6. Levar (or gitar) a taverna is a locution which I have not noted elsewhere in the troubadours. In Modern Provençal, according to Mistral, leva taverno means ‘to keep a tavern’; but that can hardly be the meaning here. It seems to signify ‘bring down to evil ways.’
7. Falterna. Levy (SW, III, 408) connects this word with Modern Provençal farfantello, fauterno, ‘berlue, éblouissement, lueur vacillante, apparition, fantôme’ (Mistral). Here, its meaning seems to me rather to be ‘light-mindedness,’ perhaps even ‘wickedness.’
8. What is vendre a terna? A terna is the successful group of three numbers in a lottery, so possibly ‘sell to the winning numbers,’ ‘sell to the highest bidder,’ instead of the interpretation suggested in the translation.
14-15. The reconstruction of these lines is difficult. I have followed C closely, with but two slight changes. But it is more likely that the meaningless readings of DIK conceal the original reading, modified by the copyist of C, who often made emendations.
16. I interpret mola as the by-form of amola, ampola, and think that the poet is referring to the ‘sainte ampoule’ of Reims. For the form mola see Levy, op. cit., V, 294.
19. The same comparison occurs in the tenso 173,5, vss. 35-36:
“Qu’elas vivon de raubar
Plus qu’Aspes qui cor ab ega.”
23. C’s reading virola is evidently preferable to the viola of DIK, as the same word is repeated two lines below. The verb virolar is evidently the same as the Modern Provençal viroula, ‘tournoyer, parcourir, rôder’ (Mistral). The meaning here is probably ‘keep turning about, be inconstant or fickle.’
25-26. The most difficult lines of the whole song. Lea (or leal) is not a Provençal word. I conjecture that it may be a feminine form, specially forged for the rhyme, of leu< LEVEM. Another possibility, less likely in my opinion, is that it is the feminine of the Old French adjective lé- lée <LATUM. ( 1) I have adopted in my translation the first supposition, but the interpretation proposed remains exceedingly doubtful.
28. Comunalha means ‘communauté, action de mettre en commun.’ Bertran here accuses “las joves” of vulgarizing love —the same idea as in vss. 25-26.
38. In this line I take que as the concessive pronoun, equivalent to que que. The personal object ·l refers to the drut of the following verse.
43. The word teira, tiera means ‘suite, série, ligne.’ So I understand selhas de mieja teira as meaning ‘middle-aged women.’
49. Neither reading is very satisfactory. I have adopted that of the manuscripts DIK, with a slight modification.
50. For the form perga see Grandgent, Outline of the Phonology and Morphology of Old Provençal, p. 129.
51-52. The interpretation here proposed in the translation is again uncertain.
63. No such word or form as garanta has hitherto been noted in Provençal. I assume it to be a by-form of garanda, ‘juste mesure.’ But the meaning of the line is doubtful.
65. Here mover nova means, probably, ‘to stir up strife.’ See the quotations given by Levy, op. cit., V, 426-27, in which nova, novas occur with the meaning ‘strife, dispute,’ and note also Catalan nueva, ‘chisme.’
Note:
1) For examples of OFr forms used by the troubadours in rhyme see Erdmannsdörfer, Reimwörterbuch der Troubadours (Berlin, 1897), pp. 7-8. But he cites no example of an ending -ea.
|
