Abstract: This article replaces Jacques Le Goff’s typology of the supernatural with a theoretical opposition between the « marvellous of transcendence » and the « marvellous of alterity ». Analysing the song of Tristan de Nanteuil illustrates the pertinence of this new framework by showing how the marvellous of alterity, originating in genres foreign to the epic universe, is reinvested with the marvellous of transcendence so as to correspond with the generic programme of the epic.
