Medieval epicity and the deconstruction of classical epic

In the literary history of epic poetry medieval Latin epics do not very often appear. Poems that conform to epical standards seem rare or even absent. Simultaneously, however, vernacular epic flourishes and is recognised as such. For that reason, one might wonder if the apparent absence of medieval Latin epic is not rather due to the scholars’ eyes that perhaps are too much preconditioned by a classicist understanding of ‘epicity’. This contribution wants to open up the discussion by presenting medieval Latin epicity as a very specific and conscious way of dealing with the classical models, more based upon deconstruction and recreation than on the imitation of normative models.