![]() ![]() He narrates the death of Serlone II of Altavilla, nephew of Ruggero, represented as a mythical and chivalrous hero in epic tones that echo the genre of the chanson de geste. In the eleventh century, the Benedictine monk Geoffrey Malaterra, commissioned by Roger I of Altavilla to pass on the history of the Norman conquest of Sicily, gives an account of cannibalism practised by Saracens 9. But this Italian island is not just a land of mythical devouring giants. 9 Geoffrey Malaterra, De rebus gestis Rogerii Calabriae et Siciliae comitis et Roberti Guiscardi duc (.)ĩSicily has been renowned since ancient times for being a land of man eating Cyclops, a belief that was later transferred to the Arab-Islamic West 8.Perfectly corresponding to such a prototype is the figure of Tabur, the Saracen against which the hero William of Orange strenuously fights in the Chanson de Guillaume, a literary work dating back to the first half of the twelfth century loosely inspired by the historical figure of William I of Toulouse (750 ca – 812).ĢBy depicting the enemy, stigmatizing their diversity as a monstrous and terrifying being, Christian authors at the same time celebrate the valour of the heroes capable of annihilating such an adversary: defenceless paladins without blemish and without fear, facing bestialized and monstrous characters. ġLong fangs, sharp claws and excessive hirsutism: these are some of the traits that characterize the stigmatization of the enemy in Old French chansons de geste. Je l’eüst mort quant sa hanste li fruisse 1. ![]() Gros out le cors, si out l’eschine curbe, Wathelet-Willem, Paris, Les belles lettres, 1975, v. ![]()
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