* Sap. 11.2. After having chosen this motto, I learned, with great interest, from Curtius’ recent work (Europäische Literatur und Lateinisches Mittelalter [Bern 1948] 495–6) that the verse in question, which bears witness to the divine predilection for mathematical order (‘Die Disposition Gottes war arithmetisch’), was one of those most quoted in medieval Latin texts.Google Scholar

¹ Diez, F., Altrömische Sprachdenkmäler (Bonn 1846) 113.Google Scholar

² Paris, Gaston, La littérature normande avant l'annexion (Paris 1899) 31 f.Google Scholar

³ Becker, Ph. A., Grundriss der altfranzösischen Literatur (Heidelberg 1907) 15.Google Scholar

⁴ Foerster, Wendelin, Sankt Alexius (Halle 1915).Google Scholar

⁵ Winkler, Emil, ‘Von der Kunst des Alexiusdichters,’ Zeitschrift für romanische Philologie [= ZRPh] 47 (1927) 589 f.Google Scholar

⁶ Spitzer, Leo, ‘Erhellung des « Polyeucte » durch das Alexiuslied,’ Archiuum Romanicum 16 (1932) 473 f.Google Scholar

⁷ Richter, Elise, ‘Studien zum altfranzösischen Alexiuslied I,’ Zeitschrift für französische Sprache und Literatur [= ZFSL] 57 (1933) 80 f.Google Scholar

⁸ Curtius, Ernst, ‘Zur Interpretation des Alexiusliedes,’ ZRPh 56 (1936) 113 f. — Cf. also, for shorter treatments of our poem, Vossler, K., Frankreichs Kultur und Sprache (2nd ed. Heidelberg 1929). 41 f. and Olschki, L., Die romanischen Literaturen des Mittelalters (Wildpark-Potsdam 1928) 14 f. of Alexis’ parents, too little interested in his personal development. A year earlier, however, Spitzer had already given the real answer to Winkler's charges against Alexis the saint: having been struck by the fact that the objections of Julius Schmidt against the ‘cruel’ nature of the martyr Polyeucte were of the same brand as those of Winkler against Alexis, he proceeds to explain Corneille's play in the light of the Alexis, and the Alexis in the light of the tradition which inspired it: the ascetic tradition of imitatio Christi, according to which the qualities of absolutism and of insensibility to the emotions of others, as well as of oneself, are prerequisites for those who would seek to imitate perfectly the martyrdom of Christ.Google Scholar

⁹ For an excellent summary of the three main critics of the Alexis (Winkler, Spitzer, and Curtius) cf. the article of Hatzfeld, H., ‘Esthetic Criticism Applied to Medieval Romance Literature,’ Romance Philology 1 (1948) 305.Google Scholar

¹⁰ Cf. the sentence in which he sums up the excellence of the A lexis (Europäische Litteratur 387): ‘Die französische Literatur setzt im 11. Jahrhundert mit geistlichen Verserzählungen ein. Deren Perle, das « Alexiuslied » [um 1050], ist die wohlabgewogene Komposition eines gelehrten Kunstdichters, der die rhetorischen Mittel kannte und Virgil gelesen hatte.’ Google Scholar

¹¹ Two other scholars have been struck by our poet's praise of the ‘wicked’ ages of Noah and Abraham: Scheludko (ZRPh 55.194–7) and Elise Richter (ZFSL 57.91–2). The first finds the explanation, somehow, in the theme of senectus mundi which was taken over from classical authors by Cyprian (and further elaborated upon by Theodulfus) and is evidently echoed in the Introduction to our poem (‘Velz est [li secles] e frailes, tut s'en vat declinant 9); thus the age of Noah etc. must have been better simply because it was ‘younger.’ But the period in which Cyprian wrote and which he found to be evil because old, was, roughly, the period (of early Christianity) of which our poet is writing and which he finds good (because it produced Alexis) I — Professor Richter would seem to share my interpretation, according to her statement (in which she opposes the idea of Helene Adolf [ibid. 88–90] that the three ages in question represent chronological divisions belonging to the sex aetates mundi of Jerome): ‘In allen drei Fällen ist also die « Welt » nicht als die « Umwelt », die « Zeitgenossen » der Genannten zu verstehen, sondern als die Welt, in der solche Männer erstanden.‘ Google Scholar

¹² Curtius (Europäische Lit. 257ff.) notes that the word antiqui is used, in medieval Latin, to refer to the writers of pagan antiquity, and to the Church Fathers, alike.Google Scholar

¹³ Thus, the first time we are presented directly to Alexis, we realize, with a shock, that we (like the parents) have not recognized his true nature. Is this not the first of a long series of ‘failures to recognize Alexis’ which will go to make up so much of the poem? Alexis, who will spend the rest of his life incognito, has already been living incognito in the poem itself.Google Scholar

¹⁴ It may be mentioned, in passing, that the key-verse ‘Pur hoc vos di…’ is quoted by Curtius (ZRPh. 56), on the same level with ‘Or revendrai al pedre et a la medre,’ as an example of ‘auctorial intervention’: a rhetorical device the automatic application of which is a sure mark of ‘eine… bewusst gehandhabte Technik des Erzählens und Komposition.’ Google Scholar

¹⁵ I speak of ‘poetic justification’ since there is, obviously, no need of justification from the point of view of evangelical perfection.Google Scholar

¹⁶ The deep significance of the wording of this prayer has been sensed by Elise Richter (p. 83); she has nothing to say, however, of the irony involved (an ambitious father praying for that which must inevitably prove the frustration of his ambitions), or of the art of the poet. Rather, she is morally indignant at the parents that, having prayed for a child after God's own heart, they were unable, because of their own conventional brand of Christianity, to accept the consequences of their prayer.Google Scholar

¹⁷ It is, however, a hint to further action; and, with our author, such suggestions are always to be seen as seeds which, at some point in the story, will germinate. Indeed, in this ‘hint’ we have a powerful suggestion of forces quietly at work, long at work, which will inevitably undermine the busy outward activity of Eufemien. The two lines 49–50 point us both backward (to the prayer of the parents) and forward: to the moment when the inner workings of Alexis’ soul (his talent) shall express themselves in action — a moment which immediately follows the revelation of these forces, Google Scholar

¹⁸ Spitzer has already pointed out the significance of the ‘glance at the bed’: ‘Der Blick auf das Bett und zugleich auf die Schönheit des irdischen Weibes entbindet die seelischen Energien des Gottsuchers’ (p. 481, note).Google Scholar

¹⁹ Thus, the first words spoken by Alexis (and the only words that he will utter before he assumes his saintly incognito) contain the moral kernel of the poem. But it must be noted that, on the whole, our poem is remarkably lacking in moral and religious teaching; and the few references of this sort to be found are of the simplest and most self-evident nature (Cf. ‘Ki ad pechet bien s'en pot recorder, /Par penitence s'en pot tres bien salver / Briés est cist secles, plus durable atendeiz’: 546–8). But our poem, as we have said, is a demonstration of truths which for the most part are taken for granted. The saint exists, primarily, not to preach, but to embody. Thus our poet has chosen to give us a quite factual account of the stages in Alexis’ saintly career — now the inner (‘Quant tut sun quor en ad si afermet…’), now the outer stages (‘A grant poverte deduit sun grant parage’), since this offers an example of principles become practice. In the words of Jolles (Einfache Formen [Halle 1930] 36), the saint is ‘Eine Gestalt, in der wir etwas, was uns allseitig erstrebenswert erscheint, wahrnehmen, erleben und erkennen, und die uns zugleich die Möglichkeit der Betätigung veranschaulicht — kurz, er ist im Sinne der Form ein imitabile’ (cited by Heisig, , ‘Geschichtsmetaphysik des Rolandsliedes…,’ ZRPh 55.8).Google Scholar

²⁰ A modern reader could easily miss the dramatic impact given by the telescoped sequence ‘Cum veit le lit, esguardat la pulcela,/ Dunc li remembret des un seinor celeste’; for the ‘telescoping’ itself may fail to strike him. — I should say, however, that such a construction in such a context is rare in Old French. We will find by the score such cases as ‘Quant ço veit Guenes qu'ore s'en rit Rollant,/ Dune ad tel doel…’ (Chanson de Roland 303–4) — but here we have already been told of the laughter of Roland. And, indeed, we will regularly find that in Old French causal clauses are used to remind us of what we already know, rather than to offer new information: development by recapitulation (one step backward, two steps forward) was an inherent characteristic of Old French. Accordingly, we should have expected our ‘Cum veit le lit…’ to have been preceded by some such statement as ‘Vint en la chambre ou gist sa muiler; li lit eret aprestet etc.’ Instead, the author, in order to suggest the sudden impact upon Alexis of the sight of the bed, has produced what for his age was a stylistic impact — but one that appears as somehow inevitable, given the presence of the definite article: ‘the bed, which is given with the marriage-chamber.’ Google Scholar

²¹ It was to revere the imagene that Alexis sought Alsis — there, finally, to be revered himself by the command of the imagene. But the imagene is also the pivot of a second pair of contradictions, so beloved by our author: having been the cause of Alexis’ arrival in Alsis, it will later be the cause of his departure. Everything in our poem is subordinated to the career of Alexis, which alone gives meaning to whatever and whoever is crossed by it.Google Scholar

²² Compare, for example, the stanzas in our poem given to the (approaching) death of Alexis, with those describing that of Roland: never is a picture given of Alexis himself, of his bed, of the surroundings (as, in the Roland we find: ‘desuz un pin’, ‘sur l'erbe verte’, ‘turnat sa teste’, ‘a l'une main si ad sun piz batud’ etc.). Or again, consider the two scenes in our poem in which Alexis addresses a member of his family (the maiden on their wedding night, Eufemien on the streets of Rome): we have already said, of the first, that the maiden herself is not directly presented (only in the subordinate clause: ‘Vint an la chambre ou eret sa muiler’). But it is also difficult to visualize Alexis himself: we know that he entered the room, addressed the maiden, gave her the ring and the ‘renges,’ commended her to God, and left ‘la chambre sun pedre.’ But we do not see him cross the threshold and, when he addresses the bride, though we hear his words ring out clearly, we cannot see the speaker: is he standing? (In a later version he is represented as seated on the bed.) Does he make gestures? Does he take from his finger the ring he gives her? Similarly, in the second scene, the figure of Alexis remains intangible. Nowhere, for example, are the garments (of any character) described; and Alexis’ body itself, which is such an integral element of the story is never presented to the eye: as the physical result of his program of penance we know only that ‘sa tendre carn ad mudede,’ and that, after his death, his face was ‘clere e bele.’ Surely this is deliberate on the part of the author, for it may be noted that he is somewhat less parsimonious of descriptive detail in his treatment of the worldly father, and much less so in his treatment of the physical mother (see below), to whom most of the descriptive details are devoted, and to whom alone are given gestures beyond the conventional. I should say that the poem as a whole is conceived of as built around abstractions: human types rather than human individuals. These are characters whose significance we are meant to consider, with the eye of the spirit: only in the case of the mother is the flesh forced upon us.Google Scholar

²³ Let not the practical-minded say that it was absolutely necessary for Alexis to take some money with him — in order, for example, to pay his passage on the boat (‘Dunet sum priz ed enz est aloet’: 78) for the author takes pains to stress that, in Alsis, he was able to give away great sums: Tot sun aver qu'od sei en ad portet, Tut le depart… Larges almosnes, que gens ne l'en remest, Dunet as povres u qu'il les pout trouver. (91–4) Google Scholar

²⁴ According to Elise Richter, however (ZFSL 56.66), this line is intended to reveal the maiden's complete misinterpretation of Alexis’ flight (‘trotz der geistlichen Ermahnung, die ihr Alexius gab’): Pechet le m'a tolut = ‘it was a crime for him to leave me’! Only when the maiden looks upon Alexis dead are we meant to believe that she becomes enlightened, and willing to exonerate him (in a line which Elise Richter will reconstruct rather arbitrarily: see below, note 54). As we shall see, the maiden's lament over Alexis’ dead body will contain no word of reproach (in sharp contrast to the grief of the parents) — precisely because, in my opinion, she perceived the ‘pure’ necessity of his flight, already on her wedding night. It is difficult to imagine, as does Miss Richter, that the bride should be completely deaf to Alexis’ words (which she alone of the three was privileged to hear); and even more difficult to imagine a sudden and radical (and unexplained) change of attitude on her part when she should learn of his death. Such an unanticipated development would be without analogy in our poem. In this regard, Winkler seems to be rather of my opinion: to him, the words of the maiden in lines 108–10 (which, however, he does not discuss any further) show her to be ‘halb dem Himmel gewonnen’ (p. 591).Google Scholar

²⁵ It may be further noted that in the first and fourth (chiasmus) of these statements the lack of recognition is doubly stressed: ‘Mais n'an conurent sum vis ne sum semblant’ and ‘Nel reconurent ne ne l'unt anterciet.’ Thus the failure of the sergeants (without which the success of Alexis could never have been achieved) is six times emphasized. For some reason Curtius (p. 126) finds a five-fold repetition in this passage, which he lists, as an example of amplificatio (?) along with the detailed description of the mourning mother's physical gestures (423–32).Google Scholar

²⁶ Note the pointed contrast (separated by only one sentence) between line 125 just cited and 128: Google Scholar

… Ne vus sai dire cum il s'en firet liez. (125).Google Scholar

Cil s'en repairent a Rome la citet,Google Scholar

Nuncent al pedre que nel pourent truver.Google Scholar

Set il fut graim, ne l'estot demander. Google Scholar

a contrast all the more effectively presented, because of the stylistical similarity: both lines represent ‘auctorial intervention’ in the interests of stressing the degree of the emotion.Google Scholar

²⁷ The sequence, ‘le pedre e la medre e la pulcele’ occurs, in all, nine times in our poem.Google Scholar

²⁸ Just as the mother was given one line in the Prelude, but now a whole scene of mourning in which her character is fully revealed, so the father, to whose characterization (in action) the Prelude was devoted, is here given only one line of mourning (indirectly reported). We may see here, first, a fine sense of balance on the part of the poet, who would put the two parents in equal relief, and in such a way that each may occupy, in his turn, the centre of the stage (as is also achieved in the final scene of mourning). But it is also fitting that the father should reveal himself first in action, as he works to build up a tradition — for it is his activity, his traditions, that are frustrated by Alexis — the mother, in an emotional reaction; for it is her emotions that are frustrated by Alexis. She has no plans other than that of keeping Alexis forever close to her: she knows no traditions, only instincts.Google Scholar

²⁹ The word leonessa actually appears in the Latin version.Google Scholar

³⁰ It is with this apostrophe to the room, which should immortalize her grief, that the mother concludes her words of mourning; just as, years later, she will conclude her lament over Alexis’ body with an apostrophe to the people of Rome, who should magnify her grief to world-wide proportions: ‘Seinurs de Rome… / Aidiez m'a plaindra le duel de mun ami…’ (461–2).Google Scholar

³¹ Cited by E. Auerbach (Mimesis [Bern 1946] 159) from a letter of Saint Bernard to a young noble he is congratulating for having abandoned the world and entered a monastery: Ep. 322.2 (PL 182.527). St. Bernard then goes on to quote, somewhat modified, the words of Saint Jerome, which read in the original (quoted by Rüstow, , Vereinzelung: Tendenzen und Reflexe [Istanbul 1948] 7): ‘licet parvulus ex collo pendeat nepos, licet sparso crine et scissis vestibus ubera, quibus nutrierat, mater ostendat, licet in limine pater jaceat, per calcatum perge patrem, siccis oculis ad vexillum crucis vola! pietatis genus est in hac re esse crudelem’: Ep. 14.2 (CSEL 54.46–7).Google Scholar

³² The thirty-four years of Alexis’ penance are surely intended (as has been remarked by other critics) to represent the life-span of Christ on earth. Perhaps the most frequent approximation of the age of Christ is that of thirty-three years: but we find in the Passion, ‘Trenta tres anz et alques plus/ des que carn pres in terra fu’ (5–6).Google Scholar

³³ Thus Alexis, sitting among the beggars in Alsis, so far away from the kingdom of Rome, is ‘pres de Deu e des regnes del ciel.’ And because of his devotion and steadfastness of purpose he is recognized as already ‘dignes d'entrer en paradis’ — and, hence, worthy of being honored by the people. What a reward for a life of inconspicuous, passive resistance to evil: We could call it the ‘martyrdom’ of Saint Alexis in that extended sense in which Sulpicius Severus (Ep. 2.9–13) had spoken of St. Martin as a martyr, though he had not had to suffer death for Christ, or Eucherius of Lyons had written: ‘Ac sic illustrium bellatorum pugnas, privata cum passionibus nostris congressione meditemur. Nam quia esse novimus sine persecutore bellum, potest dare Deus et sine cruore martyrium’ (PL 50.865A, quoted by Heisig, , ‘Geschichtsmetaphysik des Rolandsliedes und ihre Vorgeschichte,’ ZRPh 55 [1935] 8). For a summary of patristic texts containing this concept of unbloody martyrdom, cf. P. Séjourné, ‘Saint (culte des),’ DThC 14.933.Google Scholar

³⁴ Winkler, too, points out the element of suspense in this search, without, however, recognizing that this element is already anticipated in the search at Alsis.Google Scholar

³⁵ Curtius, too, recognizes the superiority of the dead Alexis, , ‘der verklärte Alexis,’ over the living (thus Winkler's ‘complaint’ that so little of the poem is given to the living Alexis, betrays an ignorance of the intentions of the poem). Curtius does not, however, show how this hierarchical distinction is borne out by the parallelism just noted.Google Scholar

³⁶ We may remember that the high stage of saintly resolve reached by Alexis in Alsis is expressed in the line: ‘Quant tut sun quor en ad si afermet,/ Que ja, sum voil, n'istrat de la citied…’ — and yet the next step of Alexis was, precisely, to leave the city. Before the miracle of the imagerie, flight from Alsis would have meant the frustration of his spiritual aims; now, it represents his only salvation. Similarly (or rather, conversely), the flight from home on his wedding night, so necessary for the beginning of his program, will be followed by a return to his father's house, where his program will be perfectly consummated.Google Scholar

³⁷ According to our poem, the ship whose course was so mysteriously changed, was borne by ‘the winds’ to Rome: but, though we are not told that this was due to a divine agency (cf. lines 80–2, describing the arrival of Alexis’ ship at Lalice [according to schedule]: ‘La pristrent terre o Deus les volt mener Dreit a Lalice…/ arivet sainement la nacele’), we must suppose that it was by God's will that Alexis was taken to Rome. And we may, perhaps, believe that God, Who foresaw the holy end of Alexis, wished to reward his ‘superlative’ constancy by having his death take place in the centre of Christendom, where his body could be immediately honored by the Pope himself. Perhaps also, it fitted the plans of divine economy, that the Holy City itself should be blessed and enriched by the life and death of Alexis, who would become the local saint of Rome, an intercessor with God for its inhabitants.Google Scholar

³⁸ Winkler, too (in an article written in answer to that of Elise Richter [and Helen Adolf], and contained in the same volume, ZFSL 57.92–5) mentions this line in refutation of the idea that Alexis was forced to struggle with his feelings while living under his parent's roof. — It is interesting, incidentally, to note that the lack of struggle evident in Alexis’ saintly development — which Winkler had, in his original article, represented as a weakness of the poem — now appears under a somewhat different light. Now we are told that the account of Alexis’ asceticism ‘liest sich wie eine einfache Exemplifikation des Wortes aus dem Lukas-Evangelium,’ and he goes on to quote Luke 18.29–30, without, however, mentioning the fact that Spitzer (loc cit. note 6 supra) in his refutation of Winkler a year earlier had already mentioned two other scriptural passages by which this quotation could be matched, and capped: Matthew 10.37–8 and Luke 14.26–7.Google Scholar

³⁹ How clearly this phrase shows the estrangement of Alexis from all human ties: his mother and father are referred to as ‘relatives of mine who live in these regions.’ It is only in stanza 42 that we find ‘mon pedre’ and ‘ma medre’ (avoc ma spuse).’ Google Scholar

⁴⁰ This interpretation is admitted by Winkler, however, as possible (ZFSL 57.94), Google Scholar

⁴¹ That this expression is not understood by Eufemien as a perfunctory phrase is seen by his answer, in which Alexis’ request is granted both in the name of God and of his son; ‘Por amor Deu e pur mun cher ami’ (223).Google Scholar

⁴² In general, the poet would seem to want us to think of the family of Alexis as spending the thirty-four years after his flight in one uninterrupted program of mourning, with no other purpose in life, with no other interests. Eufemien, for example, who had first been presented as so active, would seem to have lapsed into total inactivity. Yet here we see him, surrounded by his men, apparently out on some mission, the only time in which he is presented as not absorbed in lamentation. What this mission was, we do not know — unless it was the ‘mission’ of being found by Alexis! For, undoubtedly, Alexis ran less risk of being recognized by his father than by his mother (note line 250, referring to Alexis’ caution after having been received by his father: ‘Ço ne volt il que sa mere le sacet’; and it will be the mother who recognizes the dead Alexis without benefit of the ‘cartre’): accordingly our poet may have contrived this situation in order to allow only Eufemien to see Alexis face to face. But once Alexis has addressed him and asked for shelter, Eufemien is made immediately to return to his role of grieving parent, moved to tears by Alexis’ reminder of the lost son.Google Scholar

⁴³ Cf. ‘Soz le degret ou il gist sur sa nate, /Iluec paist l'um…’:246–7; ‘suz le degret ou il gist e converset…’ (261); ‘L'egua li getent si moilent sun liçon’ (267); ‘… Fors sul le lit u il ad jeü tant’ (274).Google Scholar

⁴⁴ Elise Richter would see in the lines, ‘Ne neuls hom ne sout les sons ahanz / For sul le lit u il ad jeü tant…,’ a reference to Alexis’ emotional suffering (les ahanz) caused by his nearness to his loved ones. It could not, she argues, refer to his physical martyrdom, since this must have been clearly visible to anyone. This is almost as if she had in mind a sentimental character from a Victorian novel weeping into his pillow at night, when none could observe him. Winkler is quite right in objecting to this as utterly unwarranted: he reminds her that Alexis’ bed is, quite simply, his abode where he stays day and night; and that ses ahanz (which are his bodily sufferings) are unperceived by others simply because these were too indifferent to observe him, their very indifference being the point that the poet would make. — Winkler might also have pointed out that the word ahanz was regularly used in religious literature as a synonym for passion: its first appearance is in the Passion de Jésus-Christ, where it is applied three times to the suffering of Christ on the Cross (3, 12, 111), and once to the martyrdom of the followers of Christ (490); in the Saint Léger we find two examples (4, 9) of aanz used (like passion, in the final line) to refer to the physical torture of the saint (cf. ‘Apres ditrai vos dels aanz/ Que li suos corps susting si granz’: 9). From this literature it will be taken over by the epic, to be applied to soldiers suffering the rigors of battle for their lord (‘Bel sire reis, jo vos ai servit tant,/ Sin ai oüt e peines e ahans.’: Rol. 863–4), or in a looser reference, to those suffering physical torment of any sort (‘… l'unt otriet li Franc/ Que Guenes moerget par merveillus ahan’: Rol. 3963). Thus Elise Richter's interpretation of the line ‘Ne nëuls hom ne sout les sons ahanz’ is impossible for semantic as well as psychological reasons.Google Scholar

⁴⁵ In Alexis’ request to the good sergeant, ‘Quer mei, bel frere, ed enca e parcamin,/ Ed une penne, ço pri, tue mercit’ (281–2), we have one of the rare occasions on which Alexis is presented as breaking the almost total silence of his thirty-four years of penance. Our poet has imagined, in all, only three verbal communications on the part of Alexis: his speech to the maiden on the wedding night (‘Oz mei, pulcele! Celui tien ad espus…’), the words he addresses to his father, as to a stranger (‘Eufemien, bel sire…/ Quar me herberges pur Deu…’) and the request, just cited, to the sergeant. All three, it must be noted, are commands: Alexis communicates with his fellow beings only to assign them some task or program. The first command shows Alexis concerned with the salvation of another of the maiden; the second and third have to do with his own program of saintliness, for which others are called in to serve: to his father he assigns the role of providing a physical background for his saintly life (and death), to the sergeant that of furnishing the tools by which this sainthood is officially documented. The two ‘practical’ requests are immediately granted him, by the father and the sergeant respectively: the spiritual command to the maiden will not be followed until many years have elapsed. (It is surely significant that Alexis asks nothing of his mother I) Google Scholar

⁴⁶ Thus Alexis is anticipating the discovery of his body, and is facilitating his own canonization. How objective is Alexis’ attitude towards his own sainthood! (Cf. the words of Jolles, , Einfache Formen [Halle 1930] 35: ‘Was aber bedeutet er [der Heilige] der Gemeinschaft?… er ist ihr ein Mittel, Tugend vergegenständlicht zu sehen, vergegenständlicht bis in die höchste Potenz, bis in die himmlische Macht’ — note the terminology of mathematics.) Google Scholar

⁴⁷ In contrast to the tendency, so frequently met with in epic literature, to repeat a message in full whenever there is a question of its contents, our author sums up the autobiographical ‘cartre’ (for us who know so well what the contents must be) in the one, meaningful, line: ‘How he went away and how he came back.’ Only when it is read to the Pope, the Emperors, and Eufemien, will the message be described in any detail. What admirable economy! Google Scholar

⁴⁸ This line characterizing the ‘good sergeant’ is preceded by the statement, ‘Contral seinur ne s'en volt mesaler’; and if we compare the words in which he expressed his desire to assume the charge of Alexis (^‘As me,’ dist il, ‘kil guard pur ton cumand, / Pur tue amur an soferai l'ahan’: 229–30), it is clear that the devotion of the sergeant is intended to represent, in harmony with medieval ‘gradualism,’ a parallel, on a lower plane, to that of Alexis. Just as Alexis serves faithfully his heavenly lord, so the sergeant serves his earthly lord (according to the admonition of St. Paul); and the ordeal of this service is characterized by the word ahanz; with this word, evocative of the passion, the humble ideal of practical helpfulness and devotion is sanctified.Google Scholar

⁴⁹ It is significant that the Emperors make this request in the name of the Pope: they, the princes of this earth, humble themselves to become merely the messengers of the Apostoile. Google Scholar

⁵⁰ And yet Winkler has objected (in the name of human decency) that the cartre should have been given over not to the spiritual authorities but to this father, who has shown himself completely indifferent to its contents, completely indifferent to his son's purpose! Google Scholar

⁵¹ This had already been noted briefly by Winkler. But it is Elise Richter who most vividly, indeed passionately, attacks the self-centeredness of the father, to whom Alexis was only a means to his end, who was utterly indifferent to the inner needs of his son (to his ‘personality’), though lavishing all physical comforts and luxuries upon him. And the mother, who had been spared by Winkler, fares perhaps even worse at her hands as completely wrapped up in her own grief, indifferent to her son's development, and apparently unmoved by his sufferings. — With a few exceptions (such as her indignation that this 11th-century father should not have consulted Alexis’ wishes before choosing his wife), Miss Richter's remarks are absolutely valid, considered in the light of moral judgments: no one after her will be apt to think in sentimental terms of the bereaved parents. (And Curtius could find no better answer to her arguments than (a) to oppose the phrase used by G. Paris [but not in reference to this scene], ‘exquise et profonde sensibilité’ and (b) to cite two parallels from a bereaved mother's lament in the Aeneid.) Still, I would say that Miss Richter has failed entirely to sense the abstract quality of these two figures, who exist only as a reductio ad impossibile: this father and this mother in their devotion to human ties are infra-natural, and are postulated as a foil to the supernatural nature of Alexis (in his rejection of human ties). She has failed to see the ‘mathematical demonstration’ underlying the author's use (for he uses his characters to his own end, as he warned us in the opening stanza of the narrative). And so she is able to speak of Eufemien as ‘ein Vater, wie es deren tausende zu allen Zeiten gegeben hat und gibt’ and, the mother, ‘ein zu allen Zeiten und auch heute wohlbekannter Typus’: that is, typical bourgeois parents such as she may have met in the Vienna of her time. Indeed, she congratulates Alexis for his escape from their bondage, as she might some young intellectual who has escaped from the stuffy, conventional atmosphere of his bourgeois home, from the ‘averageness’ of everyday life. For she ends her article, praising the ‘divine cruelty’ of Alexis in the words ‘Und das, was diesen Durchschnittsmenschen [!] als Härte erscheint, ist ein gigantisches Ringen gegen die Satzungen des Alltags [!].’ But even so could be characterized the cheap defiance of an Emma Bovary! Google Scholar

⁵² It is obvious that in such expressions as ‘Ad ambes mains derumpt sa blance barbe’ (387, used of the father) or ‘Trait ses chevels e debat sa peitrine’ (431, used of the mother), we have to do with traditional gestures of grief, such as are frequently described in Old French literature. But we will find with our poet no automatic application of these topoi: no such phrases are used of the maiden; to the father is assigned only the line just quoted, while the mother's bodily expressions of grief are described in two stanzas (423–32; cf. also 436), and are allowed to exceed the scope of the traditional gestures (‘Sun mort amfant detraire ed acoler’: 429).Google Scholar

⁵³ Is not the mother to be seen as a contrast to the Virgin, as an ‘Anti-Mary’? For just as the mother was first characterized by the periphrasis, ‘Ki li portat…’ (and allowed, continuously, to dwell on the theme of her ‘portëure’), so the (only) reference to the Virgin presents her as ‘…la virgine ki portat salvetét,/ Sainta Marie ki portat Damne Deu’ (89–90). Thus there was a holy precedent for the mother of Alexis: that of imitatio Mariae. This she rejected. — It might be objected that the mother, who was not present at the reading of the cartre, was thereby prevented, in her ignorance of Alexis’ motives, from following this precedent. But I see in her exclusion from this revelation not so much an extenuating circumstance as a judgment brought against her by the poet; she was not allowed to listen to the saint's explanation. Thus the poet's evaluation of the family as a whole would be shown according to the degree of revelation accorded them: the maiden is allowed to hear from Alexis’ lips, at the moment of his illumination, the ideal which would henceforth motivate his actions; the father, to listen to Alexis’ autobiographical letter (after having been refused possession of this by the dead Alexis). But the mother, the blindest of the three, is offered no theoretical opportunity for illumination. (And, as we have seen, Alexis speaks to the maiden in his own name; to the father, as a stranger; but to his mother, not at all.) Google Scholar

⁵⁴ Thus I read this problematic passage: ‘So oft have I looked afar for you, [wondering] if you would return — return in order to comfort your wife, not out of sinfulness (felunie) or weakness (lastet) [for it would be weakness to abandon your holy life, and sinfulness to resume the role of husband].’ According to this reading, line 475, pur félonie nïent ne pur lastet, may remain intact and in its place, instead of being inserted between line 472–3 (as Stefan Hofer has proposed, ZFSL 53.166) or replaced by the emendation, por felonie nem laissas ne por meil (as Elise Richter has proposed on the basis of the Vaticanus variant, por felonie o lassas o por grant meil: ZFSL 56.65–7). According to Miss Richter, this reading would reveal the final enlightenment of the bride who realizes, for the first time (see above), the purity of Alexis’ motives: ‘it was not [after all] out of wickedness or evil that you left me.’ — Spitzer, too, has refused to accept this emendation, but for a different reason (p. 487). He believes that the bride, like the parents, has never recognized the purity of Alexis’ motives (and, also like the parents, will not do so before the miracle of the healing occurs); accordingly, he proposes that line 475 be retained and interpreted as a reference to the motives of the bride herself, who, supposedly, is explaining that, if she has looked afar, it was ‘nicht nach andern, sondern nach dem Bräutigam’ (this was also the idea of G. Paris, according to Curtius, ZRPh 56.115). But I do not understand why this explanation should be necessary, since it had already been stated that the maiden had looked precisely for Alexis (‘… pur tei an luinz gardet,/ Si revenisses…’).Google Scholar

⁵⁵ It is of course for a beauty that has vanished that she mourns: ‘O bele buce, bel vis, belle faiture, / Cum est mudede vostra bela figure’ (481–2). In the first line she evokes the youthful beauty she once so briefly knew, in the second she mourns its destruction. Evidently for the whole of her long waiting she had kept the memory of his features: as, now, she scans his countenance, it calls to mind the face she knew, only to obliterate, by its reality, that image. And yet she was looking into ‘del saint hume le vis cler et bel’: was she, after all, oblivious to that spiritual beauty? Poor frail, tender, confused being, still feeling herself a young bride: she, too, untouched by the years.Google Scholar

⁵⁶ It is obvious that the maiden, just like the father and the mother, has failed to recognize Alexis, during all the years he spent under the steps of his father's house. Why, then, does the poet not allow her to blame herself for her blindness, as did both the father and the mother? It was said above that the poet has intended the parents’ words of self-reproach (‘A! las… cum fui avoglet!’) to remind us of a still deeper blindness of which they were unaware. Accordingly, the maiden, to whom it was given to sense, dimly, the sanctity of Alexis, is spared these words of self-condemnation, whose deeper meaning would not (quite) apply to her.Google Scholar

⁵⁷ Of course, her long-delayed imitation of Alexis’ imitatio is incomparably inferior to his: she could not take this step until after he had died.Google Scholar

⁵⁸ This shift, within the same stanza, from a scene of grief to one of joy may remind us of stanza 32, which took us directly from the sorrow of the parents in Rome to Alexis’ triumphant asceticism in Alsis.Google Scholar

⁵⁹ Spitzer has stressed the truth, pointed out by Jolles, that the imitatio achieved by the saint is intended to be imitated in turn by his followers — so that there may be an ascending chain leading up to God.Google Scholar

⁶⁰ This line, characterized by Foerster as Geschmacklosigkeit, is declared by Winkler to be necessary to the poem — in spite of its tastelessness! But Spitzer has pointed out that the saint is, indeed, a holy ‘substitute’ for Christ and, because of his miraculous ‘powers’, is necessary to the land where he is found.Google Scholar

⁶¹ Here, just as earlier when the ‘imagene’ had called for Alexis, the honor intended for the saint is justified in the name of his saintliness: this is no honor lightly accorded.Google Scholar

⁶² Again, in his Europäische Literatur 493, Curtius says of the Vita Leudegarii, which is divided by the saint's death into two books of 733 and 513 verses: ‘Der Verfasser hat also eine annährende Symmetrie erstrebt.’ And he adds: ‘Ähnlich ist der Verfasser des afr. Alexiuslebens verfahren.’ Google Scholar

⁶³ But what of the two stanzas 109, 110, which Pio Rajna (Arch. Rom. 13 [1929] 1f.) on the basis of the codex Vaticanus, discovered by him, has decided should be rejected? (In ZRPh 56, Curtius concurs in this decision, though the outline he offers represents all 125 stanzas.) If these are omitted, will not the proportion 56: 1: 56 be altered so that the death of Alexis no longer occurs in the exact middle (of the main body of the poem)? For my part, I have not been convinced by Rajna's reasoning that it is preferable to omit these stanzas. But, curiously enough, it would be possible to sacrifice them, and still retain the same ratio 56: 1: 56 simply by including the two stanzas of the conclusio within the second great half. (And, obviously, the two stanzas of the exordium could be fused with the Prelude, without affecting the proportions of the main body of the poem: 10+56+1+56 = 123).Google Scholar

⁶⁴ This double schema, conforming to the inner and the outer aspects of the poem, would surely seem to be in accord with medieval thinking. And yet I know of no parallel illustration of this hierarchical idea in terms of mathematical symmetry: one will look in vain for anything similar, for example, in the chapter (XV) of Curtius’ Europäische Literatur that is devoted to Zahlenkomposition .Google Scholar

⁶⁵ It would not be accurate to say that the two sequences of five stanzas are devoted entirely to the two decisions of Alexis: in each case, the first stanza prepares the situation which shall motivate the decision in question (st. 11: Alexis’ entrance into the marriage chamber; st. 39: the unexpected arrival of Alexis’ ship at Rome); the final stanza shows the first step of the decision become action (st. 15: Alexis flees from la chambre sum pedre; st. 43: Alexis accosts his father in the streets of Rome), It is in the middle three stanzas that the decision itself takes shape, Google Scholar

⁶⁶ How to explain, within a series of proportions so carefully maintained, the one discrepancy represented by 10 in the second half; by 5: 5 in the first? Did the author decide to sacrifice mathematical perfection in the interests of narrative technique (for it is obviously more effective, in the second half, to have the two large groups of 23 stanzas — the grief of the family, the exultation of the crowd — immediately juxtaposed)? Perhaps. And yet, after what we have seen, I cannot but believe that our poet would have been able to harmonize the two goals of narrative development and quantitative proportions, if he had so desired. It is, at least, not impossible to imagine in the second half (10: 23: 23) a deliberate variation on the ratio 5: 23; 5: 23 — and one which would, precisely, appeal to a mathematician: the same figure, first presented as split into two, then as an indivisible unit. (Thus it might be said that the system of proportions, in the main body of the poem, is based upon the two figures 23 and 10). Is there also to be found in this schema any concern with number symbolism? Without seeking to force the point, I should say that it is not impossible to find reflections of this concern in the system of proportions of our poem. If, for example, that of the main body is based upon the two figures 10 and 23, it may be legitimate to see these as representing the sum of 33, the number most often ascribed to the years of Christ on earth (together with the number 34, given textually by our poet as a reference to the same life-span). Again, the Prelude, if counted in lines rather than stanzas, gives the number 40; since the Prelude brings us up to the temptation of Alexis, could this number be intended as a reference to the forty days of Christ in the desert? Again (still counting by lines), the ‘perfect’ number 10 appears in both exordium and conclusio; while, in the second great half, we find the two groups of five (stanzas) integrated to give a sequence of ten, describing the great moment when Alexis’ body is officially recognized by Pope and Emperors.Google Scholar

⁶⁷ The central position enjoyed in our poem by Alexis, who dominates all other characters and toward whom all, in some way, are turned, may remind one of the arrangement of figures to be found in many medieval paintings.Google Scholar

⁶⁸ As for the effect of Alexis’ death upon his parents, the final effect and the most important is, of course, the salvation of their own souls (their conversion evidently being due to the post-mortem miracle). Yet this spiritual fact is summed up in one line (‘Pur cel saint cors sunt lur anames salvedes’: 605), while many stanzas are devoted to describing the ‘natural fact’ of the emotional effect produced upon them by Alexis’ death. It is obvious that by dwelling at such length on the laments of the family, the poet has offered an exceedingly dramatic contrast between their own frenzied grief, and the joy, no less frenzied, of the crowds. But (just as was true of the ‘device of postponement’ represented by the Prelude) the motivation for this procedure must, ultimately, be connected with the moral purpose of the poem (of this ‘demonstration’). Perhaps, here, too, we may apply the warning of the poet: ‘Pur hoc vus di: d'un son filz voil parler’: that is, we must concentrate, and at great length, on the blind grief of the parents, who would sacrifice all things to family ties, in order to sense, at its sharpest, the moral contrast offered by Alexis’ absolute rejection of these ties for the sake of spiritual salvation; in this contrast between the two forces of family piety and piety toward God, the force that is to be overcome must be expanded ‘to the highest power’ in order that the final victory will be greater. And again (just as has been remarked of the Prelude, with its emphasis on the exigencies of family tradition), the picture of uncompromising, inflexible family-worship offered us by the parents’ laments, serves as poetic justification of the uncompromising step taken by Alexis: the rigid institution they embody is the family that the Christian must ‘hate’; given such a family, Alexis’ decision was the only possible solution.— Q.E.D. — And, as for the single line, ‘Pur cel saint cors sunt lur anames salvedes’ — is it not enough to state, simply, factually, that this spiritual event happened? Salvation is a fact, concerning which nothing matters save the great Yes or No.Google Scholar