French translation of the Constitutions of Clarendon (Con Clar Fr)
This text is a rhyming version of the Constitutions of Clarendon from the French biography of St Thomas Becket by Guernes of Pont-Sainte-Maxence. The text survives in a single manuscript from the late twelfth century.
Print editions
- Emmanuel Wahlberg, ed., La Vie de saint Thomas le Martyr par Guernes de Pont-Sainte-Maxence. Poème historique du XIIe siècle (1172–1174) (Lund, 1922), pp. 81–86.
Manuscripts
- Rl: Oxford, Bodleian Library, MS Rawlinson C. 641, fos. 10r-13r
description & facsimiles
Other versions of this law
Introduction
by Ian Short
The following is a prose translation of vv. 2391-2546 of Guernes de Pont-Sainte-Maxence’s Vie de Thomas Becket, composed between 1172 and 1174. The passage is a version of the Constitutions of Clarendon (1164) in Medieval French alexandrines, interspersed with authorial comment. It has been translated from Emmanuel Walberg’s edition in the “Classiques français
du Moyen Age” series, vol. 77 (Paris: Champion, 1936), pp. 74-78, the base
manuscript of which is MS Wolfenbüttel Herzog August Bibliothek Cod. Guelf. 34.6 Aug. 20, ff. 1-84v, dating from the end of the 12th century or start of the 13th. Cf. also the edition and annotated translation of Guernes’ poem by Jacques T.E. Thomas in the “Ktemata” series, vols. 15-16 (Louvain / Paris: Peeters, 2002).