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Fragments of Erec et Enide and Their Relation to the Manuscript Tradition

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  02 December 2020

Jean Misrahi
Jean Misrahi*
Affiliation:
Fordham University
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Extract

Arecent study of the manuscripts of the works of Chrétien de Troyes contains an appendix which purports to survey the published fragments of the various romances. In point of fact, so far as Erec is concerned, it omits all reference to the. three fragments we now possess. Those to which the author refers are not properly speaking manuscript fragments, but rather early publications of excerpts from complete manuscripts which have now been collated by Foerster in his large edition and by myself in a forthcoming edition of the same romance. Therefore, despite the fact that Foerster's collation was careless and incomplete, these early fragmentary publications are of slight interest. However, in an extensive work dealing with the ensemble of the manuscript tradition of Chrétien, some mention should have been made of the three real fragments which we possess, even though, as the editors of the two published ones have remarked, they are not extensive enough to be of great importance in the classification of the manuscripts.

Type
Research Article
Information
PMLA , Volume 56 , Issue 4 , December 1941 , pp. 951 - 961
Copyright
Copyright © Modern Language Association of America, 1941

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References

1 Alexandre Micha, La Tradition manuscrite des romans de Chrétien de Troyes (Paris: Droz, 1939), pp. 395–396.

2 Wendelin Foerster, Erec und Enide von Christian von Troyes (Halle: Max Niemeyer, 1890).

3 Vide H. K. Stone, “Le Karrenritter de Foerster,” Romania, lxiii (1937), 398–401.

4 Romania, xliii, 253–254. This fragment will hereafter be referred to as Th.

5 Throughout this paper all references will be to the line numbers in Foerster's editions.

6 Romania, lxiii (1937), 310–324. Hereafter referred to as An (nonay).

7 Loc. cit. It is the only fragment at present in a public library, and it will be referred to hereafter as G(eneviève).

8 Charles Kohler, Catalogue des manuscrits de la Bibliotheque Sainte-Geneviève (Paris: Pion, 1893), vol. i, No. 1269.

9 Vide Wendelin Foerster, Romanische Bibliothek, N°. xiii, “Kristian von Troyes Erec und Enide” (Halle, Niemeyer, 1896), pp. xxxix–xl (2nd edition, 1909, pp. xxxi–xxxii).

10 The rather meager results of this collation are given by Foerster in the passage referred to in the preceding note. The numbers of the lines mentioned therein as having been read by Warnke are slightly different from those cited above. The difference is no doubt due to the position of the single leaf in question, which was used as a feuillet de garde in the binding of a breviary, at right angles to the back of the book, and hence some of the lines are in whole or in part engaged in the binding of the back or cut off at the bottom of the leaf.

11 Thomas strangely attributes to Foerster the statement that the Sainte-Geneviève fragment is written in single column.

12 Th 34 ll. Vide Thomas, loc. cit., p. 253; An 38 ll. Vide Pauphilet, loc. cit., pp. 313–316; G vide infra.

13 Sic Thomas. I have not seen the MS.

14 Loc. cit., p. 312.

15 The correct figure should perhaps be 119. M. Pauphilet's transcription omits 1. 5616, no doubt a simple lapsus, since the couplet is incomplete, and if the line were actually missing in the MS, the column would contain 37 lines instead of the usual 38.

16 All of M. P.'s figure in my list with the exception of 1. 5455, mentioned no doubt by error, since the line is identical in An and C. M. P, probably intended to write 5454, which is missing in his list.

17 5463 Car AnC, Que HPBVAE; 5482 (5481–82 are inverted in An according to M. P.‘s transcription; no other MS shows the same order.) ce AnC, cest HPBA, cel VE (This line should be added to M. P.‘s list of cases where An agrees with E against all other MSS. An and E alone have “monter,” all others read “antrer.” The reason for this omission, and possibly for others, is probably the fact that Foerster does not give the variant of E.); 5495 Tant que les lices ont passees AnC, Qant les l. orent p. HBVAE (Et q … ont BVA), Tant que totes les ont p. P; 5520 tu ies biax AnC, ml't ies b. HPBVAE; 5672 Au matin quant fu ajorné AnC, Au main q. il. fu a. HPBVE (5672–75 are missing in A); 5726 Qui qu'en AnC, Qui que HBE, Coi con (die) P, Qui qui VA.

18 5422, 5446, 5447, 5452, 5454, 5468, 5469, 5471, 5475, 5479, 5496, 5498, 5503, 5509, 5528, 5558, 5564, 5577, 5628, 5649, 5657, 5662, 5666, 5725.

19 Vide Foerster, op. cit., 2nd edition (1909), p. xxxi and Micha, op. cit., p. 94.

20 Bédier, Le Lai de l'Ombre par Jean Renart, S.A.T.F. (Paris: Firmin-Didot, 1913), pp. xxiii-xlv.

21 5431, 5557, 5642, 5652, 5662.

22 5494.

23 This refers only to cases where there is general agreement within each of the two groups.

24 The following is the list of mistakes in Foerster's note 3 on p. xxxi (2nd ed., 1909): 5373 par is not missing; 5411 should read 5412; 5421 descendisomes] the ms. reads descendriomes; 5392 loheraine is found not only in γ (VAE), but also in P. F.'s apparatus criticus in the large edition (Halle, 1890, p. 192) mistakenly gives lombardie in PB. P has loheraine; 5464 should read 5414 and the reading nule gent is found not in γ or in A in particular, but in PBA.

25 Erec und Enide, 2nd edition (1909), p. xxxii, n.: “die Schrift kenne ich nicht.”

26 Twelve cases in all: 5370, 5375, 5392, 5396, 5398, 5412, 5422, 5431, 5446, 5447, 5452, 5454. F. remarked this lack of relationship to C despite the common inversion of ll. 5362–63: “doch fehlen wieder die C-Eigentümlichkeiten.”

27 5363, 5368, 5371, 5372, 5375, 5376, 5385, 5394, 5400, 5407, 5413, 5419, 5422, 5424, 5428, 5440, 5442, 5443, 5444, 5450, 5451, 5454, 5455.

28 5360, 5363, 5366, 5367, 5369, 5374, 5375, 5381, 5392, 5394, 5395, 5404, 5405, 5414, 5417, 5419–20, 5419, 5420, 5421, 5424, 5425, 5426, 5429, 5431, 5442, 5449, 5454, 5455.

29 5363, 5370, 5375, 5392, 5396, 5398, 5412, 5446, 5447, 5452, 5454.

30 5372, 5385, 5392, 5446, 5447, 5452, 5454.

31 5360, 5361, 5367, 5389, 5413, 5414, 5456.

32 5365, 5373, 5377, 5397, 5403, 5416, 5417, 5418, 5422, 5442, 5444, 5449.

33 5360, 5361, 5368, 5372, 5373, 5376, 5378, 5386, 5389, 5390, 5393, 5394, 5397, 5404, 5405, 5414, 5415, 5416, 5418, 5419, 5427, 5429, 5449.

34 Op. cil. (1909), p. xxxii.

35 For a recent and clear exposition of the various sorts of “mechanical” scribal errors see Eugene Vinaver's study on the “Principles of Textual Emendation” in Studies in French Language and Mediaeval Literature Presented to Professor M. K. Pope (Manchester University Press, 1939), pp. 351–370.

36 Loc. cit., p. 361.

1 MS cut off at bottom. Three full lines lacking.

2 Space left for an initial B which was never painted in.

3 MS cut off at bottom; five lines missing.

4 MS cut of at bottom. Three lines are lacking.

5 MS cut off at bottom.