The ''arlabecca'' () was a

genre Genre () is any form or type of communication in any mode (written, spoken, digital, artistic, etc.) with socially-agreed-upon conventions developed over time. In popular usage, it normally describes a category of literature, music, or other for ...

Old Occitan Old Occitan ( oc, occitan ancian, label=Occitan language, Modern Occitan, ca, occità antic), also called Old Provençal, was the earliest form of the Occitano-Romance languages, as attested in writings dating from the eighth through the fourteen ...

lyric poetry Modern lyric poetry is a formal type of poetry which expresses personal emotions or feelings, typically spoken in the first person. It is not equivalent to song lyrics, though song lyrics are often in the lyric mode, and it is also ''not'' equi ...

. First mentioned in an ''

ensenhamen An ''ensenhamen'' (; meaning "instruction" or "teaching") was an Old Occitan didactic (often lyric) poem associated with the troubadours. As a genre of Occitan literature, its limits have been open to debate since it was first defined in the 19th ...

'' by

Peire Lunel Peire Lunel de Montech ( fl. 1326–1384), also known as Cavalier Lunel or Peire de Lunel, was a lawyer, politician and author of Toulouse. His name indicates he was a knight (''cavalier'' in Occitan) from Montech.Also spelled Monteg. Occitan "c ...

, the genre was supposed by François Raynouard to be a lament or dirge, and Emil Levy thought it a "kind of poetry". It may derive from the

Galician-Portuguese Galician-Portuguese ( gl, galego-portugués or ', pt, galego-português or ), also known as Old Portuguese or as Medieval Galician when referring to the history of each modern language, was a West Iberian languages, West Iberian Romance languag ...

term for a

rebec The rebec (sometimes rebecha, rebeckha, and other spellings, pronounced or ) is a bowed stringed instrument of the Medieval era and the early Renaissance. In its most common form, it has a narrow boat-shaped body and one to five strings. Origi ...

, ''arrabecca''. The term ''rebec'' (plural ''rebecz'') can be found in Old Occitan references to both an instrument and a genre (as in the ''

Leys d'amors Guilhem Molinier or Moulinier ( 1330–50) was a medieval Occitan poet from Toulouse. His most notable work is ''Leys d'amors'' ("Laws of Love"), a treatise on rhetoric and grammar that achieved great notoriety and, beyond the Occitan, influenced ...

'', where it is undefined). Possibly the ''rebec'' is the same genre as the ''arlabecca''. Lunel defined his ''arlabecca'' by its

metre The metre (British spelling) or meter (American spelling; see spelling differences) (from the French unit , from the Greek noun , "measure"), symbol m, is the primary unit of length in the International System of Units (SI), though its pref ...

, and thus his ''ensenhamen'' was an ''arlabecca'' as well.

Sources

*Frank M. Chambers. ''An Introduction to Old Provençal Versification''. DIANE Publishing, 1985. See pp. 256–7. {{Western medieval lyric forms Western medieval lyric forms Poetic forms Occitan literary genres Medieval poetry