Editing Rustichello da Pisa (section)

==Life and work==
Rustichello appears to have been a native of [[Pisa]]. His first known work, the French text known as the ''Roman de Roi Artus'' or, simply, the ''Compilation'', appears to derive from a particular book in the possession of [[Edward I of England]] when he passed through Italy on his way to fighting in the [[Eighth Crusade]] in 1270 to 1274.  While written in French, it is the first known romance by an Italian author to address the Arthurian legend.<ref name=Hoffman>Hoffman, "Rusticiano  Pisa", p. 392.</ref> The ''Compilation'' contains an interpolation of the ''[[Palamedes (romance)|Palamedes]]'', a now-fragmentary prose account of Arthur's [[Saracen]] knight [[Palamedes (Arthurian legend)|Palamedes]], and a history of the [[Round Table]].<ref>Lacy, "Palamedes", p. 352.</ref> It was later divided into two sections, named after their principal protagonists, ''[[Meliodas|Meliadus]]'' ([[Tristan]]'s father) and ''[[Guiron le Courtois]]''.  Both remained popular for hundreds of years, and influenced many later works written in French as well as in Spanish, Italian, and even Greek.<ref name=Hoffman/>

Rustichello may have been captured by the Genoese at the [[Battle of Meloria (1284)|Battle of Meloria]] in 1284, amid a conflict between the [[Republic of Genoa]] and the [[Republic of Pisa]]. When Polo was imprisoned around 1298, possibly after a clash between Genoa and [[Republic of Venice|Venice]] (according to tradition the [[Battle of Curzola]]<ref>''The Travels of Marco Polo'', p. 16.</ref>), he told his tales of travel to Rustichello. Together they created the book known as ''[[The Travels of Marco Polo]]''.<ref name=Hoffman/>