Aycart or Aicart del Fossat or Aicardo de Fossato (fl.

Floruit

Floruit , abbreviated fl. , is a Latin verb meaning "flourished", denoting the period of time during which something was active...

 1250–68) was a troubadour

Troubadour

A troubadour was a composer and performer of Old Occitan lyric poetry during the High Middle Ages . Since the word "troubadour" is etymologically masculine, a female troubadour is usually called a trobairitz....

 from Le Fossat

Le Fossat

Le Fossat is a commune in the Ariège department in southwestern France.-Geography:The Lèze flows northwest through the middle of the commune and crosses the village.-Population:-References:*...

 in Ariège

Ariège

Ariège is a department in southwestern France named after the Ariège River.- History :Ariège is one of the original 83 departments created during the French Revolution on 4 March 1790. It was created from the counties of Foix and Couserans....

. To him are attributed one sirventes

Sirventes

The sirventes or serventes is a genre of Occitan lyric poetry used by the troubadours. In early Catalan it became a sirventesch and was imported into that language in the fourteenth century, where it developed into a unique didactic/moralistic type...

and a partimen

Partimen

The partimen is a genre of Occitan lyric poetry composed between two troubadours, a subgenre of the tenso or cobla exchange in which one poet presents a dilemma in the form of a question and the two debate the answer, each taking up a different side. It was especially popular in poetic contests....

with Girard Cavalaz

Girard Cavalaz

Girardo Cavallazzi or Cavallazzo was an Italian troubadour from Lombardy. His only surviving work is four coblas of a partimen he exchanged with Aycart del Fossat concerning the nature of Heaven and Hell: Si paradis et enfernz son aital....

.

The sirventes is about the victory of Charles of Anjou over Conradin

Conradin

Conrad , called the Younger or the Boy, but usually known by the diminutive Conradin , was the Duke of Swabia , King of Jerusalem , and King of Sicily .-Early childhood:Conradin was born in Wolfstein, Bavaria, to Conrad...

 at the Battle of Tagliacozzo

Battle of Tagliacozzo

The Battle of Tagliacozzo was fought on 23 August 1268 between the French, Provençal, and Italian forces of Charles of Anjou and the Italian, Spanish, Roman, Arab and German troops of the Hohenstaufen army, led by Conradin , the sixteen year old Duke of Swabia and claimant to the throne of Sicily...

 (1268). The partimen, "Si paradis et enfernz son aital", is a dilemma on the nature of Heaven

Heaven

Heaven, the Heavens or Seven Heavens, is a common religious cosmological or metaphysical term for the physical or transcendent place from which heavenly beings originate, are enthroned or inhabit...

 and Hell

Hell

In many religious traditions, a hell is a place of suffering and punishment in the afterlife. Religions with a linear divine history often depict hells as endless. Religions with a cyclic history often depict a hell as an intermediary period between incarnations...

 (c. 1250). The debaters are known only as Aicart and Girart, but they have long been identified with Aycart and Girard. The partimen is preserved in a manuscript from Bergamo

Bergamo

Bergamo is a town and comune in Lombardy, Italy, about 40 km northeast of Milan. The comune is home to over 120,000 inhabitants. It is served by the Orio al Serio Airport, which also serves the Province of Bergamo, and to a lesser extent the metropolitan area of Milan...

, where it has a Latin

Latin

Latin is an Italic language originally spoken in Latium and Ancient Rome. It, along with most European languages, is a descendant of the ancient Proto-Indo-European language. Although it is considered a dead language, a number of scholars and members of the Christian clergy speak it fluently, and...

 razo

Razo

Raso is an islet of 8 square kilometers in the Barlavento archipelago of Cape Verde. Raso is flanked by the smaller Branco islet on the west and by São Nicolau island on its eastern side. Raso is uninhabited and is now the only home of the Raso Lark. The Brown Booby and Red-billed Tropicbird visit...

.

Further reading

• Bastard, Antoine de. "Aicart del Fossat et les événements politiques en Italie (1268)." Mélanges de philologie romane dédiés à la mémoire de Jean Boutière (1899–1967), 1:51–75 (Liège, 1971).
• Bertoni, Giulio. "Un nuovo trovatore italiano: Girardo Cavallazzi." Romania, 43:587–593 (1914).
• Gresti, Paolo. "Un nuovo trovatore italiano? Osservazioni sul partimen tra Aycard de Fossat e Girard Cavalaz, Si paradis et enfernz son aital (BdT 6A.1)", p. 341–354. Il genere ‹tenzone› nelle letterature romanze delle Origini. Atti del convegno internazionale, Lausanne, 13–15 November 1997, edd. M. Pedroni and A. Stäuble. Ravenna, 1999.

Works

• Si paradis et enfernz son aital at Rialto