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This dissertation compares the presentation of Helen, Cassandra, Polyxena, Hecuba, and Andromache - five prominent female figures of the Trojan War - by Benoît de Sainte-Maure in his Roman de Troie and by Herbort von Fritzlar in his Liet von Troye. two narratives of the twelfth Century which witnessed a keen interest by Anglo-Norman nobility in asserting its purported descent from the nobility of Troy. As the courtly culture of France had established itself as a model for other European courts, a German sovereign, Hermann von Thüringen, acquired Benoît's Roman de Troie and asked Herbort von Fritzlar to adapt it for his court. The Liet von Trove was most likely written around 1195 to furnish the story preceding that of Heinrich von Veldeke's Eneasroman.
Both authors narrate generally the same stories of these five Trojan women, but differ in the presentation of their love and guilt. While Benoit shows the beneficial effects of love through Helen and Andromache - Andromache becomes the mother of the new Troy Herbort points to Helen's unfaithfulness, to love's dangerous ways in the example of Polyxena, and, in Andromache, to the salutary consequences of a virtuous mother's love. Both authors consider Andromache per se guiltless and do not blame Cassandra either, but show differences in assigning guilt regarding the other women: Herbort blames love in the case of Polyxena and considers the unfaithful Helen guilty, and Benoit assigns blame to Hecuba because of her loss of faith, while attributing Troy's destruction and Polyxena's death to fate.
The importance of Helen, Cassandra, Polyxena, Hecuba, and Andromache is weighed differently by Benoit and by Herbort. The reason for these differences is that, although both authors inform, entertain, and teach through these women, they present them with different goals in mind: Benoit educates his audience in affairs of the court, emphasizing the idea of nobility as continuing from Troy onward, whereas Herbort, who does not show evidence of that tradition, gives his audience lessons in morality.
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