Literature in Frankish Greece 291
considerable nostalgia from the more complicated 14th century: the Morea of
his youth was remembered as a peaceful and prosperous land of “tanta cortesia
e amorevolezza”.5
Sanudo’s portrayal of the Morea as a courtly and gracious land is confirmed
by the Catalan Ramon Muntaner, writing at about the same time but looking
back to the former glory days of the Villehardouin principality: “the noblest
chivalry of the world was that of the Morea, and they spoke as beautiful French
as in Paris”.6 The principality appears to have been keen to assert its French
origins and essential nature. Marino Sanudo repeatedly emphasises the
Champenois origins of the Villehardouins, suggesting that they were explicit
in asserting their Frenchness. Looking back from the 14th century, then, the
Frankish Morea in the middle years of the 13th century was something of a
“little France”; more than any other part of the Latin empire, it came closest to
the image of “quasi nova Francia” proclaimed by Pope Honorius in 1224.7
The principles of courtoisie were indeed highly prized in the principality;
arguably they lay at the heart of the Villehardouins’ whole approach to princely
rule.8 Courtoisie in the 13th century was a nexus of behaviours and values: epic
warrior prowess, wisdom, desire for glory and a concern for reputation, gener-
osity, mercy, and refinement in manners. The courteous life included war and
the various rehearsals for war, hunting, jousting, conspicuous consumption
and feasting, and increasingly the arts of courtly love. The principality under
Geoffrey ii and William ii certainly exemplified this lifestyle. The princes
were military leaders: Geoffrey actively supported the Latin empire with vital
military support and William chose repeatedly to wage war. The princes were
wise and just: in their law code the Assizes of Romania they maintained a com-
plex and adaptable legal code, while Sanudo reports that Geoffrey carefully
superintended his vassals’ treatment of his subjects; moreover, the much-
missed fairness to their subjects of Villehardouin rule is a central theme of the
14th-century Chronicle of the Morea. They were flamboyant: these princes
5 Sanudo, Istoria, p. 107, line 4.
6 “la pus gentil cavalleria del mon era de la Morea: e parlaven axi bell frances com dins en
Paris,” Ramon Muntaner, Crónica catalana de Ramon Muntaner, ed. Antonio de Bofarull
(Barcelona, 1860), §261.
7 Petrus Pressutti, ed., Regesta Honorii Papae iii, 2 vols. (Rome, 1888), 2:250–51, no. 5006.
8 Tina Lynn Rodrigues, The Old French Chronique de Morée: Historiographic-Romance
Narrative, The Greek Context, and Courtoisie (Princeton, 1996); Karl D. Uitti, “Historiography
and Romance: Explorations of Courtoisie in the Chronique de Morée,” in Autobiography,
Historiography, Rhetoric: A Festschrift in Honor of Frank Paul Bowman by his Colleagues,
Friends and Former Students, ed. Mary Donaldson-Evans, Lucienne Frappier-Mazur and
Gerald Prince (Amsterdam, 1994), pp. 265–86.