Folquet de Lunel

Folquet de Lunel (1244 – c. 1300) was a troubadour from Lunel (in the modern Hérault) in the Languedoc. He left behind nine recorded lyric poems, including five "cansos", two "partimens", and two "sirventes". He also wrote one longer work, the "Romans de mondana vida". Folquet's birth date can be known precisely because he tells us in his "Romans", written in 1284, that he was forty years old at the time.

Folquet's earliest datable work is a "partimen" with Guiraut Riquier, dated to between 1264 and 1270. He presents Guiraut with a tricky question:

Folquet, along with fellow troubadours Dalfinet and Cerverí de Girona, was in Spain in 1269 in the entourage of "infante" Peter. They accompanied Peter to Toledo, where he treated with Alfonso X of Castile. On 26 April at Riello, near Cuenca, on the way, Folquet was charged with distributing pay to the three: three "solidi" each for himself and Dalfinet and one "solidus" for Cerverí. His meeting with Alfonso X inspired Folquet, already a staunch Ghibelline, to write a "sirventes" in support of Alfonso's claim to the Holy Roman Empire. "Al bon rey q'es reys de pretz car" was usually dated to 1269, but is more likely to have been written later, between February 1271, when Pope Gregory X arrived in Rome, and September 1273, when Rudolf of Hapsburg was elected King of Germany, since the "sirventes" mentions a pope (there had been a vacancy since 1268) and does not mention Rudolf's claim to the Empire. The most probable date is August/September 1273. The "sirventes" defends the attempts of Alfonso to receive his crown, advocates for the freedom of Henry of Castile (the imprisoned by the Guelphs), and lends support to Aragones political ambitions in Italy. Like both his contemporaries Cerverí de Girona and Paulet de Marselha, Folquet had nothing but praise for Peter, James his father, and the Aragonese. The metre of the "sirventes" is copied from the work "Bel m'es ab motz leugiers a far" by Sordello. Cerverí in his "Cobla en sis lengatges" copied the same metre, either from Sordello or Folquet.

At some point during the ongoing Guelph-Ghibelline conflict Folquet travelled into Lombardy, where he heard firsthand of the popularity of Alfonso:Folquet had returned to Lunel by 1274. There he entered into relations with Henry II of Rodez, who was the dedicatee of his "Romans". Three religious "cansos" may also have been dedicated to him: "Dompna bona, bel'e plazens", "Si quon la fuelh'el ramel", and "Tant fin'amors totas horas m'afila". Indeed, a count of Rodez appears in the "tornadas" of both his religious and his (two) courtly love songs. Scholarship is divided over whether the intended count was Hugh IV, indicating that the songs are a product of Folquet's youth, or Henry II, making them a product of his maturity.

ources

*Riquer, Martín de. "Los trovadores: historia literaria y textos". 3 vol. Barcelona: Planeta, 1975.