Heroes, Historical and Fictional and In-between (Part Two)

Godfrey and the Christian armies, Jerusalem in the background. Sebastien Leclerc (1637-1714).
© The Hunterian, University of Glasgow 2014

In Canto One of Jerusalem Delivered, one by one the leaders of the First Crusade pass in front of the reader’s eyes like a true military parade, while Torquato Tasso offers a running commentary on their country of origin, their families, and the strength of each one’s army. We have seen Godfrey of Bouillon, the central character and leader, and now along with him we see Robert of Normandy, Raymond of Toulouse, William, bishop of Orange, Ademar, bishop of Le Puy, Baldwin and Eustace, the younger brothers of Godfrey, Stephen of Blois, Tancred of Calabria, and many other lords with their armies from all over Europe, from Norway to Sicily, from Ireland and Scotland to Greece. Most of them were actually historical figures who really participated in the Crusade; their names can be found in many chronicles of the First Crusade, contemporary or later (Tasso used William of Tyre, who wrote in the late twelfth century, as his main historical source[1]). Some of them were mythical or semi-mythical, like Arthur and his knights.

But above these, see young Rinaldo, mid

the whole parade the champion absolute,

sweetly ferocious, darting looks that bid

a king’s worship: him all eyes here salute.

Age he outran, and hope, and scarcely did

his flowers bud when he grew ripe with fruit.

You’d think, when cased in glistening carapace,

he’s Mars. (He’s Cupid when he bares his face).

Rinaldo on the Bank of the Enchanted River. Elizabeth Collins, 1759.
© The Hunterian, University of Glasgow 2014

Rinaldo is the other great hero of Jerusalem Delivered. He is a fictional character, based not on any historical figure[2] but on another epic hero, Achilles from The Iliad. Rinaldo is very young, very handsome, and very brave (the perfect super-hero), but just like Achilles, his anger and conflict with Godfrey bring serious trouble to the Christian camp. He then leaves his companions in order to seek glory for himself: his adventures on this quest provide one of the main romantic episodes in the epic.

When Tasso wrote Jerusalem in the late sixteenth century, the Renaissance movement had been propagating a return to classical Antiquity and its ideals (as interpreted by the  Western European culture of the time). Tasso was a serious theorist on the modern epic and pleaded for its return to the classical sources, Homer and Virgil; this was also partly a renunciation of the chivalric romance of the times, with its numerous episodes with no apparent beginning or end, its plethora of plots and characters, and its endless digressions (to fans of Game of Thrones: does this ring any bells?). But as chivalric romance was wildly popular – especially Ludovico Ariosto’s Orlando Furioso –  it would be fatal for an author to ignore it completely, or steer too far away from it. As Daniel Javitch put it:

“[Tasso] could not afford the risk of losing his readership by not incorporating in his epic poem some of the more pleasurable ingredients of Ariostean romance, in particular its marvelous and erotic dimensions, and the episodic digressions they entailed.”[3]

Enchanted rivers, magical forests, islands with exotic nymphs, and the formidable, beautiful witch Armida will offer plenty of the marvelous and the erotic element sought by readers (then and now), and will more than compensate the romantically-inclined for all those longs lists of warriors and serious discourses on war and religion that the more austere, classicist side of Torquato Tasso deemed indispensable to the “new” epic.

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[1] Interestingly, William Hunter owned a copy of William of Tyre’s chronicle on the First Crusade; there will be a separate post about it all soon.

[2] Tasso gives Rinaldo a genealogy, making Este his homeplace. That was the birthplace of the Este family, of whom Alfonso II d’ Este was Tasso’s patron. Patronage was extremely important for writers at a time when it would have been impossible to live on book royalties (the majority of the population was illiterate), Creative Writing teaching posts had not yet been invented, and selling film/TV rights was not an option either. Tasso was mindful of always singing the praise of his patron, even in broad hints, as when he describes how Rinaldo fled his home to follow the Crusade: “Noblest of flights! a worthy precedent for / deeds that await his great-souled progeny!” (Canto One, stanza 60)

[3] Daniel Javitch, ‘Tasso’s Critique and Incorporation of Chivalric Romance: His Transformation of Achilles in the Gerusalemme Liberata,’ International Journal of the Classical Tradition, 13:4 (Spring 2007), p.517.

Heroes, historical and fictional, Part One

Seventeenth century artist Giambattista Piazzetta depicted Godfrey, Duke of Lotharingia, in a classical mode: his dress, helmet and demeanour – and semi-nakedness- link him to the Greco-Roman epic heroes and gods. But his gesture of pointing to the heavens is specifically Christian, and so is the winged angel who brought God’s decision of making him the leader of the Christian army. Tasso wanted to write a great Christian epic to equal the pagan ones of antiquity, and he did it using many of the classical conventions. Sp Coll Hunterian Cd.2.1., Special Collections, University of Glasgow Library

Who is the hero in this story? He is introduced to us in Canto One (think of a Canto as a chapter in a novel), in accordance with epic etiquette. Godfrey, Duke of Lotharingia (1060-1099) was a historical figure. He was one of the leaders of the First Crusade: he led a large contingent, along with other nobles, most notably his brother Baldwin, Hugh of France, Robert of Normandy, Robert of Flanders (many Roberts, which is perhaps what inspired Walter Scott’s novel on the First Crusade, Count Robert of Paris – but more of that later), and many others, from the Rhineland to Hungary, then through the Balkans to Thrace and Constantinople, where he met with other contingents and more leaders. Uniting outside Constantinople the “pilgrims”, as they called themselves (the terms Crusade and Crusader were invented much later, in the sixteenth century), crossed the Golden Horn, passed on to Anatolia, and from there moved towards Jerusalem,  their ultimate destination.

Was Godfrey a hero in history? It depends. He was certainly brave in terms of the values system of his time: an aristocratic warrior who led armies to war, being the first among them to plunge into battle. It would also seem that he was honestly religious in his purpose to liberate the Holy Sepulchre  from Muslim rule (which was the Crusaders’ professed aim), rather than motivated solely by ambition and greed, like many others who participated in that enterprise. Perhaps this was the reason why Godfrey was unanimously elected by the other leaders of the First Crusade to become the first King of Jerusalem. It is interesting that Godfrey did not accept the title of King, postulating that there was only one King in Jerusalem and that was Jesus Christ, so he took the humbler title Defender of the Holy Sepulchre instead. But he died within less than a year, and his brother Baldwin, who had no such scruples, became Baldwin I, first official Latin King of Jerusalem. Tasso will play upon this difference of character, offsetting the one brother, the pure Christian hero, against the other, the grasping and worldly lord (not quite a villain though – this type will be reserved for “infidels” only, and to a lesser degree, for Greeks).

In Jerusalem Delivered history is stretched a little to make for a more compelling narrative. The action begins in Canto One, stanza 7, when “the Eternal Father downwards cast his eyes” and sees that the Crusaders are not doing as well as it was hoped. They need a leader, so God who examines all hearts decides that Godfrey is the one. In a scene which has striking similarities to rhapsody α of The Odyssey combined with the Christian story of the Annunciation, God sends Gabriel (the Christian counterpart of Hermes, the winged messenger) down to earth, to apprise Godfrey of his decision. Godfrey summons the leaders and in a rousing speech urges them into action: Jerusalem must be delivered. Peter the Hermit (another historical figure, “who first preached the crusade and led it out”), representing spiritual authority and inspired by God, convinces the assembled nobles to make Godfrey their leader:

“Make one sole head lend them its light and force;

to one sole man sceptre and power bring:

grant him the place and image of a king.”

Thus fact is embellished by fiction in Tasso’s epic. Narrative reality has its own rules in epic poetry: the random and even pointless character of historical facts would be very badly received by an audience that expects a certain unity and determinate structure. Therefore Godfrey the “single charismatic leader” is infinite preferable to “the fragmented, conflicting leadership of reality.” The latter is material for historians; the former is the prerogative of the poet.