ABSTRACT
Prior to 1270 and most likely before 1254, Walter de Bibbesworth composed a French-language textbook in rhymed Anglo-Norman verse for the duchess of Pembroke, Lady Dionysia Mounchensey. Through his Tretiz, Bibbesworth assisted the duchess to teach her family the French required of medieval English nobility. John, William, and Joan, Dionysia's children, probably learned their French with the assistance of this work (Berndt, 135). Bibbesworth recognized Dionysia's familiarity with French and penned his tract in that tongue. Acknowledging that some of the more technical terms might give her difficulty, however, he glossed these words in English. Transcending its original narrow audience, the Tretiz attracted interest throughout the later Middle Ages as a pedagogical work.
