Een nieuw fragment van handschrift A van de Roman der Lorreinen (Michigan State University, Criminology Collection, XX KJC7690.A48 1687)

Among the many books in Michigan State University’s Criminology Collection is a Corpus juris militaris, published in Germany in 1687. Its binding contains four small parchment strips with medieval Dutch verses. Although the strips are still attached in the spine, the verses can be identified as belonging to the Roman der Lorreinen, and more specifically as remnants of manuscript A, written in the duchy of Brabant in the second quarter of the fourteenth century. Manuscript A originally must have consisted of over 400 leaves, containing more than 150.000 verses (note: there are no complete manuscripts of the Roman der Lorreinen). Only 7% of manuscript A has been preserved in several European libraries, mainly in Germany. The new fragment suggests that manuscript A was used as binding material not earlier than the end of the seventeenth century (after 1687). The newly found verses are from the first part of the Roman der Lorreinen, which was an adaptation of the Old French chanson de geste Garin le Loherenc. This article offers a first edition and study of the verses, comparing them to the Old French counterparts. This comparison offers additional evidence for the earlier hypothesis that manuscript A contained the same adaptation of Garin le Loherenc as the fragmentary manuscripts B and C.