Rereading: DOMNEI by James Branch Cabell

Cover art by Brian Froud

I don’t have a hardcover of this book, so I reread the 1972 Ballantine paperback. (Also in this book is the shorter work “The Music From Behind the Moon” which I will read and review separately.)

Domnei is a word I was not familiar with, but Wikipedia helped. It’s part of the code of medieval chivalry, the relationship between a knight and his lady, generally a non-physical bond of devotion between them. Another way of putting it would be lady worship. The ideas of chivalry developed in medieval France, and Cabell’s book takes place there in his mythical province of Poictesme. In the story, the knight (more of an outlaw really) is Perion of the forest, who wins the love of Melicent, daughter of Manuel, the source and beginning of his “Biography of Manuel,” and Domnei is considered the fourth book of that series.

Perion and Melicent meet at the court of her brother Emmerick, current ruler of Poictesme, where Perion has been taken in under a false name to heal from an illness. Despite that, Perion is struck by Melicent’s beauty, which is renowned, and the two become devoted to each other almost despite themselves. Melicent helps Perion escape from France, and he goes into battle against the Saracen king Demetrios, but is captured and made a slave. When Melicent learns of this, she takes some valuable jewels and travels in secret to the court of Demetrios to bargain for Perion’s freedom. Demetrios is equally struck by her beauty and bravery, and agrees to release Perion, but does not want the jewels. He wants Melicent herself as a wife, to add to his harem. She agrees.

The rest of the book details the trials of Melicent in the court of Demetrios, who she does not like, and the adventures of Perion as he repeatedly tries to defeat Demetrios in battle to free his lady. It’s a struggle with many twists and turns that goes on for years. Demetrios makes a third to this triangle, he’s a brave warrior himself, and he admires the bond between Perion and Melicent, even while he hates the fact that he can never have what they share.

The story is well told and the characters and plot are interesting. There’s less of the humor and modern outlook of some of Cabell’s later work, it was originally published in 1913, but this is a revised version. It almost has the feel of a true medieval tale, a good one. Recommended.

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