CHANT ROYAL

This article appears in Volume V05, Page 848 of the Encyclopedia Britannica.

Encyclopedia Britannica - Main :: CAU-CHA

CHANT ROYAL , one of the fixed forms of verse invented by the ingenuity of the poets of medieval France. It is composed of five strophes, identical in arrangement, of eleven verses each, and of an envoi of five verses. All the strophes are written on the five rhymes exhibited in the first strophe, the entire poem, therefore, consisting of sixty lines in the course of which five rhymes are repeated. It has been conjectured that the

chant

CHANT (derived through the Fr. from the Lat. cantare, to sing; an old form is " chaunt ")

royal is an extended ballade, or rather a ballade conceived upon a larger scale; but which form preceded the other appears to be uncertain. On this point Henri de Croi, who wrote about these forms of verse in his Art et science de rhetorique (1493), throws no light. He dwells, however, on the

great

GREAT

dignity of what he calls the " Champt Royal," and says that those who defy with success the ardour of its rules deserve crowns and garlands for their pains.

Etienne

ETIENNE, CHARLES GUILLAUME (1778-1845)

Pasquier (1529-1615) points out the fact that the

Chant

CHANT (derived through the Fr. from the Lat. cantare, to sing; an old form is " chaunt ")

Royal, by its length and the rigidity of its structure, is better fitted than the ballade for solemn and pompous themes. In Old French, the most admired chants royal are those of Clement

Marot

; his Chant royal chrestien, with its refrain .
" Sante au corps, et Paradis a fame,"
was celebrated.

Theodore

de Banville defines the chant royal as essentially belonging to ages of faith, when its subjects could be either the exploits of a hero of royal race or the processional splendours of religion. La Fontaine was the latest of the French poets to attempt the chant royal, until it was resuscitated in modern times.
This species of poem was unknown in

English

ENGLISH

medieval literature and was only introduced into

Great

GREAT

Britain in the last

quarter

QUARTER (through Fr. from Lat. quartarius, fourth
part
- PART
)

of the 19th

century

CENTURY (from Lat. centuria, a division of a hundred men)

. The earliest chant royal in

English

ENGLISH

was that published by Edmund Gosse in 1877; it is here given to exemplify the structure and rhyme-arrangement of the. form

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