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The chronicler, the hagiographer, and the sea : On La prise d’Alexandrie by Guillaume de Machaut Guillaume de Machaut’s last work, La prise d’Alexandrie takes the form of a verse chronicle of the life of Peter I of Lusignan, King of Cyprus. It focuses on the Battle of Alexandria in 1365, which concluded with a Christian victory and the – admittedly very short-lived – occupation of the town by Lusignan and his armies. In this article, I will start from the hypothesis that La prise d’Alexandrie is a hybrid text, the result of a kind of literary syncretism buttressed by three traditions : hagiographic, epic, and historical. From this perspective, I propose to analyze the place occupied by the maritime element in Machaut’s writing by positioning it in relation to the concerns of the Rheims poet and the models that might have influenced his historical narrative.