[1][2] The hero Generides is born as an illegitimate son of the King of India, and after adventures marries a princess of Persia and becomes ruler of both India and Persia.
[3] The original, which may have been in Middle English or French, appears to have been a compilation of the fourteenth century.
[4] Despite the wide use of Eastern names and locations, these do not appear to have any particular significance, and though many analogues can (and have) been drawn between it and various Indian and Persian tales, the characters and episodes are familiar ones in medieval romances.
[6] While as in Guigemar, the hero is identified by a trait of his garment, in Generides, the lady's tears can only be washed out by the lady herself, which suggests that poet used a fairy tale of the type of Black Bull of Norroway; magical shirts are a commonplace, but only in this romance and that tale does the detail of the heroine's ability to wash clean the shirt appear.
[7] The lovers stay in the woods with his sword between them, which inspires their pursuer not to kill them; this is evidently imitating the scene in Tristan.