The World of the Troubadours
Medieval Occitan Society, c.1100–c.1300

Linda M. Paterson (Author)

9780521558327, Cambridge University Press

Paperback, published 5 October 1995

384 pages
23 x 15.2 x 2.5 cm, 0.586 kg

'This is a book of major importance to all medievalists … The world of the troubadours successfully challenges or at leaxst questions many of the received orthodoxies about the South of France … Dr Paterson's erudition and grasp of her subject are enviable, and she has produced a book which will certainly become a classic in its field.' The Times Literary Supplement

Occitania, known today as the 'south of France', had its own language and culture in the Middle Ages. Its troubadours created 'courtly love' and a new poetic language in the vernacular, which were to influence European literature for centuries; and its Cathar heretics were the first victims of the Inquisition. This is the first comprehensive study of the society in which the troubadours lived. For readers of literature it offers a wide-ranging insight into the realities which lay behind the poetic mystique. For historians it opens up an important and and neglected area of medieval Europe, comparable to France, Germany and Catalonia, drawing on sources not readily accessible to those without specialist linguistic and literary expertise. It addresses major issues, such as the nature of feudalism, knighthood, courts, medicine, women, and the family, and is accessible to the reader interested generally in the Middle Ages or Occitan culture.

1. Introduction: Occitan identity and self-perception
2. Occitan 'feudalism'
3. Knights and non-knightly combatants
4. The knight and chivalry
5. Courts and courtiers
6. Peasants
7. Towns
8. Doctors and medicine
9. Women
10. Children
11. Clergy, heretics and inquisitors
Conclusion.

Subject Areas: Early history: c 500 to c 1450/1500 [HBLC], European history [HBJD]