Historia Caroli Magni
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Historia de vita Caroli Magni et Rolandi (History of the life of Charlemagne and Roland), usually known as Historia Caroli Magni, is a Latin prose narrative of legendary material about Charlemagne and his times. It was traditionally ascribed to Charlemagne's contemporary Turpin, Archbishop of Reims, and is still sometimes known as the "pseudo-Turpin."
The Historia Caroli Magni was declared authentic in 1122 by Pope Calixtus II. It is, however, not based on historical sources but on the tradition of the chansons de geste, notably the Chanson de Roland (Song of Roland). Its popularity seems to date from the latter part of the 12th century, the period when versions of this epic began to be written down. Gaston Paris, who made a special study of the Historia, considers that the first five chapters were written by a monk of Compostella in the 11th century and the remainder by a monk of Vienne between 1109 and 1119.
The popularity of the work is attested by the fact that there are at least five French translations of the Historia dating from the 13th century and one into Latin verse of about the same time. There was also a Welsh adaptation, dating to the 14th century, and found in the Red Book of Hergest. According to August Potthast there are about fifty manuscripts of the story in existence.
[edit] References
The Historia was first printed in 1566 at Frankfurt; perhaps the best edition is the one edited by Ferdinand Castets as Turpini historia Karoli magni et Rotholandi (Paris, 1880). It has been translated many times into French and also into German, Danish and English. The English translation is by Thomas Rodd and is in the History of Charles the Great and Orlando, ascribed to Turpin (London, 1812).
See
- Gaston Paris, De pseudo-Turpino (Paris, 1865), and Histoire poetique de Charlemagne, new ed. by P. Meyer (1905)
- Victor Henry Friedel, "Études compostellanes" in Otia Merceiana (Liverpool, 1899).
- This article incorporates text from the Encyclopædia Britannica Eleventh Edition, a publication now in the public domain.
