The 11
th century
Song of Roland, an epic poem based on the Battle of Roncevaux in 778, describes Charlemagne riding into battle with Joyeuse by his side:
[Charlemagne] was wearing his fine white coat of mail and his helmet with gold-studded stones; by his side hung Joyeuse, and never was there a sword to match it; its color changed thirty times a day.
One day, during battle, Charlemagne allegedly lost Joyeuse, and promised a reward for anyone who could find it. After several attempts, one of his soldiers brought it to him and Charlemagne kept his promise by saying, “
Here will be built an estate of which you will be the lord and master, and your descendants will take the name of my wonderful sword: Joyeuse.” Charlemagne is said to have planted his sword in the ground to mark the point where the town would be built. According to the story, this is the origin of the French town of Joyeuse in Ardèche, which was founded on that spot and named in honor of the sword
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We have recently seen a spate of books defending the Enlightenment, the period of efflorescence in 18th-century Europe that helped shape the modern world.
At the vanguard has been the Harvard psychologist Steven Pinker, who titled his most recent monument to scientific progress Enlightenment Now. The book earned Bill Gates’s endorsement but was widely criticised by historians since it was not an assessment of the Enlightenment at all, but a compilation of data showing us why life was now better than ever.
Other advocates have been more subtle, stressing that what set the Enlightenment apart from preceding eras was less its confidence in reason per se, than its focus on the secular (as opposed to the sacred) as the space in which happiness ought to be pursued and quite possibly achieved.
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