Song of Roland Religion Quotes

In the very first stanza, the poet bungles his theology. He gets Mohammed right since the Saracens are all meant to be Muslim. But why is Apollo, the ancient Greek sun god, in the same category? 12th-century Christian Europe had a very foggy understanding of Islam, lumping what they knew of Mohammed and the Koran with everything else that was non-Christian.

The Saracens are just as religious as the Franks but have the misfortune of belonging to the wrong and evil religion instead of the true and good one. Marsile lets his religion guide him and clearly thinks that swearing on his holy scriptures will make his oath stronger. The poet doesn't criticize the Spanish for being irreligious but for being wrongly religious. (By the way, no one knows the origin of Tervagant).

It's no surprise that the pagans think their god is superior to the Christian one (although they're soon whistling a different tune). What is interesting here is how this statement is basically a mirror image of the Frankish philosophy that Saint Peter is better. You could switch "Mohammed" and "Saint Peter of Rome" and have a perfectly accurate sentence for a Frankish knight to say.