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The first victim after the flood is a giant. Even the greatest and most powerful must submit to Death.
| Death The biggest and the most powerful that the whole world can search for, I will make obedient to me. 200 I will lower him into the earth. |
It's just as unusual to see a giant in a dance of death as it is to see Noah's ark, but the two things are a little connected. Just before the Flood, the Bible tells us that »There were giants in the earth in those days« (Genesis 6:4). From the context, one could even get the idea that it was these giants who had raised God's ire, so maybe the giants were the first to die from the Flood?
| The Giant I am sorrowful and distraught because Death strikes me, I feel. In a few hours I will have lost 204 strength, beauty, honor and reason. |
Here is another example of an "equivocal rhyme", where a word has two meanings: "[je] sens" = "I feel" (from the verb "sentir"), "le sens" = common sense / reason.
| The squire Now, there is not a man so strong that he is not subject to the very fearsome death. 208 See here the proof. |
It is very ambiguous who these giants were (and how they survived the Flood). Were they physically large? Or great warriors? The Bible would seem to suggest the latter: »the same became mighty men which were of old, men of renown«.
The same ambiguity is present in the Latin quotation (which is missing in Français 17001 and therefore was taken from the Ambrosiana manuscript): »Gigas non salvabitur in multitudine virtutis sue«, where the Bible translates "Gigas" to "mighty man": »a mighty man is not delivered by much strength« (Psalm 33:16).
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La mort Le gayant Lescuier |
