Roman de Fauvel
Encyclopedia
The Roman de Fauvel, translated as The Story of the Fawn-Colored Beast, is a 14th century French
poem
accredited to French royal clerk Gervais du Bus, though probably best known for its musical arrangement by Philippe de Vitry
in the Ars Nova
style. First published in Paris
in 1314, the piece serves as an allegorical
criticism of church and state, using the metaphor
of a horse becoming the ruler of his master's house upon a kind whim from Dame Fortune
. The poem, though banned at the time for being seditious and heretical, was wildly successful and still copied into the 15th century. Twelve manuscript
s have survived, many of which are in remarkably good condition, because they were stowed away securely due to their illegality.
Following in the literary tradition of the thirteenth century, the Roman de Fauvel is often compared with the Roman de la Rose
.
The Roman de Fauvel is laden with allegories and political satire. The donkey's name, which when broken down forms fau-vel, or "veiled lie", also forms an acrostic
in which each letter stands for one of the seven deadly sins
: Flatterie (Flattery), Avarice (Greed), Vilenie (Guile), Variété (inconstancy), Envie (Envy), and Lâcheté (Cowardice).
, the goddess of Fate, smiles upon Fauvel and appoints him leader of the house. Subsequently, Church
and secular leaders from many places make pilgrimage
s to see him, and bow to him in servitude, symbolizing Church and state rulers quickly bowing to Sin and corruption.
Upon receiving Dame Fortune's smile, Fauvel travels to Macrocosmos and asks for her hand in marriage. She denies him, but in her stead she proposes he wed Lady Vainglory. Fauvel agrees, and the wedding takes place, with such guests present as Flirtation, Adultery, Carnal Lust, and Venus
, in a technique similar to that of the Morality play
s of the 15th and 16th centuries.
Finally, Dame Fortune reveals that Fauvel's role in the world is to give birth to more iniquitous rulers like himself, and to be the preceder of the Antichrist
, eventually to bring about the end of the world.
. While these pieces were once thought of as arbitrarily selected repertory for textual "accompaniment" (Paris, 1898; Langfors, 1914; Gagnepain, 1996), recent scholarship (such as "Fauvel Studies" and Dillon's "Music-Making") has tended to focus on the ingenious intertextual/glossing role(s) played by musical notation - both visual and aural - in augmenting and diversifying the (political) themes of Gervais' admonitio (Herbelot, 1998). Amongst other curious discoveries are the inclusion of numerous "false" chants (Rankin) interspersed between actual liturgical material, perhaps a direct musical play on the deceptive qualities of its equine trickster. Much attention has also been paid to fr. 146's numerous polyphonic motets, some of which (In Nova Fert, for example) exhibit red notation of newer mensural notational innovations generally described under the umbrella of ars nova
.
Although the text of the Roman de Fauvel is not particularly well known, the music has been frequently performed and recorded. The question of how the entire work would have been read or staged in the 14th century is the subject of academic debate. Some have suggested that BN146, the copy with additional 3000 verses and 169 musical pieces, could have been intended as a theatrical performance (Dankh, Herbelot). This hypothesis is of course in contradiction with the concurrent opinion that the Roman de Fauvel is mainly an anthology (Gagnepain).
and French liturgical and devotional, sacred and profane, monophonic and polyphonic, chant, old and new music). The BN146 has often been said to mark the beginning of the stylistic period Ars Nova.
The first recording of the work has been made in 1972 by the Studio der Fruehen Musik (Studio of Early Music) on the EMI Reflexe - label, directed by Thomas Binkley. This recording is currently available as part of a 5-CD box-set on the Virgin-label. The speaker of the verses uses the original old-French, including some now very odd-sounding pronouncing of -still familiar- French words. The musical interludes have some, especially for that time, poignant dissonances/counterpoint; which likely serve to illustrate the mocking nature of the whole Roman.
French language
French is a Romance language spoken as a first language in France, the Romandy region in Switzerland, Wallonia and Brussels in Belgium, Monaco, the regions of Quebec and Acadia in Canada, and by various communities elsewhere. Second-language speakers of French are distributed throughout many parts...
poem
Poetry
Poetry is a form of literary art in which language is used for its aesthetic and evocative qualities in addition to, or in lieu of, its apparent meaning...
accredited to French royal clerk Gervais du Bus, though probably best known for its musical arrangement by Philippe de Vitry
Philippe de Vitry
Philippe de Vitry was a French composer, music theorist and poet. He was an accomplished, innovative, and influential composer, and may also have been the author of the Ars Nova treatise...
in the Ars Nova
Ars nova
Ars nova refers to a musical style which flourished in France and the Burgundian Low Countries in the Late Middle Ages: more particularly, in the period between the preparation of the Roman de Fauvel and the death of the composer Guillaume de Machaut in 1377...
style. First published in Paris
Paris
Paris is the capital and largest city in France, situated on the river Seine, in northern France, at the heart of the Île-de-France region...
in 1314, the piece serves as an allegorical
Allegory
Allegory is a demonstrative form of representation explaining meaning other than the words that are spoken. Allegory communicates its message by means of symbolic figures, actions or symbolic representation...
criticism of church and state, using the metaphor
Metaphor
A metaphor is a literary figure of speech that uses an image, story or tangible thing to represent a less tangible thing or some intangible quality or idea; e.g., "Her eyes were glistening jewels." Metaphor may also be used for any rhetorical figures of speech that achieve their effects via...
of a horse becoming the ruler of his master's house upon a kind whim from Dame Fortune
Fortuna (mythology)
Fortuna was the goddess of fortune and personification of luck in Roman religion. She might bring good luck or bad: she could be represented as veiled and blind, as in modern depictions of Justice, and came to represent life's capriciousness...
. The poem, though banned at the time for being seditious and heretical, was wildly successful and still copied into the 15th century. Twelve manuscript
Manuscript
A manuscript or handwrite is written information that has been manually created by someone or some people, such as a hand-written letter, as opposed to being printed or reproduced some other way...
s have survived, many of which are in remarkably good condition, because they were stowed away securely due to their illegality.
Following in the literary tradition of the thirteenth century, the Roman de Fauvel is often compared with the Roman de la Rose
Roman de la Rose
The Roman de la rose, , is a medieval French poem styled as an allegorical dream vision. It is a notable instance of courtly literature. The work's stated purpose is to both entertain and to teach others about the Art of Love. At various times in the poem, the "Rose" of the title is seen as the...
.
The Roman de Fauvel is laden with allegories and political satire. The donkey's name, which when broken down forms fau-vel, or "veiled lie", also forms an acrostic
Acrostic
An acrostic is a poem or other form of writing in which the first letter, syllable or word of each line, paragraph or other recurring feature in the text spells out a word or a message. As a form of constrained writing, an acrostic can be used as a mnemonic device to aid memory retrieval. A famous...
in which each letter stands for one of the seven deadly sins
Seven deadly sins
The 7 Deadly Sins, also known as the Capital Vices or Cardinal Sins, is a classification of objectionable vices that have been used since early Christian times to educate and instruct followers concerning fallen humanity's tendency to sin...
: Flatterie (Flattery), Avarice (Greed), Vilenie (Guile), Variété (inconstancy), Envie (Envy), and Lâcheté (Cowardice).
Plot
Fauvel, an ambitious but foolish horse, decides that he is unsatisfied with his residence in the stable and moves into the largest room of his master's house. Upon moving there, he changes it to suit his needs and has a custom hayrack built. Dame FortuneFortuna (mythology)
Fortuna was the goddess of fortune and personification of luck in Roman religion. She might bring good luck or bad: she could be represented as veiled and blind, as in modern depictions of Justice, and came to represent life's capriciousness...
, the goddess of Fate, smiles upon Fauvel and appoints him leader of the house. Subsequently, Church
Christian Church
The Christian Church is the assembly or association of followers of Jesus Christ. The Greek term ἐκκλησία that in its appearances in the New Testament is usually translated as "church" basically means "assembly"...
and secular leaders from many places make pilgrimage
Pilgrimage
A pilgrimage is a journey or search of great moral or spiritual significance. Typically, it is a journey to a shrine or other location of importance to a person's beliefs and faith...
s to see him, and bow to him in servitude, symbolizing Church and state rulers quickly bowing to Sin and corruption.
Upon receiving Dame Fortune's smile, Fauvel travels to Macrocosmos and asks for her hand in marriage. She denies him, but in her stead she proposes he wed Lady Vainglory. Fauvel agrees, and the wedding takes place, with such guests present as Flirtation, Adultery, Carnal Lust, and Venus
Venus (mythology)
Venus is a Roman goddess principally associated with love, beauty, sex,sexual seduction and fertility, who played a key role in many Roman religious festivals and myths...
, in a technique similar to that of the Morality play
Morality play
The morality play is a genre of Medieval and early Tudor theatrical entertainment. In their own time, these plays were known as "interludes", a broader term given to dramas with or without a moral theme. Morality plays are a type of allegory in which the protagonist is met by personifications of...
s of the 15th and 16th centuries.
Finally, Dame Fortune reveals that Fauvel's role in the world is to give birth to more iniquitous rulers like himself, and to be the preceder of the Antichrist
Antichrist
The term or title antichrist, in Christian theology, refers to a leader who fulfills Biblical prophecies concerning an adversary of Christ, while resembling him in a deceptive manner...
, eventually to bring about the end of the world.
Music
Of all the surviving manuscript versions of Le Roman de Fauvel, BN fr. 146 has attracted the most musicological attention due to hundreds of interpolated musical items woven into a complex mis-en-page together with text and image. The large volume compiled by a certain Chaillou de pesstain expands Gervais' original poem as well as 169 interpolated and notated musical pieces, some of which has been thought to have been composed by Philippe de VitryPhilippe de Vitry
Philippe de Vitry was a French composer, music theorist and poet. He was an accomplished, innovative, and influential composer, and may also have been the author of the Ars Nova treatise...
. While these pieces were once thought of as arbitrarily selected repertory for textual "accompaniment" (Paris, 1898; Langfors, 1914; Gagnepain, 1996), recent scholarship (such as "Fauvel Studies" and Dillon's "Music-Making") has tended to focus on the ingenious intertextual/glossing role(s) played by musical notation - both visual and aural - in augmenting and diversifying the (political) themes of Gervais' admonitio (Herbelot, 1998). Amongst other curious discoveries are the inclusion of numerous "false" chants (Rankin) interspersed between actual liturgical material, perhaps a direct musical play on the deceptive qualities of its equine trickster. Much attention has also been paid to fr. 146's numerous polyphonic motets, some of which (In Nova Fert, for example) exhibit red notation of newer mensural notational innovations generally described under the umbrella of ars nova
Ars nova
Ars nova refers to a musical style which flourished in France and the Burgundian Low Countries in the Late Middle Ages: more particularly, in the period between the preparation of the Roman de Fauvel and the death of the composer Guillaume de Machaut in 1377...
.
Although the text of the Roman de Fauvel is not particularly well known, the music has been frequently performed and recorded. The question of how the entire work would have been read or staged in the 14th century is the subject of academic debate. Some have suggested that BN146, the copy with additional 3000 verses and 169 musical pieces, could have been intended as a theatrical performance (Dankh, Herbelot). This hypothesis is of course in contradiction with the concurrent opinion that the Roman de Fauvel is mainly an anthology (Gagnepain).
Surviving copies
The copy designated BN146 is attributed to Chaillou de Pesstain. Its particular value resides in the additional 3000 verses and 169 musical pieces (56 in Latin and 113 in French) which constitute a veritable anthology of thirteenth and early fourteenth century music (this includes LatinLatin
Latin is an Italic language originally spoken in Latium and Ancient Rome. It, along with most European languages, is a descendant of the ancient Proto-Indo-European language. Although it is considered a dead language, a number of scholars and members of the Christian clergy speak it fluently, and...
and French liturgical and devotional, sacred and profane, monophonic and polyphonic, chant, old and new music). The BN146 has often been said to mark the beginning of the stylistic period Ars Nova.
The first recording of the work has been made in 1972 by the Studio der Fruehen Musik (Studio of Early Music) on the EMI Reflexe - label, directed by Thomas Binkley. This recording is currently available as part of a 5-CD box-set on the Virgin-label. The speaker of the verses uses the original old-French, including some now very odd-sounding pronouncing of -still familiar- French words. The musical interludes have some, especially for that time, poignant dissonances/counterpoint; which likely serve to illustrate the mocking nature of the whole Roman.
Trivia
- The English expression "to curry Fauvel", (now to "curry favor") arose from the scene in which potentates descended so low as to brush down the donkey and clean him off.
- The name "Fauvel" is an acrosticAcrosticAn acrostic is a poem or other form of writing in which the first letter, syllable or word of each line, paragraph or other recurring feature in the text spells out a word or a message. As a form of constrained writing, an acrostic can be used as a mnemonic device to aid memory retrieval. A famous...
made from the initials of a French variant of six of the Seven Deadly SinsSeven deadly sinsThe 7 Deadly Sins, also known as the Capital Vices or Cardinal Sins, is a classification of objectionable vices that have been used since early Christian times to educate and instruct followers concerning fallen humanity's tendency to sin...
: Flaterie (pride), Avarice (greed), Vilanie (wrath), Variété (inconstancy/sloth), Envie (envy), and Lacheté (cowardice/lust).
See also
- Ars novaArs novaArs nova refers to a musical style which flourished in France and the Burgundian Low Countries in the Late Middle Ages: more particularly, in the period between the preparation of the Roman de Fauvel and the death of the composer Guillaume de Machaut in 1377...
- Medieval music#France: Ars nova
- Guillaume de MachautGuillaume de MachautGuillaume de Machaut was a Medieval French poet and composer. He is one of the earliest composers on whom significant biographical information is available....
- Philippe de VitryPhilippe de VitryPhilippe de Vitry was a French composer, music theorist and poet. He was an accomplished, innovative, and influential composer, and may also have been the author of the Ars Nova treatise...
- Allegory in the Middle AgesAllegory in the Middle AgesAllegory in the Middle Ages was a vital element in the synthesis of Biblical and Classical traditions into what would become recognizable as Medieval culture...
External links
- Bibliography on ARLIMA