HUON OF BORDEAUX, hero of romance. The French chansonde geste of Huon de Bordeaux dates from the first half of the 13th century. Huon, son of Seguin of Bordeaux, kills Char lot, the emperor's son, who had laid an ambush for him, without recognizing his assailant. He is condemned by Charlemagne to be hanged, but reprieved on condition that he visits the court of Gaudisse, the amir of Babylon, and brings back a handful of hair from the amir's beard and four of his back teeth, after having slain the greatest of his knights and three times kissed his daughter Esclarmonde. By the help of the fairy dwarf Oberon, Huon suc ceeds in this errand, in the course of which he meets with further adventures. The Charlot of the story has been identified by A. Longnon (Romania viii. I—I I) with Charles 1'Enfant, one of the sons of Charles the Bald and Irmintrude. The poem exists in a later version in alexandrines, and, with its continuations, was put into prose in 1454 and printed by Michel le Noir in 1516, since when it has appeared in many forms, notably in a beautifully printed and illustrated adaptation (1898) in modern French by Gaston Paris. The romance had a great vogue in England through the translation (c. 1540) of John Bourchier, Lord Berners, as Huon of Burdeuxe. The tale was dramatized and produced in Paris by the Confrerie de la Passion in 1557, and in Philip Henslowe's diary there is a note of a performance of a play, Hewen of Bur doche, on Dec. 28, For the literary fortune of the fairy part of the romance see OBERON.
The Chanson de geste of Huon de Bordeaux was edited by F. Guessard and C. Grandmaison for the Anciens poetes de la France in 1860; Lord Berners's translation was edited for the E.E.T.S. by S. L. Lee in 1883-85. See also Hist. lift. de la France (vol. xxvi., 1873) ; L. Gautier, Les Epopees francaises (2nd ed. vol. iii. pp. ; A. Graf, I complementi della Chanson de Huon de Bor deaux (Halle, 1878) ; M. Schweigel, "Esclarmonde," etc. in Ausg. u. Abhandl. . . . der roman. phil. (Marburg, 1889) ; C. Voretzsch, Epische Studien (vol. i., Halle, 1900) .