- Peire de Maensac
Peire de Maensac was an
Auvergnat knight andtroubadour .He was from Maensac (either
Mauzat orMainsat ) in the lands ofDalfi d'Alvernha . He came from the poor petty nobility. His brother Austor or Austors was also a troubadour, but none of his works survives. [Austor is not "Astorgins de Mayencac, domicellus" mentioned in a document of 1238, as commonly supposed. (Egan, 76 n3)] According to Peire's "vida" the brothers agreed that one of them would "have the castle" (i.e. inherit) and the other would be the "inventor" (i.e. troubadour). Peire became the troubadour.He wrote poems dedicated to the (unnamed) wife of Bernart de Tierci. According to his "vida" he sang so much to her that she eventually allowed herself to be "abducted" by him. He fled with her to the castle of Dalf d'Alvernha, but her husband waged a "great war" to bring her back. Dalfi reputedly defended the castle so well that Bernart was unable to ever reclaim her.
Peire was called a "pleasant companion" by his biographer. He wrote mostly "cansos" of
courtly love with "pleasing melodies", but also "coblas de solatz". The meaning of this last phrase is not certain. It could mean "good entertainingcouplet s" ("bon couplets divertissants") according to Boutière-Schutz, the first of the "vida's" editors, but it could also mean simply "tenso s", as preferred by Egan, the "vida's" first English editor.Notes
ources
*"The Vidas of the Troubadours". Margarita Egan, trans. New York: Garland, 1984. ISBN 0 8240 9437 9.
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