Editing François Villon (section)

=== Early life ===
Villon's real name may have been '''François de Montcorbier''' or '''François des Loges''':<ref name="Charpier-birth" /> both of these names appear in official documents drawn up in Villon's lifetime. In his own work, however, Villon is the only name the poet used, and he mentions it frequently in his work. His two collections of poems, especially "[[Le Testament]]" (also known as "Le grand testament"), have traditionally been read as if they were autobiographical. Other details of his life are known from court or other civil documents.

From what the sources tell us, it appears that Villon was born in poverty and raised by a foster father, but that his mother was still living when her son was thirty years old. The surname "Villon," the poet tells us, is the name he adopted from his foster father, Guillaume de Villon, chaplain in the collegiate church of [[Saint-Benoît-le-Bétourné]] and a professor of [[canon law]], who took Villon into his house.{{sfn|Saintsbury|1911|p=87}}  François describes Guillaume de Villon as "more than a father to me".<ref name="Clarke">{{Cite book|title=Pseudonyms |first =Joseph F. | last = Clarke|publisher=Book Club Associates | location = United Kingdom |date=1977 |page=167}}</ref><ref name="Villon-2013">{{cite book |last=Villon |first=François |title=Poems |chapter=[[Le Testament|The Testament]]  |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=EgVIGZjg4y8C&pg=PA84 |year=2013 |publisher=Northwestern University Press |location=Evanston, Illinois |language=fr |isbn=978-0-8101-2878-1 |page=84 |oclc=921910344 |translator-last=Georgi |translator-first=David   |access-date=10 July 2017 |quote=Item, et a mon plus que pere, Maistre Guillaume de Villon / Qui esté m'a plus doulx que mere [Item, and to my more than father, Master Guillaume de Villon / Who is to me more painful than mother]}}</ref>