Efforts to arrive at a structural definition of the genre have been made in the past. Joseph Bédier is conventionally credited with the first of these. The principles of his approach are encoded in the formula Ω + a + b + c, where omega represents the immutable core element of the narrative, and a, b, c its unessential accessory traits. Bédier's intention was to mount a diachronic attack on the ‘théorie orientaliste’, and to discredit efforts to postulate antique near-eastern sources for a substantial number of medieval French narratives. His concentration on the accessory elements led directly to his thesis that the fabliaux were the product of an urbanised, mercantile, bourgeois society, since the elements chosen as definitive for the genre were essentially social. However, concentration on a different selection of accessory elements led Per Nykrog to reverse Bédier's conclusions, and attribute the fabliaux to an aristocratic audience for whom the narratives constituted ‘un genre courtois burlesque.’ That two critics examining the same body of materials should arrive at such diametrically opposed conclusions indicates that their approaches were in some way flawed. Despite the fact that both were concerned to define the fabliaux as a literary genre, a synchronic definition would certainly have required that more attention than either critic was prepared to give should have been directed at an understanding of the core element Ω.