It was, in fact, only such a language as might be expected to arise from the adoption of the Latin tongue by strangers, and was properly characterized by the term "Romana rustica." Its separation into different dialects to the extent which is exhibited in the two leading divisions -- the Norman and Provençal -- was the effect of later political operations. France, till the close of the Carlovingian dynasty, was in reality a mere province of Germany, and ruled by one who was, properly speaking, a foreign prince, with a court composed of his soldiers, whose language (the Francic) was totally different from that of the population governed. The ancient inhabitants are, in the legal documents of the conquerors, all Romans. Their language is the Roman language. On the final separation of the kingdom of France from the Empire, the real population of Gaul recovered its weight, and in time the court assumed its proper language. But for a long period it is manifest that the German rulers of France, and their military retainers, did not even trouble themselves to understand the dialect of the inhabitants and landholders. Even in 948, at the council of Ingelheim, Frodoard mentions that the Archbishop Artaud translated his letter into German, that Louis IV. might be able to understand it. The inconvenience of this state of things seems to have been in some degree remedied by the use of the Latin language for state purposes. At length, on the cessation of the Norman wars and the accession of Capet, arose the monarchy of France, (adopting the name which was in reality a badge of ancient servitude, as belonging to those Germans, on a separation from whom the independence of Gaul began); and then, too, the language of its inhabitants once more became that of the state, under the name of French, which however belongs in truth as little to it as to the monarchy. The dialect of the North was more adulterated than that of the South, by intermixture with the German tribes; and the long separation of the Gallic provinces into France (properly so called) and Provence, left both tongues to form in an independent manner. The South had always been less under the immediate dominion of the Francic army, and it had not been ravaged like the North by wave after wave of Norman devastation. It had reposed in comparative peace from the foundation of the kingdom of Arles and Provence, by Boson, in the 9th century; the Roman institutions had, to a great extent, been preserved, and its language had of course experienced less change. In the 11th century, therefore, we find the Provençal tongue melodious and flexible, while the Northern was struggling into notice as a written language, as yet crude and unfashioned: and we have some of the most harmonious of the Provençal songs much earlier than the date which we can with any certainty assign to the rudest productions of a similar kind in the North.
In does not follow, however, that the latest in time should be deprived of all claim to originality; for the same awakening of the intellect, the same materials for the exercise of the imagination, and the same stimulus from the institutions of the age, would in both countries produce in due time their natural results. In many of the favourite topics of pursuit, it is difficult to determine which dialect is entitled to the honour of invention; and in truth a great similarity must be expected to exist; for after a time the poets of both districts met and were patronized at the same courts; the princes of the North allied themselves to the daughters of the South; the English monarchs, the principal patrons of the Norman literature, had possessions in both divisions, and drew the singers of both to their courts; and one common cause united them in the East.
The early intercourse between the two great divisions of France is not marked by expressions of much kindness or conciliation. Robert king of France about the year 1000 married Constance daughter of William count of Provence or Aquitaine; ....
...It is very uncertain when the first efforts were made to raise the Northern French to the dignity of a poetic language; but we have every reasonto believe that it was, at any rate, confined to devotional pieces, riming legends, and perhaps chronicles, till the aera of Louis VII. of France and Henry II. of England, (or rather more decisively the reign of Philip Augustus,) commencing with the latter half of the 12th century. And on this is built the commonly received opinion, that the marriage of Eleanor of Guienne, first with a French and afterwards with an English monarch, brought into notice the Provençal poets, of whom she was a zealous patron, and gave a stimulus to the application of the language of the North, then characterized by its simplicity and naïveté, to similar purposes. One of the most distinguished of the Troubadour poets, Bernard de Ventadour, sighed at the feet of this princess when she left the courts of the South to lead the intrigues of the North. It affords a curious commentary on the character in which our history exhibits this princess, to hear her addressed in such lines as these, which the poet seems to have penned to her when she had left France for England;
Quan la doss' aura venta
Deves vostre pais,
M'es veiaire qu'ieu senta
Odor de paradis,
Per amor de la genta
Ves cui ieu sui aclis,
En cui ai mes m'ententa,
E mon coratge assis.
Attempts have been made to carry the date of French lyric poetry much higher: and in the first place it is observed, that Ives de Chartres complains to Urban II. at the close of the eleventh century, of the popular poetic squibs which his opponent at Orleans had written against him ....
... And St Bernard himself is recorded to have composed "cantiunculas mimicas et urbanos modulos;" but the great doubt is, whether (as Ravallière thinks) all these songs were not written in Latin. There is, perhaps, less doubt about the "vulgares cantus" mentioned in the 'Gesta Dei' as being lampoons upon Arnulphus, Patriarch of Jerusalem under Godfrey de Bouillon; but it is not safe to rely on an earlier epoch for the popular use of the French language, at any rate in lyric poetry, than that which we have pointed out.
When, however, we point to the reign of Philip Augustus (1180-1223), or that of his predeccesor, as the true commencement of the age of early French poetry, we must not connect its progress otherwise than chronologically with the courts of those monarchs. In the early literature of France, the court of Paris had little or no share: it belonged almost entirely to Normandy and England. The Northern Romance was nursed to its maturity by the fostering patronage of the Anglo-Norman princes, and with them continued its riper cultivation. The language was, however, long in an extremely unsettled state: even at the end of the 12th century we find it in some pieces approaching very nearly to the Provençal in inflexion and melody; while in other authors of nearly the same period, it has much more of the structure of modern French. Thus Benoit (who perhaps wrote about 1170 or 1180), in describing the spring in which Rollo quitted England for Neustria, sings in a strain of very Southern cast :--
Quant li ivers fu trepasser,
Vint li duls tens, e li ester;
Venta l' aure sueve et quoie,
Chanta li merles et la treie;
Bois reverdirent e prael,
E gent florirent li ramel;
Parut la rose buen olanz
E altre flors de maint semblanz.
But Chrestien de Troyes (who died in 1191) uses what seems to be a ruder style, as in the chanson:--
Joie ne guerredons d'amours
Ne vienent pas par bel servir;
Car on voit chaus souvent faillir
Ki servent sans aller allours.
Si m'en aïr,
Quant celi serf sans repentir
Ki ne me veut faire secours.
Voirs est c'amours est grant douçours
Quant doi cuer sont un sans partir;
Mais amours fait l'un seul languir,
Et les anuis sentir tousjours.
Bien os gehir:
Que ne puis à amours venir
En amours gist tous mes secours.
The fame of the Trouvères mainly rests on their lais and fabliaux, to which, at least in the later period of their reign, they peculiarly devoted themselves, and which, by the popularity of the subjects, have raised them in general estimation above their Southern rivals. Yet if their poetic excellence is to be tried by the standard of these compositions, it will, with few exceptions, stand rather low; for certainly tamer or more prosaic performances are scarcely to be met with than the generality of their tales; and in point of talent and poetic feeling, there is no comparison between the powers of these tellers of stories and of the Provençaux, after giving the latter their full share of blame for their follies and conceits.
But, though little known (having hitherto been left to slumber in MS.), there is almost as prolific a school of lyric poetry among the Northern as the Southern French poets. Indeed, it would be singular if there were not a great community of subjects when the poets of the two dialects were brought together at such courts as those of Henry II. and Eleanor of Guienne, and of their son Richard Coeur de Lion, who was himself a poet in both tongues, had dominions in each country, and was moreover allied, like most of the monarchs of his day, to a lady of one of the courts of the South -- the daughter of the king of Navarre;
"Her name was Berengere, faire woman of age,
Was ther non hir Pere of no heiere parage."
(Langtoft's Chron.)
Accident has prevented our perusing the MS. stores of these neglected and almost unknown singers in the king's library of Paris, and making such selections from them for the present work as were desirable for comparing them with their cotemporaries; but from all that has been seen, there is little doubt they possess much of the sprightliness of heart which sparkles in the songs of the Troubadours and Minnesingers. The same devotion to the female sex, the same zeal in their service, the same curious blending of religious and amatory feelings and associations, distinguish these writers, as appear in the works of the Troubadours; they had institutions of gallantry corresponding in most respects to those of the South; they had their Puys May, where their Gieux-partis were the counterparts of the Provençal Tensons; they were as pathetic martyrs to "cis jolis maux," the pains of love; and that some of them were as keen pursuers of concetti is well known to those who have perused the chansons of king Thibaud, and seen the poet "in the prison of which Love keeps the keys, aided by his three bailiffs, Hope deferred, Beauty, and Anxiety."
Among the crowd of lyric poets of about the age of Philip Augustus, rank many of the nobility of the kingdom, such as Henry duke of Brabant, Peter Mauclerc count of Bretagne, the count of Anjou (brother of St. Louis, afterwards king of Naples, and the husband of one of the daughters of the great Provençal house of Berengar), the count de la Marche, Gaces Brulez (the friend of Thibaud), Hughes de Bercy, Raoul de Soissons, and many others; none of whom, as Le Grand d'Aussy observes with some astonishment, ever attempted fabliaux, which he assumes must naturally have pleased them much better. He admits, however, that the language of these chansonniers, "sans être plus pure ni plus élégante que celle des autres auteurs leurs contemporains, est au moins plus coulante et plus douce."
The poet of this class who is most known, though perhaps he least deserves it, is Thibaud count of Champagne and king of Navarre, the "buon re Tebaldo" of Dante (Inf. xxii.), whose chansons the learned Ravallière has edited with so much sound erudition. Thibaud was born of a family that truly belongs to the literary history of the age. He was the grandson of Marie de France, that countess of Champagne who was so zealous patron of the Provençal poets, and whose decisions were ever held to be law in the courts of love; and Marie herself was the daughter of Eleanor, whom we have seen to be the object of the worship of Bernard de Ventadour.
Bossuet has very summarily dismissed this riming monarch by describing him as one who made verses which he was fool enough to publish. The Chroniclers of St. Denis, on the contrary, say that he "fit les plus belles chansons et les plus delitables et melodieuses qui furent oncques oyées." The reader must decide this for himself; but certainly the "buon re" is not gifted with the happiest turn of Troubadour feeling. He has none of the buoyant gallant spirit of his predecessors and of many of his cotemporaries; he aims at a more imposing march,-- at a more philosophical turn of thought,-- without much poetic genius to elevate, or either feeling or fancy to enliven, what we must often pronounce a very dull subject. He may be accurately classed with the early Italian sonnetteers.
In his own estimation of his mental powers (chanson 17), he dismisses as trifling the poets whose songs testified their joy in the smiles of their mistresses, by dressing up nature in her gayest robes, and revelling in her sweets; such ornaments are beneath his notice, for he tells us,
Feuille ne flors ne vaut riens en chantant,
Fors ke por defaute sans plus de rimoier,
Et pour faire soulas moienne gent,
Qui mauvais mos fout sovent abaier.
Geoffroi Rudel would have taught him that such topics were not always sought as resources to cover poverty of invention, but that the poet might see in the book of nature types of that beauty which he celebrated, and exhortations to the gaiety of heart which was most likely to attract its smiles;
Pro, ai del chan essenhadors
Entorn mi, et ensenhairitz;
Pratz e vergiers, albres e flors,
Voutas d'auzelhs,-- e lays e critz,
Per lo dous termini suau.
In those of Thibaud's chansons which relate to the Crusades, there is a solemnity of feeling, which interests, because it appears to come from the heart; but in general his style is very quaint, dull and meagre. Perhaps one of his prettiest thoughts opens his 15th chanson, in which he alludes to the tradition that the nightingale sometimes so strains his throat in singing, as to fall dead at the foot of the tree on which he sits:
Li rossignols chante tant
Ke mors chiet de l'arbre jus;
Si belle mort ne vit nus,
Tant douce, ne si plaisant:
Autresi muir, en chantant a hauts cris,
Et si ne puis de ma dame estre vis.
Among the compositions of the earliest of the Norman French poets, there are a great many pastorals, with which the genius of the language very well accorded. They are not very easy to translate;-- perhaps they are scarcely worth the trouble;-- and one of them may therefore be quoted more properly here, as published by Roquefort from the MS. collection of French poets before 1300, in the king's library.
A la fontenelle
Qui sort seur l'araine
Trouvai pastorelle
Qui n'iert pas vilaine,
Où ele se dementoit d'amors;
Dex quant vendra mon ami douz?
Merci, merci, douce Marote,
N'ociez pas vostre ami douz.
Dame de grant biauté,
Que ferai je lassé?
Se j'osasse amer
Je n'ose por mou pere;
A tort me chastiés d'amors,
Car j'amerai mon ami douz;
Merci, merci, douce Marote,
N'ociez pas vostre ami douz.
E li chevalier
Qui l'a escoutée,
S'estant arresté
Mist pié fors destrier;
Devant li se mist a genouz;
Bele, vez ci vostre ami douz:
Merci, merci, douce Marote,
N'ociez pas vostre ami douz.
Dites moy Marote
Serés vos m' amie?
A bele contele
Ne faudrois vos mie;
Chemise ridée et peliçon
Aurez, se je ai vostre amors;
Merci, merci, douce Marote,
N'ociez pas vostre ami douz.
Our selections from the Norman French poets, some of which have never before been in print, will be found to be very scanty; and it is difficult to have it otherwise, considering the little pains which have hitherto been taken, even in France, with this branch of its early literature.
A great deal might be done in this department, from the stores of the King's Library at Paris: but even in what will be found hereafter, and in the volumes which have just appeared, entitled "Les Poètes François depuis le XII Siècle jusq'à Malherbe; Paris, 1824," (miserably deficient as those volumes are, in the exhibition of hitherto unpublished matter,) it will be plain that Boileau gave rather a precipitate judgement when he said --
Villon* fut le premier, dans ce siècles grossiers
Débrouiller l'art confus de nos vieux Romanciers.
Marot bientôt après fit fleurir les Ballades, &c.
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
Enfin Malherbe vint; et le premier en France
Fit sentir dans les vers une juste cadence; &c.
* [Of the 15th century]
A comparison of the Northern and Southern languages of France leads to the conclusion, that even in its best days the former was greatly the inferior in melody and power, though not perhaps in a peculiar naïveté and sweetness. Of these qualities, its beautiful diminutive furnish the most obvious instance; and they were accordingly turned to excellent account by the poets, as in such lines as these:--
Elle estoyt blanche comme let,
Et doulce comme ung aignellet,
Vermeillette comme une rose.
Unfortunately, these, its most redeeming qualities, have gradually given way before the pretended refinements, that at length produced the "belle langue" which is the most unpoetic of European tongues.
~ Lays of the Minnesingers or German Troubadours of the 12th and 13th Centuries. (anonymous). Printed in London for Longman, etc. 1825. {1st edition}.
Learned controversies have agitated the rival partisans of the Langue d'oc and Langue d'oeil, as to their comparative antiquity, their mutual relations, and the degree of influence on the literature of modern Europe which may properly be ascribed to each. The exact period to be assigned to the formation of the proper Northern Romance we can hardly expect to determine; the most probable theory may be, that one common Romance was universally diffused as the popular tongue over the Gallic provinces at a very early period, perhaps even under the Roman Government itself, but at least during that gradual dissolution of the Roman institutions, which took place on the establishment of the barbarian monarchies.
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