Monthly Archives: March 2015

Mar29

Amours 1.196

Posted on March 29, 2015 by fattoxxon

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Au plus profond de ma poitrine morte

Il m’est advis qu’une main je reçoy,

Qui me pillant entraine avecque soy

Mon cœur captif, que maistresse elle emporte.

Coustume inique, et de mauvaise sorte,

Malencontreuse et miserable loy,

Tu m’as tué, tant tu es contre moy,

Loy des humains, bride trop dure et forte.

Faut-il que veuf, seul entre mille ennuis,

Mon lict desert je couve tant de nuits ?

Hà ! que je porte et de haine et d’envie

A ce Vulcan ingrat et sans pitié,

Qui s’opposant aux raiz de ma moitié,

Fait eclipser le Soleil de ma vie.

In the deepest place in my dead breast

I seem to feel a hand

Which as it plunders me drags with it

My captive heart, and takes it to be its mistress.

Iniquitous custom, wicked fate,

Unlucky and wretched law,

You have killed me, so much you are against me,

Law of mankind, bridle too harsh and strong.

Must I bereft, alone among a thousand troubles,

Brood on my deserted bed for so many nights?

Ah, what hate and jealousy I bear

Towards that ungrateful and pitiless Vulcan

Who, setting himself against the light of my other half,

Eclipsed the Sun of my life.

Muret, footnoting the Amours, tells us: ‘Vulcan, husband of Venus, was a jealous god. This sonnet has nothing to do with Cassandre, as with several others in this book.’ Vulcan as the husband of Venus, who found her in bed with Mars; are we to assume that Ronsard has been playing with a married lady? Or is this a less-precise reference, which would fit Cassandre better, to another lover competing for her hand and making off with her – perhaps, her husband-to-be rather than a husband? Or is Muret right in saying this has nothing to do with Cassandre – for, after all, we have already encountered many a sonnet addressed to Sinope, Marguerite and other ladies?

In the end, does it matter?! Poetry does not, after all, have to be subjected to the analysis which a strict biographer might apply. It is an attractive poem with a novel image in the opening quatrain and some unusual phrases in the second.

In both, there are variants in the earlier Blanchemain edition: of these I think we can safely say the older versions of lines 2 and 7 are weaker, but that does not make the version less interesting.

Au plus profond de ma poitrine morte

Sans me tuer une main je reçoy,

Qui, me pillant, entraine avecques soy

Mon cœur captif, que, maistresse, elle emporte.

Coustume inique et de mauvaise sorte,

Malencontreuse et miserable loy,

Tant à grand tort, tant tu es contre moy,

Loy sans raison miserablement forte.

In the deepest place in my dead breast

I feel a hand which does not kill me,

Which as it plunders me drags with it

My captive heart, and takes it to be its mistress.

Iniquitous custom, wicked fate,

Unlucky and wretched law,

So wrongly, so much you are against me,

Law without reason, wretchedly strong.

Mar26

Amours 1.200

Posted on March 26, 2015 by fattoxxon

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Les vers d’Homere entre-leus d’aventure,

Soit par destin, par rencontre ou par sort,

En ma faveur chantent tous d’un accord

La guarison du tourment que j’endure.

Ces vieux Barbus, qui la chose future

Des traits des mains, du visage et du port

Vont predisant, annoncent reconfort

Aux passions de ma peine si dure.

Mesmes la nuict, le somme qui vous met

Douce en mon lict, augure me promet

Que je verray vos fiertez adoucies :

Et que vous seule oracle de l’amour,

Verifirez en mes bras quelque jour

L’arrest fatal de tant de propheties.

The poetry of Homer, glanced over at random,

Whether by fate or accident or luck

Sings all in harmony for my benefit

The cure of the torment which I endure.

Those bearded ancients, who future things

Predicted by the features of hands, of the face,

Of the way you walk, announce comfort

For the passions of my harsh suffering.

Even the night and sleep which place you

Softly in my bed, make me the prophecy

That I shall see your pride softened;

And that you, sole oracle of love,

Will someday make true in my arms

The inevitable end of so many prophecies.

The idea of using ancient texts as oracles is a commonplace, though most people would think of opening the Bible at random rather than a copy of Homer! But this is all part of the learned image Ronsard wants to project – and to play with, for after all it is not so learned to resort to ancient texts at random for oracular (almost astrological) predictions…

Only one variant in Blanchemain, in the penultimate line, where Casandre “Verifirez dans mes bras…”. The change which has no impact on the meaning, only on the sound of the line, in the later version swapping out the hard ‘d’ sound of “dans” and replacing it with the soft and sensuous ‘z’ sound that comes from placing a vowel after the -ez ending of “verifirez”.

Mar24

Amours 1.178

Posted on March 24, 2015 by fattoxxon

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O traits fichez jusqu’au fond de mon ame,

O folle emprise, ô pensers repensez,

O vainement mes jeunes ans passez,

O miel, ô fiel, dont me repaist ma Dame :

O chaud, ô froid, qui m’englace et m’enflame,

O prompts desirs d’esperance cassez,

O douce erreur, ô pas en vain trassez,

O monts, ô rocs, que ma douleur entame !

O terre, ô mer, chaos, destins et cieux,

O nuict, ô jour, ô Manes stygieux,

O fiere ardeur, ô passion trop forte :

O vous Daimons, ô vous divins esprits,

Si quelque amour quelquefois vous a pris,

Voyez, pour Dieu, quelle peine je porte !

O wounds fixed right in the bottom of my soul,

O foolish influence, o thoughts re-thought,

O my years of youth passed in vain,

O the sweetness, the bitterness, which my Lady feeds me;

O heat, o cold, which freeze and inflame me,

O swift wishes for hope, now broken,

O sweet error, o paths taken in vain,

O hills and rocks, the beginnings of my sadness!

O earth, sea, chaos, fate and heavens,

O night and day, o Stygian shades,

O proud ardour, o passion too strong;

O fates, o divine spirits,

If any love ever seized you,

See, for God’s sake, the pain I bear!

A few days ago we had Ronsard’s ijitation of Gesualdo, “Ny… ny… ny…”; today, another one, this time “O… o… o…”! The bravura technical challenge is the same, and the result is too. Charming, brilliant, and yet at the same time a little tongue-in-cheek…

In line 12 I’ve translated “Daimons” as ‘fates’, since the reference seems to be more to the Greek ‘daimon’ than to the more medieval ‘demon’. But in Blanchemain’s version, the only variant is the spelling here: “O vous démons !” which translates more obviously as ‘O demons’…

Ronsard’s immediate source, as before, was Giovanni Andrea Gesualdo. To show his sophistication, Ronsard places another unrelated poem between his two imitations; going one better than Gesualdo, whose two poems follow each other directly in the Rime diverse. Here’s the Italian original:

O viva fiamma, o miei sospiri ardenti

O miserabil duol, o spirti lassi,

O pensier d’ogni speme ignudi & cassi,

O strali nel mio cuor fieri & pungenti;

O bei desir de l’honorate menti,

O vane imprese, o dolorosi passi,

O selve, o piaggie, o fonti, o fiume, o sassi

O spietata cagion de miei tormenti:

O gloriosi allori, o verdi mirti,

O luogo un tempo à me dolce, & giocondo,

Ove io gia sparsi dilettoso canto;

O voi leggiadri, et amorosi spirti,

S’alcun vive qua giu nel basso mondo

Pietà vi prenda del mio acerbo pianto.

O living flame, o my ardent sighs,

O wretched grief, o fading spirits,

O thoughts of every hope denuded and demolished,

O proud and stinging shafts in my heart,

O beautiful desires of honoured minds,

O vain undertakings, o steps illed with sadness,

O woods, o shores, o founts, o rivers, o rocks,

O ruthless cause of my torments,

O glorious laurels, o green myrtles,

O place once sweet to me and happy

Where I once scattered delightful songs,

O you graceful and loving spirits,

If any [of you] live down here in the base world,

Take pity on my bitter weeping.

Notice how, in line 11, Gesualdo adapts his theme slightly by opening the line not with “O” but with “Ove” – a neat and clever touch!

This time, both Ronsard and Gesualdo are basing their poems on a Petrarchan original (Canzoniere 161), though typically the “O” motif is used more, and more brilliantly, by the two refined, showy and definitely more sophisticated followers in the late renaissance.

O passi sparsi, o pensier’ vaghi et pronti,

O tenace memoria, o fero ardore,

O possente desire, o debil core,

O i occhi miei, occhi non già, ma fonti!

O fronde, honor de le famose fronti,

O sola insegna al gemino valore!

O faticosa vita, o dolce errore,

Che mi fate ir cercando piagge et monti!

O bel viso ove Amor inseme pose

Gli sproni e ‘l fren ond’el mi punge et volve,

Come a lui piace, et calcitrar non vale!

O anime gentili et amorose,

S’alcuna à ‘l mondo, et voi nude ombre et polve,

Deh ristate a veder quale è ‘l mio male.

O wandering steps! O vague and busy dreams!

O changeless memory! O fierce desire!

O passion strong! heart weak with its own fire;

O eyes of mine! not eyes, but living streams;

O laurel boughs! whose lovely garland seems

The sole reward that glory’s deeds require;

O haunted life! delusion sweet and dire,

That all my days from slothful rest redeems;

O beauteous face! where Love has treasured well

His whip and spur, the sluggish heart to move

At his least will; nor can it find relief.

O souls of love and passion! if ye dwell

Yet on this earth, and ye, great Shades of Love!

Linger, and see my passion and my grief.

(Translation by Thomas Wentworth Higginson)

Mar23

Amours 1.181

Posted on March 23, 2015 by fattoxxon

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Jamais au cœur ne sera que je n’aye,

Soit que je tombe en l’oubli du cercueil,

Le souvenir du favorable accueil,

Qui reguarit et rengregea ma playe.

Cette beauté, pour qui cent morts j’essaye,

Me saluant d’un petit ris de l’œil,

Se presenta si benigne à mon dueil,

Qu’un seul regard de tous mes maux me paye.

Si donc le bien d’un esperé bon jour,

Plein de caresse, apres un long sejour,

En cent nectars mon esperance plonge,

Quel paradis m’apporteroit ce bien,

Si bras à bras d’un amoureux lien

Je la tenois tant seulement en songe ?

Never in my heart will be that which I don’t have,

Even if I fall into the oblivion of the coffin –

The memory of favour and welcome

Which cures and aggravates [Love’s] wound.

That beauty for whom I dare a hundred deaths

Greeted me with a little smile in her eye

And showed herself so kind about my grief

That one single glance repaid me for all my ills.

If then the delight of a hoped-for greeting,

So caressing, after a long wait

Plunges my hopes into a hundred nectars,

What paradise would that delight bring me

If arm in arm in a lover’s embrace

I could hold her – even if only in dreams?

Sometimes I get an unexpected surprise from an unexpected direction: today’s is that this is the only poem I’ve uploaded so far – out of nearly 500! – that’s begun with “Jamais…” (‘Never…’) – which seems such an obvious opening word for a love-poet! That’s one of the many things I enjoy about Ronsard, his ability to surprise even by avoiding the obvious! Blanchemain’s earlier version offers a number of variants, which combine to give us an attractive alternate version:

Jamais au cœur ne sera que je n’aye,

Soit que je tombe en l’oubli du cercueil,

Le souvenir du favorable accueil

Qui reguarit et rengregea ma playe ;

Car la beauté pour qui cent morts j’essaye,

Me saluant d’un petit ris de l’œil,

Si doucement satisfait à mon dueil,

Qu’un seul regard de tous mes maux me paye.

Si donc le bien d’un esperé bon-jour,

Plein de caresse, aprés un long sejour,

En cent nectars peut enivrer mon âme,

Quel paradis m’apporteroit les nuits,

Où se perdra le tout de mes ennuis,

Evanoui dans le sein de ma dame ?

Never in my heart will be that which I don’t have,

Even if I fall into the oblivion of the coffin –

The memory of favour and welcome

Which cures and aggravates [Love’s] wound,

Because the beauty for whom I dare a hundred deaths

Greeted me with a little smile in her eye

And so gently met me in my grief

That one single glance repaid me for all my ills.

If then the delight of a hoped-for greeting,

So caressing, after a long wait

Can make my soul drunk with a hundred nectars,

What paradise would night-time bring me

In which all of my pains could be lost,

Vanished in my lady’s breast?

Mar21

de la Hèle – Mais voyez

Posted on March 21, 2015 by fattoxxon

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Title

Mais voyez mon cher esmoy

Composer

George de la Hèle (1547-86)

Source

Le Rossignol musical … , 1598, Phalèse

(text on Lieder.net site here)
(blog entry here)
(recorded extract here – source: De Vlaamse Polyfonie 2 – Philippe Rogier in Spain, by the Currende Consort)

Another of my own transcriptions, and another 5-voice song. It’s the only Ronsard song we have from the pen of George de la Hèle – and indeed the ONLY song we have from his pen. De la Hèle was one of those unfortunate composers whose works have disappeared not just into obscurity but into ashes: he was a well-regarded pupil of Manchicourt, and became master of royal chapel of Philip II in Madrid in his early thirties, where most of his prolific output perished in the fire of 1734. What we are left with consists of a handful of scraps and a book of 8 Masses he commissioned Plantin to print (Plantin insisted de la Hèle buy 40 copies himself to make the project viable, though generously charged him only 16 florins a copy instead of 18!) The ‘scraps’ are 2 motets, and this song.

The song survives because it was printed by Phalèse in a small selection of Ronsard-song within his Rossignol musical – for which it was selected because of its fame after it won first prize at the prestigious Puy song-contest of Evreux (the ‘Puy de musique d’Evreux’) in 1576. The winner was named Prince of the Puy – and the event has been revived in recent years as the ‘Puy neuf d’Evreux’, with composers challenged to write a piece on a text used in the renaissance to win the title once again of Prince of the Puy.

The song itself is quite self-consciously sophisticated (and, as you can see, long!), but nonetheless attractive. Note the long notes on ‘angelicque face’, and the runs on ‘jouissance’ etc – madrigalian word-painting in the Italian style. Sadly, it has never been recorded by singers, though I have a recording of the first part only played by an ‘alta capella’ consort of ‘loud’ instruments such as might have entertained the crowds at the Puy d’Evreux. The extract runs from the top of p4 of the score (“vostre front et voz cheveux” in the contra) to around bar 43 at the foot of the next page.

A couple of other facts about the composer: after his early success he died young, before he was 40, for reasons unknown; but not before he had married a lady apparently named Madelena Guabaelaraoen (I imagine she was quite pleased to swap surnames…!)

seconde partie

For your reference and enjoyment, here are the original pages from the Rossignol musical, as made freely available by the Bibliothèque Nationale de France on its Gallica website.

superius contra quinta tenor bassus

Mar20

Amours 1.176

Posted on March 20, 2015 by fattoxxon

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Ny les desdains d’une Nymphe si belle,

Ny le plaisir de me fondre en langueur,

Ny la fierté de sa douce rigueur,

Ny contre Amour sa chasteté rebelle :

Ny le penser de trop penser en elle,

Ny de mes yeux l’eternelle liqueur,

Ny mes souspirs messagers de mon cœur,

Ny de sa glace une ardeur eternelle :

Ny le desir qui me lime et me mord,

Ny voir escrite en ma face la mort,

Ny les erreurs d’une longue complainte,

Ne briseront mon cœur de diamant,

Que sa beauté n’y soit tousjours emprainte :

« Belle fin fait qui meurt en bien aimant.

Not the disdain of so fair a nymph,

Not the pleasure of melting into listlessness,

Not the pride of her sweet harshness,

Not her chasteness, rebelling against love;

Not the thought of thinking too much about her,

Not the eternal weeping of my eyes,

Not my sighs, messengers of my heart,

Not eternal passion for her icy-ness;

Not desire which traps me and gnaws at me,

Not seeing death written in my face,

Not the mistakes of a long lament;

These will not break my diamond-hard heart

And prevent her beauty forever being stamped there:

“A fair ending he makes who dies loving truly.”

It’s quite unusual to find Ronsard so single-minded as in the way he begins the first 11 lines of this poem (which I’ve replicated in the translation); but that is partly because he is deliberately copying (or translating) another poem which attempts the same effect in Italian. Before we go there, a couple of variants in Blanchemain’s edition: in line 6, “la fatale liqueur” (‘the death-dealing weeping…’); and in line 8 “Ny de ma flamme une ardeur eternelle” which necessitates a revised translation of the whole line – ‘Not the eternal heat of my fire’.

Ronsard’s original, as so often in his selection of Italian poets for translation, is not Petrarch himself but one of the sixteenth-century Petrarchist followers. In this case it is Giovanni Andrea Gesualdo, expert in Greek and Latin, poet in the Petrarchist vein and a commentator on Petrarch. Born in 1496, his poetry was published in a collected edition in 1585, but it is not clear whether he was still alive at the time. (As far as I know, unrelated to the more famous Carlo Gesualdo, composer of the late 16th century.) Ronsard’s source was (probably) the ‘Rime diverse di molti eccellentissimi auttori…’ of 1545. Both Ronsard and Gesualdo quote from Petrarch himself in the last line, a line which had become proverbial. Here’s Gesualdo’s poem:

Ne di selvaggio cuor feroce sdegno,

Ne crude voglie nel mio danno accorte,

Ne il veder già le mie speranze morte,

Ne il lungo affanno lagrimoso e ‘ndengno;

Ne ‘l guasto al viver mio fido sostegno,

Ne il girne ratto inanzi tempo a morte,

Ne pensier ch’a me sol tormento apporte,

Ne ‘l mal inteso mio desir sì degno;

Ne la spenta mia dolce usata aita,

Ne il mai qua giù sentito, aspro dolore,

Onde io m’appresso a l’ultima partita;

Ne altro fia che ‘l mio primiero ardore,

Spenga giamai mentre dimoro in vita;

Che bel fin fa, chi ben amando muore.

Not the fierce anger of a wild heart,

Nor crude desires nor my prudent injury,

Nor seeing my hopes already dead,

Nor long sorrow, tearful and unworthy;

Not my failure to keep alive my faithfulness,

Nor time, stolen before, running away to death,

Nor the thought which to me alone brings torment,

Nor my desire, so worthy but misunderstood,

Nor my sweet life, spent and used up,

Nor the ills I suffer down here, the bitter pain,

Whence I press on to my final parting;

These will not make it any different from my first love,

Nor make it die while I remain alive:

“What a fine end he makes, who dies loving truly.”

Mar19

Chanson

Posted on March 19, 2015 by fattoxxon

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A ce malheur qui jour et nuit me poingt

Et qui ravit ma jeune liberté,

Dois-je tousjours obeïr en ce poinct,

Ne recevant que toute cruauté ?

Fidellement

Aimant,

Je sens

Mes sens

Troubler,

Et mon mal redoubler.

Cest or frizé, et le lys de son teint,

Sous un Soleil doublement esclaircy,

Ont tellement mes moüelles attaint,

Que je me voy déja presque transi.

Son œil ardant,

Dardant

En moy

L’esmoy

Du feu,

Me brusle peu à peu.

Je cognois bien, mais helas ! c’est trop tard,

Que le meurtrier de ma franche raison,

S’est escoulé par l’huys de mon regard,

Pour me brasser ceste amere poison :

Je n’eus qu’ennuis

Depuis

Le jour

Qu’Amour

Au cœur

M’inspira sa rigueur.

Et nonobstant (cruelle) que je meurs,

En observant une saincte amitié,

Il ne te chaut de toutes mes clameurs,

Qui te devroient inciter à pitié.

Vien donc, Archer

Tres-cher,

Volant,

Doublant

Le pas,

Me guider au trespas !

Ny mes esprits honteusement discrets,

Ny le travail que j’ay pour t’adorer,

Larmes, souspirs et mes aspres regrets

Ne te sçauroient, (Dame) trop inspirer,

Si quelquefois,

Tu vois

A l’œil

Le dueil

Que j’ay,

Pour l’amoureux essay.

Quelqu’un sera de la proye preneur,

Que j’ay long-temps par cy-devant chassé,

Sans meriter joüira de cet heur,

Qui a si fort mon esprit harassé.

C’est trop servy,

Ravy

Du mal

Fatal,

Je veux

Concevoir autres vœux.

Quelque lourdaut, ou quelque gros valet,

Seul à l’escart de mon heur joüissant,

Luy tastera son ventre rondelet,

Et de son sein le pourpre rougissant.

De nuict, de jour,

L’amour

Me fait

Ce fait

Penser,

Et me sert d’un Enfer.

Or je voy bien qu’il me convient mourir

Sans esperer aucun allegement,

Puis qu’à ma mort tu prens si grand plaisir,

Ce m’est grand heur et grand contentement,

Me submettant,

Pourtant

Qu’à tort

La Mort

L’esprit

Me ravit par despit.

This pain which stabs me day and night

And which steals away the freedom of my youth,

Must I always obey it on this point

Though receiving only cruelty?

Loyally

Loving

I sense

My senses

Troubled

And my pain redoubled.

These golden curls, and the lilies of her complexion,

Beneath a sun shining doubly-clear

Have struck me to the core so far

That I feel myself almost dead.

Her burning eye,

Darting

At me

The pain

Of fire

Burns me little by little.

I realise, but oh too late,

That the murderer of my cool reason

Has escaped through the portal of my eyes

To brew for me this bitter poison.

I have had only worries

Since

The day

Love

Into my heart

Breathed her harshness.

And though I may die, cruel one,

Preserving this holy friendship

All my cries will not bother you

Though they should move you to pity.

Come then, Archer-god

So dear to me,

Flying,

Doubling

Your speed,

To guide me to death.

Neither my shy and modest spirits,

Nor the trouble it causes me to love you,

Not tears, sighs and bitter regrets –

None of these, my lady, will be able to move you as much

As if sometimes

You see

In my eyes

The pain

Which I gain

Through love’s trial.

Some other hunter it will be who takes

The prey that I’ve been coursing up to now;

Without deserving, he’ll enjoy that pleasure

Which has so fiercely tortured my soul.

It’s no use;

Seized

By fatal

Illness,

I will

Pursue other vows of love.

Some dolt or gross servant

Alone, apart, mocking my fortune,

Will caress her rounded belly

And the blushing crimson of her breast.

By night and day

Love

Makes me

This truth

Consider,

And makes my life a hell.

I clearly see that I ought to die

Without a hope of lessened pain;

Since my death gives you such great pleasure,

Then it will be a great happiness and great pleasure

Submitting myself,

However

Wrongly

Death

In spite

Steals my spirit.

Appended by Marty-Laveaux to what he calls an “Autre recueil de sonnets” (‘Another collection of sonnets’), although as you may note it is not a sonnet, this is yet another piece culled from the main texts by Ronsard. Blanchemain’s text is identical. This was another poem which inspired contemporary composers.

Mar18

Amours 1.177

Posted on March 18, 2015 by fattoxxon

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Au mesme lict où pensif je repose,

Presque ma Dame en langueur trespassa

Devant-hier, quand la fiévre effaça

Son teint d’œillets, et la lévre de rose.

Une vapeur avec sa fiévre esclose,

Dedans le lict son venin me laissa,

Qui par destin, diverse m’offensa

D’une autre fiévre en mes veines enclose.

L’un apres l’autre elle avoit froid et chaud :

Ne l’un ne l’autre à mon mal ne default :

Et quand l’un croist, l’autre ne diminue.

L’accés fiévreux tousjours ne la tentoit,

De deux jours l’un sa chaleur s’alentoit :

Je sens tousjours la mienne continue.

In the same bed where I lie thoughtfully

My Lady nearly drooped and died

The day before yesterday, when fever wiped away

Her carnation-pink tint and the rose from her lips.

A vapour wrapped up in her fever

Left me its poison in the bed

Which, by fate, assaulted me in various ways

With another fever shut within my veins.

One after another, she was hot and cold;

Neither one nor the other took away my pain;

And when one grew, the other did not lessen.

The feverish bout is not still attacking her;

Of the two days one was when the heat went down;

But I still feel my own continuing.

(No commentary needed; and no variants as I haven’t found this one in Blanchemain so far!)

Mar16

Odes 1.3

Posted on March 16, 2015 by fattoxxon

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Today one of Ronsard’s early Odes, very formally structured in the classical style with strophes & antistrophes repeating a metrical scheme, and then epodes acting as a ‘refrain’ structure in between pairs of these.

A LA ROYNE

Strophe 1

Je suis troublé de fureur,

Le poil me dresse d’horreur,

D’un effroy mon ame est pleine,

Mon estomac est pantois,

Et par son canal ma vois

Ne se desgorge qu’à peine.

Une deité m’emmeine ;

Fuyez, peuple, qu’on me laisse,

Voicy venir la deesse ;

Fuyez, peuple, je la voy.

Heureux ceux qu’elle regarde,

Et plus heureux qui la garde

Dans l’estomac comme moy !

Antistrophe 1

Elle, esprise de mes chants,

Loin me guide par les champs

Où jadis sur le rivage

Apollon Florence aima,

Lorsque jeune elle s’arma

Pour combattre un loup sauvage.

L’art de filer ny l’ouvrage

Ne plurent à la pucelle,

Ny le lit mignard ; mais elle,

Devant le jour s’éveillant,

Cherchoit des loups le repaire,

Pour les bœufs d’Arne son père

Sans repos se travaillant.

Epode 1

Ce Dieu, qui du ciel la vit

Si valeureuse et si belle,

Pour sa femme la ravit,

Et surnomma du nom d’elle

La ville qui te fit naistre,

Laquelle se vante d’estre

Mere de nostre Junon,

Et qui par les gens étranges

Pour ses plus grandes louanges

Ne celebre que ton nom.

Strophe 2

Là les faits de tes ayeux

Vont flamboyant comme aux cieux

Flamboye l’aurore claire ;

Là l’honneur de ton Julien

Dans le ciel italien

Comme une planette esclaire.

Par luy le gros populaire

Pratiqua l’experience

De la meilleure science,

Et là reluisent aussi

Tes deux grands papes, qui ores

Du ciel, où ils sont encores,

Te favorisent icy.

Antistrophe 2

On ne compte les moissons

De l’esté, ni des glaçons

Qui, l’hiver, tiennent la trace

Des eaux roides à glisser :

Ainsi je ne puis penser

Les louanges de ta race.

Le Ciel t’a peint en la face

Je ne sçay quoy qui nous monstre,

Dès la premiere rencontre,

Que tu passes par grand-heur

Les princesses de nostre âge,

Soit en force de courage,

Soit en royale grandeur.

Epode 2

Le comble de ton sçavoir

Et de tes vertus ensemble

Dit que l’on ne peut icy voir

Rien que toy qui te resemble.

Quelle dame a la pratique

De tant de mathematique ?

Quelle princesse entend mieux

Du grand monde la peinture,

Les chemins de la nature

Et la musique des cieux ?

Strophe 3

Ton nom, que mon vers dira,

Tout le monde remplira

De ta loüange notoire :

Un tas qui chantent de toy

Ne sçavent si bien que moy

Comme il faut sonner ta gloire.

Jupiter, ayant mémoire

D’une vieille destinée

Autrefois determinée

Par l’oracle de Themis,

A commandé que Florence

Dessous les loix de la France

Se courbe le chef soumis.

Antistrophe 3

Mais il veut que ton enfant

En ait honneur triomphant,

D’autant qu’il est tout ensemble

Italien et François,

Qui de front, d’yeux et de vois,

A père et mere resemble.

Déjà tout colere il semble

Que sa main tente les armes,

Et qu’au milieu des alarmes

Jà desdaigne les dangers ;

Et, servant aux siens de guide,

Vainqueur, attache une bride

Aux royaumes estrangers.

Epode 3

Le Ciel, qui nous l’a donné

Pour estre nostre lumiere,

Son empire n’a borné

D’un mont ou d’une riviere.

Le destin veut qu’il enserre

Dans sa main toute la terre,

Seul roy se faisant nommer,

D’où Phébus les Indes laisse,

Et d’où son char il abbaisse

Tout panché dedans la mer.

To the Queen

I am assailed by madness,

My hair stands up with horror,

Panic fills my soul,

My heart is stunned,

And my voice can barely

Pass through my throat.

A deity has seized me.

Run, people, please leave me,

See, here comes the goddess !

Run, people, I see her !

Fortunate the men on whom she looks,

More fortunate the man who keeps her

In his heart, like me !

In love with my songs, she

Guides me far among the fields

Where once on the riverbank

Apollo loved Florence,

When the young [nymph] armed herself

To fight a savage wolf.

Not the art of spinning nor its works

Could please the maid,

Nor her pretty bed ; but she,

Before the breaking day

Would seek the dens of wolves,

Working without rest

For the cattle of her father Arno.

This god, who from heaven saw her

So bold and so fair,

Seized her as his wife

And named from her name

The town which gave you birth.

That town boasts of being

Mother of our Juno [queen],

And amongst foreign peoples

For her greater praise

Celebrates only your name.

There the deeds of your ancestors

Rise blazing, as in the heavens

Blazes the bright dawn ;

There [blazes] the glory of your Guiliano

In the Italian skies

Like a bright planet.

Through him, the rude commons

Gained understanding

Of the best learning,

And there shone forth too

Your two great Popes, who still

From heaven, where they are now,

Favour you here.

We cannot count the harvest

Of summer, nor the icicles

Which in winter mark the route

Of waters stubborn in flowing ;

Just so I cannot encompass

The praises of your family.

Heaven painted something

In your appearance which has shown us,

Since first we met,

That you surpass in the greatnes of your destiny

The princesses of our age,

Whether in the force of your courage

Or in royal grandeur.

The sum of your learning

And of all your virtues

Tells us that we cannot see here

Anyone but you, who is like you.

What lady has the skill

Of so much mathematics ?

What princess understands better

The design of the great world,

The paths of nature

And the music of the heavens ?

Your name, which my verse shall praise,

Will fill the whole world

With your well-known praise ;

A mass of those who sing of you

Do not know as well as I

How we should sound your glory.

Jupiter, recalling

An ancient fate

Once determined

By the oracle of Themis,

Commanded that Florence

Beneath the laws of France

Should bend its submissive head.

But he wanted your child

To have triumphant honour from it

As he is, at the same time,

Italian and French,

His brow, eyes and voice

Resembling his father’s and mother’s.

Already full of anger it seems

That his hand tries out arms

And in the midst of alarms

Already disdains danger ;

And, acting as a guide to his men,

As victor places a bridle

On foreign kingdoms.

Heaven, which gave us him

To be our light,

Has not bounded his empire

With hill or river.

Fate wants him to grip

In his hand the whole earth,

Giving him the name of king alone,

From where Phoebus leaves the Indies

To where he brings down his chariot

Sinking into the sea.

We’ve seen Ronsard in panegyric mode before. Obviously it was important to lavish praise on potential patrons, especially royalty; what I think distinguishes Ronsard’s work in this vein is the way he knits so many ideas together into a complex and sophisticated hymn of (undeserved) praise.

So here he adopts a very classical style, with a very un-classical theme; and indeed opens with the singer being ‘possessed’ by a god in a theme harking back to Greek tragedy. Indeed the whole form of the poem echoes tragic choruses in Greek plays.

Antistrophe 1 invents a foundation myth for Florence. The poem is ddressed to Queen Catherine (de Medici), whose family famously rules Florence for much of the renaissance. Ronsard himself offered some footnotes to help us through the invented myth: “as in Pausanias Apollo loved the maiden Bolina, after whom is named a town in Achaea. In the style of the ancients, the poet disguises true things with fictions and fables, and invents a nymph who gave her name to the town of Florence, a daughter of Arno, loved and raped by Apollo; which in effect means that this town is full of courage and learning, as in truth many admirable spirits & many great captains have come from it.” Note that, for all his praise of Florence, Ronsard praises France more for having seized the city – strophe 3!

The authorial footnote is less helpful in strophe 2, where – regarding the reference to “Julien” he tells us only ‘See here the history of Florence’! There are two famous Giuliano de Medicis – brother and son of Lorenzo the Magnificent. The former is famous for being assassinated in the Duomo (cathedral) in Florence; the latter for marrying into the royal family of Savoy and being made Duke of Nemours by king Francis I (of France), before dying prematurely. Both are buried side by side in the Medici chapel in Florence, beneath monuments designed by Michelangelo. I suspect Ronsard is referring to the Duke of Nemours – Catherine’s father’s uncle; but it could be either.

The two great Popes are also, of course, Medicis: Clement VII, alias Giulio de Medici, the posthumous son of the assassinated Giuliano; and Leo X, alias Giovanni de Medici, nephew of the same Giuliano. Both feature in Raphael’s famous portrait of Leo X (Giulio as a cardinal).

Epode 2 brings an unexpected appearance of the word ‘mathematics’ in poetry…! While the praises here are overdone, there is no doubting that Catherine was cultured and knowledgeable: her patronage of the arts and of public spectacles has left little to remember, but she also spent enormous sums on building programmes, and no doubt took a close interest in the architectural designs (which would have been mathematically proportioned). The authorial footnote in any case tells us that ‘mathematics covers all kinds of science, geometry, astronomy and the others, which are all called mathematics’. Some have read the remaining lines as further evidence of scientific learning: ‘the painting of the great world’ (as it translates literally) might be cosmography, but could equally be a reference to her understanding of the art of perspective etc in painting; the ‘paths of nature’ might refer to an understanding of natural phenomena as much as the knowledge of physics (or perhaps alchemy/chemistry) suggested by some; and the ‘music of the spheres’ need not imply metaphysics any more than an understanding of ‘musical proportion’ etc. But however we read it the message is clear: a clever, learned and cultured queen.

Although the prophecy in strophe 3 is invented, Themis is invoked as the classical (or pre-classical) model of what is ‘right’. The footnote tells us ‘this ancient goddess is, high in the heavens for the gods, what justice is here below for men on the earth’. Themis can be translated as ‘right’, though it carries strong connotations of divine order, natural law, the right way of doing things, the will of the gods… All of which Ronsard is invoking through his reference, as ordaining France’s conquest of Florence – so that France’s king, Catherine’s son, might have the best of French and Italian spirit and courage. In the 1550s, this would have been a clear reference to Francis II; but in the following 30 years Catherine was a major power behind the throne for three of her sons, Francis being followed by Charles IX and then Henri III as the Valois dynasty tottered towards its collapse. Ronsard’s decision not to name her son here proved very handy, and kept the poem up-to-date through the rest of his life (Catherine died 4 years after him).

Strophe 3 and Epode 2 (in that order) form the text of Lassus’s 1571 musical setting and were also set by Clereau (here and here), who printed them as separate songs but in the same, reversed, order. Though neither openly names Catherine or is dedicated to her, both retain the reference to Florence as well as France. As Charles IX had married the daughter of the Holy Roman Emperor in 1570, we can be pretty confident that the composers expected the song to be recognised as a tribute to the most powerful Queen in Europe; whether they also meant the song as a sign of support for the Catholic faith at a time when much of northern Europe was riven by the Protestant-Catholic troubles, is less obvious – though it may have been hard to separate the one from the other.