FET DES ROMAINS
. Written ca. 1213/14 by an anonymous, probably Parisian, author, the Fet des Romains is
a compilation of Roman historical texts. Sallust’s De coniuratione Catilinae, Suetonius’s
De vita Caesarum, Lucan’s Pharsalia (properly called Bellum civile), and especially
Julius Caesar’s Commentarii de bello gallico (then believed to have been written by one
Julius Celsus) supplied the models for the translation into Old French prose. There are
also traces of Flavius Josephus’s Bellum Judaicum, Peter Comestor, Augustine, and
Isidore of Seville. Despite announcements in the prologue that the work will cover all
twelve Caesars, the Fet is essentially a life of Julius Caesar. The prologue, stressing the
civilizing power of literature, the duty to impart one’s knowledge to others, and the moral
lessons that can be learned from the Romans, borrows heavily from Sallust. The text
itself begins with a short overview of Roman history, recounts Caesar’s birth (as a
Caesarean section, based on Isidore of Seville’s Etymologies), and then, like Suetonius,
skips to Caesar’s sixteenth year. The Catiline conspiracy and Caesar’s political
difficulties are followed by an account of the Gallic Wars which forms the bulk of the
744-page (in the modern edition) book. The civil war is recounted according to Lucan
(whose anti-Caesar feelings largely disappear in the translation). The book ends with
Caesar’s murder.
The Fet was extremely popular, in both learned and aristocratic circles, in several
countries and over several centuries. Its last period of popularity was in the Burgundy of
Charles the Bold. More than sixty manuscripts survive, many of them beautifully
illuminated. In one group of manuscripts, the Fet is preceded by the Histoire ancienne
jusqu’à César, an unfinished history of the world that leaves off approximately where the
Fet begins. Both texts are important because they are among the earliest examples of
French prose and of historical texts in the vernacular. The Fet is also tied to
contemporary politics through two allusions to similarities between Julius Caesar and the
French king Philip Augustus. Perhaps the text indirectly supported Philip’s expansionist
desires. The Fet and the Histoire ancienne show the strong interest in ancient history as a
source for both moral exemplars and a national past.
Renate Blumenfeld-Kosinski
[See also: HISTOIRE ANCIENNE JUSQU ’À CÉSAR; HISTORIOGRAPHY]
Flutre, Louis Fernand, and K.Sneyders de Vogel, eds. Li fet des Romains. Paris: Droz, 1936.
Beer, Jeanette M.A. A Medieval Caesar. Geneva: Droz, 1976.
Flutre, Louis Fernand. Li fait des Romains dans les littératures française et italienne du XIIIe au
XVIe siècle. Paris: Hachette, 1932.
Guenée, Bernard. “La culture historique des nobles: le succès des Faits des Romains (XIIIe au XVe
s.).” In La noblesse au moyen âge, ed. Philippe Contamine. Paris: Presses Universitaires de
France, 1976, pp. 261–88.
Meyer, Paul. “Les premières compilations françaises d’histoire ancienne.” Romania 14(1885):1–
81.
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