Rumi 633Hundred Years’ War: Trial by Fire(1990; reprint, Philadel-
phia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 1999); Jenny
Stratford, ed., Medieval Art, Architecture, and Archaeology
at Rouen (London: British Archaeological Association,
1993).
Round Table The Round Table was first mentioned by
the WACE in his romance, Brut,taking the idea from
GEOFFREYof Monmouth’s History of the Kings of Britain.
The Round Table represented the idea of a brilliant col-
lection of KNIGHTSunder the authority of King ARTHUR.
The form of the table ensured meant that there were to be
no quarrels over prestige. Its destruction meant the loss
of the Arthurian idealistic kingdom. Robert de Boron (fl.
1200) in his book Merlinsaid that it was made by Merlin
for Arthur’s father. It was meant to be reminiscent of the
table for the Last Supper and another where the GRAIL
rested. One seat was to be vacant until the coming of a
chosen knight, who only by means of his perfect virtue
would be able to sit at the real table of the Grail. Develop-
ing the idea further CHRÉTIEN DE TROYES listed the
Knights of the Round Table. The valor and prowess of
these knights were the pillars of the Arthurian court but
also ultimately the sources of the end of the dream of
Camelot.
See also GALAHAD;GAWAIN AND THE GAWAIN
ROMANCES;GUINEVERE;LANCELOT;MALORY,THOMAS;
PERCEVAL;TRISTAN ANDISEULT.
Further reading:Anne Berthelot, King Arthur and the
Knights of the Round Table(New York: Harry N. Abrams,
1997); Christopher Dean, Arthur of England: English Atti-
tudes to King Arthur and Knights of the Round Table in the
Middle Ages and the Renaissance(Toronto: University of
Toronto Press, 1987); James A. Schultz, The Shape of the
Round Table: Structures of Middle High German Arthurian
Romance(Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1983).
Rudel, Jaufré SeeJAUFRÉRUDEL.
Rudolf of Habsburg (1218–1291)king of Germany,
emperor
Rudolf, the count of HABSBURG, was born in 1218 in a
family with property and substance in upper Alsace and
near Zurich. He was elected king of the Romans in
September 1273 after a long interregnum. He did not
maintain the Italian policies of the HOHENSTAUFEN
dynasty and refused an imperial coronation in ROME,
being crowned instead at AACHEN. At the Diet of Nurem-
burg in 1274, he began a policy of claiming all the impe-
rial rights once held by FREDERICKII. He defeated and
killed Premysl Ottokar II (r. 1253–78), the king of
BOHEMIA, his rival for the imperial office, in 1278 at the
Battle of Drünkrut or Marchfeld. He tried systematically
then to increase his power by taking possession of the
duchies of AUSTRIA, Carinthia, and Styria which became
the bases of Habsburg power for centuries. He was a capa-
ble and fair administrator, created peaceful conditions in
the empire, and gained the support of the magnates and
many of the princes of GERMANY. He was moderate in his
dealings with the PAPACY, even surrendering claims to
SICILYand parts of the PAPALSTATES. Nonetheless, at his
death July 15, 1291, he was unable to pass on the imperial
and royal titles to his son Albert I (r. 1298–1308).
See alsoSWABIA.
Further reading: Benjamin Arnold, Medieval Ger-
many 500–1300: A Political Interpretation (Basingstoke,
England: Macmillan, 1997); F. R. H. Du Boulay, Germany
in the Later Middle Ages(New York: St. Martin’s Press,
1983); Joseph P. Huffman, The Social Politics of Medieval
Diplomacy: Anglo-German Relations (1066–1307) (Ann
Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 2000); Joachim
Leuschner, Germany in the Late Middle Ages,trans. Sabine
MacCormack (Amsterdam: North-Holland 1980).Ruiz, Juan(Archpriest of Hita)(ca. 1283–ca. 1350)
Spanish poet, cleric
Juan was born about 1283 and was educated at TOLEDO.
Little is known of his life. While he was the archpriest in
the village of Hita near Alcalá, he wrote in about 1330 The
Book of Good Love.There were later versions, including
one from 1343 which consisted of 12 narrative poems
describing different love affairs in a morally ambiguous
way. The author distinguished between good LOVE, that of
GOD, and carnal love. He praised spiritual love but
described in great detail a male hero’s unsuccessful
attempts at seductions of women. It contained high-
spirited descriptions of amorous adventures and satirical
pictures of life. He drew on FABLES, FABLIAUX, mock heroic
allegory, and parodies. Ruiz employed lower-class charac-
ters, mostly comical, and used popular speech and
proverbs drawn from a variety of sources, including the
BIBLEand ancient and Arabic authors. He died about 1350.
Further reading:Juan Ruiz, The Book of Good Love,
trans. Elizabeth Drayson MacDonald (London: Dent,
1999); John Dagenais, The Ethics of Reading in Manuscript
Culture: Glossing the Libro de buen amor(Princeton, N.J.:
Princeton University Press, 1994); Laurence De Looze,
Pseudo-Autobiography in the Fourteenth Century: Juan Ruiz,
Guillaume de Machaut, Jean Froissart, and Geoffrey Chaucer
(Gainesville: University Press of Florida, 1997) Henry Ans-
gar Kelly, Canon Law and the Archpriest of Hita(Bingham-
ton: Medieval & Renaissance Texts & Studies, 1984); Rigo
Mignani, ed., A Concordance to Juan Ruiz, Libro de buen
amor(Albany: State University of New York Press, 1977).Rumi (Jalal al-Din, Mawlana, Our Lord, Djelaleddin,
Jelalod-din)(1207–1273)Persian mystic, poet
Rumi was born perhaps on September 30, 1207, at Balkh
in Khurasan, modern-day Afghanistan. Jalal al-Din Rumi