Roman de Thèbes

The Roman de Thèbes (Thebes novel) is an old French verse epic from the 12th century that has been handed down without an author's name.

The Thebes novel was probably written around 1160 and is, if not the oldest, at least a school of the genre of the ancient novel, which subsequently flourished until around 1180 .

It comprises a good 10,000 verses and works in pairs of rhyming octosyllables the thebais by the ancient Latin author Statius (1st century AD), an epic about the tragic fate of Oedipus and his family, especially the twin sons Eteocles and Polynices, who were at Battle for rule in Thebes ultimately slain each other.

The work, written for a predominantly courtly audience, still shows many stylistic devices of the contemporary chansons de geste , but also anticipates those of the courtly novel . In contrast to the ancient novels created after him, it still gives relatively little space to the subject of love.

Web links

• Gert Pinkernell: Article in "Names, Titles and Dates of French Literature" (source of the article)