Thibaut de Blaison, Blason, or Blazon (died after March 1229) was a Poitevin nobleman,

Crusade The Crusades were a series of religious wars initiated, supported, and sometimes directed by the Latin Church in the medieval period. The best known of these Crusades are those to the Holy Land in the period between 1095 and 1291 that were i ...

r, and

trouvère ''Trouvère'' (, ), sometimes spelled ''trouveur'' (, ), is the Northern French (''langue d'oïl'') form of the ''langue d'oc'' (Occitan) word ''trobador'', the precursor of the modern French word ''troubadour''. ''Trouvère'' refers to poet- ...

from a noble family with lands in Blason and Mirabeau. Eleven poems—one contested and one definitely spurious—have been ascribed to Thibaut in the

chansonnier A chansonnier ( ca, cançoner, oc, cançonièr, Galician and pt, cancioneiro, it, canzoniere or ''canzoniéro'', es, cancionero) is a manuscript or printed book which contains a collection of chansons, or polyphonic and monophonic settings o ...

s. Three further anonymous songs have also been attributed to him by Terence H. Newcombe, his modern editor. Thibaut was the

seneschal The word ''seneschal'' () can have several different meanings, all of which reflect certain types of supervising or administering in a historic context. Most commonly, a seneschal was a senior position filled by a court appointment within a royal, ...

Poitou Poitou (, , ; ; Poitevin: ''Poetou'') was a province of west-central France whose capital city was Poitiers. Both Poitou and Poitiers are named after the Pictones Gallic tribe. Geography The main historical cities are Poitiers (historical c ...

and his uncle was Maurice, Bishop of Poitiers. In 1214 Thibaut helped negotiate a truce between

Philip II of France Philip II (21 August 1165 – 14 July 1223), byname Philip Augustus (french: Philippe Auguste), was King of France from 1180 to 1223. His predecessors had been known as kings of the Franks, but from 1190 onward, Philip became the first French ...

and

John of England John (24 December 1166 – 19 October 1216) was King of England from 1199 until his death in 1216. He lost the Duchy of Normandy and most of his other French lands to King Philip II of France, resulting in the collapse of the Angevin Emp ...

. In 1212 he was taking part in the

Reconquista The ' (Spanish, Portuguese and Galician for "reconquest") is a historiographical construction describing the 781-year period in the history of the Iberian Peninsula between the Umayyad conquest of Hispania in 711 and the fall of the Nasrid ...

in Spain and he was among 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 ...

rs besieging Toulouse in 1218. He appears alongside the trouvère Amauri de Craon in a document of 1219. He attended the coronation of

Louis IX 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 d ...

in 1226, along with the trouvère

Hue de la Ferté Hue de la Ferté ( fl. 1220–35) was a French trouvère who wrote three '' serventois'' attacking the regency of Blanche of Castile during the minority of Louis IX. He maligns Blanche's partiality to foreigners and singles out Theobald I of Nav ...

Theobald I of Navarre Theobald I (french: Thibaut, es, Teobaldo; 30 May 1201 – 8 July 1253), also called the Troubadour and the Posthumous, was Count of Champagne (as Theobald IV) from birth and King of Navarre from 1234. He initiated the Barons' Crusade, was famous ...

, also a trouvère, dedicated the song ''De ma dame souvenir'' to Thibaut and also used Thibaut's ''Amours, que porra devenir'' as a model for a religious poem of his own.

Gautier d'Espinal Gautier d'Espinal (also d'Epinal, d’Épinal or d'Espinau) (died before July 1272).Theodore Karp, "Gautier d'Espinal". Grove Music Online. Oxford Music Online, http://www.oxfordmusiconline.com/subscriber/article/grove/music/10765 (accessed 24 Dec ...

also borrowed the melody of ''Amours'' for one piece. Thibaut himself borrowed from rhythms from the

polyphonic Polyphony ( ) is a type of musical texture consisting of two or more simultaneous lines of independent melody, as opposed to a musical texture with just one voice, monophony, or a texture with one dominant melodic voice accompanied by chords, h ...

repertoire of the day. He may have based his ''Bien font Amours lor talent'' on the ''

conductus The ''conductus'' (plural: ''conducti'') was a sacred Latin song in the Middle Ages, one whose poetry and music were newly composed. It is non-liturgical since its Latin lyric borrows little from previous chants. The conductus was northern Frenc ...

'' ''Quid frustra consumeris'' and ''Chanter et renvoisier seuil'' on ''Sol sub nube latuit''. With the exception of three ''

chansons A (, , french: chanson française, link=no, ; ) is generally any lyric-driven French song, though it most often refers to the secular polyphonic French songs of late medieval and Renaissance music. The genre had origins in the monophonic so ...

'' that are restricted to a sixth—''Amours, que porra devenir'', ''Chanter et renvoisier seuil'', and ''Huimain par un ajourant''—and one, ''Li miens chanters ne puet mais remanoir'', which is severely restricted in movement, most of Thibaut's melodies move freely. They are all basically syllabic, with only ''Li miens chanters'' exhibiting more complex

melisma Melisma ( grc-gre, μέλισμα, , ; from grc, , melos, song, melody, label=none, plural: ''melismata'') is the singing of a single syllable of text while moving between several different notes in succession. Music sung in this style is referr ...

. Compared to his melodies (all recorded in

bar form Bar form (German: ''die Barform'' or ''der Bar'') is a musical form of the pattern AAB. Original use The term comes from the rigorous terminology of the Meistersinger guilds of the 15th to 18th century who used it to refer to their songs and the ...

),The first six lines of ''Quant je voi'' are given

mensural notation Mensural notation is the musical notation system used for European vocal polyphonic music from the later part of the 13th century until about 1600. The term "mensural" refers to the ability of this system to describe precisely measured rhythm ...

in the

Chansonnier Cangé A chansonnier ( ca, cançoner, oc, cançonièr, Galician and pt, cancioneiro, it, canzoniere or ''canzoniéro'', es, cancionero) is a manuscript or printed book which contains a collection of chansons, or polyphonic and monophonic settings o ...

. his prosody is usually simple, though three songs—''Bien font Amours lor talent'', ''Bon jour ait hui cele a cui sui amis'', and ''Quant je voi esté venir''—exhibit some variety. The simplicity of ''Bien font Amours'' is more in keeping with Thibaut's style and not the more "flamboyant" style of

Gautier de Dargies Gautier de Dargies (ca. 1170 – ca. 1240) was a trouvère from Dargies. He was one of the most prolific of the early trouvères; possibly twenty-five of his lyrics survive, twenty-two with accompanying melodies, in sixteen separate ''chansonn ...

, to whom it is also attributed.

List of songs

*''Amours, que porra devenir'' **Model for ''De chanter ne me puis tenir'' (

) and ''Se par force de merci'' (

, only music) *''Bien voi que ne puis morir'' *''Bon jour ait hui cele a cui sui amis'' (no music) *''Chanter et renvoisier seuil'' **Contrafactum is ''Pour mon chief reconforter'' (

Gautier de Coincy Gautier de Coincy (1177–1236) was a French abbot, trouvère and musical arranger, chiefly known for his devotion to the Virgin Mary. While he served as prior of Vic-sur-Aisne he compiled ''Les Miracles de Nostre-Dame'' (known in English as ''T ...

) *''Chanter m’estuet, si crien morir'' *''Huimain par un ajourant'' *''Li miens chanters ne puet mais remanoir'' *''Quant je voi esté venir'' *''Quant se resjouissent oisel'' (no music) ;Disputed *''Bien font Amours lor talent'' **Contrafactum is ''C'est en mai, au mois d'esté'' (anonymous) ;Attributed (anonymous in MSS) *''Avant ier me chevauchoi'' (

motet In Western classical music, a motet is mainly a vocal musical composition, of highly diverse form and style, from high medieval music to the present. The motet was one of the pre-eminent polyphonic forms of Renaissance music. According to Margar ...

no.402) *''Avant ier me chevauchoie'' (no music) *''En avril au tens nouvel''

Notes

References

* Karp, Theodore
"Thibaut de Blaison."
''Grove Music Online''. ''Oxford Music Online''. Accessed 20 September 2008. {{DEFAULTSORT:Blaison, Thibaut De Trouvères People of the Reconquista People of the Albigensian Crusade 13th-century French nobility Male classical composers People from Poitiers