WITH AN INTRODUCTION BY HENRY MORLEY
LL. D., LATE PROFESSOR OF ENGLISH LITERATURE ATUNIVERSITY COLLEGE, LONDON
LONDON:
GEORGE ROUTLEDGE & SONS, LTD.
NEW YORK: E. P. DUTTON & CO.
| INTRODUCTION | |
| HISTORY OF CHARLES THE GREAT AND ORLANDO. | |
| THE DAYS OF CHARLEMAGNE AND OF THE CID CAMPEADOR. | |
| GESTA ROMANORUM. | |
| THE FAMOUS HISTORY OF DR. FAUSTUS. |
This volume of "Mediæval Tales" is in four parts, containingseverally, (1) Turpin's "History of Charles the Great andOrlando," which is an old source of Charlemagne romance;(2) Spanish Ballads, relating chiefly to the romance ofCharlemagne, these being taken from the spirited translationsof Spanish ballads published in 1823 by John Gibson Lockhart;(3) a selection of stories from the "Gesta Romanorum;"and (4) the old translation of the original story of Faustus, onwhich Marlowe founded his play, and which is the first sourceof the Faust legend in literature.
Turpin's "History of Charles the Great and Orlando" isgiven from a translation made by Thomas Rodd, and publishedby himself in 1812, of "Joannes Turpini Historia de Vita CaroliMagni et Rolandi." This chronicle, composed by some monkat an unknown date before the year 1122, professed to be thework of a friend and secretary of Charles the Great, Turpin,Archbishop of Rheims, who was himself present in the scenesthat he describes. It was--like Geoffrey of Monmouth's nearlycontemporary "History of British Kings," from which weredrawn tales of Gorboduc, Lear and King Arthur—romanceitself, and the source of romance in others. It is at the root ofmany tales of Charlemagne and Roland that reached afterwardstheir highest artistic expression in Ariosto's "Orlando Furioso."The tale ascribed to Turpin is of earlier date than the year1122, because in that year Pope Calixtus II. officially declaredits authenticity. But it was then probably a new invention,designed for edification, for encouragement of faith in theChurch, war against infidels, and reverence to the shrine ofSt. James of Compostella.
The Church vouched for the authorship of Turpin, Archbishopof Rheims, "excellently skilled in sacred and profane literature,of a genius equally adapted to prose and verse; the advocate ofthe poor, beloved of God in his life and conversation, who oftenhand to hand fought the Saracens by the Emperor's side; andwho flourished under Charles and his son Lewis to the year ofour Lord eight hundred and thirty." But while this work gaveimpulse to the shaping of Charlemagne romances with Orlando(Roland) for their hero, there came to be a very general opinionthat, whether the author of the book were Turpin or another, hetoo was a romancer. His book came, therefore, to be known asthe "Magnanime Mensonge," a lie heroic