Contenu du sommaire : Le Moyen Age 2020/3-4

According to a hypothesis put forward by J.
P. Martin, the conclusion of Girbert de Mez, for its last 3,000 verses, could be the work of a “mediocre continuator.” On a stylistic level, the conclusion diverges from the beginning with its focus on war (featuring an increase in the number of general battle scenes) and fewer descriptive motifs. We note, moreover, a shift in the spatial framework (the end of Girbert de Mez is set in the south west and south east of France) and a renewal of the narrative voice. Finally, it appears that the story following the death of Fromont, the main opponent of the Lorraine people, departs from the usual narrative structures of the song, the episodes of vendetta being replaced by episodes of crusade. The rich manuscript tradition of Girbert (fifteen manuscripts for the conclusion) also seems to support our hypothesis of a continuation of the work, with some parts marking the possibility of a premature conclusion of the text.

After over thirty years, the study of emotions has earned a place of honor in the field of medieval history. However, some methodological challenges remain for most historians in the field. While the lexical approach lies at the heart of our practice, and justifiably so, as it anchors the interpretation of emotions in the very flesh of the text, it leaves a lot to be desired, particularly when the texts—namely the Merovingian corpus—lack precise emotional vocabulary. This article aims to show how, by combining various more or less orthodox tactics, and thus creating new methodological toolkits, one can hope to overcome the elusiveness or even the silence of the sources.

As the importance of appearances was constantly increasing at the end of the medieval period, we examine how the writing of affectivity evolved, in connection with a shift in the status of the motif of clothing. Usually considered as a simple descriptive tool and a secondary element in narratives, clothing is brought to the forefront in the texts of the corpus at hand. This invites us to comprehend how affectivity is expressed in a literature that foreshadows or endorses the end of courtly love ideals. Crossing the border between emotions betrayed by the body and emotions translated by clothing, we demonstrate that clothing functions as a codified emotional language fit to display select emotions in order for an individual to become better integrated with the emotional courtly communities and to partake in the game of love (still, it is necessary not to leave anything to chance, and to beware of the tricks of clothing, which can reveal too much). Everything occurs as if the characters preferred to wear love rather than to state it.... But such a language of clothes can also emphasize the divide between being and appearance, and seems to be conducive to all subversions: clothes then say less about the power of love than its perversion. This language contributes to shaping a type of character made of a new material, confronted with new rules in court and the need to control his or her image. We are thus invited to study the resultant psychological depths from every angle.

The discovery and recent publication of several lead seals with Kufic characters from the Umeyyad period on them are an important addition to our knowledge of the history of the conquest of Al-Andalus in the early eighth century. Bearing names of Arab governors, cities paying tribute, and loot taken from the peninsula by conquerors, these seals complement our knowledge on a controversial period, our understanding of which has so far only been through texts and coins. The aim of this article is to gather the information provided by these different sources in order to underline the scale and speed of the disruptions that occurred in former Visigothic Spain.

Although the short episode of the “pregnant king” from Aucassin and Nicolette is well known, a complete study of the pregnant man character-type, undertaken in part by Zapperi, is still lacking, notably by failing to fully take into consideration its mainstay status in the Aesopic tradition, starting with the Romulus of Nilant and continued in Hexametrical Romulus, Marie de France, and Berekhiah. Despite being nothing more, at first, than a likely misreading of the Latin apologue of the Mountain in Labour, it had a major influence in the Anglo-Norman area. It reappeared on the Bayeux Tapestry and in at least one satirical text from the time period (Serlon de Bayeux). Establishing the full history of this character, from the ninth century up until the beginning of the thirteenth, enables a better contextualization of its presence in the chantefable. We can thus definitively discard the old “couvade” folkloric hypothesis and fully embrace its existence as a literary motif, influenced in fables by the nascent fabliau's farcical humor and in the chantefable by that of the carnival.