«Par plains ne par forez»: lineamenti del territorio forestale nei romanzi di Chrétien de Troyes

Abstract

The vulgate idea of the medieval forest as uncultivated and remote land does not correspond to the reality of the documentation: since the early Middle Ages, in fact, the forest was part of the human consortium and was intensively exploited for its resources, also thanks to the systematic agricultural conversion of some of its portions. However, the image that emerges from the works of courtly narrative is decidedly the opposite and is rather influenced by the cultural heritage responsible for the literary portrayal as a disturbing place, in which supernatural forces stir. This image, certainly preponderant and thus privileged in studies, has overshadowed the observation of the actual features of the wilderness in the authors of the Western Middle Ages. In this essay, an attempt is made to detect traces of the real woodland landscape in the novels of Chrétien de Troyes.