CHANSONS DE GESTE or GESTES, zlnist (Fr., songs of achievement or adventure). The name generally given by scholars to the large and important class of (Tie wit lilt -prang into existence in France in the latter part of the Tenth Century or the beginning of the Eleventh. The history of their origin is obscure, and there no evidenee for the existence of preceding ballads out of which they were compiled. The earlier ones are written in deeasyllable is line,. ar ranged in groups (called in French htisscs or tirades) of varying number, connected by as mau•e or vomel-rhyin•, the vtolr-nnant, of the linal syllables not being the same. This asso nance was soon replaced by rh?nie, and the ten syllable line about by the twelve•ythible or Alexandrine. which is said to take its name front the poem .I/csam/re le Grand, by Alexandre de liernay and Lambert le Tors. Their subject is uniformly French history, treated in a romantic spirit. and generally centring around Chrle magne as the epic hero. As their mime implies, they were composed, not to be read, hut to be sung or recited. About 110 of them are p•e
served, averaging 6000 lines apiece. Excepting the oldest and best-known. the chanson dt Po hold (q.v.), and the Thirteenth-C•ntury Fora. bras. the all of the Twelfth ('entury, are the hest in the judgment of the nuts) emn petent critics: .1/iscans, Antis et Amite's, .tit Noche, Berne aux grans Pies. Garin le Loherain, rkrard de ItVissillon, Huon de Bordeaux. Ogi, do Danewarche, Raoul elf I'ambrai, and the Voyage de Charlemagne a Constuntinople.. Con suit; Lion Gautier, Les e'pope'es francaises ed.. 4 vols. Pans. 1S78-94 : id., in Petit de Histoirc de In langur et• irancaise (Paris, 1896-98) ; Rajna. Le origini epopect fran•esea (Florenve, 1884) bury, The Flourishing of Romance and the Ris,.; of Allegory (New York. 1897) ; G. Paris, toire pot gigue de Charlemagne (Paris, 1865): and see FRENCH LITERATURE: TROUVERE: JoN