gap

   The term gap was applied to a particular genre of TROUBADOUR lyric poetry popularized by GUILLAUME IX, the first troubadour. Essentially the gap was a boasting song, in which the singer presents himself as a master in his field—either the greatest poet, or the noblest courtier, or the truest lover, or, more commonly, all of these, since the convention in the COURTLY LOVE tradition was that love ennobled the lover, and gave him the skills to sing. The best in any one of these areas must also be the best in the others, since they are interconnected. In Guillaume’s poem “Ben vuelh que sapchon li pluzor,” the poet boasts:

   I want everyone to tell

   whether there’s good color to this vers

   that I have brought out of my workshop:

   because I’m the one that gets the flower in

   this craft,

   and that is the truth.

   (Goldin 1973, 33, ll. 1–5)

   As the poem goes on, the “crafts” of which he is master turn out to be not only poetry, but courtliness and physical lovemaking as well. Another early troubadour, MARCABRU, wrote a well-known gap, “D’aisso lau Dieu,” in which he satirizes the attitude of the lustful man who boasts of his ability to fool the gilos or jealous husband and have any woman he wants:

   In another man’s woods

   I go hunting every time I feel like it,

   and I set my two little dogs barking,

   and my third, my hound,

   thrusts forward,

   all bold and fixed on the prey.

   (Goldin 1973, 59, ll. 37–42)

   But the true lover could boast as well, and a more common kind of gap from that point of view is BERNART DE VENTADORN’s “Non es meravelha s’eu chan,” which begins

   Of course it’s no wonder I sing

   better than any other troubadour:

   my heart draws me more toward love,

   and I am better made for his command.

   (Goldin 1973, 127, ll. 1–4)

   The true lover’s humility was a tenet of the courtly tradition, so Marcabru’s poem displays the lust of the false lovers that he condemned. But the ennobling power of love to raise the lover to the heights of noble behavior and poetic skill was also a tenet of courtliness, so that one could speak as Bernart does and still maintain humility, because the praise would go to the power of love.

   Bibliography

   ■ Goldin, Frederick, ed. and trans. Lyrics of the Troubadours and Trouvères: An Anthology and a History. Garden City, N.Y.: Anchor, 1973.