William Goodyear's Wandering Knight (1581 – STC 4700) is a translation of Jean de Cartheny's Voyage du chevalier errant (1557), which in turn shows signs of the influence of both Deguileville's Vie and Thomas de Saluces's Livre du chevalier errant. The Voyage first appeared in print in 1557, although the author's dedication to Mary of Hungary, Regent of the Netherlands, carries the date of December 1552. Cartheny revised his work for his second edition from 1572, and added a new dedication. The work seems to have enjoyed a fair degree of popularity, and the second edition was reprinted several times, in 1587 (three editions), 1594, 1595 and 1620. The work was also translated into English (1581 and ten reprints), German (1602), Dutch (1649), Welsh (1585) and Latin (1606), the latter two being in manuscript alone. Although biographical information about the author is scant, internal evidence and Cartheny's dedication allow the reconstruction of the environment in which he was writing. Born in 1520 in Valenciennes, he entered the Carmelite Order, received his Doctorate in Theology in 1554 and soon became Regent of the convent in Brussels. His reputation for great learning was only tainted by what seems to have been a youthful infatuation with evangelical ideals, which he was made to abjure publicly in 1539.

A Catholic Everyman

The Voyage du chevalier errant is clearly an elaboration of the traditional medieval topos of the homo viator, and thus again combines elements of chivalric romance with the allegory of the Christian pilgrimage of life.