Jaufré Rudel, the Prince of Blaya, fell in love with a certain Count-
ess of Tripoli on the mere rumor of her charms; assumed the cross
for the sole and sacrilegious purpose of meeting her; fell ill upon the
voyage, and on his arrival was recovered from a death-like trance by
his lady's embrace, only to die almost immediately in her arms.
ess of Tripoli on the mere rumor of her charms; assumed the cross
for the sole and sacrilegious purpose of meeting her; fell ill upon the
voyage, and on his arrival was recovered from a death-like trance by
his lady's embrace, only to die almost immediately in her arms.
Warner - World's Best Literature - v20 - Phi to Qui
To begin with, he did not choose his models
wisely. Like all of his contemporaries he was fascinated by Alexan-
drine erudition; but he did not learn, as did the greatest poets of his
age, to correct this tendency by a close study of the earlier masters.
Indeed it is surmised, in the absence of the poems of Callimachus,
that Propertius has gone beyond his instruction. Doctus was a favor-
ite adjective with which to compliment a poet of that age, and Pro-
pertius strove to merit it by displaying his learning in and out of
season. He delights to refer to the most abstruse of myths, or to
their least familiar characters. Never poet stood more in need of
Corinna's advice; for his sack contained only the toughest nuts of the
Greek legend. The obscurity created by this fondness for mythologic
lore is too often increased by an abruptness of thought occasionally
bordering on incoherence. Images are not always clearly conceived.
in his impetuous imagination; and there is not infrequently an
awkwardness of phraseology, or an inexactness of expression. Some-
times one is faintly reminded of Persius and his verbal contortions,
or of other poets who fancy they have made poetry when they have
only written impossible prose.
All these are serious faults; and more likely to endear an author
to schoolmasters and editors than to lovers of poetry. But the per-
sonality of Propertius is strong enough to dominate them all. Few
writers win for themselves a more willing indulgence, or give a
clearer impression of a talent greater than its best work. Sooner or
later his readers come to believe that he might have done greater
things had he so chosen. He chose, however, to lavish his power
upon love elegies; and it is by them that he is usually judged. In
intensity of passion, in utter simplicity and directness of its expres-
sion, Propertius is inferior to Catullus,-as who is not? But as a
poet of love he may safely challenge comparison with any but Ca-
tullus. His Cynthia is never to be classed with the shadowy Chloes
## p. 11863 (#493) ##########################################
SEXTUS PROPERTIUS
11863
and Leuconoës of Horace's bloodless affections. The genuineness of
his love is undoubted. His delight in the charms and accomplish-
ments of his mistress; the jealousy provoked by her infidelities; his
sorrow at parting from her, even in fancy; the rapture of a recon-
ciliation; these and many another aspect of love, and the "evil cares
which it has," are depicted with unmistakable sincerity. For Cyn-
thia's sake he will give up a career, and abandon his plans for travel
abroad. At times he even refuses to write on any other subject:
Cynthia is the first and will be the last of his songs.
The day came, however, when he could narrate his own infidel-
ity, and picture Cynthia's successor filching jewelry from her funeral
pyre. More and more throughout his later books, it is apparent that
other themes were claiming part of his attention. To most men his
great passion will hardly seem a less genuine experience because he
too came to feel that life is greater than love. Believers in poetical
fitness may insist that he died shortly after ceasing to write on the
all-absorbing theme; but the man Propertius, though not the poet,
is quite as likely to have lived to found the family which Pliny
expressly ascribes to him.
Some of the most pleasing of the poems are among the num-
ber not concerned with Cynthia. The "queen of elegies," his noble
epitaph on Cornelia, is deservedly famous, though marred by his
characteristic faults. In the last book are found also a few poems,
dealing with the legendary history of Rome. Whether we regard
them as among his earliest, or as their metrical structure would
seem to indicate, his latest works, they are an interesting evidence of
the manner in which his intense nature responded to the appeal of
national and patriotic themes. It has been surmised that they prob-
ably suggested to Ovid the plan of his 'Fasti. ' Ovid mentions Pro-
pertius with warm admiration, and many imitations and echoes show
clearly the impression made by Propertius upon the poets of the
younger generation. By later Roman writers Propertius is seldom
cited, and there are no selections from his works in the anthologies.
The extant manuscripts are for the most part late, and much
interpolated, as might be expected in the case of a writer so often
obscure. The same quality has caused the earlier editions of the
elegies to be loaded with useless conjectures, and subjected to the
most arbitrary rearrangement. The saner criticism of the present cen-
tury has restored the text; but a satisfactory commentary is yet to
be written. The neglect of Propertius by the schools is shown by
the comparative rarity of editions in modern times. That by F. A.
Paley (London, 1872) is practically the only accessible edition with
English notes, though a volume of selections has been more recently
edited by J. P. Postgate (London, 1881). Of the German editions,
## p. 11864 (#494) ##########################################
11864
SEXTUS PROPERTIUS
Hertzberg's (Halle, 1843), in four volumes with Latin notes, is the
most complete. Of English translations, by far the best poetical ver-
sion is the work of Dr. James Cranstoun (Edinburgh, 1875), from
which the following selections are made.
G. M. Whicher
BEAUTY UNADORNED
WHY
HY wear, my Life, when thou abroad dost stir,
A head trimmed up to fashion's latest laws?
A Coan vestment of transparent gauze,
And hair perfumed with Orontean myrrh ?
Why deck thyself with gems and costly dress?
Why mar with trinkets Nature's form divine,
And not allow thy beauties forth to shine
In all their own, their matchless loveliness?
To thee such aids can add no charms—ah, no!
True love will aye disdain the artist's care.
See! the fair fields a thousand colors wear,
And ivy sprays far best spontaneous grow.
Fairer in lonely grots green arbutes rise,
Fairer the streamlet wends its wandering way,
Lovelier bright pebbles gem their native bay,
And birds sing sweetlier artless melodies.
TO TULLUS
D
EAR Tullus, now I'd gladly plow wild Adria's waves with thee,
And fearlessly my canvas spread upon the Ægean sea;
Yea, by thy side I'd o'er the steep Rhipæan ridges roam,
Or wend my toilsome way beyond swart Memnon's distant home:
But me a maiden's pleading words and circling arms detain; [vain.
'Gainst her pale cheek and earnest prayers to strive, alas! were
Still of her ardent love for me she raves the weary night,
And swears there's not a god in heaven, if e'er I leave her sight;
Declares that she is not my love; nay more, the frantic girl
Vents every threat that peevish maids at heartless lovers hurl;
## p. 11865 (#495) ##########################################
SEXTUS PROPERTIUS
11865
Against her plaints a single hour I cannot, cannot hold.
Ah! perish he, if such there be, whose bosom could be cold!
True, I should see fair Athens reared beneath Minerva's smile,
And Asia's grandeur famed of old; but is it worth the while
To make my Cynthia scream what time my vessel seeks the sea,
To see her tear her tender cheeks in frenzied agony,
And say that she will kiss the wind that balks her lover's plan,
And that no monster walks the earth so fell as faithless man?
Go, strive to earn a nobler wreath than e'er thine uncle wore,
And to our old allies their long-forgotten rights restore:
And may the unpitying Boy ne'er bring on thee my sorrows fell,
And all the tokens of a woe my tears too plainly tell;
For thou hast frittered not thy years on Beauty's fatal charms,
But aye been ready to assert thy country's cause in arms.
Here let me lie, as fortune aye hath willed it in the past;
And let me still devote my soul to folly to the last.
Many in tardy love have gladly spent their latest day,—
Then let me die with these, with these let earth conceal my clay:
For fame I was not nurtured, nor in arms would glorious prove;
The Fates decree my fields shall be the battle-plains of love.
Then whether thou shalt roam athwart Ionia's pleasant lands,
Or where Pactolus streaks the Lydian vales with golden sands;
Whether on foot thou'lt scour the plain or tempt with oars the sea,
And all the duties well discharge thine office claims from thee:
If thou shouldst chance to think of me in foreign climes afar,
Be well assured I'm living still beneath a baleful star.
TO CYNTHIA
SINC
INCE from my love I had the heart to flee,
Justly to halcyons lone my wail I pour;
No more Cassiope my bark will see,
And all my vows fall fruitless on the shore.
The winds are leagued for thee now far away;
Hark to the threatening tempest's fitful gust!
Will no kind fortune this dread storm allay?
Must a few grains of sand conceal my dust?
Oh, let no more thy harsh upbraidings rise,
But say this night at sea my fault atones!
## p. 11866 (#496) ##########################################
11866
SEXTUS PROPERTIUS
Or canst thou paint my fate with tearless eyes,
Nor in thy bosom bear hold my bones?
Ah! perish he who first, with impious art,
In sail-rigged craft dared tempt the unwilling sea!
'Twere better I had soothed my mistress's heart-
Hard though she was, how peerless still to me!
Than view this wild and forest-mantled shore,
And woo the longed-for Twins that calm the wave.
Then earth had veiled my woes, life's fever o'er,
And some small stone-love's tribute - marked my grave.
For me she might have shorn her cherished hair;
'Mid sweet-breath'd roses laid my bones at rest;
Called o'er my dust my name, and breathed a prayer
That earth might lightly lie upon my breast.
Fair Doris's daughters, who o'er ocean roam,
Speed our white sails with your auspicious band!
And oh, if Love e'er sought your azure home,
Grant one who loved like you, a sheltered strand!
TO CAIUS CILNIUS MÆCENAS
YOU
You ask me why love-elegy so frequently I follow,
And why my little book of tender trifles only sings:
It is not from Calliope, nor is it from Apollo,
But from my own sweet lady-love my inspiration springs.
If in resplendent purple robe of Cos my darling dresses,
I'll fill a portly volume with the Coan garment's praise;
Or if her truant tresses wreathe her forehead with caresses,
The tresses of her queenly brow demand her poet's lays.
Or if, perchance, she strike the speaking lyre with ivory fingers,
I marvel how those nimble fingers run the chords along;
Or if above her slumber-drooping eyes a shadow lingers,
My tranced mind is sure to find a thousand themes of song.
Or if for love's delightful strife repose awhile be broken,
Oh, I could write an Iliad of our sallies and alarms;
If anything at all she's done - if any word she's spoken-
From out of nothing rise at once innumerable charms.
――――
## p. 11867 (#497) ##########################################
SEXTUS PROPERTIUS
11867
But if the Fates had given me the power, beloved Mæcenas,
To marshal hero-bands, I'd neither sing of Titan wars,
Nor Ossa on Olympus piled, that Terra's brood most heinous,
By aid of Pelion, might scale the everlasting stars;
Nor hoary Thebes, nor Pergamus in Homer's song undying;
Nor sea to sea by stern decree of haughty Xerxes brought;
The warlike Cimbri, nor the soul of Carthage death-defying;
Nor Remus's ancient realm, nor deeds of fame by Marius
wrought;
But I would sing of Cæsar's might and Cæsar's martial glory,
And next to mighty Cæsar would my lyre for thee be strung:
For while of Mutina, or of Philippi fell and gory,
Or of the naval war and rout by Sicily I sung;
Or of Etruria's ancient hearths in ruin laid forever,
Or Ptolemæan Pharos with its subjugated shore,
Or Egypt and the Nile what time the broad seven-mantled river
In drear captivity to Rome our conquering armies bore;
Or kings with golden fetters bound, in gorgeous-hued apparel,
And trophied prows of Actium, whirled along the Sacred Way,
My Muse would ever twine around thy brow the wreath of
laurel-
In time of peace, in time of war, a faithful subject aye.
TO THE MUSE
'TIS
Is time to traverse Helicon in themes of higher strain,
'Tis time to spur my Thracian steed across a wider plain;
Now I would sing of mighty hosts and deeds of battle done,
And chronicle the Roman fields my general has won;
And if my powers of song should fail — to dare were surely fame:
Enough that I have had the will; no higher praise I claim.
-
Let hot youth sing the laughing loves-be war the theme of age;
Be war my theme-till now the dream of love has filled my page.
With sober mien and graver brow I now must walk along,
Now on another lyre my Muse essays another song.
Rise, O my Muse! from lowly themes; put on your strength, ye
Nine
Who haunt the clear Pierian springs! -outpour the lofty line!
## p. 11868 (#498) ##########################################
11868
SEXTUS PROPERTIUS
As when we cannot reach the head of statues all too high,
We lay a chaplet at the feet, so now perforce do I;
Unfit to climb the giddy heights of epic song divine,
In humble adoration lay poor incense on thy shrine;
For not as yet my Muse hath known the wells of Ascra's grove:
Permessus's gentle wave alone hath laved the limbs of Love.
THE IMMORTALITY OF GENIUS
RPHEUS, 'tis said, the Thracian lyre-strings sweeping,
Stayed the swift stream and soothed the savage
Citharon's rocks, to Thebes spontaneous leaping,
Rose into walls before Amphion's lute.
With dripping steeds did Galatea follow,
'Neath Ætna's crags, lone Polyphemus's song:
Is't strange the loved of Bacchus and Apollo
Leads captive with his lay the maiden throng?
Though no Tænarian blocks uphold my dwelling,
Nor ivory panels shine 'tween gilded beams;
No orchards mine Phæacia's woods excelling,
No chiseled grots where Marcian water streams,-
Yet Song is mine; my strain the heart engages;
Faint from the dance sinks the lithe Muse with me:
O happy maid whose name adorns my pages! *
Each lay a lasting monument to thee!
The pyramids that cleave heaven's jeweled portal;
Eléan Jove's star-spangled dome; the tomb
Where rich Mausolus sleeps,- are not immortal,
Nor shall escape inevitable doom.
Devouring fire and rains will mar their splendor;
The weight of years will drag the marble down:
Genius alone a name can deathless render,
And round the forehead wreathe the unfading crown.
## p. 11869 (#499) ##########################################
SEXTUS PROPERTIUS
11869
CORNELIA
O
PAULUS! vex my grave with tears no more:
No prayers unlock the portals of the tomb;
When once the dead have trod the infernal floor,
Barred stand the adamantine doors of doom.
Though the dark hall's dread king would hear thy prayer,
'Twere vain: dead shores will drink thy tears the
while.
Prayers move high heaven; but pay the boatman's fare,
The drear gate closes on the shadowy pile.
I doffed the maiden's dress;-I was a bride;
The matron's coif confined my braided hair:
Too soon, O Paulus! doomed to leave thy side;
I was but thine, my tombstone shall declare.
Years changed me not; a blameless life I spent,
From wedlock to its close our fame secure:
Nature my blood with inborn virtue blent;
No fears could make my guileless heart more pure.
My meed a mother's tears; the city's woe;
Even Cæsar's sorrow consecrates my bier:
Rome saw the mighty god a-weeping go,
And mourn his daughter's worthy sister-peer.
Though young, the matron's honored robe I wore;
Death from no barren dwelling bore his prize:
My boys! my solace when I live no more,
Ye held me in your hands and closed my eyes.
Twice had my brother filled the curule chair,
A consul ere his sister's days were run.
Thy censor-sire in mind, sweet daughter, bear:
Uphold his honor; wed, like me, but one;
With offspring prop our line. The bark's afloat:
I gladly go, so many mourn my doom;
A wife's last triumph, and of fairest note,
Is fame's sweet incense rising o'er her tomb.
Paulus, our pledges I commend to thee;
Burnt in my bones still breathes a mother's care.
Discharge a mother's duties, then, for me;
For now thy shoulders all their load must bear.
## p. 11870 (#500) ##########################################
11870
SEXTUS PROPERTIUS
Kiss them, and kiss them for their mother; dry
Their childish tears: thine all the burden now.
Ne'er let them see thee weep or hear thee sigh,
But with a smile thy sorrow disavow.
Enough that thou the weary nights shouldst moan,
And woo my semblance back in visions vain;
Yet whisper to my portrait when alone,
As if the lips could answer thee again.
If e'er these halls should own another queen,
And a new mother fill your mother's bed,—
My children, ne'er let frowning look be seen,
But honor her your father chose to wed.
So shall your manners win her tender grace,
And surely she will love for love return;
Nor praise too much your mother to her face,
For fear her breast with jealous feelings burn.
But should my image still his thoughts engage,
And Paulus dower my dust with love so rare,
Oh, learn to watch your father's failing age,
And shield his weary widowed heart from care!
Heaven add to yours the years I hoped in store,
And may your lives my aged Paulus cheer!
'Tis well: I ne'er the robes of mourning wore,
And all my children gathered round my bier.
My cause is plead. Each weeping witness, rise,
Since death's rewards life's losses well repay.
Heaven waits the pure in heart: be mine the prize
To soar triumphant to the realms of day.
## p. 11871 (#501) ##########################################
11871
PROVENCAL LITERATURE
(THE TROUBADOURS, 1090–1290)
BY HARRIET WATERS PRESTON
CURIOUS natural feature of Dalmatia—that long, narrow coun-
try straitened between the mountains and the Adriatic-is
the number of rivers which come up suddenly from under-
ground, or burst full-grown from the bases of the hills, and seek the
sea with a force and velocity of current all the more impressive from
the mystery of their origin. Just so the poetry of the Troubadours
leaps abruptly, in full volume, out of the mirk of the unlettered ages,
and spreads itself abroad in a laughing flood of which the superficial
sparkle may sometimes deceive concerning the strength of the under-
current passion on which it is upborne.
Gai Saber-the Gay Science -was the name bestowed by these
gushing singers themselves upon their newly discovered art of verse-
making; and the epithet was perfectly descriptive. To the serious,
disciplined, and systematic nineteenth-century mind, there is some-
thing incongruous, not to say indecent, in the association of science
and joy. Whatever else the science may be, in whose sign we are
supposed to conquer, it is not gay. But the Troubadour did not even
know the difference between science and art. His era in the life of
modern Europe corresponds exactly with the insouciant season when
«< a young man's fancy lightly turns to thoughts of love. " The Trou-
badour was palpitating, moreover, with the two masterful enthusiasms
of his time: the religious enthusiasm of the Crusades, and the high-
flown sentiments and noble chimeras of the lately formulated code of
chivalry.
Seizing the instrument nearest to his hand, a supple and still
growing offshoot from the imperishable root of Latin speech,-he
shaped his pipe, fashioned his stops, and blew his amorous blast;
and was so overcome by amazement at the delightful result, that he
was fain loudly to proclaim himself the happy finder (trobaire) of the
verbal music he had achieved, rather than its maker or poet.
Lengua Romana, or Romans, was what he called his own language.
To Dante, in the beginning of the fourteenth century, it was Pro-
vençal as distinguished from the lengua materna, or Italian: and
Provençal it is, to this day, loosely called. But it was spoken in
-
## p. 11872 (#502) ##########################################
11872
PROVENÇAL LITERATURE
substantially the same form, far outside the fluctuating limits of
mediæval Provence; and one of the Troubadours themselves - Rai-
mon Vidal- has in fact defined its limits very explicitly. "The only
true language of poetry," he says, "is that of Limousin, Provence,
Auvergne, and Quercy;
and every man born and brought
up in those countries speaks the natural and right speech. "
The time at which the troubadour minstrelsy flourished is as
distinctly marked as its locality. Two hundred years, from the last
decade of the eleventh century to the last of the thirteenth, com-
prise it all. Fifty years for its rise, a hundred for its most exuberant
period, fift more for its decline,- and the brief but picturesque and
exciting story is all told. The love of man for woman is its per-
petual and almost exclusive theme; primarily that same "simple and
sensuous" motif which was already old in the world when the all-
knowing King of Israel sang,—“Rise up, my love, my fair one, and
come away! For lo! the winter is past, the rain is over and gone,
the time of the singing of birds is come, and the voice of the turtle
is heard in the land! " The special form of the tender passion to
which the troubadour tuned his lay was, however, the love of chiv-
alry: theoretically a selfless and spiritual sentiment, having even a
touch about it of religious exaltation. It involved the absolute devo-
tion of life, wit, and prowess to the service of a formally chosen lady-
love; and was as much a part of the sacramental obligations of a
full-made knight as the service of God and of his feudal seigneur.
The art in which this love found expression was thus essentially an
aristocratic one; reserved for the practice of those who were either
élite by birth and fortune, or ennobled by the possession of rare
poetic gifts. Marriage was no part of its aim, and was never once,
in the case of any well-known troubadour, its dénouement. The
minstrel's lady was quite regularly the wife of another man; often of
his feudal lord or sovereign ruler. The scope for tragedy and crime
afforded by so fantastic a relation is obvious, and history has plenty
to tell of the calamities which attended it in particular cases. Yet
the austere ideal was never totally eclipsed; and that it survived the
final disappearance of the troubadour as a court-minstrel and titu-
lar lover, we have abundant proof in the mystic lauds addressed by
Dante to Beatrice and by Petrarch to Laura.
•
For the rest, the precocious perfection of form exhibited by some
of the earliest troubadour songs which we possess, is not quite as
miraculous as at first sight it appears. The main points in the mech-
anism of troubadour verse, both in its earlier and simpler, and in its
later and highly elaborate developments, are two: strong tonic accents
- mostly iambic, though sometimes of trochaic lines- and termi-
nal rhymes. By these features it is radically distinguished from the
## p. 11873 (#503) ##########################################
PROVENÇAL LITERATURE
11873
quantitative measures of classic Greece and Rome; and in these
respects it has furnished the model for almost all modern European
poetry. But the rustic and popular poetry of the Latin race had
been, from the first, a poetry of accent: and the tradition of it had
been handed down through the early hymns of the Christian Church,
and the rude staves and ballads trolled from town to town and from
castle to castle during the Dark Ages, by the joculatores or jongleurs;
those vagrant mimes and minstrels who played so large a part after-
wards, in diffusing and popularizing the more refined compositions of
the troubadours. Rhyme, on the other hand, though it might well
have occurred to anybody as a fitting ornament of song,-rhyming
words and syllables being exactly as obvious and essential a form of
harmony as musical chords,- was very probably borrowed immedi-
ately from that Arabian verse in which it is so lavishly employed,
during the long sojourn of the Saracens in Southern Europe.
It seems a curious freak of philological fate whereby a literature
so juvenile and impulsive as that of the troubadours, so destitute of
connected thought, and at the same time so instinct with emotions,
so that the very stress of feeling often renders its utterances vague,
stammering, and all but unintelligible, should have become — largely
by virtue of its important historical position midway between the
written word of ancient Rome and that of modern France a favorite
and hard-trodden field for dry research, grammatical quibbling, and
controversy on technical points. But so it is. Every sigh of the
troubadour minstrel has been analyzed, and every trill conjugated.
Yet when all has been said and read, the reader's appreciation of this
unique body of song will have to depend rather more upon personal
divination and temperamental sympathy than upon any laboriously
acquired skill in interpretation. Even for the name and lineage of
many of the most famous and successful finders, as well as for the
incidents of their lives, we are mainly dependent upon two sets of
brief biographies, compiled by nameless monks, one in the twelfth
and one in the fourteenth century. Of these cloistered authors, the
earlier was no doubt contemporary with a certain number of his sub-
jects; but we may safely conclude that they both adorned their
facts, to some extent, with fancy and with fable. In selecting, out of
a hundred or two of these romantic lives, a few as typical of all, we
may think ourselves fortunate if, as in the case of the name that
heads all the lists, the poet be a sufficiently exalted personage to have
had a place in general history, and to have borne a part in the lead-
ing events of his time.
―――
William IX. , Count of Poitiers and Duke of Aquitaine, was born
in the year 1071, and succeeded in his fifteenth year to the sover-
eignty of a region comprising, besides Gascony and the southern half
XX-743
## p. 11874 (#504) ##########################################
11874
PROVENÇAL LITERATURE
of Aquitaine, Limousin, Berry, and Auvergne. Almost alone among
the great lords of southern France, he resisted the call of Raymond
of Toulouse to the First Crusade in 1095; but when in the last year
of the century the great news arrived of the capture of Jerusalem,
and an appeal was made for the reinforcement of the small garrison
left in the Holy Land, William was overborne, and prepared, though
still reluctantly, to go. His amours had been numerous, and he
had already written love songs,- many of which are licentious to a
degree, though some few reflect in sweet and simple strains the
most refined ideals of chivalry.
Now, on the eve of his departure for the East, early in 1101, he
composed a farewell to Provence, being haunted by a sad presenti-
ment that he should see that fair land no more. His foreboding was
not realized. He came back unscathed at the end of two years, after
many wild adventures and narrow escapes, and wrote a burlesque
account in verse (which has not survived) of his experiences in Pales-
tine. He lived until 1127, and made ruthless war in his later years
upon his young and defenseless neighbor, Alphonse Jourdain of Tou-
louse, for the sovereignty of that province. Alphonse was a son of
the heroic Raymond, the leader of the first crusade, born in the
Holy Land and baptized in the Jordan,-whence his surname. A
daughter of his was distinguished by the tuneful homage of a trou-
badour named Guiraud le Roux, of knightly rank but poor, who had
taken service at Alphonse's court. This Guiraud is remarkable as
being the only troubadour on record who loved but one woman; and
there is a quality about his whimsical and subtle but always irre-
proachable verses which reminds one a little of the Elizabethan lyric.
William IX. of Poitiers was succeeded by his son William X. ; and
he in turn was the father of one of the most illustrious women of
her age,
a great patroness of the troubadours, and past-mistress
of all that nebulous lore which was made the absurd matter of sol-
emn discussion and adjudication in the so-called Courts of Love. This
was no other than the beautiful and stately Eleanor,- Princess of
Aquitaine and Duchess of Normandy, first married to Louis VII.
of France, then divorced and married to Henry II. of England,― the
merciless but by no means immaculate censor of the fair Rosamond
Clifford, and the mother of Richard of the Lion Heart. She was
already married to Henry, who was ten years her junior; but she
had not yet visited England when she welcomed and installed as
her formal worshiper at the Norman court one of the most famous
and prolific of all the troubadours,—a true poet, though a light and
inconstant lover,— Bernard of Ventadour. Very humbly born, the
son in fact of the castle baker, Bernard's exquisite talent was early
discovered by his master, Ebles III. of Ventadour, who is described
――――
## p. 11875 (#505) ##########################################
PROVENÇAL LITERATURE
11875
in the old chronicles as having "loved, even to old age, the songs of
alacrity. " Ebles not only educated the boy, but permitted and even
encouraged him, for a long time, to afficher himself as the adorer
of his own youthful second wife, Adelaide of Montpellier. The day
came, however, when the youth's homage was suddenly discovered to
have passed the proper ceremonial bounds; and he was abruptly dis-
missed, to take new service in Normandy. It is next to impossible
to separate, in his remains, the songs of the two periods: Adelaide
or Eleanor, it is all virtually one. The limpid stream of babbling
minstrelsy flows on for some forty years, always dulcet and delicate,
sometimes lightly pathetic, but reflecting indifferently the image of
either lady. Within the long period of Bernard's placid ascendency
were comprised the rapid and fiery careers of two men of a very
different stamp,- the most tragical figures in all the miscellaneous
choir.
Jaufré Rudel, the Prince of Blaya, fell in love with a certain Count-
ess of Tripoli on the mere rumor of her charms; assumed the cross
for the sole and sacrilegious purpose of meeting her; fell ill upon the
voyage, and on his arrival was recovered from a death-like trance by
his lady's embrace, only to die almost immediately in her arms.
The horrible story of William of Cabestaing would seem quite
beyond belief were it not given circumstantially, and with very slight
variations, by an unusual number of writers. Himself a gallant and
accomplished cavalier, William won such favor in the eyes of the
Lady Margarida, wife of Raymond of Roussillon, that he aroused the
savage jealousy of the latter, who waylaid and slew him, and then
cut out his heart, which he ordered cooked and seasoned and set before
his wife. The hapless lady partook of it; then, on being brutally
told the ghastly truth, she swore that she would never eat again,
sprang past her husband, who had drawn his sword, leaped from the
high balcony of an open window, and perished. Both Raymond and
William were vassals of Alphonse II. of Aragon, himself a trouba-
dour, and a great patron of the art. He had Raymond arrested, and
caused him to die in prison; while the tomb of the lovers before
the door of the church at Perpignan was long a place of pious resort
for the pilgrims of passion in those parts.
A different and less melodramatic interest attaches to the names
of the two Arnauts,— Arnaut Daniel and Arnaut de Maroill: of whom
the former, as we know from Canto xxvi. of the 'Purgatorio,' spoke
in Provençal to Dante when he met him in the shades; while the
latter is mentioned by Petrarch in a canzone as "the less famous
Arnaut. " The distinction seems a strange one: for while the verses
of the former are chiefly remarkable for an extraordinary artificiality
and complexity of rhythm, the latter, who had vowed his devotions
## p. 11876 (#506) ##########################################
11876
PROVENÇAL LITERATURE
to a certain lovely Viscountess of Béziers, was the author of some
of the most exquisitely tender bits of Provençal song which we pos-
sess.
The laborious verbal conceits and metrical intricacies of Dante's
Arnaut were imitated with great ingenuity, and even exaggerated, by
Raimon de Miraval, who fought in the Albigensian war; during which
so many of the local poets and their patrons fell, that a whole civili-
zation seemed to perish with them. That cruel contest may be held
to mark the beginning of the end of the Provençal school of song.
The name of a woman, the Countess Die,-who also, like the
royal Eleanor, presided over a Court of Love,- remains attached to
one plaintive lament much admired in its day; and another woman,
though unnamed, was the author of the most artless and impassioned
of all the peculiar class of poems known as albas or morning-songs.
Another very beautiful alba was written by Guiraut de Borneil, of
whom it is said by his ancient biographer that he composed the first
true chanson, all previous poets having made verses only. He won a
weightier kind of renown by the virile force and fire of his sirventes,
- didactic or satiric pieces,-in which he mourned the accumulated
misfortunes of his country, or lashed the crimes and vices of the men
who had brought her to the verge of ruin.
Contemporary with Guiraut was another intrepid censor of the
corruptions of his time, Peire Cardinal; of whom we have a satire
beginning with the burning words, "Who desires to hear a sirventes
woven of grief and embroidered with anger? I have spun it al-
ready, and I can make its warp and woof! " Both these brave men
died not far from the year 1230, and the course of Provençal liter-
ature after their day is one of steady deterioration.
Начнет политикой
BIBLIOGRAPHY. — There is no adequate history in English of the
elder Provençal literature; nothing to compare, for instance, with
Friedrich Diez's 'Leben und Werke der Troubadours. ' This has
been brought quite up to date in the revision of Bartsch (1883), and
includes also copious poetical versions. The chief general treatises in
English are Rutherford's Troubadours' (London, 1873), and Hüffer's
'Troubadours' (London, 1878). More accessible and quite as trust-
worthy is the article in the Britannica' on Provençal literature.
The curiosity of the modern reader as to the social conditions
which created and upheld the so-called Courts of Love, is best grati-
fied by J. F. Rowbotham's 'The Troubadours and Courts of Love,'
## p. 11877 (#507) ##########################################
PROVENÇAL LITERATURE
11877
one of the series entitled 'Social England' (Macmillan, New York,
1895). Another interesting and recent work is Ida Farnell's 'Lives of
the Troubadours,' translated from Provençal sources. This little
book is illustrated with poetical English versions. Miss Preston's
own volume, 'Troubadours and Trouvères' (Roberts Brothers, Boston,
1876) is devoted, in spite of its title, chiefly to Jasmin and the more
recent Provençal poets of this century. The chapter on the Trou-
badours (pages 151 to 231) is largely made up of spirited versions,
which are in part repeated, in revised form, in the course of the
present article.
For those who wish to study the Provençal texts in the original,
the most convenient collection is Karl Appel's 'Chrestomathie' (Leip-
zig, 1895). There is an elementary introduction to the old Provençal
language by Kitchin.
[The dates at the head of these pieces represent, approximately, the time
within which the several authors wrote. ]
GUILLAUME DE POITIERS
(1190-1227)
B
I
EHOLD the meads are green again,
The orchard-bloom is seen again,
Of sky and stream the mien again
Is mild, is bright!
Now should each heart that loves obtain
Its own delight.
But I will say no ill of love,
However slight my guerdon prove;
Repining doth not me behove:
And yet—to know
How lightly she I fain would move
Might bliss bestow!
There are who hold my folly great,
Because with little hope I wait;
But one old saw doth animate
And me assure:
Their hearts are high, their might is great,
Who well endure.
Translation of H. W. P.
## p. 11878 (#508) ##########################################
11878
PROVENÇAL LITERATURE
II
DESIRE of song hath taken me,
But sorrowful must my song be;
No more pay I my fealty
In Limousin or Poitiers,
Since I go forth to exile far,
And leave my son to stormy war,
To fear and peril; for they are
No friends who dwell about him there.
What wonder then my heart is sore
That Poitiers I see no more,
And Fulk of Anjou must implore
To guard his kinsman and my heir?
If he of Anjou shield him not,
And he who made me knight, I wot
Many against the boy will plot,
Deeming him well-nigh in despair.
Nay, if he be not wondrous wise,
And gay, and ready for emprise,
Gascons and Angevins will rise,
And him into the dust will bear.
Ah, I was brave and I had fame,
But we are sundered, all the same!
I go to Him in whose great name
Confide all sinners everywhere.
Surrendering all that did elate
My heart,—all pride of steed or state,—
To Him on whom the pilgrims wait,
Without more tarrying, I repair.
Forgive me, comrade most my own,
If aught of wrong I thee have done!
I lift to Jesus on his throne
In Latin and Románs my prayer.
Oh, I was gallant, I was glad,
Till my Lord spake, and me forbade;
But now the end is coming sad,
Nor can I more my burden bear.
## p. 11879 (#509) ##########################################
PROVENÇAL LITERATURE
11879
Good friends, when that indeed I die,
Pay me due honor where I lie:
Tell how in love and luxury
I triumphed still,- or here or there.
But farewell now, love, luxury,
And silken robes and miniver!
C
GUIRAUD LE ROUX
(1110-1147)
OME, lady, to my song incline,
The last that shall assail thine ear.
Translation of H. W. P.
None other cares my strains to hear,
And scarce thou feign'st thyself therewith delighted!
Nor know I well if I am loved or slighted;
But this I know, thou radiant one and sweet,
That, loved or spurned, I die before thy feet!
Yea, I will yield this life of mine
In very deed, if cause appear,
Without another boon to cheer.
Honor it is to be by thee incited
To any deed; and I, when most benighted
By doubt, remind me that times change and fleet,
And brave men still do their occasion meet.
N°
(1140-1195)
BERNARD DE VENTADOUR
Translation of H. W. P.
O MARVEL is it if I sing
Better than other minstrels all,
For more than they am I love's thrall,
And all myself therein I fling:
Knowledge and sense, body and soul,
And whatso power I have beside:
The rein that doth my being guide
Impels me to this only goal!
## p. 11880 (#510) ##########################################
11880
PROVENÇAL LITERATURE
His heart is dead whence doth not spring
Love's odor sweet and magical;
His life doth ever on him pall
Who knoweth not that blessed thing:
Yea, God who doth my life control
Were cruel, did he bid me bide
A month or even a day, denied
The love whose rapture I extol.
How keen, how exquisite the sting
Of that sweet odor! At its call
An hundred times a day I fall
And faint; an hundred rise and sing!
So fair the semblance of my dole,
'Tis lovelier than another's pride:
If such the ill doth me betide,
Good hap were more than I could thole!
Yet haste, kind Heaven, the sundering
True swains from false, great hearts from small!
The traitor in the dust bid crawl,
The faithless to confession bring!
Ah, if I were the master sole
Of all earth's treasures multiplied,
To see my lady satisfied
Of my pure faith, I'd give the whole!
II
WHEN I behold on eager wing
The skylark soaring to the sun,
Till e'en with rapture faltering
He sinks in glad oblivion,
Alas, how fain to seek were I
The same ecstatic fate of fire!
Yea, of a truth, I know not why
My heart melts not with its desire!
Methought that I knew everything
Of love. Alas, my lore was none!
For helpless now my praise I bring
To one who still that praise doth shun;
One who hath robbed me utterly
Of soul, of self, of life entire,
So that my heart can only cry
For that it ever shall require.
## p. 11881 (#511) ##########################################
PROVENÇAL LITERATURE
11881
For ne'er have I of self been king
Since the first hour, so long agone,
When to thine eyes bewildering,
As to a mirror, I was drawn.
There let me gaze until I die;
So doth my soul of sighing tire,
As at the fount, in days gone by,
The fair Narcissus did expire.
III
A
WHEN the sweet breeze comes blowing
From where thy country lies,
Meseems I am foreknowing
The airs of Paradise.
So is my heart o'erflowing
For that fair one and wise
Who hath the glad bestowing
Of life's whole energies;
For whom I agonize
Whithersoever going.
I mind the beauty glowing,
The fair and haughty eyes,
Which, all my will o'erthrowing,
Made me their sacrifice.
Whatever mien thou'rt showing,
Why should I this disguise?
Yet let me ne'er be ruing
One of thine old replies:-
"Man's daring wins the prize,
But fear is his undoing. "
Translation of H. W. P.
RICHARD CŒUR DE LION
(1169–1199)
H! CERTES will no prisoner tell his tale
Fitly, unless as one whom woes befall;
Still, as a solace, songs may much avail:
Friends I have many, yet the gifts are small,
Shame! that because to ransom me they fail,
I've pined two years in thrall.
-
## p. 11882 (#512) ##########################################
11882
PROVENÇAL LITERATURE
But all my liegemen in fair Normandy,
In England, Poitou, Gascony, know well
That not my meanest follower would I
Leave for gold's sake in prison-house to dwell;
Reproach I neither kinsman nor ally,-
Yet I am still in thrall.
Alas! I may as certain truth rehearse,
Nor kin nor friends have captives and the dead:
'Tis bad for me, but for my people worse,
If to desert me they through gold are led;
After my death, 'twill be to them a curse
If they leave me in thrall.
No marvel, then, if I am sad at heart
Each day my lord disturbs my country more;
Has he forgot that he too had a part
In the deep oath which before God we swore?
But yet in truth I know, I shall not smart
Much longer here in thrall.
Blackwood's Magazine, February 1836.
GUILLAUME DE CABESTAING
(1181-1196)
I
SEE the days are long and glad;
On every tree are countless flowers,
And merry birds sing in the bowers,
Which bitter cold so long made sad:
But now upon the highest hills,
Each amid flowers and sparkling rills,
After his manner takes delight.
And therefore I rejoice once more
That joy of love should warm my breast,
And lay my sweet desires to rest.
As serpent from false sycamore,
I from false coldness speed me ever;
Yet for love's sake, which cheers me never,
All other joys seem vain and light.
## p. 11883 (#513) ##########################################
PROVENÇAL LITERATURE
11883
Never since Adam plucked the fruit
Whence thousand woes our race oppress,
Was seen on earth such loveliness.
The body, formed that face to suit,
Is polished more than amethyst;
Her very beauty makes me tryst,
Since she of me takes little heed.
Ah, never shall there come a time
When love, that now inflames my heart,
Shall struggle from her to depart.
As plants, even in a wintry clime,
When the sun shines regain new life,
So her sweet smiles, with gladness rife,
Deck me with love, as plants with flower.
I love so madly, many die
From less, and now my hour seems near.
For though my love's to me most dear,
In vain for help or hope I sigh.
A fire upon my heart is fed,
The Nile could quench no more than thread
Of finest silk support a tower.
Alas that I must still lament
The pains that from love ever flow;
That baffled hope and ceaseless woe
All color from my cheek have sent.
But white as snow shall be my hair,
And I a trembling dotard, ere
Of my best lady I complain.
How oft, from lady's love we see
The fierce and wicked change their mood;
How oft is he most kind and good
Who, did he not love tenderly,
Would be each passion's wayward slave.
Thus am I meek with good and brave,
But haughty to the bad and vain.
Thus with delight each cherished woe I dree,
And sweet as manna seems slight joy to me.
Blackwood's Magazine, February 1836.
## p. 11884 (#514) ##########################################
11884
PROVENÇAL LITERATURE
II
THERE is who spurns the leaf, and turns
The stateliest flower of all to cull:
So on life's topmost bough sojourns
My lady; the most beautiful!
Whom with his own nobility
Our Lord hath graced, so she may move
In glorious worth our lives above,
Yet soft with all humility.
Her pleading look my spirit shook,
And won my fealty long ago;
My heart's blood stronger impulse took,
Freshening my colors. And yet so,
No otherwise discovering
My love, I bode. Now, lady mine,
At last, before thy throngèd shrine,
I also lay my offering.
III
THE visions tender
Which thy love giveth me,
Still bid me render
My vows, in song, to thee;
Gracious and slender,
Thine image I can see,
Wherever I wend, or
What eyes do look on me.
Yea, in the frowning face
Of uttermost disgrace,
Proud would I take my place
Before thy feet,
Lady, whose aspect sweet
Doth my poor self efface,
And leave but joy and praise.
Who shall deny me
The memory of thine eyes?
Evermore by me
Thy lithe white form doth rise.
## p. 11885 (#515) ##########################################
PROVENÇAL LITERATURE
11885
If God were nigh me
Alway, in so sure wise,
Quick might I hie me
Into his Paradise!
Ο
COMTESSE DE DIE
Translations of H. W. P.
(TWELFTH CENTURY)
F THAT I would not, I, alas! must sing,
He whom I love has caused me such deep pain:
For though I love him more than earthly thing,
My love and courtesy but meet disdain,
And beauty, merit, wit, are all in vain;
But I must mourn as hopelessly and long
As if I wittingly had done him wrong.
It comforts me, sweet friend, to think that never
Have I 'gainst you in word or deed transgressed:
More than Seguis Valens* I loved you ever,
And that my love surpasses yours I'm blessed;
For you are worthier far, O dearest, best.
You're proud to me in conduct, speech, and air,
But to all others kind and debonaire.
It marvels me, sweet friend, that you can feel
Towards me that pride that cuts me to the heart:
All wrong it were that any dame should steal
Your love from me, whate'er may be her art;
And never let the memory depart
Of what our love once was. Mother divine!
Forbid that coldness sprang from fault of mine.
Your prowess which all others hold so dear,
Your fame, disquiet me with their bright shine;
For not a lady, whether far or near,
But will, if e'er she love, to you incline.
But you, sweet friend, ah! well might you divine
Where beats the heart more tender than them all:
Forget not former vows, whate'er befall.
* Seguis and Valens were the hero and heroine of a romance of that day.
## p. 11886 (#516) ##########################################
11886
PROVENÇAL LITERATURE
Much should pure fame, much should desert avail,
My beauty much, but truth and love far more;
Therefore send I this song to bid you hail,
And in your ear my thoughts and hopes to pour.
I fain would know, O friend that I adore!
Why you to me are ever harsh and cold:
Is't pride or hate, or think you me too bold?
All this my message bears, and this beside,
That many suffer from excess of pride.
Blackwood's Magazine, February 1836.
So
ARNAUT DE MAROILL
(1170-1200)
OFTLY sighs the April air
With the coming of the May;
Of the tranquil night aware,
Murmur nightingale and jay;
Then, when dewy dawn doth rise,
Every bird, in his own tongue,
Wakes his mate with happy cries,-
All their joy abroad is flung.
Gladness, lo, is everywhere,
When the first leaf sees the day:
And shall I alone despair,
Turning from sweet love away?
Something to my heart replies
Thou too wast for rapture strung:
Wherefore else the dreams that rise
Round thee, when the year is young?
One than Helen yet more fair,
Loveliest blossom of the May,
Rose tints hath and sunny hair,
And a gracious mien and gay;
Heart that scorneth all disguise,
Lips where pearls of truth are hung:
God who gives all sovereignties
Knows her like was never sung.
Though she lead through long despair,
I would never say her nay,
## p. 11887 (#517) ##########################################
PROVENÇAL LITERATURE
11887
If one kiss-reward how rare! -
Each new trial might repay.
Swift returns I'd then devise,
Many laborers but not iong;
Following so fair a prize,
I could never more go wrong.
RAIMON DE MIRAVAL
(1190-1200)
Translation of H. W. P.
F
AIR summer-time doth me delight,
And song of birds delights no less;
Meadows delight in their green dress,
Delight the trees in verdure bright;
And far, far more delights thy graciousness,
Lady, and I to do thy will, delight.
Yet be not this delight my final boon,
Or I of my desire shall perish soon!
For that desire most exquisite
Of all desires, I live in stress
Desire of thy rich comeliness;
Oh, come, and my desire requite!
Though doubling that desire by each caress,
Is my desire not single in thy sight?
Let me not then, desiring sink undone;
To love's high joys, desire be rather prone!
No alien joy will I invite,
But joy in thee, to all excess:
Joy in thy grace, nor e'en confess
Whatso might do my joy despite.
So deep my joy, my lady, no distress
That joy shall master; for thy beauty's light
Such joy hath shed, for each day it hath shone,
Joyless I cannot be while I live on.
Translation of H. W. P.
## p. 11888 (#518) ##########################################
11888
PROVENÇAL LITERATURE
ALBA-AUTHOR UNKNOWN
(TWELFTH CENTURY)
UNE
NDER the hawthorns of an orchard lawn,
She laid her head her lover's breast upon,
Silent, until the guard should cry the dawn;
Ah God! ah God! Why comes the day so soon?
I would the night might never have passed by!
So wouldst thou not have left me, at the cry
Of yonder warder to the whitening sky;-
Ah God! ah God! Why comes the day so soon?
One kiss more, sweetheart, ere the melodies
Of early birds from all the fields arise!
One more, without a thought of jealous eyes! —
Ah God! ah God! Why comes the day so soon?
And yet one more, under the garden wall,
For now the birds begin their festival,
And the day wakens at the warder's call;-
Ah God! ah God! Why comes the day so soon?
-
'Tis o'er! O dearest, noblest, knightliest,
The breeze that greets thy going fans my breast!
I quaff it, as thy breath, and I am blest! —
Ah God! ah God! Why comes the day so soon?
Fair was the lady, and her fame was wide;
And many knights for her dear favor sighed;
But leal the heart out of whose depths she cried,-
Ah God! ah God! Why comes the day so soon?
Translation of H. W. P.
ALBA-GUIRAUT DE BORNEIL
(1175-1230)
Α΄
LL-GLORIOUS King!
wisely. Like all of his contemporaries he was fascinated by Alexan-
drine erudition; but he did not learn, as did the greatest poets of his
age, to correct this tendency by a close study of the earlier masters.
Indeed it is surmised, in the absence of the poems of Callimachus,
that Propertius has gone beyond his instruction. Doctus was a favor-
ite adjective with which to compliment a poet of that age, and Pro-
pertius strove to merit it by displaying his learning in and out of
season. He delights to refer to the most abstruse of myths, or to
their least familiar characters. Never poet stood more in need of
Corinna's advice; for his sack contained only the toughest nuts of the
Greek legend. The obscurity created by this fondness for mythologic
lore is too often increased by an abruptness of thought occasionally
bordering on incoherence. Images are not always clearly conceived.
in his impetuous imagination; and there is not infrequently an
awkwardness of phraseology, or an inexactness of expression. Some-
times one is faintly reminded of Persius and his verbal contortions,
or of other poets who fancy they have made poetry when they have
only written impossible prose.
All these are serious faults; and more likely to endear an author
to schoolmasters and editors than to lovers of poetry. But the per-
sonality of Propertius is strong enough to dominate them all. Few
writers win for themselves a more willing indulgence, or give a
clearer impression of a talent greater than its best work. Sooner or
later his readers come to believe that he might have done greater
things had he so chosen. He chose, however, to lavish his power
upon love elegies; and it is by them that he is usually judged. In
intensity of passion, in utter simplicity and directness of its expres-
sion, Propertius is inferior to Catullus,-as who is not? But as a
poet of love he may safely challenge comparison with any but Ca-
tullus. His Cynthia is never to be classed with the shadowy Chloes
## p. 11863 (#493) ##########################################
SEXTUS PROPERTIUS
11863
and Leuconoës of Horace's bloodless affections. The genuineness of
his love is undoubted. His delight in the charms and accomplish-
ments of his mistress; the jealousy provoked by her infidelities; his
sorrow at parting from her, even in fancy; the rapture of a recon-
ciliation; these and many another aspect of love, and the "evil cares
which it has," are depicted with unmistakable sincerity. For Cyn-
thia's sake he will give up a career, and abandon his plans for travel
abroad. At times he even refuses to write on any other subject:
Cynthia is the first and will be the last of his songs.
The day came, however, when he could narrate his own infidel-
ity, and picture Cynthia's successor filching jewelry from her funeral
pyre. More and more throughout his later books, it is apparent that
other themes were claiming part of his attention. To most men his
great passion will hardly seem a less genuine experience because he
too came to feel that life is greater than love. Believers in poetical
fitness may insist that he died shortly after ceasing to write on the
all-absorbing theme; but the man Propertius, though not the poet,
is quite as likely to have lived to found the family which Pliny
expressly ascribes to him.
Some of the most pleasing of the poems are among the num-
ber not concerned with Cynthia. The "queen of elegies," his noble
epitaph on Cornelia, is deservedly famous, though marred by his
characteristic faults. In the last book are found also a few poems,
dealing with the legendary history of Rome. Whether we regard
them as among his earliest, or as their metrical structure would
seem to indicate, his latest works, they are an interesting evidence of
the manner in which his intense nature responded to the appeal of
national and patriotic themes. It has been surmised that they prob-
ably suggested to Ovid the plan of his 'Fasti. ' Ovid mentions Pro-
pertius with warm admiration, and many imitations and echoes show
clearly the impression made by Propertius upon the poets of the
younger generation. By later Roman writers Propertius is seldom
cited, and there are no selections from his works in the anthologies.
The extant manuscripts are for the most part late, and much
interpolated, as might be expected in the case of a writer so often
obscure. The same quality has caused the earlier editions of the
elegies to be loaded with useless conjectures, and subjected to the
most arbitrary rearrangement. The saner criticism of the present cen-
tury has restored the text; but a satisfactory commentary is yet to
be written. The neglect of Propertius by the schools is shown by
the comparative rarity of editions in modern times. That by F. A.
Paley (London, 1872) is practically the only accessible edition with
English notes, though a volume of selections has been more recently
edited by J. P. Postgate (London, 1881). Of the German editions,
## p. 11864 (#494) ##########################################
11864
SEXTUS PROPERTIUS
Hertzberg's (Halle, 1843), in four volumes with Latin notes, is the
most complete. Of English translations, by far the best poetical ver-
sion is the work of Dr. James Cranstoun (Edinburgh, 1875), from
which the following selections are made.
G. M. Whicher
BEAUTY UNADORNED
WHY
HY wear, my Life, when thou abroad dost stir,
A head trimmed up to fashion's latest laws?
A Coan vestment of transparent gauze,
And hair perfumed with Orontean myrrh ?
Why deck thyself with gems and costly dress?
Why mar with trinkets Nature's form divine,
And not allow thy beauties forth to shine
In all their own, their matchless loveliness?
To thee such aids can add no charms—ah, no!
True love will aye disdain the artist's care.
See! the fair fields a thousand colors wear,
And ivy sprays far best spontaneous grow.
Fairer in lonely grots green arbutes rise,
Fairer the streamlet wends its wandering way,
Lovelier bright pebbles gem their native bay,
And birds sing sweetlier artless melodies.
TO TULLUS
D
EAR Tullus, now I'd gladly plow wild Adria's waves with thee,
And fearlessly my canvas spread upon the Ægean sea;
Yea, by thy side I'd o'er the steep Rhipæan ridges roam,
Or wend my toilsome way beyond swart Memnon's distant home:
But me a maiden's pleading words and circling arms detain; [vain.
'Gainst her pale cheek and earnest prayers to strive, alas! were
Still of her ardent love for me she raves the weary night,
And swears there's not a god in heaven, if e'er I leave her sight;
Declares that she is not my love; nay more, the frantic girl
Vents every threat that peevish maids at heartless lovers hurl;
## p. 11865 (#495) ##########################################
SEXTUS PROPERTIUS
11865
Against her plaints a single hour I cannot, cannot hold.
Ah! perish he, if such there be, whose bosom could be cold!
True, I should see fair Athens reared beneath Minerva's smile,
And Asia's grandeur famed of old; but is it worth the while
To make my Cynthia scream what time my vessel seeks the sea,
To see her tear her tender cheeks in frenzied agony,
And say that she will kiss the wind that balks her lover's plan,
And that no monster walks the earth so fell as faithless man?
Go, strive to earn a nobler wreath than e'er thine uncle wore,
And to our old allies their long-forgotten rights restore:
And may the unpitying Boy ne'er bring on thee my sorrows fell,
And all the tokens of a woe my tears too plainly tell;
For thou hast frittered not thy years on Beauty's fatal charms,
But aye been ready to assert thy country's cause in arms.
Here let me lie, as fortune aye hath willed it in the past;
And let me still devote my soul to folly to the last.
Many in tardy love have gladly spent their latest day,—
Then let me die with these, with these let earth conceal my clay:
For fame I was not nurtured, nor in arms would glorious prove;
The Fates decree my fields shall be the battle-plains of love.
Then whether thou shalt roam athwart Ionia's pleasant lands,
Or where Pactolus streaks the Lydian vales with golden sands;
Whether on foot thou'lt scour the plain or tempt with oars the sea,
And all the duties well discharge thine office claims from thee:
If thou shouldst chance to think of me in foreign climes afar,
Be well assured I'm living still beneath a baleful star.
TO CYNTHIA
SINC
INCE from my love I had the heart to flee,
Justly to halcyons lone my wail I pour;
No more Cassiope my bark will see,
And all my vows fall fruitless on the shore.
The winds are leagued for thee now far away;
Hark to the threatening tempest's fitful gust!
Will no kind fortune this dread storm allay?
Must a few grains of sand conceal my dust?
Oh, let no more thy harsh upbraidings rise,
But say this night at sea my fault atones!
## p. 11866 (#496) ##########################################
11866
SEXTUS PROPERTIUS
Or canst thou paint my fate with tearless eyes,
Nor in thy bosom bear hold my bones?
Ah! perish he who first, with impious art,
In sail-rigged craft dared tempt the unwilling sea!
'Twere better I had soothed my mistress's heart-
Hard though she was, how peerless still to me!
Than view this wild and forest-mantled shore,
And woo the longed-for Twins that calm the wave.
Then earth had veiled my woes, life's fever o'er,
And some small stone-love's tribute - marked my grave.
For me she might have shorn her cherished hair;
'Mid sweet-breath'd roses laid my bones at rest;
Called o'er my dust my name, and breathed a prayer
That earth might lightly lie upon my breast.
Fair Doris's daughters, who o'er ocean roam,
Speed our white sails with your auspicious band!
And oh, if Love e'er sought your azure home,
Grant one who loved like you, a sheltered strand!
TO CAIUS CILNIUS MÆCENAS
YOU
You ask me why love-elegy so frequently I follow,
And why my little book of tender trifles only sings:
It is not from Calliope, nor is it from Apollo,
But from my own sweet lady-love my inspiration springs.
If in resplendent purple robe of Cos my darling dresses,
I'll fill a portly volume with the Coan garment's praise;
Or if her truant tresses wreathe her forehead with caresses,
The tresses of her queenly brow demand her poet's lays.
Or if, perchance, she strike the speaking lyre with ivory fingers,
I marvel how those nimble fingers run the chords along;
Or if above her slumber-drooping eyes a shadow lingers,
My tranced mind is sure to find a thousand themes of song.
Or if for love's delightful strife repose awhile be broken,
Oh, I could write an Iliad of our sallies and alarms;
If anything at all she's done - if any word she's spoken-
From out of nothing rise at once innumerable charms.
――――
## p. 11867 (#497) ##########################################
SEXTUS PROPERTIUS
11867
But if the Fates had given me the power, beloved Mæcenas,
To marshal hero-bands, I'd neither sing of Titan wars,
Nor Ossa on Olympus piled, that Terra's brood most heinous,
By aid of Pelion, might scale the everlasting stars;
Nor hoary Thebes, nor Pergamus in Homer's song undying;
Nor sea to sea by stern decree of haughty Xerxes brought;
The warlike Cimbri, nor the soul of Carthage death-defying;
Nor Remus's ancient realm, nor deeds of fame by Marius
wrought;
But I would sing of Cæsar's might and Cæsar's martial glory,
And next to mighty Cæsar would my lyre for thee be strung:
For while of Mutina, or of Philippi fell and gory,
Or of the naval war and rout by Sicily I sung;
Or of Etruria's ancient hearths in ruin laid forever,
Or Ptolemæan Pharos with its subjugated shore,
Or Egypt and the Nile what time the broad seven-mantled river
In drear captivity to Rome our conquering armies bore;
Or kings with golden fetters bound, in gorgeous-hued apparel,
And trophied prows of Actium, whirled along the Sacred Way,
My Muse would ever twine around thy brow the wreath of
laurel-
In time of peace, in time of war, a faithful subject aye.
TO THE MUSE
'TIS
Is time to traverse Helicon in themes of higher strain,
'Tis time to spur my Thracian steed across a wider plain;
Now I would sing of mighty hosts and deeds of battle done,
And chronicle the Roman fields my general has won;
And if my powers of song should fail — to dare were surely fame:
Enough that I have had the will; no higher praise I claim.
-
Let hot youth sing the laughing loves-be war the theme of age;
Be war my theme-till now the dream of love has filled my page.
With sober mien and graver brow I now must walk along,
Now on another lyre my Muse essays another song.
Rise, O my Muse! from lowly themes; put on your strength, ye
Nine
Who haunt the clear Pierian springs! -outpour the lofty line!
## p. 11868 (#498) ##########################################
11868
SEXTUS PROPERTIUS
As when we cannot reach the head of statues all too high,
We lay a chaplet at the feet, so now perforce do I;
Unfit to climb the giddy heights of epic song divine,
In humble adoration lay poor incense on thy shrine;
For not as yet my Muse hath known the wells of Ascra's grove:
Permessus's gentle wave alone hath laved the limbs of Love.
THE IMMORTALITY OF GENIUS
RPHEUS, 'tis said, the Thracian lyre-strings sweeping,
Stayed the swift stream and soothed the savage
Citharon's rocks, to Thebes spontaneous leaping,
Rose into walls before Amphion's lute.
With dripping steeds did Galatea follow,
'Neath Ætna's crags, lone Polyphemus's song:
Is't strange the loved of Bacchus and Apollo
Leads captive with his lay the maiden throng?
Though no Tænarian blocks uphold my dwelling,
Nor ivory panels shine 'tween gilded beams;
No orchards mine Phæacia's woods excelling,
No chiseled grots where Marcian water streams,-
Yet Song is mine; my strain the heart engages;
Faint from the dance sinks the lithe Muse with me:
O happy maid whose name adorns my pages! *
Each lay a lasting monument to thee!
The pyramids that cleave heaven's jeweled portal;
Eléan Jove's star-spangled dome; the tomb
Where rich Mausolus sleeps,- are not immortal,
Nor shall escape inevitable doom.
Devouring fire and rains will mar their splendor;
The weight of years will drag the marble down:
Genius alone a name can deathless render,
And round the forehead wreathe the unfading crown.
## p. 11869 (#499) ##########################################
SEXTUS PROPERTIUS
11869
CORNELIA
O
PAULUS! vex my grave with tears no more:
No prayers unlock the portals of the tomb;
When once the dead have trod the infernal floor,
Barred stand the adamantine doors of doom.
Though the dark hall's dread king would hear thy prayer,
'Twere vain: dead shores will drink thy tears the
while.
Prayers move high heaven; but pay the boatman's fare,
The drear gate closes on the shadowy pile.
I doffed the maiden's dress;-I was a bride;
The matron's coif confined my braided hair:
Too soon, O Paulus! doomed to leave thy side;
I was but thine, my tombstone shall declare.
Years changed me not; a blameless life I spent,
From wedlock to its close our fame secure:
Nature my blood with inborn virtue blent;
No fears could make my guileless heart more pure.
My meed a mother's tears; the city's woe;
Even Cæsar's sorrow consecrates my bier:
Rome saw the mighty god a-weeping go,
And mourn his daughter's worthy sister-peer.
Though young, the matron's honored robe I wore;
Death from no barren dwelling bore his prize:
My boys! my solace when I live no more,
Ye held me in your hands and closed my eyes.
Twice had my brother filled the curule chair,
A consul ere his sister's days were run.
Thy censor-sire in mind, sweet daughter, bear:
Uphold his honor; wed, like me, but one;
With offspring prop our line. The bark's afloat:
I gladly go, so many mourn my doom;
A wife's last triumph, and of fairest note,
Is fame's sweet incense rising o'er her tomb.
Paulus, our pledges I commend to thee;
Burnt in my bones still breathes a mother's care.
Discharge a mother's duties, then, for me;
For now thy shoulders all their load must bear.
## p. 11870 (#500) ##########################################
11870
SEXTUS PROPERTIUS
Kiss them, and kiss them for their mother; dry
Their childish tears: thine all the burden now.
Ne'er let them see thee weep or hear thee sigh,
But with a smile thy sorrow disavow.
Enough that thou the weary nights shouldst moan,
And woo my semblance back in visions vain;
Yet whisper to my portrait when alone,
As if the lips could answer thee again.
If e'er these halls should own another queen,
And a new mother fill your mother's bed,—
My children, ne'er let frowning look be seen,
But honor her your father chose to wed.
So shall your manners win her tender grace,
And surely she will love for love return;
Nor praise too much your mother to her face,
For fear her breast with jealous feelings burn.
But should my image still his thoughts engage,
And Paulus dower my dust with love so rare,
Oh, learn to watch your father's failing age,
And shield his weary widowed heart from care!
Heaven add to yours the years I hoped in store,
And may your lives my aged Paulus cheer!
'Tis well: I ne'er the robes of mourning wore,
And all my children gathered round my bier.
My cause is plead. Each weeping witness, rise,
Since death's rewards life's losses well repay.
Heaven waits the pure in heart: be mine the prize
To soar triumphant to the realms of day.
## p. 11871 (#501) ##########################################
11871
PROVENCAL LITERATURE
(THE TROUBADOURS, 1090–1290)
BY HARRIET WATERS PRESTON
CURIOUS natural feature of Dalmatia—that long, narrow coun-
try straitened between the mountains and the Adriatic-is
the number of rivers which come up suddenly from under-
ground, or burst full-grown from the bases of the hills, and seek the
sea with a force and velocity of current all the more impressive from
the mystery of their origin. Just so the poetry of the Troubadours
leaps abruptly, in full volume, out of the mirk of the unlettered ages,
and spreads itself abroad in a laughing flood of which the superficial
sparkle may sometimes deceive concerning the strength of the under-
current passion on which it is upborne.
Gai Saber-the Gay Science -was the name bestowed by these
gushing singers themselves upon their newly discovered art of verse-
making; and the epithet was perfectly descriptive. To the serious,
disciplined, and systematic nineteenth-century mind, there is some-
thing incongruous, not to say indecent, in the association of science
and joy. Whatever else the science may be, in whose sign we are
supposed to conquer, it is not gay. But the Troubadour did not even
know the difference between science and art. His era in the life of
modern Europe corresponds exactly with the insouciant season when
«< a young man's fancy lightly turns to thoughts of love. " The Trou-
badour was palpitating, moreover, with the two masterful enthusiasms
of his time: the religious enthusiasm of the Crusades, and the high-
flown sentiments and noble chimeras of the lately formulated code of
chivalry.
Seizing the instrument nearest to his hand, a supple and still
growing offshoot from the imperishable root of Latin speech,-he
shaped his pipe, fashioned his stops, and blew his amorous blast;
and was so overcome by amazement at the delightful result, that he
was fain loudly to proclaim himself the happy finder (trobaire) of the
verbal music he had achieved, rather than its maker or poet.
Lengua Romana, or Romans, was what he called his own language.
To Dante, in the beginning of the fourteenth century, it was Pro-
vençal as distinguished from the lengua materna, or Italian: and
Provençal it is, to this day, loosely called. But it was spoken in
-
## p. 11872 (#502) ##########################################
11872
PROVENÇAL LITERATURE
substantially the same form, far outside the fluctuating limits of
mediæval Provence; and one of the Troubadours themselves - Rai-
mon Vidal- has in fact defined its limits very explicitly. "The only
true language of poetry," he says, "is that of Limousin, Provence,
Auvergne, and Quercy;
and every man born and brought
up in those countries speaks the natural and right speech. "
The time at which the troubadour minstrelsy flourished is as
distinctly marked as its locality. Two hundred years, from the last
decade of the eleventh century to the last of the thirteenth, com-
prise it all. Fifty years for its rise, a hundred for its most exuberant
period, fift more for its decline,- and the brief but picturesque and
exciting story is all told. The love of man for woman is its per-
petual and almost exclusive theme; primarily that same "simple and
sensuous" motif which was already old in the world when the all-
knowing King of Israel sang,—“Rise up, my love, my fair one, and
come away! For lo! the winter is past, the rain is over and gone,
the time of the singing of birds is come, and the voice of the turtle
is heard in the land! " The special form of the tender passion to
which the troubadour tuned his lay was, however, the love of chiv-
alry: theoretically a selfless and spiritual sentiment, having even a
touch about it of religious exaltation. It involved the absolute devo-
tion of life, wit, and prowess to the service of a formally chosen lady-
love; and was as much a part of the sacramental obligations of a
full-made knight as the service of God and of his feudal seigneur.
The art in which this love found expression was thus essentially an
aristocratic one; reserved for the practice of those who were either
élite by birth and fortune, or ennobled by the possession of rare
poetic gifts. Marriage was no part of its aim, and was never once,
in the case of any well-known troubadour, its dénouement. The
minstrel's lady was quite regularly the wife of another man; often of
his feudal lord or sovereign ruler. The scope for tragedy and crime
afforded by so fantastic a relation is obvious, and history has plenty
to tell of the calamities which attended it in particular cases. Yet
the austere ideal was never totally eclipsed; and that it survived the
final disappearance of the troubadour as a court-minstrel and titu-
lar lover, we have abundant proof in the mystic lauds addressed by
Dante to Beatrice and by Petrarch to Laura.
•
For the rest, the precocious perfection of form exhibited by some
of the earliest troubadour songs which we possess, is not quite as
miraculous as at first sight it appears. The main points in the mech-
anism of troubadour verse, both in its earlier and simpler, and in its
later and highly elaborate developments, are two: strong tonic accents
- mostly iambic, though sometimes of trochaic lines- and termi-
nal rhymes. By these features it is radically distinguished from the
## p. 11873 (#503) ##########################################
PROVENÇAL LITERATURE
11873
quantitative measures of classic Greece and Rome; and in these
respects it has furnished the model for almost all modern European
poetry. But the rustic and popular poetry of the Latin race had
been, from the first, a poetry of accent: and the tradition of it had
been handed down through the early hymns of the Christian Church,
and the rude staves and ballads trolled from town to town and from
castle to castle during the Dark Ages, by the joculatores or jongleurs;
those vagrant mimes and minstrels who played so large a part after-
wards, in diffusing and popularizing the more refined compositions of
the troubadours. Rhyme, on the other hand, though it might well
have occurred to anybody as a fitting ornament of song,-rhyming
words and syllables being exactly as obvious and essential a form of
harmony as musical chords,- was very probably borrowed immedi-
ately from that Arabian verse in which it is so lavishly employed,
during the long sojourn of the Saracens in Southern Europe.
It seems a curious freak of philological fate whereby a literature
so juvenile and impulsive as that of the troubadours, so destitute of
connected thought, and at the same time so instinct with emotions,
so that the very stress of feeling often renders its utterances vague,
stammering, and all but unintelligible, should have become — largely
by virtue of its important historical position midway between the
written word of ancient Rome and that of modern France a favorite
and hard-trodden field for dry research, grammatical quibbling, and
controversy on technical points. But so it is. Every sigh of the
troubadour minstrel has been analyzed, and every trill conjugated.
Yet when all has been said and read, the reader's appreciation of this
unique body of song will have to depend rather more upon personal
divination and temperamental sympathy than upon any laboriously
acquired skill in interpretation. Even for the name and lineage of
many of the most famous and successful finders, as well as for the
incidents of their lives, we are mainly dependent upon two sets of
brief biographies, compiled by nameless monks, one in the twelfth
and one in the fourteenth century. Of these cloistered authors, the
earlier was no doubt contemporary with a certain number of his sub-
jects; but we may safely conclude that they both adorned their
facts, to some extent, with fancy and with fable. In selecting, out of
a hundred or two of these romantic lives, a few as typical of all, we
may think ourselves fortunate if, as in the case of the name that
heads all the lists, the poet be a sufficiently exalted personage to have
had a place in general history, and to have borne a part in the lead-
ing events of his time.
―――
William IX. , Count of Poitiers and Duke of Aquitaine, was born
in the year 1071, and succeeded in his fifteenth year to the sover-
eignty of a region comprising, besides Gascony and the southern half
XX-743
## p. 11874 (#504) ##########################################
11874
PROVENÇAL LITERATURE
of Aquitaine, Limousin, Berry, and Auvergne. Almost alone among
the great lords of southern France, he resisted the call of Raymond
of Toulouse to the First Crusade in 1095; but when in the last year
of the century the great news arrived of the capture of Jerusalem,
and an appeal was made for the reinforcement of the small garrison
left in the Holy Land, William was overborne, and prepared, though
still reluctantly, to go. His amours had been numerous, and he
had already written love songs,- many of which are licentious to a
degree, though some few reflect in sweet and simple strains the
most refined ideals of chivalry.
Now, on the eve of his departure for the East, early in 1101, he
composed a farewell to Provence, being haunted by a sad presenti-
ment that he should see that fair land no more. His foreboding was
not realized. He came back unscathed at the end of two years, after
many wild adventures and narrow escapes, and wrote a burlesque
account in verse (which has not survived) of his experiences in Pales-
tine. He lived until 1127, and made ruthless war in his later years
upon his young and defenseless neighbor, Alphonse Jourdain of Tou-
louse, for the sovereignty of that province. Alphonse was a son of
the heroic Raymond, the leader of the first crusade, born in the
Holy Land and baptized in the Jordan,-whence his surname. A
daughter of his was distinguished by the tuneful homage of a trou-
badour named Guiraud le Roux, of knightly rank but poor, who had
taken service at Alphonse's court. This Guiraud is remarkable as
being the only troubadour on record who loved but one woman; and
there is a quality about his whimsical and subtle but always irre-
proachable verses which reminds one a little of the Elizabethan lyric.
William IX. of Poitiers was succeeded by his son William X. ; and
he in turn was the father of one of the most illustrious women of
her age,
a great patroness of the troubadours, and past-mistress
of all that nebulous lore which was made the absurd matter of sol-
emn discussion and adjudication in the so-called Courts of Love. This
was no other than the beautiful and stately Eleanor,- Princess of
Aquitaine and Duchess of Normandy, first married to Louis VII.
of France, then divorced and married to Henry II. of England,― the
merciless but by no means immaculate censor of the fair Rosamond
Clifford, and the mother of Richard of the Lion Heart. She was
already married to Henry, who was ten years her junior; but she
had not yet visited England when she welcomed and installed as
her formal worshiper at the Norman court one of the most famous
and prolific of all the troubadours,—a true poet, though a light and
inconstant lover,— Bernard of Ventadour. Very humbly born, the
son in fact of the castle baker, Bernard's exquisite talent was early
discovered by his master, Ebles III. of Ventadour, who is described
――――
## p. 11875 (#505) ##########################################
PROVENÇAL LITERATURE
11875
in the old chronicles as having "loved, even to old age, the songs of
alacrity. " Ebles not only educated the boy, but permitted and even
encouraged him, for a long time, to afficher himself as the adorer
of his own youthful second wife, Adelaide of Montpellier. The day
came, however, when the youth's homage was suddenly discovered to
have passed the proper ceremonial bounds; and he was abruptly dis-
missed, to take new service in Normandy. It is next to impossible
to separate, in his remains, the songs of the two periods: Adelaide
or Eleanor, it is all virtually one. The limpid stream of babbling
minstrelsy flows on for some forty years, always dulcet and delicate,
sometimes lightly pathetic, but reflecting indifferently the image of
either lady. Within the long period of Bernard's placid ascendency
were comprised the rapid and fiery careers of two men of a very
different stamp,- the most tragical figures in all the miscellaneous
choir.
Jaufré Rudel, the Prince of Blaya, fell in love with a certain Count-
ess of Tripoli on the mere rumor of her charms; assumed the cross
for the sole and sacrilegious purpose of meeting her; fell ill upon the
voyage, and on his arrival was recovered from a death-like trance by
his lady's embrace, only to die almost immediately in her arms.
The horrible story of William of Cabestaing would seem quite
beyond belief were it not given circumstantially, and with very slight
variations, by an unusual number of writers. Himself a gallant and
accomplished cavalier, William won such favor in the eyes of the
Lady Margarida, wife of Raymond of Roussillon, that he aroused the
savage jealousy of the latter, who waylaid and slew him, and then
cut out his heart, which he ordered cooked and seasoned and set before
his wife. The hapless lady partook of it; then, on being brutally
told the ghastly truth, she swore that she would never eat again,
sprang past her husband, who had drawn his sword, leaped from the
high balcony of an open window, and perished. Both Raymond and
William were vassals of Alphonse II. of Aragon, himself a trouba-
dour, and a great patron of the art. He had Raymond arrested, and
caused him to die in prison; while the tomb of the lovers before
the door of the church at Perpignan was long a place of pious resort
for the pilgrims of passion in those parts.
A different and less melodramatic interest attaches to the names
of the two Arnauts,— Arnaut Daniel and Arnaut de Maroill: of whom
the former, as we know from Canto xxvi. of the 'Purgatorio,' spoke
in Provençal to Dante when he met him in the shades; while the
latter is mentioned by Petrarch in a canzone as "the less famous
Arnaut. " The distinction seems a strange one: for while the verses
of the former are chiefly remarkable for an extraordinary artificiality
and complexity of rhythm, the latter, who had vowed his devotions
## p. 11876 (#506) ##########################################
11876
PROVENÇAL LITERATURE
to a certain lovely Viscountess of Béziers, was the author of some
of the most exquisitely tender bits of Provençal song which we pos-
sess.
The laborious verbal conceits and metrical intricacies of Dante's
Arnaut were imitated with great ingenuity, and even exaggerated, by
Raimon de Miraval, who fought in the Albigensian war; during which
so many of the local poets and their patrons fell, that a whole civili-
zation seemed to perish with them. That cruel contest may be held
to mark the beginning of the end of the Provençal school of song.
The name of a woman, the Countess Die,-who also, like the
royal Eleanor, presided over a Court of Love,- remains attached to
one plaintive lament much admired in its day; and another woman,
though unnamed, was the author of the most artless and impassioned
of all the peculiar class of poems known as albas or morning-songs.
Another very beautiful alba was written by Guiraut de Borneil, of
whom it is said by his ancient biographer that he composed the first
true chanson, all previous poets having made verses only. He won a
weightier kind of renown by the virile force and fire of his sirventes,
- didactic or satiric pieces,-in which he mourned the accumulated
misfortunes of his country, or lashed the crimes and vices of the men
who had brought her to the verge of ruin.
Contemporary with Guiraut was another intrepid censor of the
corruptions of his time, Peire Cardinal; of whom we have a satire
beginning with the burning words, "Who desires to hear a sirventes
woven of grief and embroidered with anger? I have spun it al-
ready, and I can make its warp and woof! " Both these brave men
died not far from the year 1230, and the course of Provençal liter-
ature after their day is one of steady deterioration.
Начнет политикой
BIBLIOGRAPHY. — There is no adequate history in English of the
elder Provençal literature; nothing to compare, for instance, with
Friedrich Diez's 'Leben und Werke der Troubadours. ' This has
been brought quite up to date in the revision of Bartsch (1883), and
includes also copious poetical versions. The chief general treatises in
English are Rutherford's Troubadours' (London, 1873), and Hüffer's
'Troubadours' (London, 1878). More accessible and quite as trust-
worthy is the article in the Britannica' on Provençal literature.
The curiosity of the modern reader as to the social conditions
which created and upheld the so-called Courts of Love, is best grati-
fied by J. F. Rowbotham's 'The Troubadours and Courts of Love,'
## p. 11877 (#507) ##########################################
PROVENÇAL LITERATURE
11877
one of the series entitled 'Social England' (Macmillan, New York,
1895). Another interesting and recent work is Ida Farnell's 'Lives of
the Troubadours,' translated from Provençal sources. This little
book is illustrated with poetical English versions. Miss Preston's
own volume, 'Troubadours and Trouvères' (Roberts Brothers, Boston,
1876) is devoted, in spite of its title, chiefly to Jasmin and the more
recent Provençal poets of this century. The chapter on the Trou-
badours (pages 151 to 231) is largely made up of spirited versions,
which are in part repeated, in revised form, in the course of the
present article.
For those who wish to study the Provençal texts in the original,
the most convenient collection is Karl Appel's 'Chrestomathie' (Leip-
zig, 1895). There is an elementary introduction to the old Provençal
language by Kitchin.
[The dates at the head of these pieces represent, approximately, the time
within which the several authors wrote. ]
GUILLAUME DE POITIERS
(1190-1227)
B
I
EHOLD the meads are green again,
The orchard-bloom is seen again,
Of sky and stream the mien again
Is mild, is bright!
Now should each heart that loves obtain
Its own delight.
But I will say no ill of love,
However slight my guerdon prove;
Repining doth not me behove:
And yet—to know
How lightly she I fain would move
Might bliss bestow!
There are who hold my folly great,
Because with little hope I wait;
But one old saw doth animate
And me assure:
Their hearts are high, their might is great,
Who well endure.
Translation of H. W. P.
## p. 11878 (#508) ##########################################
11878
PROVENÇAL LITERATURE
II
DESIRE of song hath taken me,
But sorrowful must my song be;
No more pay I my fealty
In Limousin or Poitiers,
Since I go forth to exile far,
And leave my son to stormy war,
To fear and peril; for they are
No friends who dwell about him there.
What wonder then my heart is sore
That Poitiers I see no more,
And Fulk of Anjou must implore
To guard his kinsman and my heir?
If he of Anjou shield him not,
And he who made me knight, I wot
Many against the boy will plot,
Deeming him well-nigh in despair.
Nay, if he be not wondrous wise,
And gay, and ready for emprise,
Gascons and Angevins will rise,
And him into the dust will bear.
Ah, I was brave and I had fame,
But we are sundered, all the same!
I go to Him in whose great name
Confide all sinners everywhere.
Surrendering all that did elate
My heart,—all pride of steed or state,—
To Him on whom the pilgrims wait,
Without more tarrying, I repair.
Forgive me, comrade most my own,
If aught of wrong I thee have done!
I lift to Jesus on his throne
In Latin and Románs my prayer.
Oh, I was gallant, I was glad,
Till my Lord spake, and me forbade;
But now the end is coming sad,
Nor can I more my burden bear.
## p. 11879 (#509) ##########################################
PROVENÇAL LITERATURE
11879
Good friends, when that indeed I die,
Pay me due honor where I lie:
Tell how in love and luxury
I triumphed still,- or here or there.
But farewell now, love, luxury,
And silken robes and miniver!
C
GUIRAUD LE ROUX
(1110-1147)
OME, lady, to my song incline,
The last that shall assail thine ear.
Translation of H. W. P.
None other cares my strains to hear,
And scarce thou feign'st thyself therewith delighted!
Nor know I well if I am loved or slighted;
But this I know, thou radiant one and sweet,
That, loved or spurned, I die before thy feet!
Yea, I will yield this life of mine
In very deed, if cause appear,
Without another boon to cheer.
Honor it is to be by thee incited
To any deed; and I, when most benighted
By doubt, remind me that times change and fleet,
And brave men still do their occasion meet.
N°
(1140-1195)
BERNARD DE VENTADOUR
Translation of H. W. P.
O MARVEL is it if I sing
Better than other minstrels all,
For more than they am I love's thrall,
And all myself therein I fling:
Knowledge and sense, body and soul,
And whatso power I have beside:
The rein that doth my being guide
Impels me to this only goal!
## p. 11880 (#510) ##########################################
11880
PROVENÇAL LITERATURE
His heart is dead whence doth not spring
Love's odor sweet and magical;
His life doth ever on him pall
Who knoweth not that blessed thing:
Yea, God who doth my life control
Were cruel, did he bid me bide
A month or even a day, denied
The love whose rapture I extol.
How keen, how exquisite the sting
Of that sweet odor! At its call
An hundred times a day I fall
And faint; an hundred rise and sing!
So fair the semblance of my dole,
'Tis lovelier than another's pride:
If such the ill doth me betide,
Good hap were more than I could thole!
Yet haste, kind Heaven, the sundering
True swains from false, great hearts from small!
The traitor in the dust bid crawl,
The faithless to confession bring!
Ah, if I were the master sole
Of all earth's treasures multiplied,
To see my lady satisfied
Of my pure faith, I'd give the whole!
II
WHEN I behold on eager wing
The skylark soaring to the sun,
Till e'en with rapture faltering
He sinks in glad oblivion,
Alas, how fain to seek were I
The same ecstatic fate of fire!
Yea, of a truth, I know not why
My heart melts not with its desire!
Methought that I knew everything
Of love. Alas, my lore was none!
For helpless now my praise I bring
To one who still that praise doth shun;
One who hath robbed me utterly
Of soul, of self, of life entire,
So that my heart can only cry
For that it ever shall require.
## p. 11881 (#511) ##########################################
PROVENÇAL LITERATURE
11881
For ne'er have I of self been king
Since the first hour, so long agone,
When to thine eyes bewildering,
As to a mirror, I was drawn.
There let me gaze until I die;
So doth my soul of sighing tire,
As at the fount, in days gone by,
The fair Narcissus did expire.
III
A
WHEN the sweet breeze comes blowing
From where thy country lies,
Meseems I am foreknowing
The airs of Paradise.
So is my heart o'erflowing
For that fair one and wise
Who hath the glad bestowing
Of life's whole energies;
For whom I agonize
Whithersoever going.
I mind the beauty glowing,
The fair and haughty eyes,
Which, all my will o'erthrowing,
Made me their sacrifice.
Whatever mien thou'rt showing,
Why should I this disguise?
Yet let me ne'er be ruing
One of thine old replies:-
"Man's daring wins the prize,
But fear is his undoing. "
Translation of H. W. P.
RICHARD CŒUR DE LION
(1169–1199)
H! CERTES will no prisoner tell his tale
Fitly, unless as one whom woes befall;
Still, as a solace, songs may much avail:
Friends I have many, yet the gifts are small,
Shame! that because to ransom me they fail,
I've pined two years in thrall.
-
## p. 11882 (#512) ##########################################
11882
PROVENÇAL LITERATURE
But all my liegemen in fair Normandy,
In England, Poitou, Gascony, know well
That not my meanest follower would I
Leave for gold's sake in prison-house to dwell;
Reproach I neither kinsman nor ally,-
Yet I am still in thrall.
Alas! I may as certain truth rehearse,
Nor kin nor friends have captives and the dead:
'Tis bad for me, but for my people worse,
If to desert me they through gold are led;
After my death, 'twill be to them a curse
If they leave me in thrall.
No marvel, then, if I am sad at heart
Each day my lord disturbs my country more;
Has he forgot that he too had a part
In the deep oath which before God we swore?
But yet in truth I know, I shall not smart
Much longer here in thrall.
Blackwood's Magazine, February 1836.
GUILLAUME DE CABESTAING
(1181-1196)
I
SEE the days are long and glad;
On every tree are countless flowers,
And merry birds sing in the bowers,
Which bitter cold so long made sad:
But now upon the highest hills,
Each amid flowers and sparkling rills,
After his manner takes delight.
And therefore I rejoice once more
That joy of love should warm my breast,
And lay my sweet desires to rest.
As serpent from false sycamore,
I from false coldness speed me ever;
Yet for love's sake, which cheers me never,
All other joys seem vain and light.
## p. 11883 (#513) ##########################################
PROVENÇAL LITERATURE
11883
Never since Adam plucked the fruit
Whence thousand woes our race oppress,
Was seen on earth such loveliness.
The body, formed that face to suit,
Is polished more than amethyst;
Her very beauty makes me tryst,
Since she of me takes little heed.
Ah, never shall there come a time
When love, that now inflames my heart,
Shall struggle from her to depart.
As plants, even in a wintry clime,
When the sun shines regain new life,
So her sweet smiles, with gladness rife,
Deck me with love, as plants with flower.
I love so madly, many die
From less, and now my hour seems near.
For though my love's to me most dear,
In vain for help or hope I sigh.
A fire upon my heart is fed,
The Nile could quench no more than thread
Of finest silk support a tower.
Alas that I must still lament
The pains that from love ever flow;
That baffled hope and ceaseless woe
All color from my cheek have sent.
But white as snow shall be my hair,
And I a trembling dotard, ere
Of my best lady I complain.
How oft, from lady's love we see
The fierce and wicked change their mood;
How oft is he most kind and good
Who, did he not love tenderly,
Would be each passion's wayward slave.
Thus am I meek with good and brave,
But haughty to the bad and vain.
Thus with delight each cherished woe I dree,
And sweet as manna seems slight joy to me.
Blackwood's Magazine, February 1836.
## p. 11884 (#514) ##########################################
11884
PROVENÇAL LITERATURE
II
THERE is who spurns the leaf, and turns
The stateliest flower of all to cull:
So on life's topmost bough sojourns
My lady; the most beautiful!
Whom with his own nobility
Our Lord hath graced, so she may move
In glorious worth our lives above,
Yet soft with all humility.
Her pleading look my spirit shook,
And won my fealty long ago;
My heart's blood stronger impulse took,
Freshening my colors. And yet so,
No otherwise discovering
My love, I bode. Now, lady mine,
At last, before thy throngèd shrine,
I also lay my offering.
III
THE visions tender
Which thy love giveth me,
Still bid me render
My vows, in song, to thee;
Gracious and slender,
Thine image I can see,
Wherever I wend, or
What eyes do look on me.
Yea, in the frowning face
Of uttermost disgrace,
Proud would I take my place
Before thy feet,
Lady, whose aspect sweet
Doth my poor self efface,
And leave but joy and praise.
Who shall deny me
The memory of thine eyes?
Evermore by me
Thy lithe white form doth rise.
## p. 11885 (#515) ##########################################
PROVENÇAL LITERATURE
11885
If God were nigh me
Alway, in so sure wise,
Quick might I hie me
Into his Paradise!
Ο
COMTESSE DE DIE
Translations of H. W. P.
(TWELFTH CENTURY)
F THAT I would not, I, alas! must sing,
He whom I love has caused me such deep pain:
For though I love him more than earthly thing,
My love and courtesy but meet disdain,
And beauty, merit, wit, are all in vain;
But I must mourn as hopelessly and long
As if I wittingly had done him wrong.
It comforts me, sweet friend, to think that never
Have I 'gainst you in word or deed transgressed:
More than Seguis Valens* I loved you ever,
And that my love surpasses yours I'm blessed;
For you are worthier far, O dearest, best.
You're proud to me in conduct, speech, and air,
But to all others kind and debonaire.
It marvels me, sweet friend, that you can feel
Towards me that pride that cuts me to the heart:
All wrong it were that any dame should steal
Your love from me, whate'er may be her art;
And never let the memory depart
Of what our love once was. Mother divine!
Forbid that coldness sprang from fault of mine.
Your prowess which all others hold so dear,
Your fame, disquiet me with their bright shine;
For not a lady, whether far or near,
But will, if e'er she love, to you incline.
But you, sweet friend, ah! well might you divine
Where beats the heart more tender than them all:
Forget not former vows, whate'er befall.
* Seguis and Valens were the hero and heroine of a romance of that day.
## p. 11886 (#516) ##########################################
11886
PROVENÇAL LITERATURE
Much should pure fame, much should desert avail,
My beauty much, but truth and love far more;
Therefore send I this song to bid you hail,
And in your ear my thoughts and hopes to pour.
I fain would know, O friend that I adore!
Why you to me are ever harsh and cold:
Is't pride or hate, or think you me too bold?
All this my message bears, and this beside,
That many suffer from excess of pride.
Blackwood's Magazine, February 1836.
So
ARNAUT DE MAROILL
(1170-1200)
OFTLY sighs the April air
With the coming of the May;
Of the tranquil night aware,
Murmur nightingale and jay;
Then, when dewy dawn doth rise,
Every bird, in his own tongue,
Wakes his mate with happy cries,-
All their joy abroad is flung.
Gladness, lo, is everywhere,
When the first leaf sees the day:
And shall I alone despair,
Turning from sweet love away?
Something to my heart replies
Thou too wast for rapture strung:
Wherefore else the dreams that rise
Round thee, when the year is young?
One than Helen yet more fair,
Loveliest blossom of the May,
Rose tints hath and sunny hair,
And a gracious mien and gay;
Heart that scorneth all disguise,
Lips where pearls of truth are hung:
God who gives all sovereignties
Knows her like was never sung.
Though she lead through long despair,
I would never say her nay,
## p. 11887 (#517) ##########################################
PROVENÇAL LITERATURE
11887
If one kiss-reward how rare! -
Each new trial might repay.
Swift returns I'd then devise,
Many laborers but not iong;
Following so fair a prize,
I could never more go wrong.
RAIMON DE MIRAVAL
(1190-1200)
Translation of H. W. P.
F
AIR summer-time doth me delight,
And song of birds delights no less;
Meadows delight in their green dress,
Delight the trees in verdure bright;
And far, far more delights thy graciousness,
Lady, and I to do thy will, delight.
Yet be not this delight my final boon,
Or I of my desire shall perish soon!
For that desire most exquisite
Of all desires, I live in stress
Desire of thy rich comeliness;
Oh, come, and my desire requite!
Though doubling that desire by each caress,
Is my desire not single in thy sight?
Let me not then, desiring sink undone;
To love's high joys, desire be rather prone!
No alien joy will I invite,
But joy in thee, to all excess:
Joy in thy grace, nor e'en confess
Whatso might do my joy despite.
So deep my joy, my lady, no distress
That joy shall master; for thy beauty's light
Such joy hath shed, for each day it hath shone,
Joyless I cannot be while I live on.
Translation of H. W. P.
## p. 11888 (#518) ##########################################
11888
PROVENÇAL LITERATURE
ALBA-AUTHOR UNKNOWN
(TWELFTH CENTURY)
UNE
NDER the hawthorns of an orchard lawn,
She laid her head her lover's breast upon,
Silent, until the guard should cry the dawn;
Ah God! ah God! Why comes the day so soon?
I would the night might never have passed by!
So wouldst thou not have left me, at the cry
Of yonder warder to the whitening sky;-
Ah God! ah God! Why comes the day so soon?
One kiss more, sweetheart, ere the melodies
Of early birds from all the fields arise!
One more, without a thought of jealous eyes! —
Ah God! ah God! Why comes the day so soon?
And yet one more, under the garden wall,
For now the birds begin their festival,
And the day wakens at the warder's call;-
Ah God! ah God! Why comes the day so soon?
-
'Tis o'er! O dearest, noblest, knightliest,
The breeze that greets thy going fans my breast!
I quaff it, as thy breath, and I am blest! —
Ah God! ah God! Why comes the day so soon?
Fair was the lady, and her fame was wide;
And many knights for her dear favor sighed;
But leal the heart out of whose depths she cried,-
Ah God! ah God! Why comes the day so soon?
Translation of H. W. P.
ALBA-GUIRAUT DE BORNEIL
(1175-1230)
Α΄
LL-GLORIOUS King!
