Great Britain -- History -- Richard I, 1189-1199; Great Britain -- Kings and rulers -- Biography; Richard I, King of England, 1157-1199
To me this passage in the _Itinerarium_ suggests a possibility of
reconciling practically all the dates and notes of time given by all
our authorities, Arab and Frankish, relating to this matter. It is
not inconceivable that the original authority—whoever he may have
been—for the “twenty-two days” had through a confusion of memory
substituted the duration of the stay between the two Casals for
that of the stay near and in Lydda and Ramlah, and _vice versa_.
In that case the correct dates would stand thus: Between the two
Casals, twenty-two days, November 1-22; in the plain between Lydda
and Ramlah, “full fifteen days,” November 23-December 8; retirement
into the two cities December 8, and further advance (to Beit Nuba)
on January 3, “six weeks” from the date of encampment between them.
Whether these coincidences are merely accidental, and the “twenty-two
days” a sheer blunder due to the Latin “translator” having misread
“vint _en_ deux jors” as “vint _e_ deus jors,” in Ambrose’s line
7466, or whether in that line as we now have it _en_ is a scribe’s
error for _e_, and ll. 7464-6 should be read as a single sentence,
with a parenthesis stuck into the middle of it for the sake of
rime—“E l’ost erra par mi la plaine (Sor les biaus chevals peus
d’orge) Vint e deus jors entre Seint Jorge e Rames”—whether the
“translator” rendered _erra_ in l. 7464 by _sedit_ because he thought
thus to make better sense of his version of l. 7466, or whether the
poet meant that the host roamed about the plain in which its camp
was set, and perhaps even shifted the camp about, in vain efforts to
avoid the enemies and the rain (see ll. 7469-75, especially l. 7473,
“Iceles pluies _nos chacerent_”); these are questions involving too
many other questions for a discussion of them to be attempted here.
NOTE IV
_Casal des Plains and Casal des Bains_
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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