DOI Seite / Zitierlink:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.63221#0249
CHAPTER XIII
(1495—1544 f
I
CLEMENT MAROT
For the last fifteen years and more, from the battle of
Pavia onwards, there had been a marked progress in the
literature of France. The National movement was beginning
to assert itself, though here its development was slower than
in the sister arts. Since the days of its first great progenitor,
Francois Villon, and of Charles d’Orleans, the ballade-singer,
it had been chiefly represented by the Drama. The “ Fraterni-
ties ” were the first actors, and “ Mysteries,” as in other
countries, the first plays. These dramatized versions of the
Scriptures were acted in the Hopital de la Trinite and the
Hotel de Flandre, of which the “ Fraternities ” obtained the
monopoly; and the people flocked to them without interfer-
ence until the time of King Francis. The rise of the
Reformers was the death-blow of the Mysteries. In 1542,
the Provost of Paris objected to the performance of the Acts
of the Apostles and protested against Mysteries in general.
They kept their audience from Mass, he said, lasting as they
did, from ten o’clock until five; and they made the Priests
hurry over the service, or even abandon it in their eagerness
to reach the play in time. And then there was the political
(1495—1544 f
I
CLEMENT MAROT
For the last fifteen years and more, from the battle of
Pavia onwards, there had been a marked progress in the
literature of France. The National movement was beginning
to assert itself, though here its development was slower than
in the sister arts. Since the days of its first great progenitor,
Francois Villon, and of Charles d’Orleans, the ballade-singer,
it had been chiefly represented by the Drama. The “ Fraterni-
ties ” were the first actors, and “ Mysteries,” as in other
countries, the first plays. These dramatized versions of the
Scriptures were acted in the Hopital de la Trinite and the
Hotel de Flandre, of which the “ Fraternities ” obtained the
monopoly; and the people flocked to them without interfer-
ence until the time of King Francis. The rise of the
Reformers was the death-blow of the Mysteries. In 1542,
the Provost of Paris objected to the performance of the Acts
of the Apostles and protested against Mysteries in general.
They kept their audience from Mass, he said, lasting as they
did, from ten o’clock until five; and they made the Priests
hurry over the service, or even abandon it in their eagerness
to reach the play in time. And then there was the political