For a thousand years the myth of descent from the dispersed heroes of the conquered Trojan race was a sacred literary tradi tion throughout western Europe. The first Franco-Latin chroni clers traced their history to the same origin as that of Rome, as told by the Latin poets of the Augustan era; and in the middle of the 7th century Fredegarius Scholasticus (Rer. gall. script. ii. relates how one party of the Trojans settled between the Rhine, the Danube and the sea. In a charter of Dagobert occurs the statement, "ex nobilissimo et antiquo Trojanorum reliquiarum sanguine nati." This statement is repeated by chroniclers and panegyrical writers, who also considered the History of Troy by Dares to be the first of national books. Succeeding kings imi tated their predecessors in giving official sanction to their legend ary origin ; Charles the Bald, in a charter, uses almost the same words as Dagobert, "ex praeclaro et antiquo trojanorum san guine nati." In England a similar tradition had been early formulated, as appears from Nennius's Historia Britonum and Geoffrey of Monmouth. The epic founder of Britain was Brutus, son, or in another tradition, great-grandson, of Aeneas, in any case of the royal house of Troy. The tradition, repeated in Wace's version of Geoffrey, by Matthew Paris and others, per sisted to the time of Shakespeare. Brutus found Albion unin habited except by a few giants. He founded his capital on the banks of the Thames, and called it New Troy. Otto Frisingensis (12th century) and other German chroniclers repeat similar myths. About ioso a monk named Bernard wrote De excidio Trojae, and in the middle of the 12th century Simon Chevre d'Or, canon of the abbey of Saint-Victor, Paris, followed with another poem in leonine elegiacs on the fall of the city and the adventures of Aeneas, in which the Homeric and Virgilian records were blended.
About the year 1184 Benoit de Sainte-More (q.v.) composed a poem of 30,000 lines entitled Roman de Troie. He derived his information chiefly from the pseudo-annals of Dictys and Dares, but we may justly consider the Roman de Troie as an original work. From this source subsequent writers drew their notions of Troy, mostly without naming their authority and generally with out even knowing his name. This is the masterpiece of the pseudo classical- cycle of romances : and in the Latin version of Guido delle Colonne it passed through every country of Europe.
The De bello trojano of Joseph of Exeter, in six books, a genu ine poem of no little merit, was written soon after Benoit's work or about the years 1187-88. At first ascribed to Dares Phrygius and Cornelius Nepos, it was not published as Joseph's until 162o, at Frankfurt. It was directly drawn from the pseudo-annalists, but the influence of Benoit was considerable. Of the same kind was the Troiliis of Albert of Stade (1249), a version of Dares, in verse, characterized by the old severity and affected realism. But these Latin works can only be associated indirectly with Benoit, who had closer imitators in Germany at an early period. Herbort of Fritzlar reproduced the French text in his Lied von Troye (early 13th century), as did also Konrad von Wiirzburg (d. 1287) in his Bach von Troye of 40,000 verses, which he himself com pared to the "boundless ocean." It was completed by an anony mous poet. To the like source may be traced a poem of 30,000 verses on the same subject by Wolfram von Eschenbach; and Jacques van Maerlant reproduced Benoit's narrative in Flemish. The Norse or Icelandic Trojumanna saga repeats the tale with some variations.
In Italy, Guido delle Colonne, a Sicilian, began in 127o and finished in 1287 a prose Historia trojana, in which he reproduced the Roman de Troie of Benoit, and so closely as to copy the errors of the latter. The vivacity and poetry of the Anglo Norman trouvere disappear in a dry version. The immense popu larity of Guido's work is shown by the large number of existing manuscripts. In the 14th and the commencement of the 15th century four versions appeared in England and Scotland. The best known is the Troy Book, written between 1414 and 1420, of John Lydgate, who had both French and Latin texts before him. An earlier and anonymous rendering exists at Oxford (Bodleian ms. Laud Misc. 595). There is the Gest Hystoriale of the De struction of Troy (Early Eng. Text Soc., 1869-1874), written in a northern dialect about 139o; a Scottish version (15th century) by a certain Barbour, not the poet, John Barbour; and The Seege of Troy, a version of Dares (Harl. ms. 525 Brit. Mus.). The invention of printing gave fresh impetus to the spread of Guido's work. The first book printed in English was The Re cuyell of the Hystoryes of Troye, a translation by Caxton from the French of Raoul Lefevre.
BIBLiocRAPHY.—The Troy legend is dealt with in the elaborate work of A. Joly, Benoit de Sainte-More et le Roman de Troie (1870-71) ; G. Korting, Der altfranz. Roman de Troie (1883) ; F. Settegast, Benoit de Ste-More (Breslau, 1876) ; G. C. Frommann, Herbort v. Fritzlar u. Benoit de Ste-More (Stuttgart, 1837) ; R. Jackel, Dares Phrygius u. Benoit de Ste-More (Breslau, 1875) ; Le Roman de Troie, ed. L. Constans (Soc. d. anc. textes fr. Paris, 1904).