And so another month passes. I’m happy to say that I have begun a new paper on Boeve intending to establish why the hero should be ‘…of Haumtone’, and thus ultimately ‘of Southampton’. The answer seems relatively simple, at least from the point of view of my research, although it may take some work to construct the properly convincing argument. It is based on historical details and literary references, and happily the keystone of the argument emerged from all the work I did last year on pilgrimage. This demonstrated the significance of the port. When I add in Geoffrey of Monmouth and Ralph de Diceto some interesting connections can be made.
Of course the dating of Boeve requires negotiation, but I still believe that composition must be separated from the scribal recording. This is likely to be contentious but I am prepared to defend my theory by reference to all the historical records. There are so many other aspects to the matter of naming in Boeve, and they all eventually echo in Bevis, but I believe the only way to proceed is by taking each element in turn because I have already, on more than one occasion, made the mistake of trying to put too much into one paper. However, I now regard each of those disappointing attempts as ‘mines’ from which I can now abstract the more valuable nuggets and refine and polish them. Only time will tell if this approach will work.
Sir Bevis of Hampton - Local Hero 