Louis Chalon, «L'Effondrement de l'Espagne visigothique et l'invasion musulmane selon le Poema de Fernán González», AEM, IX (1974-79), 353-63, compares the Poema's account with the historical reality and with historiographic tradition, The comparison is also made in the last section of the article by Pedro Valdecantos García, «Los godos en el Poema de Fernán González», Revista de la Universidad de Madrid, VI (1957), 499-530, whom Chalon does not cite. Chalon's article is much superior to that of his predecessor, who, although he offers a good deal of useful information, reflects too obviously the political attitudes of official Spain in the 1950s (e. g., «Con su vida colectiva, intrigante en revuelo perpetuo, [los judíos] dan al pleito dinástico un cariz esencialmente trágico. Es el problema hebreo el mayor peligro que tenía planteado el estado visigodo; problema muy antiguo», p. 519).

James F. Burke, History and Vision: the figural structure of the «Libro del Cavallero Zifar» (London: Tamesis, 1972), pp. 57-58.

Nepaulsingh (p. 86) suggests another Biblical source for part of the amplification: «The melting of the Gothic weapons in a huge fire (st. 63) probably echoes Ezekiel 39:9 ("et succendent et comburent arma")».

I discuss the equivalent passage of the Estoria de España in «The Death and Rebirth of Visigothic Spain in the Estoria de España», RCEH, IX (1984-85), 345-67, at p. 358.

Criticism and Medieval Poetry (London: Edward Arnold, 1964), p. 23.

West (p. 37) translates carbonero as 'coal-miner', but I remain convinced that 'charcoal-burner' is the correct rendering.

See Claude Édouard Allaigre, «Des Rapports de l'histoire, de la légende et de la chanson de geste: le saint moine-ermite du Poema de Fernán González», in Les Genres littéraires et leurs rapports avec l'histoire: Actes du XIVe Congrès de la Société des Hispanistes Français (Nice: SHF, 1978), pp. 17-31; the discussion that followed this paper is recorded, pp. 33-48,

Graciela Brevedán, «Estudio estructural del Poema de Fernán González» (unpublished doctoral thesis, University of Kentucky, 1976), pp. 30-31, compares this pattern with an example in Visigothic Spain: Wamba's successor (Poema, st. 33).

On the development of this topos, see Stephen Reckert, The Matter of Britain and the Praise of Spain: the history of a panegyric (Cardiff: University of Wales Press, 1967). See also Josefina Nagore de Zand, «La alabanza de España en el Poema de Fernán González y en las crónicas latino-medievales», Incipit, VII (1987 [1988]), 35-67.

The abundance of oil and wax is again mentioned -in its traditional place and without ecclesiastical connections- in st. 147.