompany themselves, or be accompanied, on the vielle, a mediæval fiddle played with a bow. Several manuscript texts include lines in which the jongleur demands attention, threatens to stop singing, promises to continue the next day, and asks for money or gifts.[29] By the middle of the 13th century, singing had probably given way to recitation.[3]

It has been calculated that a reciter could sing about a thousand verses an hour

Quatre Fils Aymon comprises 18,489 verses), it is conceivable that few spectators heard the longest works in their entirety.[32]

While poems like The Song of Roland were sometimes heard in public squares and were no doubt warmly received by a broad public,[33] some critics caution that the chansons should probably not be characterized as popular literature[34] and some chansons appear particularly tailored for an audience of aristocratic, privileged or warrior classes.[35]

The poems themselves

More than one hundred chansons de geste have survived in around three hundred manuscripts[5] that date from the 12th to the 15th century. Several popular chansons were written down more than once in varying forms. The earliest chansons are all (more or less) anonymous; many later ones have named authors.

By the middle of the 12th century, the corpus of works was being expanded principally by "cyclisation", that is to say by the formation of "cycles" of chansons attached to a character or group of characters—with new chansons being added to the ensemble by singing of the earlier or later adventures of the hero, of his youthful exploits ("enfances"), the great deeds of his ancestors or descendants, or his retreat from the world to a convent ("moniage") – or attached to an event (like the Crusades).[36]

About 1215

Guiraut de Cabrera in his humorous poem Ensenhamen, better known from its first words as "Cabra juglar": this is addressed to a juglar (jongleur) and purports to instruct him on the poems he ought to know but does not.[38]

The listing below is arranged according to Bertrand de Bar-sur-Aube's cycles, extended with two additional groupings and with a final list of chansons that fit into no cycle. There are numerous differences of opinion about the categorization of individual chansons.

Geste du roi

Main article: Geste du roi

The chief character is usually Charlemagne or one of his immediate successors. A pervasive theme is the King's role as champion of

The Song of Roland
".

Geste de Garin de Monglane

Main article: La Geste de Garin de Monglane

The central character is not

Muslim
) enemy.

Geste de Doon de Mayence

Main article: Doon de Mayence

This cycle concerns

traitors
and rebels against royal authority. In each case the revolt ends with the defeat of the rebels and their eventual repentance.

  • Gormond et Isembart
  • Girart de Roussillon (1160–1170). The hero Girart de Roussillon also figures in Girart de Vienne, in which he is identified as a son of Garin de Monglane. There is a later sequel:
  • Les Quatre Fils Aymon
     (end of the 12th century)
  • Raoul de Cambrai, apparently begun by Bertholais; existing version from end of 12th century
  • Doön de Mayence (mid-13th century)
  • Doon de Nanteuil current in the second half of the 12th century, now known only in fragments which derive from a 13th-century version.[54] To this several sequels were attached:
    • Aye d'Avignon, probably composed between 1195 and 1205. The fictional heroine is first married to Garnier de Nanteuil, who is the son of Doon de Nanteuil and grandson of Doon de Mayence. After Garnier's death she marries the Saracen Ganor
    • Gui de Nanteuil, evidently popular around 1207 when the troubadour Raimbaut de Vaqueiras mentions the story. The fictional hero is son of the heroine of Aye d'Avignon (to which Gui de Nanteuil forms a sequel)
    • Tristan de Nanteuil. The fictional hero is son of the hero of Gui de Nanteuil
    • Parise la Duchesse. The fictional heroine is daughter of the heroine of Aye d'Avignon. Exiled from France, she gives birth to a son, Hugues, who becomes king of Hungary[55]
  • Maugis d'Aigremont
  • Vivien l'Amachour de Monbranc

Lorraine cycle

Main article: Lorraine cycle

This local cycle of epics of Lorraine traditional history, in the late form in which it is now known, includes details evidently drawn from Huon de Bordeaux and Ogier le Danois.

Crusade Cycle

Main article:
Crusade Cycle

Not listed by Bertrand de Bar-sur-Aube, this cycle deals with the First Crusade and its immediate aftermath.

  • Chanson d'Antioche, apparently begun by Richard le Pèlerin c. 1100; earliest surviving text by Graindor de Douai c. 1180; expanded version 14th century
  • Les Chétifs telling the adventures (mostly fictional) of the poor crusaders led by Peter the Hermit; the hero is Harpin de Bourges. The episode was eventually incorporated, c. 1180, by Graindor de Douai in his reworking of the Chanson d'Antioche
  • Matabrune tells the story of old Matabrune and of the great-grandfather of Godefroi de Bouillon
  • Le Chevalier au Cigne tells the story of Elias, grandfather of Godefroi de Bouillon. Originally composed around 1192, it was afterwards extended and divided into several branches
  • Les Enfances Godefroi or "Childhood exploits of Godefroi" tells the story of the youth of Godefroi de Bouillon and his three brothers
  • Chanson de Jérusalem
  • La Mort de Godefroi de Bouillon, quite unhistorical, narrates Godefroi's poisoning by the Patriarch of Jerusalem
  • Baudouin de Sebourc (mid-14th century)
  • Bâtard de Bouillon (early 14th century)

Others

The chansons de geste reached their apogee in the period 1150–1250.[3] By the middle of the 13th century, public taste in France had begun to abandon these epics, preferring, rather, the romances.[59] As the genre progressed in the middle of the 13th century, only certain traits (like versification, laisse structure, formulaic forms, setting, and other clichés of the genre) remained to set the chansons apart from the romances.[59] The 15th century saw the cycles of chansons (along with other chronicles) converted into large prose compilations (such as the compilation made by David Aubert).[23][60] Yet, the themes of the epics continued to exert an influence through the 16th century.[60]

Legacy and adaptations

The chansons de geste created a body of

mythology
that lived on well after they ceased to be produced in France.

The French chanson gave rise to the Old Spanish tradition of the cantar de gesta.

The chanson de geste was also adapted in southern (Occitan-speaking) France. One of the three surviving manuscripts of the chanson Girart de Roussillon (12th century) is in Occitan,[61] as are two works based on the story of Charlemagne and Roland, Rollan a Saragossa[62] and Ronsasvals (early 12th century).[63] The chanson de geste form was also used in such Occitan texts as Canso d'Antioca (late 12th century), Daurel e Betó (first half of the 13th century), and Song of the Albigensian Crusade (c.1275) (cf Occitan literature).

In medieval

Rolandslied, c.1170), and the German poet Wolfram von Eschenbach based his (incomplete) 13th century epic Willehalm (consisting of seventy-eight manuscripts) on the Aliscans, a work in the cycle of William of Orange (Eschenbach's work had a great success in Germany), these remained isolated examples. Other than a few other works translated from the cycle of Charlemagne in the 13th century, the chansons de geste were not adapted into German, and it is believed that this was because the epic poems lacked what the romances specialized in portraying: scenes of idealized knighthood, love and courtly society.[64]

In the late 13th century, certain French chansons de geste were adapted into the Old Norse Karlamagnús saga.

In

Orlando furioso (1516) by Ludovico Ariosto, and Jerusalem Delivered (1581) by Torquato Tasso
are all indebted to the French narrative material (the Pulci, Boiardo and Ariosto poems are founded on the legends of the paladins of Charlemagne, and particularly, of Roland, translated as "Orlando").

The incidents and plot devices of the Italian epics later became central to works of English literature such as

Roman Catholicism
.

The Welsh poet, painter, soldier and engraver David Jones's Modernist poem "In Parenthesis" was described by contemporary critic Herbert Read as having "the heroic ring which we associate with the old chansons de geste".

See also

Notes

  1. ^ UK: /ˌʃɒ̃sɒ̃ də ˈʒɛst/, US: /ʃɑːnˌsɔːn də ˈʒɛst/, Old French: [tʃãnˈtsõn də ˈdʒɛstə], Modern French: [ʃɑ̃sɔ̃ d(ə) ʒɛst].

References

Citations

  1. ^ Crosland, 1.
  2. ISBN 0198661258
    .
  3. ^ a b c d e Hasenohr, 242.
  4. ^ Holmes, 66.
  5. ^ a b La Chanson de Roland, 12.
  6. ^ a b c Hasenohr, 239.
  7. ^ Hasenohr, 520–522.
  8. ^ Holmes, 102–104.
  9. ^ Holmes, 90–92.
  10. ^ La Chanson de Roland, 10.
  11. ^ Hasenohr, 1300.
  12. ^ a b Holmes, 68.
  13. ^ Holmes, 66–67.
  14. ^ a b c Holmes, 67.
  15. ^ a b c see also Hasenohr, 239.
  16. ^ a b c La Chanson de Roland, 11.
  17. ^ a b Holmes, 68-9.
  18. ^ see also Hasenohr, 240.
  19. ^ a b Hasenohr, 240.
  20. Chanson de Saisnes: for details see Matter of France
    .
  21. ^ La Chanson de Roland, 16–17.
  22. ^ Hasenohr, 242
  23. ^ a b Adam, 45.
  24. ^ Wittmann, Henri. 1995. "La structure de base de la syntaxe narrative dans les contes et légendes du créole haïtien." Poétiques et imaginaires: francopolyphonie littéraire des Amériques. Edited by Pierre Laurette & Hans-George Ruprecht. Paris: L'Harmattan, pp. 207–218.[1]
  25. ^ Dorfman, Eugène. 1969. The narreme in the medieval romance epic: An introduction to narrative structures. Toronto: University of Toronto Press.
  26. ^ *Tusseau, Jean-Pierre & Henri Wittmann. 1975. "Règles de narration dans les chansons de geste et le roman courtois". Folia linguistica 7.401-12.[2]
  27. ^ a b La Chanson de Roland, 12.
  28. ^ Bumke, 429.
  29. ^ a b c La Chanson de Roland, 14.
  30. ^ a b Bumke, 521-2.
  31. ^ a b Bumke, 522.
  32. ^ see Bumke, 522.
  33. ^ Brault, 28.
  34. ^ Brault, 353 (note 166).
  35. ^ see Brault, 28.
  36. ^ Adam, 10.
  37. ^ Recueil général et complet des fabliaux ed. A. de Montaiglon (1872) vol. 1 p. 3
  38. ^ Martín de Riquer, Los cantares de gesta franceses (1952) pp. 390–404
  39. ^ Le Roland occitan ed. and tr. Gérard Gouiran, Robert Lafont (1991)
  40. ^ La geste de Fierabras, le jeu du réel et de l'invraissemblable ed. André de Mandach. Geneva, 1987.
  41. ^ "Fierabras and Floripas: A French Epic Allegory" ed. and trans. by Michael A.H. Newth. New York: Italica Press, 2010.
  42. ^ Ed. F. Guessard, S. Luce. Paris: Vieweg, 1862.
  43. ^ Jehan de Lanson, chanson de geste of the 13th Century ed. J. Vernon Myers. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1965.
  44. ^ Ed. A. Thomas. Paris: Société des anciens textes français, 1913.
  45. ^ Galiens li Restorés ed. Edmund Stengel (1890); Le Galien de Cheltenham ed. D. M. Dougherty, E. B. Barnes. Amsterdam: Benjamins, 1981.
  46. ^ Aiquin ou la conquête de la Bretagne par le roi Charlemagne ed. F. Jacques. Aix-en-Provence: Publications du CUER MA, 1977.
  47. ^ Raimbert de Paris, La Chevalerie Ogier de Danemarche ed. J. Barrois (1842)
  48. ^ Ed. François Guessard, Henri Michelant. Paris, 1859.
  49. ^ Michela Scattolini, "Ricerche sulla tradizione dell'Huon d'Auvergne." Tesi di dottorato. Siena, Scuola di dottorato europea in filologia romanza, 2010, pp. 6-7.
  50. ^ Simon de Pouille ed. Jeanne Baroin (1968)
  51. ^ a b c La geste de Beaulande ed. David M. Dougherty, E. B. Barnes (1966)
  52. ^ Ed. C. Wahlund, H. von Feilitzen. Upsala and Paris, 1895.
  53. ^ Ed. W. Cloetta. Paris, 1906–13.
  54. ^ "La chanson de Doon de Nanteuil: fragments inédits" ed. Paul Meyer in Romania vol. 13 (1884)
  55. ^ Parise la Duchesse ed. G. F. de Martonne (1836); Parise la Duchesse ed. F. Guessard, L. Larchey (1860)
  56. ^ Gormont et Isembart ed. Alphonse Bayot (1931)
  57. ^ R. Weeks, "Aïmer le chétif" in PMLA vol. 17 (1902) pp. 411–434.
  58. ^ Ed. Jacques Normand and Gaston Raynaud. Paris, 1877.
  59. ^ a b Adam, 38.
  60. ^ a b Haseonohr, 243.
  61. ^ Hasenohr, 547.
  62. ^ Hasenohr, 1305.
  63. ^ Hasenohr, 1320.
  64. ^ Bumke, 92–93.
  65. ^ Hasenohr. Article: "Entrée d'Espagne", pp. 412–3.
  66. ^ Brand, 168.

Bibliography

External links

Wikisource has the text of the 1911 Encyclopædia Britannica article "Chansons de Geste".
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