Therefore Gaston Paris was right in saying that the Fierabras poem contained only the second part of the earlier poem, the first part of which had not come down to us.
Now it seemed as though this view, which had been clearly [‹xiii›] demonstrated and generally adopted, would have to undergo a thorough modification on the discovery of a new Fierabras Manuscript in Hanover. Professor Grœber, having been informed of the existence of that MS. by Professor Tobler, published from it, in 1873, the poem of the Destruction de Rome,[23] which in that MS. precedes the Fierabras romance.[24] In his Address to the Assembly of German Philologists at Leipzig,[25] the same scholar attempted to show that this poem represented the first part of the earlier Balan romance.
This supposition, however, can only be accepted with reserve, and needs a great modification, as by no means all the references to previous events contained in the Fierabras receive explanation in the Destruction, although all such previous events must have been narrated in the original Balan. Moreover, one of these allusions in the Fierabras is in direct contradiction to the contents of the Destruction.
Thus ll. 2237 et seq. of the Fierabras:[26]—
“.i. chevalier de France ai lontans enamé:
Guis a nom de Borgoigne, moult i a bel armé;
Parens est Karlemaine et Rollant l’aduré.
Dès que je fui à Romme, m’a tout mon cuer emblé,
Quant l’amirans mes peres fist gaster la cité,
Lucafer de Baudas abati ens ou pré,