It is a fact that the earliest extant French _chanson de geste_ was in existence a century before the earliest extant Spanish _cantar de gesta_: it is also a fact that the French version of Roland’s story was widely diffused in Spain at an early date. It was there recorded in the forged chronicle ascribed to Archbishop Turpin, and it filtered down to the masses who heard it from French pilgrims on the road to the shrine of St. James at Santiago de Compostela. Among these pilgrims were French _trouvères_, and through them the Spaniards became acquainted with the _Chanson de Roland_. It was natural that suggestion should operate in Spain as it operated in Germany, where Konrad produced his _Rolandslied_ about the year 1130. There is at least a strong presumption that the author of the _Poema del Cid_ had heard the _Chanson de Roland_. Sr. Menéndez y Pelayo, whose patriotism and fine literary sense make him a witness above suspicion, admits that there is a marked resemblance between the battle-scenes in the two poems, and further allows that there are cases of verbal coincidence which cannot be accidental. We may therefore agree with Gaston Paris that the author of the _Poema del Cid_ found his inspiration in the _Chanson de Roland_: that is to say, the _Chanson_ probably suggested to him the idea of composing a similar work on a Spanish theme, and gave him a few secondary details. We cannot say less, nor more: except that in subject and sentiment the _Poema_ is intensely local. As regards its substance, the _Poema_ is intermediate between history and fable. There is no respect for chronology; one personage is mistaken for a namesake; the Cid’s daughters, whose real names were Cristina and María, are called Elvira and Sol, and are provided with husbands to whom they were never married in fact, but who may have been maliciously introduced (as Dozy surmised) to exhibit the Leonese in an odious light. It is the office of an epic poet to exalt his hero, and to belittle that hero’s enemies; you might as reasonably look for perfect execution in the _Poema del Cid_ as for judicial impartiality. Apart from freaks which may be due to bad copying, we accept the fact that the metre is capricious, fluctuating between lines of fourteen and sixteen syllables: we must also accept the fact that history fares no better than metre, and often fares worse. Yet the spirit of the poet is not consciously unhistorical; he conveys the impression of believing in the truth of his own story. There is an accent of deep sincerity from the outset, in what—owing to mutilation—is now the beginning of the _Poema_, a passage recording the exile of the Cid:—