Rialto

189.4

 

   

Granet

 

 

 

 

   

Pos al comte es vengut en corage,

    Seigner Sordel, qe per mi retrait sia
    so qe vos dos avez ditz de follage,
4   vos e·M Bertran, en la tenzon partia,
    en dirai ver: chascus pres follamen,
    vos q’az amor non valguest anc nien,
    e·N Bertran pres prez d’armas, q’en batailla
8   non perdet anc per colps sos ausbercs mailla.
     
    Ben sabon tut d’En Sordel son usage,
    qe ben ama ses jauzimen s’amia
    ni ja non vol qe·il vegna d’agradage
12   qe·l colg ab se, qar vergona·l prendria.
    E s’anc nuls hom ab gran cors recrezen,
    flac ni volpill, plen de nonchalemen,
    pot aver prez d’armas, ben l’a ses failla
16   mos compaire Bertranz ples de nuailla.
     
    Per la comtessa de Rodes valen
    an ras lor cap cavalier mais de cen;
    e s’En Sordel se vol gardar de failla,
20   son cap raira, o ja Deus non li vailla!
     
    A·N Johan prec de Valleri breumen
    qe non creia En Bertran d’ardimen
    tro in tornei lo veia o en batailla,
24   q’adoncs sabra de son bran si ben tailla.

 

 

 

Text: Linda Paterson, Rialto 3.xii.2011.


Mss.: F 9r-v, M 257v.

Diplomatic editions: Carl August Friedrich Mahn, Gedichte der Troubadours in provenzalischer Sprache, 4 vols., Berlin 1856-1873, n. 1017 (M); Edmund Stengel, Die provenzalische Blumenlese der Chigiana, erster und getreuer Abdruck nach dem gegenwärtig verstümmelten Original und der vollständigen Kopie der Riccardiana, Marburg 1878, col. 2 ( F).

Critical editions: Césaire Antoine Fabre, «Guida de Rodez, baronne de Posquières, de Castries et de Montlaur, inspiratrice de la poésie provençale (1212-1266)», Annales du Midi, 24, 1912, pp. 153-184 and 321-354, p. 338 (on M); Amos Parducci, Granet, trovatore provenzale, Roma 1929, p. 19 (on F).

Versification: a10 b10 a10 b10 c10 c10 d10 d10 (Frank, 382:48). Two coblas unissonans and two four-line tornadas. While five other pieces have the same verse-form, but with different rhyme-endings, the piece is actually an irregular contrafactum of the partimen BdT 238.2 = 388.2 (Frank 368:3), probably dating from 1210-1229 (see the General note to the edition of that piece in Ruth Harvey and Linda Paterson, The Troubadour Tensos and Partimens: A Critical Edition, Cambridge 2010) in which Guionet and Raimbaut debated the respective merits of the brave man lacking in all other qualities and the courtly coward: this in turn derives ultimately from a song of Gace Brulé, RS 1102 (see John H. Marshall, «Pour l’étude des contrafacta dans la poésie des troubadours», Romania, 101, 1980, pp. 289-335, p. 316, and Stefano Asperti, «Contrafacta provenzali di modelli francesi», Messana, 8, 1991, pp. 5-49, p. 35). The choice of such a model, albeit with slight modification of the last two lines of the stanza, is obviously deliberate and very apposite to Granet’s subject.

Note: In two of the three mss. of the partimen BdT 437.10 = 76.2, the text is followed by this brief sirventes of Granet, which mocks the choices made by both of the participants in the debate, Sordel and Bertran, probably Bertran d’Alamano. For the circumstances and date, as well as the references in the text, see the General note to BdT 437.10 = 76.2 in  Harvey and Paterson, The Troubadour Tensos: «Since Granet’s piece was written at the suggestion of a comte who may well have been Raimon Berenguer V of Provence, it is possible that the partimen also was written at his court, where both troubadours are known to have been present in 1241. This might explain the rather curious turn of phrase used by Sordel in the first tornada (La comtessa vs. cil de Rodes): this form of words would be natural if the piece were first performed when another countess, namely Raimon Berenguer’s wife, was present. It is likely that both Sordel in the present piece and Granet in his answering sirventes were referring to Guida of Rodez (see in particular François Pirot, Recherches sur les connaissances littéraires des troubadours occitans et catalans des XIIe et XIIIe siècles, Barcelona 1972, pp. 308-310), rather than to her sister-in-law Isabella (died 1231), wife of Uc IV of Rodez. But the date of both pieces remains uncertain: the count referred to by Granet may have been Charles of Anjou (see Marco Boni, Sordello, Le poesie, Bologna 1954, pp. lxiii-lxv, n. 231 and Id., Sordello. Con una scelta di liriche tradotte e commentate, Bologna 1970, p. xlii, n. 125), rather than Raimon Berenguer; and Jean de Valery, mentioned in both pieces, particularly distinguished himself in the Seventh Crusade, though, of course, his bravery may have been a byword much earlier. Since Jean left France in 1253, this date represents the terminus ante quem for our piece (see Boni, Sordello, p. 101)».

[LP]


Foreword

BdT    Granet