An Anglo-Norman Reader

Jane Bliss

Description

This book is an anthology with a difference. It presents a distinctive variety of Anglo-Norman works, beginning in the twelfth century and ending in the nineteenth, covering a broad range of genres and writers, introduced in a lively and thought-provoking way. Facing-page translations, into accessible and engaging modern English, are provided throughout, bringing these texts to life for a contemporary audience.

The collection offers a selection of fascinating passages, and whole texts, many of which are not anthologised or translated anywhere else. It explores little-known byways of Arthurian legend and stories of real-life crime and punishment; women’s voices tell history, write letters, berate pagans; advice is offered on how to win friends and influence people, how to cure people’s ailments and how to keep clear of the law; and stories from the Bible are retold with commentary, together with guidance on prayer and confession.



Each text is introduced and elucidated with notes and full references, and the material is divided into three main sections: Story (a variety of narrative forms), Miscellany (including letters, law and medicine, and other non-fiction), and Religious (saints' lives, sermons, Bible commentary, and prayers). Passages in one genre have been chosen so as to reflect themes or stories that appear in another, so that the book can be enjoyed as a collection or used as a resource to dip into for selected texts.



This anthology is essential reading for students and scholars of Anglo-Norman and medieval literature and culture. Wide-ranging and fully referenced, it can be used as a springboard for further study or relished in its own right by readers interested to discover Anglo-Norman literature that was written to amuse, instruct, entertain, or admonish medieval audiences.

Sujets

• Anglo-Norman literature
• Letter
• Homiletics
• Anthology
• Hagiography
• Short Stories
• History

Informations

• Publié par: Open Book Publishers
• Date de parution: 08 février 2018
• Nombre de lectures: 3
• EAN13: 9781783743162
• Langue: English
• Poids de l'ouvrage: 1 Mo

Extrait

AN ANGLO-NORMAN READER


An Anglo-Norman Reader
Jane Bliss






https://www.openbookpublishers.com
© 2018 Jane Bliss


The text of this book is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International license (CC BY-NC 4.0). This license allows you to share, copy, distribute and transmit the work for non-commercial purposes; to remix, transform and build upon the material providing attribution is made to the author (but not in any way that suggests that she endorses you or your use of the work). Attribution should include the following information:
Jane Bliss, An Anglo-Norman Reader . Cambridge, UK: Open Book Publishers, 2018. https://doi.org/10.11647/OBP.0110
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Every effort has been made to identify and contact copyright holders and any omission or error will be corrected if notification is made to the publisher.
California State University Northridge has provided support for the publication of this volume.
ISBN Paperback: 978-1-78374-313-1
ISBN Hardback: 978-1-78374-314-8
ISBN Digital (PDF): 978-1-78374-315-5
ISBN Digital ebook (epub): 978-1-78374-316-2
ISBN Digital ebook (mobi): 978-1-78374-317-9
DOI: 10.11647/OBP.0110
Cover Design by Heidi Coburn.
Front cover image by Bill Black (2012): Wace, in Alderney Bayeux Tapestry Finale.
Back cover image by Danny Chapman (2017): Ormer Shells.
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Printed in the United Kingdom, United States, and Australia by Lightning Source for Open Book Publishers (Cambridge, UK)


Contents
Acknowledgements & Notes
Copyright Acknowledgements
Note for Ebook Editions
Abbreviations
Bible Books
Introduction
Selection of Texts
Principal Themes and Topics
Treatment of Texts
Story
History
Wace’s Roman de Rou
Description of England
The French Chronicle of London
Des Grantz Geanz
Romance
Roman de Thèbes (Amphiarax)
Protheselaus
Le Roman de Fergus
Le Roman du reis Yder
The Anglo-Norman Folie Tristan
Short Stories
Tristan Rossignol
Two Fabliaux
Le Roi d’Angleterre et le Jongleur d’Ely
An Anglo-Norman Miscellany
Satirical, Social, and Moral
Le Roman des Franceis , by André de Coutances
L’Apprise de Nurture
Grammar and Glosses
La Maniere de Langage
Letters
Maud Mortimer’s letters to the King
Christine de Pisan’s letter to Isabelle of Bavaria
Doctors, Lawyers, and Writers
A Medical Compendium
Legal Texts
‘En autre ovre’ (Prologues)
Religious Writings
Biblical and Apocryphal
Proverbes de Salemon (chapter 7)
The Creation , by Herman de Valenciennes
Hagiography
La Vie d’Edouard le Confesseur , by a Nun of Barking
La Vie Seinte Audree , by Marie
The Life of St. Catherine , by Clemence
Homiletic
Maurice de Sully: Credo and Pater Noster
Sermon on Joshua
Rossignos
Eight Deadly Sins , attributed to Robert Grosseteste
Nicole Bozon, from Contes Moralisés , 128: Bad Company
Appendix
‘Et pis y avait quat’e: enne histouaire de ma graond’mé’, an adventure story
Bibliography
Primary Texts
Secondary Texts
Indexes
Manuscripts
Bible References
General Index


Acknowledgements & Notes
Thanks are due to the following colleagues and friends:
Matthew Albanese, Laura Ashe, Katie Attwood, Ian Bass, Catherine Batt, Bill and Pauline Black, Marina Bowder, Glyn Burgess, Daron Burrows, Emma Cavell, Danny Chapman, Victoria Condie, Graham Edwards, Sarah Foot, Linda Gowans, Douglas Gray , Huw Grange, Miranda Griffin, Richard Howard, David Howlett, Eliza Hoyer-Millar, Tony Hunt, Paul Hyams, Andy King, Carolyne Larrington, Jude Mackley, Quentin Miller, Ben Parsons, Stephen Pink, Jackie and Ed Pritchard, Gillian Rogers, Royston Raymond, Samantha Rayner, Kate Russell, Lynda Sayce, Ian Short, Ilona Soane-Sands, Eric Stanley, Justin Stover, Richard Trachsler, Judith Weiss. I am very grateful to the many anonymous readers of my book, who have submitted helpful and enthusiastic reports, and to the editors at Open Book.
In addition, my thanks are due yet again to Henrietta Leyser, who has always been so generous with ideas and advice for me; and to the librarians who have helped me to track untrackable material. Further, I am proud to honour the memory of another two remarkable women: Dominica Legge, and my old friend and colleague Elfrieda Dubois. Elfrieda often told me how she used to meet Legge in the Bibliothèque Nationale, who would hale her off for cups of coffee and amuse her endlessly with talk about Anglo-Norman ‘because’, said Elfrieda, ‘nobody else would listen!’ Lastly, I cannot sufficiently express my gratitude to Quentin for help and love and everything. This book is dedicated to them, and to the Oxford Anglo-Norman Reading Group.
Copyright Acknowledgements
I wish to thank the following people and publishers who have granted me permission to use their work. This book contains a large number of different texts, therefore my list must be set out as economically as possible. All the passages reproduced in this book are listed in my Bibliography in addition to being cited in footnotes, so it can easily be seen which passage is taken from which published work. Each publisher (or editor, in the case of previously-unpublished texts) is stated clearly in the principal citation of each text, normally in the introduction to it.
I am also very grateful to colleagues, and relevant institutions, for help and advice in my efforts to trace copyright-holders.
First, I thank the Anglo-Norman Text Society for their generous permission to use more than a dozen extracts, of varying length; each is identified in its place, as stated above. 1 I thank the British Library for permission to transcribe and use three pages, kindly provided by them, from three different manuscripts: the first introduces my second Part (An Anglo-Norman Miscellany), the second passage is appended to A Medical Compendium , and the third is appended to the Credo and Pater Noster .
Next, in alphabetical order, I would like to thank the following: Alderney Bayeux Tapestry Finale Emma Cavell, for the first of Maud Mortimer’s Letters Honoré Champion (Paris), for an extract from Le Roman des Franceis Tony Hunt, for two substantial texts: the Credo and Pater Noster , and the Sins attributed to Robert Grosseteste Livre de Poche (Paris), for an extract from Le Roman de Thèbes PMLA , for permission to use the Apprise de Nurture , reprinted by permission of the Modern Language Association of America from Anglo-Norman Books of Courtesy and Nurture , PMLA 44 (1929), pp. 432–7 Royston Raymond, for the story printed in my Appendix Selden Society, for permission to use part of the legal text Placita Corone William Allen, for permission to use an extract from the Roman de Fergus
Note for Ebook Editions
Readers of the ebook editions may need to adjust font or window size to ensure that text and translation appear on alternate pages.
Notes


1 Several of these are available to search (page by page) on the Anglo-Norman Hub.


Abbreviations
Short titles in notes, that can be found easily and alphabetically in the bibliography, are not listed here.

Alexander The Wars of Alexander , ed. Duggan and Turville-Petre
AND Anglo-Norman Dictionary (see http://www.anglo-norman.net/ )
ANTS Anglo-Norman Text Society; PTS = Plain Texts Series; OPS = Occasional Publications Series
AV Bible (Authorized Version); LV = Bible (Latin Vulgate)
Bede Bede, History , tr. Shirley-Price et al .
Cher Alme Texts of Anglo-Norman Piety , ed. Hunt
Dean Dean and Boulton, Anglo-Norman Literature
DMH Dictionary of Medieval Heroes , Gerritsen & van Melle
Edouard La Vie d’Edouard , Bliss
EETS Early English Text Society; OS = Original Series; SS = Supplementary Series; ES = Extra Series
FRETS French of England Translation Series
GL (Supp) Gilte Legende , ed. Hamer and Russell (vol. 1 of 4, Supplementary Lives , 2000)
IPN Index of Proper Names (or Index des Noms Propres)
JEGP Journal of English and Germanic Philology
Larousse Dictionnaire de l’ancien français , ed. Greimas
Legge Legge, Anglo-Norman Literature and i