[In the following excerpt, originally published in 1824, Swan, the first translator of the complete Gesta Romanorum into English, offers a brief history of the work.]

I now hasten to the Gesta Romanorum; and purpose giving a brief outline of its history, with a notice of certain stories which, without reference to their own individual merit, have been raised into higher importance by furnishing the groundwork of many popular dramas. I shall also take occasion to offer a few remarks upon the translation now before the public, elucidatory of certain points which seem to require explanation.

The Gesta Romanorum was one of the most applauded compilations of the Middle Ages. The method of instructing by fables is a practice of remote antiquity; and has always been attended with very considerable benefit. Its great popularity encouraged the monks to adopt this medium, not only for the sake of illustrating their discourses, but of making a more durable impression upon the minds of their illiterate auditors. An abstract argument, or logical deduction (had they been capable of supplying it), would operate but faintly upon intellects rendered even more obtuse by the rude nature of their customary occupations; while, on the other hand, an apposite story would arouse attention, and stimulate that blind and uninquiring devotion, which is so remarkably characteristic of the Middle Ages.

The work under consideration is compiled from old Latin chronicles of Roman, or rather, as Mr. Warton and Mr. Douce think, of German invention. But this idea, with all submission, derives little corroborative evidence from fact. There is one story, and I believe, but one, which gives any countenance to it. That a few are extracted from German authors (who may not, after all, be the inventors) is no more proof that the compiler was a German, than that, because some stories are found in the Roman annals, the whole book was the production of a Latin writer.

Oriental, legendary, and classical fables, heightened by circumstances of a strong romantic cast, form the basis of this singular composition. But the authorities cited for classical allusions are usually of the lower order. Valerius, Maximus, Macrobius, Aulus Gellius, Pliny, Seneca, Boethius, and occasionally Ovid, are introduced; but they do not always contain the relation which they are intended to substantiate; and it is invariably much disguised and altered. The oriental apologues are sometimes from the romance of Baarlam and Josaphat, and in several instances from a Latin work entitled, De Clericali Disciplina, attributed to Petrus Alphonsus, a converted Jew, godson to Alphonsus I. of Arragon, after whom he was named. There is an analysis of it by Mr. Douce inserted in Mr. Ellis's Specimens of Early English Romances. According to the former of these gentlemen, two productions bearing the title of Gesta Romanorum, and totally distinct from each other, exist. I confess I see no good reason for the assertion. I take the later work to be the same as its predecessor, with a few additions, not so considerable by any means as Mr. Douce imagines.¹ This I shall show, by and by. Of the present performance, though it purports to relate the Gests of the Romans, there is little that corresponds with the title. On the contrary, it comprehends “a multitude of narratives, either not historical, or in another respect, such as are totally unconnected with the Roman people, or perhaps the most preposterous misrepresentations of their history. To cover this deviation from the promised plan, which, by introducing a more ample variety of matter, has contributed to increase the reader's entertainment, our collector has taken care to preface almost every story with the name or reign of a Roman emperor; who, at the same time, is often a monarch that never existed, and who seldom, whether real or supposititious, has any concern with the circumstances of the narrative.”²

The influence which this work has had on English poetry is not the least surprising fact connected with it. Not only the earlier writers of our country—Gower, Chaucer, Lydgate, Occleve, &c.—have been indebted to it, but also, as the reader will perceive in the notes, the poets of modern times. Its popularity in the reign of Queen Elizabeth is proved by many allusions in the works of that period. In an anonymous comedy, published early in the following reign, entitled Sir Giles Goosecap, we have: “Then for your lordship's quips and quick jests, why Gesta Romanorum were nothing to them.”³ In Chapman's May-Day,⁴ a person speaking of the literary information of another character, styles him—“One that has read Marcus Aurelius, Gesta Romanorum, the Mirrour of Magistrates, & c. … to be led by the nose like a blind beare that has read nothing!”⁵

The author of this popular work has been often guessed at, but nothing certain is known. Warton believes him to be Petrus Berchorius, or Pierre Bercheur, a native of Poitou; and prior of the Benedictine convent of Saint Eloi, at Paris, in the year 1362. Mr. Douce, on the other hand, contends that he is a German, because “in the Moralization to chapter 144” [Tale CXLIV. of the translated Gesta], “there is, in most of the early editions, a German proverb; and in chapter 142” [Tale CXLII.], “several German names of dogs.” I apprehend, however, that these names may be found more analogous to the Saxon; and, at all events, Warton's idea of an interpolation is far from improbable. Mr. Douce adds, that the earliest editions of the Gesta were printed in Germany; and certainly they often bear the name of some place in that country. But in the first ages of the art of printing, such might be the case, without actually identifying the point where the impression was struck off. It is a fact, sufficiently well known, that copies of certain books, printed in Italy, appeared, in every respect similar, and at the same time, in many parts of Germany, the Netherlands, &c. The only observable difference was in the alteration of names in the title-page. Now, if this be true, the Gesta Romanorum, printed in Italy, and thence sent for sale to some factor in distant parts, might have this person's name and residence affixed, not from any dishonest motive, but merely to announce the place in which they were to be sold. Such a supposition is not beyond the bounds of probability, and may be worth considering. Many copies will be found without date or place; and perhaps the inconvenience and difficulty which a new title-page created, might on some occasions induce the booksellers to omit it altogether.

English idioms and proverbial expressions are so frequent in the Gesta Romanorum, that they might lead to a supposition quite the reverse of Mr. Douce's idea; but I rather conceive them the necessary consequence of transcription; and that the manuscript was thought to require verbal flourishes, as well as gilded margins and illuminated initials. In like manner I account for the Saxon names of dogs [Tale CXLII.], which are quite unnecessary, and seem introduced in the most arbitrary manner. The incidents of one story [Tale CLV.] are said to occur in the bishopric of Ely. “This fact,” says the writer of the Gesta, “related upon the faith of many to whom it was well known, I have myself heard, both from the inhabitants of the place and others.” The inference, therefore, is that the narrator was either an Englishman, or one well acquainted with the localities of the place he describes. If the origin of the other stories be deducible from the position laid down by Mr. Douce, then, by parity of reasoning, the writer of the tale in question was the compiler of the series—and most probably an Englishman: at all events, his work might be prepared in England. But this would not be conceded; and it is only by supposing an interpolation of the story, or of part of the story, that the difficulty is to be obviated. At any rate, the circumstance itself cannot justly be adduced in proof either one way or the other. But whoever was the author, or authors (which is more probable), and wherever they were produced, it is for the most part agreed that these tales were collected as early as the commencement of the fourteenth century—if not long before. Through a period of five hundred years, they have afforded a popular entertainment: the uncultivated minds of the Middle Ages valued them as a repertory of theological information, and later times as an inexhaustible fund of dramatic incident.

Of that which is called by Mr. Douce the English Gesta, it now remains to speak. “This work was undoubtedly composed in England in imitation of the other; and therefore it will be necessary for the future to distinguish the two works by the respective appellations of the original and the English Gesta.”⁶ “It is natural to suppose that a work like the original Gesta would stimulate some person to the compilation of one that should emulate, if not altogether supersede it; and accordingly this design was accomplished at a very early period by some Englishman—in all probability, a monk.”⁷ The feeling on my mind with regard to this Gesta certainly is, that it was intended for the same work as the original: but that in the transcription, with the latitude which the “Adam scriveners” of old invariably allowed themselves, many alterations (miscalled improvements) were made, together with some additions. The English translations of this last compilation vary frequently from their original. For instance, in the eighteenth chapter of the MS. [“English”] Gesta, fol. 17, a knight falls in love with Aglaës, daughter of the Emperor Polentius; but in the English translation of the story (in 1648, a thin 18mo, containing forty-four stories) this same person is styled Philominus. It forms “The fourteenth History.” Now, the fact that no manuscript of this Gesta exists in any of the catalogues of continental libraries is easily accounted for, on the supposition of its being transcribed in England, and consequently confined to this country. For other nations, being in possession of an authenticated original, would have little inducement to seek after a newly fabricated copy. English verses found therein, with English proper names, and English law terms, and modes of speech (arguments on which Mr. Douce lays much stress), no more constitute another work than Horace's Art of Poetry, translated by Roscommon; or than Donne's Satires, modernized by Pope. …

Notes

1. “In fact, the two Gestas may just as well be considered the same work, as the different versions of The Wise Masters, or of Kalilah u Damnah. The term Gesta Romanorum implies nothing more than a collection of ancient stories, many of which might be the same, but which would naturally vary in various countries according to the taste of the collector, in the same manner as different stories are introduced in the Greek Syntipas, the Italian Erastus, and English Wise Masters.”—Dunlop, Hist. of Fiction, vol. ii. p. 170.

2. Warton, Dissert. on Gest. Rom. p. vii.

3. London. Printed for J. Windet, 1606.

4. Act III. p. 39. 1611.

5. Warton.

6. Douce, Illustr. of Shakespeare, vol. ii. p. 362.

7. Ibid. p. 364.