Ruin and Restoration: Troy and the Politics of the City in Medieval English Literature’

In late-medieval Britain, the rise of towns and cities as sites of commercial wealth led to confrontations between urban elites and feudal lords for control of the cities. The legend of Troy, reimagined by medieval authors drawing indirectly on Homer and Virgil, represents the ruin and restoration of a city, providing a powerful model for urban audiences and rulers in Britain. Comparing Lydgate’s Troy Book with the anonymous Seege or Batayle of Troye, this paper argues that the two texts construct different and competing forms of urban governance in the shadow of potential ruin.

Helen Fulton is Chair of Medieval Literature at the University of Bristol. She has published widely on Medieval English and Welsh literatures from the perspective of their political and literary connections. She is currently leading a five-year funded project on the cultural history of the medieval March of Wales, focusing on the circulation of manuscripts and the role of patrons in this distinctive border region.