pick🤫 don‘t wake Nikki.
This is a delightful 13-century Arthurian romance with a female knight, Silence, forced to hide her identity and act a man. Jealous kings, slain dragons, female healers and a wild-man version of Merlin. It was discovered in 1911, a single manuscript in Old French verse in a box marked “old papers - no value”.
Romance written in the 12-13th cent.
Silence is a girl brought up disguised as a boy so she could be her parents' heir. Of course, they are the most valiant, accomplished & virtuous person ever 😁
The King of England likes & values them, but after they reject the Queen's advances, she turns against them & tribulations start.
I thought their gender of birth would be uncovered in battle, as per trope, but no: something stranger & funnier happens 👏
So far:
- Hébain married the King of Norway's daughter
- Cador slayed the dragon terrorising Winchester, and earned the right to marry the maid of his choosing
- Eufémie cured Cador's illness and earned the right to marry the man of her choosing
- You guessed it: Cador and Eufémie married each other
- Eufémie gave birth to a girl, but they announced a boy - and therefore heir - to the world
Medieval romances FTW!
I'll stop bc spoilers 😋
Now that I‘ve finished Chaucer, I‘ve made the Roman de Silence my morning book. This is a 13th century Old French Arthurian romance in verse. And so far, in translation, it reads a lot like the Lais of Marie de France - that is to say, light and charming.
Roman de Silence | 
