against King Aigolan-dus, Altumaior of Cordova and Furre of Navarre, the giant
Ferracutus, and Ebrahim of Seville. Having reaffirmed his supremacy, Charlemagne
undertakes a pilgrimage to St. James’s tomb in Compostela. The remainder of the
chronicle recounts the Spanish campaign of Charlemagne, Roland, Oliver, and Turpin
against Marsile and Baligant, known from the Chanson de Roland. After the defeat at
Roncevaux, Charlemagne elevates the abbey of Saint-Denis to the rank of most important
church in France and builds a basilica in honor of the Virgin Mary in Aix-la-Chapelle.
Some time later, Turpin learns in a vision of Charlemagne’s death and of the intervention
of St. James, who saves the emperor’s soul from a horde of black devils.
One of the reasons for the great success of the Historia is the ingenious combination
of the powerful medieval legends of St. James and Charlemagne and the attempt at
subsuming the former under the latter. As a work of church propaganda, the Historia
promotes Saint-Denis as the center of French political and ecclesiastical power, equal,
and ideally superior, to St. James’s at Compostela. But the chronicle also marks the
transition, in the cultural and literary spheres, from rhymed epic and hagiography,
considered unreliable, to authoritative historiography in prose and based on Latin prose.
The amalgam of legendary, historic, and didactic elements that is the Pseudo-Turpin
marks the demise of hagiography, the birth of historiography, and the conception of the
prose romance.
Hans R.Runte
[See also: ANONYMOUS OF BÉTHUNE; CHANSON DE GESTE;
HISTORIOGRAPHY; LIBER SANCTI JACOBI; LIBERAL ARTS; PHILIPPE
MOUSKÉS; PIERRE DE BEAUVAIS; ROLAND, CHANSON DE]
Mandach, André de, ed. Chronique dite saintongeaise: texte franco-occitan inédit “Lee”: a la
découverte d’une chronique gasconne du XIIIe siècle et sa poitevinisation. Tübingen:
Niemeyer, 1970. [Edition of Version I based on National Library of Wales 5005B (Lee MS).]
Schultz, Oscar, ed. “Der provenzalische Turpin.” Zeitschrift für romanische Philologie 14
(1890):467–520. [Edition of Provençal version based on B.L. Add. 17920, fol. 6b-19b.]
Short, Ian, ed. The Anglo-Norman Pseudo-Turpin Chronicle of William de BrianeI Oxford:
Blackwell, 1973. [Edition of Version IV based on B.L.Arundel 220.]
Walpole, Ronald N., ed. An Anonymous Old French Translation of the Pseudo-Turpin Chronicle: A
Critical Edition of the Text Contained in Bibl. Nat. fr. 2137 and 17203 and Incorporated by
Philippe Mouskés in his Chronique rimée. Cambridge: Medieval Academy of America, 1979.
[Edition of Version VI.]
——, ed. “The Burgundian Translation of the Pseudo-Turpin Chronicle in Bibliothèque Nationale
(French MS. 25438).” Romance Philology 2 (1948–49):178–215; 3 (1949–50): 83–116. [Edition
of single manuscript of Version VII.]
——, ed. The Old French Johannes Translation of the Pseudo-Turpin Chronicle. Berkeley:
University of California Press, 1976. [Edition of Version II based on B.N. fr. 2464.]
——, ed. Le Turpin français, dit le Turpin I. Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1985. [Edition
of Version V based on B.N. fr. 1850.]
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