Chanson de Roland

“ It makes its appearance in the Chanson de Roland, which has come down to us in a thirteenth-century form, incorporating the earlier Epic of Roland, probably composed towards the end of the eleventh century. In this we find mention of it when Charlemagne, after he is said to have taken Cordova, retires to a garden with Roland and Oliver and his barons, the elder ones amusing themselves with chess and tric-trac, and the younger ones with fencing, the king meanwhile looking on, seated under a pine-tree. ”

“ The earliest poems of the cycle are naturally the closest to historical truth. The central point of the geste du roi is the 11th-century Chanson de Roland (see Roland, Legend of) , one of the greatest of medieval poems. Strangely enough the defeat of Roncesvalles, which so deeply impressed the popular mind, has not a corresponding importance in real history. But it chanced to find as its exponent a poet whose genius established a model for his successors, and definitely fixed the type of later heroic poems. ”

“ The "Song of Roland" might be called the national epic of France. It corresponds to the "Mort d'Arthur" of England, the "Cid Chronicles" of Spain, the "Nibelungen Lied" of Germany, and the Longobardian legends of North Italy. Italian mediæval literature is rich in the Roland romances, founded on the fabulous "Chronicle of John Turpin" and the "Chansons de Gestes," of which the "Song of Roland" is one. ”

“ Roland is a variation on the one perpetual heroic theme; it has a grander setting, a grander accompaniment, than Byrhtnoth or Waldere, but it is essentially the old story of the heroic age,—no knight-errantry, but the last resistance of a man driven into a corner.
The greatness of the poem of Roland is that of an author who knows his own mind, who has a certain mood of the heroic imagination to express, and is at no loss for his instrument or for the lines of his work. ”

“ You are an old man, and you have the fancies of a child. You know what a mighty man of valor is this Roland. Think you that any one would dare to attack him? No one, of a truth. Ride on, Sire; why halt you here? The fair land of France is yet far away."
Roland blew his horn a third time, and when the King heard it he said, "He that blew that horn drew a deep breath." And Duke Naymes cried out, "Roland is in trouble; on my conscience he is fighting with the enemy. Some one has betrayed him; 'tis he, I doubt not, that would deceive you now. ”

“ To-day we shall lose, I fear me much, my brave nephew Roland. I know by the sound of his horn that he has but a short time to live. Put your horses to their full speed, if you would come in time to help him, and let a blast be sounded by every trumpet that there is in the army." So all the trumpets in the host sounded a blast; all the valleys and hills re-echoed with the sound; sore discouraged were the heathen when they heard it. "King Charles has come again," they cried; "we are all as dead men. When he comes he shall not find Roland alive." ”

“ Nora sang the old, tender, Scotch love-song with a simple pathos that suited it as well as did her fine contralto. Roland, who like most emotional people, was exceedingly sensitive to the power of music, felt it float through his whole being—soothing the nervous system which had been on the strain all day, and taking him, for a moment, into that world of romance among whose bowery walks it is so pleasant, for even the most practical-minded, occasionally to wander. ”

“ She had confessed everything, laying her heart bare before Roland. "The knowledge that I am making a sacrifice for him," she says, "has upset his happiness. He suffers in accepting what yet he cannot do without." Roland, if exacting in daily life, could rise to great occasions. ”

“ I have often thought since, in the greater experience of mankind which life has afforded me, that if, in early years, their destinies had been exchanged,—if Roland had taken to literature, and my father had been forced into action,—each would have had greater worldly success. For Roland's passion and energy would have given immediate and forcible effect to study; he might have been a historian or a poet. It is not study alone that produces a writer, it is intensity. In the mind, as in yonder chimney, to make the fire burn hot and quick, you must narrow the draught. ”

“ Yet although Roland has this universal or symbolical or musical meaning—unlike the more individual personages in the Sagas, who would resent being made into allegories—the total effect is mainly due to legitimate epic means. There is no stinting of the epic proportions or suppression of the epic devices. The Song of Roland is narrative poetry, a model of narrative design, with the proper epic spaces well proportioned, well considered, and filled with action. ”

“ See, here is his sword; 'tis a noble spoil that I shall carry back with me to Arabia." Thereupon he took the sword in one hand, with the other he laid hold of Roland's beard.
But as the man laid hold, Roland came to himself, and knew that some one was taking his sword from him. He opened his eyes but not a word did he speak save this only, "Fellow, you are none of ours," and he smote him a mighty blow upon his helmet. The steel he brake through and the head beneath, and laid the man dead at his feet. "Coward," he said, "what made you so bold that you dared lay hands on Roland? ”

“ At first, in the "Song of Roland," it is still kept in check; it walks with long strides, but only walks. Presently its wings have grown; incidents are multiplied; giants and monsters abound, the natural disappears, the song of the jongleur grows a poem under the hands of the trouvère; he would speak, like Nestor of old, five, even six years running, and not grow tired or stop. Forty thousand verses are not too much to satisfy their gabble; a facile mind, copious, inquisitive, descriptive, such is the genius of the race. ”

“ I have seen the Saracen host of Spain,
Over plain and valley and mountain spread,
And the regions hidden beneath their tread.
Countless the swarm of the foe, and we
A marvellous little company."
Roland answered him, "All the more
My spirit within me burns therefore.
God and the angels of heaven defend
That France through me from her glory bend.
Death were better than fame laid low.
Our Emperor loveth a downright blow."
At last Roland blows his horn, but it is too late. All the Moors are slain or routed, but so are all the Franks save Roland, and he has received his death blow. ”

“ In that poem, indeed, war and religion are the sole motives employed, and its motto might be two lines from another of the finest chansons (Aliscans, 161-162) :—
In Roland there is no love-making whatever, and the hero’s betrothed “la belle Aude” appears only in a casual gibe of her brother Oliver, and in the incident of her sudden death at the news of Roland’s fall. M. Léon Gautier and others have drawn the conclusion that this stern and masculine character was a feature of all the older chansons, and that imitation of the Arthurian romance is the cause of its disappearance. ”

“ A mighty blow it was, cleaving the man in twain down to his saddle—aye, and the saddle itself with its adorning of gold and jewels, and the very backbone also of the steed whereon he rode, so that horse and man fell dead together on the plains. "Well done!" cried Roland; "you are a true brother of mine. 'Tis such strokes as this that make the King love us."
Nevertheless, for all the valor of Roland and his fellows the battle went hard with the men of France. Many lances were shivered, many flags torn, and many gallant youths cut off in their prime. Never more would they see mother and wife. ”

“ Roland bent his head lower to catch the sounds about to issue from the lips.
"There's a different and a better inheritance, Roland; one of love, and light, and everlasting peace. You will both of you strive for that."
"Yes, that we will. And gain it too. Oh, Hamish, if you could but stop with us a bit longer!" burst forth Roland, letting his suppressed emotion come out with a choking sob. "It's nothing all round but dying. ”

“ And the final example of this is something which is also illustrated by the obscure minstrel who threw up his sword as he sang the Song of Roland, as well as by the Song of Roland itself. Modern history, mainly ethnological or economic, always talks of a thing like the Norman adventure in the somewhat vulgar language of success. ”

“ Nowhere is the great political importance attributed by contemporaries to Madame Roland so decisively shown as here. She had now been pushed to the very forefront of the Revolution, visible to all eyes, a mark for envy, to become the favourite target for the venomous calumnies of Marat and the Père Duchesne. Her co-operation in composing and promulgating the numerous writings by which Roland sought to influence public opinion could not remain unknown. ”

“ I admire the abnegation of the translator, who is himself a very brilliant and individual writer, in having really translated the Song of Roland. It would have been easy for a man of his poetic gift to make out of it a modern poem. It might easily have been a temptation to him to deal with Roland rather as Tennyson dealt with Arthur. But the value of his vivid and very laborious service to literature is precisely that a modern man, educated on the modern histories, may find here the things he does not expect. ”

“ The bride lookt like a queen;
And so they returned to the merry greenwood,
Amongst the leaves so green.
ROLAND AT RONCESVALLES NOTE,—The greatest legendary hero of France is Roland, one of
Charlmagne's knights. His deeds are told in Chansons De Roland (Songs
of Roland) . These songs correspond to the legends of King Arthur in
England and to the stories of the Cid in Spain.
Every nation possesses a few of these great characters whose lives have furnished incidents without number to enrich the literature of the land. Roland shines as one of the finest of national heroes. ”

“ All the other songs of action, however beautiful and however ancient they may be, are far inferior. The text of the 'Song of Roland' as it has come down to us cannot have been written much before 1100. ”

“ But the wounds they received in their bodies were without number, and at length the Archbishop tottered and fell. But they had not slain him yet: with a mighty struggle he rose to his feet and looked round for Roland. 'I am not conquered yet,' he said; 'a brave man dies but never surrenders.' Then with his good sword he rushed into the mêlée dealing death around him. Roland fought as keenly as his friend, but the moments seemed long till Charles brought them help. Again he sounded his horn, though the wound in his head burst out afresh with his effort. ”

“ A countless throng flooded the streets; men, women, and children, shouting, laughing, execrating. The celebrity of Madame Roland, her extraordinary grace and beauty, and her aspect, not only of heroic fearlessness, but of joyous exhilaration, made her the prominent object of the public gaze. ”

“ The paynim host is shattered and riven; but nearly all the Franks have fallen. Roland looks upon the mountains and the plain. Of those of France he sees so many lying dead, and he laments them like a high-born knight (chevaliers gentilz) . “Seigneurs barons, may God have pity on you and grant Paradise to your souls, and give them to repose on holy flowers! ”

“ During this struggle there suddenly burst upon the darkness a broad and lurid gleam of light, that illuminated the whole arena of the barmkyn, its battered gate and ruined wall, its corpse-strewn court and striking architecture; and then Roland could perceive the ghastly visage of that powerful foe who grasped him—powerful even in death, for sight had all but left his glazed and sunken eyes; yet the vengeance of a demon seemed to burn in his despairing heart, and to add strength to his muscular gripe. ”

“ He devoured eagerly the light reading thrown in his way, and picked up thence that kind of knowledge which novels and plays afford, for good or [Pg 156] evil, according as the novel or the play elevates the understanding and ennobles the passions, or merely corrupts the fancy, and lowers the standard of human nature. But of all that Roland desired him to be taught, the son remained as ignorant as before. ”

“ Most of the epic poems of the middle ages in which Roland's death is recorded, especially the different old French Chansons de Roland ou de Roncevaux, an Icelandic poem on the subject, and Stricker's middle-high German lay of Roland, all of them written between A.D. 1100 and 1230—agree in this, that after Roland's fall at Roncesvalles, and the complete rout of the heathen by Charlemagne, the latter returns home and is met—some say at Aix-la-Chapelle, others at Blavie, others at Paris—by Alda or Alite, Olivier's sister, who inquires of him where Roland, her betrothed, is. ”

“ There is hardly anything in the poem except the single mood; its simplicity is overpowering, a type of heroic resistance for all the later poets of Europe. This impressive effect is aided, it is true, by an infusion of the lyrical tone and by playing on the pathetic emotions. Roland is ideal and universal, and the story of his defeat, of the blast of his horn, and the last stroke of Durendal, is a kind of funeral march or "heroic symphony" into which a meaning may be read for every new hero, to the end of the world; for any one in any age whose Mood is the more as the Might lessens. ”

“ The tears were in his eyes with the genuineness of his emotion. Roland's love for his early friend, who had once suffered so much for his sake, was no simulated one. The spectators spared a minute to turn and gaze on them--the two notable young men. Arthur was nearly as tall as Roland, very noble and distinguished. His face had not the singular beauty--as beauty--of Hamish's, but it was good, calm, handsome: one of those that thoughtful men like to look upon. ”