The Four Sons of Aymon
The Four Sons of Aymon (French: [Les] Quatre fils Aymon, Dutch: De Vier Heemskinderen, German: Die Vier Haimonskinder), sometimes also referred to as Renaud de Montauban (after its main character) is a medieval tale spun around the four sons of Duke Aymon: the knight Renaud de Montauban (also spelled Renaut, Renault, Italian: Rinaldo di Montalbano, Dutch: Reinout van Montalbaen), his brothers Guichard, Allard and Richardet, their magical horse Bayard (Italian: Baiardo), their adventures and revolt against the emperor Charlemagne.
The oldest extant version of the tale is an anonymous Old French chanson de geste, Quatre Fils Aymon, which dates from the late 12th century and comprises 18,489 alexandrine (12-syllable) verses grouped in assonanced and rhymed laisses (the first 12,120 verses use assonance; critics suggest that the rhymed laisses derive from a different poet).
[2] Of the dozen extant versions of the chanson, all are anonymous except for one, Histoire des quatre fils Aymon, attributed to Huon de Villeneuve [fr], a 13th-century trouvère.
Renaud and his three brothers were sons of Aymon de Dordone (a fictional location in the Ardennes, though the name seems to be related to Dordogne near Montauban).
The brothers are, however, forced to flee from Montessor, and eventually they proceed to Gascony to aid the King Yvon in his battles against the Emir Begès.
In the end, he is murdered by resentful workers, but his body is miraculously saved from the river and makes its way magically in a cart back to his brothers.
Charlemagne is portrayed as vengeful and treacherous in these stories; the sympathy of the storyteller is clearly with the four brothers, but ultimately feudal authority is upheld.
Historie van den Vier Heemskinderen, the Dutch translation, dated 1508 and held at the University of Munich gives the following version: Duke Aymon, King of Pierlepont, thinks that Charles, his liege Lord, has not shown him gratitude enough when he gets only Dordogne (Dordoen) with the capital of Albi for his help in many of Charles' wars.
He is even angrier about the fact that his warrior-friend Hugh (Huon) de Narbonne gets nothing at all and decides to become renegade until Charlemagne gives him a suitable reward.
Aye rears her four sons (Richard, Writsaert, Adelhaert and Renout in this version) in secret at Pierlepont until the day that Aymon tells her how he regrets the fact that they have no offspring.
Nonetheless, they escape their pursuers with the help of King Son of Aquitaine, who gives his daughter Claire or Clarisse to Renaud to wife and the castle of Montauban.
[7] and William Caxton published a prose translation under the name "The Right Pleasant and Goodly Historie of the Foure Sonnes of Aymon".
[8] The translation was repeatedly reprinted, as well as dramatised, in the 16th and early 17th centuries, and its popular story was referred to (and used) by figures such as Thomas Nashe and Samuel Rowlands—though by 1673 Francis Kirkman would call the text a rarity.
Les quatre fils Aymon (1844) is an opera by Michael William Balfe, written for the Opéra-Comique (also popular in German-speaking countries for many years as Die Vier Haimonskinder).
[15] A study by the University of Liège in 1976 found a dozen sites in the Ardennes that claimed to be the fortress Montessor (or Montfort) constructed for the brothers by Maugis.
Taking place on each July 2, the procession of "giants" represents Charlemagne, the nine worthy peers, the four sons of Aymon upon their horse, and their cousin Maugis.
