Jaufre Rudel and the Lady of Dreams

Abstract

The Provençal biographer's account of Jaufre Rudel's dying visit to the “faraway lady” was first seriously called in dispute by E. Stengel. Afterward, Gaston Paris disposed of the whole legend, as well as of the general reliability of the Provengal biographers, whose testimony had been accepted without question half a century before by Fauriel and others. Monaci, while granting the legendary character of “Melissenda,” attempted to identify Jaufre Rudel's beloved with Eleanor of Aquitaine. Appel, arguing from the number of religious phrases occurring in Jaufre's poems, concluded that the lady of his devotions was the Virgin. Appel's theory, supported as it is by a vast erudition, is confuted in my opinion by P. Savj-Lopez. Giulio Bertoni would adopt a middle ground between those who, like Appel, maintain the idealism of Jaufre's love, or like Monaci, believe that his passion was fixed upon a woman of earth, more or less identified by allusions in his verse. Ramiro Ortiz would accept the conclusions of Monaci, etc., admitting the reality of the lady, but feels that either Jaufre Rudel was directly influenced by certain passages of William of Poitiers, or else some of the minstrels who sang Jaufre's poetry made interpolations borrowed from William.