Chapter 5 - The English Melusine and Partenay

Summary

This chapter examines the two Middle English translations of the Mélusine romance. I turn to the English tradition last because its earliest surviving witnesses were created at the latest date. However, it is also fitting to end this discussion with the English translations because, in many ways, they are the exceptions to some of the patterns that have emerged in the previous chapters. As such, the English versions provide an interesting variant to the overall discussion. For a start, whereas we have so far seen that the translations are based either on Jean's HM or Coudrette's RP – with the exception of the Dutch translation, which includes episodes from both – the English versions represent two distinct translations of the two French redactions. The prose Melusine is a translation of the HM, and the verse Romans de Partenay is a translation of the RP. The Partenay is also the only example of a verse-toverse Mélusine translation. It is also the only one to feature comments on the translator's methods, which makes it even more unusual.

Another significant difference is that the English translations survive in only one manuscript each, both datable to around 1500. These versions do not, therefore, come near the variety and spread of the extensive manuscript traditions of the HM, the RP, and the German translation. It is also striking that the English translations survive almost entirely in a manuscript context at a time when Mélusine translations on the Continent were appearing predominantly – or in the case of the Castilian and Dutch translations, exclusively – in print. This is especially interesting when we consider that the prose translation is almost certainly based on a French printed edition. There are a few surviving fragments of a printed edition of a prose Melusine, likely published by Wynkyn de Worde around 1510. Aside from these fragments, however, there is no direct evidence of any other editions, suggesting that the prose translation did not have such a fruitful print legacy as most other Mélusine translations. The verse translation was not set to print at all.

Furthermore, neither the prose nor the verse manuscript has been illustrated. Although there are numerous large blank spaces in the manuscript of the prose translation – suggesting that someone intended it to be illustrated – the images were never put in.