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RS 1582

Anonymous

I Por joie avoir perfite en Paradis m’estuet laisier le païs ke j’ain tant ou celle maint cui g'ey merci toz dis, 4a gent cors gay, a vis frès et plaisant. Et mes fins cuers dou tot a li s’otroie mais il covient ke li cors s’en retraie, si m’en irey lay ou Deus mort sofri 8por nos reänbre a jor dou Vandredi.

II Douce amie, g'ey acuët grant dolour kant me covient enfin de vos partir, ou g'ey troveit tant bien et tant dousour, 12joie et soulaz, dou tot a mon plaisir. Mais Fortune m’ait fait par sa puissance changier ma joie a duel et a pesance, c’avrey por vos mainte nuit et maint jor. 16Ensi irey servir mon Criätour.

III Ne plus k’enfes, ne pui la fain sofrir ne l’en neu puet chastoier d’en plourer, ne croi ge pas ki me puisse tenir 20de vos, ke suel baisier et acolleir, ne ge n’ey pas en moy tant d’estenance! Cent fois la nuit remir vostre senblance: tant moy plaisoit vostre cors atenir! 24Kant ne l’avrei, si morray de desir.

IV Biaus sires Deus, asi con ge por vos lais le païs ou celle est cui j’ain si, vos nos doigniez en sielz joie a toz jors 28m’amie et moy per la vostre mercit! Et li doigniez de moy ameir poussance, ke ne m’oublit por longue demourance, ke je l’ain plus ke rien ki soit el mont, 32s’en ei pitié teil ke li cuers m’en font!

V Belle Isabel, a cors Deu vos comant, ge ne puis plus avioc vos demorer: en paenime, a la gent mescreant, 36m’estuet ensi por l’amour Deu aleir. Por saveir m’airme i vois en bone entente, mais bien sachiez, amie belle et gente, se nus mourut por leament ameir, 40ne cuit vivre dresk’a havre de meir.

VI Car atresi con la flors nast de l’ante, nest li grans duelz de vos ki me tormante. Mais, s’en revaig, sour sains le puis jurer, 44ke c’iert por vos servir et honoreir. Ge chant d’amors leas ou j'ey m’antente, ne ge ne kier ke mes cuers s’en repente. Mais mon signor de Gisour veil mandeir 48ke c’est honours de leamant ameir.


I To have perfect joy in Paradise I must leave the land I love so well, where lives the lady from whom I always have mercy, with her elegant, joyful person, and her fresh and pleasing face. My true heart gives itself completely to her, but my body has to part from her: thus I shall leave for the place where God suffered death to ransom us on Good Friday.

II Sweet love, I have felt a sharp pain now that I finally have to part from you, in whom I have found so much kindness, such sweetness, joy and happiness, all to my delight. But Fortune in her power has changed my joy to grief and torment, which I shall feel on your account many a night and day. Thus do I go to serve my Creator.

III I can endure hunger no more than can a child, and just as he cannot be stopped from crying for it, I do not think that anyone can keep me away from you, whom I love to kiss and embrace. I have no such power of abstinence in me! A hundred times a night I gaze on your beauty in my imagination: it pleased me so much to hold you in my arms! When I have this no more, I shall die of desire.

IV Fair Lord God, if for your sake I leave the land where lives the one I love so dearly, grant in your mercy everlasting joy in the heavens for me and my beloved! And give her the strength to continue to love me, so that she does not forget me because of the long wait, for I love her more than anything else in the world, and I feel such pity for it that my heart is melting!

V Fair Isabella, I commend you to Christ’s body. I may no longer remain with you: to the unbelievers in pagan lands must I go for the love of God. To save my soul I go with good intention. But be well aware, my beautiful, gracious love, if ever anyone died for loving loyally, I do not think I shall live until I arrive at a safe sea port.

VI For as the flower is born of the anther, so is born of you the great sorrow which torments me. But if I return, I can swear upon the saints that it will be to serve and honour you. I sing of loyal love whereon I have my thoughts, and I seek not for my heart to repent of it. But I wish my lord of Gisors to know that it is an honour to love loyally.

Text

Anna Radaelli, 2015.

Mss.

(1). U 161r-v (anon).

Versification and music

10 abab c'c'dd (MW 1209:16); 5 8-line coblas singulars + 2 4-line envois. Rhyme a = I is, II our (or), III ir, IV os (ors), V ant; rhyme b = I ant, II ir, III er (eir), IV i (it), V er (eir); rhyme c = I oie (aie), II, III, IV ance, V ente, t1 ante, t2 ente; rhyme d = I i, IV ont; identical-equivocal rhyme: 13 puissance : 29 poussance; equivocal rhyme 37 entente : 45 antente; identical expression at the rhyme: 39 leament ameir : 48 leamant ameir. Medial caesura: 7, 8, 14, 32, 37; lyric caesura: 9, 13, 40. Diaeresis: 9, 16, 29, at the caesura: 7, 35; elision at the caesura: 8, 14, 37. Enjambement: 19-20 (v. 20 without caesura). The verse form 1209 (=Frank 382) only actually corresponds to st. I and st. IV, which have the final couplet rhyming dd. In the middle part of the song the final couplet of stanzas II and III repeats the rhyme aa (= MW 1144 = Frank 360), while the final stanza (V) and the two envois end with bb (MW 1163 = Frank 362). These metrical forms reveal particularly interesting points of contact. The versification of stanzas II and III (= MW 1144:3) is modelled on the love-song Ne me sont pas achoison de chanter (RS 787 = MW 1144:2, 5 coblas unissonans of 8 vv. + 1 4-line tornada di 4 vv., melody ABAB CDEB'), attributed to Gace Brulé by mss. CKNPX, whereas ms. a assigns it to Guillaume le Vinier; mss. HLOUVza on the other hand transmit it as anonymous and it is also so cited by Gerbert de Montreuil in his Roman de la Violette. The versification of st. V and the two envois of our RS 1582 (not registered in MW under 1163) is identical to that of Andrieu Contredit d'Arras’s love-song... ir / del gerredon ke j'atenc a avoir (RS 1387b = 1163:3), 5 coblas unissonans of 8 lines (v. 1 is missing) + 4-line envoi, transmitted without attribution (but with autonominatio in v. 15) and provided with a musical stave without notation in the Droz fragment (BnF, nouv.acq. fr. 15797, see Droz 1928, 540). Stanzas I and III of the song Bele et blonde est cele pour qui je chant (RS 308 = 1163:2) have this same versification, 4 coblas unissonans + 4-line envoi, transmitted with two different melodic versions in PU (ABAB CDEB' e ABCD EFGH). Of the three mss. preserving it, C 28 attributes it to Thibaut de Champagne (li rois de Navaire) and P 109 to the Châtelain d'Arras (Li chastelains d'Arraz), while U 67 gives it as anonymous (Li chastelain d'Arras only being added in the margin by a later hand). Wallensköld 1915, p. 127, considers it the work of an anonymous author in the first half of the 13th c., excluding it not only from Thibaut’s corpus but also from that of the Châtelain d'Arras, and later (Wallensköld 1925, 224-227) inserts it in into his Appendice among Thibaut’s songs of doubtful attribution (see also pp. LXVI and LXX-LXXI. For the possibility that RS 308 may be attributable to the Châtelain d'Arras, author of the chanson de départie RS 140, see Barbieri 2015, Note). To the network of analogies described here we can add the third verse-form found in stanzas I and IV of Por joie avoir perfite en Paradis, with its final decasyllabic couplet rhyming dd (= MW 1209:16). This pattern also is found in two songs from Arras datable to between the first and second quarter of the 13th c. and which are associated with the same tune having the structure ABAB CDEF: the first is attributed to Chardon de Croisilles in T 41 and C 209, Rose ne lis ne me done talent (RS 736 = MW 1209:15, 4 coblas doblas of 8 vv. + 2 4-line envois) and the second is Par maintes fois ai chanté liement by Robert de la Pierre (RS 696 = 1209:14, 5 coblas unissonans of 8 vv. + 1 5-line envoi, unicum of ms. a). To these songs can be added two jeux-partis by the Prince del Puy of Arras Jehan Bretel: Adan, mout fu Aristotes sachans (RS 277 = 1209:12) and Jehan de Vergelai, vostre escient (RS 669 = MW 1209:13). Finally, the versification and tune are also found in the gallicised version of Pistoleta’s sirventes with a courtly tone, RS 641 Quar eusse cent mil mars d'argent, transmitted with two different melodic versions by U 82 and O 125 (original version: Ar agues eu mil marcs de fin argen, BdT 372.3 = Frank 382:25, 5 coblas unissonans di 8 vv., melody ABAB CDEF). Also linked to the Occitan tradition indicated under Frank 382 (= MW 1209) is another text datable to between the first and second quarter of the 13th c.: the tenso of Raimbaut de Vaqueiras and Conon de Bethune, Seigner Coine, jois e pretz et amors (BdT 392.29 = Frank 382:27, 4 coblas unissonans of 8 vv.), from the period of the Fourth Crusade (see Paterson 2012). In summary, Por joie avoir perfite en Paradis appears as a sort of metrico-melodic collage of three verse-forms (MW 1144:3, 1209:16, 1163) whose models are to be identified respectively with Gace Brulé’s song (the attribution in ms. a to the Arrageois Guillaume le Vinier is significant, and is probably due to his admiration of Gace declared in RS 1859), with the tenso of Conon de Bethune and Raimbaut de Vaqueiras, and with the song of Andrieu Contredit. These three configurations match those of compositions by a sizeable group of poets gravitating around Arras and its poetic circle in the first half of the 13th c. (the Châtelain d'Arras, Chardon de Croisilles, Andrieu Contredit, Robert de la Pierre, Jehan Bretel). The presence of two different metrical-melodic forms (MW 1144 and 1209) in the same song may conceivably be the result of an attempt to update modes of performance, with adjustments being made to the basic structure at the end (though the rhyme-words have the same tonic vowel), in a position particularly susceptible to melodic variation. Note also that the texts following the (triple) metrico-melodic model of RS 1582, apart from Gace Brulé RS 787 (f. 98v), are preserved in U together with neumatic notation: Pistoleta’s sirventes BdT 372.3 (given as anonymous on f. 82r), Chardon de Croisilles’ song RS 736 (f. 58r) and the Chastelain d'Arras’s song RS 308 (f. 67r).

Previous editions

Bédier-Aubry 1909, p. 283.

Analysis of the manuscript tradition

The first three lines of a blank four-line stave are traced in red beneath the first line of the text, with space for musical notation in the first stanza. The song was transcribed by the third hand at work in the ms. (ff. 110-168, fasc. XXII) datable to the end of the 13th c. At the bottom of f. 161v are two later additions (see Tyssens 1991, 387, and Tyssens 2007, 21-22). Bédier’s emendations not accepted into the present edition are as follows: vv. 7 je for si; 11 eliminates et and prints tante dousour; 17 puet for pui; 18 ne ne l'en for ne l’en neu; 19 ke for ki; 24 l'avrai for l’aurei; 25 ensi for asi; 27 siel for sielz; 29 poissance for poussance; 41 nest for nast; 43 revien for revaig; 45 entente for antente; 48 leament for leamant.

Historical context and dating

Bédier 1909 declares on p. 283: ‘Nous ignorons l'auteur et la date de cette jolie chanson’. Similarly Dijkstra 1995, p. 133, includes it (but without analysing it) among her list of the nine chansons de départie with male first-person speaker, all assigned to the period 1189-1239, stressing (p. 149) the impossibility of proposing a date of composition, and referring to the ‘auteur inconnu de la chanson indatable’. However, on the basis of information provided by the metrical structure and two onomastic indications: Belle Isabel (v. 33) and mon signor de Gisour (v. 47), it is possible at least to suggest a hypothesis for the period within which the piece may have been composed.

Most telling is mon signor de Gisour of v. 47. Gisors was one of the major castellanies of the border region between the Norman and French Vexin. A Plantagenet domain until the first decades of the 12th c., it marked the frontier between the spheres of influence of the dukes of Normandy and the king of France. After being under Capetian control during the middle of the century, the Norman Vexin and Gisors became Angevin again after 1160 on the marriage of the Young King to Margaret, sister of Philip Augustus. The situation remained unchanged until 1193, when, during Richard’s imprisonment, Gilbert de Vascœuil, to whom the king had entrusted the castellany of Gisors in 1191, handed the fortress over to the Capetian king without striking a blow. The transfer was officially sanctioned in January 1196, by the treaty of Gaillon. In reality the region around the Epte had been the centre of a power struggle over many years, and from the beginning of his reign Philip Augustus had shown an increasing determination to reassert royal authority over those regions, even if he had renounced his hereditary claim to Gisors and the Norman Vexin in 1186 on the death of the Young King. The situation was therefore in a state of continual tension which exploded into open conflict in the first months of 1188: a clash symbolically resolved in August of that year by Philip cutting down the famous elm, thus clearly demonstrating his desire to conduct no further negotations with the Angevin (Baldwin 1989, pp. 25-26 and 77-78, Power 2004, pp. 388-412 and Diggelmann 2010). Despite this, from the late 12th c. a long tradition of meetings and negotiations between Normans and French had been established in the Vexin’s mutual borders. In January 1188, with the treaty of Gisors, Henry II, Philip Augustus and Philip I of Flanders had decided to take the cross after hearing Joscius of Tyre’s impassioned account of the fall of Jerusalem to Saladin. However, the textual and metrical references of RS 1582 lead us to postulate a period following January 1188 or January 1196 for the identification of the vaguely expressed signor de Gisour in v. 47. In fact, under the conditions of the treaty drawn up at Le Goulet in May 1200 between Philip Augustus and John of England, it was envisaged that the castles of Gisors nd Neaufles (recently returned to Angevin hands), would form part of the dowry which Blanche of Castile was bringing to the future king Louis VIII. From the early 13th c., the bailliage of Gisors thus included both the Norman and French castellanies in the region of the Seine and Eure. From 1226, the year of the king’s death, Gisors remained part of the queen’s dowry where, from the end of her regency in 1235, she stayed on many occasions: 17th- and 18th-c. acts document an intervention of hers in 1240 for the restoration of the church of Saint Gervais, illustrated at that time in the stained-glass windows decorated with the arms of Castile. The same documents also attest the Queen’s presence at Gisors in May 1249, on the occasion of the consecration of the new shrine (Hamon 2008, pp. 145-147, n. 29-32). So if she were the signor de Gisour in v. 47, our song could have been composed in the period preceding the crusaders’ departure from Marseille in the ‘barons’ crusade’ of 1239. Thibaut de Champagne, its leader, had been prevented from setting out for the Holy Land in 1230 (see for example Dijkstra 1995a, p. 119), but the preaching of the crusade began at the end of 1234 and the trouvère took the cross in 1235. Por joie avoir perfite en Paradis would therefore be placed among the chansons de départie composed on the eve of departure, together with Thibaut de Champagne’s RS 6, RS 757 and Chardon de Croisilles’ RS 1152 and RS 499 (it will be recalled that stanzas I and IV of RS 1582 re-use the versification of RS 736 of the Arras trouvère). Also among the members of Thibaut’s crusading entourage was Andrieu Contredit (who died in Arras in 1248, according to the Registre de la Confrérie des Jongleurs et des Bourgeois d'Arras), mentioned in royal documents of 1239 which attest his intention to go on crusade: Andreas Contredit, miles ministerellus, crucesignatus (see Vigneras 1934), but to whom no crusade song is attributed. Among his compositions, however, we find a lyric lai on the death of belle Isabelle (RS 81, unicum of T 75v, sine musica, rubric: De bel yzabel . Contredis), beginning De belle Isabel ferai / un lai ke je vos dirai. The striking correspondence with the apostrophe to Belle Isabel in v. 33, together with the coincidence of the versification of stanza V and the two envois of RS 1582, together with that of Andrieu’s song RS 1387b, indicated above, further support the hypothesis that Por joie avoir perfite en Paradis was composed between 1235 and 1239 in the milieu of the Arras poetic circle.