"El nom del Payre e del Filh e del Sant Esperit
Comensa la cansos que maestre Guilhelms fit,
Us clercs qui in Navarra fo, a Tudela, noirit;
Pois vint a Montalba, si cum l'estoria dit."
--Guilhelms de Tudela, la Canso, w/a rough approximation in English below
"In the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit
Begins the song that master William made
He grew up in Tudela in Navarra, [where he] became a cleric
Then he came to Montauban, as the story will tell."
A couple of years ago, I pretty much horrified my ever-practical wife--then just recently at peace with my interest in studying Catalan--when I showed her my nice new paperback in modern French...and medieval Occitan. The work in question, the 13th century La Chanson de la Croisade albigeoise composed by Guilhelms de Tudela and an anonymous successor (excerpted above), is one of the main primary contemporary sources on the Albigensian Crusade and a great read for anyone interested in medieval history and/or the chanson de geste genre; however, sheepishly trying to explain these merits to a dona who saw medieval Occitan as just another potential detour from my Spanish studies wasn't my greatest success ever!
Fast forward to the here and now, and Occitan remains a real--if only sporadic--interest of mine as I shuffle through this shadow world of romance languages and medieval studies geekdom. Too many languages, too little time! Although I haven't been able to study any form of provençal in a classroom yet, there are at least a lot of resources devoted to it in cyberspace these days. One Occitan blog I'm fond of is Lo blòg deu Joan from Tolosa (Toulouse); it has a ton of links to other Oc-themed resources, and people with some Catalan background should be able to decipher a lot of the Occitan as well. Anem Oc!
Entradas
Well, well! I would never have expected to be cited in an English language blog! I am glad you are kind of fond of it, as you have put it so nicely. It took me twelve days to find yours, well I am here finally! Nice to meet your blog!
ResponderBorrarHave a good week-end!
Hi Joan,
ResponderBorrarThanks for the note--I'm glad you came across the secret link to your own blog! I'd actually been meaning to write you for a while to tell you how much I enjoy your site, but I was trying to gather up the courage to say something "en català" since my Occitan is read-only at this point (and only barely at that) and that was the best I could do. De totes maneres, moltes gracies per el teu comentari. M'agrada molt el teu bloc, i la oportunitat de llegir més sobre Occitània sempre és una cosa molt bé. Fins aviat!
Hi R-lo! No need to worry about the language! That's not an issue, you are welcome! En español o en cualquier otro idioma romance, o si no , en inglés !
ResponderBorrarThe Occitan variety chiefly used in my blog is Gascon, although some of my posts are written in (broken) Catalan and a few in Lengadocian.
Gràcies per l'acollida calorosa al teu bloc! Hi tornaré!
Thanks again, Joan. By the way, I've added an easier to find link to your blog so others who are interested can access it more readily. In the meantime, benvengut here!
ResponderBorrarThanks! I have just done the same for yours in mine! Adopted!
ResponderBorrar