Johnston, R. C., ed., The Crusade and Death of Richard I (Anglo-Norman Text Society 17. Oxford) Read this source online
Text name(s): Crusade and Death of Richard I
Number of pages of primary source text: 47
Author(s):
Dates: 1184 - 1191
Archival Reference: Bodleian Library, Oxford, MS. Fairfax 10
Original Language(s):
- Anglo-Norman
Translation:
- Original language included.
Translation Comments:
Geopolitical Region(s):
- British Isles
- England
- Middle East
- Austria
- Italy
County/Region:
Record Types:
- Chronicle, Annals
- Biography
Subject Headings:
- Crusades
- Historiography
- Maritime
- Military Orders
- Royalty / Monarchs
- Travel / Pilgrimage
- War - Military History
- Muslims / Islam
- War - Chivalry
- Nobility / Gentry
Apparatus:
- Index
- Glossary
- Bibliography
- Introduction
Comments:
The Crusade and Death of Richard I is a late thirteenth- or early fourteenth-century Anglo-Norman prose chronicle, based on earlier Latin accounts, focusing on Richard I’s role in the crusade and his return. After delays in Sicily and disputes with Philip Augustus, the King of France, Richard captured Cyprus and the city of Acre, made a truce with Saladin, and was captured by the Duke of Austria on his return home. The chronicle continues with his wars with France after his eventual release, and his death from a wound received in them. The work is based principally on Roger of Howden’s chronicle, but includes information from other sources, possibly Roger of Wendover or Matthew Paris’s chronicles, as well as multiple sources compiled and edited by the anonymous author of this text. A brief (3 pp.) bibliography follows the introduction, and there are notes to the text (26 pp.), which is not presented in translation, a selective Anglo-Norman glossary (7 pp.), and an index of proper names (5 pp.).
Introduction Summary:
The brief introduction (21 pp.) discusses the two manuscripts in which the text survives and the editorial procedure, summarizes the chronicle’s contents, and argues for a later date and a more extensive and varied use of sources than had previously been established. The editor also addresses prominent linguistic characteristics of the text.
Cataloger: EGK
