Songs of the Women Troubadours

Matilda Tomaryn Bruckner, Laurie Shepard, Sarah White, Laurie Shepard, Sarah White, Matilda Tomaryn Bruckner

• Publisher: Taylor & Francis
• Year: 2004
• Print ISBN: 9780815335689
• eBook ISBN: 9781135577797
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Littérature
• Subtopic: Critique littéraire

This work offers an edition and translation of some 30 poems by the trobairitz, a remarkable group of women poets from the twelfth and thirteenth centuries, who composed in the style and language of the troubadours. Introductory essays and notes by specialists in the field place the poems in literary, linguistic, historical, social and cultural contexts. English versions facing Occitan texts elucidate the original language and themes, while supplying poems that can be enjoyed by contemporary readers. The varied corpus includes love songs (cansos), debate poems (tensos), political satires (sirventes) and other lyrical sub-genres (including dawn-song, lament, ballad, chanson de mal mariee). To represent the range of female voices available in the lyric corpus of the troubadours, the editors have selected songs consistently attributed to historically documented women poets, as well as songs whose authorship is open to question. The latter may be presented by the manuscripts with or without a named woman poet, but all offer female speakers personae characteristic of troubadour poets in general.

12. Maria de Ventadorn and Gui d’Ussel, “Gui d’Ussel be.m pesa”

Na Maria de Ventedorn e’N Gui d’Uissel

I. Gui d’Ussel be.m pesa de vos

car vos etz laissatz de chantar,

e car vos i volgra tornar

per que sabetz d’aitals razos,

5 vuoill qe.m digatz si deu far egalmen

dompna per drut, qan lo qier francamen,

cum el per lieis, tot cant taing ad amor,

segon los dreitz que tenon l’amador.

II. Dompna Na Maria, tenssos

10 e tot cant cuiava laissar,

mas aoras non puosc estar

q’ieu non chant als vostres somos.

E respond eu a la dompna breumen

que per son drut deu far comunalmen

15 cum el per lieis ses garda de ricor,

q’en dos amics non deu aver maior.

III. Gui, tot so don es cobeitos

deu drutz ab merce demandar,

e.il dompna pot o comandar,

20 ...

E.l drutz deu far precs e comandamen

cum per amiga e per dompna eissamen,

e.il dompna deu a son drut far honor

cum ad amic, mas non cum a seignor.

IV 25 Dompna, sai dizon demest nos

que, pois que dompna vol amar,

engalmen deu son drut onrar,

pois engalmen son amoros.

E s’esdeven que l’am plus finamen,

30 e.l faich e.l dich en deu far aparen,

e si ell’a fals cor ni trichador,

ab bel semblan deu cobrir sa follor.

I. Gui d’Ussel, I’ m troubled about you

because you’ve left off singing;

so, as I wish to bring you back to it,

and because you know so much about such things,

5 I want you to tell me if a lady should do equally

for her lover all that pertains to love,

as he does for her, when he asks honestly,

according to the laws that lovers hold.

II. Lady Maria, I thought I was done

10 with tensos and with all songs,

but now it isn’t possible

for me not to sing at your command.

So I answer the lady in few words:

She should return in kind to her lover

15 what he gives her, without regard to rank,

for between two friends neither should be greater.

III. Gui, a lover must ask for all he wants

as for a favor,

and the lady may command,

20 ...

And the lover should fulfill pleas and commands

for her who is both his friend and his lady,

and the lady must honor her lover

as a friend, but not as overlord.

IV. 25 Lady, among us they say

that when a lady wants to love

she should honor her lover on equal terms

because they are equally in love.

And if she happens to love him more perfectly

30 she should let it show in deeds and words;

and if she has a false or treacherous heart

she should hide her folly with pleasant looks.

V. Gui d’Uissel, ges d’aitals razos

non son li drut al comenssar,

35 anz ditz chascus, qan vol preiar,

mans iointas e de genolos:

“Dompna voillatz qe.us serva franchamen

cum lo vostr’om,” et ella enaissi.l pren.

Eu vo.l iutge per dreich a trahitor

40 si.s rend pariers e.is det per servidor.

VI. Dompna, so es plaitz vergoignos

ad ops de dompna a razonar

que cellui non teigna per par

a cui a faich un cor de dos.

45 O vos diretz, e no.us estara gen,

que.l drutz la deu amar plus finamen

o vos diretz q’il son par entre lor,

que ren no.il deu drutz mas qant per amor.

V. Gui d’Ussel, at the beginning lovers

say no such thing;

35 instead, each one, when he wants to court,

says, with hands joined and on his knees:

“Lady, permit me to serve you honestly

as your liege man” and that’s the way she takes him.

I rightly consider him a traitor if, having given

40 himself as servant, he makes himself an equal.

VI. Lady, it’s a shameful claim

on a lady’s part to argue

that she should not consider equal

the man with whom she’s joined two hearts as one.

45 Either you’ll say (and not to your own honor)

that the lover must love her more perfectly,

or you’ll say that they are equals,

for he owes her nothing but what he gives for love.

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Table of contents

• Front Cover
• Half Title
• Title Page
• Copyright
• Preface of the General Editors
• Dedication
• Contents
• Foreword
• Preface
• Introduction
• Manuscripts Consulted
• Bibliography
• Note on the Texts
• Note on the Translations
• Cansos
• Tensos
• Sirventes
• Planh
• Salut d’Amor
• Balada
• Alba
• Fragments
• End Notes
• Pronunciation Guide
• Index of Poets and Poetic Terms