As to the popularity of the Fierabras romance in the Netherlands, the following passage from Hoffmann, Horæ Belgicæ (Vratislaviæ, 1830), I. 50, may be quoted here11:—
“Quam notæ Belgis, sec. xiii. et xiv., variæ variarum nationum fabulæ fuerint, quæ ex Gallia septemtrionali, ubi originem ceperunt, translatæ sunt, pauca hæc testimonia demonstrabunt:— … in exordio Sidraci:—12
‘Dickent hebbic de gone ghescouden,
die hem an boeken houden
daer si clene oerbare in leren,
also sijn jeesten van heeren,
van Paerthenopeuse, van Amidase,
van Troijen ende van Fierabrase,
ende van menighen boeken, die men mint
ende daer men litel oerbaren in vint,
‹viii›
ende dat als leghene es ende mere,
ende anders en hebben ghene lere,
danne vechten ende vrowen minnen
ende lant ende steden winnen … …’—
“Nec rarius tanguntur fabulæ de Carolo Magno, Speculum Historiale, IV. 1. xxix (cf. Bilderdijk, Verscheidenh, I. D. bl. 161–2):—
‘Carel es menichwaerf beloghen
in groten boerden ende in hoghen,
alse boerders doen ende oec dwase,
diene beloghen van Fierabrase,
dat nie ghesciede noch en was. …
die scone walsce valsce poeten,
die mer rimen dan si weten,
belieghen groten Caerle vele
in sconen worden ende bispele
van Fierabrase van Alisandre,
van Pont Mautrible ende andre,
dat algader niet en was. …’ ”
That the Fierabras romance must have been well known and highly popular in England and Scotland, may be gathered from the numerous references to this poem in various Middle English works.
Thus the whole subject of the Fierabras romance is found in the following passage, taken from Barbour’s Bruce, ed. Skeat, 3, 435 ss., where the King is described as relating to his followers:—
“Romanys off worthi Ferambrace,
That worthily our-commyn was
Throw the rycht douchty Olywer;
And how the duz Peris wer
Assegyt intill Egrymor,
Quhar King Lawyne lay thaim befor
With may thowsandis then I can say,
And bot elewyn within war thai,
And a woman; and wa sa stad,
That thai na mete thar within had,
Bot as thai fra thair fayis wan.
Y heyte, sua contenyt thai thaim than;
That thai the tour held manlily,
Till that Rychard off Normandy,
Magre his fayis, warnyt the king,
That wes joyfull off this tithing:
For he wend, thai had all bene slayne,
Tharfor he turnyt in hy agayne,
And wan Mantrybill and passit Flagot;
And syne Lawyne and all his flot
Dispitusly discumfyt he:
And deliueryt his men all fre,
And wan the naylis, and the sper,
And the croune that Ihesu couth ber; ‹ix›
And off the croice a gret party
He wan throw his chewalry.”13
In his poem of Ware the Hawk, Skelton (ed. Dyce, I. 162) cites Syr Pherumbras as a great tyrant. He also refers to him in one of his poems against Garnesche, whom he addresses with the following apostrophe:—
“Ye fowle, fers and felle, as Syr Ferumbras the ffreke.”
The story of the combat between Oliver and Ferumbras is alluded to by Lyndsay, in his Historie of ane Nobil and Wailȝeand Squyer, William Meldrum, ed. Hall, ll. 1313–16:—
“Roland with Brandwell, his bricht brand,
Faucht never better, hand for hand,
Nor Gawin aganis Golibras,
Nor Olyver with Pharambras.”
The tale of the fortified bridge of Mauntrible seems also to have been very well known in England and Scotland. In the Complaint of Scotland, ed. Murray, p. 63, we find the Tail of the Brig of the Mantrible mentioned among other famous romances. In his lampoon on Garnesche, Skelton describes his adversary as being more deformed and uglier than
“Of Mantryble the bryge Malchus14 the murryon.”
As has already been mentioned, amongst all the Charlemagne romances the (originally French) romance of Fierabras is remarkable as being one of the first that was rescued from the dust of libraries; and it is worthy of note, in connection with it, that the first printed version was not a French, but a Provençal one, which was published not in France, the birth-place of the romance, but in Germany.
The manuscript of this Provençal version having been discovered by Lachmann in the Library of Prince Ludwig von Oettingen-Wallerstein,15 ‹x› somewhere about the year 1820, the poem was published in 1829 by Immanuel Bekker.16
Raynouard, who drew attention to this edition of the poem in the Journal des Savants, March 1831, supposed this Provençal version to be the original.
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