Chrétien de Troyes

Chrétien de Troyes ( ;  ;   1160–1191) was a French poet and trouvère. He was known for writing about many Arthurian people. He wrote about Gawain, Lancelot, Perceval and the Holy Grail. He wrote many chivalric romances. Some of his works were Erec and Enide, Lancelot, Perceval and Yvain. They were some of the most important works in medieval literature. His book structures were important in creating a modern novel.

Life
There is not much known about his life. He was probably from Troyes, or was connected to it. Between 1160 and 1172 he served at the court of his patroness Marie of France, Countess of Champagne. Later, he served the court of Philippe d'Alsace, Count of Flanders. His name, which meant "Christian from Troyes", might be a pen name of a person who converted from Judiasm to Christianity.

 References 

Sources

Loomis, Roger Sherman (1991). The Grail: From Celtic Myth to Christian Symbol. Princeton. 

Bibliography
 M. Altieri, Les Romans de Chrétien de Troyes: Leur perspective proverbiale et gnomique (1976, A G Nizet, Paris).
 Jean Frappier, "Chrétien de Troyes" in Arthurian Literature in the Middle Ages, Roger S. Loomis (ed.). Clarendon Press: Oxford University. 1959. 
 Jean Frappier, Chrétien de Troyes: The Man and His Work. Translated by Raymond J. Cormier. Athens, Ohio: Ohio University Press, 1982. 
 Idris Llewelyn Foster, "Gereint, Owein and Peredur" in Arthurian Literature in the Middle Ages, Roger S. Loomis (ed.). Clarendon Press: Oxford University. 1959.
 K. Sarah-Jane Murray, "A Preface to Chretien de Troyes," Syracuse University Press, 2008. 
 Gerald Seaman, "Signs of a New Literary Paradigm: The 'Christian' Figures in Chrétien de Troyes," in: Nominalism and Literary Discourse, ed. Hugo Keiper, Christoph Bode, and Richard Utz (Amsterdam: Rodopi, 1997), pp. 87–109.
 Albert W. Thompson, "The Additions to Chrétien's Perceval" in Arthurian Literature in the Middle Ages, Roger S. Loomis (ed.). Clarendon Press: Oxford University. 1959
 Karl D. Uitti, Chrétien de Troyes Revisited, Twayne: New York, 1995. 


This article incorporates material from an essay by W. W. Comfort, published in 1914.

Other websites





The Charrette Project 2 at Baylor University
Dictionnaire Électronique de Chrétien de Troyes complete lexicon and transcriptions of the five romances of this Old French author by ATILF/CNRS-Université de Lorraine and LFA/University of Ottawa
El Grial, including poetry by Chrétien de Troyes set to music by Capella de Ministrers & Carlos Magraner
 Bibliography of his works on Archives de littérature du Moyen Âge

Category:12th-century births
Category:12th-century deaths
Category:People from Troyes
Category:French novelists
Category:French writers
Category:French poets