Rozalia Sasor

The Legend of the Seven Infants of Lara. A Commentary and Translation

The text published in this issue has two parts: a critical apparatus consisting of the introduction and footnotes, and a translation into Polish of the prose version of the Legend of the Seven Infants of Lara from manuscript E2 of Estoria de Espanna by Alfonso X the Wise. The critical part contains a discussion of three main research problems, which include the historicity of events and characters, potential sources of inspiration for the authors of subsequent variants of the Legend, and the relationship between these variants. Here we also find the characteristics of the source text of the translation, i.e. the royal chronicle mentioned above. The discussion of historical events and characters appearing in the legend is based on a comparative analysis of the canonical study of the subject by Ramón Manéndez Pidal included in the monograph La leyenda de los Infantes de Lara (3rd edition, 1971), as well as historical sources and the latest studies by Spanish and foreign scholars, often critical of Pidal’s research. Potential influences on the shape of the legend, originating mainly from the French epic, have been indicated for each of the threads, the content of which brings to mind associations with the texts written earlier. The relationship between the different variants of the legend is explained by the evolution of the text from the oldest song of an informative character (Spanish canto noticiero), to first and second epic songs, which have not survived to date, to the prose versions in the chronicles Estoria de Espanna and Crónica de 1344 by Pedro Alfonso, Count de Barcelos. The description of the different variants is complemented by a tabular summary of the most important differences between the prose versions of the legend from both chronicles. 

The translation of the chapters of Estoria de Espanna containing the story of seven infants is based on a variant of the chronicle called Versión amplificada de 1289 (Extended Version from 1289), which belongs to the so-called post-Alfonsian chronicles and was written after the death of Alfonso X, during the reign of his son, Sancho IV the Brave. It is the oldest preserved version of the  Legend of the Seven Infants of Lara, which is the basis for the later variants. The source for the translation is manuscript E2 (MS X-I-4, Biblioteca del Monasterio de San Lorenzo, El Escorial, Madrid) known in its two modern editions: Primera Crónica General de España, edited by Ramón Menédez Pidal, and Estoria de Espanna Digital, an online edition.

Knightly Code of Conduct in Alonso the Wise’s Siete Partidas: Text and Context

Alfonso X of Castile, also known as Alfonso the Wise was one of the most eminent Medieval rulers of the Kingdom of Castile and León. This paper presents selected facts from his life, especially highlighting his achievements as a patron of science and literature, as well as propagator of the vernacular language, i.e. Castilian. A special focus herein will be on the code Siete Partidas. Written under Alfonso’s auspices, this text describes knightly customs and combines the features of fiction and legal documents. The paper consists of two parts: a commentary and a translation of Title XXI of Partida II. The commentary presents the essential information on Alfonso X, including his legislative activities connected to Siete Partidas, and also the significance of the code for Spanish legislation, the contents of the seven books (partidas), as well as its authorship. In order to provide some background of the knightly culture on the Iberian Peninsula in the 13th century, knighthood rights are also presented on the basis of other contemporary texts on related subjects, such as Ramon Llull’s The Book of the Order of Chivalry or the French anonymous treatise L’ordene de chevalerie. The translation presented in the second part of the article is the first and the only Polish version of a fragment of Siete Partidas dealing with duties, privileges and also customs. Prepared on the basis of the critical edition by Jerry R. Craddock and Jesús Rodríguez Velasco, the translation attempts to grasp the nature of the original language and content, providing notes, which facilitate comprehension of particularly challenging problems.

Notes on Francesc Eiximenis’ Book of Angels

Francesc Eiximenis, a Catalan Franciscan and writer who lived in the 14th century, is not very well known today outside the narrow circle of Catalan researchers of the Middle Ages, even though he was a very popular author at the time and was eagerly translated into other languages. He was most enthusiastic about using his native language, i.e. Catalan, in which he wrote treatises on the truths of faith, theological questions, and social and political issues. The purpose of this study is to introduce Eiximenis and to present a Polish translation of an excerpt from the first book of his angelological treatise entitled Llibre dels angels (Book of Angels). Rozalia Sasor’s translation, together with an initial critical commentary on the text, is the first contemporary edition of this part of the treatise. The paper, which is at the same time an introduction to the translation, is divided into four sections. In the first one, Sasor briefly discusses the state of knowledge about Francesc Eiximenis in Poland; in the second one, she presents his biography with a special emphasis on the time of his studies and his theological and philosophical interests, and in the third she characterises the Llibre del angels and the circumstances surrounding the creation of the work. It is worth noting at this point that the aforementioned characteristics focus on the properties of the language of the original, which contributed to the success of Llibre dels angels among readers; it also takes up the previously undiscussed problem of the sources of the treatise. The paper ends with a comment on the Polish translation, in which Sasor explains how she prepared the source text for translation as there is no contemporary critical edition of the first three books of Llibre dels angels; she also discusses the translation strategy she adopted. The whole publication is completed by a translation of selected excerpts from the first part of Llibre dels angels, i.e. chapters 1–7, 9, 14, and 16–17, with critical commentary.

The Lost Castilian Epic

The main aim of the paper is to present the most important Castilian epic poems belonging to the so-called lost epic, i.e. anonymous texts that have not survived to our times, but one can assume with a high degree of probability that they existed, first in oral circulation, and later in prose versions in chronicle and in romancero.
The existence of old Castilian epic is undermined by the individualistic theory of the origin of epic poems authored by the French researcher Joseph Bédier, who believed that there were only poems that have survived in writing, but two other theories undermine these assumptions: the neotraditional theory of the Spanish medievalist Ramón Menéndez Pidal and the eclectic theory proposed by the British hispanist Alan Deyermond. Both agree on the existence of the Castilian epic in oral tradition, with each assuming their different origin and a different number of unpreserved poems. They also agree on the causes of the disappearance of the oldest Castilian epic songs, which, even if written down, could share the fate of thousands of manuscripts destroyed due to wars, fires or normal wear and tear. Only two have survived in original versions: The Poem of the Cid in an incomplete manuscript from the first half of the 14^th century and a hundred verses of the Roncesvalles (Roncevaux) poem in a manuscript also from the beginning of the 14^th century. Two other epic works are known thanks to later adaptations of the texts to the requirements of the erudite epic mester de clerecía (Spanish: craft of the clergy), namely the Poema de Femán González (Poem on Femán González) and Mocedades de Rodrigo (The Youthful Actions of Rodrigo). The former comes from the mid-13^th century, while the latter from the mid-14^th century.
Nevertheless, there is indirect evidence of the existence of old Castilian epic, including the prose versions of epic legends in medieval Latin and Castilian chronicles, as well as the occurrence of typical epic motifs in late medieval and renaissance romances, which are believed to have been created by cutting longer poems into shorter texts. The two 13^th-century Latin chronicles, Chronicon mundi by Lucas de Tuy and De rebus Hispaniae by Rodrigo Jiménez de Rada, contain the richest epic material, while among the Castilian chronicles Estoria de España, commonly known under the title Primera Crónica General given by Menéndez Pidal, and Crónica de 1344, stand out in this respect.
The main body of the paper is a discussion of the lost poems based on the Castilian chronicles mentioned above. The list includes only those songs whose existence is recognized by the majority of medievalists, i.e.: Bernardo del Carpio, Mainete, La condesa traidora (Treacherous Countess), Cantar de los siete infantes de Lara (Song of the Seven Lara Princes), Romanz del Infant García (A Romance about Infanta García) andCantar de Sancho II y el cerco de Zamora (Song of Sancho II and the siege of Zamora). For each text, a summary is provided along with the sources in which variants of the poems have survived, sometimes directly indicating the existence of today lost epic songs.