Bibliotheca Arnamagnæana - 01.06.1959, Blaðsíða 291
277
speaking people for any length of time. Still it is difficult to account for
his knowledge of literary French, such as it is, if we assume that he learnt
it in Norway. No one who had just picked up some French from mer-
chants or sailors would be in a position even to attempt to translate a
chanson de geste, and it must have been difficult, if not impossible, to find
qualified teachers in a cultural outpost such as Norway then was. We
know little about the teaching of foreign languages in Western Europe
during the Middle Ages (except for Latin, of course), and what scanty
information there is chiefly concerns the teaching of French in England,
where that language was not, strictly speaking, foreign. But what we
know suggests that it was not easy, even in England, to learn French
except with the assistance of French-speaking teachers4.
There were certainly a number of sailors, merchants, and a few noble-
men who knew some French, enough to make themselves understood in a
foreign country, just as most sailors to-day know enough English to get
on in foreign ports5 *, but even those who knew enough French to speak
it fluently were not necessarily qualified to translate books. The trans-
lated literature was a court literature, and it is within the class of cour-
tiers and their retainers that we are likely to find the translators. If we
have to choose between a nobleman and a cleric as the most probable
candidate, the choice is easy. It is hardly possible that a nobleman would
know so little about arms and matters of chivalry, and care so little for
them. The translator probably learnt his French abroad, but a nobleman
in France or England would certainly move in circles where fighting on
horseback was at least discussed, and he would have some chance of learn-
ing about the different ways of using espee and espiet. A cleric abroad
would probably have been sent there to study, and in the more secluded
atmosphere of a monastery he may well have learnt to read and write
French, even if Latin was the language used by teachers and students on
most occasions. The mistakes made by the translator show that his mastery
of French was by no means complete, and he seems to have been unable
to distinguish between the two cases of Old French (above, p. 136).
This would be less surprising if he had learnt his French in England,
4 On the knowledge of foreign languages in the Middle Ages, see Anker Teilgård
Laugesen: Om de germanske folks kendskab til fransk sprog i middelalderen (Kø-
benhavn 1951), especially pp. 16-30, 52-55.
5 Cp. the words of the Father in Konungs Skuggsid to the Son who is going
abroad as a merchant (ed. Holm-Olsen, p. 58).