O cancioneiro oral tradicional do Norte de Portugal e da Galiza

Abstract

The lyric cancioneiros from Northern Portugal and Galicia constitute, to a great extent, a shared tradition. To affirm this is not to deny the specificity of the cancioneiro with regards to each country or region. There are certain characteristics that distinguish the cancioneiros from one another, but equally there are clear similarities between them, in form as well as in content. Their geographic proximity, their various connections, and also the political, linguistic, and cultural separation of Portugal and Galicia have given rise to the complicated relationship that has created a cancioneiro we can refer to as, to evoke the medieval lyric poetry school, Galician-Portuguese. Departing from these historical and cultural conjectures, this article aims to compare the major lines of structure and form within the cancioneiros from Northern Portugal and from Galicia. Through the comparison of poems which have circulated or are still in circulation in this geo-cultural area, we can, on the one hand, reflect upon the way in which the cancioneiro functions and, on the other hand, consider the world views of the communities from which the texts originate and which are shaped at the same time by these very texts.