Cliausoii dc Roland. 113 



the Roland " die plastische Schonheit, " " die gleichmassige VoU- 

 kommenheit," and "die Anschaulichkeit." ^ Let us then endeavor 

 to set forth in detail the technical excellence of the Oxford manu- 

 script. Let us first consider the composition of O in its entiret}-, 

 then the composition of its various parts. '- 



Considered in its entirety, the Oxford manuscript possesses unit}', 

 coherence, emphasis.^ 



To the present writer the practicall}' perfect unit}' of O is un- 

 mistakably evident. Yet most Roland students, from Bourdillon,* a 

 translator of 1840, who called the ]Doem " le plus grand ramas de 

 sottises qu'on puisse voir," to Bruckner, ^ a dissertationist of 1905, 

 who never tires of discussing its " Widerspriiche," have considered 

 its unity to be greatly impaired by what they have termed incon- 

 sistencies and impossibilities.'^^ Here is an 'inconsistency.' At the 

 beginning of the poem, Marsila, discouraged, desperate, cries, "Jo 

 nen ai ost qui bataille li dunne " ; "' later, — say the critics — the poet 

 contradicts himself, for Marsila tells Ganelon that he has a host of 

 400,000 men. They do not, or will not, see that when Marsila asks 

 Ganelon whether, with his host of 400,000, he may give battle to 



^ Neither Becker nor the other wiiters mentioned refer explicitly to O. 

 but we may take it for granted that the poem to which the}^ refer is 

 practically O. 



^ For the bibliography of studies on the technic of the Roland^ cf. Seel- 

 mann. Bibliographie des altfranzosischen Rolandsliedes (Heilbronn, 1888), 

 pp. 52—54. I have been unable to procure several of the monographs 

 there enmnerated ; therefore I may be only repeating facts set forth long- 

 ago. It is certain, however, that it is time for fresh insistence upon 

 those facts. 



^ These technical terms, as well as others of similar nature, I take 

 from A College Manual of Rhetoric (New York, 4th ed.), by Professor C. S. 

 Baldwin of Yale Universitj". 



* Le Roman de Rojtcevaux traduit en Francais (Dijon, 1840), p. 76. 



^ Das Verhdlttiis des franzosischen Rolandsliedes zur Turpinschen Chronik iind 

 ztcm Carmen de Prodicione Gitenotiis (Eostock, 1905), pp. 61—70, ef passim. 



^ The critics of the Roland in this respect are too many to enumerate. 

 The list includes authoritative names : Scholle, Zeitschrift f. roman. Philol., 

 iv, 215—221 ; Claston Paris, Extraits de la Chanson de Roland^ pp. xxvi— xxvii ; 

 Grober. La Chanso^i de Roland d'aprcs le Mamiscrit d' Oxford (numbers 53 

 and 54 of the Bihliotheca Romanica).^ pp. 9—10. Now and then, however, 

 alleged inconsistencies and impossibilities have been denied : cf . Lindner, 

 Romanische Forschjtngeji. vii. .566—568 ; Stengel, Zeitschrift f. roman. Philol.. 

 viii, 499-521. 



' 18. 



Trans. Conn. Acad., Vol. XV. 8 July, 1909. 



