If the Middle Ages might rightly be considered the Age of Allegory, it may well be because its authors were fascinated by the relation between abstract qualities and concrete human beings, a topic that allegory explores more fully than any other trope. In his prologue to the Chevalier de la charrette (composed between 1177 and 1181), Chrétien de Troyes refers to ‘la dame qui passe / totes celes qui sont vivanz’ (‘the lady who surpasses all those living’ [lines 10–11]), but he makes clear that this lady is ‘ma dame de Chanpaigne’, that is, Marie, countess of Champagne, daughter of King Louis VII and Eleanor of Aquitaine, and one of the most important patronesses of her day. Marie may epitomise a universal value, but, as Chrétien establishes, she has done so through her own particular excellence. As the story opens, Chrétien represents Queen Guinevere, similarly, as at once the incarnation of Love and an actual, historical woman, whom Lancelot both worships and honours. In contrast, in the beginning of the Roman de la rose (composed around 1230), Guillaume de Lorris alludes obliquely to ‘cele qui tant a de pris / et tant est digne d'estre amee / qu'el doit estre Rose clamee’ (‘she who has so much value and is so worthy of being loved that she should be called “Rose”’ [lines 42–4]). The poet portrays his beloved, not as an actual historical woman, like Marie of Champagne, but as a rose, whose identity derives from her allegorical status.