Based on an account found in the Memoires of the fifteenth-century French diplomat Philippe de Commines, Quentin Durward is a historical novel concerning the eponymous Scottish archer in the service of Louis XI of France.
Well received by its reviewers on its publication in May 1823, who saw it as one of the best of the ‘Waverley Novels’, Quentin Durward is today little-read among Scott’s novels. It sold slowly in Britain but found great popularity in France, where it became an instant bestseller. The novel saw the consolidation of a fashion in France for Scott and by 1830 a third of all novels sold in the country were by the author.