The dissertation is a modern English translation of Old French hagiographic poem.
The anonymous work is a compilation of various Greek and Latin legends written about the saint, as well as authorial social commentary on fourteenth-century French life. There are two known manuscripts, both located in the National Library of Paris: B.N. 2182 and N.ACQ.FR. 7515. The poem consists of 7783 verses of rhyming couplets in octosyllabic verse, divided into a Prologue, eight chapters, and an Epilog. The final verses give the date of composition as 1322.
The introduction to the dissertation is in three parts: a manuscript study, the literary context of the work, and the sources. The manuscript study is in five parts: (1) a description of the two manuscripts, (2) the author, (3) the date of composition, (4) the language of two manuscripts, (5) an annotated summary of the text with reference to the sources. The context is a presentation of four aspects of hagiographic literature pertaining to Saint John: (1) a description of hagiographic literature, (2) the saint in medieval society, (3) the cult of the saint, and (4) the cult of Saint John the Baptist. The last part is a study of seven possible sources: the Bible, Josephus, Sozomen, Gregory of Tours, Peter Comestor, John Beleth, and Jacques de Voragine; references to these and other sources are also footnoted throughout the study of the text.
The bibliography consists of more than 70 books consulted, the majority having been cited in the dissertation. The two appendices list French hagiographic works from the fourteenth century and the known French hagiographic works on John the Baptist. The indices list the variants and the proper names of the two existing manuscripts.
This is not the first critical edition of The Legend of Saint John the Baptist (an earlier edition gives a shorter critical analysis and a transcription of the poem with no bibliography), but it has the distinction of being the first translation of the poem into a modern language and a more thorough analysis of the poem and its context.