Of Reynaert the Fox Text and Facing Translation of the Middle Dutch Beast Epic Van den vos Reynaerde Edited by André Bouwman and Bart Besamusca amsterdam university press Of Reynaert the Fox Of Reynaert the Fox Text and Facing Translation of the Middle Dutch Beast Epic Van den vos Reynaerde Edited with an introduction, notes and glossary by André Bouwman and Bart Besamusca Translated by Th ea Summerfi eld Includes a chapter on Middle Dutch by Matt hias Hüning and Ulrike Vogl Th e production of this book was made possible by Hendrik Muller’s Vaderlandsch Fonds en NLPVF (Foundation for the Production and Translation of Dutch Literature) Cover: Kok Korpershoek, Amsterdam, the Netherlands Front cover: detail from Chester Beatt y Library, Dublin, Ms. 61 (psalterium, Flanders, s. XIII-2, border decoration f. 61r: Reynaert and Cuwaert cf. ll. 144-48). © Chester Beatt y Library. Back cover: fox. © Jochum Kole, Heerenveen, the Netherlands Lay-out: V3Services, Baarn, the Netherlands ISBN 978 90 8964 024 6 E-ISBN 978 90 4850 233 2 NUR 113 © Besamusca, Bouwman, Summerfi eld/Amsterdam University Press, 2009 All rights reserved. Without limiting the rights under copyright reserved above, no part of this book may be reproduced, stored in or introduced into a retrieval system, or transmitt ed, in any form or by any means (electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise) without the writt en permission of both the copyright owner and the author of the book. Table of contents Acknowledgements 7 Introduction 9 1. Literary tradition 9 2. Th e author 14 3. Th e text 17 3.1 Th e prologue 17 3.2 Th e plot 18 3.3 Words and deeds 19 3.4 Literary space 23 3.5 Justice and its perversion 24 4. Th e audience 28 5. Transmission and reception 34 About the translation 41 Text, translation and notes 41 Editorial principles 247 Middle Dutch – A short introduction 257 1. Middle Dutch diversity 257 1.1 Diff erences between dialects 259 2. Spelling and pronunciation 260 3. Grammatical structures 263 3.1 Morphology 263 3.1.1 Declension 263 3.1.2 Plural formation 266 3.1.3 Conjugation 267 5 3.2 Syntax 268 3.2.1 Word order 268 3.2.2 Passive voice and impersonal constructions 269 3.2.3 Negation 270 Further reading 273 1. Editions 273 2. Research 274 3. Middle Dutch 277 Index of proper names 279 Glossary 283 Word index (semantic fi elds) 347 Bibliography 357 List of illustrations 367 Contributors 368 6 Acknowledgements Our plan to publish an edition and facing translation of Van den vos Reynaerde for non- Dutch readers dates back to the fi rst half of the 1990s. But years went by, and it was not until the end of 2004 that we found the time one needs to carry out such a project. At that time, we were also happy to meet in Maria Vlaar an enthusiastic representative of the Foundation for the Production and Translation of Dutch Literature (NLPVF). Th is organization has fi nanced the translation. Th e structure of this book has benefi ted from the example of several predecessors. Adriaan J. Barnouw – translator of many Dutch texts (among them Van den vos Reynaerde) – published an edition of the Middle Dutch legend Beatrijs for foreign students as early as 1914, which includes a grammar and a glossary. Th e idea to add an extensive glossary to our edition and translation took shape while using Wendelin Foerster’s Wörterbuch zu Kristian von Troyes’ sämtliche Werken (5th ed. 1973), later also Th e Earliest Branches of the Roman de Renart (2001), edited by R. Anthony Lodge and Kenneth Varty. Th anks are due to our German colleagues Matt hias Hüning and Ulrike Vogl, who contributed a chapter on Middle Dutch. Th eir introduction to Middle Dutch diversi- ty, spelling, pronunciation and grammatical structures enhances the practical value of this volume considerably. We owe the greatest debt to Th ea Summerfi eld, who skilfully translated Van den vos Reynaerde and our accompanying texts into English. We thank her for the close and harmonious cooperation during the last two years. We cherish the memories of our monthly, all-day-long sessions in which the three of us discussed the exact meaning of hundreds of Middle Dutch lines and their English equivalents. Finally, we should like to extend our gratitude to colleagues who graciously helped us with this edition. Douglas Kelly commented on the English translation of Van den vos Reynaerde; Peter Field did the same for the Introduction. Keith Busby, Karina van Dalen-Oskam, Marijke Mooijaart and Peter Raedts gave useful advice. May this edition att ract new readers to the undisputed masterpiece of Middle Dutch literature! We welcome all suggestions for improvement. André Bouwman, Bart Besamusca 7 Introduction If the Times Literary Supplement were to ask its readers which works they considered to be supreme masterpieces of medieval literature, what would be the result? No doubt the Chanson de Roland would fi gure prominently, as would the Arthurian romances by Chrétien de Troyes. In all probability Sir Gawain and the Green Knight, Wolfram von Eschenbach’s Parzival and Gott fried von Strassburg’s Tristan would also be listed. In addition, Dutch readers of the TLS would be certain to make a case for Van den vos Reynaerde (literally: ‘Of Reynaert the Fox’). Th is Middle Dutch beast epic is famous among specialists, but is hardly known outside the Netherlands and Belgium as a result of the language barrier. Th e present edition of Van den vos Reynaerde with its translation into English on facing pages hopes to bridge the gap between this thirteenth-century text and non-Dutch rea- ders. Th ey are likely to fi nd it as fresh and entertaining as it was when it was fi rst writt en. It will enable them to get acquainted with, for example, the author’s composition tech- nique, his lively style, his preference for striking descriptive details, his wit and his deep- ly cynical outlook on life. Text and translation are accompanied by explanatory notes (to be found at the bott om of the page). A glossary, short introduction to Middle Dutch and suggestions for further reading conclude this volume. First, however, this introduc- tion will discuss the literary tradition of the medieval beast epic and facts known about the author. It will also provide a brief summary and note major features of the tale, the implied audience and the transmission and reception of the work. 1 Literary tradition Our knowledge of medieval beast literature in western Europe is almost entirely limited to those stories that were writt en down, initially in Latin, later also in the vernacular languages. No doubt stories about animals will also have been passed down by word 1 For an introduction in English based on recent research into nine centuries of Reynaert literature, see Varty 2000; for an introduction in Dutch, see Janssens & Van Daele 2001. 9 Introduction of mouth, but very litt le is known about this oral tradition. Th is makes it diffi cult to de- termine the relationship between the oral transmission of tales and writt en, literary culture or the extent to which the two traditions are rooted in popular and (Latin) scholarly cultures. Vehement debates about the origins of the western European beast epic have been the result. As early as the nineteenth century the so-called ‘folklorists’ looked for the answer in folk poetry about animals that either had not been preserved, or had not been recor ded until a much later date. Th is type of poetry was initially regarded by Jacob Grimm as an animal saga, already known by the Germanic tribes, which had developed indepen- dently from the classical fables. Later, Leopold Sudre was an exponent of the idea that orally disseminated medieval folk tales featuring animals were based in part on classi- cal fables and Latin monastic poetry. Th e ‘Aesopists’, on the other hand, detected the direct examples of the Latin and vernacular beast epics from the twelft h and thirteenth centuries in these early medieval writt en animal stories. Lucien Foulet has shown convincingly that the authors of the earliest Old French Renart narratives did, in fact, frequently derive material directly from the Ysengrimus, a Middle Latin beast epic named aft er the wolf who, in confrontations with the cun- ning fox Reinardus, is continually worsted. Th e author of the Ysengrimus, too, creatively recycled a considerable amount of material from classical fables, so that the supposed dependence on folk tales is doubtful, to say the least. Although the last word has not yet been said (or writt en) about the early history of the Roman de Renart and the Ysen- grimus, these narratives are clearly essential to a proper understanding of the tradition of which Van den vos Reynaerde forms part. Th e author of this Middle Dutch beast epic, ‘Willem’, was familiar with at least part of the Old French corpus of texts and used it in the course of his composition. Th e Flemish poet was by no means exceptional in this. Nearly all medieval beast literature, both in Latin and in the vernacular, made creative use of existing texts. Th e literary tradition to which Van den vos Reynaerde belongs, is ultimately, by way of various medieval stepping-stones, based on the Greek fable of the sick lion, ascribed to Aesop. It may well be that Willem did not know this fable in its original form. Never- theless knowledge of this oldest of all sources is useful.