Charlemagne in England: The Matter of France in Middle English and Anglo-Norman Literature

中世纪英国的英雄文学颂扬三种人物的行为：英国传奇英雄、亚瑟和他的骑士、查理曼大帝和他的同僚。前两组最近受到了学术界的关注，但最后一组中的12个文本相对被忽视，尽管世纪后期早期英语文本协会的一系列中古英语（ME）文本版本给了他们一个突出的身份，即“英国查理曼传奇”。从14世纪到16世纪，查理曼大帝的传奇诗被创作和复制，卡克斯顿印刷了查尔斯大帝的散文生活以及《亚瑟王之死》，但是当亚瑟王的主题在英国文学和文化中持续存在时，查理曼大帝的主题却没有。如果他被视为法国的民族英雄，这似乎可以解释。然而，令评论家困惑的是，大多数英国查理曼文本的产生与百年战争相吻合。因此，法语原文已经以盎格鲁-诺曼语（AN）形式存在，这是否重要？查理曼大帝在什么意义上有一个既定的孤立身份？查理曼大帝在英格兰项目的目的是探索这种孤立的文学传统，平等地关注AN和ME文本，研究它们之间的文本关系以及叙事形式和一般期望的对应关系。它评估了他们的观众和接收在一个多语言社会的证据，以及他们的当代文化和政治意义。基督徒和撒拉逊人之间的核心冲突，与早期的AN时期的国际十字军利益相似，并在14世纪和15世纪反映了奥斯曼土耳其人对西方安全的威胁。在许多文本中，骑士精神的撒拉逊人的主题非常突出，通过皈依的幻想，表明了与东方他者交往的愿望。中世纪英国文化和政治问题的复杂反映对当代英国有一些共鸣。需要进一步研究查理曼传统中的宗教因素。在早期的法国作品中，重点是重新夺回的激情遗物，特别是与朝圣地点有关的，在AN和ME文本中出于不同的目的进行了修改。在许多文本的强烈教理特征可能涉及到第四拉特兰理事会（1215），其中结合了牧区改革和教育与促进十字军东征夺回耶路撒冷，既反映在查理曼文本的关注。中世纪英语文本中的虔诚方面被归因于“文书作者”，这也需要调查与世俗虔诚的关系。这是一个及时的项目-它受益于中世纪英格兰法语项目（约克）和多语言项目（布里斯托）的工作。它将激发对AN文本的更充分的批判性关注。艾尔斯博士正在完成一个版本的埃杰顿MS La毁灭德罗马和菲伦布拉斯，并建议一个博士生编辑独立的汉诺威MS文本。同样，该项目将鼓励出版ME作品的过期新版本，因为虽然《梅莱恩的围攻》和《拉乌夫·科伊尔3ear》--这两部独特的文本都没有已知的来源--已经被编辑过不止一次，但基于Fierabras、Otinel和《罗兰香颂》的八部独立的诗歌文本仍有待学术界的全面关注。哈德曼夫人对ME罗兰片段的研究提供了一个可以做些什么的指示，并通过Duggan最近对法国罗兰语料库的评论版提供了信息，一名博士生将在这项工作的基础上，调查中世纪英国的Roncevaux传统。这本身就是一个相当大的、连贯的项目，也是一个更大的国际合作项目的典范，该项目旨在探索其他语言和文化中的新传统：“欧洲的Chalemagne”。

The heroic literature of medieval England celebrates the acts of three groups of characters: English legendary heroes, King Arthur and his knights, and the Emperor Charlemagne and his peers. The first two groups have received major recent scholarly attention, but the twelve texts in the last group have been comparatively neglected, though a series of editions of the Middle English (ME) texts for the Early English Text Society in the late 19th century gave them a prominent identity as 'The English Charlemagne Romances'. From the 14th to the 16th century, verse romances of Charlemagne were composed and copied, and Caxton printed a prose life of Charles the Great as well as the Morte Darthur, but while Arthurian themes persisted in English literature and culture, those of Charlemagne did not. This might seem explicable if he is viewed as the national hero of the French. Yet, to the puzzlement of critics, the production of most English Charlemagne texts coincided with the Hundred Years' War. Is it significant, therefore, that the original French texts already existed in Anglo-Norman (AN) form? In what sense might Charlemagne have had an established insular identity? The aim of the Charlemagne in England project is to explore this insular literary tradition with equal focus on the AN and the ME texts, examining the textual relations between them and the correspondences in narrative form and generic expectations. It assesses the evidence for their audiences and reception in a multilingual society, and for their contemporary cultural and political significance. The central conflict represented, between Christians and Saracens, offers parallels to international crusading interests in the earlier AN period, and in the 14th and 15th centuries mirrors the perceived threat to western security from the Ottoman Turks. The prominence in so many of the texts of the motif of the chivalrous Saracen indicates, through the fantasy of conversion, a desire for engagement with the eastern Other. This complex reflection of cultural and political concerns in medieval England has some resonances for contemporary Britain.Further investigation is needed of the religious element in the insular Charlemagne tradition. The emphasis in early French works on recaptured Passion relics, specifically related to pilgrimage sites, is modified in AN and ME texts for different purposes. The strong catechetical feature in many of the texts may relate to the concerns of the Fourth Lateran Council (1215), which combined a programme of pastoral reform and education with the promotion of crusade to retake Jerusalem, both reflected in Charlemagne texts. Aspects of piety in the ME texts have been attributed to 'clerical authorship', and this too needs investigation in relation to lay piety.This is a timely project - it benefits from the work of the French of Medieval England programme (York) and the Multilingualism project (Bristol). It will stimulate fuller critical attention to the AN texts. Dr Ailes is completing an edition of the Egerton MS La Destruction de Rome and Fierenbras, and proposes that a PhD student edit the independent Hanover MS text. Equally, the project will encourage overdue new editions of the ME works, for while The Siege of Melayne and Rauf Coil3ear - both unique texts with no known source - have been edited more than once, the eight separate verse texts based on Fierabras, Otinel, and the Chanson de Roland await thorough scholarly attention. An indication of what can be done is provided by Mrs Hardman's study of the ME Roland fragment, informed by Duggan's recent critical edition of the French Roland corpus, and a PhD student will build on this work, investigating the tradition of Roncevaux in medieval Britain. This is a considerable, coherent project in itself and also the exemplar for a larger collaborative project on an international scale to explore the tradition anew in other languages and cultures: 'Chalemagne in Europe'.