The ''serena'' (evening song) is a minor
Old Occitan
Old Occitan ( oc, occitan ancian, label= 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 fourteenth centuries. Old ...
lyric 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 ...
. Despite the name, it is not a
serenade. Rather, it is a counterpart to the ''
alba
''Alba'' ( , ) is the Scottish Gaelic name for Scotland. It is also, in English language historiography, used to refer to the polity of Picts and Scots united in the ninth century as the Kingdom of Alba, until it developed into the Kingdom ...
'' (dawn song). In an ''alba'', the lover laments the coming of the dawn that forces lovers to part. In the ''serena'', the lover complains of the long wait for evening to arrive so he can consummate his love. The genre was invented late in the history of the Occitan lyric by the
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 ''trobairi ...
Guiraut Riquier
Guiraut Riquier de Narbona ( 1230 in Narbonne – 1292 in Narbonne or Rodez) is among the last of the Occitan troubadours. He is well known because of his great care in writing out his works and keeping them together—the New Grove Encyclopedia c ...
in his song ''Ad un fin aman fon datz'' (A true lover once awaited), which he claimed to have completed in the year 1263, when he was living in
Narbonne
Narbonne (, also , ; oc, Narbona ; la, Narbo ; Late Latin:) is a commune in Southern France in the Occitanie region. It lies from Paris in the Aude department, of which it is a sub-prefecture. It is located about from the shores of the ...
.
[, has an English translation. , has the original text with a Spanish translation.] The refrain of Guiraut's ''serena'' goes:
Notes
Bibliography
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Western medieval lyric forms
Occitan literary genres
13th-century songs