I'm hoping this is a question about history and not linguistics, though I'll cross-post if necessary.
Did the name for the roman form as seen in medieval literature derive or refer to Rome itself? I guess I'd always assumed that medieval epics about knights and whatnot were being likened to classical epic poetry. A friend recently challenged me on this, and I can't find a source to either back me up or prove me wrong. Happy for either to be the case, but I'm stumped so far.
As you might imagine, searching for the word 'roman' isn't very helpful.
"romance" is a Middle-English word, and it's root used to mean works derived or originating from Latin ("romance" languages comes from this). yes, it does come from Roman and became used to mean stories, epics, and poems and knights who idealized a certain chivalry before it evolved to mean love.
it came from the French word Romanz and the first recorded in the 1650s as far as i know, although it's use to mean Romanesque era things has been around since the 1300s. Source