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Some Geographical Problems of the Oxford Roland
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 02 December 2020
Extract
It is quite natural that most mediaevalists who have up to the present dealt extensively with problems presented by the Oxford version of the Chanson de Roland should not have had an active personal interest in mediaeval Hispanic studies per se. True it is that members of the last generation of Roland specialists, notably the historian P. Boissonnade in extending J. Bédier's theories, have brought into sharp focus the importance for Roland studies of the eleventh- and early twelfth-century French crusades into Spain against the Moors, especially in aid of, or collaboration with the Cid's overlord, Alfonso VI of Leon and Castile. And in this connection Bédier added his voice to those who have admitted the possibility that the Oxford Roland may have been composed after the turn of the century.
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References
1 Du nouveau sur la Chanson de Roland (Paris, 1923).
2 Cf. Les Légendes épiques, 4 vols. (Paris, 1926-29), iii, passim.
3 La Chanson de Roland. Commentaires (Paris, 1927), p. 59 and passim.
4 In his edition of the C. de R. (Boston, 1923, revised 1929).
5 Cf. George H. T. Kimble, Geography in the Middle Ages (London, 1938), p. 10; and J. K. Wright, The Geographical Lore of the Time of the Crusades (New York, 1925), pp. 10, 40. Cf. also G. Sarton, Introduction to the History of Science (Baltimore, 1927-31), i, 228.
6 Although he was probably translated out of Greek into Arabic in the eighth century. Cf. Kimble, op. cit., p. 47. According to Kimble (p. 75), P. was probably translated out of Arabic into Latin late in the twelfth century, although direct translations from the Greek into Latin and the modern languages awaited the Renaissance (Wright, op. cit., p. 19).
7 The Roland studies of R. Fawtier, C. de R., étude historique (Paris, 1933), and J. Györy, Etude sur la C. de R. (Paris, 1936), and the editions of the poem by A. Hilka (Halle, 1926), F. Whitehead (London, 1942), and G. Bertoni, editio minor (Florence, 1935); editio maior (Florence, 1936) cast no new light on the problems with which I deal. Journal articles since the publication of Bédier's Commentaires have not afforded, to the best of my knowledge, fresh information on these, declared still unsolved by the great French savant (but cf. infra, Note 23).—For a survey of the history of Roland editing, cf. Bédier's “De l'Édition princeps de la Chanson de Roland aux éditions les plus récentes,” Rom, lxiii (1937), 433-469; lxiv (1938), 145-244, 489-521.
8 On Basque phonology, cf. H. Gavel, Grammaire basque, Tome I (Bayonne, 1929), Ch. i (Phonétique). See also the references given infra, Note 15, paragraph 1.
8a All references are to the Oxford MS: La Chanson de Roland, Reproduction phototypique du manuscrit Digby 23, (Paris, SATF, 1933), supplemented by the much clearer reproduction made two years earlier by the same editor (Count A. de la Borde) for the Roxburghe Club of London.
I base the present study on the Oxford manuscript and disregard later versions, as well as emended versions of 0., because like Bédier, I believe that all possibilities for justification of the readings of this MS, embodying as it admittedly does the oldest version extant of the poem, should be exhausted before emending on the basis of later versions. (Of course, certain obvious scribal errors have had to be emended by editors.)
9 . Italics are mine.
10 Strabo, Geography, edited with translation by H. L. Jones, Loeb Classical Library (New York, London, 1917-32), in 8 vols. Bk. iii, Ch. 2.
11 Cf. maps in R. Menéndez Pidal, La España del Cid (Madrid, 1929); cf. also maps accompanying Strabo's Geography, ed. cit.
12 Cf. the map of Spain by Carolus Clusius (Charles de l'Écluse) dated 1570, reproduced in Monumenta Cartographica, Reproductions of Unique and Rare Maps, edited by F. C. Wieder (The Hague, 1925-33), in S vols., ii, Pls. 41, 42, 43, 44.
13 Los xl libros del Compendio historial de los Reyes de España (Antwerp, 1571), in 2 vols., i, 101.
14 Cf. A. Ballesteros y Beretta, Historia de España (Madrid, 1918-43), in 10 vols., i, 120, and Padre Mariana, Historia general de España …, rev. ed. (Madrid, 1817-22), in 10 vols., i, 3, 37.
15 Concerning Duero, cf. R. Menéndez Pidal's edition of the Cantar de mio Cid (Madrid, 1908-11), in 3 vols., ii, 148-149 and iii, 632; also W. J. Entwistle, The Spanish Language (London, 1936), p. 39. For early comments on voicing of initial stop consonants in Basque, cf. J. B. de Erro y ***Azplroz, Alfabeto de la lengua primitiva de España … (Madrid, 1806), pp. 61, 62, 64; cf. also the modem statement of W. J. Entwistle, op. cit., p. 17: “The [Basque] language shows reluctance to use initial voiceless p t k …” He goes on to state that the corresponding voiced consonants are employed instead. Especially significant anent interchange of consonants in general is Entwistle's statement (p. 18) : “Peculiarly Basque are the numerous metatheses of consonants, as bage=gabe …, and the interchange of consonants in accordance with tables of permutation, as m>b in mezpera for O. Sp. viespera …” or some account of these permutations, cf. Resurrección M. Azkue, Dictionnaire basque-espagnol-français (Bilbao, 1905-06), in 2 vols., the discussions under each consonant heading.
Above I have omitted all consideration of the Duresté variants of Durestant—cf. E. Langlois, Table des noms propres de toute nature, compris dans les chansons de gestes imprimées (Paris, 1904), p. 184; also G. Huet, “Duresté, Dorestadt,” Romania, xlii (1912), 102-104—because I know of no evidence adduced by anyone to the effect that any of the poems exhibiting examples of Duresté (jusqu'en Duresté, etc.) is older than the Roland. I believe it likely that these variants stem from the Roland, but with loss of the original precise meaning of Durestant.
16 Italics are mine.
17 C. Plini Secundi, Naturalis historiae … Edidit Carolus Mayhoff (Leipzig, 1892-1909), in 6 vols., Lib. vi, Cap. 29, <170.
18 Op. cit., Bk. xvi, Ch. 4.
19 Claudii Ptolemaei, Geographiae, Codex Urbinas Graecus 82, in 3 vols. (London and Leipzig, 1932), (Codices e Vaticanis Selecti, Vol. xviii), Lib. viii, Cap. 16, <121. Cf. also English trans. by Edward L. Stevenson (New York: N. Y. Public Library, 1932).
20 Cf. Kimble, op. cit., p. 10.
21 Cf. Entwistle, op. cit., p. 17.
22 Baligant's pais, Babilonie, I interpret in the classical sense, not as Cairo.
23 Op. cit., p. 213 ff. H. Grégoire, in Byzantion, xix (1939), 265-315, writing in collaboration with R. de Keyser, develops the thesis that the Baligant episode was written under the, inspiration of the exploits of Robert de Guiscard and his son Bohemond during the pre-Crusade expedition of 1081-85 to the Balkans against Byzantine forces. In this article (p. 297), an endeavor is made to identify Cheriant with Charzanes or Arzan, a river flowing north of Durazzo. Baldise (cf. supra), G. links with Pali, a cape of the Balkan region. He elaborates his arguments still further in Bull. de la classe des lettres et des sciences morales … [de l'Acad. royale de Belgique], 5è série, xxv (1939), 211-273, presenting identifications of various Roland place names. He claims also that Baligant stands for George Paleologus and Charlemagne for Robert Guiscard! The linguistic and other evidence for all this seems insufficient, though of course the invoking of the names of the two famous Normans is scarcely a novelty.
24 Ibid., p. 187.
25 Op. cit., Lib. v, Cap. 29; Lib. vi, Cap. 34.
26 Elymologiae, Lib. xiv, 38; in Opera omnia (Rome, 1797-1803), in 7 vols., iv, 172.
27 Op. cit., Lib. xiv, Cap. 2, <28; ibid., Cap. 3, <3.
28 Herodotus, with an English Translation by A. D. Godley, Loeb Classical Library (London and New York, 1921-24), Bk. v, Ch. 118.
29 Cf. Henry Kiepert, Twelve Maps of the Ancient World, 11th ed. (Boston, n.d.), Map v, Fi, and p. 15.
30 Bk. ii, Ch. 5, 33; xvi, 4, 37; xvii, 3, 7. For Gr. > Lat. e, cf. C. H. Grandgent, An Introduction to Vulgar Latin (New York, 1907), <184.
31 Bk. iv, Ch. 6, p. 16.
32 Lib. v, Cap. 8.
33 Cf. Wright, op. cit., p. 40.
34 For Anglo-Norman spelling of ei as e, cf. Bédier, Commentaires, p. 257.
35 P. 227.
36 ZRPh, iv, 372
37 Op. cit., Lib. v, Cap. 32.
38 Op. cit., p. 198.
39 Ibid., p. 98.
40 História de Portugal (Coïmbra, 1922-28), in 5 vols., i, 40, 247.
41 Novo diccionario da lingua portuguesa (Lisbon, 1925-26), in 2 vols.
41a Cf. S. Spiro Bey, An English Arabic Vocabulary … of Egypt (Cairo, 1929).
42 Cf. Mappae arabicae, edited by Konrad Miller (Stuttgart, 1926-31), in 5 vols., Bd. i, Heft 3.
43 Ibid., ii, 117; the designation reads: “al marin, hiš al kasr,” identified by the editor as Castro Marin. Idrisi (Al Edrisi) died in 1164.
44 For kasr (qasr), cf. Miller, op. cit., Bd. i, Heft i, 40; also Dozy and Engelmann, Glossaire des mots españols et portuguais dérivés de l'arabe (Paris, 1869), and A. Steiger, Contribución a la fonética del hispano-árabe (Madrid, 1922), p. 168.
45 Italics are mine.
46 NBAE, v (Madrid, 1906), p. 386.
47 Cf. Caragotia for Çaragoça, as quoted by Padre Florez, España sagrada (Madrid, 1754-79), in 51 vols. xxi, 142.
48 Ibid., xiv, 449.
49 Cf. supra, Note 12.
50 Cf. Ballesteros, op. cit., ii, 315, 318.
51 Ibid., p. 318.
52 P. Madoz, Diccionario geográfico-estadíslico-histórico de España (Madrid, 1849), v-vi (bound together with continuous pagination), 401. Cf. also the Spanish encyclopaedias. Sta. Cilia is on the highway to Tiermas (cf. infra). For the existence of S. C. in 1076, cf. Colección de documentos para la historia de Aragón, in 12 vols. (Saragossa, n.d.), ix, 103.
53 It is well known that the historical Charlemagne wrested Santa Cecilia de Monserrat (near Barcelona) from the Moors in 797.
54 Op, cit., pp. 121, 122.
55 A. Dauzat, Les Noms de lieux (Paris, 1926), p. 58.
56 Ed. cit., p. 287a.
57 Op. cit., i, 60.
58 Menéndez Pidal spells it Coliure (Catalan fashion, but with only one l) in his La España del Cid, map of Spain in 1065 a.d., opposite p. 170.
59 For these types of changes, cf. Menéndez Pidal, Manual de gramática histórica española (Madrid, 1941), <<65, 66 passim. Professor Leo Spitzer, who had the kindness to examine a manuscript of this article, suggests in a communication that the stages of change might better be represented: Colibre>Colimbre (cf. giblet, jimbelotte, m developed before labial) >Comible (metathesis).
60 Op. cit., under name in question.
61 Op. cit., p. 106.
62 L. Sainéan (in Les Sources indigènes de l'étymologie française. Recherches complémentaires [Paris, 1925-30], in 3 vols., ii, 438), though contending that most geographical place names ending in -erne that are to be found in the Roland and various other O.Fr. works are “foncièrement imaginaires,” does aid me to prove the present thesis by indicating as the point of departure for such place names the well known example of Salerno>Salerne, whence Palermo>Palerne, and—I reject this—Boissonnade's Valtierra>Valterne. I point out that Palerne occurs on Idrisi's map of Italy as balarm (ed. cited, Bd. i, Heft 2, p. 118). Since it is in the Roland (v. 2923), we may assume the development: Arab. balarm>Basque Balarn or Balern (non-Ci. Lat. m final>n in Basque and Span.; cf. H. Gavel, Grammaire basque [Bayonne, 1929], p. 39 and Menéndez Pidal, Manual, <63)>O.F. Palerne (with partial correction through learned influence). Palerne may have in turn influenced the other-erne place names of the Roland in such minor ways, but Sainéan has not proven that these are imaginary. Especially has he neglected Basque influence here.
63 Op. cit., pp. 116-118.
64 Under the later Roman empire, a Hellenistic vogue produced ultimately the application in French of the ending -noples (<Gr. neapolis, “new town,” with o under influence of o of Gallic novios, Latin novem [cf. Dauzat, op. cil., pp. 32, 93], and perhaps of Gr. neo-) to various names of persons, thus creating new place names, viz. Grenoble<Gratianopolis. Cf. also Constantinople.
65 Ed. cit., Bd. i, Heft 2, p. 117.
66 Ed. cit., p. 296a.
67 Op. cit., p. 38, and La Toponymie française (Paris, 1939), pp. 20, 187.
68 Boissonnade, op. cit., pp. 127-129.