GUILLAUME DE LORRIS (fl. 1230), author of the earlier section of the Roman de la Rose, derives his name from a township in the department of Loiret. Nothing else is positively known of him. A rubric in the poem puts Jean de Meun's con tinuation 4o years after Guillaume's death, which therefore used to be dated about 126o; but since Jean de Meun's own work has recently been thrown back, Guillaume's has been fixed before 1240. He tells us he dreamt the dream which forms the substance of the poem in his 2oth year, and began to "rhyme it" five years later. The continuation shows more intellectual vigour than Guillaume's portion, but the earlier part is perhaps the more original. The great features of his work are the almost unsur passed beauty of his word-pictures, and the allegorical setting, which, though now wearisome, was in his time effective. He had, of course, predecessors (Raoul de Houdenc, the troubadours, and others) ; but it was Guillaume who fixed the style.
For an attempt to identify de Lorris see L. Jarry, Guillaume de L. et le testament d'Alphonse de Poitiers (188i) ; P. Paris, in Hist. litt. de la France, vol. xxiii. For Chaucer's translation, see Skeat, vol. 1.