The divided heart: Heroism and violence in the Old French <italic>chanson de geste</italic>.

Abstract

The central issue in this study is how ethics govern the hero's distinction from other characters in the Old French <italic>chanson de geste</italic> and set him apart both from his companions and from his negatively portrayed counterparts, the traitor and the coward, through the priorities the hero assigns to kinship, feudal and affective relationships. The distinction is expressed in the hierarchy the narrators assign to the fears governing the actions of the various characters, and through the relative legitimacy attributed to the hero's use of violence as opposed to that of either the traitor or the coward. Through specific aspects of the problem in each of four texts I show how the ethical valuation of violence is linked to the success of other social relationships. I show how the ethical use of violence is associated with successful marital relationships and above all is shown as virtually determinant of the legitimacy of heirs in <italic>Doon de la Roche</italic>. The chapter on <italic> Aye d'Avignon</italic> demonstrates the crucial importance of deferred violence, mercy, in the hero's transformation of hostile social relationships with another clan into close feudal and kinship ties that are, in principle at least, harmonious. In the chapter on <italic>Raoul de Cambrai</italic> I show how, when ties of kinship are viewed as significant only between men and in the form of mutually supportive violence, those ties are depicted as misfiring, in particular when they reject the relationship between son and mother. Finally, I show how the hierarchy of fears, established in the <italic>Chanson de Guillaume</italic> as defining the hero, is also represented as governing the actions and valuation of the characters in the other three works. The study concludes that these 12th and 13th century texts do not exhibit a monolithic attitude towards the ethics of violence. Rather, the texts offer a series of reflections and even debates, often responding to other texts in a general way, on the legitimacy of violence, in terms of the success or failure of violence in support of social relationships based on feudal ties or kinship.