Sir Orfeo is an anonymous Middle English narrative poem. ... Middle English is the name given by historical philologists to the diverse forms of the English language spoken in England from around the 12th to the 15th centuries— from after the Norman invasion by William the Conqueror in 1066 to the mid to late 15th century, when the Chancery Standard... Narrative poetry is poetry that tells a story. ...

Dated to the late thirteenth or early fourteenth century, it represents a mixture of the Greek myth of Orpheus with Celtic mythology and folklore concerning fairies, introduced into the English culture via the Old French Breton lais of poets like Marie de France. Sir Orfeo is preserved in three manuscripts, Advocates 19.2.1 known as the Auchinleck MS. and dated at about 1330, the oldest. The next oldest manuscript, Harley 3810, is from about the beginning of the fourteenth century. The third, Ashmole 61, was compiled over the course of several years; the portion of the MS. containing Sir Orfeo is c. 1488. The beginning of the poem describes itself as a Breton lai, and says it is derived from a no longer extant text, the Lai d*Orphey. Child Ballad 19 "King Orfeo" is closely related to this poem. (12th century - 13th century - 14th century - other centuries) As a means of recording the passage of time, the 13th century was that century which lasted from 1201 to 1300. ... (13th century - 14th century - 15th century - more centuries) As a means of recording the passage of time, the 14th century was that century which lasted from 1301 to 1400. ... Greek mythology comprises the collected legends of Greek gods and goddesses and ancient heroes and heroines, originally created and spread within an oral-poetic tradition. ... The head of Orpheus, from an 1865 painting by Gustave Moreau. ... A Celtic cross incorporating the Celtic knotwork motif associated with Celtic cultures Like other Iron Age Europeans, the early Celts maintained a polytheistic mythology and religious structure. ... For the Nelly Furtado album, see Folklore (album). ... by Sophie Anderson A fairy, or faery, is a creature from stories and mythology, often portrayed in art and literature as a minuscule humanoid with insect-like wings. ... Royal motto: Dieu et mon droit (French: God and my right) Englands location within the UK Official language English de facto Capital London de facto Largest city London Area  - Total Ranked 1st UK 130,395 km² Population  - Total (2001)  - Density Ranked 1st UK 49,138,831 377/km² Religion... Old French is a term sometimes used to refer to the langue doïl, the continuum of varieties of Romance language spoken in territories corresponding roughly to the northern half of modern France and parts of Belgium and Switzerland during the period roughly from 1000 to 1300 A.D... Traditional coat of arms This article is about the historical duchy and French province, as well as the cultural area of Brittany. ... Breton lai or lay is a form of medieval French and English romantic literature. ... Marie de France was a poet, in France and England during the late 12th century. ...

In the poem, Sir Orfeo, king of Thrace, loses his wife Heurodis (i.e. Eurydice) to the fairy king, who steals her away from under an apple tree, an imp tree that happened to be haunted by the fairies, and takes her to his underworld kingdom. Orfeo, distraught by this, leaves his court and wanders in a forest. While there, he sees Heurodis riding past in the company of the fairy host. He follows them to the realm of the fairy king, where he entertains the fairy king by playing his harp. The fairy king, pleased with Orfeo's music, offers him the chance to choose a reward; he chooses Heurodis. Orfeo returns with Heurodis and reclaims his throne. Thrace is a historical and geographic area in south-east Europe spread over southern Bulgaria, north-eastern Greece, and European Turkey. ... In Greek mythology, there were two characters named Eurydice, or Eurydíkê. The more famous was a woman - or a nymph - named Eurydice who was the wife of Orpheus. ... In the study of mythology and religion, the underworld is a generic term approximately equivalent to the lay term afterlife, referring to any place to which newly-dead souls go. ... The harp is a chordophone whose strings are positioned perpendicular to the soundboard. ...

While this is not the classical myth of Orpheus, the poet shows substantial ingenuity in merging the Orpheus of mythology, who tries and fails to obtain the return of his wife Eurydice from Hades, the realm of Pluto, with the traditional Celtic fairy motifs of the fairy rade or hunt, the fairies' otherworldly kingdom, their attempts to abduct mortals, and the magical transformations endured by those who are captured by them. These motifs are shared by both Sir Orfeo and later-collected versions of Celtic ballad fairy-lore in such works as the ballads of Thomas the Rhymer and Tam Lin. This article describes the ancient classical period: for the classical period in music (second half of the 18th century): see Classical music era. ... Hades (Greek: - Hadēs or - Háidēs) (unseen) means both the ancient Greek abode of the dead and the god of that underworld. ... Pluto was the god of the underworld in Roman mythology. ... A Celtic cross. ... The ancient symbol of the pentagram is often used as a symbol for magic. ... A ballad is a story in song, usually a narrative song or poem. ... Thomas the Rhymer (also Thomas Rhymer or Thomas Rymer) is the better-known name of Thomas of Erceldoune, a 13th Century Scottish soothsayer. ... Tam Lin is the hero of a Scottish Borders legend about faeries and mortal men (one of several Thomases in myth, the others are True Thomas and Thomas the Rhymer). ...

Following J.R.R. Tolkien's death, his son Christopher Tolkien found an unpolished translation of Sir Orfeo and published it in edited form with Sir Gawain and the Green Knight and Pearl. J. R. R. Tolkien in 1916. ... Christopher John Reuel Tolkien (born November 21, 1924) is best known as the son of author J. R. R. Tolkien, and as the editor of much of his fathers posthumously published work. ... Sir Gawain and the Green Knight is a late 14th century metrical romance recorded in a manuscript containing three other pieces of an altogether more Christian orientation, which are linked by a commonality of dialect usage. ...

References

• Bliss, A. J. Ed. Sir Orfeo. Oxford: Oxford University Press. 1966.

• Brouland, Marie-Therese. Le Substrat celtique du lai breton anglais:Sir Orfeo. Paris: Didier Erudition. 1990.

• Shuldham-Shaw, Patrick. *The Ballad King Orfeo.* Scottish Studie 20: 124*26. 1976.

• Sir Orfeo. Kenneth Sisam. Ed. Fourteenth Century Verse and Prose. Oxford: Oxford University Press. 1921.

External links

• Sir Orfeo (http://www.lib.rochester.edu/camelot/teams/orfeo.htm) etext
• The Englishing of Romance: Familiarising Sir Orfeo (http://gondolin.hist.liv.ac.uk/~azaroth/university/orfeo/orfeo.html) by Robert Sanderson