I trovatori nel Veneto e a Venezia. Atti del Convegno internazionale - Venezia, 28-31 ottobre 2004 (review)

Abstract

Reviewed by: I trovatori nel Veneto e a Venezia. Atti del Convegno internazionale - Venezia, 28-31 ottobre 2004 Wendy Pfeffer Lachin, Giosuè, ed. I trovatori nel Veneto e a Venezia. Atti del Convegno internazionale - Venezia, 28-31 ottobre 2004. Medioevo e Rinascimento Veneto 3. Roma/Padova: Editrice Antenore. 2008. ISBN: 978-88-8455-623-3. I Trovatori nel Veneto includes most of the presentations given at the conference organized under the auspices of the Fondazione Giorgio Cini, with support from the Società Italiana di filologia romanza and the Association internationale d'études occitanes. The premise of the 2004 meeting was to summarize research of the last thirty years or so and to share current work of the scholars involved, with a particular focus on the area of Venice and its surroundings. Given the importance of the northeastern region of Italy as a venue for troubadour performance and for the preservation of medieval Occitan texts, there was no shortage of content. The volume opens with a long essay by Giosuè Lachin labeled "Introduzione" (xiii-cv), though the essay is anything but. Lachin uses this opportunity to showcase his current work with troubadour manuscript D, offering readers a very careful description of that volume and an interpretation of the logic of its composition. Lachin hypothesizes that D and the Liber Alberici represent a primitive phase of the development of a troubadour canon of authors (lxxvi). Lachin emphasizes the role of scribes trained at the university (e.g., Padua, lxxxviii) as an important factor in understanding the composition of D; he sees the volume as an example of pecia construction1 (xciv). Daniela Rando considers the question, What is a court? in "I luoghi della cultura nella Marca del duecento" (3-25) and offers a coherent response, not only to the question itself but also how the setting for culture evolved in the eleventh-thirteenth centuries in Italy. In this retelling, the passage from vagrant court to castle to city seems almost ineluctable. The next essay, "Alla corte dei Tempesta: trovatori e magistri nel castelle di Noale (sec. XIII-XIV)" by Raffaele Roncato (27-38) is a bonus, for the presentation was not on the original conference program (xii). Roncato emphasizes the importance of the castle and court at Noale as a stopping point for troubadour and Occitan culture. [End Page 69] Francesca Flores d'Arcais reminds the reader, in "Letteratura cavalleresca e arti figurative nel Veneto dal XIII al XIV secolo," (39-46) of the role of figurative art in this region, though most of the examples illustrate Old French rather than Occitan texts. The author suggests two frescos may refer to the themes of Occitan lyric, one in Bassano portraying a lover (45) and a second in Trento, which portrays a courtly scene, a distant echo of troubadour poetry (46). Continuing the theme of pictorial arts, Giordana Canova Mariani addresses "Il poeta e la sua immagine: il contributo della miniatura alla localizzazione e alla datazione dei canzonieri provenzali AIK e N" (47-76). Here an art historian uses the methods of that discipline to date four chansonniers. The author suggests that A can be dated to shortly after 1273-75 (61), that I and K can be dated to the 1290's (67), that N dates from the 1260's–1270's (75).2 The arguments mustered depend almost entirely on comparing the art in these four manuscripts (portraits and flourishes) with dated manuscripts from scriptoria in the Veneto. Historian Michel Roquebert offers "L'Emigration languedocienne en Italie padane au cours du XIIIe siècle" (77-95), based largely on Inquisition documents relating to four heretic travelers. Roquebert establishes a geography and a sociology of exile; the documents he examined allow him also to consider the material and social conditions of exile. In "Sur quelques troubadours qui franchirent les Alpes du temps de la Croisade contre les Albigeois," (97-133), Gérard Gouiran extends Roquebert's discussion to specific troubadours, notably Folquet de Romans. Gouiran's essay is, in truth, a description of the lifestyle of troubadours and joglars who flourished in thirteenth-century Italy. Saverio Guida's contribution, "Esperienza trobadorica e realtá veneta" (135-170) complements Gouiran's essay nicely...