March 2022 – Page 2 – purple motes

Straparola’s riddles in tolerant discourse of gender difference

In the relatively liberal and tolerant pre-modern period, persons of different gender told each other riddles without fear. At the oracle of Delphi in ancient Greece, a priestess (Phythia) told riddles to men and women. In ancient Israel, the Queen of Sheba tested King Solomon with riddles. Gendered Anglo-Saxon riddles have survived from the seventh century. Early in the sixteenth century, a group of aristocratic Italian women and men gathered to share stories and riddles.[1] Some of their riddles provide important perspectives on gender, yet such riddles would be harshly repressed in many places today.

Consider a riddle that Lodovica shared with her friends:

Gentle dames, I go to find
a friend to me that’s cheer and kind,
and having found it, next I’m seen
to set it straight my knees between,
and then I rouse the life that dwells
within, and soon its virtue tells
as to and fro my hand I sway,
beneath my touch sweet ardors play —
delights which might a savage move,
and make you faint through too much love.
{ Cortesi donne mie, vommi a trovare
L’amico che mi dà tanto diletto.
Ed ivi giunta, tosto me ’l fo dare,
E tra una coscia e l’altra me lo metto
Quella novella poi, che rallegrare
Tutte vi face, piglio; e inanzi e indietro
Menandola, ne manda un dolce fuore,
Che languire vi fan spesso d’amore. }[2]

Some of the women criticized Lodovica for her riddle. But they didn’t denounce her on Twitter, try to get her fired from her job, and urge that her bank account be frozen. Lodovica explained that critics of her riddle were projecting their own moral failings:

Those of you who have smutty and malign minds can only imagine things nasty and evil. It’s you who have judged my words to mean something entirely foreign to my own conception of them. This riddle of mine is intended simply to describe the viola da gamba. When a lady desires to play it and so give delight to her friends, she places it between her knees. Then, taking the bow in her right hand, she moves it to and fro so that she can draw forth from her instrument those sweet sounds that at times make us all languish in love.
{ Un mal disposto stomaco non getta fuori se non cose triste e cattive. Voi che avete il stomaco tutto disconcio, giudicate quello che non è l’intento mio. L’enimma adunque dimostra il violone, il quale la donna, per sonare e dar trastullo ad altrui, mette tra l’una coscia e l’altra; e preso il plettro con la destra mano, quello mena su e giù, onde ne uscisse un dolce suono, che d’amore fa tutti languire. }

No one should be criticized for recognizing and appreciating love.

Meninist literary critics have identified pervasive historical disparagement and brutalization of penises. Such scholars might study with suspicion Arianna’s riddle:

Rough, long, and round am I to sight,
yet ladies find in me delight.
They take me with a laughing face
and find for me a fitting place.
They handle me in knowing wise,
and put me where my business lies.
Next prick and pinch me, till I’m fain
to do their will once and again.
Now, ladies, if this thing you tell,
’tis plain to me you know it well.
{ Grande e brutto son io, grosso e rotondo,
Ed a le donne do molto diletto.
Elle m’abbracian con viso giocondo,
E fra le coscie lor mi tengon stretto.
Elle pungonmi e danno, ed io secondo
Lor voglie star convengo al mio dispetto.
Donne, se questa cosa indovinate,
Dirò ben certo che sete fatate. }

Describing men as rough tends to associate them with beasts. Rough can even insinuate rape. Arianna, however, explained that her riddle describes a form upon which women place cloth to be embroidered.

A man with fine knowledge of literary history identified a possible anti-meninist dog-whistle in a riddle. Eritrea told the riddle:

I am supple, round, and white,
a good span’s length will gauge me right.
If ladies to their service bind me,
searching and alert they’ll find me.
Give me but place, and lend a hand,
I’ll enter and I’ll take my stand.
But touch me not, on mischief bent,
or dirty fingers you’ll lament.
{ Bianca e tonda son’io, non molto dura;
Grossa, che la man m’empie, è cosa vera.
A le femine c’han grand’apertura,
Me le ficco nel corpo tutta intiera.
Minor a’ maschi fo di me misura,
E dentro a lor mi vò più assai leggiera.
E chi mi prende mi stringe pian piano,
Temendo d’inlordarsi al fin la mano. }

About what is her riddle?

“Your riddle, Lady Eritrea, can mean nothing other than giving a soul to the devil. But be careful that you don’t put the devil into Hell, because it may heat up,” said Bembo to her.
{ Il vostro enimma, signora Eritrea, altro non significa che dar l’anima al diavolo; ma vardate che non si metta il diavolo nell’inferno, perchè s’abbruscierà, disse il Bembo. }

Eritrea declared that her riddle had no such meaning. In other words, she wasn’t referring to a man’s penis as a devil that enters the gateway that nature made for procreation. Men’s penises in fact are not diabolic. According to Eritrea, her riddle concerned a tallow candle.

While gynocentric scholars have tended to marginalize concern about gynocentrism, one should recognize that a woman governed this group and that most of the story-tellers / riddlers were women. Consider the extent to which gynocentrism shaped Cateruzza’s riddle:

What thing is that we ladies prize?
Five fingers’ breadth will tell its size,
different fair nooks you find inside,
no outlet, though the gate is wide.
The first attempt will give us pain,
for free access is hard to gain.
But later it grows long and straight,
and large and small accommodates.
{ Qual cosa è tra noi donne e damigelle,
Larga non più, nè men di cinque dita;
Dentro ritien diverse e vaghe celle.
Con buona entrata, ma priva d’uscita.
Al primo entrar vi fa guardar le stelle.
Per non trovarsi libera ispedita;
Ma poi vien lunga stretta, larga e tonda,
Quanto più e meno la grossezza abonda. }[3]

This riddle explicitly begins with women’s valuations — what ladies prize. Men hear women’s valuations repeatedly. Men’s internalization of women’s valuations historically led to sexual feudalism in which men were effectively serfs. Obscuring these systemic injustices, Cateruzza stated that her riddle was about a glove.

One must be attentive to men’s voices. The man Trevisan interrupted the stream of women’s voices using a woman’s voice:

Its length and breadth shall I disclose?
Upon my lap it nestles close.
I stroke it and I hold it tight —
till all around it gives delight.
Fair ladies, is it strange to you
it does its work correct and true?
Though rapture sweet within may dwell,
’tis passive till it knows me well.
{ Un palmo e più lo toglio, e non in vano,
Ed ei col cul nel grembo mio si sede;
Io l’accareccio, e lo meno per mano,
E dò diletto a chi l’ascolta e vede.
Donne amorose, non vi paia strano,
Perchè il mistier fo con misura a fede.
E molto mi contenta il dolce suono,
Lo tengo duro fin che il mi sa buono. }[4]

The key verse is the concluding one: “’tis passive till it knows me well.” This verse challenges sexually stereotyping men as dogs. Nonetheless, Trevisan said that his riddle was about playing a lute. Lute players historically have been predominately men. Men trobairitz played their lutes to please privileged women in elite courts. Like a lute player, Trevisan used his wit to demonstrate men in their bodily being providing pleasure to women despite not being financially remunerated.

Ordinary gendered discourse, and life as well, seldom are as subtle as a riddle. Late in the twelfth century, the minnesinger Heinrich von Veldeke complained:

They’ve said it’s true, for many a year,
that women hate gray hair.
That makes it hard for me —
and a shame for them
if they prefer their lovers
clumsy rather than wise.
As much or as little as I am gray,
a feeble wit in women is what I hate.
They’d rather have
new tin than old gold.
They say they favor the young ones
because they cannot wait.
{ Man seit al fúr war
manig iar
dú wib hassen grawes har
das ist mir swar
vnd ist ir misse pris
dú lieber hat ir amis
tvmb danne wis
Dest me noch dest min
das ich gra bin
ich hasse an wiben kranken sin
das si núwes zin
nement fúr altes golt
si iehent si sin den ivngen holt
dvrh vngedolt }[5]

Men have long carried a sexual burden of performance. Men’s impotence is an epic disaster. Women who won’t wait for older men are complicit in systemic gender injustice. You should be able to solve such riddles.

* * * * *

Notes:

[1] Riddling is probably co-extensive with story-telling in most linguistic fields. The leading scholar of Italian riddles observed:

Riddling in Italy goes back to the earliest vernacular records. The oldest is written in Venetian dialect and dates back to the end of the eight or the beginning of the ninth century.

De Filippis (1947) p. 136. For more on the history of riddles in Italy, De Filippis (1948).

[2] Giovanni (Zoan) Francesco Straparola, The Pleasant Nights {Le Piacevoli Notti}, following Night 12, Story 2, Italian text from Rua (1899), English translation (modified) from Beecher (2012). The immediately subsequent quote above similarly follows Night 12, Story 2.

Le Piacevoli Notti was first published in Venice in 1550 (vol. 1, nights 1-5) and 1553 (vol. 2, nights 6-13). For a freely available online English translation (with some bowdlerization), Waters (1894). Beecher (2012) revises Waters (1984) and provides a complete translation of all the text.

Straparola’s riddles were just as influential historically as his stories. De Filippis (1947) p. 146. Nonetheless, scholars have studied Straparola’s stories much more extensively than Straparola’s riddles.

Subsequent quotes above, unless otherwise noted, are similarly from the riddles added after each of Straparola’s stories. The stories to which the riddles above are appended are, cited by night.story: 10.2 (Rough, long, and round…), 10.4 (I am supple, round, and white…), 6.3 (What thing is that…), and 13.11 (Its length and breadth…).

[3] Beecher’s text adds four additional verses:

the shape of him that does employ
his pains to work this pleasant toy.
It’s always ready to oblige
the user’s taste, whae’er the size.

Beecher (2012) vol. 2, p. 44. Corresponding verses don’t exist in Rua’s Italian text, nor in any other Italian text I’ve been able to find. Those English verses appear in Carrington’s edition (Paris, 1906) of Waters (1894).

[4] De Filippis remarked of Straparola’s riddles and their French adaptations:

Some of them are really lascivious, even if the young ladies who relate them pretend not to know it. The bagpipe, candle, glove, lock, lute, pen, stockpot, shoe, trumpet, warming-pan and several others, could all be gathered together under one heading and given a suitable name which would describe them all. This could be done with both the Italian and the French versions. The only difference between the two would be that the French list would be longer, since Larivey, not only increased the unseemliness of his Italian models by extending Straparola’s octaves into French sonnets, but added several other succulent morsels taken from other Italian sources. Indecency in riddles, however, is not an Italian monopoly.

De Filippis (1947) p. 146.

[5] Heinrich von Veldeke, minnesang 62.11, “They’ve said it’s true, for many a year {Man seit al fúr war},” Middle High German text (regularized) from the Codex Manesse, folio 31r, via Wikisource; English translation (modified slightly) from Goldin (1973) pp. 18-21. Goldin’s text has different word forms and has slightly different lineation. It’s first verse: “Men seget vorwâr nû manech jâr”. Whether Henrich wrote in Middle High German or Middle Dutch (Maaslandic) is a matter of dispute.

[images] (1) Portrait of a happy young woman, perhaps Maria de’ Medici. Excerpt from painting by Alessandro Allori. Painted about 1555. Via Wikimedia Commons. (2) Excerpt from portrait of Eleanor of Toledo. Painted by Bronzino about 1545. Via Wikimedia Commons. (3) Except from portrait of a Renaissance woman. Painted about 1585 by Scipione Pulzone. Preserved as accession # 37.605 in the The Walters Art Museum. The Walters Art Museum exemplifies public service by providing this image under a CCO license.

References:

Beecher, Donald. 2012. Giovanni Francesco Straparola. The Pleasant Nights. 2 vols. Toronto: University of Toronto Press.

De Filippis, Michele. 1947. “Straparola’s Riddles.” Italica. 24 (2): 134-146.

De Filippis, Michele. 1948. The Literary Riddle in Italy to the End of the Sixteenth Century. Berkeley: University of California Press.

Goldin, Frederick. 1973. German and Italian Lyrics of the Middle Ages: an anthology and a history. Garden City, N.Y.: Anchor Press.

Rua, Giuseppe. 1899. Le piacevoli notti di M. Giovanfrancesco Straparola da Caravaggio nelle quali si contengono le favole con i loro enimmi da dieci donne e duo giovani raccontate. 2 vols. Bologna: Romagnoli-Dall’ Acqua. Alternate presentation of 1927 edition.

Waters, W.G., trans. 1894. Giovanni Francesco Straparola. The Nights. Vol. 1. Vol. 2. London: Lawrence and Bullen. Alternate presentation: vol. 1, vol. 2.

languishing for love: medieval women’s songs for beloved men

Mother, I went to see
boats on the bay,
and I’m dying of love.
Boats on the sea,
and I waited for them,
and I’m dying of love.
Boats on the bay,
and I went to wait,
and I’m dying of love.
And I waited for them
but I didn’t find him,
and I’m dying of love.
{ Foi eu, madre, veer
as barcas eno ler
e moiro me d’ amor
As barcas eno mar
e foi las aguardar
e moiro me d’ amor
As barcas eno ler
e foi las atender
e moiro me d’ amor
E foi las aguardar
e non o pud’ achar
e moiro me d’ amor }[1]

An exquisite medieval Latin love song from no later than the eleventh century tells of a woman’s longing for her beloved man. This poem poignantly expresses how much a medieval woman needed her man and wanted to be with him:

Languishing for
love of you,
I arose
at dawn
and made my way
bare-footed
through snow and
through cold,
and searched
the desolate seas
to see if I could find
sails flying in the wind,
or catch sight
of a ship’s prow.
{ Nam languens
amore tuo
consurrexi
diluculo
perrexi-
que pedes nuda
per niues et
per frigora
atque maria
rimabar mesta
si forte uentiuola
uela cernerem,
aut frontem nauis
conspicerem. }[2]

A dawn song typically tells of lovers reluctantly separating after having enjoyed a night together. In this poem, the circumstances are the opposite: the woman gets up at dawn to leave and seek sight of her beloved man. Traveling bare-footed through snow and cold figures the absence of her lover covering her and warming her. Desolate seas churn with his absence. Her yearning to see billowing sails flying in the wind and the prow of her lover’s ship indicates her desire for him to return. It’s also a beautiful figure of her appreciation for his active genitals. She wants to be his port and to encompass him.

Pergaminho Vindel (Vindel parchment): songs of Martin Codax

Galician-Portuguese “songs about a beloved man {cantigas d’amigo},” which were composed between about 1200 and 1350, commonly have a woman yearning for a beloved man out at sea. Martin Codax’s cycle of mid-thirteenth-century cantigas d’amigo shows different aspects of this motif. The woman ardently longs for her beloved man:

Waves of the sea of Vigo
have you seen my boyfriend?
Oh God, will he come soon?
Waves of the swollen sea,
have you seen my darling?
Oh God, will he come soon?
Have you seen my boyfriend,
because of whom I’m sighing?
Oh God, will he come soon?
Have you seen my darling,
for whom I feel great yearning?
Oh God, will he come soon?
{ Ondas do mar de Vigo,
se vistes meu amigo?
e ai Deus, se verrá cedo?
Ondas do mar levado,
se vistes meu amado?
e ai Deus, se verrá cedo?
Se vistes meu amigo?
o por que eu sospiro;
e ai Deus, se verrá cedo?
Se vistes meu amado?
o por que ei gran coidado;
e ai Deus, se verrá cedo? }[3]

The repetition in this poem emphasizes the woman’s longing. The following poem introduces a desired message and the woman’s mother, who historically, but not always, is a restraining character:

Here I have a message
my boyfriend is coming,
and I’ll go, mother, to Vigo.
I have a message here
my darling is coming,
and I’ll go, mother, to Vigo.
My boyfriend is coming,
and he’s safe and sound,
and I’ll go, mother, to Vigo.
My darling is coming,
and he’s sound and safe,
and I’ll go, mother, to Vigo.
{ Mandad’ ei comigo
ca ven meu amigo,
e irei, madr’, a Vigo
Comig’ ei mandado
ca ven meu amado,
e irei, madr’, a Vigo
Ca ven meu amigo
e ven san’ e vivo,
e irei, madr’, a Vigo
Ca ven meu amado
e ven viv’ e sano,
e irei, madr’, a Vigo }[4]

These stanzas alternate boyfriend and darling, so uniting those terms. The variation “safe and sound” with “sound and safe” similarly fuses terms. From the first two stanzas to the second two stanzas, the verse “my boyfriend / darling is coming” moves up from the second verse to the first verse of the stanzas. He’s coming! That’s sufficient reason for insisting, at the end of each stanza, “I’ll go, mother, to Vigo.”

The young woman went to Vigo. She was alone and afraid:

Oh God, if my boyfriend knew now
that I am all alone in Vigo?
and I’m in love.
Oh God, if my darling knew now
that I’m in Vigo all alone?
and I’m in love.
That I am all alone in Vigo,
and don’t have any guards with me,
and I’m in love.
That I’m staying in Vigo all alone
and haven’t brought any guards along,
and I’m in love.
And I don’t have any guards with me,
except my eyes, which cry for me,
and I’m in love.
And I haven’t brought any guards along,
except my eyes, which are both crying,
and I’m in love.
{ Ai Deus, se sab’ ora meu amigo
com’ eu senheira estou en Vigo?
e vou namorada
Ai Deus, se sab’ ora meu amado
com’ eu en Vigo senheira manho?
e vou namorada
Com’ eu senheira estou en Vigo
e nulhas gardas non ei comigo,
e vou namorada
Com’ eu senheira en Vigo manho
e nulhas gardas migo non trago,
e vou namorada
E nulhas gardas non ei comigo
ergas meus olhos que choran migo,
e vou namorada
E nulhas gardas migo non trago
ergas meus olhos que choran ambos,
e vou namorada }[5]

She waited and waited:

Oh waves that I came to see,
can you possibly tell me
why my boyfriend lingers without me?
Oh waves I came to ponder,
can you possibly explain
why my boyfriend lingers without me?
{ Ai ondas que eu vin veer,
se me saberedes dizer
por que tarda meu amigo sen min?
Ai ondas que eu vin mirar,
se me saberedes contar
por que tarda meu amigo sen min? }

The song cycle ends with the waves’ turmoil. Did this woman realize her ennobling love for her beloved man? That’s up to you to decide.

Men’s lives mattered to medieval women. They felt horror for men absent and dying in war. Medieval women didn’t blithely blame with fatuous pretentiousness the patriarchy for war. They recognized men’s gender-disproportionate suffering in war:

Oh Saint James, my famous patron,
lead my boyfriend here to me.
Someone’s bearing flowers across the sea
and I’ll gaze, mother, at the towers of Jaen.
Oh Saint James, patron in whom I trust,
lead my darling here to me.
Someone’s bearing flowers across the sea
and I’ll gaze, mother, at the towers of Jaen.
{ Ai Santiago, padron sabido,
vós mh adugades o meu amigo;
sobre mar ven quen frores d’ amor ten;
mirarei, madre, as torres de Geen
Ai Santiago, padron provado,
vós mh adugades o meu amado;
sobre mar ven quen frores d’ amor ten;
mirarei, madre, as torres de Geen }[7]

While yearning for her beloved man, the woman introspectively honors men’s suffering in war. Jaen is an inland Andalusian city that was the site of sieges and battles between Muslim and Christian armies. Saint James {Santiago}, whose remains have long been venerated at Santiago de Compostela, is a preeminent saint of Spain. He was known by the thirteenth century as “Saint James the Moor-Slayer {Santiago Matamoros}” and was invoked in the Spanish battle cry, “Saint James, seal Spain! {¡Santiago y cierra España!}”[8] She, however, doesn’t want Saint James to urge her beloved man into battle, but to bring him home to her.

The emblem of Saint James is a scallop shell, not a flower. The white lily {fleur-de-lis}, which became a French heraldic symbol, was a flower that Christians associated with chastity. The red rose, in contrast, symbolized Christian martyrdom.[9] Impersonally acknowledging “someone’s bearing flowers across the sea,” the woman seems to be vaguely recognizing red roses and that her beloved man might be dying in battle. Her gaze at the towers of Jaen indicates the horror of war. She prays to Saint James to bring her beloved man home to her from across the sea. Yet at the same time and looking in the opposite direction, she recognizes that he might be dead.

Poetry of women languishing in love while waiting for beloved men to return from across the sea is probably as old as Penelope of the ancient Greek Odyssey. Such poetry will arise again before the seas go dry and the rocks melt with the sun. All that’s needed is women’s love for men.[10]

* * * * *

Notes:

[1] Nuno Fernandez Torneol 5, song about a beloved man {cantiga de amigo}, “Mother, I saw sailing {Vi eu, mha madr’, andar}” (B 645, V 246) stanzas 2-5 (of 7), Galician-Portuguese text (editorial marks eliminated) from Cohen (2003), English translation (modified slightly) from Cohen (2010). Rip Cohen should be honored for his enormous sacrifice in working on cantigas de amigo and making much of his work freely available worldwide on the Internet. Here’s this song at Universo Cantigas and at Galician-Portuguese Medieval Songs. Nuno Fernandez Torneol / Nuno Fernandes Torneol was active in the beginning or middle of the thirteenth century.

All the surviving cantigas de amigo are attributed to men singers. Whether these songs reflect heard or imagined women’s voices isn’t known and matters little. In medieval Europe, women and men knew intimately each other’s voices. The cantigas de amigo are likely authentic representations of women’s voices. That’s what women and men would have most wanted to hear in naturalistic songs of love.

[2] Cambridge Songs {Carmina cantabrigiensia} 14A, “Because languishing {Nam languens},” Latin text (editorial marks elided) and English translation (modified) from Ziolkowski (1994), following Dronke (1965) pp. 275-6. This poem has survived only in the Carmina cantabrigiensia, where it was interpolated into Carmina cantabrigiensia 14 (“Modus Liebinc”) between strophes 3b and 4a. Here’s some poetic analysis of the poem leading to an alternate translation.

Dronke suggested that “Nam languens” is a Latin version of Old High German folks songs known “friend songs {winileods}.” In a capitulary issued in 789, Charlemagne forbid nuns from writing or sending winileods. Dronke also cited parallels in Tuscan ritornelli and Hispano-Arabic kharjas and declared:

It is clear that at least some of the love-songs in the eleventh-century Cambridge manuscript {Carmina cantabrigiensia} drew inspiration from a living tradition of cantigas de amigo.

Id. pp. 276-7. The Galician-Portuguese corpus of cantigas de amigo date from no earlier than the thirteenth century. Exactly what Dronke was claiming, and the evidence for his claim, isn’t clear. In any case, Latin and vernacular songs have probably always influenced each other.

[3] Martin Codax 1, song about a beloved man {cantiga de amigo}, “Waves of the sea of Vigo {Ondas do mar de Vigo}” (B 1278, N 1, V 884, C 1278), Galician-Portuguese text (editorial marks eliminated) from Cohen (2003), English translation (modified slightly) from Cohen (2010). Universo Cantigas doesn’t currently provide any songs of Martin Codax. Here’s this song at Galician-Portuguese Medieval Songs., which includes English translations by Richard Zenith for all of Martin Codax’s songs. Martin Codax / Martim Codax apparently was a Galician non-noble singer (joglar) active in the middle or third quarter of the thirteenth century.

Martin Codax’s surviving songs consist of a seven-song cycle about a woman yearning for her beloved who’s away at sea. Martin’s song cycle has survived with musical notation in the Vindel Parchment {Pergaminho Vindel}. These songs, along with songs of King Dinis of Portugal in the Sharrer Parchment {Pergaminho Sharrer}, are the only cantigas d’amigo to survive with music. Martin Codax’s songs have been studied intensively. They have also frequently been performed and recorded.

[4] Martin Codax 2, song about a beloved man {cantiga de amigo}, “Here I have a message {Mandad’ ei comigo}” (B 1279, N 2, V 885), stanzas 1-4 (of 6), Galician-Portuguese text (editorial marks eliminated) from Cohen (2003), English translation (modified slightly) from Cohen (2010). Here’s this song at Galician-Portuguese Medieval Songs.

[5] Martin Codax 4, song about a beloved man {cantiga de amigo}, “Oh God, if my boyfriend knew now {Ai Deus, se sab’ ora meu amigo}” (B 1281, N 4, V 887), Galician-Portuguese text (editorial marks eliminated) from Cohen (2003), English translation (modified slightly) from Cohen (2010). Here’s this song at the Galician-Portuguese Medieval Songs.

[6] Martin Codax 7, song about a beloved man {cantiga de amigo}, “Oh waves that I came to see {Ai ondas que eu vin veer}” (B 1284, N 7, V 890), Galician-Portuguese text (editorial marks eliminated) from Cohen (2003), English translation (modified slightly) from Cohen (2010). Here’s this song at Galician-Portuguese Medieval Songs.

[7] Pai Gomez Charinho 6, song about a beloved man {cantiga de amigo}, “Oh Saint James, my famous patron {Ai Santiago, padron sabido}” (B 843, V 429), Galician-Portuguese text (editorial marks eliminated) from Cohen (2003), English translation (modified slightly) from Cohen (2010). Here’s this song at Galician-Portuguese Medieval Songs. It’s not yet available at Universo Cantigas. Pai Gomez Charinho / Paio Gomes Charinho was a Galician man trobairitz active in the last decades of the thirteenth century.

[8] The literal meaning of the Spanish battle cry “Saint James, close Spain! {¡Santiago y cierra España!}” isn’t fully clear. The word “y” seems to me likely to be functioning as an intensifier like “et” can in medieval Latin. “Close Spain” could mean close off Spain from Muslim invaders, or it could mean close in battle with them. On “Saint James the Moor-Slayer {Santiago Matamoros},” Quinn (2011).

[9] On the Christian symbolism of the lily and the rose, see my post on Walahfrid’s gardening.

[10] Cf. Robert Burns, “A red, red rose.” Drawing upon folk tradition, Burns wrote this song in Scotland in 1794.

[images] (1) Vindel Parchment {Pergaminho Vindel}. Created between 1275 and 1299. Preserved as Pierpont Morgan Library, New York, Vindel MS M979. Via Wikimedia Commons. (2) Recording of Martin Codax’s “Waves of the sea of Vigo {Ondas do mar de Vigo}” by Orquesta de Instrumentos Autóctonos y Nuevas Tecnologías Untref (2016). Via YouTube. (3) Recording of Martin Codax’s “Here I have a message {Mandad’ ei comigo}” by Ensemble Oni Wytars (1992 or earlier). Via YouTube. (4) Recording of Pai Gomez Charinho’s “Oh Saint James, my famous patron {Ai Santiago, padron sabido}” by Ensemble Lauda (Henry Vidal, conducting) from their album Cantigas de Santuarios (2020). Via YouTube. (5) Illustration of “Saint James the Moor-Slayer {Santiago Matamoros}” in an instance of the Codex Calixtinus / pseudo-Calixtinus, Book of Saint James {Liber Sancti Jacobi} / The Pilgrim’s Guide. Detail from folio 120 of Biblioteca Universitaria de Salamanca. Manuscript 2631. Source image via Wikimedia Commons. The original Codex Calixtinus was created about 1140, It is currently preserved in the Cathedral of Santiago de Compostela.

References:

Cohen, Rip. 2003. 500 Cantigas d’Amigo. Porto: Campo das Letras.

Cohen, Rip. 2010. The Cantigas d’Amigo: An English Translation. Online. Quotes are based on the 2016 edition.

Dronke, Peter. 1965. Medieval Latin and the Rise of European Love-Lyric. 2 vols. Vol. 1, Vol. 2. Oxford: Clarendon Press.

Quinn, Rebecca C. 2011. “Santiago as Matamoros: Race, Class, And Limpieza de Sangre in a Sixteenth-Century Spanish Manuscript.” The Larrie and Bobbi Weil Undergraduate Research Award Documents, 1. Online.

Ziolkowski, Jan M. 1994. The Cambridge Songs (Carmina Cantabrigiensia). New York: Garland. Introduction.

flower of flowers: beloved woman as loveliest flower

In praising the greatness of God, a psalmist proclaimed:

Give thanks to the God of gods, for his mercy endures forever.
Give thanks to the Lord of lords, for his mercy endures forever. [1]

{ הודו לאלהי האלהים כי לעולם חסדו׃

הודו לאדני האדנים כי לעלם חסדו׃ }

The grammatical pattern of phrases like “God of gods” is an ancient specification for superlatives. In Psalms, “God of gods” refers to the one beloved God devoted to his specific people through a covenant like marriage. Men, prone as they are to gyno-idolatry, applied the “God of gods” grammatical pattern to beautiful women. To Meleager of Gadara more than two millennia ago, the exotic and loving young woman Zenophila was “the freshest flower of flowers {ἐν ἄνθεσιν ὥριμον ἄνθος}.”[2]

Some medieval men focused on clever flower-arranging instead of the arduous work of incarnating love on a daily basis. In a panegyric for the sixth-century Merovingian king Childebert II, the Italian poet Venantius Fortunatus described Childebert as:

a flowering flower of flowers, flowing with your flowery flower

{ florum flos florens , florea flore fluens }[3]

That’s flattery. In the context of seeking love, women tend to interpret flattery as a sign of weakness and desperation. The twelfth-century grammarian Serlo of Wilton played a more sophisticated game. He wrote:

A flower to the flower of flowers: “Flower, bloom your flower in moisture.
You are changeless splendor. You offer it to me, you more significant than I.
Spring of true spring, in truth spring, in spring you want
apples to be seen. Flower, you appear! You redden in perspiration. You shine more greatly!”

{ Flos floris flori: “Florem, flos, flore liquori.
Es nitor equalis. Mihi das, mihi plus specialis.
Ver veris veri, vero, ver, vere videri
vis mala. Flos, pares! Spumis rutilas. Mage clares!” }[4]

As a young man, Serlo of Wilton ardently loved women. This poem seems to be an erotic address of a young man (“a flower”) to his beloved young woman (“the flower of flowers”) in intimate embrace. It shows men’s characteristic self-devaluation relative to women, as well as men’s appreciation for women’s sexuality and the beauty of women’s vaginas. Yet this poem isn’t constructed as personal and spontaneous. It presents the words “flower {flos}” and “spring {ver}” serially in the standard grammatical Latin declension of six cases. Such formal verbal play undermines the intensely personal relation of incarnate love.

Perhaps reacting to phrases such as “flower of flowers {flos florum}” and other formalistic uses of flowers in prior love poetry, a medieval poet insisted on the sensuous, incarnate reality of his beloved. She just happened to be named Flora, the same name as the ancient Roman goddess of flowers. But this Flora is as real as smell, sight, and sound:

My flower, pick a flower, because a flower designates love.
For this flower I am a prisoner with excessive love.
Sweetest Flora, always have the scent of this flower
so your beauty will be as lovely as the dawn.
Flora, see the flower, and when you see it, laugh for me!
To the flower speak well. Your voice is a nightingale’s song.
Give kisses to the flower. The flower becomes your red lips.

{ Suscipe, flos, florem, quia flos designat amorem.
Illo de flore nimio sum captus amore.
Hunc florem, Flora dulcissima, semper odora.
Nam velut aurora fiet tua forma decora.
Florem, Flora, vide, quem dum videas, michi ride.
Flori fare bene; tua vox cantus philomenae.
Oscula des flori, rubeo flos convenit ori. }[5]

A flower designates love, but this Flora isn’t just a representation. She’s a flesh-and-blood woman with sensory appeal richer than a glossy picture. This poem ends with an epigram:

The flower in a picture is not a flower but a figure.
One who paints a flower doesn’t paint the flower’s smell.

{ Flos in pictura non est flos, immo figura;
qui pingit florem, non pingit floris odorem. }

The thirteenth-century Romance of the Rose taught this wisdom so that other men would not be as foolish as Pygmalion. This poet, writing prior to the Romance of the Rose, had already learned the difference between a representation of a flower and an actual, beloved person.

woman receiving flowers from a man: illumination for "Suscipe, flos, florem" in the Carmina Burana

The “flower of flowers {flos florum}” can mean something other than abstractly the greatest or best flower. Like “God of gods” in Hebrew scripture, “flower of flowers” can also imply a particular personal relationship. The poem “My flower, pick a flower {Suscipe, flos, florem},” comes close to the phrase “flos florum,” but deliberately avoids it. The flower in this poem is a personally special flower, Flora. She is his flower, and she is as lovely as an actual flower. He wants to be her beloved. She and he are living persons. This poem expresses the Hebrew biblical sense of “God of gods” without using the phrase “flower of flowers {flos florum}.”

* * * * *

Notes:

[1] Psalms 136:2-3. Similar phrases occur in Ezra 7:12, Ezekiel 26:7, Daniel 2:37, 1 Timothy 6:15, and Revelation 17:14, 19:16.

[2] Meleager of Gadara, Greek Anthology 5.144, “Already the white violet flowers {ἤδη λευκόιον θάλλει},” v. 3, ancient Greek text from Paton (1916-18), English translation from Dronke (1965) vol. 1, p. 181. For a review of the “flower of flowers {flos florum}” construction in ancient and medieval literature, but largely excluding the Bible, Donke (1965) vol. 1, pp. 181-92. Expressions such as “flower of flowers {flos florum}” and “rose of roses {rosa rosarum}” became common in hymns in Europe in the twelfth century. Id. p. 186. Dronke emphasized the abstract sense of “flos florum”:

The divine flower is the flower of flowers, uniting all their perfections and fulfilling them in a greater perfection.

Id. p. 184. In Godfrey of Saint-Victor’s twelfth-century sequence, Mary, bitterly lamenting the death of her son Jesus, declared

Flower of flowers, prince of morals,
fount of forgiveness,
how heavy with nails
is your punishment!

{ Flos florum, dux morum,
veniae vena,
quam gravis in clavis
est tibi poena! }

Carmina Burana, 14 additional, “Earlier not knowing lamentation {Planctus ante nescia},” stanza 3a, Latin text and English translation (modified slightly) from Traill (2018). This stanza connects Jesus’s abstract excellence to Jesus specifically being punished with nails on a cross.

[3] Venantius Fortunatus, Songs {Carmina}, Appendix 5, v. 10, Latin text from Leo (1881) p. 279, my English translation. This poem displays Venantius’s “greatest self-indulgence.” He uses “prosodic ornaments the way desperate amateur fiddlers use vibrato.” Levine (2008) p. 85.

[4] Serlo of Wilton, “A flower to the flower of flowers {Flos floris flori},” Latin text from Dronke (1965) vol. 2, p. 505, my English translation, benefiting from that of id. This poem survives on folio 59v of Paris, BnF Latin 6765. It’s poem 19 in Öberg (1965). In v. 3, Öberg reads “ver o ver” rather than Dronke’s “vero ver,” and in v. 4, “vis mea” rather than Dronke’s “vis mala.” Donke’s readings of the Latin text seem to me to make better sense.

Understandings / translations of this poem have varied considerably. It presents a variety of technical difficulties:

the denotative sense of the words dissipates before the verbal play and the poem becomes a weird textbook, declining flowers and spring into an absurdity of words and shifting forms … Such a poem is far more about grammatical forms, the ambiguities of syntax, and the shifting meaning of signs than it is about any objective subject matter.

Moser (2004) p. 156. My sense is that this poem is best read in the context of Serlo’s other love poems.

[5] Carmina Burana 186, “My flower, pick a flower {Suscipe, flos, florem},” vv. 1-7, Latin text and English translation (modified) from Traill (2018). The subsequent quote above is similarly vv. 8-9 (of 9) of “Suscipe, flos, florem.” Here’s the Mediaeval Baebes’ version of this song from their 2014 album Temptation.

[images] (1) Flora, the ancient Roman goddess of flowers. Painted by Jan Matsys in 1559. Preserved in the Hamburger Kunsthalle (Hamburg, Germany). Via Wikimedia Commons. (2) Woman receiving flowers from a man. Illumination for “Suscipe, flos, florem” on folio 72v of the Carmina Burana (München, Bayerische Staatsbibliothek, Clm 4660).

References:

Dronke, Peter. 1965. Medieval Latin and the Rise of European Love-Lyric. 2 vols. Vol. 1, Vol. 2. Oxford: Clarendon Press.

Leo, Friedrich, ed. 1881. Venanti Honori Clementiani Fortunati presbyteri italici Opera poetica. Berolini: apud Weidmannos.

Levine, Robert. 2008. “Patronage and Erotic Rhetoric in the Sixth Century: The Case of Venantius Fortunatus.” Medieval and Renaissance Texts and Studies. 347: 75-94.

Moser, Thomas C. 2004. A Cosmos of Desire: the medieval Latin erotic lyric in English manuscripts. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press.

Öberg, Jan, ed. 1965. Serlon de Wilton: Poèmes Latins. Stockholm: Almqvist och Wiksell.

Paton, W.R., ed and trans. 1916-18. The Greek Anthology with an English Translation. London: William Heinemann (vol. I, bks. 1-6; vol. II, bks. 7-8; vol. III, bk. 9; vol IV, bks. 10-12; vol. V, bks. 13-16).

Traill, David A. 2018, ed. and trans. Carmina Burana. Dumbarton Oaks Medieval Library, 48-49. Cambridge, Massachusetts: Harvard University Press.

piggish men rebel against constraints of men’s lives

Men have long been disparaged as pigs. In the ancient Greek Odyssey, Queen Circe welcomed some of Odysseus’s men to her island of Aeaea. Then, with drugs and a stroke of her magic wand, she turned them into pigs. Women shouldn’t make men into their kept pigs.

Odysseus rescued his men. He threatened Circe with his sword. Seeing his tool, she supplicated him and begged him to unite with her in bed. But Odysseus, a man alive in more than just his little head, was wary:

Circe, how can you ask me to treat you with warmth,
you who in your halls have made my men into pigs,
and now detain me here, with guile bidding me
into your bed-chamber so that once I lie there
naked you may make me unmanly and vile.
Go to bed with you? Not me, not
until you consent to swear, goddess, a binding oath
that you’ll never plot new intrigue to hurt me.
{ ὦ Κίρκη, πῶς γάρ με κέλεαι σοὶ ἤπιον εἶναι,
ἥ μοι σῦς μὲν ἔθηκας ἐνὶ μεγάροισιν ἑταίρους,
αὐτὸν δ᾽ ἐνθάδ᾽ ἔχουσα δολοφρονέουσα κελεύεις
ἐς θάλαμόν τ᾽ ἰέναι καὶ σῆς ἐπιβήμεναι εὐνῆς,
ὄφρα με γυμνωθέντα κακὸν καὶ ἀνήνορα θήῃς.
οὐδ᾽ ἂν ἐγώ γ᾽ ἐθέλοιμι τεῆς ἐπιβήμεναι εὐνῆς,
εἰ μή μοι τλαίης γε, θεά, μέγαν ὅρκον ὀμόσσαι
μή τί μοι αὐτῷ πῆμα κακὸν βουλευσέμεν ἄλλο. }

After Circe swore not to trick him and not to emasculate him, Odysseus slept with her.

Of course Odysseus couldn’t joyfully do manly work while his men were kept as pigs. To hearten Odysseus, Circe released her kept pigs and returned them to their natural manly form. Odysseus and his men rejoiced to once again enjoy manly fellowship.

Odysseus remained at Circe’s home for a full year. He fulfilled husbandly duties for her while relaxing and feasting every night with his men. Odysseus and his men probably became fat. While men deserve a relaxing and comfortable home-based life, getting fat is bad for men’s health.

Odysseus’s men urged him to think of his home in Ithaca, where his wife Penelope and his son Telemachus awaited his return. Odysseus had been a conventional husband and father. He managed the queendom and fought to defend it. Circe required no such work from him. Some argue that a man must be insane to marry. Why should Odysseus, relaxing and feasting in Circe’s home, return to his conventional married life in Ithaca? He probably feared that if he didn’t return, he would be remembered not as a hero, but as a liar and a pig.

About two millennia later, Ersilia and Galeotto, rulers of the queendom of Anglia, were childless. Then three fairies charmed Ersilia. She subsequently gave birth to a son who appeared to be a pig. Ersilia and Galeotto loved their son even though he was a pig:

The child then, brought up carefully, would often come to his mother and, raising himself on his hind feet, put his snout and forefeet in her lap. The loving mother would in turn caress him, putting her hands on his bristly back, and hug and kiss him, no differently than if he were a human creature. And the child would curl his tail and show with obvious signs that the maternal caresses pleased him very much. The piglet, once somewhat grown, began to speak like a human and go about the city. Where there was garbage and filth, he would thrust himself into it, as pigs do. Afterwards, all dirty and stinking, he would return home. Running up to his father and mother and rubbing himself around their clothes, he made them all filthy with dung. But because he was their only son, they suffered everything in patience.
{ Il bambino adunque, diligentemente nodrito, sovente veniva alla madre, e, levatosi in piedi, le poneva il grognetto e le zampette in grembo. E la pietosa madre all’incontro lo accarezzava, ponendoli le mani sopra la pilosa schiena, ed abbracciavalo e basciavalo, non altrimenti che creatura umana si fusse. Ed il bambino avinchiavasi la coda, e con evidentissimi segni le materne carezze esserli molto grate le dimostrava. Il porcelletto, essendo alquanto cresciuto, cominciò umanamente parlare e andarsene per la città; e dove erano l’immondizie e le lordure, sì come fanno i porci, dentro se li cacciava. Dopo, così lordo e puzzolente, si ritornava a casa: e, accostatosi al padre ed alla madre e fregandosi intorno alle vestimenta loro, tutte da letame gli le imbruttava; e perciò che egli gli era unico figliuolo, ogni cosa pazientemente sofferivano. }[2]

When the pig grew older, he told his mother that he wanted to marry. His mother warned him that no woman would have a pig-man as her husband.

One day the pig declared that he wanted to marry a particular young woman. She was the eldest daughter of a poor woman with three daughters. Being married to a prince would be highly advantageous to the daughter and her mother, even if the prince were a pig. The daughter didn’t want to marry the pig-prince. Her mother persuaded her to marry him.

The daughter planned to kill her pig-husband on their wedding night. But the pig learned of her plan. After she had fallen asleep, he killed her in self-defense. Killing a spouse in self-defense is legal under the broad “battered wife” legal doctrine. Nonetheless, the queen harshly reproached her pig-son for killing his wife.

The pig wanted to marry his deceased wife’s sister. In response, the king favored killing his son to prevent him from committing more acts of self-defense. But the queen refused to allow her pig-son to be killed. Moreover, she persuaded the poor woman and her second-eldest daughter to accept a marriage to the pig-prince. Unfortunately, that marriage went as did the prior one. The pig killed his second wife in self-defense.

Now the pig wanted to marry the third daughter. Pig-men just don’t learn from experience. He told his mother of his desire. Furious, she absolutely denied his request. Then the pig threatened to kill his mother if she didn’t do what he wanted. That’s despicable. Nonetheless, still loving her son, she didn’t have him arrested and imprisoned for threatening murder. Instead, she humbly begged the poor woman’s youngest daughter, named Meldina, to marry her pig-son:

Meldina, my daughter, I want you to take Sir Pig for your husband. Do not have regard for him, but for his father and me. If you will come to know how to make yourself comfortable with him, you will be the luckiest and happiest lady that one can find.
{ Meldina, figliuola mia, voglio che tu prendi messer lo porco per tuo sposo: nè aver rispetto a lui, ma al padre suo e a me; che, se tu saprai ben esser con esso lui, sarai la più felice e la più contenta donna che si trovi. }

Meldina calmly responded that she would be honored as a poor woman to marry into the royal family. The queen wept at Meldina’s sweet spirit. The queen also feared for Meldina’s safety.

The just-married Meldina, dressed in lavish clothes and precious jewels, eagerly awaited her husband. Sir Pig arrived in his usual filthy state. The queen, who had supplied Meldina with her lavish attire, told her to push the pig away. But Meldina wisely said to the queen:

Sacred Majesty, of old
three wise lessons I’ve been told:
first, don’t waste your effort, please,
to seek impossibilities;
second, don’t go trusting quite
in things that are not fair and right;
third, the precious gift you hold
value as the rarest gold.
{ Tre cose ho già sentite raccontare,
Sacra corona veneranda e pia:
L’una, quel ch’è impossibile truovare,
Andar cercando, è troppo gran pazzia;
L’altra, a quel tutto fede non prestare,
Che ’n sè non ha ragion nè dritta via;
La terza, il dono prezioso e raro
C’hai nelle mani, fa che ’l tenghi caro. }

In light of such wisdom, wife and husband not only tolerated each other, but also loved each other dearly:

Sir Pig, who was not sleeping but heard clearly everything his wife had said, rose to his feet. He licked her face, her throat, her breasts, and her shoulders. She in turn caressed and kissed him, so that he was totally kindled with love. When the hour of repose came, the bride went to bed, waiting for her dear husband to come. It was not long before that husband, all filthy and stinking, went to bed. And she, raising the cover, bid him to come nearer to her. She set his head on the pillow, covering him well and closing the curtains so that he wouldn’t get a chill. When daylight came, Sir Pig, leaving the mattress full of manure, went off to feed.
{ Messer lo porco, che non dormiva ma il tutto chiaramente intendeva, levatosi in piedi, le lingeva il viso, la gola, il petto e le spalle; ed ella all’incontro l’accarezzava e basciava, sì che egli tutto d’amore si accendeva. Venuta l’ora di posare, andossene la sposa in letto, aspettando che ’l suo caro sposo se ne venisse; e non stette molto che ’l sposo, tutto lordo e puzzolente, se n’andò al letto. Ed ella, levata la coltre, se lo fece venire appresso, e sopra il guanciale li conciò la testa: coprendolo bene e chiudendo le cortine, acciò che freddo non patisse. Messer lo porco, venuto il giorno, e avendo lasciato il materasso pieno di sterco, se n’andò alla pastura. }

The queen feared that she would find her daughter-in-law dead after one night of marriage to her pig-son. Meldina instead was happy, even though her bed was covered with filth.

Some days later, the pig-prince revealed his secret to his wife. He showed her that he was merely wearing a stinking and dirty pigskin. Underneath that skin he was a fully human being, a man, an attractive and handsome young man. He embraced Meldina. All night long they enjoyed the delights of intimacy in their common human form. The following morning Meldina’s husband put on again his pigskin. He apparently didn’t want to be a man within the sexual feudalism of the court, nor to incur men’s obligation to risk death in the gender-discriminatory, men-on-men violence of war.[3]

Soon Meldina became pregnant. She birthed a handsome son, not a pig-human hybrid, but a fully human son. The queen and king were delighted to be grandparents of a fully human being. So too was Meldina. She couldn’t restrain herself from revealing her husband’s secret to her mother-in-law:

Most prudent queen, I thought that I was married to a beast. But you have given me for a husband the most handsome, the most virtuous, and the best-mannered young man that nature ever created. When he comes into my bedroom to lie down beside me, he takes off his stinking hide and, dropping it on the ground, becomes a tidy and lovely young man. No one could believe it, if she didn’t see it with her own eyes.
{ Prudentissima Reina, io mi credevo esser accompagnata con una bestia; ma voi mi avete dato per marito il più bello, il più vertuoso e il più accostumato giovane che mai la natura creasse. Egli, quando viene in camera per accoricarsi appresso me, si spoglia la puzzolente scorza, e, in terra quella diposta, un attilato e leggiadro giovane rimane. Il che niuno potrebbe credere, se con gli occhi propi non lo vedesse. }

The queen, who thought that she knew her own son, didn’t believe her daughter-in-law. So Meldina told her to come at night and peep into their bed-chamber.

That night the queen brought candles and the king to peep upon their son and daughter-in-law in bed. Looking into the bedroom, they saw a pigskin dropped on the floor. Men commonly drop with their clothes on the floor. In the bed, their son, looking and acting like a fully human man, was embracing his wife. The queen and king rejoiced. The king, undoubtedly following his wife’s order, commanded that the pigskin be shredded. Of course the royal couple never asked their son why he sought to avoid appearing to be a man. Men’s protests against gender injustices have long been suppressed.

Melinda’s husband became the new nominal king of Anglia. The people called him the Pig-King. He ruled in a way that pleased all the women of the realm. The men of the realm didn’t complain. Men relatively rarely complain. Meldina and her husband loved each other dearly and lived happily ever after. Their story is a conventional fairy tale for those who cannot perceive a piggish voice of men’s sexed protest.

* * * * *

Notes:

[1] Homer, Odyssey 10.337-44, ancient Greek text from Murray (1919) via Perseus, my English translation, benefiting from those of id., Kline (2004), and Fagles (1996). Steadman (2020) provides helpful reading resources.

[2] Giovanni (Zoan) Francesco Straparola, The Pleasant Nights {Le Piacevoli Notti}, Night 2, Story 1, Italian text from Rua (1899), English translation (modified) from Smarr (1983) pp. 167-73. Le Piacevoli Notti was first published in Venice in 1550. Subsequent quotes above are similarly from this story. For alternate English translations, Beecher (2012) and Waters (1894).

Beecher offered a gynocentric interpretation of this pig-man tale:

Embedded in the narrative genes of Straparola’s tale is a memory of the struggle for purgatorial purification and redemption; in its future is the struggle for the psychological reform that makes a man fit company for female society. One is vestigial, the other in ovo.

Beecher (2012) vol. 1, p. 281. To the contrary, Straparola’s tale seems to me to provide women with insight into being loving spouses for men as they are. The challenge is significant, but the reward is great. Beecher at least declared, “Amusingly, our sympathy is on the side of the pig.” Id. p. 285. More sympathy for men would help to reduce systemic gender injustices causing, among other horrible effects, a massive male gender protrusion in the population of persons incarcerated.

Folklorists categorize this story as a “beast-bridegroom” tale, ATU 425A. It’s related to the well-know fairy-tales “Beauty and the Beast” and “Cinderella.” Beecher considered it to be rooted in Indian literature. He ignored the story of Circe, Odysseus, and his men in the Odyssey.

[3] Beecher characterized this tale as:

an emblematic depiction of the necessary adjustments within the couple whereby wifely tolerance and compassion ultimately reform the savage beast, allowing him to escape from his arrested self. That feature was later enhanced in the ‘Beauty and the Beast’ tradition in which the beast with a potential for kindness finds his better self through the ministrations of a sympathetic woman.

Beecher (2012) vol. 1, p. 282. The pig-husband revealed his secret to his wife because she loved him for what he was. That meninist moral has nothing to do with reforming a savage beast.

[image] Group of pigs. Photo by kallerna at a pig farm in Vampula, Finland, on July 31, 2021. Via Wikimedia Commons.

References:

Beecher, Donald. 2012. Giovanni Francesco Straparola. The Pleasant Nights. 2 vols. Toronto: University of Toronto Press.

Fagles, Robert, trans. 1996. Homer. The Odyssey. New York: Penguin Publishing Group.

Kline, A. S. 2004. Homer: The Odyssey. Poetry in Translation. Online.

Murray, A. T., ed. and trans., revised by George E. Dimock. 1919. Homer. Odyssey. Volume I: Books 1-12. Loeb Classical Library 104. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.

Smarr, Janet Levarie, trans.. 1983. Italian Renaissance Tales: Selected and Translated, with an Introduction. Rochester, MI: Solaris Press.

Steadman, Geoffrey. 2020. Odyssey 9-12 Commentary. Online.

Waters, W.G., trans. 1894. Giovanni Francesco Straparola. The Nights. Vol. 1. Vol. 2. London: Lawrence and Bullen. Alternate presentation: vol. 1, vol. 2.

Indian-Persian-Arabic-Jewish-Christian wisdom in rotten world

The world has always been rotten. Translating into Middle Persian the ancient Indian wisdom of the Panchatantra, the sixth-century Persian royal physician Borzuya lamented:

We find, O my honored brethren and distinguished teachers, that the world is going backwards in this hard time of ours, in this our evil and vexatious generation. [1]

In the eighth-century Islamic caliphate, ibn al-Muqaffa translated Borzuya’s work into Arabic as the Kalila wa Dimna. In the eleventh century, a Syriac Christian translated Kalila wa Dimna into Syriac. Elaborating upon Borzuya’s claim that he was living among an “evil and vexatious generation,” the Syriac translator about five centuries later interpolated his own despair:

So it is especially in the days in which it has seemed good to your Excellency that this book should be brought to light and translated from Arabic into Syriac. For we find that the truth on which the world has been founded, and on which as if on solid adamant the Church of Christ has been built, is especially hidden by the teachers of the Church and the pastors of God. Yes, they have hidden in the heart of the earth that love which is the perfecter of all virtues, according to the testimony of the wise architect and zealous treasurer and heavenly apostle. Love is utterly taken from the world, especially from the priests and from those who seek the priestly office. Love is laid in the dust of the earth. [2]

The Syriac translator strongly criticized his fellow men of the Church:

Finally, the whole mass of humanity, especially the men of the Church, have put away the remembrance of the end from before their eyes. They have cast the fear of the Judge and of His keen vengeance behind their backs.

The Indian-Persian-Arabic worldly wisdom of Kalila wa Dimna is an alternative to corrupted or ignored Christian ethics. A sense of Christian ethical despair may have motivated the translation of Kalila wa Dimna from Arabic into Syriac in the eleventh century.

One story in Kalila wa Dimna suggests the eminence of Jewish scholars. A traveler met a holy man zealous in following his religious duties. The holy man welcomed the traveler as his guest and served him dates. In the course of their conversation, the holy man spoke Hebrew. The guest found Hebrew to be beautiful and desired to learn it. The holy man then instructed his guest with a story of a crow and a partridge. The crow saw a partridge strutting about and admired its manner of walking. The crow attempted to imitate the partridge, but couldn’t. In attempting to imitate the partridge, the crow corrupted his own manner of walking and became the most graceless of all birds. The holy man thus warned his guest not to attempt to learn Hebrew, for he would fail and moreover spoil his ability to speak his own language well.[3]

The story of the holy man and his guest suggests that, in the time and place of its composition, Hebrew was a prestigious language. That’s consistent with this story being written between roughly 550 GC and 1000 GC in central Mesopotamia. The Pumbedita Yeshiva and Sura Yeshiva then led highly regarded Jewish learning in central Mesopotamia (“Babylonia”). Persians, Christians, and Arabs probably regarded with a mixture of admiration and cultural fear eminent Jewish holy men representing such learning. The story of the holy man and this guest supports cultural insularity and defensiveness.

holy man and his guest in illustration to Kalila wa Dimna

In despair about Christian culture and translating the Indian-Persian-Arabic wisdom of Kalila wa Dimna, the Syriac translator was culturally defensive. He eliminated references to Hebrew in translating the story of the holy man and his guest. In his Syriac translation, the traveling guest refers only to a language that’s pleasant-sounding and that the wise desire to know. The Syriac translator also inserted into his translation many unmarked Biblical quotations as well as references to God coded as “the wise one,” “the chief of the wise,” or “the Witness.” While broadening access to Indian-Persian-Arabic wisdom, the Syriac translator also promoted Christian wisdom.

The Syriac translator’s inserted Christian wisdom makes Kalila wa Dimna more complex. Consider the story of the King of Kashmir and his talking pet bird Fanzah. The King’s boy and Fanzah’s fledgling son became friends. But one day the boy became annoyed at his young avian friend and killed him. Fanzah in retaliation gouged out the boy’s eyes and then flew to safety on a high perch outside the King’s palace. The King urged Fanzah to return. The King said that Fanzah had rightly taken vengeance and promised that he would not seek to harm Fanzah. Fanzah refused to return, even after a long, philosophical argument about dispelling anger, change of heart, and overcoming fear. Fanzah rightly feared that the King wished to do him harm.[4]

Early in his dialogue with the King, Fanzah spoke of punishment for deception. In the Arabic version, Fanzah declared:

The deceitful man is taken in his own snares. If he himself escapes the chastisement which he deserves, his crime is punished upon his children’s children. Now your son has acted treacherously towards mine, and I have lost no time in punishing him as he merited. [5]

The King’s son in anger acted wrongly, but not deceitfully. The King himself was acting deceitfully in claiming that he retained no anger toward Fanzah and didn’t seek to harm him. The Syriac translator ethically elaborated here through the voice of Fanzah:

O master who oppress your servants, know that everyone who does not observe his covenant or keep his oath, who neither fears his Maker nor stands in awe of the judgement of his Creator, has a bad end. And although the just Judge’s punishment may be delayed for a time while the long-suffering God bears with him, yet certainly justice will be required at last. And though justice may not be required of him, it will be required of his children, even to three and four generations. For very wonderful are the works of God, and his doings past finding out. [6]

The Syriac translator implied that the King or his descendants would have a bad end because of the King’s attempt to deceive and harm Fanzah. The story itself ends merely with Fanzah flying away from the King. The reader is left to imagine the King’s fate.

In the rotten world, responding to violence with violence might be necessary to remain alive. In contrast to immediate, essential self-defense, responding to violence with violence more typically seeks to satisfy anger or prevent future violence. That’s acting in accordance with emotion or reasoned prophecy. An alternative is to believe that the God of Abraham will punish the wicked. Vengeance is mine, said this Lord.[7] Imagining that good will overcome evil might prompt doing good right now. Doing good right now is certainly immediately better than doing evil right now in what has long been the rotten world.

* * * * *

Notes:

[1] Excerpt from Borzuya’s autobiography in the eleventh-century Syriac translation of Kalila wa Dimna. English translation (modified insubstantially) from Keith-Falconer (1885) p. 264, based on the Syriac text of Wright (1884). According to Knatchbull’s English translation of the Arabic text of De Sacy (1816), the corresponding Arabic text seems to say only “the age appeared to be going backwards.” Knatchbull (1819) p. 80.

The Syriac translator’s native tongue apparently was Arabic. His Syriac seems to have been learned formally in study of the Bible and biblical commentators. Keith-Falconer (1885) p. lix.

Many other persons at many other times and places have declared that humanity has become rotten. An author in twelfth-century central Europe lamented, “The old ways have passed {Transierunt vetera}.” In the thirteenth century, the Swabian-born wandering poet called The Marner wrote a poem that began, “Hastening towards its end, the world moves toward its setting {Mundus finem properans vergit ad occasum}.” Carmina Burana 9 addition. A Spanish writer in the fifteenth century declared, “Everything is going to hellfire and to evil {todo va a fuego y a mal}.” Lamenting the rottenness of the current world doesn’t imply abstract, general contempt for the world. Such laments remember a past, better world.

[2] Borzuya’s autobiography, English translation (modified for readability) from Keith-Falconer (1885) p. 264. Keith-Falconer explicitly bracketed this text as an addition of the Syriac translator. The subsequent quote above is similarly from id. p. 265.

[3] This story is variously called “The Ascetic and his Guest,” “The Hermit and the Traveler,” “The Monk and his Guest,” and “The Pious man and the Guest.” For freely available English translations, Knatchbull (1819), pp. 343-6, and Keith-Falconer (1885) pp. 217-8.

[4] This story is variously called “The King and the Bird,” “The King and the Bird Pinzih,” and “The Prince and the Bird Fanzah.” For freely available English translations, Knatchbull (1819), pp. 286-97, and Keith-Falconer (1885) pp. 178-85.

The Syriac translator inflected the practical wisdom of animals with Biblical concepts and references. For example, in his Syriac translation a lion says to a crow:

How evil is your counsel, and weak your intellect, and feeble your mind! You are remote from the truth, and devoid of compassion, and stripped of virtue. You were not faithful in being so insolent as to make this speech before me. Why, have you not heard that I made a promise to the camel, and gave him an oath, and made a faithful covenant between myself and him? And have you not heard that a man may distribute many talents to the poor, and not be so profited as a man who saves one soul from slaughter? How are you so insolent as to say to me: “Falsify your promises and be unfaithful to your covenant, and anger your Creator, and provoke your Judge for a little food that perishes, and inherit eternal torment?”

Keith-Falconer (1885) p. 179 (modified insubstantially for readability). In medieval Europe, Christians also wrote bizarre animal tales.

Keith-Falconer called the Syriac Christian translator a bad translator:

the numbers of Scriptural quotations and allusions which embellish almost every page of the book, are amply sufficient to betray the Christian translator. These of course have no place in the Arabic version. … the translator was a bad one. He did not always understand the text before him, as we have seen; and he often gave a different turn to a passage in order to bring out a Christian sentiment.

Keith-Falconer (1885) pp. lix-lx. The Syriac Christian translator wasn’t a faithful translator of his Arabic source. But the Syriac translator created a strange and interesting work.

[5] “The King and the Bird,” English translation from Knatchbull (1819) p. 288.

[6] “The King and the Bird,” English translation from Keith-Falconer (1885) p. 179. Cf. Exodus 20:5, Numbers 14:18, Psalms 40:5, 92:5, Romans 11:33-34.

[7] Deuteronomy 32:35, Romans 12:19, Hebrews 10:30.

[images] (1) Holy man and his guest. Illumination from an instance of Kalila wa Dimna made in the first quarter of the thirteenth century. Excerpt from folio 139v of BnF Arabe 3465. (2) Birds of Hindustan. Illustration (color-enhanced) from a late-sixteenth-century instance of the Baburnama. Folio preserved as accession # W.596.31B in the Walters Art Museum (Baltimore, USA). Also available on Wikimedia Commons.

References:

De Sacy, Silvestre. 1816. Calila et Dimna ou fables de Bidpai, en arabe précédées d’un mémoire sur l’origine de ce livre et sur les diverses traductions qui en ont été faites dans l’orient et suivies de la Moallaka de Lébid en arabe et en français. Paris: De l’Imprimerie Royale.

Keith-Falconer, I. G. N, ed. and trans. 1885. Kalilah and Dimnah: or, The Fables of Bidpai: being an account of their literary history. Cambridge: University Press.

Knatchbull, Wyndham, trans. 1819. Kalila and Dimna, or, The Fables of Bidpai. Oxford: W. Baxter for J. Parker.

Wright, William. 1884. The Book of Kalilah and Dimnah or the Fables of Bidpai: Translated from Arabic into Syriac, being the later Syriac version (11th century): Syriac text edited from a unique manuscript of Trinity College library, Dublin, with a glossary, additions and corrections to the text. Oxford: Clarendon Press.