The Knight in History Read Free

Arnautz qu’amas l’aura ,
E cbatz la lebre ab lo bou
E nadi contra suberna .
I am Arnaut who gathers the wind
and hunts the hare with the ox
and swims against the incoming tide. 41
    Dante’s favorite among Arnaut’s cansos was not a technical display of virtuosity such as “ L’aura amara ,” but “ Sols sui qui sai ,” a poem with a simple metrical arrangement and a rhyme scheme in which each line in the seven-line stanza rhymes with a corresponding line in the others; what Dante admired was the harmony between the means of expression and the ideas expressed, the “lucid and graceful and elevated order of construction.” 42
…D’autras vezer sui secs e d’auzir sortz ,
Qu’en sola lieis vei et esgar;
E jes d’aisso no · ill sui fals plazentiers
Que mais la vol non ditz la boca · l cors;
Qu ’eu no vau tant chams, vauz ni plans in puois
Qu ’en un sol cors trob aissi bos aips totz:
Qu ’en lieis los volc Dieus triar et assire .
Ben ai estat a maintas bonas cortz
Mas sai ab lieis trob pro mais que lauzar:
Mesura e sen et autres bos mestiers ,
Beutat, joven, bos faitz e bels demors .
Gen I’enseignet Cortesia e la duois;
Tant a de si totz faitz desplazens rotz
…I am blind to others, and their retort
I hear not. In her alone, I see, move,
Wonder…. And jest not. And the words dilate
Not truth; but mouth speaks not the heart outright:
I could not walk roads, flats, dales, hills, by chance,
To find charm’s sum within one single frame
As God hath set in her t’assay and test it.
And I have passed in many a goodly court
To find in hers more charm than rumor thereof…
In solely hers. Measure and sense to mate,
Youth and beauty learned in all delight,
Gentrice did nurse her up, and so advance
Her fair beyond all reach of evil name,
     

PAGE FROM A MANUSCRIPT OF ARNAUT DANIEL’S “LO FERM VOLER.” (BIBLIOTECA AMBROSIANA, MILAN, MS. G R71 SUPERIORE, F. 78)
De lieis no cre rens de ben sia a dire….
Ma chansos prec que no · us sia enois ,
Car si voletz grazir lo son e · ls motz
Pauc preza Arnautz cui que plassa o que tire .
To clear her worth, no shadow hath oppresst it….
The song begs you: Count not this speech ill chance,
But if you count the song worth your acclaim,
Arnaut cares lyt who praise it or who contest it.
(Translation by Ezra Pound) 43
    Arnaut’s most famous poem, “ Lo ferm voler ,” was a sestina, a form invented by Arnaut and imitated by a number of poets, including Dante and Petrarch. This poem has been called “a high point of trobar clus ” (difficult troubadour poetry). 44 Six rhyming words are used, repeated in each subsequent stanza in a fixed pattern in relation to the preceding one, the rhyming words of the tornada repeating the last three of the last stanza. Arnaut’s poem plays throughout on the words l’oncle (uncle or kinsman) and l’ongle (claw or nail) and on verga , which can mean “rod” or “Virgin” and vergier (orchard). At least two levels of meaning are present: the literal one, the thoughts of the lover whose love is firm against the attacks of slanderers, who longs for his lady and loves her more than his family, and whose love will bring him joy in paradise; and the allegorical one, the debate between mind and spirit, with Arnaut’s affirmation of Fin’ Amors , the perfect form of profane love, which he hopes will take him to paradise.
Lo ferm voler q ’el cor m ’intra
No · m pot jes becs escoissendre ni ongla
De lausengier, qui pert per mal dir s’arma;
E car non I’aus batr’ab ram ni ab verga ,
Sivals a frau, lai on non aurai oncle ,
Jauzirai joi, en vergier o dinz cambra .
Quan mi soven de la cambra
On a mon dan sai que nuills hom non intra
Anz me son tuich plus que fraire ni oncle ,
Non ai membre no · m fremisca, neis l’ongla ,
Aissi cum fai l’enfas denant la verga ,
Tal paor ai que · ill sia trop de m’arma .
Del cors li fos, non de l’arma .
E cossentis m’a celat dins sa cambra!
Que plus mi nafra · l cor que colps de