Saints Tryphina and Hirlanda

Abstract

IN THE interesting article by C. Grant Loomis, King Arthur and the Saints, SPECULUM (1933), viii, 478 ff., the legend of Saint Tryphina of Brittany is included as one of those connected with King Arthur of Britain. As a matter of fact, however, the husband of the long-suffering heroine Tryphina is always represented as a prince of Armorica, not of England. Another king is supposed to be ruling in England at the time, whose name (according to the Breton mystery of the fifteenth to sixteenth century) is Abacarus -certainly quite different from the Arturus of Geoffrey or Nennius! There is some evidence, to be sure, that the author of the mystery had King Arthur of Britain in mind when he gave the name to Tryphina's husband 'Arzur,' since he declares in the prologue that the Prince of Brittany lived in the year 508 (in Breton: 'Er bloaz pemp kant hag eiz); but but there is no doubt that Brittany is meant, since Arzur mentions none but Breton towns among his possessions. King Abacarus, on the other hand, mentions conquests in Ireland, Flanders, Holland, France, and Spain. In the folk-tale collected by A. Le Braz,2 the King of England who, by the way, lives in London has no name; the heroine's husband is King Arzur of Brittany. Since there were three Breton princes of the name in the Middle Ages (Arthur i, murdered by John of England in 1203; Arthur ii, 1302-12; Arthur iii, 1457-58), the name was probably taken from the local ruling house, not from Arthurian romance. It is not quite correct to say that 'the patient Griselda motive furnishes the background of the story' of Tryphina. Characteristic of the Griselda story is the absence of accusation against the heroine. Her husband is merely testing her humility when he persecutes her; he is quite aware throughout the story that Griselda is innocent of any misdeed. Tryphina, on the other hand, is twice accused by her villainous brother, the ambitious Kervouron: first, of strangling her new-born child, and second, of committing adultery with one of her husband's knights. She belongs therefore in the ranks of calumniated and persecuted queens such as Chaucer's Constance, La Manekine, Emare, Florence de Rome, and Crescentia. Her name, as Mr Loomis points out, is taken from the legend of Saint Trifine of Brittany in the Vita Gildae of the Monk of Ruis, who was cruelly done to death by her husband though without any accusation. Both heroines are quite fictitious, of course.' The legend of St Tryphina as presented in the Breton mystery and folk-tale is the source of the later legend about Hirlanda of Brittany. This appeared first in a volume published in 1640 by the Jesuit father Rene Cerisiers, bearing the