. The region that came to be known as the Dauphine is bounded by the Rhone and Savoie on the west and north, by Italy on the east, and by Provence on the south. From the 5th century, it formed part of a succession of kingdoms known as “Burgundy” or “Arles and Vienne” (so named after the two cities that disputed the claim to be its capital). After 1032, this kingdom passed in theory under the direct authority of the Holy Roman emperor, but in fact it continued to be controlled by regional magnates. One of these, Archbishop Brochard of Vienne, gave comital authority over the northern part of the Viennois to the count of Savoy, while giving the southern part, with the title of count, to Guigues le Vieux (d. 1060/70), lord of Vion and Albon. This was the beginning of the Viennois as a political entity, but not until Guigues IV (d. 1142) does the name Dauphin appear, as a surname (Guigo Dalphinus). The reasons for this surname are unknown, but since Guigues’s mother was English and had a cousin named Dolfin, she was probably responsible.
The rulers of the Viennois, while annexing the adjoining territories (the Briangonnais, Gresivaudan, Embrunais, Gapengais, and the baronies of La Tour-du-Pin, Montauban, and Mevouillon), continued to call themselves “count of Vienne and Albon” until the late 13th century, when dauphin first became a title and Dauphine the name of the principality. The acquisition of the Dauphine by the king of France occurred in 1349, after Humbert II sold it to Philip VI, who bestowed it upon his grandson, the future Charles V. Charles was thus the first dauphin belonging to a French royal family, and the royal heir apparent thereafter received the title, underlining the importance of this extension of French sovereignty beyond the Rhone. Under Dauphin Louis II (r. 144057), the future King Louis XI, the final important annexations (Valentinois and Diois) to the Dauphine took place. The mother house of the Carthusian order, La Grande Chartreuse, was founded near Grenoble in 1084, as were the Hospitalers of Saint-Anthoine at about the same time in the Viennois. Several well-known troubadours came from the southern Dauphine, and in 1339 a university was founded at Grenoble.
Eugene L. Cox
[See also: DAUPHIN]
Bautier, Robert-Henri, and Janine Sornay. Les sources de I’histoire economique et social du moyen age. I. Provence, Comtat Venaissin, Dauphine, et etats de la maison de Savoie. Paris: CNRS, 1968.
Bligny, Bernard, ed. Histoire du Dauphine. Toulouse: Privat, 1973.
Chevalier, Cyr Ulysse. Regeste dauphinois, ou repertoire chronologique et analytique des documents imprimes et inedits relatifs a l ’histoire du Dauphine des origines chretiennes a I’annee 1349. 5 vols. Valence: Imprimerie Valentinoise, 1913-26.
Sclafert, Therese. Le Haut-Dauphine au moyen age. Paris: Sirey, 1926.
DAUREL ETBETON
. A single 14th-century manuscript (B. N. nouv. acq. fr. 4232) preserves 2,200 lines of this Occitan chanson de geste in rhymed laisses (the first five in Alexandrines, the rest decasyllabic), composed ca. 1150-68. His father, Boves d’Antona, having been cruelly betrayed, Beton passes his enfance in Babylonian exile with the jongleur Daurel, who sacrifices his own child to save Beton. In a unique Odyssean prelude to Beton’s revenge, Daurel recites the tale of betrayal before the traitor himself.
Amelia E. Van Vleck
Kimmel, Arthur S., ed. A Critical Edition of the Old Provencal Epic Daurel et Beton. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1971.
World History
