Woodcut by Pieter Brueghel the Elder, realized in 1566, with the title “The Masquerade of Orson and Valentine”, whose original is in the Boijmans Van Beuningen Museum, Rotterdam, The Netherlands.
The story of Valentine and Orson, originated in oral folk tradition, appears for the first time in written form in a chanson de geste of the XIII century, and was afterwards republished in a prose version in 1489 in France and in 1550 in England. The tale narrates of two twin brothers. Their mother, sister of Pepin the Short, king of the Franks, and wife of the Emperor of Constantinople, gave birth to them while she is crossing a forest. One of the twins was recovered by Pepin himself and brought up at the court, where he became a knight, while the second one, reared by a she-bear in the forest, became a wild man, with great physical strength, whose renown traveled across the reign. The two brothers end up to meet, fight with one another and finally reconcile.
Brueghel’s engraving reveals how this tale was represented in popular performances, where the personages were impersonated by masked characters. In particular, Orson takes up the typical characteristic of the Wild Man, with a cloth which alludes to long hair, often in green, referring to the association with the plant world, a long beard, unkempt hair and a big rod in his hand.

[Image: http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Die_Masquerade_von_ Orson_und_Valentin.jpg]