Mr. Van Laun's theory of the origin of the French people is not a very clear one; not even in his own mind, it would seem. He starts with the assertion, in very positive terms, that the Iberians were the vanguard of the invading races who overwhelmed and swept before them the oldest known inhabitants of Western Europe—the Celts; and his language implies that the former were and the latter were not an Indo-European race; that the vanguard of the Indo-European invaders found the Celts in Europe and overcame them. But there is no doubt, we believe, that the Celts themselves were, or are, an Indo-European race, and that they are the oldest representatives of that race in Europe. Their position in the extreme west, even in the Highlands of Scotland and in Ireland, shows this. As to the Iberians, the name itself is rather vague as that of a people or a race; but as far as we know anything of the race which Mr. Van Laun seems to have in view, they were found in the west of Europe by the invading Celts. The Basques are regarded by philologists and ethnologists as the modern representatives of the "Iberians," if that name must be used—at any rate of the prehistoric inhabitants of Western Europe. Of this Mr. Van Laun himself seems to have an inkling, for he says "they were possibly themselves an indigenous European race driven back upon the Celts by the invading tribes which so persistently trod upon their heels." He finds a confirmation of this supposition in a curious etymological coincidence. In the Basque tongue atzean signifies "behind," and atzea "a foreigner." He accounts for this by supposing that the Iberian, pushed hard by the invaders, made common cause with the Celt, and that therefore the ever-encroaching Goth and Frank were "the people behind him." But if his "Iberians" were an indigenous European race, how could they be "driven back" upon the Celts unless the latter had gone through and through them, and so actually got before them, leaving the indigenous people between them—the Celts—and the succeeding Indo-European invaders? The fact is that Mr. Van Laun has begun so very far back that he is in deep water, rather out of his depth—out of any one's depth indeed. For as to the Basques, they are still an ethnological and philological puzzle. The balance of probabilities, however, seems to be in favor of their being the, or an, indigenous European race, not connected with the Aryan or Indo-European races, against whom they, a small remnant, have managed to hold their own, and preserve their individuality in language, law, and customs for more than two thousand years. The first element, the ground, so to speak, of the French nation, is, however, doubtless Celtic; and as to how much of an intermingling there may have been between them and the "Iberians," or the indigenous race represented by the Basques, we do not know. Judging by the very remarkable individuality of that strange people, their boldness, and their disposition to keep themselves to themselves, the probabilities of any very great intermingling between them and their conquerors are very small indeed.
Upon the Celts came the Greeks and the Romans. The former took no such hold of the country as the latter did; but yet there seems to be some reason for Mr. Van Laun's summary of the influence upon Gaul, (not yet France) of the two great nations of antiquity when he says: "Greece, the commercial nation, had charmed and penetrated her hosts by her poetry, her rhetoric, her arts; Rome, the military nation, remodelled her victims by her laws, her administration, her moral vigor." This is somewhat loosely expressed for a work of such literary pretensions as those of the book before us; but it suggests the truth. There was, however, in the end, to use a popular phrase, "no comparison" between the influence of the Greeks and that of the Romans upon Gaul. It was in letters as in society and in politics; the intellectual existence of Gaul, as well as her physical existence, was to be inextricably interwoven with that of her Roman conquerors. Gaul became Romanized; the language of the country, whatever it had been, was driven out, and Latin took its place. The people of the country became one of what are now known as the Latin races, chiefly because of their languages. French is little more than Latin first debased and then by culture reformed into a language having a character and laws of its own. The words which form the bulk of the French language may be traced, have been traced, down step by step from the original Latin forms; and it is found that changes from ancient Latin to modern French took place according to certain phonetic laws so absolute that, given a Latin word, philologists can tell surely under what form it must appear in French.
After the Romans came the Teutonic invaders; and of these the Franks so imposed themselves upon the country that they gave it their name, and Gaul became France. Charlemagne was neither Celtic nor Latin, but simply Karl the Great, a Teutonic monarch under whose sceptre all the Franks were united. The predominance of the Franks in Gaul for many generations had a modifying influence upon the people. The Celtic Gaul was a lively, spirited, vain, bold, but not a very steadily courageous man. The Teutonic was a quieter, steadier, more reserved, and more thoughtful man. He was a bigger man, too, and like big men, he took things more quietly; he had the steady courage which the dashing and gaily caparisoned Celt somewhat lacked. And yet it is remarkable that in the end the Celtic nature reasserted itself in France, although with some modification; and to-day the Frenchman is a Celt, as fond of talk, of fanciful poetry, of fine dress, and show, and dash, as his forefather was fifteen hundred years ago.
It was not until about the year 850 that the language of the people of France assumed a form distinctively French, according to the modern standard; and even then it was so rude and unformed that to a modern uneducated Frenchman it would be quite as strange and incomprehensible as Latin itself. From the very first the great distinction between the language of the north and that of the south seems to have existed. The langue d'oc and the langue d'oil contended for the mastery, which was finally won by the latter. This is remarkable, as the former was the softer and more cultivated tongue. The finest and the most of the very early poetry of France was written in the langue d'oc. To this literature and to the condition of the society in which it was produced Mr. Van Laun gives much attention, as might have been expected. This part of his book is interesting to students of literary history; but we must confess that the songs of the troubadours have to us very rarely any of the charms of poetry, and that we think that much of the admiration of them which has been expressed by literary antiquarians is fictitious. There is occasionally in these poems a touch of natural feeling; but generally they are cold and full of conceits. Form seems to have been more important in the poet's eyes than spirit; and instead of genuine fervor we have deliberate extravagance. The great epic poem of the French language—its greatest if not its only great poem—the "Chanson de Roland"—is written in the langue d'oil. Mr. Van Laun notices this poem of course, and gives a brief summary of its plot, or we might better say of its incidents; but we are surprised that he does not give it more attention. It is far more worthy of critical examination than the fantastic love poems of the troubadours.
In his account of feudal society and of the effect which its conditions had upon such literature as there was in that day, Mr. Van Laun could hardly pass over those tribunals so characteristic and so foreign to our modes of thought and feeling nowadays—the courts of love, of which the troubadours were, in a sort, the advocates. These courts were governed by a Code of Love, which had thirty-one statutes or ruling maxims. Of these maxims the most significant, and some of the most remarkable, are the following:
The plea of wedlock is not a sufficient excuse from love.
None can be bound by a double love.
It is undoubted that love is always diminishing or increasing.
A two years' widowhood is enjoined for a deceased lover.
It is shameful to love those with whom marriage would be shameful.