- Also spelled:
- Trouveur
- Key People:
- Theobald I
- Raoul de Houdenc
- Blondel de Nesle
- Colin Muset
- Related Topics:
- vocal music
- minnesinger
- chanson de geste
- troubadour
- jongleur
trouvère
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What is a trouvère?
A trouvère was part of a school of northern French poets who prospered from the 11th to the 14th centuries. The trouvères were influenced by the Provençal troubadours, adopting their themes and metric forms. However, unlike the troubadours, they did not value obscure metaphors and developed their own distinct lyric poetry.
Trouvère lyrics were intended to be sung, either by the poet or with instrumental accompaniment. Though initially connected to feudal courts, their poetry gained popularity in aristocratic and middle-class circles.
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Where and when did trouvères live?
The trouvères were poets who thrived in Northern France from the 11th to the 14th century. Traveling around feudal courts in search of patronage, their themes and metrical forms were highly stylized, and they were known for combining traditional themes while using established forms of expression. Although originally connected with feudal courts, the trouvères increasingly found patrons among the middle classes.
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What kind of poetry did trouvères write?
The trouvères were poet-musicians who flourished in northern France from the 11th to the 14th century. Heavily influenced by the troubadours of southern France, the essence of their writing combined traditional themes with established forms, emphasizing familiarity over originality.
Like the troubadours, the basic theme of trouvère poetry is courtly love, where the poet expresses unrequited passion for an unattainable lady. However, the trouvères developed a distinct lyric style, sometimes satirical or focused on the pleasures of life.
Trouvère lyrics were intended to be sung, either solo or with instrumental accompaniment, using musical forms with repeated phrases, dance songs with refrains, songs with repeated lines, and through-composed songs.
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How are trouvères different from troubadours?
The trouvères and troubadours were both lyric poets of the Middle Ages, but they flourished in different regions and wrote in different languages. The trouvères were from northern France and wrote in the langue dâoĂŻl, while the troubadours were from southern France, northern Spain, and northern Italy, writing in the langue dâoc of Provence.
Both groups were influenced by the concept of courtly love, but the trouvères did not value obscurity of metaphor as much as the troubadours. Also, the trouvères increasingly found patrons among the middle classes, whereas the troubadours were favored in courts and had great freedom of speech.
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What themes are often found in trouvère poetry?
The main theme in trouvère poetry is courtly love, where poets describe their unrequited passion for an unattainable lady.
Other themes found in their poems include:
* The pleasures of the good life
* Satire
* Politics
* Crusades
* Reverence for the Virgin
* Disgust at clerical corruptionTrouvères did not value originality, and their rhetoric combined traditional themes and established forms. The audience enjoyed the familiarity with clichÊs rather than the poet's innovation.
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How did trouvères influence later French poetry and music?
The trouvères were poet-musicians who flourished in northern France from the 11th to the 14th century. Inspired by the troubadours of southern France, the trouvères created a distinct lyric poetry, setting their works to music and likely performing them with accompaniment.
Though the exact performance style of the trouvères is not known, their monophonic songs and varied musical forms influenced later French music, including works by such composers as Guillaume de Machaut. The trouvères' emphasis on courtly love and their use of established forms also impacted French poetry, as seen in the works of later poets like Rutebeuf.
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trouvère, any of a school of poets that flourished in northern France from the 11th to the 14th century. The trouvère was the counterpart in the language of northern France (the langue dâoĂŻl) to the Provençal troubadour (q.v.), from whom the trouvères derived their highly stylized themes and metrical forms. The essence of trouvère rhetoric lies in the combination of traditional themes and the use of established forms in which to express them. The audience gained pleasure from familiarity with these clichĂŠs rather than from the poetâs originality. It is thus perhaps the least characteristic trouvères, such as Rutebeuf (flourished 1250â80), generally considered the last and greatest of the trouvères, who are most appreciated today.
Communication between northern and southern France was facilitated and encouraged by the Crusades, and a number of trouvères, such as the Châtelaine de Coucy and Conon de BÊthune, took part in them. The trouvères, however, developed a lyric poetry distinct from that of the troubadours, and, unlike the latter, they did not prize obscurity of metaphor for its own sake. Their poetry is sometimes satirical and sometimes (as in the case of Colin Muset) concerned with the pleasures of the good life; but the basic theme remains that of courtly love, in which the poet describes his unrequited passion for an inaccessible lady.
Trouvère lyrics were intended to be sung, probably by the poet alone or with instrumental accompaniment provided by a hired musician. Although originally connected with feudal courts, around which the trouvères traveled looking for patronage, their poetry was not just popular with aristocratic circles, and they tended increasingly to find their patrons in the middle classes. Half the extant trouvère lyrics are the work of a guild of citizen poets of Arras. Many of the trouvères, such as Gace BrĂťlĂŠ (late 12th century), were of aristocratic birth; Thibaut de Champagne (1201â53) was king of Navarre. But others, including Rutebeuf, were of humble origin. See also jongleurs.
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The songs of the trouvères were monophonic (consisting solely of melodic line). Their exact mode of performance is not known. The form of the instrumental accompaniment is unknown, but it almost certainly included preludes, postludes, and interludes.
The trouvères used a variety of musical forms, some for any of several of the various poetic categories and some linked to the type of the verse. Four broad categories can be discerned: musical forms based on multiple repetitions of a short phrase, as in a litany; dance songs with refrains; songs based on pairs of repeated lines; and through-composed songs (i.e., using no repetition).
Compositions with no repetition within the stanza include the vers and the chanson. In the chanson, however, a short initial section is repeated, and a piece of the opening section may recur at the end. Most surviving trouvère music is written in a notation that indicates the pitch of the notes but not their relative duration or accentuation, an omission that has given rise to much debate as to rhythmic interpretation in the edition of the songs for modern performance.