Medieval Attitudes Toward Vernacular Literature -- ENGL 380

Dr. Debora B. Schwartz
English Department, California Polytechnic State University

Medieval Attitudes Toward Vernacular Literature

As illustrated by the Prologues and Epilogues to 12th-Century French Works

This study guide refers to the following readings: Marie de France, prologues and epilogue to the Lais and the Fables (which you can access as a .PDF file on e-reserve in PolyLearn) and the prologues to Chrétien de Troyes's Erec and Enide and Cliges (in Arthurian Romances, the first two paragraphs on pp. 37 and 123; may also be accessible as a .PDF file on e-reserve in PolyLearn).

The comments made by 12th-century poets in the prologues and epilogues to their vernacular works reveal a great deal about their attitudes toward the literature they are creating. The poets who adapted Latin or other works into romanz, their word for the French vernacular -- like those who adapted French works into other languages (e.g. Gottfried von Strassburg's German reworking of Thomas's Tristan) -- clearly saw themselves as participating in the process of translatio studii. These poets were less concerned with the end product of their literary efforts than with the process whereby they participated in the on-going transmission of the "lamp of literature" from one generation to another. "Originality" is not at issue (nor is "plagiarism" or "intellectual property" -- notions which did not exist during the Middle Ages). A literary work would typically include elements drawn from a large number of Latin sources (and sometimes vernacular ones as well -- see the prologue to Marie de France's Lais, pp. 28-9). These elements were freely combined, modified, and reworked by the poet. Note that while medieval translatio often involves translation from one language into another (as in Gottfried's German adapatation of Thomas's French romance), it is not concerned with producing what we would consider a faithful translation of the original. Instead, the medieval poet deliberately modifies, adapts, adds to and reworks his sources. His or her poem is valued not for its "originality" but for the skill with which the poet has combined disparate elements into a pleasing and artful whole.

The prologue to Chrétien de Troyes's Erec and Enide demonstrates that "originality" was not the goal of medieval poets. Chrétien freely admits his story is not "original": "This is the tale of Erec, son of Lac, which those who try to live by storytelling customarily mangle and corrupt before kings and counts" (Arthurian Romances, 37). Yet Chrétien is clearly proud of his literary achievement, boasting that his poem will be remembered "as long as Christendom lasts." What he is proud of is his participation in the process of translatio, his skill in transforming the disjointed pieces of a "tale of adventure" into a "beautifully ordered composition."

Medieval texts were valued not as end products but as links in an on-going chain of clerkly activity, parts of a process of textual transmission and regeneration linking the poet and poem to a collective literary past: the classical auctores taught in the Cathedral schools. Recall that the first "romances" were adaptations of Latin works into the French vernacular, or romanz, and that this word was applied to any vernacular French narrative regardless of subject matter (see "Courtly Love"). Two examples are the Anglo-Norman Romance of Eneas written ca. 1160 for Eleanor of Aquitaine, and the Fables of Marie de France, who likewise worked in Anglo-Norman England (Eleanor's husband, Henry II, is thought to be the King referred to by Marie in the prologue to her Lais, p. 29). But even as poets such as Chrétien de Troyes and Marie de France began turning to non-Latin sources for inspiration, a sense of continuity with Latin tradition remained. Although Marie de France asserts that she deliberately decided against translating from the Latin when she began writing her Lais ("I began to think about composing some good stories and translating from Latin to Romance; but that was not to bring me fame: too many others have done it," Prologue to the Lais, 28-9), she still emphasizes the essential clerkliness of her writing project. She refers to the "ancients," to the philosopher Priscian, and to other unnamed philosophers in her Prologue (lines 9-17), implicitly inviting her readers to approach her vernacular work as seriously as they would a Latin text, "glossing the letter" (interpreting its meaning) as they would do with a "real" work of (Latin) literature. A similar reverence for clerkliness and pride in her participation in the process of translatio is found in the prologue and epilogue to the Fables (these readings are on e-reserve in PolyLearn). Marie presents her work as part of a dynamic literary tradition governed by the principle of translatio studii, the transfer of literary legitimacy from the Ancients (Greece and Rome) to the Moderns (12th-century England and France).

The notion of translatio studii et imperii is explicitly formulated in the prologue to Cligés, the second extant romance of Chrétien de Troyes (active ca. 1170-1190): "Through the books we have, we learn of the deeds of ancient peoples and of bygone days. Our books have taught us that chivalry and learning first flourished in Greece; then to Rome came chivalry and the sum of knowledge, which now has come to France" (Arthurian Romances, 123). Translatio imperii, the connection between "modern" (i.e. Arthurian) and classical (Greek and/or Roman) chivalry, is illustrated by Chrétien's subject, the story of the Greco-Arthurian knight Cligés, "a youth who, in Greece, was of King Arthur's line." Translatio studii, the transmission of literary culture or learning, is represented by Chrétien's poem itself. While the translator of our textbook refers to "learning" and the "sum of knowledge," the Old French word clergie used by Chrétien has specific literary connotations. It might better be translated as "clerkliness," the literary skills taught to clerics by the medieval Church. Chrétien's pride in his literary accomplishments is clearly stated at the beginning of this prologue, where he lists his prior literary works, which include adapations from the Latin works of Ovid, a story about King Mark and Isolde the Blonde (characters in the stories about Tristan and Isolde, the "best sellers" of the twelfth century), and the romance Erec and Enide.

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