Paladin
They first appear in the medieval (12th century) chanson de geste cycle of the Matter of France, where they play a similar role to the Knights of the Round Table in Arthurian romance.
The legend is based on the historical Umayyad invasion of Gaul and subsequent conflict in the Marca Hispanica between the Frankish Empire and the Emirate of Córdoba.
The earliest recorded instance of the word paladin in the English language dates to 1592, in Delia (Sonnet XLVI) by Samuel Daniel.
[2] By the 13th century, words referring specifically to Charlemagne's peers began appearing in European languages; the earliest is the Italian paladino.
However, the modern spelling paladin is now reserved for the fictional characters of the chanson de geste, while the conventional English translation of comes palatinus is count palatine.
The Count Palatine of the Rhine served as prince-elector from "time immemorial" (with Wigeric of Lotharingia reaching back to the late Carolingian era), noted as such in a papal letter of 1261, and confirmed as elector in the Golden Bull of 1356.
In the French courtly literature of the 12th century, the paladins are the twelve closest companions of Charlemagne, comparable to the role of the Knights of the Round Table in Arthurian romance.
Always named among the paladins are Roland and Oliver; other recurring characters are Archbishop Turpin, Ogier the Dane, Huon of Bordeaux, Fierabras, Renaud de Montauban and Ganelon.
Their greatest moments come in The Song of Roland (written between c. 1040 and 1115), which depicts their defense of Charlemagne's army against the Saracens of Al-Andalus, and their deaths at the Battle of Roncevaux Pass due to the treachery of Ganelon.
In Le Pèlerinage de Charlemagne they accompany their king on a pilgrimage to Jerusalem and Constantinople in order to outdo the Byzantine Emperor Hugo.
The Italian Renaissance authors Matteo Maria Boiardo and Ludovico Ariosto, whose works were once as widely read and respected as William Shakespeare's, contributed prominently to the literary and poetical reworking of the tales of the epic deeds of the paladins.
[4] Boiardo and Ariosto's paladins are Orlando (Roland), Charlemagne's nephew and the chief hero among the paladins; Oliver, the rival to Roland; Ferumbras (Fierabras), the Saracen who became a Christian; Astolpho, descended from Charles Martel and cousin to Orlando; Ogier the Dane; Ganelon the betrayer, who appears in Dante Alighieri's Inferno;[5] Rinaldo (Renaud de Montauban); Malagigi (Maugris), a sorcerer; Florismart, a friend to Orlando; Guy de Bourgogne; Namo (Naimon or Namus), Duke of Bavaria, Charlemagne's trusted adviser; and Otuel, another converted Saracen.
The plot is based on a verse tale by La Fontaine, Le petit chien qui secoue de l'argent et des pierreries, itself derived from an episode in Ariosto's Orlando Furioso.
[6] The enthusiasm for operas based on Ariosto continued into the Classical era and beyond with such examples as Niccolò Piccinni's Roland (1778), Haydn's Orlando paladino (1782), Méhul's Ariodant (1799) and Simon Mayr's Ginevra di Scozia (1801).
The Song of Roland has nevertheless inspired numerous modern works, including Graham Greene's The Confidential Agent (1939),[11] and Stephen King's Dark Tower series.
