Turold

The oldest surviving manuscript of the Song of Roland, at Oxford, ends with the line 'Here ends the tale that Turoldus tells.' Beyond this we know nothing of Turold: he may have been the poem's author, or its copyist, or the minstrel who sang it. The poem took shape in the late eleventh century, around the time of the First Crusade, and is generally thought to have circulated among the Normans of Normandy or England. It is said that when William of Normandy invaded England in 1066, a minstrel sang the deeds of Roland before the army at Hastings to stir the soldiers' courage.