Part 2

_Arthurian Romances._--The second class of early French epics consists of the Arthurian cycle, the _Matiere de Bretagne_, the earliest known compositions of which are at least a century junior to the earliest chanson de geste, but which soon succeeded the chansons in popular favour, and obtained a vogue both wider and far more enduring. It is not easy to conceive a greater contrast in form, style, subject and sentiment than is presented by the two classes. In both the religious sentiment is prominent, but the religion of the chansons is of the simplest, not to say of the most savage character. To pray to God and to kill his enemies constitutes the whole duty of man. In the romances the mystical element becomes on the contrary prominent, and furnishes, in the Holy Grail, one of the most important features. In the Carlovingian knight the courtesy and clemency which we have learnt to associate with chivalry are almost entirely absent. The _gentix ber_ contradicts, jeers at, and execrates his sovereign and his fellows with the utmost freedom. He thinks nothing of striking his _cortoise moullier_ so that the blood runs down her _cler vis_. If a servant or even an equal offends him, he will throw the offender into the fire, knock his brains out, or set his whiskers ablaze. The Arthurian knight is far more of the modern model in these respects. But his chief difference from his predecessor is undoubtedly in his amorous devotion to his beloved, who, if not morally superior to Bellicent, Floripas, Esclairmonde, and the other Carlovingian heroines, is somewhat less forward. Even in minute details the difference is strongly marked. The romances are in octosyllabic couplets or in prose, and their language is different from that of the chansons, and contains much fewer of the usual epic repetitions and stock phrases. A voluminous controversy has been held respecting the origin of these differences, and of the story or stories which were destined to receive such remarkable attention. Reference must be made to the article ARTHURIAN LEGEND for the history of this controversy and for an account of its present state. This state, however, and all subsequent states, are likely to be rather dependent upon opinion than upon actual knowledge. From the point of view of the general historian of literature it may not be improper here to give a caution against the frequent use of the word "proven" in such matters. Very little in regard to early literature, except the literary value of the texts, is ever susceptible of _proof_; although things may be made more or less _probable_. What we are at present concerned with, however, is a body of verse and prose composed in the latter part of the 12th century and later. The earliest romances, the _Saint Graal_, the _Quete du Saint Graal_, _Joseph d'Arimathie_ and _Merlin_ bear the names of Walter Map and Robert de Borron. _Artus_ and part at least of _Lancelot du Lac_ (the whole of which has been by turns attributed and denied to Walter Map) appear to be due to unknown authors. _Tristan_ came later, and has a stronger mixture of Celtic tradition. At the same time as Walter Map, or a little later, Chretien (or Chrestien) de Troyes threw the legends of the Round Table into octosyllabic verse of a singularly spirited and picturesque character. The chief poems attributed to him are the _Chevalier au Lyon_ (Sir Ewain of Wales), the _Chevalier a la Charette_ (one of the episodes of _Lancelot_), _Eric et Enide_, _Tristan_ and _Percivale_. These poems, independently of their merit, which is great, had an extensive literary influence. They were translated by the German minnesingers, Wolfram von Eschenbach, Gottfried of Strassburg, and others. With the romances already referred to, which are mostly in prose, and which by recent authorities have been put later than the verse tales which used to be postponed to them, Chretien's poems complete the early forms of the Arthurian story, and supply the matter of it as it is best known to English readers in Malory's book. Nor does that book, though far later than the original forms, convey a very false impression of the characteristics of the older romances. Indeed, the Arthurian knight, his character and adventures, are so much better known than the heroes of the Carlovingian chanson that there is less need to dwell upon them. They had, however, as has been already pointed out, great influence upon their rivals, and their comparative fertility of invention, the much larger number of their _dramatis personae_, and the greater variety of interests to which they appealed, sufficiently explain their increased popularity. The ordinary attractions of poetry are also more largely present in them than in the chansons; there is more description, more life, and less of the mere chronicle. They have been accused of relaxing morality, and there is perhaps some truth in the charge. But the change is after all one rather of manners than of morals, and what is lost in simplicity is gained in refinement. _Doon de Mayence_ is a late chanson, and _Lancelot du Lac_ is an early romance. But the two beautiful scenes, in the former between Doon and Nicolette, in the latter between Lancelot, Galahault, Guinevere, and the Lady of Malehaut, may be compared as instances of the attitude of the two classes of poets towards the same subject.

_Romances of Antiquity._--There is yet a third class of early narrative poems, differing from the two former in subject, but agreeing, sometimes with one sometimes with the other in form. These are the classical romances--the _Matiere de Rome_--which are not much later than those of Charlemagne and Arthur. The chief subjects with which their authors busied themselves were the conquests of Alexander and the siege of Troy, though other classical stories come in. The most remarkable of all is the romance of _Alixandre_ by Lambert the Short and Alexander of Bernay. It has been said that the excellence of the twelve-syllabled verse used in this romance was the origin of the term alexandrine. The Trojan romances, on the other hand, are chiefly in octosyllabic verse, and the principal poem which treats of them is the _Roman de Troie_ of Benoit de Sainte More. Both this poem and _Alixandre_ are attributed to the last quarter of the 12th century. The authorities consulted for these poems were, as may be supposed, none of the best. Dares Phrygius, Dictys Cretensis, the pseudo-Callisthenes supplied most of them. But the inexhaustible invention of the trouveres themselves was the chief authority consulted. The adventures of Medea, the wanderings of Alexander, the Trojan horse, the story of Thebes, were quite sufficient to spur on to exertion the minds which had been accustomed to spin a chanson of some 10,000 lines out of a casual allusion in some preceding poem. It is needless to say that anachronisms did not disturb them. From first to last the writers of the chansons had not in the least troubled themselves with attention to any such matters. Charlemagne himself had his life and exploits accommodated to the need of every poet who treats of him, and the same is the case with the heroes of antiquity. Indeed, Alexander is made in many respects a prototype of Charlemagne. He is regularly knighted, he has twelve peers, he holds tournaments, he has relations with Arthur, and comes in contact with fairies, he takes flights in the air, dives in the sea and so forth. There is perhaps more avowed imagination in these classical stories than in either of the other divisions of French epic poetry. Some of their authors even confess to the practice of fiction, while the trouveres of the chansons invariably assert the historical character of their facts and personages, and the authors of the Arthurian romances at least start from facts vouched for, partly by national tradition, partly by the authority of religion and the church. The classical romances, however, are important in two different ways. In the first place, they connect the early literature of France, however loosely, and with links of however dubious authenticity, with the great history and literature of the past. They show a certain amount of scholarship in their authors, and in their hearers they show a capacity of taking an interest in subjects which are not merely those directly connected with the village or the tribe. The chansons de geste had shown the creative power and independent character of French literature. There is, at least about the earlier ones, nothing borrowed, traditional or scholarly. They smack of the soil, and they rank France among the very few countries which, in this matter of indigenous growth, have yielded more than folk-songs and fireside tales. The Arthurian romances, less independent in origin, exhibit a wider range of view, a greater knowledge of human nature, and a more extensive command of the sources of poetical and romantic interest. The classical epics superadd the only ingredient necessary to an accomplished literature--that is to say, the knowledge of what has been done by other peoples and other literatures already, and the readiness to take advantage of the materials thus supplied.

_Romans d'Aventures._--These are the three earliest developments of French literature on the great scale. They led, however, to a fourth, which, though later in date than all except their latest forms and far more loosely associated as a group, is so closely connected with them by literary and social considerations that it had best be mentioned here. This is the _roman d'aventures_, a title given to those almost avowedly fictitious poems which connect themselves, mainly and centrally, neither with French history, with the Round Table, nor with the heroes of antiquity. These began to be written in the 13th century, and continued until the prose form of fiction became generally preferred. The later forms of the chansons de geste and the Arthurian poems might indeed be well called romans d'aventures themselves. _Hugues Capet_, for instance, a chanson in form and class of subject, is certainly one of this latter kind in treatment; and there is a larger class of semi-Arthurian romance, which so to speak branches off from the main trunk. But for convenience sake the definition we have given is preferable. The style and subject of these romans d'aventures are naturally extremely various. _Guillaume de Palerme_ deals with the adventures of a Sicilian prince who is befriended by a were-wolf; _Le Roman de l'escoufle_, with a heroine whose ring is carried off by a sparrow-hawk (_escoufle_), like Prince Camaralzaman's talisman; _Guy of Warwick_, with one of the most famous of imaginary heroes; _Meraugis de Portleguez_ is a sort of branch or offshoot of the romances of the Round Table; _Cleomades_, the work of the trouvere Adenes le Roi, who also rehandled the old chanson subjects of _Ogier_ and _Berte aux grans pies_, connects itself once more with the _Arabian Nights_ as well as with Chaucer forwards in the introduction of a flying mechanical horse. There is, in short, no possibility of classifying their subjects. The habit of writing in gestes, or of necessarily connecting the new work with an older one, had ceased to be binding, and the instinct of fiction writing was free; yet those romans d'aventures do not rank quite as high in literary importance as the classes which preceded them. This under-valuation arises rather from a lack of originality and distinctness of savour than from any shortcomings in treatment. Their versification, usually octosyllabic, is pleasant enough; but there is not much distinctness of character about them, and their incidents often strike the reader with something of the sameness, but seldom with much of the naivete, of those of the older poems. Nevertheless some of them attained to a very high popularity, such, for instance, as the _Partenopex de Blois_ of Denis Pyramus, which has a motive drawn from the story of _Cupid and Psyche_ and the charming _Floire et Blanchefleur_, giving the woes of a Christian prince and a Saracen slave-girl. With them may be connected a certain number of early romances and fictions of various dates in prose, none of which can vie in charm with _Aucassin et Nicolette_ (13th century), an exquisite literary presentment of medieval sentiment in its most delightful form.

General characteristics of early narrative.

Spread of literary taste.

In these classes maybe said to be summed up the literature of feudal chivalry in France. They were all, except perhaps the last, composed by one class of persons, the trouveres, and performed by another, the jongleurs. The latter, indeed, sometimes presumed to compose for himself, and was denounced as a _troveor batard_ by the indignant members of the superior caste. They were all originally intended to be performed in the _palais marberin_ of the baron to an audience of knights and ladies, and, when reading became more common, to be read by such persons. They dealt therefore chiefly, if not exclusively, with the class to whom they were addressed. The bourgeois and the villain, personages of political nonentity at the time of their early composition, come in for far slighter notice, although occasionally in the few curious instances we have mentioned, and others, persons of a class inferior to the seigneur play an important part. The habit of private wars and of insurrection against the sovereign supply the motives of the chanson de geste, the love of gallantry, adventure and foreign travel those of the romances Arthurian and miscellaneous. None of these motives much affected the lower classes, who were, with the early developed temper of the middle- and lower-class Frenchman, already apt to think and speak cynically enough of tournaments, courts, crusades and the other occupations of the nobility. The communal system was springing up, the towns were receiving royal encouragement as a counterpoise to the authority of the nobles. The corruptions and maladministration of the church attracted the satire rather of the citizens and peasantry who suffered by them, than of the nobles who had less to fear and even something to gain. On the other hand, the gradual spread of learning, inaccurate and ill-digested perhaps, but still learning, not only opened up new classes of subjects, but opened them to new classes of persons. The thousands of students who flocked to the schools of Paris were not all princes or nobles. Hence there arose two new classes of literature, the first consisting of the embodiment of learning of one kind or other in the vulgar tongue. The other, one of the most remarkable developments of sportive literature which the world has seen, produced the second indigenous literary growth of which France can boast, namely, the fabliaux, and the almost more remarkable work which is an immense conglomerate of fabliaux, the great beast-epic of the Roman de Renart.

_Fabliaux._--There are few literary products which have more originality and at the same time more diversity than the fabliau. The epic and the drama, even when they are independently produced, are similar in their main characteristics all the world over. But there is nothing in previous literature which exactly corresponds to the fabliau. It comes nearest to the Aesopic fable and its eastern origins or parallels. But differs from these in being less allegorical, less obviously moral (though a moral of some sort is usually if not always enforced), and in having a much more direct personal interest. It is in many degrees further removed from the parable, and many degrees nearer to the novel. The story is the first thing, the moral the second, and the latter is never suffered to interfere with the former. These observations apply only to the fabliaux, properly so called, but the term has been used with considerable looseness. The collectors of those interesting pieces, Barbazan, Meon, Le Grand d'Aussy, have included in their collections large numbers of miscellaneous pieces such as _dits_ (rhymed descriptions of various objects, the most famous known author of which was Baudouin de Conde, 13th century), and _debats_ (discussions between two persons or contrasts of the attributes of two things), sometimes even short romances, farces and mystery plays. Not that the fable proper--the prose classical beast-story of "Aesop"--was neglected. Marie de France--the poetess to be mentioned again for her more strictly poetical work--is the most literary of not a few writers who composed what were often, after the mysterious original poet, named _Ysopets_. Aesop, Phaedrus, Babrius were translated and imitated in Latin and in the vernacular by this class of writer, and some of the best known of "fablers" date from this time. The fabliau, on the other hand, according to the best definition of it yet achieved, is "the recital, generally comic, of a real or possible incident occurring in ordinary human life." The comedy, it may be added, is usually of a satiric kind, and occupies itself with every class and rank of men, from the king to the villain. There is no limit to the variety of these lively verse-tales, which are invariably written in eight-syllabled couplets. Now the subject is the misadventure of two Englishmen, whose ignorance of the French language makes them confuse donkey and lamb; now it is the fortunes of an exceedingly foolish knight, who has an amiable and ingenious mother-in-law; now the deserved sufferings of an avaricious or ill-behaved priest; now the bringing of an ungrateful son to a better mind by the wisdom of babes and sucklings. Not a few of the _Canterbury Tales_ are taken directly from fabliaux; indeed, Chaucer, with the possible exception of Prior, is our nearest approach to a fabliau-writer. At the other end of Europe the prose novels of Boccaccio and other Italian tale-tellers are largely based upon fabliaux. But their influence in their own country was the greatest. They were the first expression of the spirit which has since animated the most national and popular developments of French literature. Simple and unpretending as they are in form, the fabliaux announce not merely the _Cent Nouvelles Nouvelles_ and the _Heptameron_, _L'Avocat Patelin_, and _Pantagruel_, but also _L'Avare_ and the _Roman comique_, _Gil Blas_ and _Candide_. They indeed do more than merely prophesy the spirit of these great performances--they directly lead to them. The prose-tale and the farce are the direct outcomes of the fabliau, and the prose-tale and the farce once given, the novel and the comedy inevitably follow.

Social importance of fabliaux.

The special period of fabliau composition appears to have been the 12th and 13th centuries. It signifies on the one side the growth of a lighter and more sportive spirit than had yet prevailed, on another the rise in importance of other and lower orders of men than the priest and the noble, on yet another the consciousness on the part of these lower orders of the defects of the two privileged classes, and of the shortcomings of the system of polity under which these privileged classes enjoyed their privileges. There is, however, in the fabliau proper not so very much of direct satire, this being indeed excluded by the definition given above, and by the thoroughly artistic spirit in which that definition is observed. The fabliaux are so numerous and so various that it is difficult to select any as specially representative. We may, however, mention, both as good examples and as interesting from their subsequent history, _Le Vair Palfroi_, treated in English by Leigh Hunt and by Peacock; _Le Vilain Mire_, the original consciously or unconsciously followed in _Le Medecin malgre lui_; _Le Roi d'Angleterre et le jongleur d'Eli_; _La houce partie_; _Le Sot Chevalier_, an indecorous but extremely amusing story; _Les deux bordeors ribaus_, a dialogue between two jongleurs of great literary interest, containing allusions to the chansons de geste and romances most in vogue; and _Le vilain qui conquist paradis par plait_, one of the numerous instances of what has unnecessarily puzzled moderns, the association in medieval times of sincere and unfeigned faith with extremely free handling of its objects. This lightheartedness in other subjects sometimes bubbled over into the _fatrasie_, an almost pure nonsense-piece, parent of the later _amphigouri_.

_Roman de Renart._--If the fabliaux are not remarkable for direct satire, that element is supplied in more than compensating quantity by an extraordinary composition which is closely related to them. _Le Roman de Renart_, or _History of Reynard the Fox_, is a poem, or rather series of poems, which, from the end of the 12th to the middle of the 14th century, served the citizen poets of northern France, not merely as an outlet for literary expression, but also as a vehicle of satirical comment,--now on the general vices and weaknesses of humanity, now on the usual corruptions in church and state, now on the various historical events which occupied public attention from time to time. The enormous popularity of the subject is shown by the long vogue which it had, and by the empire which it exercised over generations of writers who differed from each other widely in style and temper. Nothing can be farther from the allegorical erudition, the political diatribes and the sermonizing moralities of the authors of _Renart le Contre-fait_ than the sly naivete of the writers of the earlier branches. Yet these and a long and unknown series of intermediate bards the fox-king pressed into his service, and it is scarcely too much to say that, during the two centuries of his reign, there was hardly a thought in the popular mind which, as it rose to the surface, did not find expression in an addition to the huge cycle of _Renart_.