Chanson De Geste

The , from 'deeds, actions accomplished') is a medieval narrative, a type of epic poem that appears at the dawn of French literature. The earliest known poems of this genre date from the late 11th and early 12th centuries, shortly before the emergence of the lyric poetry of the troubadours and trouvères, and the earliest verse romances. They reached their highest point of acceptance in the period 1150–1250.Hasenohr, 242.

Composed in verse, these narrative poems of moderate length (averaging 4000 lines) were originally sung, or (later) recited, by minstrels or jongleurs. More than one hundred ''chansons de geste'' have survived in approximately three hundred manuscripts''La Chanson de Roland,'' 12. that date from the 12th to the 15th century.

Origins

Since the 19th century, much critical debate has centered on the origins of the ''chansons de geste'', and particularly on explaining the length of time between the composition of the ''chansons'' and the actual historical events which they reference.Hasenohr, 239. The historical events the ''chansons'' allude to occur in the 8th through 10th centuries, yet the earliest ''chansons'' that have survived were probably composed at the end of the 11th century: only three ''chansons de geste'' have a composition that incontestably dates from before 1150: the ''Chanson de Guillaume'', '' The Song of Roland'' and '' Gormont et Isembart'': the first half of the ''Chanson de Guillaume'' may date from as early as the 11th century; ''Gormont et Isembart'' may date from as early as 1068, according to one expert; and ''The Song of Roland'' probably dates from after 1086 to c.1100.

Three early theories of the origin of ''chansons de geste'' believe in the continued existence of epic material (either as lyric poems, epic poems or prose narrations) in these intervening two or three centuries.Holmes, 68. Critics like Claude Charles Fauriel, François Raynouard and German Romanticists like Jacob Grimm posited the spontaneous creation of lyric poems by the people as a whole at the time of the historic battles, which were later put together to form the epics. This was the basis for the " cantilena" theory of epic origin, which was elaborated by Gaston Paris, although he maintained that single authors, rather than the multitude, were responsible for the songs.Holmes, 67.

This theory was also supported by Robert Fawtier and by Léon Gautier (although Gautier thought the ''cantilenae'' were composed in Germanic languages). At the end of the 19th century, Pio Rajna, seeing similarities between the ''chansons de geste'' and old Germanic/Merovingian tales, posited a Germanic origin for the French poems. A different theory, introduced by the medievalist Paul Meyer, suggested the poems were based on old prose narrations of the original events.see also Hasenohr, 239.

Another theory (largely discredited today''La Chanson de Roland'', 11.), developed by Joseph Bédier, posited that the early ''chansons'' were recent creations, not earlier than the year 1000, developed by singers who, emulating the songs of "saints' lives" sung in front of churches (and collaborating with the church clerics), created epic stories based on the heroes whose shrines and tombs dotted the great pilgrimage routes, as a way of drawing pilgrims to these churches.Holmes, 68-9. Critics have also suggested that knowledge by clerics of ancient Latin epics may have played a role in their composition.

Subsequent criticism has vacillated between "traditionalists" (''chansons'' created as part of a popular tradition) and "individualists" (''chansons'' created by a unique author), but more recent historical research has done much to fill in gaps in the literary record and complicate the question of origins. Critics have discovered manuscripts, texts and other traces of the legendary heroes, and further explored the continued existence of a Latin literary tradition (cf. the scholarship of Ernst Robert Curtius) in the intervening centuries. The work of Jean Rychner on the art of the minstrels and the work of Parry and Lord on Yugoslavian oral traditional poetry, Homeric verse and oral composition have also been suggested to shed light on the ''oral'' composition of the ''chansons'', although this view is not without its criticsHasenohr, 240. who maintain the importance of ''writing'' not only in the preservation of the texts, but also in their composition, especially for the more sophisticated poems.

Subject matter and structure

Composed in Old French