Charlemagne and the Matter of France

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Charlemagne And The Matter Of France OSHER 675-002 Dates: Thursdays: October 15 – November 19 Time: 1:30 pm – 3:00 pm Location: Online via Zoom Instructor: Gordon Jones Course Description: The Matter of France is the second of the three great “matters” of medieval European literature. The first, the Matter of Britain, deals with King Arthur and legends and myths associated with him; the third, the Matter of Rome, deals with material from classical history and mythology. The Matter of France is sometimes called the Carolingian Cycle as it springs from the historical figure of Charlemagne, to whose existence has been attached to a body of literature and legendary material associated with the history (and pseudo-history) of France, the Crusades, and the Holy Land. This course will begin with the historical Charlemagne and the Holy Roman Empire, and then examine the more romantic Charlemagne and his Twelve Peers (or Paladins), as they were dealt with in the Old French chansons de geste, providing inspiration and subject matter for medieval and Renaissance epics, art, and, later, novels and operas. Course Overview: (Tentatively) Week1: The historical Charlemagne and the Holy Roman Empire Week2: The Song of Roland and the introduction of the Twelve Peers Week3: The Twelve Peers in Italy and Jerusalem Week4: The Northern connections: Ogier the Dane; Valentine and Orson, Willehalm (Charlemagne’s cousin), and others Week5: The Southern French connection. Charlemagne in Occitania Week6: Everything else, including modern adaptations (I say “tentatively,” because much will depend on the level of familiarity with the subject matter on the part of the class, and where our collective interests may lead us. I have a collection of more than 30 volumes on the Matter of France, so there is plenty of material.) .

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By Uta Goerlitz — München the Emperor Charlemagne
Amsterdamer Beiträge zur alteren Germanistik 70 (2013), 195-208 Special Issue Section: Saints and Sovereigns KARL WAS AIN WÂRER GOTES WÎGANT 1 PROBLEMS OF INTERPRETING THE FIGURE OF CHARLEMAGNE IN THE EARLY MIDDLE HIGH GERMAN KAISERCHRONIK 2 by Uta Goerlitz — München Abstract The Kaiserchronik is the first German rhymed chronicle of the Roman Empire from Caesar to around 1150, fifteen years before Charlemagne’s canonization in 1165. A strand of scholarship that goes back to the middle of C19 sees the chronicle’s Charlemagne as an Emperor figure who is decidedly depicted as “German”. This cor- relates with the assumption, widespread in C19 and most of C20, based upon the erroneous equation of “Germanic” to “German”, that the historic Charlemagne was the first medieval “German” Emperor, an assumption debunked by historians in the last few decades. Readings of critics based on these faulty premises have neglected essential characteristics of this Early Middle High German text. One of these characteristics is Charlemagne’s saintly features, which implicitly contradict interpretations of the Emperor figure as a national hero. First, I question traditional interpretive patterns of Charlemagne in the Kaiserchronik. Then I re-examine the chronicle’s Charlemagne account, focusing, on the one hand, on the interferences between the descriptions of Charlemagne as a worldly ruler and, on the other, as a Christian Emperor with saintly characteristics. The Emperor Charlemagne (AD 800–814) was canonized in the year 1165, instigated by Emperor Frederic I Barbarossa and approved by the Antipope Paschal III. This event took place roughly a decade after the composition of the Early Middle High German Kaiserchronik, the central text of the following contribution.
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