'Nostre Français N'unt Talent De Fuïr': The Song of Roland and the Enculturation of a Warrior Class

Abstract

During the German siege of Paris in December 1870, a learned and patriotic medievalist, Gaston Paris, delivered a set of lectures at the Collège de France on La Chanson de Roland et la nationalite franҫaise. It would now be timely for a specialist in contemporary history and literature to prepare another study on the Song of Roland and modern nationalism, particularly in the period of World War I. Influential historians have blamed the newspapers and the popular press for inflaming public opinion on the eve of the Great War. That "yellow journalism" helped to indoctrinate the masses who marched enthusiastically to war cannot be doubted, but scholars and professors also played their part in the movement, and while the press harangued the future foot soldiers, the academic elite was addressing the officer class. Every poilu knew about Joan of Arc, but the officers had also learned in their lycèes of the valor of the heroes of Roncevaux. While the greater part of this paper is devoted to the social and political values conveyed by the Chanson in the Middle Ages, the use of literature to buttress values can conveniently be illustrated by some reference to the Song in more modern times.