Robert the Devil

The story originated in France in the 13th century and has since provided the basis for many literary and dramatic works, most notably the Meyerbeer opera Robert le diable.

In a tourney he overthrows and slays thirty opponents; then he goes roaming about the world; then he returns to his native land, and begins once more to play the bandit, robbing, burning, murdering, ravishing.

He will learn to conquer Hell, to subdue himself, to thwart the designs of that accursed fiend who created him to serve his own ends, who has made of him a docile instrument of destruction and of sin.

He goes to Rome, casts himself at the feet of the pope, makes confession to a holy hermit, submits himself to the harshest kind of penance, and swears that henceforth he will taste no food that he has not first wrested from the jaws of a dog.

Recognized at last, he refuses all rewards and honors, the imperial crown, even the monarch's own daughter, goes away to dwell with his hermit in the wilderness, and dies a saint, blessed by both God and men.

But the legend owes its popularity to the story-books, of which the earliest known appeared at Lyons in 1496, and again at Paris in 1497, under the title La Vie du terrible Robert le dyable.

In England, the subject was treated in the metrical romance, Sir Gowther, probably written around the end of the 14th century (though in this version the devil disguises himself as the mother's husband).

[4] An English translation from the French chapbook was made by Wynkyn de Worde, Caxton's assistant, and published without date under the title Robert deuyll.

The villain in Erich Kästner's 1931 children's story Pünktchen und Anton, a petty criminal and thief, is rather facetiously nicknamed "Robert the Devil".

[9] Scholars (e.g., Eilert Løseth [no],[10] Ernst Tegethoff [de],[11] Laura Hibbard Loomis,[12] Jack Zipes,[13] Waldemar Liungman [sv],[14] Maxime Chevalier (es),[15] Francisco Vaz da Silva[16]) have noted similarities between the medieval tale of Robert le Diable and two folktales classified in the international Aarne-Thompson-Uther Index as types ATU 314, "Goldener", and ATU 502, "The Wild Man as Helper", in their common second part: the hero leaves home and goes to work in a lowly position in another kingdom (usually, as a gardener); later, he rides into battle to save the kingdom from a foreign enemy, and is injured during a battle; his wound or bandaged injury is used to identify him.