Supplement to the Glossary of the Romance of the Rose

that Abelard had set to verse, and then to music, which was sung throughout France: a slight favor that Heloise prized beyond its true value; but she could well take pride in it, since she preferred the title of his concubine to the dignity of Empress: she found more sweetness in concubinage than in an open marriage.

And if the name of wife seems more holy and more binding, the word "friend" original: "amicæ" has always been sweeter to me, or, if you would not be offended, that of concubine original: "concubinæ" or mistress original: "scorti" (i).

This is what she wrote, while being a nun, to Abelard who had gone to hide his shame in the shadows of a cloister. This learned girl had improved upon To "improve upon" or "outdo" here suggests she took the sentiment even further than the classical source. this passage from an epistle by Dido to Aeneas References to the legendary Queen of Carthage and the Trojan hero from Virgil's Aeneid and Ovid's Heroides. (l).

If you are ashamed of a wife, let me not be called your bride, but your hostess; provided she is yours, Dido will endure being whatever you wish. original Latin: "Si pudet uxoris, non nupta, sed hospita dicar, / Dum tua sit Dido quid libet esse feret."

Posterity has preserved for us few anecdotes from the life of Guillaume de Lorris. Clément Marot A renowned French Renaissance poet who published a modernized version of the Romance of the Rose in the 16th century. compared him to the Ennius Quintus Ennius (c. 239 – c. 169 BC) was a writer often called the "father of Roman poetry." By comparing Lorris to Ennius, Marot is identifying him as the founding father of French literature. of the Romans:

(i) First letter from Heloise to Abelard.
(l) Heroides, Epistle VII.