Marcabru
Encyclopedia
Floruit
Floruit , abbreviated fl. , is a Latin verb meaning "flourished", denoting the period of time during which something was active...
1130-1150) is one of the earliest 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....
s whose poems are known. There is no certain information about him; the two vida
Vida (Occitan literary form)
Vida is the usual term for a brief prose biography, written in Old Occitan, of a troubadour or trobairitz.The word vida means "life" in Occitan languages. In the chansonniers, the manuscript collections of medieval troubadour poetry, the works of a particular author are often accompanied by a...
s attached to his poems tell different stories, and both are evidently built on hints in the poems, not on independent information.
According to the brief life in MS. BNF 12473 Marcabrun was from Gascony
Gascony
Gascony is an area of southwest France that was part of the "Province of Guyenne and Gascony" prior to the French Revolution. The region is vaguely defined and the distinction between Guyenne and Gascony is unclear; sometimes they are considered to overlap, and sometimes Gascony is considered a...
(details of the dialect of his poems support this) and was the son of a poor woman named Marcabruna. He made bad poems and bad satires, and spoke evil of women and of love. This evidently comes from a reading of poem 293,18.
According to the longer biography in MS. Vat. Lat. 5232 Marcabru was abandoned at a rich man's door, and no one knew his origin. He was brought up by Aldric del Vilar, learned to make poetry from Cercamon
Cercamon
Cercamon , whose real name, as well as any actual biographical data, is unknown, was one of the earliest troubadours. He was apparently a jester of sorts, born in Gascony, who spent most of his career in the courts of William X of Aquitaine and perhaps of Eble III of Ventadorn...
, was at first nicknamed Pan-perdut and later Marcabru. He became famous, and the lords of Gascony, about whom he had said many bad things, eventually put him to death. This appears to be based on poems 16b,1 and 293,43 (an exchange between Aldric del Vilar and Marcabru) and guesswork; the link with Cercamon is doubted by modern scholars.
Forty-five poems are attributed to Marcabru, learned, often difficult, sometimes obscene, relentlessly critical of the morality of lords and ladies. He experimented with the pastorela
Pastorela
The pastorela was an Occitan lyric genre used by the troubadours. It gave rise to the Old French pastourelle. The central topic was always meeting of a knight with a shepherdess, which may lead to any of a number of possible conclusions. They are usually humorous pieces...
, which he uses to point out the futility of lust. One tells of how the speaker's advances are reviled by a shepherdess on the basis of class. Another tells of how a man's attempt to seduce a woman whose husband was at the crusades
Crusades
The Crusades were a series of religious wars, blessed by the Pope and the Catholic Church with the main goal of restoring Christian access to the holy places in and near Jerusalem...
is firmly rebuffed. He may also have originated the tenso
Tenso
A tenso is a style of Occitan song favoured by the troubadours. It takes the form of a debate in which each voice defends a position on a topic relating to love or ethics. Closely related genres include the partimen and the cobla exchange...
in a debate with Uc Catola
Uc Catola
Uc Catola was a knight and early troubadour, possibly a participant in the Second Crusade and perhaps later a monk.Uc composed what is possibly the first tenso with his famous contemporary Marcabru: Amics Marchabrun, which concerned the nature of love. Uc argued that it was good and noble, while...
(as early as 1133) on the nature of love and the decline of courtly behaviour. Marcabru was a powerful influence on later poets who adopted the obscure trobar clus
Trobar clus
Trobar clus , or closed form, was a complex and obscure style of poetry used by troubadours for their more discerning audiences, and it was only truly appreciated by an elite few. It was developed extensively by Marcabru, but by 1200 its inaccessibility led to its disappearance...
style. Among his patrons were William X of Aquitaine
William X of Aquitaine
William X , called the Saint, was Duke of Aquitaine, Duke of Gascony, and Count of Poitou between 1126 and 1137. He was the son of William IX by his second wife, Philippa of Toulouse....
and, probably, Alfonso VII of León
Alfonso VII of León
Alfonso VII , born Alfonso Raimúndez, called the Emperor , became the King of Galicia in 1111 and King of León and Castile in 1126. Alfonso first used the title Emperor of All Spain, alongside his mother Urraca, once his mother vested him with the direct rule of Toledo in 1116...
. Marcabru may have travelled to Spain in the entourage of Alfonso Jordan, Count of Toulouse, in the 1130s. In the 1140s he was a propagandist for the Reconquista
Reconquista
The Reconquista was a period of almost 800 years in the Middle Ages during which several Christian kingdoms succeeded in retaking the Muslim-controlled areas of the Iberian Peninsula broadly known as Al-Andalus...
and in his famous poem with the Latin beginning Pax in nomine Domini! he called Spain a lavador (washer) where knights could go to have their souls cleansed fighting the infidel.
Four monophonic
Monophony
In music, monophony is the simplest of textures, consisting of melody without accompanying harmony. This may be realized as just one note at a time, or with the same note duplicated at the octave . If the entire melody is sung by two voices or a choir with an interval between the notes or in...
melodies to accompany Marcabru's poetry survive; additionally, three melodies of poems that may be contrafacta of Marcabru's work may be attributed to him.