Music is immortal, and it is conjectured that it has been around since the beginning of human existence. By the time the second millennium AD, different cultures had developed and with it came musical traditions. Western art music (more popularly known as “classical music”) has its roots in medieval Europe. Some of the most famous poets of antiquity were also esteemed composers of instrumental music to accompany the words they wrote. For example, the Troubadour tradition originated in southern France late in the twelfth century. A pioneering figure in this tradition was Bernart de Ventadorn, who was born around 1130 or 1140 in Limousin at the castle of Ventadorn to a poor family. He was a poet and composer that first served under the Viscount of Ventadorn. During his tenure for the Viscount, he flattered his master’s wife with his poetry and songs, leading to them falling in love. It was a long period of time before the Viscount of Ventadorn found out about their affair and banished Bernart from Ventadorn. His career then led him to serve under Eleanor of Aquitaine, to which both developed romantic feelings toward one another as well. This second period of servitude ended when she married King Henry II of England. His last master was Count Raimon of Toulouse, to which he served until the count’s death. He then settled in a monastery in Dordogne to live out the rest of his life until his death around 1190 or 1200. With these several romances came many emotions associated with love, such as great joy, but also remorse, anger, and sadness. Ventadorn and many of the other Troubadours wrote words and lyrics with a theme in mind known as Fine Amour or “courtly love.” This implies that the words honored a person of the opposite sex, often a woman. However, there are many instances in which the lyrics indicate that the speaker in Ventadorn’s poems was actually rather foolish in their excessive love and idolatry of such persons. These feelings are reflected in many of his poems, particularly Can vei la lauzeta Mover, and Be M’an Perdut.
Fine Amour is an ideal love by which the lover reformed himself or herself. According to the ninth edition of A History of Western Music, the subject was “a real woman of noble birth, usually another man’s wife, but she was adored from a distance, with discretion, respect, and humility.” The criteria of this style are doubtlessly present in some of the words of Ventadorn’s poems. Marilynn Desmond quotes C.S. Lewis saying “love became a serious business for the first time in the 11th century,” and that “love seldom rises above the levels of merry sensuality or domestic comfort, except to be treated as a tragic madness.” In Bernart de Ventadorn’s poem and canso, or “love song,” Be M’an Perdut, the speaker says that he does not “wonder that her love holds me close, for I believe no more beautiful body is to be seen in the world.” In addition, the speaker indicates that he “shall always wish her well both in honor and good fortune, and I shall be her vassal, lover, and servant. I shall love her whether it pleases her or grieves her, for one cannot force a heart without killing it.” The first quote qualifies in the theme of Fine Amour due to the fact that the speaker describes her love holding him close. In the latter quote, the speaker even admits to being devoted. These confessions confirm that the speaker intended a devoted love toward the woman they spoke of.
There is no doubt that there are many textual examples in which Bernart de Ventadorn expresses Fine Amour. However, further reading finds that the speakers of Ventadorn’s poems also talk rather foolishly or contemptuously toward the persons that they love, which seriously compromises the fundamental intention of courtly love. Sometimes, the text of these poems even indicates that the speaker feels like they have no control over themselves. Marianne Shapiro elaborates on the literary type of the “Fols Naturaus.” She explains that “a witless man could be pitied and persecuted but not held to account in any rational terms for his words.” The speaker in Be M’an Perdut admits his own foolishness, being “Like a fish who rushes to the bait and suspects nothing until he has caught himself on the hook, I let myself go one day and did not take care until I was in the midst of the flame which burns me more fiercely than fire in an oven.” In addition to this admission, this quote in the song comes in the verse previous to the verse stating Fine Amour. It could be seen as foolish because of the speaker’s excessive desire of the woman. The speaker letting themself go and not tending to the feelings certainly qualifies because they say that they neglected to pay attention to them, and is now encapsulated.
Surely, these examples could also just be a reflection of Ventadorn being disappointed by lost love? After all, he had multiple women that he was romantically devoted to. Perhaps even more explicit evidence of Bernart’s interpretation of love being foolish and defiant of Fine Amour is in his poem Can vei la lauzeta mover. The speaker of the poem concedes “I have no power over myself. / and have not had possession of myself / since the time when she allowed me to look into her eyes, / in a mirror which I like very much.” This is yet another instance in which the speaker is encapsulated and does not feel that they can hold themselves accountable for their feelings. Instead of the speaker showing a “refined love” as in Fine Amour, this feeling of a lack of control clearly qualifies as foolishness as well as within the realm of the literary “Fols Naturaus.” It can be argued that this is a typical feeling that is associated with a deep love for someone, but maybe it could also be that the previous quotes barely scratch the surface of what is the foolishness in Ventadorn’s version of courtly love. Further on in the poem, the speaker issues a direct complaint, where he despairs “of ladies; / I shall not trust them ever again; / just as I used to defend them, / Now I shall condemn them.” Even if these are typical emotions that are part of the ebb and flow of falling in and out of love, it contradicts the Fine Amour that Bernart de Ventadorn is lauded for in his poetry because the quote shows complete inconsistency with the definition. As aforementioned, the lover adored the woman from a distance with discretion, respect, and humility. Instead of being devoted to the woman they love no matter what, the speaker instead decides that he cannot only trust the woman he loves, but any woman, though. Is this the voice of someone that is deserving of the title of showing “courtly love” in his love poems?
Though the work of Bernart de Ventadorn is worth applauding in the realm of poetry and music, both in the medieval era and its influence on both of these disciplines in general, his expression of love through his poetry on the subject does not consistently show Fine Amour and is often times rather foolish and delusional. He is just another typical tortured soul that falls in and out of love like any other human being. If you happen to pick up a love poem or listen to a song by this famous and immortalized figure, read the text carefully and decide for yourself whether or not the love is true.
Sources:
Bernart de Ventadorn. Can vei la lauzeta mover. New York: W. W. Norton and
Company. 2014. (recording at )
Bernart de Ventadorn. Be m’an Perdut.
Burkholder, Peter J., Donald Jay Grout, and Claude V. Palisca A History of Western
Music. New York: W. W. Norton and Company. 2014.
Lewis, C. S. Allegory of Love. London: Oxford Press, 1936. Quoted in Desmond,
Marilynn. “Cautullus and Bernart de Ventadorn: The Rhetoric of Sincerity.”
Neuphilologische Mitteilungen 83, no. 4 (1982): 405.
Nichols, Stephen G. and John A. Galm The Songs of Bernart de Ventadorn. Chapel Hill:
The University of North Carolina Press, 1962.
Shapiro, Marianne. “Fols Naturaus”: The Born Fool as Literary Type.” Romance Notes 19, no. 2 (1978): 243-4.