St Michel, whence he is also sometimes called Robertus de Monte. He died, according to Potthast, on the 29th of May 1186. He wrote additions and appendices to the chronicle of Sigebert of Genblours, covering the period A.D. 385–1100, and a chronicle in continuation of Sigebert, extending from 1100 to 1186, of great value for Anglo-Norman history. Robert was in a good position to obtain information, for the Mont St Michel was one of the four great centres of pilgrimage in Europe. But he was excessively timid and cautious, and hardly mentions events, like the murder of Becket, which were subjects of controversy. Besides, his style is that of the driest annalist. It is for continental affairs between 1154 and 1170 that his information is especially valuable. His notices of English affairs are slight and sometimes misleading.
The best modern editions are the Chronique de Robert de Torigni, &c., edited by Léo old Delisle for the Soc. de l’histoire de Normandie (Rouen, 1872–1873), and Chronicle of Robert of Torigni, edited, with an introduction, by Richard Howlett (Rolls Series, No. 82, iv. 1889).
ROBERT THE DEVIL, hero of romance. He was the son of
a duke and duchess of Normandy, and by the time he was
twenty was a prodigy of strength, which he used, however,
only for outrage and crime. At last he learnt from' his mother,
in explanation of his wicked impulses, that he was born in
answer to prayers addressed to the devil. He was directed by
the pope to a hermit, who imposed on him by way of penance
that he should maintain absolute silence, feign madness,
take his food from the mouth of a dog, and provoke ill-treatment
from the common people without retaliating. He became
court fool to the emperor at Rome, and delivered the city from
Saracen invasions in three successive years in the guise of an
unknown knight, having each time been bidden to fight by a
celestial messenger. The emperor’s dumb daughter recovered
speech to declare the identity of the court fool with the deliverer
of the city, but Robert refused the hand of the princess and the
imperial inheritance, and ended his days in the hermitage of
his old confessor.
The French romance of Robert le Diable is one of the oldest versions of the legend, and differs in detail from the popular tales printed in the 15th and 16th centuries. It was apparently founded on folk-lore, not on the wickedness of Robert Guiscard or any historical personage; but probably the name of Robert and the localization of the legend may be put down to the terror inspired by the Normans. In the English version the hero is called Sir Gowther, and the scene is laid in Germany. This metrical romance dates from the beginning of the 15th century, and is based, according to its author, on a Breton lay. The legend had undergone much change before it was used by E. Scribe and C. Delavigne in the fibretto of Meyerbeer’s opera of Robert le Diable.
See Robert le Diable, ed. E. Löseth (Paris, 1903, for the Soc. des anc. textes fr.); Sir Gowther, ed. K. Breul (Oppeln, 1886); M. Tardel, Die Sage v. Robert d. Teufel in neueren deutschen Dichtungen (Berlin, 1900). Breul’s edition of the English poem contains an examination of the legend, and a bibliography of the literature dealing with the subject. The English prose romance of Robert the Devyll was printed (c. 1510) by Wynkyn de Worde.
ROBERT THE STRONG (le Fort) (d. 866), count of Anjou
and of Blois, is said by Richerus to have been the son of a
certain Witichin, but nothing definite is known about his
parentage or early life. Quickly attaining a prominent position
among the Frankish nobles, he appears as rector of the abbey
of Marmoutier in 852, and as one of Charles the Bald’s missi
dominici, in 853; but soon afterwards he was among those
who rebelled against Charles, and invited the king’s half brother,
Louis the German, to invade West Francia. However,
after the peace between Charles and Louis in 860 Robert
came to terms with his sovereign, who made him count of
Anjou and of Blois, and entrusted him with the defence of
that part of his kingdom which lay between the Seine and the
Loire, a district which had suffered greatly from the ravages
of the Normans and the Bretons. By his conduct in many
stubborn fights with these foes, Robert thoroughly earned his
surname and gained the confidence of the king, who gave him
the counties of Nevers and Auxerre. He was killed in battle
at Brissarthe in October 866, leaving two sons, Odo, or Eudes,
and Robert, both of whom became kings of the Franks. Robert
has been compared to the Maccabees, and the fact that he
was the ancestor of the Capetian kings of France has invested
him with historical importance.
See K. von Kalekstein, Robert der Tapfere (Berlin, 1871); and E. Favre, Éudes, comte de Paris et roi de France (Paris, 1893).
ROBERT, HUBERT (1753–1808), French artist, born at
Paris in 1753, deserves to be remembered not so much for his
skill as a painter as for the liveliness and point with which he
treated the subjects he painted. The contrast between the
ruins of ancient, Rome and the life of his time excited his
keenest interest; and, although he had started for Italy on
his own responsibility, the credit he there acquired procured
him the protection of the minister Marigny and an 'official
allowance. His incessant activity as an artist, his daring
character, his many adventures, attracted general sympathy
and admiration. In the fourth canto of his L’Imagination
Delille celebrated Robert’s miraculous escape when lost in the
Catacombs; later in life, when imprisoned during the Terror
and marked for the guillotine, by a fatal accident another
died in his place and Robert lived. The quantity of his work
is immense; the Louvre alone contains nine paintings by his
hand and specimens are frequently to be met with in provincial
museums and private collections. Robert’s work has more
or less of that scenic character which justified his selection by
Voltaire to paint the decorations of his theatre at Ferney.
Robert died of apoplexy on the 15th of April 1808. His work was
much engraved by the abbé Le Non, with whom he had visited
Naples in the company of Fragonard during his early days;
in Italy his work has also been frequently reproduced by
Chatelain, Liénard, Le Veau, and others.
See C. Blanc, Hist. des peintres; Villot, Notice des tableaux du Louvre; Julius Meyer, Gesch. mod. fr. Malerei.
ROBERT, LOUIS LEOPOLD (1794–1835), French painter, was born at Chaux de Fonds (Neuchatel) in Switzerland on the 13th of May 1794, but left his native place with the engraver Girardet at the age of sixteen for Paris. He was on the eve of obtaining the grand prix for engraving when the events of 1815 blasted his hopes, for Neuchatel was restored to Prussia, and Robert was struck off the list of competitors as a foreigner. Whilst continuing his studies under Girardet he had never ceased to frequent the studio of David, and he now determined to become a painter, and only returned to his native country when his master himself was exiled. At Neuchatel he attracted the notice of Roullet de Mezerac, who enabled him by a timely loan to proceed to Rome. In depicting the customs and life of the people, of southern Italy especially, he showed peculiar feeling for the historical characteristics of their race. After executing many detached studies of Italian life Robert conceived the idea of painting four great works which should represent at one and the same time the four seasons in Italy and the four leading races of its people. In the “Return from the Féte of the Madonna dell’ Arco” (Louvre) he depicted the Neapolitans and the spring. This picture, exhibited at the Salon of 1827, achieved undoubted success and was bought for the Luxembourg by Charles X.; but the work which appeared in 1831—the “Summer Reapers arriving in the Pontine Marshes ” (Louvre), which became the property of Louis Philippe-established the artist’s reputation. Florence and her autumn vineyards should now have furnished him with his third subject. He attempted to begin it, but, unable to conquer his passion for Princess Charlotte Napoleon (then mourning the violent death of her husband, Robert’s devoted friend), he threw up his work and went to Venice, where he began and carried through the fourth of the series, the “Fishers of the Adriatic.” This work was not equal to the “Reapers.” Worn by the vicissitudes of painful feeling, and bitterly discouraged, Robert committed suicide before his easel on the 20th of March 1835, on the tenth anniversary of the melancholy suicide of a brother to whom he had been much attached.
