Bradamante, a female Christian knight in the service of Charlemagne, is the sister of Rinaldo and the daughter of Duke Amon, the duke of Dordognes.[4] She falls in love with a Saracen warrior named Ruggiero, but she refuses to marry him unless he converts from Islam. An expert in combat, she wields a magical lance that unhorses anyone it touches, and rescues Ruggiero from being imprisoned by the wizard Atlantes.[5] She is described as wearing white, with a white shield and a crest of a pennon.[6]
She is one of the French warriors fighting during a Saracen invasion into France. She is in the middle of fighting a Saracen warrior, Rodomont, when another Saracen warrior, Ruggiero, informs her that Charlemagne is retreating. Bradamante tries to leave to join the rest of the French forces, but Rodomont keeps her from leaving. Ruggiero, finding Rodomont’s actions dishonorable, steps in to fight Rodomont to allow Bradamante to leave. However, Bradamante is unable to catch up to Charlemagne’s army and instead returns to Rodomont and Ruggiero, feeling guilty for leaving someone else to fight in her place. Rodomont is impressed with the honor of Ruggiero and Bradamante and rides off, leaving Ruggiero and Bradamante together. They are mutually impressed with one another and share their identities. Bradamante also removes her helmet, revealing to Ruggiero for the first time that she is a woman. An ambush then manages to separate them.[7]
The two lovers are separated many more times in the story, and Bradamante faces many challenges. She travels to a castle made of steel to rescue Ruggiero from the wizard Atlantes with the help of the sorceress Melissa and a magic ring,[8] escapes from a castle full of illusions,[9] and encounters many other difficulties.
After the lovers are reunited, Rinaldo grants Ruggiero his blessing to marry Bradamante. However, her parents reject the suitor even after Ruggiero converts to Christianity, preferring Leo, the son of the Greek emperor Constantine. Bradamante manages to convince King Charlemagne to decree that she will only marry a man who can withstand her in battle, greatly angering her parents, who nonetheless reluctantly agree. Ruggiero, meanwhile, sets off to kill Leo. On the way, he finds the Constantine’s forces battling the Bulgarians. Ruggiero immediately enters the battle to assist the Bulgarians, who had been losing, and manages to turn the tide of the battle. However, he is captured and imprisoned by the Greeks. Leo, impressed with Ruggiero’s valor, frees him. He then asks for a favor, and Ruggiero, grateful for his freedom, promises to grant whatever Leo asks. Leo, having learned of Bradamante’s challenge and knowing he isn’t strong enough to win against her, asks that Ruggiero fight Bradamante on his behalf. Ruggiero reluctantly keeps his promise and disguises himself as Leo to fight Bradamante. He wins the match and retreats to the woods, wishing to die. There, Leo finds him and asks what is wrong. After Ruggiero reveals his identity and that he is in love with Bradamante, Leo annuls the engagement to let Bradamante and Ruggiero wed.[10][11] At the end, their marriage gives rise to the noble House of Este, who were patrons to both Boiardo and Ariosto.[12][13]
The poems drew from legends of Charlemagne, chansons de geste, and blended recurring motifs found in the Matter of France and the Matter of Britain.[14][15][16] Bradamante and Ruggiero's romance is most likely made to parallel the romance of Angelica and Orlando. Bradamante and Ruggiero's love is reciprocated and honorable, whereas Orlando is driven mad with love and Angelica despises him. Bradamante also spends much of Orlando Furioso chasing down her love to save him, contrasting with Angelica, who spends most of the story running from Orlando.[17]
In later works
Bradamante and Fiordispina (1632–1635) by Guido Reni
In 1582, French dramatist Robert Garnier wrote a tragicomedy named Bradamante that further develops the love story between the heroine and Roger (Ruggiero).[18]
Several eponymous operas have been written about the heroine:
Bradamante appears as one of the leading characters in several novels. For example, in Italo Calvino's surrealistic, highly ironic 1959 novel Il Cavaliere inesistente (The Nonexistent Knight).[21]
In cinema, she is depicted by Barbara De Rossi in the 1983 Italian film Paladini-storia d'armi e d'amori (also known as Paladins—the story of love and arms or Hearts and Armour) – a film based on the legends surrounding the Peers of Charlemagne.[22]
She appears as a Lancer class Servant in the mobile game Fate/Grand Order.
The mobile game Puzzles and Dragons has added her to their roster as "White Feathered Knight, Bradamante" with Active Skill "La Bella Paladina" and Leader Skill "I don't fraternize with weaklings".
↑ Calvino, Italo (23 October 2012). "Bradamante e Marfisa". Orlando furioso di Ludovico Ariosto raccontato da Italo Calvino[Orlando Furioso by Ludovico Ariosto narrated by Italo Calvino] (in Italian). Segrate, Italy: Edizioni Mondadori. p.180. ISBN978-88-520-3018-5. Retrieved 14 July 2016.
↑ Ariosto, Ludovico (2009). Orlando furioso: a new verse translation. The Belknap Press of Harvard University Press. pp.41–53. ISBN978-0-674-03535-5.
↑ Ariosto, Ludovico (2009). Orlando furioso: a new verse translation. The Belknap Press of Harvard University Press. pp.259–267. ISBN978-0-674-03535-5.
↑ Reynolds, Barbara (30 August 1975). "Introduction". In Arisoto, Ludovico (ed.). Orlando Furioso: Part I. Translated by Reynolds, Barbara. New York, USA: Penguin Group. p.64. ISBN978-1-101-49280-2. Retrieved 15 July 2016.
↑ Ward, Adolphus William; Waller, Alfred Rayney; Trent, William Peterfield; Erskine, John; Sherman, Stuart Pratt; Van Doren, Carl, eds. (1907–1921). "Chapter XIII: Metrical Romances, 1200–1500". The Cambridge History of English and American Literature. Cambridge, U.K.: Cambridge University Press. p.13. ISBN1-58734-073-9. Retrieved 14 July 2016.
↑ Ariosto, Lodovico (1962). Sir John Harington's Translation of Orlando Furioso. Southern Illinois University Press. pp.IX.
↑ Stone, Donald (2015). "The Place of Garnier's Bradamante in Dramatic History". Journal of the Australasian Universities Language and Literature Association. 26 (1): 260–271. doi:10.1179/aulla.1966.26.1.007. ISSN0001-2793.
1 2 3 Clément, Félix; Larousse, Pierre (1881). Dictionnaire des Opéras[Dictionary of Operas] (in French). Paris, France: Administration du Grand Dictionnaire Universel. p.119. Retrieved 15 July 2016.
Tomalin, Margaret (July 1976). "Bradamante and Marfisa: An Analysis of the 'Guerriere' of the 'Orlando Furioso'". The Modern Language Review. 71 (3): 540–552. doi:10.2307/3725747. JSTOR3725747.
Ludovico Ariosto was an Italian poet. He is best known as the author of the romance epic Orlando Furioso (1516). The poem, a continuation of Matteo Maria Boiardo's Orlando Innamorato, describes the adventures of Charlemagne, Orlando, and the Franks as they battle against the Saracens with diversions into many sideplots. The poem is transformed into a satire of the chivalric tradition. Ariosto composed the poem in the ottava rima rhyme scheme and introduced narrative commentary throughout the work.
Orlando furioso is an Italian epic poem by Ludovico Ariosto which has exerted a wide influence on later culture. The earliest version appeared in 1516, although the poem was not published in its complete form until 1532. Orlando furioso is a continuation of Matteo Maria Boiardo's unfinished romance Orlando innamorato. In its historical setting and characters, it shares some features with the Old French Chanson de Roland of the eleventh century, which tells of the death of Roland. The story is also a chivalric romance which stemmed from a tradition beginning in the late Middle Ages and continuing in popularity in the 16th century and well into the 17th.
Renaudde Montauban was a legendary hero and knight which appeared in a 12th-century Old French chanson de geste known as The Four Sons of Aymon. The four sons of Duke Aymon are Renaud, Richard, Alard and Guiscard, and their cousin is the magician Maugris. Renaud possesses the magical horse Bayard and the sword Froberge.
Orlando Innamorato is an epic poem written by the Italian Renaissance author Matteo Maria Boiardo. The poem is a romance concerning the heroic knight Orlando (Roland). It was published between 1483 and 1495.
Orlando, usually known in modern times as Orlando furioso, is an opera in three acts by Antonio Vivaldi to an Italian libretto by Grazio Braccioli, based on Ludovico Ariosto's epic poem Orlando Furioso. The first performance of the opera was at the Teatro San Angelo, Venice, in November 1727. It is to be distinguished from an earlier Vivaldi opera of 1714, Orlando furioso, set to much the same libretto, once thought to be a revival of a 1713 opera by Giovanni Alberto Ristori but now considered by Vivaldian musicologists to be a fully-fledged opera by Vivaldi himself.
Astolfo is a fictional character in the Matter of France where he is one of Charlemagne's paladins. He is the son of Otto, the King of England, and is a cousin to Orlando and Rinaldo, and a descendant of Charles Martel. While Astolfo's name appeared in the Old French chanson de gesteThe Four Sons of Aymon, his first major appearance was in the anonymous early fourteenth-century Franco-Italian epic poem La Prise de Pampelune. He was subsequently a major character in Italian Renaissance romance epics, such as Morgante by Luigi Pulci, Orlando Innamorato by Matteo Maria Boiardo, and Orlando Furioso by Ludovico Ariosto.
Oliver, sometimes referred to as Olivier de Vienne or de Gennes, is a legendary knight in the Matter of France chansons de geste, especially the French epic The Song of Roland. In the tradition, he was Roland's closest friend, advisor, confidant and brother-in-law to be, one of Charlemagne's twelve peers and brother of Aude, Roland's betrothed. He dies with Roland at the Battle of Roncevaux Pass. Some critics have linked his name to the olive tree, a biblical symbol of divine wisdom.
Atlantes was a powerful sorcerer featured in chansons de geste. In Boiardo's Orlando Innamorato (1482), where he is known as Atalante, the magician fears that Rugiero will convert to Christianity and aid Charlemagne against the Saracens. To prevent this and forestall Rugiero's death, he constructs a magic garden ringed by glass on Mt. Carena in the Atlas Mountains, after which he is named. In Orlando Furioso, Atlantes' magical castle is filled with illusions, in order to divert Ruggiero from what he has foretold as certain doom. Ruggiero is later set free by Bradamante and after numerous trials and quests sires a great line of heroes. He later dies betrayed fulfilling the destiny foretold by Atlantes.
Ferragut was a character—a Saracen paladin, sometimes depicted as a giant—in texts dealing with the Matter of France, including the Historia Caroli Magni, and Italian epics, such as Orlando Innamorato by Matteo Maria Boiardo and Orlando Furioso by Ludovico Ariosto. In the tales, he was portrayed as physically invulnerable except at his navel/stomach, and was eventually killed by the paladin Roland.
Angelica is a princess in the epic poem Orlando innamorato by Matteo Maria Boiardo. She reappears in the saga's continuation, Orlando furioso by Ludovico Ariosto, and in various later works based on the two original Orlando pieces. The narratives are part of the Matter of France, a cycle of legendary history stories based on the adventures of Charlemagne and his paladins.
Rodomonte is a major character in the Italian romantic epic poems Orlando innamorato by Matteo Maria Boiardo and Orlando furioso by Ludovico Ariosto. He is the King of Sarza and Algiers and the leader of the Saracen army which besieges Charlemagne in Paris. He is in love with Doralice, Princess of Granada, but she elopes with his rival Mandricardo. He tries to seduce Isabella but she tricks him into killing her by mistake. In remorse, Rodomonte builds a bridge in her memory and forces all who cross it to pay tribute. When the "naked and mad" Orlando arrives at the bridge, it is Rodomonte, the pagan, who throws him into the river below. They both swim ashore, but Orlando who is naked and is unimpeded by heavy armor gets to the shore first. Finally, Rodomonte appears at the wedding of Bradamante and Ruggiero and accuses Ruggiero of treason for converting to Christianity and abandoning the Saracen cause. The two fight a duel and Rodomonte is killed.
Ruggiero is a leading character in the Italian romantic epics Orlando Innamorato by Matteo Maria Boiardo and Orlando Furioso by Ludovico Ariosto. Ruggiero had originally appeared in the twelfth-century French epic Aspremont, reworked by Andrea da Barberino as the chivalric romance Aspramonte. In Boiardo and Ariosto's works, he is supposed to be the ancestor of Boiardo and Ariosto's patrons, the Este family of Ferrara, and he plays a major role in the two poems.
Brunello is a character in the Italian romantic epics Orlando innamorato by Matteo Maria Boiardo and Orlando furioso by Ludovico Ariosto. Brunello is a dwarf and a cunning thief who works for the Saracen army of King Agramante. He first appears in the second book of Orlando innamorato where Agramante intends to invade Europe and defeat the Emperor Charlemagne. He has been told he has no chance of success unless he has the young warrior Ruggiero on his side, but Ruggiero has been hidden in a secret garden by the wizard Atlante and the only way to reach him is by using the magic ring belonging to Princess Angelica. Brunello undertakes to steal it and sets off for the fortress of Albracca where not only does he manage to snatch the ring but also robs King Sacripante of his horse and the female warrior Marfisa of her sword. Marfisa sets off in pursuit but Brunello evades her and gives the ring to Agramante, who rewards him with a kingdom. The Saracens find Ruggiero at Mount Carena where they see him behind a wall of glass. However, the wall is too steep and slippery to climb, so Brunello suggests they trick Ruggiero out. He gets them to play war games in the plain beneath the mountain. Ruggiero, with his inherent love of combat, cannot resist and in spite of Atlante's pleas he leaves the garden and begs Brunello for his horse and armour. Brunello only agrees if he will join their expedition against France, to which Ruggiero happily consents.
Marfisa is a character in the Italian romantic epics Orlando innamorato by Matteo Maria Boiardo and Orlando Furioso by Ludovico Ariosto. She is the sister of Ruggiero but was separated from him in early childhood. She becomes queen of India and fights as a warrior for the Saracens, taking part in the siege of the fortress Albracca until her sword is stolen by Brunello. She falls in love with Ruggiero, unaware who he is until Atlantes reveals their background. Learning that her parents were Christian, she converts to the faith and joins the Emperor Charlemagne's army against the Saracens.
The Paladins, also called the Twelve Peers, are twelve legendary knights, the foremost members of Charlemagne's court in the 8th century. They first appear in the medieval chanson de geste cycle of the Matter of France, where they play a similar role to the Knights of the Round Table in Arthurian romance. In these romantic portrayals, the chivalric paladins represent Christianity against a Saracen (Muslim) invasion of Europe. The names of the paladins vary between sources, but there are always twelve of them led by Roland. The paladins' most influential appearance is in The Song of Roland, written between 1050 and 1115, which narrates the heroic death of Roland at the Battle of Roncevaux Pass.
Agolant or Agolante is a fictional character in Medieval and Renaissance romantic epics dealing with the Matter of France, including Orlando innamorato by Matteo Maria Boiardo and Orlando furioso by Ludovico Ariosto. He is a Saracen king from Africa.
Angelica and the Hermit is a 1626–1628 painting by Peter Paul Rubens. It shows an episode from canto 8 of Ludovico Ariosto's poem Orlando Furioso. It is now in the Kunsthistorisches Museum in Vienna.
Roger Freeing Angelica is an oil painting by Swiss symbolist painter Arnold Böcklin, from 1873. The painting illustrates a scene from Ariosto's epic Orlando Furioso, in which the Muslim knight Roger saves the pagan princess Angelica from a sea monster. The motif is closely related to the mythological theme of Perseus saving Andromeda.
Il Ruggiero is an opera in three acts composed by Johann Adolph Hasse to a libretto by Pietro Metastasio. It was first staged on 16 October 1771 for the wedding of Archduke Ferdinand Karl with Maria Beatrice d'Este in the Teatro Regio Ducale, Milan. It was both Metastasio's last libretto and Hasse's last opera, as well as the thirty-second Metastasio libretto Hasse had set to music.
Mandricardo is a character from the Matter of France, featured in the Italian romantic epic poems Orlando innamorato by Matteo Maria Boiardo and Orlando furioso by Ludovico Ariosto.
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