9. Raynouard, Lexique roman, IV, 113, cites this passage, according to IK (under madaisa) and translates: ‘Une vieille grise qui n’a ... excepté la peau et la voix, et tourne l’écheveau.’ Levy, op. cit., V, 4, rejects this interpretation, rightly, in my opinion, and proposes the correction: e davala·l madaisa, ‘und der Kinnbacken hängt herab.’ D’s reading clears up the difficulties.
8. I take craissa to be a by-form of graissa, ‘fat, grease.’ It is well known that in words of this stem the initial consonant varies frequently, though the forms with initial c have not hitherto been noted in Provençal texts.
12. The verb acaissar seems to occur only in this passage. Levy, op. cit., I, 10, suggests the translation ‘einschliessen, verbergen,’ but Raynouard’s interpretation ‘embrasser’ seems to me to suit better the general sense of the passage.
13. Aissa is here probably a place-name, but which? In Brunel’s Les plus anciennes chartes en langue provençale (No. 225) we find mentioned several times a certain P. d’Aissa, which Brunel identifies with a ‘lieu-dit’ near Nontron (Dordogne), not far from Limoges. If, as is likely, the name of this insignificant locality was chosen because it was familiar to the author of this piece, that adds to the probability that the author was Jausbert de Puycibot, a native of the Limousin, rather than Bernard de Durfort, whose associations are more with Toulouse and the Toulousain district.
16. The locution venir menhs has not been noted elsewhere in Provençal. The meaning here seems to be ‘amount to less, have a worse fortune.’
19. This line is hypometric by one syllable in all three manuscripts. The correction adopted in the text (aiga for ia) seems to provide the necessary contrast of meaning.
20. Lor must refer here to las vielhas.
23. The word englut is evidently a verbal substantive from englutar, ‘engluer, enduire.’ Raynouard (Lexique roman, III, 480) cites this passage and gives one more example of the word, from the Elucidarium. The word is not included by Levy in the Petit Dictionnaire, nor does he mention it in the SW.
24-25. The words blanquet, tifingon, and mentiron are evidently names of different kinds of cosmetics used by the vielhas of the period. It seems impossible to define exactly their meaning.
25. This line is hypermetric by one syllable. One could emend by substituting sus or sur for sobre.
26. The exact meaning of this line is far from evident. The translation suggested is provisional and unsatisfactory.
31. One would expect lei, not si; but the use of the reflexive for the disjunctive personal pronoun of the third person is found, occasionally, in many of the Romance languages. See Meyer-Lübke, Romanische Grammatik, III, 82. For examples of this usage in Provençal see Stimming’s note to Bertran de Born, 21,24.
33. Viest can only be the present indicative of vestir, but the diphthong is, to me, inexplicable.
35. This line, as given by all the manuscripts, is hypometric by one syllable; but the correction proposed, mas sol for mas, is simple and easy. A further question is whether one should write pel legata or pellegata. Levy, who cites this passage (op. cit., VI, 193), prefers to read it as one word and compares the Modern Provençal peleganto, pelegousto, ‘peau flasque, chair pendante’; but all the manuscripts write as two words.
36-39. The exact meaning of these lines is not clear.
39. Hypermetric; nor is it easy to suggest a possible correction. Seclaton (not found in other Provençal texts, so far as I know) is, in my opinion, the equivalent of OFr ciclaton, “étoffe de soie.”
43. What is metre ad estracha? Levy (op. cit., III, 334) cites this passage without explaining the locution. Estracha is evidently a derivative of estraire, and may mean ‘what is extracted or given up’; so metre ad estracha, ‘put up something to be extracted from one’s purse, wager.’
46-47. Facha, according to Raynouard (Lexique roman, III, 285), means ‘peinture, fard.’ Levy op. cit., III, 368), who cites this passage, considers this interpretation “sehr bedenklich.” He suggests that the line should read (as in the partimen, Jausbert de Puycibot, V, 64) . . . men coma gacha, and that facha should be taken as the end word of the following line, lost in all the manuscripts. This seems to me, in turn, “sehr bedenklich,” involving, as it does, a considerable emendation. I prefer to read com afacha, and to interpret afacha as the verbal substantive of the verb afachar, ‘apprêter, farder,’ returning thus to Raynouard’s explanation.
49. Tracha here means evidently ‘food exported or provided.’ See the passages cited by Levy, op. cit., VIII, 345.
50. It is tempting and easy to correct bon ser; but it is possible that the poet here employs ben-ser as a compound.
53. The word faura is unattested elsewhere. I take it as related to fachura, ‘enchantment,’ and fachurar, ‘enchanter.’ Cf. the definition given in the Donats provençal: (1) faiturar i maleficiara.
56-58. My interpretation of this passage involves the assumption that quar (vs. 58) repeats pleonastically the que of the preceding line. Armadura is used, ironically, in the sense of ‘armor for the face,’ that is, ‘something to cover up her faded charms.’
59. Prezes is the third person singular of the imperfect subjunctive of penre, employed as the expression of a wish unlikely to be fulfilled.
65. Besides the interpretation suggested in the translation, one could also take la dura to mean the young girl still dura of pel, not molla e fracha, like the vielha. But this would involve a reference to the preceding cobla, and seems rather farfetched.
Note:
1) Stengel, Die beiden ältesten provenzalischen Grammatiken, p. 31. |
