Table Of ContentGallica
Volume 7
Logic and Humour in tHe FabLiaux
an essay in appLied narratoLogy
Joseph bédier’s 1893 definition of the fabliaux as ‘funny stories in verse’
is still widely accepted as the best brief and general description for a
heterogeneous collection of texts. but the heterogeneity creates difficul-
ties and at the periphery of the canon all three of the criteria included in
bédier’s definition are open to question. the inventory proposed in the
current study is based on a new structural definition, a conjointure, akin to
that of romance, combining a logical episteme with a rhetorical narreme.
the episteme features a contradictory taken from boolean algebra, and
assumes four different forms, depending on whether ambiguity resulting
from the contradictory is understood by neither, by both, or by either the
sender or the receiver of a message, in the first two instances, a character
foreign to the episteme intervenes to resolve confusion in the narreme,
or appears as the victim of the sophistical assumption of a contrary-
to-fact reality; in the latter instances the sender or the receiver of the
message in the episteme triumphs in the narreme. the resulting inven-
tory, including and augmenting the texts admitted by per nykrog and
discarding numerous stories already challenged for authenticity, is theo-
retically defensible to a degree not previously achieved.
roy pearcy is an Honorary research Fellow of the university of
London.
Gallica
issn 1749–091x
general editor: sarah Kay
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Already Published
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4. Christine de Pizan’s Changing Opinion: A Quest for Certainty in the Midst of
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5. Cultural Performances in Medieval France: Essays in Honor of Nancy Freeman
Regalado, eds eglal doss-Quinby, roberta L. Krueger, e. Jane burns
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Logic and Humour in tHe FabLiaux
an essay in appLied narratoLogy
roy J. pearcy
d. s. breWer
© roy J. pearcy 2007
All Rights Reserved. except as permitted under current legislation
no part of this work may be photocopied, stored in a retrieval system,
published, performed in public, adapted, broadcast,
transmitted, recorded or reproduced in any form or by any means,
without the prior permission of the copyright owner
the right of roy J. pearcy to be identified as
the author of this work has been asserted in accordance with
sections 77 and 78 of the copyright, designs and patents act 1988
First published 2007
d. s. brewer, cambridge
isbn 978–1–84384–122–7
d. s. brewer is an imprint of boydell & brewer Ltd
po box 9, Woodbridge, suffolk ip12 3dF, uK
and of boydell & brewer inc.
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website: www.boydellandbrewer.com
a catalogue record for this title is available
from the british Library
this publication is printed on acid-free paper
printed in great britain by
biddles Ltd, King’s Lynn
contents
acknowledgements vii
abbreviations viii
introduction 1
1. origins: Fable to Fabliau
Cele qui se fist foutre sur la Fosse de son Mari 11
2. outline of a methodology
part 1: the Logical contradictories 34
3. outline of a methodology
part 2: Episteme and Narreme 52
4. origins: Fabliau to Fable
the paris b.n. fr. 12603 version of Auberee 77
5. the Fabliau canon 123
6. Fabliau structures
part 1: single Narreme Fabliaux 148
7. Fabliau structures
part 2: multiple Narreme Fabliaux 176
8. Fabliau aesthetic 197
conclusion 210
Varia:
appendices a–F 215
Fabliau inventory 233
bibliography 237
For my loving wife christine
who kept the faith
acKnoWLedgements
this project has been many years evolving, and it would be impossible to
acknowledge individually the contribution of all those who have played a part
in its development, and to whom i should like to express my sincere apprecia-
tion. to a select few individuals and institutions, however, i owe a special debt
of gratitude.
i talked to professor charles muscatine about my work with the fabliaux in the
1960s when we were both associated with the university of california system.
His kind encouragement was of immense importance to me at that time. He has
been a source of inspiration ever since, and it has always been a pleasure to meet
up with him when in the course of our academic activities our paths have crossed.
i would also like to thank my colleagues in the english department at the univer-
sity of oklahoma, where i moved in 1968. they helped create a congenial colle-
giate atmosphere in which it was possible to both teach and conduct research in
a way that most members of the profession would choose. my thanks are due to
professors stephen Knight, ardis butterfield, and david trotter, who between
them arranged for me to be appointed an Honorary research Fellow at univer-
sity college, London, and thus helped keep me active and productive after my
retirement from the university of oklahoma in 1991. Finally i owe special thanks
to my friend and colleague ian short of birkbeck college, London, who read the
manuscript, encouraged me to seek a publisher for it, and suggested numerous
ways in which it might be improved.
i first started using the facilities of the british Library during a sabbatical
leave in 1966, and i have returned to enjoy that treasure house of knowledge on
numerous occasions since then. i would like to thank the directors of the institu-
tion for allowing me the privilege of profiting from its use. my wife and i bought
a flat in bloomsbury in order to have easy access to the old british museum
Library, and fortunately we were still in easy walking distance of the library
after the move to st. pancras. i was once asked to identify my most valuable
single possession, and had no hesitation in naming my british Library reader’s
card. my thanks are also due to La Fondation camargo in cassis, France, where
i enjoyed two scholarships, and where much of the preliminary work on the
present fabliau project was carried out.
Lastly i wish to recognise the assistance with various projects, including
editorship of the first four volumes of Studies in the Age of Chaucer, for which i
have to thank my wife. Her invaluable help provided me the time, and the incen-
tive, without which this and other publication projects would not have reached
completion.
abbreViations
CFMA classiques Français du moyen age
ChauR the chaucer review
EETS early english texts society, o.s. (original series), e.s. (extra series)
MR anatole de montaiglon and gaston raynaud, eds, Recueil général et
complet des fabliaux des XIIIe et XIVe siècles, 6 vols (paris, 1872–90)
NRCF Willem noomen and nico van den boogaard, eds, Nouveau Recueil
Complet des Fabliaux, 10 vols (assen, 1983–98)
RdR ernst martin, ed., Le Roman de Renart, 4 vols (strasbourg, 1882–87)
SATF société des anciens textes Français
introduction
the idea that an intimate connection exists between humour and logic is not
original with this study. even before logic had been formalised as an autono-
mous discipline, humour often appeared in the pseudo-proof of some theory so
extravagantly at odds with common-sense notions as to provoke laughter. some
of the epicheirêmata of the pre-socratic philosopher Zeno of elea fit this pattern,
such as his argument that, given a start, a tortoise could never be overtaken by
achilles.1 a taste for humorous paradox pervades the work of the fifth-century
sophist gorgias,2 and persists into the writings of the thirteenth-century averroist
siger of brabant, whose six impossibilia included a logical defence of the propo-
sition that the trojan War was still in progress.3 Like the stoics before them,
medieval logicians produced numerous syllogisms involving humorous effron-
tery. For example the thirteenth-century Summulae Logicales of peter of spain
includes the sophism: ‘Iste canis est tuus et est pater, ergo est tuus pater’.4 the
middle ages inherited from classical antiquity such antinomies as that of the
barber of the regiment who shaves all the men, and only the men, who do not
shave themselves, and is thus unable either to shave or not to shave. it has been
suggested that analysis of this paradox might have been better placed in Punch
than in the Principia Mathematica, but its appearance in the latter work testifies
to the occurrence of comic issues in the most serious of modern treatises on
logic.5
1 information on the life and thought of this philosopher may be found in Freeman, The
Pre-Socratic Philosophers, pp. 153–64. an english translation of the extant fragments of his
writings as given in diels, Fragmente, appears in Freeman, Ancilla, p. 47.
2 For his writings see Freeman, Ancilla, pp. 127–39. His life and works are discussed
briefly by Freeman, The Pre-Socratic Philosophers, pp. 353–67, and in detail by dupréel, Les
Sophistes, pp. 61–113, 397.
3 siger von brabant, ed. baeumker, p. 10: ‘Proponebatur tertio quod bellum Troianum
esset in hoc instanti’ [‘in the third place it was argued that the trojan War was presently still in
progress’].
4 ‘this is your dog and he is a father; therefore he is your father’. For the work of the
stoics see mates, Stoic Logic, and prantl, Geschichte der Logik, vol. 1, pp. 50–58. see also
broadie, Medieval Logic, and boh, Epistemic Logic. For peter of spain’s syllogism see
Summulae Logicales, p. 81, and bocheński, Formal Logic. the part of the Summulae dealing
with the properties of terms has been edited, with an english translation, by mullally, The
Summulae Logicales of Peter of Spain.
5 For the comment on the work of alfred north Whitehead and bertrand russell see
Koyré, Epiménide le Menteur, p. 21. For the ‘barber of the regiment’ antinomy see grelling,
Description:Joseph B?©dier's 1893 definition of the fabliaux as 'funny stories in verse' is still widely accepted as the best brief and general description for a heterogeneous collection of texts. But the heterogeneity creates difficulties and at the periphery of the canon all three of the criteria included in
