It is without doubt a proof of the continuing popularity of our Reinaert, that in the Netherlands, shortly after the invention of the printing press, at least four editions of the old poem, in different versions, appeared within barely fifteen years. First, around 1473, the Reynardus Vulpes was printed by Ketelaer and De Leempt in Utrecht, the old Latin translation of Reinaert I, made by Balduinus before 1280. The text is already divided here into chapters or sections with headings; some chapters are enriched at the end with a short moral lesson. This was followed by our prose adaptation of Reinaert II, the first to make Reinaert truly common in the vernacular through printing, in 1479 by Gheraert Leeu in Gouda, and subsequently printed in 1485 by Jacob Jacobszoon van der Meer in Delft, but probably made some time earlier and existing in one or more manuscripts. That it is a reworking of Reinaert II, needs no argument: the rhymed text is very faithful, sometimes almost word for word, sometimes a little shortened, with its own prologue, but otherwise with very few additions, resolved into prose. = [Editors]

Language: Dutch