Introduction

Desiré is preserved in two manuscripts: (i) S and (ii) MS Cologny-Genève, Bibliotheca Bodmeriana, Codex Bodmer 82 (MS P in Prudence Tobin's edition). Our translation is based on S, a slightly longer version of the story.

The tale begins in Scotland with the hero's parents, who are childless until they visit St Giles in Provence. The wife soon becomes pregnant and they name their son Desiré (the Desired One’). When he grows up, he enters the service of a king and, having been made a knight, wins fame. Summoned by his father, he returns home. While there, he goes riding in the forest and decides to visit a hermit he had known in his youth. On the way he encounters a beautiful maiden whom he attempts to woo, but she persuades him to let her take him to her mistress. She turns out to be a fairy and Desiré falls in love with her. They become lovers, and when he leaves her she gives him a ring, telling him he will lose it if he transgresses in any way. Thereafter, they meet regularly and she bears him two children. Having been away fighting a war for his king, Desiré returns home and one day visits the hermit to whom he confesses his love for the fairy. The hermit imposes a penance and the ring immediately disappears. He cannot find his beloved at the usual meeting place. In despair at losing her, he becomes ill, and it is only after a year, when he is close to death, that the fairy appears to him. She reprimands him, but after this their relationship starts up again.

Several years later, while out hunting, Desiré and the king both shoot at a stag, but they miss their target and then cannot find their arrows. A youth appears, carrying the arrows and declaring that he is Desiré's son. He is taken to court to be with his father, but after a couple of months he suddenly leaves in order to return to his mother. A distraught Desiré rides after him and comes upon a dwarf who is cooking meat over a fire.