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Benoît de Sainte-Maure's "Roman de Troie", dating to around 1165, is, along with the "Roman de Thèbes" and the "Roman d'Eneas", one of the three "romances of antiquity" ("romans d'antiquité"). These romances launched the plots, themes and structures of the genre, then blossoming in the hands of authors such as Chrétien de Troyes. As an account of the Trojan War, Benoît's work is of necessity a poem about war and its causes, how it was fought and what its consequences were for the combatants. But the author's choice of the octosyllabic rhyming couplet, his fondness for description, his ability to recount the intensity of personal struggles, and above all his fascination with the trials and tribulations of Love, which affect some of the work's most prominent warriors (among them Paris and his love for Helen, and Troilus and his love for Briseida), all combine to fashion this romance - in which events from long ago are presented as a reflection of the poet's own feudal and courtly worlds. This translation, the first into English, aims to bring the poem and the author to a wider audience. It is accompanied by an introduction and notes.
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Gallica Volume 41 THE ROMAN DE TROIE BY BENOÎT DE SAINTE-MAURE Gallica ISSN 1749-091X General Editor: Sarah Kay Gallica aims to provide a forum for the best current work in medieval and Renaissance French studies. Literary studies are particularly welcome and preference is given to works written in English, although publication in French is not excluded. Proposals or queries should be sent in the first instance to the editor, or to the publisher, at the addresses given below; all submissions receive prompt and informed consideration. Professor Sarah Kay, Department of French, New York University, 13–19 University Place, 6th floor, New York, NY 10003, USA The Editorial Director, Gallica, Boydell & Brewer Ltd., PO Box 9, Woodbridge, Suffolk IP12 3DF, UK Previously published volumes in this series are listed at the end of this volume. THE ROMAN DE TROIE BY BENOÎT DE SAINTE-MAURE TRANSLATED BY GLYN S. BURGESS AND DOUGLAS KELLY D. S. BREWER © Glyn S. Burgess and Douglas Kelly 2017 All Rights Reserved. Except as permitted under current legislation no part of this work may be photocopied, stored in a retrieval system, published, performed in public, adapted, broadcast, transmitted, recorded or reproduced in any form or by any means, without the prior permission of the copyright owner The right of Glyn S. Burgess and Douglas Kelly to be identified as the authors of this work has been asserted in accordance with sections 77 and 78 of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988 First published 2017 D. S. Brewer, Cambridge ISBN 978-1-84384-469-3 D. S. Brewer is an imprint of Boydell & Brewer Ltd PO Box 9, Woodbridge, Suffolk IP12 3DF, UK and of Boydell & Brewer Inc. 668 Mt Hope Avenue, Rochester, NY 14620–2731, USA website: www.boydellandbrewer.com A CIP catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library The publisher has no responsibility for the continued existence or accuracy of URLs for external or third-party internet websites referred to in this book, and does not guarantee that any content on such websites is, or will remain, accurate or appropriate This publication is printed on acid-free paper Contents Preface and Acknowledgements Introduction vii 1 A Note on the Translation 33 Outline of the Roman de Troie 35 THE ROMAN DE TROIE Prologue 43 Overview of the Plot 45 Part One: Causes and Effects 53 Part Two: The Trojan War 127 Part Three: Settling Scores and Surviving 367 Appendix I: Notes on Some Common Words in the Roman de Troie 415 App