The debate between Hebe and Ganymede in light of its sources and manuscript context

Abstract

This article examines the anonymous twelfth-century debate poem between Hebe and Ganymede preserved in a unique manuscript, Munich, BSB, lat. 17212. I focus on the sources used by the author, who brought together all poetic treatments of Ganymede in Latin hexameter up until the 12th century : their chronological and geographical aspects provide a terminus post quem of 1184, the date when Alan of Lille is said to have finished the Anticlaudianus. Many of the contemporary sources have a Northern French flavour (e. g. Walter of Châtillon, Alan of Lille, Peter of Riga), while adjacent material in the manuscript also points to Northern France as the author’s likely provenance. I propose that the poem, given its limited circulation, unfinished nature, and forced rhetorical flourishes, is an exercise in style. In the appendix I provide a new edition and a new English translation.