:this article is about the anthropomorphic red fox. for other uses, see reynard (disambiguation).    reynard (; ; ) is a literary cycle of allegorical french, dutch, english, and german fables largely concerned with reynard, an anthropomorphic red fox and trickster figure. ==etymology of the name== theories about the origin of the name reynard are: * from the germanic man's name reginhard, which came from 'regin' = "the divine powers of the old germanic religion" and "hard": "made hard by the gods", but with the disuse of the old germanic religion was later likely interpreted as "rain-hard" meaning "staying steady under a rain of blows from weapons in battle" or similar. * from the germanic man's name reginhard (later condensed to reinhard), which comes from 'regin' = "counsel" and 'harti' = "strong", denoting someone who is wise, clever, or resourceful. the traditional french word for "fox" was goupil from latin vulpecula. however, mentioning the fox was considered bad luck among farmers. because of the popularity of the reynard stories, renard was often used as a euphemism, so that today renard is the standard french word for "fox" and goupil is now dialectal or archaic. ==in medieval european folklore and literature==  the figure of reynard is thought to have originated in alsace-lorraine folklore from where it spread to france, the low countries, and germany.briggs, asa (ed.) (1989) the longman encyclopedia, longman, isbn 0-582-91620-8 an extensive treatment of the character is the old french le roman de renart written by pierre de saint-cloud around 1170, which sets the typical setting. reynard has been summoned to the court of king noble, or leo, the lion, to answer charges brought against him by isengrim the wolf. other anthropomorphic animals, including bruin the bear, baldwin the ass, tibert (tybalt) the cat, all attempt one stratagem or another. the stories typically involve satire whose usual butts are the aristocracy and the clergy, making reynard a peasant-hero character. the story of the preaching fox found in the reynard litera
1872_books Belgian_folklore County_of_Flanders Dutch_folklore Fables Foxes_in_literature French_folklore French_legendary_creatures French_mythology German_folklore Literature_featuring_anthropomorphic_foxes Medieval_French_literature Medieval_legends Medieval_literature Mock-heroic_poems Reynard_cycle