Roncesvalles. Song of Roland. Return to Spain After France.

The Song of Roland - 778 AD -- 

Franks, Charlemagne, Roland: Basques and the Moors

From history to legend to epic.  Make up your own facts. 

Translator of epic poem glorifying Roland and Charlemagne,

despite victory of challenger Saracens

 Dorothy Sayers 1957

Real victors:  small band of Basques

Death by Sword

Roncesvalles, Navarre, Spain

Our road trip left Spain at La Seu D'Urgell, and roamed in France: Cathar country at Rennes-le-Chateau, Languedoc, Camargues, and Provence (see France Road Ways. Then we returned to Spain from Pau, and Saint-Jean-Pied-a-Port; and to Roncesvalles, in the Basque country. Our trips cross borders freely.

Roncesvalles is a valley region, a large elongated ravine plus flats, that is one of the major passes in the Pyrenees between France and Spain. The issue addressed by the region is this:  How does history pass into legend, and legend pass into epic. Is it possible to re-gather earliest sources and track the process, and come up again, or for the first time, with "history."

Roncesvalles, the valley of battle, Roland 778CE. 

Roncesvalles is the area, and a village nearby where, according to the epic Song of Roland, Charlemagne's army went into dignified retreat, having set its sights back in France.  Charlemagne left with a rear guard vastly unprepared for its task of protection against attack from behind.  The brash Roland (nephew, other relative of Charlemagne?) insisted on taking a stand against the Moors and virtually all of Roland's forces were slaughtered by the Moors.  The odds were known to be overwhelming, with scouting reasonably accurate, and the Moors were already well entrenched in Spain, with easy supply lines.  Epic poems do their best to valorize Roland, but even  Dorothy Sayers' translation shows the ongoing conflicts, agendas, personality flaws, failure to plan, that led to the disaster.

Ibaneta Hill, Monument area, Roncesvalles, Spain

The setting:

Back to history.  Charlemagne had been battling the Saxons, northern Germanic area tribes, see Sachsenhain, for  for decades. The goal was to reestablish an Empire, like the Roman had been, but now with the forcible Christian slant of the Holy Roman Empire. We may like to think that Christianity prevailed over most of Europe thanks to merit and morality; the facts lead to another conclusion.  Forced conversions on pain of death, slaughters to follow up on recalcitrance, and militant Popes and their minions wielding sword and shield in the name of Jesus.

While he was so engaged, the Moors were battling among themselves in Spain, having taken over most of it and now at odds with each other.  A deputation of Moslem princes asked Charlemagne for assistance in fighting off other Moslems.  At the time, the Moors were no particular threat to the rest of Europe.  Hoping to get Moslem allies for his own Holy Roman Empire expansion, Charlemagne put his Saxon efforts on hold and rode with his army south. He divided his army so one entered Spain near Girona, and the other near Pamplona. Charlemagne's forces defeated both Girona and Pamplona on behalf of the allied friendly-to-Charlemagne Moslems.  That left the enemy Moslems in Zaragoza, however.  Meanwhile, the Saxons reasserted their desire for independence from this violent militant Christian business back in Germany, so Charlemagne declared victory and retreated to cope with Saxons.

• Another version, older, has the battle at Roncesvalles not with hordes of Moors, but bands of local Basques -- not many -- and a band of Charlemagne followers -- also not many.

History becomes legend becomes epic; where the bits of truth, where the fabrication. Just be aware.

Charlemagne left who to protect the rear?  The legend-epic says he left his nephew, or was it another relative or perhaps not a relative at all, to guard the retreat.  Roland, we are told.

Monument to Roland, Roncesvalles battlefield, Spain

The stories diverge, however.  How to date what?  History.  Earliest versions recount that it was not the Moors who were the dastardly attackers, but the Basques, a local ethnic tribal group with no love for either these Christian warriors or Moslem.

And these Basque upstarts attacked Charlemagne's representatives, who were named Eggihardt and Anselm, and their inadequate force.

Then the story disappears for some centuries; and re-emerges thoroughly legendized and spun. A little bit of history became larger than life. And the snippy Basques in the tales morphed into a new identity -- Saracens, now, and their army now numbered in the thousands.

The introduction to the Song of Roland gives details of the changes in plot and character.  Instead of Eggihardt and Anselm, we have Roland Himself. By the close of the 11th Century, the story is firmly fixed in Roland's court.  And the agenda is clearly religious by that era as well.

The Song of Roland reads as though the hearers are already well convinced of the facts, all is familiar, and they want the bonding of re-hearing and re-vitalizing nationalist or religious fervors.  But memorials keep alive what appears to be the closer story, Basques as victors, not Saracens at that particular battle area.

Memorial plaque, Basque victors, , Roncesvalles 778-1978

This occasion in 1978 memorializes the adversaries as Basque the victors, and Charlemagne the loser. See http://www.euskomedia.org/PDFAnlt/lankidetzan/20/20221233.pdf