Bertrand de Roussillon

Bertrand de Roussillon’s story turns on a condition he believes will keep his unwanted wife at a distance. After Gillette de Narbonne cures the King of France, the king gives her Bertrand as the husband she has long desired. Bertrand rejects her on grounds of rank, marries her only under royal compulsion, and flees. Yet the ring and sons he demands as proof eventually confront him in public, and he accepts Gillette as his lawful wife.

Identity and Marriage

Bertrand is the count of Roussillon, a nobleman whose rank governs his judgment of marriage. Gillette has loved him since childhood, but he does not share her attachment when the King of France offers him to her in gratitude for his recovery. The king has promised Gillette the husband she chooses, with the royal family excluded from her choice; she names Bertrand.

Bertrand recognizes Gillette and acknowledges that she is fair, but considers her lineage beneath his own. He objects to being married to a woman he regards as socially unsuitable and tells the king he will not consent. The king insists that his promise must be kept: Gillette has restored his health, and the marriage is the reward she requested. Bertrand submits, but his compliance is formal rather than willing.

Refusal and Flight

On the appointed day, Bertrand marries Gillette before the king. He then asks leave to return to his county and consummate the marriage there, but this is a pretext: instead of going home, he rides to Tuscany. There, while Florence is at war with Siena, he joins the Florentines, who welcome him and appoint him captain over a company of men-at-arms. He remains in their service for a considerable time, separating himself from Gillette and from the county he was expected to govern.

Gillette, meanwhile, goes to Roussillon and is received as its liege lady. Finding the territory disordered after its long period without its lord, she diligently puts it in order. The vassals are pleased with her governance, grow devoted to her, and condemn Bertrand for refusing to return. Her authority in his absence makes his rejection more than a private marital slight: she is already performing the responsibilities of his position.

The Impossible Conditions

Gillette sends two knights to ask Bertrand whether her presence is the reason he stays away and to offer to leave if so. He answers that he will return only when she has his ring on her finger and a son of his in her arms. He treasures the ring because he has been led to believe it possesses a special virtue, and he treats both requirements as barriers that cannot be crossed.

The knights carry this response back to Gillette. She is distressed, but does not interpret his terms as an absolute end to the marriage. After considering how she might fulfill them, she tells Roussillon’s leading men that she will not cause Bertrand to remain in perpetual exile. She asks them to take charge of the county and inform him that she has left him free possession of it. Then, dressed as a pilgrim, she departs with a cousin and a chamberwoman, carrying money and valuable jewels, without disclosing her destination.

Florence and the Return

Gillette reaches Florence and lives quietly at a small inn. The next day, she sees Bertrand ride past with his company. Though she knows him, she asks the hostess who he is. The hostess describes him as a courteous and well-liked gentleman, devoted to a poor young woman who lives with her mother. Gillette investigates, then secretly visits the mother and daughter. She finds them in poverty and makes an arrangement with them; the mother and daughter subsequently move to the country, removing the occasion for Bertrand to visit their house.

When Gillette hears that Bertrand has left Florence and returned to Roussillon, she remains in Florence until she gives birth to twin sons, both strongly resembling their father. Later, still in pilgrim’s clothing, she travels to Montpellier and learns that Bertrand will hold a great gathering at his palace on All Saints’ Day. She enters the crowded hall with her two children and casts herself at his feet, presenting the ring and the sons as fulfillment of the conditions he set.

Bertrand is confounded. He recognizes the ring and sees that the children resemble him, but cannot understand how Gillette has met his demands. She recounts what has happened, and he accepts her account as true. Confronted not only with the promised proofs but with her constancy and ingenuity, he gives up his stubborn resistance. At the urging of his vassals and the assembled ladies, and in keeping with the promise he had made, he raises Gillette, embraces and kisses her, and acknowledges her as his lawful wife and the boys as his children. He has her dressed according to her rank and celebrates with his household and vassals for several days.

Change and Narrative Significance

Bertrand’s arc moves from status-conscious refusal to public recognition. His first response measures Gillette by lineage; his final response accepts her as wife after her actions have demonstrated her capability, persistence, and claim on him. The change is not presented as a gradual courtship: it comes when the conditions he imposed to prevent reunion are made visible and indisputable.

The ring and the children turn Bertrand’s private challenge into a public reckoning. He had used them to defer his return, but Gillette brings both into the hall before his vassals and guests, where he can no longer treat her claim as an abstract possibility. The resolution restores her to the position his flight had denied her and ends his exile from his county and marriage. His acceptance honors his promise, but the story also makes clear that Gillette’s resourcefulness, rather than Bertrand’s initiative, brings the marriage to its conclusion.