Aymon

Aymon, or HAIMON, Count of Dordogne, whose sons, Alard, Richard, Guichard, and Renaud, were the chief heroes of one of the finest romances of the Carolingian cycle. The story seems to be originally French, and the first known work in which it is found is the poem, Regnaut de Montauban, by Huon de Villeneuve, written before 1200. It occurs in a prose collection of similar stories, published at Lyons about 1480, an English translation of which, most likely by Caxton himself, was printed about 1489 (reprinted from unique imperfect Althorp copy for Early English Text Society, 1884-85). The current German story which Tieck worked up, does not appear to be from the French original, but rather borrowed from a Dutch source. Ariosto's Roland has secured the brothers a more certain immortality in the part given to Renaud, the youngest and traditionally the bravest of the four.