In Poetry Courtly Love, Arnaut Daniel was known as the Grand Master of Love.

Arnaut Daniel, a great Poetry Courtly Love poet, was a Provençal troubadour of the 13th century, praised by Dante and called "Grand Master of Love" by Petrarch. In the 20th century he was lauded by Ezra Pound as the greatest poet to have ever lived. Clearly he can be regarded as one of the greatest in his field.

Daniel was born of a noble family at the castle of Ribeyrac in Périgord. He was the inventor of the sestina, a song of six stanzas of six lines each, with the same rhymes repeated in all, though arranged in different and intricate order, which must be seen to be understood.

He was also author of the metrical romance of Lancillotto, or Launcelot of the Lake, to which Dante doubtless refers in his expression prose di romanzi ("proses of romance").

In Dante's work The Divine Comedy, Arnaut Daniel appears as a character doing penance in Purgatory for lust. He was the first among the troubadours to address the physical aspect of love with his insistence that he wants to be bodily united with his lady and he mocked those poets who only dream of a spiritual union ( “Lo ferm voler qu’el cor m’intra” ).

With all these glowing recommendations in view, let us take a closer look at some of examples of Arnaut Daniel's style of poetry courtly love.

Quan chai la fuelha (When the leaf sings)

When the leaf sings

from the highest peaks

and the cold raises,

withering the kernel and willow,

of its sweet refrains

I see the wood grow dumb;

but I'm close to love,

whosoever might leave it.

Everything is iced,

but I cannot freeze

because a love affair

makes my heart lush again;

I should not shake,

because Love covers and hides me

and makes me preserve

my merit, and leads me.

Life is good,

if joy holds it,

though some, whose things

do not go well, complain;

I don't know how

to accuse my lot

since, by my troth,

I have my share of the best.

As of flirting,

I don't know what to blame,

and of the others

I spurn the togetherness;

since, of all her peers,

no one is like mine,

since there doesn't seem to be one

who comes not after her.

I don't want my heart

to join another love

lest she flees me

and turns her head elsewhere:

that even the one from Pontremoli

has one worthier

of her, or that so seems so.

She's so kind,

that the kindest thirty

she wins by her fair look:

that's a good reason

for her to hear my songs,

because she's so noble

and so preciously deserving.

Go, then, song,

show before her:

if it were not so,

you wouldn't deserve Arnaut's toil.

http://www.trobar.org/arnaut_daniel




If you liked that example of Arnaut Daniel's poetry, you can see even more, if you follow the links below:-

Click Here For Arnaut Daniel Sample2

Click Here For Arnaut Daniel Sample3

Click Here For Arnaut Daniel Sample4

Click Here For Bernart de Ventardon Poetry

Click Here for examples of Troubadour Poetry

If you enjoyed the poetry on this page and would like to see more,Click Here for examples of Poetry Courtly Love

If you would like to see even more examples of poetry on courtly love, Click Here.

If you like Poetry Courtly Love and would like to receive more information directly in your inbox, subscribe to my Love Poetry of The World newsletter

Return from Poetry Courtly Love to Love Poetry of The World