Abstract
With the exception of a few incomplete saints’ lives, there is no vernacular literature extant from France before the beginning of the twelfth century. Nor is there evidence that such texts ever existed. But from the twelfth century itself a very considerable number of works survive, many of which, including the earliest, belong to the epic narrative genre known as chansons de geste from the Latin gesta, ‘deeds’.
… a mirror hither straight, That it may show me what a face I have.
(Shakespeare)
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Suggestions for Further Reading and Notes
Gaston Paris, La vie poétique de Charlemagne (Paris, 1905, rev. edn).
The Bibliographical Bulletin of the International Rencesvals Society (BBSR). This bulletin is published periodically and contains details of all work on the Franco-Spanish epic published in the preceding years. So far fourteen bulletins have appeared since 1958.
Norman Daniel, Heroes and Saracens: An Interpretation of the ‘Chansons de geste’ (Edinburgh, 1984). This study of the Saracens in literature includes brief summaries of some seventy texts (see pp. 328–40).
For Arthurian bibliography see next chapter.
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© 1985 Lynette R. Muir
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Muir, L.R. (1985). The Fighting Community. In: Literature and Society in Medieval France. New Studies in Medieval History. Palgrave, London. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-349-18029-5_2
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-349-18029-5_2
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