"Renart and his Horse".

Renart, stuffed with eels and herrings, jumps to the ground from the cart where the merchants have imprudently thrown him, a necklace of fish around his neck, and as a farewell throws a gab at his victims who try to pursue him ... A providential and ghostly mount, born at the hour of peril and vanished as soon as Renart is out of reach, comes to lend in need the speed of its race to the fox, at the end of an episode yet apart from the convention of language, the animal nature of the hero has never been denied. Sporadic throughout the Novel, with variable characters according to the storytellers, the evocation of animals mounted in the posture of knights is present. ... By common feeling, the mounts of our heroes have usually been classified among the elements of feudal transposition, even considering them undoubtedly as one of the most pertinent or at least the most visible in the evocation of the chivalric setting, although sometimes the curiously evanescent nature of such horses whose role is limited to the metaphorical illustration of a long race or a rapid escape is emphasized. - [Author]

Language: French