As noted in Part I, most scholars who show particular interest in early modern memoirs argue that they were an exclusively French writing practice that emerged around 1500. Yet even if we accept the definition of memoirs these scholars adopt – a definition extracted from studying mainly French Renaissance texts – many non-French Renaissance texts qualify as memoirs. The previous pages contain ample proof that in the Renaissance military memoirs were written in other languages besides French. For non-French civilian Renaissance memoirs, the best overview is Amelang's research.

Similarly, if the aforesaid definition is accepted, there is no basis for arguing that memoirs began to be written only in the middle of the fifteenth century. Clearly much earlier medieval French texts – such as Phelippe de Nevaire's Estoire de la Guerre qui fu entre l'empereor Frederic & Johan d'Ibelin and the partly lost Quatre Ages de l'homme, Villehardouin's Conquête de Constantinople, and Joinville's Vie de saint Louis – display all of the above characteristics, and at least Joinville's text was recognized as memoirs in Renaissance France. There are also quite a few non-French medieval texts that display these characteristics, such as Walter the Chancellor's Bella Antiochena, Emperor Charles IV's Vita Karoli Quarti, Gerald of Wales's Expugnatio Hibernica, Odo of Deuil's De profectione Ludovici VII in orientem, Oliver of Paderborn's Capture of Damietta, Fernan Alvarez de Albornoz's Memorias, the chronicles of Caffarus, Salimbene of Parma, Dino Compagni, Muntaner, King Jaume I, King Pere III, and the writings of the caballero school in late-medieval Castile, in particular Pedro López de Ayala's Crónicas de los reyes de Castilla.