The aristocracy of fair Provence, in its heyday of glory and prosperity, was, notwithstanding this addiction to verse, perhaps the most reckless and profligate the world has ever seen. One of the foremost Barons of the March was Bertrand Von Born, a typical war-like troubadour of the twelfth century. Prominent in the political quarrels of the day, a perfect firebrand of war, he was courted and dreaded by princes and kings; ever in search of new lands and new loves, wielding with equal vigour the lyre and the sword, in the science of war and the art of love he was without a rival. Sometimes fighting with Cœur-de-Lion, sometimes against him, this true child of the Langue d’Oc, after many gallant defences, was captured, but through the extraordinary influence he exerted over his captors, escaped with life and liberty. After a long and stormy career, Bertrand Von Born ended his days as a monk in the monastery of Coteaux.
In the gallery of noble and stately figures furnished by Provençal poetry, we have a picture of enduring historic interest left us by the troubadour Rambaud of Vaquieras, of the famous Boniface, Marquis of Montferrat, one of an heroic family of crusaders, who was himself a troubadour and the _beau-idéal_ of a knight-errant, comforting the afflicted, punishing the wicked, and relieving distressed damsels. When the preaching of Fulk of Neuilly roused the chivalry of France, Champagne, and Flanders to a new crusade, Rambaud followed the banner of his brother-in-arms the Marquis to Palestine, winning knighthood, singing and fighting his way through all the perils of the holy war. His songs are a record of splendidly dramatic incidents; and in the vivid sketches of his surroundings, we are enabled to trace the events in the life of the great soldier-poet, in whom all the virtues and vices of his ancestors seem to have been personified.
To Raymond de Miravals, who, Nostradamus informs us, was ‘deeply learned in the science of love,’ we are indebted for a series of life-like portraits of some of the loveliest women of the period. This fashionable poet, notorious for his misfortunes in love, died ‘poor, and worn out in body and mind,’ after spending many years of his life sighing in the train of a noted beauty. An old French chronicler writes: ‘Through the songs of Raymond, was Adelais admired and sought of all the barons far and near, and she became the subject of curiosity even at the courts of Aragon and Toulouse, and the king and the count sent her messages and presents of jewels, which she willingly accepted.’