SEVEN WISE MASTERS, THE

This article appears in Volume V24, Page 715 of the Encyclopedia Britannica.

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SEVEN WISE MASTERS, THE , a cycle of stories of Oriental origin. A Roman emperor causes his son to be educated away from the court in the seven liberal arts by seven wise masters. On his return to court his stepmother the empress seeks to seduce him. To avert some danger presaged by the stars he is bound over to a

week

WEEK (from A.S. wicu, Germanic *wikon, probably=
change
- CHANGE (derived through the Fr. from the Late Lat. cambium, cambiare, to barter; the ultimate derivation is probably from the root which appears in the Gr. «a urmu', to bend)
, turn)

's silence. During this time the empress accuses him to her husband, and seeks to bring about his death by seven stories which she relates to the emperor; but her narrative is each time confuted by tales of the craft of women related by the sages. Finally the prince's lips are unsealed, the truth exposed, and the wicked empress is executed.
The cycle of stories, which appears in many European languages, is of Eastern origin. An analogous collection occurs in Sanskrit, but the Indian

original

ORIGINAL

is unknown. Travelling from the

east

EAST
EAST, ALFRED (1849- )

by way of Arabic, Persian, Syriac and Greek, it was known as the book of Sindibad, and was translated from Greek into Latin in the 1 zth century by Jean, de Hauteseille (Joannes de Alta Silva), a monk of the abbey of Haute-Seille near

Toul

TOUL

, with the title of Dolopathos (ed. H. Oesterley, Strassburg, 1893). This was translated into French about 1210 by a trouvere named Herbers as Li Romans di Dolopathos; another French version, Li Romans des Sept sages, was based on a different Latin

original

ORIGINAL

. The German, English, French and Spanish chap-books of the cycle are generally based on a Latin original differing from these. Three metrical romances probably based on the French, and dating from the 14th century, exist in English. The most important of these is The Sevyn Sages by John

Rolland

ROLLAND, JOHN (fl. 1560)

Dalkeith

DALKEITH

edited for the Bannatyne Club (Edinburgh, 1837).
' The Latin romance was frequently printed in the 15th century, and Wynkyn de W at-de printed an English version about 1515. See G. Paris, Deux Redactions du roman des sept sages de Rome (Paris, 1876, Soc. des. anc. textes fr.) ; Buchner, Historia septem sapientium
. (Erlangen, 1889) ; K. Campbell, A Study of the Romance of the Seven Sages with

special

SPECIAL

reference to the middle English versions (

Baltimore

BALTIMORE
BALTIMORE, GEORGE CALVERT, 1ST BARON (C. 1580—1632)

, 1898); D. Comparetti, Researches respecting the Book of Sindibdd (Folk-

Lore

LORE
LORE, AMBROISE DE (1396-1446)

Soc., 1882).

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