Lecheor

'Lecheor' is a short, bawdy Breton lai that tells the story a group of noble women who decide to write a lai about female genitalia.

Composition and manuscripts

The actual date of composition is estimated between the end of the twelfth to the beginning of the thirteenth centuries; and linguistic elements in the text indicate that the author may have come from Northern France or perhaps England. [cite book
last = Tobin
first = Prudence O'Hara
title = Les lais anonymes des XIIe et XIIIe siècles
publisher = Librarie Droz
date = 1976
location = Geneva ] Since the text speaks of women poets, the poem could have been written by a woman. [cite book
last = Burgess
first = Glyn S.
coauthors = Leslie C. Brook
title = Three Old French Narrative Lays
publisher = Liverpool Online Series
date = 1999
location = Liverpool
pages = 98
isbn = 0953381609]

The lai of "Lecheor" is contained in two existing manuscripts:
* MS Bibliothèque Nationale, nouv. acq. fr. 1104 (in Old French)
* MS Uppsala, De la Gardie 4-7 (translation of the Old French into Old Norse)

The Old French manuscript dates from the end of the 13th or beginning of the 14th century. [Burgess 48]

Plot summary

"Lecheor" tells the story of a group of women who are gathered together for the festival of Saint Pantaleon. It is at this festival that the men and women talk about all the courtly adventures from the past year and compose lais in remembrance of them. At this particular gathering, a group of women begin to discuss the reasons why the knights go off in search of adventure. and one woman offers a simple solution: the knight is interested in the woman's vagina (Old French: "con"). The other ladies agree, and they compose a lai, which is well-received in the land.

Analysis and Significance

Title

The Old French word "lecheor" survives in the modern English "lecher", though its original meaning encompassed "'glutton,' 'debauched person,' 'the lover of a married woman,' 'trickster,' and perhaps 'minstrel.'" [Burgess 59]

Like Marie de France's "Chaitivel" or "Eliduc", the Lai of "Lecheor" has a primary title given by the author and a secondary title that appears in the text. While we would expect the title of the lai to be the "lai of the cunt," the author states that "this is the lay of the Lecher. I do not wish to utter the true name in case I am reproached for it" ("c'est le lai du Lecheor; Ne voil pas dire le droit non, C'on nu me tor a mesprison"). In Old French, however, the author hides the true name of the lai with a play on words between on "con" and "C'on".

The text suggests another play on words between "con" (cunt) and "conte" (story or tale), a pun commonly used in medieval fabliaux. [cite book
last = Bloch
first = R. Howard
title = The Scandal of the Fabliaux
publisher = University of Chicago Press
date = 1986
location = Chicago] [Burgess 57]

tructure

The poem can be broken down into the following sections:
# Description of the festival and lai-writing in general (vv. 1-36)
# Description of this year's festival (vv. 37-52)
# Proposal of the new lai (vv. 53-100)
# Reaction to the lai (vv. 101-120)
# Epilogue (vv. 121-122)

Allusions

The festival of Saint Pantelion was held on July 27. The fact that this bawdy lai is written on a Holy Day can be considered irony. [cite journal
last = Donovan
first = Mortimer
title = "Lai du Lecheor": A Reinterpretation
journal = Romantic Review
volume = 43
pages = 81–86
date = 1952 ] Some scholars consider "Pantelion" as a corruption of "Pol-de-Léon," saint from Brittany, which is the setting for this lay. [Brusegan, Rosanna. "Le Lai du Lecheor et la tradition du lai plaisant." "Miscellanea Medievalia" Tome I. Ed. J. Claude Faucon, Alain Labbé, and Danielle Quéruel. Paris: Honoré Champion, 1998.]

The Lai of "Lecheor" is not the only lai to feature women writing. "Chaitivel" and "Chevrefoil" by Marie de France also include instances of women composing lais.

Mise-en-abime

The fact that the lai of "Lecheor" is about the composition of the lai of "Lecheor" creates a mise-en-abime. The reader can assume that the original lai of "lecheor," if it even existed, would have explained more about the woman's reasoning than about the writing of the lai itself and its placement within a historical and social context.

Notes and references

ee also

*Breton lai
*Anglo-Norman literature
*Medieval literature
*Medieval French literature

External links

* [http://www.liv.ac.uk/soclas/los/narrativelays.pdf Lecheor] in English translation alongside the Old French verse