Adenet le Roi (c.1235-1297)

Adenet le Roi, literally "Little Adam the King," was a French epic poet born in Brabant, in the Low Countries. He was reared and educated under the patronage of Henry III, Duke of Brabant, whose minstrel he became. In 1269 he joined the service of Guy de Dampierre, later the Count of Flanders, as roi des menestrels ("King of the Minstrels"), accompanying him on the unsuccessful crusade in Tunis in 1270. The expedition returned by way of Sicily and Italy, and Adenet has left in his poems some very exact descriptions of the places through which he passed. Later, he was at the French court under the patronage of Queen Marie of Brabant, wife of Philip the Bold.

Adenet's poetry marks the end of the medieval epic poem in France (the chansons de geste or "songs of heroic deeds"). Writing at a time of transition, when the romance of adventure was gaining favour over the epic poem, Adenet tended to cling to the more traditional role of being an historian in verse. His later works, however, particularly Cléomadès, begin to show a fusion of the two eras, in the wider use of realistically descriptive passages, in the higher degree of imagination and artistry, and in the more chivalric treatment of his story.

His extant works, in their probable chronological order, are: Les enfances Ogier, Berthe aus gran piés, Bueves de Commarchis, none of which are published but only exist only in copied written form.