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Old French Romances, Done into English cover

Old French Romances, Done into English

Chapter 13: Footnotes
By William Morris
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About This Book

A collection of medieval French narratives rendered into English, presenting translated romances, origin legends, and folk tales drawn from twelfth- and thirteenth-century models. The pieces range from sentimental and courtly episodes to fantastical and etiological stories that explain names and customs, all adapted to convey medieval diction and atmosphere. Many selections reflect eastern Mediterranean or Byzantine influences and the circulation of stories across cultural boundaries, while the translator preserves archaisms and lyrical color to evoke the original tone. Together the texts offer a compact panorama of medieval romance forms, motifs, and narrative structures for modern readers.

 

Printed by Ballantyne, Hanson & Co.
London & Edinburgh

 

Footnotes

[1]  Nouvelles françaises en prose du xiii ième siecle, par MM. L. Moland et C. D’Hericault.  (Paris: Janet, 1856.)

[2]  I have given a version of it in my English Fairy Tales, and there is a ballad on the subject entitled The Cruel Knight.

[3]  See Clouston, Book of Sindibad, p. 279.

[4]  Figured in M. Ulysse Robert, Signes d’infamie au moyen âge, Paris, 1891.  Lovers of Stevenson will remember the effective use made of this in The Black Arrow.

[5]  It has been suggested that the names of our heroes have given rise to the proverbial saying: “A miss (Amis) is as good as a mile (Amile),” but notwithstanding the high authority from which the suggestion emanates, it is little more than a pun.

[6]  For occurrences of this incident in sagas, etc., see Grimm, Deutsche Rechtsalterthümer, 168–70; in folk-tales, Dasent, Tales from the Norse, cxxxiv.–v., n. xviii

[7]  Mr. Hartland has studied the “Lifetoken” in the eighth chapter of his elaborate treatise on the Legend of Perseus.