THE CHARACTERISTICS OF THE AUDIENCE

On the basis of the considerations that have been assembled so far, we are looking for readers distinguished by the following characteristics: a knowledge of literature, a strong interest in Arthurian material and conservative tendencies. There is evidence for the proposal that such a section of the public is to be found within the territories not of the French kings but of the Angevin kings of England. This suggestion is supported by the dominant role of Anglo-Norman literature in the twelfth century, continuing into the thirteenth, as well as by the political significance of the Arthurian material for the Anglo-Norman aristocracy's claims to legitimacy and sovereignty, and by the social and psychological position of the French-speaking stratum of the population in England, especially after the loss of their hereditary fiefs on the Continent at the beginning of the thirteenth century.

It is not possible at this point to go into detail about the significance and development of those works of French literature which were produced within the social circles of Henry II and his family.