From the Désert Liquide to the Sea of Romance: Benedeit's Le Voyage de Saint Brendan and the Irish Immrama

Abstract

Benedeit's poem Le Voyage de Saint Brendan is not a mere adaptation of the popular Latin Navigatio Sancti Brendani Abbatis. By comparing Benedeit's creative use of the sea- and pilgrimage-motives, it appears that the Anglo-Norman poem is in many aspects closer to the Irish immrama than to its presumed source, the Latin Navigatio. As a result, both the relationship between the two Brendan-voyages as well as the alleged dependence of the immrama on the Latin Navigatio are challenged.