Aucassin, Gauvain, and (Re)Ordering Paris, BnF, fr. 2168

Abstract

This article considers the place of Aucassin et Nicolette and L'Âtre perilleux in Paris, BnF, fr. 2168. Following on from remarks by Keith Busby, the present study draws on F. W. Bourdillon's edition, which concludes that the manuscript was not originally ordered as it appears at present, but was reorganized during the Middle Ages. The principal change here is that L'Âtre perilleux was moved from the centre of the collection to its opening, a reorganization that necessitates some rethinking both of the relations between the texts contained in the compilation and of our sense of its thematic architecture. In addition, this repositioning also, arguably, bears witness to divergent views regarding the place of Gauvain — an object of criticism and ridicule in a variety of romance texts — in the collection itself and in the genre of romance more generally. Accordingly, as part of a wider examination of the complex intertextual and inter-generic relations in fr. 2168, the present study argues that Gauvain's relocation and movement within the collection reads as the material manifestation of anxieties and uncertainties regarding his status and influence as a literary figure, a generic and gender trouble to which Aucassin et Nicolette appears as a key witness.