Bernart de la Barta (

fl. ''Floruit'' (; abbreviated fl. or occasionally flor.; from Latin for "they flourished") denotes a date or period during which a person was known to have been alive or active. In English, the unabbreviated word may also be used as a noun indicatin ...

1229), also spelled Bernarnz Delabarta or Benart de la Barda, was a

troubadour A troubadour (, ; oc, trobador ) was a composer and performer of Old Occitan lyric poetry during the High Middle Ages (1100–1350). Since the word ''troubadour'' is etymologically masculine, a female troubadour is usually called a ''trobairit ...

from La Barthe, the location of which is unknown. He wrote two '' tensos'', a fragment (''

cobla The cobla (, plural ''cobles'') is a traditional music ensemble of Catalonia, and in Northern Catalonia in France. It is generally used to accompany the Sardana, a traditional Catalan folk dance, danced in a circle. Structure The modern Cobla no ...

'') of a

satire Satire is a genre of the visual, literary, and performing arts, usually in the form of fiction and less frequently non-fiction, in which vices, follies, abuses, and shortcomings are held up to ridicule, often with the intent of shaming ...

, and a ''

sirventes The ''sirventes'' or ''serventes'' (), sometimes translated as "service song", was a genre of Old Occitan lyric poetry practiced by the troubadours. The name comes from ''sirvent'' ('serviceman'), from whose perspective the song is allegedly wr ...

'', "Foilla ni flors, ni chatuz temps ni fredura", an attack on terms of the

Treaty of Meaux The Treaty of Paris, also known as Treaty of Meaux, was signed on 12 April 1229 between Raymond VII of Toulouse and Louis IX of France in Meaux near Paris. Louis was still a minor, and it was his mother Blanche of Castile, as regent, who was ins ...

(1229), by which Raymond VII of Toulouse surrendered to

Louis IX of France Louis IX (25 April 1214 – 25 August 1270), commonly known as Saint Louis or Louis the Saint, was King of France from 1226 to 1270, and the most illustrious of the Direct Capetians. He was crowned in Reims at the age of 12, following the ...

, thus ending the

Albigensian Crusade The Albigensian Crusade or the Cathar Crusade (; 1209–1229) was a military and ideological campaign initiated by Pope Innocent III to eliminate Catharism in Languedoc, southern France. The Crusade was prosecuted primarily by the French crown ...

. The interpretation of Bernart's ''sirventes'' as an attack on the treaty of 1229 was first proposed in 1885 by Camille Chabaneau and subsequently accepted by Alfred Jeanroy. Bernart definitely attacks Louis IX and the Roman Church, coming equally to the defence of Raymond VII, whom he believes was treated unjustly. The crusade waged in the name of peace was for "a peace of clerics and Frenchmen". According to Bernard, a peace imposed forcibly on the defeated is unjust and Raymond, as a good vassal, deserves just treatment. Bernart also knew the troubadour

Guilhem Peire Cazals de Caortz Guilhem Peire Cazals de Caortz or Guilhem Peire de Cazals was a troubadour of the first half of the thirteenth century. He was born or lived in Cahors, Quercy, from which his name "de Caortz". Eleven of his works, including one ''tenso'', survive. ...

, with whom he composed one of his ''tensos''.

Sources

*Anatole, Christian
"Le troubadour Bernat de la Barta."
''Annales du Midi'', 101-187 (1989), pp. 225–233 *Chambers, Frank M. "Three Troubadour Poems with Historical Overtones." '' Speculum'', 54:1 (Jan., 1979), pp. 42–54. * Jeanroy, Alfred. ''La poésie lyrique des troubadours''. Toulouse: Privat, 1934. *Ricketts, Peter. "''Foilla ni flors, ni chautz temps ni freidura'' de Bernart de la Barta: édition critique et traduction." ''La France latine'', 142 (2006), pp. 141–5. {{DEFAULTSORT:Bernart De La Barta 13th-century French troubadours People of the Albigensian Crusade