Contenu du sommaire

Space and play in Cent Nouvelles nouvelles The oral tradition the prose tale inherited from the fabliau, as well as the thematic proximity it shares with farce, reveals that this growing genre in the 15th Century, represented by the Cent Nouvelles nouvelles, bears the signs of theatricality. Indeed, as in the theatre, there is a significant exchange between the spatial framework and the physical presence of the characters in the prose tale. The example of the observing, hidden character wonderfully illustrates the process. The role played by visual and auditory perception is thus amplified. Similarly, the physical space occupied by the characters in relation to objects can carry narrative importance, which sometimes allows a narratological reading of the stories. In the case of the written text, the miniatures can insure the visualization of these processes. The interdependence of space and action contribute to the author's aesthetic project and thus insure the collection's originality.

The monarchy of the early Capetians : “A mixture of misery and grandeur” ? The monarchy of the early Capetians is commonly regarded as weak. Reduced to the royal domain, their power was often less than that of princes. But this gloomy picture is being revised by French medievalists. Re-evaluation seems all the more justified if the Capetian monarchy is compared to that of the Eastern Frankish kingdom, the future Germany. The Ottonians were also limited to central areas and saw themselves confronted by powerful princes, such as the Dukes of Bavaria and Swabia. It was only Henri II who, after the year 1,000, achieved royal authority over the whole regnum. The Salians followed his example. But this policy was opposed by the nobility. The German monarchy lost its power of integration and went into crisis during the last years of Henri III. On the other hand, the policy of the early Capetians, who did not break the princes' power, was promising. Against this background, the idea of a pitiful French monarchy is no longer as well-founded.

In Virgil's wake : a medieval embellishment of Cerberus This comparative study aims to stress the particular, yet typical, strategy of appropriating a classical epic into the vernacular by Norman French adaptors in the 1160s. While clarifying Virgil's dominant inspiration, a few verses of the Aeneid (VI, v. 417-425) on Cerberus, the Guard Dog of Hell, are expanded into 48 octosyllabic verses (with borrowings from Ovid and Virgil's Georgics), thus giving the Romance of Aeneas an extraordinary “hypotyposis”. I also hope to show that iridescent description provides a metonymic key to our understanding of the way medieval romance was created in this innovative workshop in which the classics were revitalized and rediscovered in France during the 12th Century Renaissance.

The humor of an intellectual of the 1440s. The Treatise in Defense of Virtuous Women (Tratado en Defensa de Virtuosas Mugeres) by Diego de Valera Diego de Valera wrote the Treatise in Defense of Virtuous Women in about 1438-1440, probably in response to the Corbacho, a book by the Archpriest of Talavera, which attacks women, who are held responsible for all failings. Diego de Valera, on the contrary, taking as an example the noble women of the Bible and of Antiquity, extols the virtues of chastity, the sense of honor and the great courage of the ladies whose story he knows. Beyond defending women, who are perhaps capable of the qualities usually attributed to men, in his exposition and even more in his scholarly notes, Diego de Valera's treatise is heavy with irony against the long pieces of rhetoric by the intellectuals of his time and is filled with a true sense of humor as well as erudition.

The Disguise in Trubert : Questioning the Identity So far, few studies have focused on Trubert, a text that is difficult to categorize. The narrative follows the protagonist who disguises himself over and over again, as a carpenter, a doctor, a young nobleman who aspires to knighthood, and finally as a woman. He adopts disguises in a sequence of increasing complexity and transgressiveness. As the story unfolds, Truchet's disguising grows implausible, but it illustrates the problems of the medieval society, acerbically satirizing doctors, aristocrats and women. The disguises reflect also a pessimistic but strangely modern vision of the world where absurdity and gratuitous violence prevail. The multiple disguises raises the issue of the real identity of the eponymous hero : Is he the parodical double of Percival, the medieval jester, the devil's incarnation, the Antichrist or the fantasized double of the author, due to his command of the language and his ability to manipulate the other characters.

On textual knowledge and the observation of natural phenomena : the world system in the 13th Century in the chonicle of Wierum in Holland The chronicle written successively by the two Prémontré Friesian abbots Emon and Menko de Wierum, covering the period 1204-1273, is rich in information for those interested in observing natural phenomena in the Middle Ages and particularly tidal waves. These two scholars, well-versed in the writings of the main naturalists of the period, show us to what extent intertextuality reproducing faithfully, sometimes word for word, passages from the greatest scholars remains the best way to approach an explanation of such phenomena. Yet they also know how to judge both the limits of the scientia naturalis of their time and the role of Providence. All in all, in the middle of the Aristotelian century, these two scholarly monks were driven by a vision of the world and a philosophy of nature inherited in every way from Saint Augustine.