Lucky Bernart de Ventadorn

We should not be surprised that there is so little to find about famous troubadours of the Middle Ages. The Albigensian Crusade was launched in 1209 to eliminate the Cathars of Occitania in the south of France. It was a decade long struggle that had as much to do with the concerns of northern France to extend its control southwards than it did with heresy. In the end, both the Cathars and the independence of southern France were exterminated. Lost of invaluable manuscripts were burnt and many castles that kept this wisdom of ages were destroyed.

So the life and creations of a great troubadour composer and poet Bernart de Ventadorn is no exception. Yet he may consider himself very lucky comparing to other troubadours. Bernart is unique among secular composers of the 12th century in the amount of music which has survived. Out of his 45 poems, 18 have music intact, an unusual circumstance for a troubadour composer. Naturally, music of the trouvères from the North of France has a higher survival rate, because they were not touched by Albigensian Crusade, which scattered the troubadours and destroyed many sources.

Yet we again have to dive into the world of Middle Ages rumors digging out the little details about him. So what do we really know? According to one of his contemporaries, Bernart de Ventadorn was possibly a son of a baker in French castle Ventadorn in France. But another contemporary indicates that he was the son of either a servant, a soldier, or a baker and his mother was also either a servant or a baker. From evidence given in Bernart’s early poem, he most likely learned the art of singing and writing from his protector, viscount Eble III of Ventadorn. He composed his first poems to his patron’s wife, Marguerite de Turenne. Forced to leave Ventadour after falling in love with Marguerite, he traveled to Montluçon and Toulouse, and eventually followed Eleanor of Aquitaine to England and the Plantagenet court; evidence for this association and these travels comes mainly from his poems themselves. Later Bernart returned to Toulouse, where he was employed by Raimon V, Count of Toulouse; later still he went to Dordogne, where he entered a monastery. Most likely he died there in the last decade of the 12th century.

We really don’t know the date of Bernart’s birth or death. We can only guess that he was born somewhere in the thirties of 12th century. And we place his most productive time of work between 1147 and 1180. Bernart is often credited with being the most important influence on the development of the trouvère tradition in northern France. He was well known there, his melodies were widely circulated, and the early composers of trouvère music seem to have imitated him.