In 1990, Edward Roesner, Francois Avril, and Nancy Freeman Regalado published a facsimile edition of BN fr. 146,the focus of which is the longer version of the Roman de Fauvel. Once this primary text was available, it inevitably attracted scholarly curiosity and attention, to become the focus of a series of colloquia, of which Fauvel Studies is the result. From the Oxford seminars organized by Margaret Bent (1992-95) and a Paris conference (1994) organized by Bent and Andrew Wathey, they have selected twenty-seven essays representing a wide range of disciplines and approaches. The result is an informative and stimulating collection, which,though not purporting to be definitive, surely will serve as the texte de base for scholarship on this important fourteenth-century satire.
The contributions to Fauvel Studies vary greatly in scope and purpose, from a critical edition and translation of a small section of the manuscript to a variety of critical analyses and commentaries. Authors are primarily from Great Britain and America with a handful of continental colleagues. Their research backgrounds are diverse, and it is this heterogeneity of home discipline and critical method that permit the collection its claim to be interdisciplinary. In fact, only two individual essays venture beyond traditional disciplines: Wulf Arlt's "Jehannot de Lescurel and the Function of Musical Language in the Roman de Fauvel as Presented in BN fr. 146" and Emma Dillon's "The Profile of Philip V in the Music of Fauvel."
Six articles treat music, three concern the images in the manuscript, six are about specific textual segments, four discuss the social context of the manuscript, eight are fairly straightforward literary criticism, but these categories are only approximate, and I offer them in order to demonstrate the balance of the volume. The major reason that this collection of articles is so complex resides in the unusual complexity of BN fr. 146 itself. The manuscript contains five distinct components: a complainte d'amour, two Livres de Fauvel, eight dits, an assortment of love songs, and finally a long chronicle relating events of the first sixteen years of the fourteenth century. BN fr. 146 is physically the largest Fauvel manuscript (330 x 460 mm), and it is the only surviving extended manuscript, including interpolations, 169 musical additions, and 77 images or pictures.
The following are authors and titles of the twenty-seven essays:
Bent and Wathey: Introduction 1. Wulf Arlt: Jehannot de Lescurel and the Function of Musical Language in the Roman de Fauvel as Presented in BN fr. 146. 2. Margaret Bent: Fauvel and Marigny: Which Came First? 3. Elizabeth A. R. Brown: Rex ioans, ionnes, iolis: Louis X, Philip V, and the Livres de Fauvel. 4. Kevin Brownlee: Authorial Self-Representation and Literary Models in the Roman de Fauvel. 5. Ardis Butterfield: The Refrain and the Transformation of Genre in the Roman de Fauvel. Appendix: Catalogue of Refrains in Le Roman de Fauvel, BN fr. 146. 6. Michael Camille: Hybridity, Monstrosity, and Bestiality in the Roman de Fauvel. 7. Alice V. Clark: The Flowering of Charnalite and the Marriage of Fauvel. Appendix: Texts of Floret cum Vana Gloria/Florens vigor/ Neuma and Carnalitas luxuria. 8. Michael T. Davis: Desespoir, Esperance, and Douce France: The New Palace, Paris, and the Royal State. 9. Emma Dillon: The Profile of Philip V in the Music of Fauvel. Appendix: Servant regem/O Philippe prelustris francorum/ Rex regum. 10. Jean Dubabin: the Metrical Chronicle Traditionally Ascribed to Geffroy de Paris. 11. Leofrance Holford-Strevens: The Latin Dits of Geffroy de Paris: An Editio Princeps. 12. Michel Huglo: Le Contexte folklorique et musical du charivari dans le Roman de Fauvel. 13. Martin Kauffmann: Satire, Pictorial Genre, and the Illustrations in BN fr. 146. 14. Elisabeth Lalou: La Chancellerie royale a la fin du regne de Philippe IV le Bel. 15. Joseph C. Morin: Jeannot de Lescurel's Chansons, Geoffroy de Paris's Dits and the Process of Design in BN fr. 146. Appendix: the Pricking Patterns and Column Widths of gatherings 6 and 7 of fr. 146. 16. Jean-Claude Muhlethaler: Discours du narrateur, discours de Fortune: les enjeux d'un changement de point de vue. 17. Christopher Page: Tradition and Innovation in VN fr. 146: The Background to the Ballades. Appendix A: The Ballades in the Roman de Fauvel. Appendix B: a Group of Ballade Texts in Douce 308. Appendix C: The Notes Iohorenges of Le Roman de la Rose. 18. Nigel F. Palmer: Cosmic Quaternities in the Roman de Fauvel. 19. Susan Rankin: The 'Alleluyes, antenes, respons, ygnes et verssez' in BN fr. 146: A Catalogue Raisonne. 20. Nancy Freeman Regalado: The Chronique metrique and the Moral Design of BN fr.146: Feasts of Good and Evil. 21. Anne Walters Robertson: Local Chant Readings and the Roman de Fauvel. 22. Mary and Richard Rouse: Jeannot de Lescurel. 23. Allison Stones: The Stylistic Context of the Roman de Fauvel, with a Note on Fauvain. Appendix A: The Historiography of Fauvel and Related Illumination. Appendix B: The Stylistic Subgroups Surrounding the Fauvel Master. 24. Jane H. M. Taylor: Le Roman de Fauvain: Manuscript, Text, Image. 25. Malcolm Vale: The World of the Courts: Content and Context of the Fauvel Manuscript. 26. Andrew Wathey: Gerves du Bus, the Roman de Fauvel, and the Politics of the Later Capetian Court. Appendix: Members of the Royal Commission to Investigate the Financial Adminstration of Enguerran de Marigny, at 24 January 1315, and of the Estroit Conseil, July 1316. 27. Lorenz Welker: Polyphonic Reworkings of Notre-Dame Conductus in BN fr. 146: Mundus amundicia and Quare fremuerunt. Appendix: Manuscript Sigla.
One unusually pleasing aspect of this collection is that in at least two cases, two scholars are clearly aware of each other's essays and are thereby complementary (Brown and Dillon; Taylor and Stones). One small omission in an otherwise fine index is any reference to the Roman de Fauvain, the focus of two articles.
This book is handsomely designed, generously illustrated, and luxuriously printed. The editing seems to have been unusually careful, and although the volume's size approaches the cumbersome, at first glance, it is, in fact, quite manageable. Arranging the essays in alphabetical order by author does not facilitate the first reading, but it makes subsequent location of individual articles significantly easier and underlines the solid future of Fauvel Studies as a scholarly research base.