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TARAFAH ‘AMR IBN AL-‘ABD and other poets). The

conversations within the text cover a wide range

of topics, including heresy and atheism.

Another unusual work is “Letters of a Horse

and Mule” in which a horse, a mule, and other an-

imals discuss philology as well as taxation, warfare,

and other topics.

Al-Ma‘arr¯ı collected three volumes of his own

poems in his lifetime. The first of them, The

Spark from the Fire-stick, includes a series of his

earliest poems. The second collection, On Coats

of Mail, contains poems about armor. The third

collection is his most celebrated, The Constraint

of What Is Not Compulsory, which includes more

than 1,500 poems. Most of these are written in a

rhyme scheme far more elaborate than required

by the rules of Arabic verse and are replete with

plays on words so complex that the poet had to

write a commentary on his own work. Al-

Ma‘arr¯ı’s pessimism and cynicism reach full ex-

pression in this volume, with lines such as: “If

only a child died at its hour of birth and never

suckled from its mother in confinement. / Even

before it can utter a word, it tells her: Grief and

trouble is all you will get from me.” Despite the

outlook on life portrayed in his works, al-Ma‘arr¯ı

is remembered not only for the volume of work

he produced but also for his imagery and elabo-

rate style.

English Versions of Works by Ab¯u al-‘Ala¯ ’ al-

Ma‘arr¯ı

Arberry, A. J., ed. Arabic Poetry: A Primer for Students.

Cambridge, U.K.: Cambridge University Press,

1965.

Lichtenstadter, Ilse, ed. Introduction to Classical Ara-

bic Literature. New York: Twayne, 1974.

A Work about Ab¯u al-‘Ala¯’ al-Ma‘arr¯ı

Irwin, Robert, ed. Night and Horses and the Desert.

Woodstock, N.Y.: Overlook Press, 2000, 31, 58,

203, 263, 315, 354.

Mahabharata (ca. 400 B.C.–ca. 400 A.D.)

The Mahabharata is one of India’s two great liter-

ary EPICS; the other is the RAMAYANA (see VALMIKI,

MAHARSHI). It consists of a series of verses origi-

nally composed for oral recitation; most of the

verses are couplets containing 32 syllables. As a

whole, the Mahabharata contains no fewer than

73,000 verses, and some editions contain as many

as 100,000, making it eight times longer than

HOMER’s Iliad and Odyssey combined.

The Mahabharata may be based on actual events

from the eighth or ninth century

B.C. It seems to

have come into existence around the fourth century

B.C., the same time as the Ramayana. Numerous

copyists and reciters added to it and modified it

over time until it reached its current form, around

or before

A.D. 400. It now contains 18 major books,

each divided into a number of chapters. The text

also breaks down into 100 minor books.

The Mahabharata has exercised an extraordi-

nary influence over Indian literature and culture.

KALIDASA’s plays drew inspiration from it, as did the

works of many other writers. Painters and sculp-

tors depicted scenes from it, and a cult grew

around its heroine, Draupadi. In the MIDDLE AGES,

knowledge of the Mahabharata spread as far as

Java and Bali. More recently, Indian comic books

have retold the epic story.

As scholar Bruce Sullivan has noted, the Ma-

habharata represents the “desire to conserve and

preserve for everyone the wisdom enunciated by

a dharma-knowing sage.” (Dharma involves the

way things should be and the way one should be-

have.) Thus, the epic holds a significant place in

the history of Indian thought. Editor and transla-

tor J. A. B. van Buitenen points out that the Ma-

habharata

contains a large number of philosophical chap-

ters that are among the oldest documents for

more or less systematic “Hindu”thought. Like-

wise, the history of Indian law cannot be prop-

erly understood without the epic, where the

law is the single greatest concern.

Mahabharata 181

The Mahabharata’s importance is demonstrated by

the fact that the BHAGAVAD GITA, which has become

a key text in Hinduism, is only a small part of the

great epic. In the end, however, the highest praise

for the Mahabharata comes from the epic itself:

Once one has heard this story so worthy of

being heard[,] no other story will please him: it

will sound harsh as the crow sounds to one

after hearing the cuckoo sing....No story is

found on earth that does not rest on this

epic....Whatever is found here may be found

somewhere else, but what is not found here is

found nowhere!

Critical Analysis

The Mahabharata’s plot is complex. In essence, it

tells of a bitter and bloody conflict between two

sets of cousins, the Pandava brothers and the

Dharatarastra brothers. Both wish to rule Kuruk-

setra, a kingdom in northern India.

The trouble begins when King Vicitravirya dies

without heirs. His half brother Krsna Dvaipayana,

also called Krsna Vyasa, fathers sons on the king’s

two widows and a maidservant. The first son,

Dhartarastra, is blind. As a result, the second son,

Pandu, becomes king. After Pandu has ruled for

some time, however, he finds it necessary to retire

to the forest. Dhartarastra now rules the kingdom.

Pandu has five sons, while Dhartarastra has 100.

The eldest Pandava, Yudhisthira, was born before

any of his Dharatarastra cousins and therefore

claims the throne. Unfortunately, one of the

Dharatarastras, Duryodhana, wants to become

king himself. He tries to kill Yudhisthira and the

other Pandavas.

After two assassination attempts have failed,

and the Pandavas have acquired allies, Duryod-

hana agrees to divide the kingdom with his

cousins. The Pandavas travel to their part of the

kingdom and found a new capital city. Seeing them

prosper, Duryodhana’s jealousy gets the better of

him again. He challenges Yudhisthira to a dice

game during a ritual intended to consecrate the

latter as king. The game is rigged; Yudhisthira loses

his brothers’ freedom, his own freedom, and the

Pandavas’ common wife, Draupadi. He also loses a

rematch. The Pandavas agree to spend 12 years in

exile and live in disguise for a 13th year.

When the 13 years have passed, the Pandavas

and their allies return to the capital to claim the

throne for Yudhisthira. Duryodhana refuses to

yield. A war ensues that lasts for 18 days and takes

in the entire world. Duryodhana and most of the

Dharatarastras perish, as do the Pandavas’ rela-

tives, allies, and unborn children. The five Pan-

davas, however, survive, and Yudhisthira takes the

throne. Years later, his descendant hears this story,

the Mahabharata, recited by a disciple of Krsna

Vyasa.

Krsna Vyasa, the grandfather of the Pandavas

and Dharatarastras, is an important figure in

Hindu tradition. According to legend, he com-

posed not only the PURANA but also the Mahab-

harata, which he dictated to the god Ganesh. He

appears in the Mahabharata as a wise and power-

ful man. Ironically, as Sullivan points out, he is also

partly responsible for the bloody war between his

grandchildren. He deliberately made his son

Dharatarastra blind and thus complicated the line

of succession; he supervised the ritual during

which Yudhisthira lost everything in a dice game;

and he failed in his attempts to pacify his grand-

children and prevent the war.

Yet it seems the war was unavoidable. Indeed,

the inevitability of fate is a theme of the Mahab-

harata. Dharatarastra says, “My old age, the de-

struction of all my relatives, and the death of my

friends and allies happened because of fate.” Time,

says the Mahabharata, is merciless and in-

escapable:

[Time] brought the Pandava and [Dharataras-

tra] armies together in that place and there de-

stroyed them....Time ripens the creatures.

Time rots them. . . . Whatever beings there were

in the past will be in the future, whatever are

busy now, they are all the creatures of Time—

know it, and do not lose your sense.

182 Mahabharata

In keeping with its theme of time, the Mahab-

harata depicts the war between the Dharatarastras

and Pandavas as the end of one stage of history and

the beginning of another. Characters are described

as incarnations of either gods or demons, battling

each other in human form. Van Buitenen argues

that this mythical imagery is a late addition to the

epic and cheapens its story. Sullivan, in contrast,

believes that “the conflict between the gods and

demons” is a central theme of the epic, just as the

conflict between gods and giants is a central theme

in Norse mythology (see MYTHOLOGY, NORSE).

English Versions of the Mahabharata

Carrière, Jean-Claude. The Mahabharata: A Play

Based Upon the Indian Classic Epic. Translated by

Peter Brook. New York: Harper & Row, 1987.

The Mahabharata. 3 vols. Translated and edited by J.A.

B. van Buitenen. Chicago: University of Chicago

Press, 1973–78.

The Mahabharata. Translated and edited by William

Buck. Berkeley: University of California Press,

2000.

Works about the Mahabharata

Chaitanya, Krishna. The Mahabharata: A Literary

Study. New Delhi: Clarion Books; Flushing, N.Y.:

Asia Book Corp. of America, 1985.

González Reimann, Luis. The Mahabharata and the

Yugas: India’s Great Epic Poem and the Hindu Sys-

tem of World Ages. New York: Peter Lang, 2002.

Matilal, Bimal Krishna. Moral Dilemmas in the Ma-

habharata. Shimla: Indian Institute of Advanced

Study, 1989.

Sullivan, Bruce M. Krsna Dvaipayana Vyasa and the

Mahabharata: A New Interpretation. New York:

E.J. Brill, 1990.

Maimonides, Moses (Moses ben

Maimon, Rabbi Moses ben Maimon,

RaMBaM)

(1135–1204) philosopher,

physician, nonfiction writer

Moses Maimonides, known in Hebrew literature

by the acronym RaMBaM, was born in Córdoba,

Spain, to Rabbi Maimon ben Joseph, a judge of the

rabbinical court, and a mother (name unknown)

who died at his birth. He became a Talmudic

scholar and philosopher, studying and writing

books as he wandered throughout Andalusia.

In 1160, Maimonides and his family fled Spain

to evade the Muslim Almohades, who were invad-

ing Spain and persecuting Jewish communities.

They traveled to several different countries, going

first to Morocco, where they still had to hide their

Jewish origins. After an abortive attempt to move

to Israel, they settled in Egypt, first in Alexandria

and then in Fustat, close to Cairo, where Mai-

monides started studying medicine. He was even-

tually able to gain a position as chief physician at

the court of Saladin. He also became a respected

citizen and served as the leader of the Cairo Jewish

community.

Many fantastical myths and legends have grown

up around Maimonides over the years, which is

ironic since the philosopher himself was very skep-

tical of all superstition, magic, and myth. He was,

philosophically speaking, a religious rationalist. He

did not take seriously the ideas, common in his

day, of witchcraft, astrology, mysticism and speak-

ing in tongues. Nonetheless, the stories surround-

ing him include accounts of his miraculous birth

and death, tales of mysterious circumstances sur-

rounding his travels and burial, and tales of his

raising people from the dead.

Despite his obligations as chief physician and

leader of the Cairo Jewish community, Mai-

monides continued with his scholarship and pro-

duced a large body of written work on the TALMUD,

Jewish law, medicine, and philosophy. He was the

first person ever to codify Jewish law systemati-

cally, the product of which is the Mishnah Torah

(1180). In one section of this work, Maimonides

defines repentance:“Repentance involves forsaking

sins and removing such thoughts from one’s way

of thinking and resolving firmly never to do it

again....”Another of his works, The Guide to the

Perplexed, is regarded as one of the great philo-

sophical works on Judaism. Maimonides based

his interpretation of Jewish law on ARISTOTLE’s

Maimonides, Moses 183

philosophy, and his work influenced such later

writers as Benedict Spinoza and Saint Thomas

Aquinas.

In his time, Maimonides was a hero throughout

the Jewish world. Upon his death, Egyptian Jews

mourned for three days. The credo of Judaism that

he formulated, expressed in 13 articles of faith, was

reworked into the Yigdal prayer, which is included

in most Jewish prayer books. Today Maimonides is

regarded as one of the foremost Jewish philoso-

phers of all time, and his work is still widely read

and respected.

English Versions of Works by Maimonides

Codex Maimuni: Moses Maimonides’ Code of Law: The

Illuminated Pages of the Kaufmann Mishneh Torah.

Budapest: Corniva, 1984.

The Guide to the Perplexed, Vols. One and Two. Trans-

lated by Shlomo Pines. Chicago: University of

Chicago Press, 1974.

Rambam, Readings in the Philosophy of Moses Mai-

monides. Translated by Lenn E. Goodman. Los

Angeles: Gee Tee Bee, 1985.

Works about Maimonides

Davidson, Herbert A. Moses Maimonides: The Man

and His Works. Oxford: Oxford University Press,

2004.

Robinson, Ira and Lawrence Kaplan. The Thought of

Moses Maimonides: Philosophical and Legal Stud-

ies. (Studies in the History of Philosophy, Vol. 17).

Lewiston, N.Y.: Edwin Mellen Press, 1991.

Rosner, Fred and Samuel S. Kottek, editors. Moses

Maimonides: Physician, Scientist, and Philosopher.

Northvale, N.J.: Jason Aronson, 1993.

Twersky, Isadore. Introduction to the Code of Mai-

monides (Mishneh Torah). New Haven, Conn.: Yale

University Press, 1982.

Manco Capac, myth of

See MYTH OF MANCO CAPAC.

Marcus Aurelius Antoninus (Marcus

Aelius Aurelius Antoninus)

(121–180)

philosopher, Roman emperor

Marcus Antoninus Aurelius was born in Rome.

When he was young, he lost his father, and from

his earliest years enjoyed the friendship and pa-

tronage of Emperor Hadrian, who provided him

with special educational privileges. Thus, at age

eight Aurelius became a member of the Salian

priesthood. He was adopted by Hadrian’s succes-

sor, Antoninus Pius (his uncle by marriage), whose

daughter he later married.

Aurelius is known as one of the greatest emper-

ors in Roman history (reigned 161–180). In times

of plague and famine, he sold many of his own

possessions to help the poor. This and other simi-

lar acts made him one of the “Five Good Emper-

ors” (an ironic title, given that he also persecuted

the Christians as a threat to Roman rule). As a mil-

itary and civic leader, he won several important

wars and successfully dealt with serious internal

disasters. His personal life, however, was not as

successful. His wife was unfaithful, and his heir (an

adopted nephew whom some scholars believe was

responsible for Aurelius’s death) was disappoint-

ing. In addition, Aurelius was plagued by self-

doubts regarding his adequacy as an emperor, for

although he was a sound military leader, he was

troubled by the nature of war. These doubts and

contemplations were perhaps what led him to

write Meditations (first published in 1555). Origi-

nally written in Greek, the work exists in 12 vol-

umes. It is Aurelius’s interpretation of and

“meditations” on Stoic philosophy, specifically

those elements of it that extolled reason, virtue,

freedom, and morality.

In light of the personal conflicts and military

matters that Aurelius dealt with, it is not surprising

that he turned to Stoicism to find the moral stam-

ina to deal with adversity. Some critics have gone

so far as to suggest that Aurelius’s commitment to

Stoicism interfered with his ability to be an effec-

tive emperor. His successful campaigns against the

Parthians (166) and the Germans (167) as well as

184 Manco Capac, myth of

his commitment to the welfare of his people sug-

gest otherwise. Aurelius died from the plague on

March 17 in what is now Vienna.

Aurelius’s Meditations provide an in-depth look

at the man, the emperor, and the philosopher. One

of the central ideas of Meditations, and Stoicism,

is unity. Stoics believed that all “parts” were part of

a “whole,” that all things—even thoughts and emo-

tions—were entwined and could not be logically

viewed as separate. In Meditations, Aurelius writes:

All things are implicated with one another, and

the bond is holy; and there is hardly anything

unconnected with any other things....For

there is one universe made up of all things, and

one god who pervades all things, and one sub-

stance, and one law, and one reason.

(7.9)

According to this theory, Aurelius reasons that

people, as a natural part of the universe, must

abide by “natural” laws:

We are made for cooperation, like feet, like

hands, like eyelids, like the rows of the upper

and lower teeth. To act against one another

then is contrary to nature.

(2.1)

To Aurelius, harmony is a natural state of being. He

believed that happiness can be achieved by anyone,

and that external circumstances should not pre-

vent one from finding harmony. This is somewhat

characteristic of the Roman ideal of success—to

work toward a goal without allowing the possibil-

ity of failure to alter action. In Meditations, he says:

[I]f you work at that which is before you, fol-

lowing right reason seriously, vigorously,

calmly without allowing anything else to dis-

tract you, but keeping your divine part pure . . .

you will be happy.

(4.7)

Meditations is not only an invaluable sample of

early introspective writing, illuminating the devel-

opment of Aurelius’s thoughts and ideas; it is also

an extensive explanation of Stoic philosophy. The

work influenced such later writers as Petrarch,

Michel de Montaigne, George Chapman, Matthew

Arnold, and others.

English Versions of Works

by Marcus Aurelius Antoninus

Marcus Aurelius. Loeb Classical Library. Edited by G.

P. Goold. Translated by C. G. Haines. Cambridge,

Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1988.

The Meditations. Everyman’s Library. Translated by A.

S. L. Farquharson. Introduction by D. A. Rees.

New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 2003.

Thoughts of the Emperor Marcus Aurelius Antoninus.

Translated by George Long. Watchung, N.J.: Albert

Saifer, 1995.

Works about Marcus Aurelius Antoninus

Birley, Anthony. Marcus Aurelius: A Biography. New

York: Barnes and Noble, 1999.

Farquharson,A. S. L. Marcus Aurelius, His Life and His

World. Oxford, U.K.: Greenwood Publishing,

1975.

Rutherford, R. B. The Meditations of Marcus Aurelius:

A Study. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1989.

Marcus Fabius Quintilianus

See QUINTILIAN.

Marie de France (ca. 1150–ca. 1200) poet,

translator

All that is known of Marie de France, one of the

first women writers in French literature, comes

from her texts. At the end of one her tales, she

writes, “My name is Marie and I come from

France.” Most of her work was written between

1175 and 1190.

Marie wrote lais, short narrative poems, and

translated some of

AESOP’s fables and a saint’s life of

Saint Patrick. In her work, she demonstrates famil-

iarity with classical literature and contemporary

Marie de France 185

Latin and Anglo-Norman literature. Most schol-

ars believe that she either lived or spent time in

the courts of Henry II and Richard I of England;

the English and French kings were related, and the

two courts strongly influenced each other. Marie

wrote her poetry in Anglo-Norman French, which

was a widely used and easily understood dialect.

Marie’s poetry has survived because of its so-

phisticated narrative voice and condensed struc-

ture. “Chevrefoil” (“Honeysuckle”), her most

famous lai, focuses on an episode from TRISTAN

AND ISEULT, the most famous love story of the MID-

DLE AGES. In this poem, Tristan has been banished

from court, but he sends Queen Iseult a secret

message carved on a hazel branch. It compares

their love to the honeysuckle that entwines the

hazel tree; neither of them can live without the

other. Marie’s use of a specific object integral to the

plot as a metaphor for the story’s theme occurs in

several of her other lais, and it shows the elegant

economy and sophistication of her style.

English Versions of Works by

Marie de France

The Lais of Marie de France. Translated by Glyn S.

Burgess. New York: Penguin, 1999.

The Lais of Marie de France. Translated by Robert

Hanning and Joan Ferrante. Durham, N.C.:

Labyrinth Press, 1982.

A Work about Marie de France

Mickel, Emanuel J., Jr. Marie de France. New York:

Twayne, 1974.

Martial (Marcus Valerius Martialis)

(ca. 40–ca. 104) poet

Marcus Valerius Martialis, later called Martial, was

born at Bilbilis, a town in northeast Spain, to par-

ents named Fronto and Flacilla. Then a province of

the Roman Empire, Spain was also the birthplace

of the first-century writers SENECA, LUCAN, and

QUINTILIAN. In 64, during the reign of Nero, Mar-

tial went to Rome. He received a thorough educa-

tion in grammar and rhetoric, which was standard

for the time, but declined to pursue a profession.

Because he wanted to write poetry, he sought the

favor of wealthy patrons who would compensate

him for his work in return for flattery. He never

married but still enjoyed the social benefits re-

served for those who had parented three children.

Emperor Titus made him a tribune, which raised

him to the equestrian class.

Though he spent most of his working life in one

of the multilevel flats that housed the bulk of the

common population of Rome, Martial also had a

small country estate, where he took up residence in

94. Four years later, he returned to his birthplace,

aided by his friend

PLINY THE YOUNGER. His pa-

troness there, a generous lady named Marcella,

made life so agreeable that Martial wrote to his

friend JUVENAL expressing his delight with country

life. Though he missed the city, he never returned

to Rome.

Martial scorned the artificial style of EPIC writers

like Statius and instead adopted the straightforward,

personable style he admired in the poet Gaius Va-

lerius CATULLUS, which his audience appreciated. His

earliest surviving work is The Book of Spectacles,

written to celebrate the opening of the Colosseum

in 80. He wrote The Xenia in 83 and The Apophoreta

in 85 to celebrate the Roman feast of the Saturnalia.

Xenia was a word used to describe the leftovers of

the feast as gifts, and apophoreta referred to tradi-

tional gifts. These early epigrams were so popular

that Martial thereafter began to write whole books

of them, collected in the 12 books of Epigrams that

appeared between 85 and 102.

The epigram emerged originally in Greece as a

verse form used in inscriptions on monuments or

artworks, or to accompany gifts. Concise out of ne-

cessity, the poem could be simply descriptive or

commemorate a person or event. After

CALLI-

MACHUS, other poets employed the form for a wide

variety of subjects, but it remained extremely sim-

ple and stylistically pure. After Martial, the epi-

gram was irrevocably linked with satire. In the

words of scholar Peter Howell, Martial brought

this short but powerful form to “a pitch of techni-

cal perfection never afterwards rivalled.”

186 Martial

Later generations found the Epigrams some-

what obscene, but Martial’s frankness is familiar

to the modern eye. The satire in most of the

poems is comparatively gentle, since a man of his

position could scarcely afford to alienate the

wealthy and influential. It required shrewdness

and ingenuity to live the life of a perpetual

hanger-on; therefore, when Martial pokes fun at

his fellows, it seems in good spirit, as can be seen

in James Michie’s translation of the third poem

of Book I:

...Nobody sneers as loud

As a Roman: old or young, even newly-

born,

He turns his nose up like a rhino horn.

As a whole, the Epigrams offer a vivid picture of

life in Rome near the end of the first century. The

poems reveal practices of city life as well as com-

mon attitudes, for instance in the complaint that

appears in the ninth poem of Book V:

I was unwell. You hurried round,

surrounded

By ninety students, Doctor. Ninety chill,

North-wind-chapped hands then pawed

and probed and pounded.

I was unwell: now I’m extremely ill.

In all the 12 books of the Epigrams, the voice of

the poet mocks the foolishness and vanity of

human nature but never seems to hold himself

apart or superior. As Howell says of Martial,

“mankind is his concern. It is his acute perception

of human nature, and boundless interest in the life

around him, that makes him so permanently inter-

esting.” Martial’s influence spread through the late

Roman poets to the medieval writers, and Renais-

sance and Baroque authors revived the epigram as

a way of making a concise and cutting statement.

Eighteenth-century poets and writers in the Euro-

pean tradition, with their relish for caricature, con-

sidered Martial the master, and even poets of the

19th century, such as Lord Byron, found that even

if one did not appreciate Martial, it was still neces-

sary to read him.

English Versions of Works by Martial

Martial: The Epigrams. Translated by James Michie.

New York: Penguin Books, 1973.

Martial: Select Epigrams. Translated by Lindsay Wat-

son, et al. New York: Cambridge University Press,

2003.

Works about Martial

Boyle, A. J. and J. P. Sullivan, eds. Martial in English.

New York: Penguin Books, 1996.

Hull,K.W.D.,ed.Martial and His Times. London:

Bell, 1967.

medieval romance

See ROMANCE, MEDIEVAL.

Menander (ca. 342–292 B.C.) playwright

At the height of Greek cultural importance, the

city-state of Athens was the home of many distin-

guished literary figures. Before the rule of Alexan-

der the Great,Athens had been dominant in both a

political and a cultural sense. Later, in the Hel-

lenistic Age, Athens was no longer an important

political or military power, but it remained a cen-

ter of Greek culture. One of the most distinguished

literary figures that Athens produced during this

time was the playwright Menander.

The nephew of another playwright, Menander

came from a wealthy and respected family. He began

writing early in his life, producing plays as early as

his mid-20s, and continued writing throughout his

life. One of his teachers was the philosopher and

writer

THEOPHRASTUS, who had been a student of AR-

ISTOTLE. Menander was highly regarded by his fellow

Athenians and included the philosopher EPICURUS

among his friends. He regularly participated in the

drama contests of which the Athenians were so

fond, winning eight prizes over the course of his life.

Despite invitations from King Ptolemy I of Egypt

to come to Alexandria, then in the process of eclips-

Menander 187

ing Athens as the center of Greek culture, Menander

loved his home too much to move away from it. He

was around 50 when he drowned while swimming

in Piraeus harbor.

It is thought that Menander wrote more than

100 plays over the course of his life, most of them

comedies. Scholars have recovered some fragments

of Menander’s works, but the only complete sur-

viving play is titled Dyskolos (The Misanthrope, or

The Bad-Tempered Man). The main plot deals

with a man who intensely dislikes everyone else,

particularly the man his daughter wishes to marry.

Later on, his daughter’s fiancé saves his life, forcing

him to allow the wedding.

This play, like so many others Menander wrote,

is one reason scholars view the playwright as being

the greatest representative of a form of Greek drama

called the New Comedy (as opposed to the Old

Comedy of a century earlier, adhered to by such

playwrights as ARISTOPHANES). Unlike the works of

Old Comedy dramatists, Menander’s works do not

dwell on pressing social or political issues. Rather,

they are concerned with commonplace situations to

which any human being, of any time period, can eas-

ily relate. Similarly, they feature ordinary men and

women instead of characters from Greek mythology.

Other Menander plays that have partially sur-

vived include The Arbitrators, The Woman of

Samos, The Ogre, and The Man from Sicyon. As

with Dyskolos, these works seem to share many of

the same themes and styles. One common theme is

that of a young man trying to win the love of a

young woman but facing unexpected and often ab-

surd obstacles in his quest for love. Also common

are stories of separated twins causing confusion

and of parents having difficulty dealing with

ridiculously disobedient children. These themes al-

lowed Menander to create wonderful and success-

ful comedy and also became a means through

which he expressed important truths about human

nature and personal relationships.

Although not as well known as many other

Greek playwrights, Menander had a great influence

on the development of dramatic comedy. His

plots, though familiar today, were unique during

his own time, and his literary style and wit were

such that later writers, such as PLAUTUS and TER-

ENCE, adapted and imitated his works.

English Versions of Works by Menander

The Bad-Tempered Man (Dyskolos). Translated by

Stanley Ireland. Wiltshire, U.K.: Aris & Phillips

Ltd., 1995.

Four Plays of Menander: The Hero, Epitrepontes, Peri-

ceiromene, Samia. Edited by Edward Capps.

Berlin: Melissa Media, 1981.

Menander: The Grouch, Desperately Seeking Justice,

Closely Cropped Locks, the Girl from Samos, the

Shield. Edited by Palmer Bovie, et al. Philadelphia:

University of Pennsylvania Press, 1998.

Menander: The Plays and Fragments. Translated by

Maurice Balme. Oxford: Oxford University Press,

2002.

Works about Menander

Heath, Malcolm. Menander: A Rhetor in Context. Ox-

ford: Oxford University Press, 2004.

Walton, J. Michael and Peter D. Arnott. Menander and

the Making of Comedy. Westport, Conn.: Green-

wood Press, 1996.

Zagagi, Netta. The Comedy of Menander: Convention,

Variation, and Originality. Bloomington: Indiana

University Press, 1995.

Meun, Jean de

See JEAN DE MEUN.

Middle Ages (ca. 450–ca. 1450) era

The Middle Ages is a label traditionally used to de-

scribe a 1,000-year period in western Europe span-

ning the Early Middle Ages (450–900), the High

Middle Ages (900–1200), and the Late Middle Ages

(1200–1450).

Historians traditionally describe medieval so-

ciety as being made up of three classes or estates:

the class that fights, the class that prays, and the

class that tills the land. This model distinguishes

among the clerics, or those who belong to the

188 Meun, Jean de

Church; the kings and nobles, who own the land;

and the peasants, who comprise the bulk of the

population.

Medieval European society was governed by

feudalism, a system of mutual oaths and loyalties

that bound the peasants who lived on the land

(and provided the means of survival for all classes

by producing food, clothing, and other necessities)

to the nobles and knights who owned the land.

Knighthood, attained after a long and arduous ap-

prenticeship as a squire, came to be synonymous

with the French concept of chevalerie, or CHIVALRY,

which was basically a military code governing con-

duct both on and off the battlefield. While origi-

nally a martial concept requiring loyalty, bravery,

physical strength, and battle prowess, in the 12th

century the concept of chivalry became identified

with the practice of courtly love. The concept of

courtly love, originated and spread by the French

TROUBADOURS, came to be an important part of the

social and literary culture of the Middle Ages.

Historians estimate that 80 percent of the peo-

ple living on feudal estates were peasants. About

half were freemen, who could leave when they

chose, and the other half were serfs, legally bound

to the land. While Early Middle Ages systems of

production were essentially agrarian or based on

farming, the increasing settlement of cities and the

development of commercial exchange led, in the

Late Middle Ages, to a thriving city culture char-

acterized by a growing middle class and the an-

tecedents of modern industry. Where those bound

to the land were at the mercy of their overlord, and

often caught up against their will in the disputes

of the upper class, the growing cities were self-

governing, and their residents answered only to the

king. This led to the eventual decline of feudalism

and the rise of parliamentary structures.

The church of the Middle Ages was the Roman

Catholic Church, which governed the lives of those

of all estates. Christianity, the official religion of

the Roman Empire in its last years, retained its cen-

ter of power at Rome in the form of the pope, who

sent missionaries to the “barbarians” until, by the

High Middle Ages, all the lands of western Europe

were Christian. The Church used Latin as its offi-

cial language, though the native or vernacular lan-

guages continued to be spoken among the

laypeople or those not under religious vows.

Monastic orders or cloisters formed where the

truly devoted could dedicate their lives to contem-

plation. Some monasteries (for men) and convents

or nunneries (for women) developed into power-

ful centers of culture and learning.

The Church also inspired art, including music

and painting, but was primarily responsible for ed-

ucation. Priests and those in religious orders were

the most highly educated members of society. Lay

literacy evolved and spread slowly. The BIBLE,

translated by Saint JEROME, was in Latin. Philo-

sophical works, such as those composed by AUGUS-

TINE, BOETHIUS, and FRANCIS OF ASSISI, were written

in Latin. Histories, such as BEDE’s Ecclesiastical His-

tory of the English People, or pseudo-histories, such

as GEOFFREY OF MONMOUTH’s History of the Kings of

Britain, were composed in Latin. Members of reli-

gious orders communicated to each other in Latin,

as did ABÉLARD AND HÉLOÏSE in their letters, and

clerics recording individual experiences, like Julian

of Norwich and HILDEGARD VON BINGEN, did so in

Latin. The Christian Church and the classics of an-

cient Rome, the poetry of authors like VIRGIL and

OVID, were the primary authorities for medieval lit-

erature.

Despite the romantic light cast by chivalry and

courtly love, the Middle Ages were a time of almost

continual warfare and disease, beginning with the

fall of Rome in 476. After the Germanic Franks and

Anglo-Saxons settled France and England in the

fifth and sixth centuries, in the eighth through 10th

century the Vikings harried European shores. In

800, Pope Leo III crowned Charlemagne emperor

of the Holy Roman Empire. In 1066, at the Battle of

Hastings, King Harold of England was defeated by

Duke William of Normandy, thus introducing

French culture into England. In 1076, Pope Gre-

gory VII excommunicated Henry IV, the German

emperor. In 1095, the

CRUSADES launched a planned

counterattack against Islam as articulated by

MUHAMMAD. In 1215, the barons of England wrote

Middle Ages 189

the Magna Carta, and in 1295, Edward I of England

formed a model parliament. Between 1338 and

1471, France and England were constantly at war.

While attacks of the plague occurred frequently,

the Black Death, which first reached Italy from the

Middle East in 1347, proved the worst medical dis-

aster of the Middle Ages, reducing the population

of Europe by a third. Still, as trade routes opened

and western Europe came in contact with the civi-

lizations and technologies of the East through the

travels of explorers like Marco

POLO, information

concerning new civilizations, technologies, and

products revitalized medieval culture.

In 1453, the Ottoman Turks conquered Con-

stantinople, bringing an end to the Byzantine Em-

pire, the last center of Roman civilization. Those

witnessing the rebirth of learning that character-

ized the European Renaissance viewed the thou-

sand-year period after the fall of Rome as a lapse,

a “Dark Age.”

DANTE ALIGHIERI, on the cusp of the

new humanism movement born in Italy in the

13th century, not only coined the term Middle Ages

but also proved that great literature could be writ-

ten in the vernacular.

Critical Analysis

Early medieval literature is largely EPIC in nature.

The

BARDIC POETRY of Celtic-speaking peoples, the

OLD ENGLISH POETRY of the Anglo-Saxons, the Scan-

dinavian EDDA, and the Germanic SAGAs largely

focus on great events. Many of the heroes they de-

scribe, such as King Arthur, Finn, BEOWULF, or the

actors in the NIBELUNGENLIED

, are historical figures

cloaked in the glamour of fantastical myth.

Along with the invention of Western romantic

love, the French are credited with the invention of

MEDIEVAL ROMANCE in the form of the chansons de

geste, or songs of adventure. The SONG OF ROLAND,

the Arthurian romances of CHRÉTIEN DE TROYES, the

legends of TRISTAN AND ISEULT and the HOLY GRAIL,

the ROMANCE OF THE ROSE, and the Spanish El CID—

all capture the essential qualities of romantic liter-

ature. Women like MARIE DE FRANCE and Christine

de Pisan proved that literature was not entirely a

male domain. The French historiographers Geof-

froi de

VILLEHARDOUIN and Jean Froissart gave their

chronicles a romantic cast. However, Dante’s New

Life and Divine Comedy became the models for lit-

erature that all later authors aspired to use.

Some of the most important information about

daily life in the Middle Ages comes from literature

like Giovanni Boccaccio’s The Decameron (1352),

Geoffrey Chaucer’s The Canterbury Tales (1390s),

and François Villon’s Ballade, or The Testament

(1461). As do Fabliaux and the

ROMAN DE RENART of

French literature, these works provide vivid por-

traits of a cross section of the traditional medieval

estates, as well as satiric glimpses of courtly culture.

Other works of literature demonstrate the pre-

vailing ethos of the Middle Ages. Tales like Sir

Gawain and the Green Knight explore the demands

of the courtly code, while poems like William

Langland’s Piers Plowman examine the philosoph-

ical foundations of medieval society. In addition,

theatrical works like the

MYSTERY, morality, and

miracle plays used allegorical characters and bibli-

cal stories to dramatize current issues and events.

The discovery of the printing press ultimately

revolutionized medieval literature. Thanks to Jo-

hannes Gutenberg’s invention of movable type in

1458, not only did the Bible become available to a

broader audience, but publishers could circulate

works of secular literature as well, as William Cax-

ton did with Thomas Malory’s Le Morte D’Arthur

(1485). This, along with the growth of Italian hu-

manism and the decline of feudalism, paved the

way for the Renaissance in Europe.

Works about the Middle Ages

Cantor, Norman F. The Civilization of the Middle

Ages. New York: Harper Perennial, 1994.

Gies, Frances and Joseph. Daily Life in Medieval

Times. New York: Black Dog & Leventhal, 1999.

Hay, Jeff, ed. The Middle Ages, Vol 3. San Diego, Calif.:

Greenhaven Press, 2002.

Steinberg, Theodore L. Reading the Middle Ages: An

Introduction to Medieval Literature. New York:

McFarland & Company, 2003.

190 Middle Ages