Chansons de Geste and 12th Century Performance Sample
Summary
This episode explores the Song of Roland, a foundational French epic poem, and argues that its oldest surviving manuscript, Oxford Digby 23, is actually a British artifact. The hosts discuss the poem’s performance style, including its decasyllabic meter and "hard cut" scene changes, and identify the likely performer, Tyaldus, as an Anglo-Norman jongleur working in Britain. By analyzing specific dialectal features and pronunciation shifts, scholars date the manuscript to between 1140 and 1170, proving it was composed and performed in an Anglo-Norman context rather than on the continent.
Topics discussed
Introduction: The Song of Roland as British History
Overview of the Chanson de Geste tradition
The Oxford Digby 23 manuscript and its binding
Poetic structure: Laisses and scene shifts
Meter and performance style: Decasyllabic lines
Oral tradition and narrative hard cuts
Performance cues and audience familiarity
The 'slow motion' repetition technique in epic poetry
Identifying the performer: Tyaldus and the final line
The working copy: Physical evidence of a jongleur
Performance context: Solo vs. troupe
Anglo-Norman dialect and British origin
Comparing copies and dialectal spelling variations
Dating the manuscript via linguistic drift
Linguistic analysis: Dialect effects on meter
Conclusion: A French poem performed in Britain
Preview of upcoming topics and membership call
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