Love and War: Troubadour Songs as Propaganda, Protest, and Politics in the Albigensian Crusade

Abstract

From the eleventh through the thirteenth century, the troubadours flourished in the Occitan courts of southern France. As the artistic and political voices of their culture, these men and women were educated, creative, and well-placed to envoice the cultural and political events of their time. In 1208, Pope Innocent III launched the Albigensian Crusade against the pervasive Cathar sect, which had attracted followers from every stratum of Occitan society, including believers from the most important ruling families. For twenty years, the crusade decimated the region and destroyed the socio-political apparatus which had long supported, and been given voice by, the troubadours and trobairises. By the end of the war in 1229, the Occitan nobility were largely disinherited and disempowered, unable to support the kind of courtly estates to which they had been accustomed and in which the art de trobar had flourished. Many troubadours were involved both politically and militarily in the crusade and their lyric reactions include astute political commentaries, vigorous calls-to-arms, invectives against the corruption of the Catholic clergy and the French invaders, and laments for the loss of both individuals and institutions. Their works constitute an important historical narrative and the artistic expression of a culture in crisis. The troubadour songs of this period preserve the final voices of a culture straining against its own destruction, using the standard tropes, artistic conventions, and familiar genres to document the greatest crisis of their time.