Developments in the Versification of Middle Dutch Charlemagne Romance

Abstract

As is well-known, Old French chansons de geste were written in laisses, strophes of varying length bound together by assonance, whereas romances were composed in rhymed couplets. The versification of Middle Dutch epic poems is completely different from the French. Regardless of the subject, all texts are written in rhymed couplets. Little can be said with any certainty about the metre, except that each line usually contains four stressed syllables, separated by one, two or three unstressed syllables (van den Berg, “Op weg,”1). Therefore, this overview will focus exclusively on the syntactic development of Middle Dutch epic verse: how did Middle Dutch poets, and particularly those who made Charlemagne romances, compose their sentences in the form of rhymed couplets?