Last updated The Monge de Montaudon receives a prize for his poetry from the Puy Sainta Maria: the white sparrowhawk perched on his arm.
A puy or pui was a society, often organised as a guild or confraternity, sometimes along religious (Catholic) lines, for the patronisation of music and poetry, typically through the holding of competitions. The term puy derives from the Latinpodium, meaning "a place to stand", referring probably to a raised platform from which either the contests delivered their works or the judges listened to them.[1]Puys were established in many cities in northern and central France, the Low Countries, and even England during the High Middle Ages and the Renaissance, usually encouraging composition in the Old French language, but also in Latin and Occitan.[2]
The typical puy was dedicated to the Virgin Mary. Membership was regulated by statutes to which those entering had to swear. These governed the election of executive positions within the puy and the benefits inhering in members. Members could be clerical or lay, male or female, noble or bourgeois, urban or rural. The earliest societies were organised around para-liturgical celebrations of the Marian feast days, but these evolved poetry competitions and eventually the competitions became the focus of the festivals. Music and sung performance were emphasised early on, but over the centuries the quality of the poetry came to dominate the members' concern and the puys of Normandy, especially popular from the fifteenth century on, were redefined in the seventeenth as literary academies. In this form they survived until the French Revolution.
A poetical society known, in a generic fashion, as the Puy Sainta Maria (Puy-Sainte-Marie), seems to have held contests at Le-Puy-en-Velay (Podium Aniciense) in the Occitan language under the patronage of Alfonso II of Aragon (1162–96). Among the troubadours known to have competed was the Monge de Montaudon, who received a Eurasian sparrowhawk as a prize for one piece. He is said by his vida to have held the "suzerainty" of the "court of Puy" (cour du Puy) until it was dissolved.[3]
The height of the French puys was in the Late Middle Ages. The puy would have an open invitation for competitions in several categories, with the theme, form, and refrain in each category stipulated.[4] Among the common most common forms were the formes fixes, the chant royal, jeu parti, serventois, and ballade. The music was generally strophicmonophony, but the puy at Évreux, founded in 1570, did accept two submissions of through-composedpolyphony from Orlande de Lassus. The problems of adjudication at the contests spurred the production of several treatises on versification in the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries.[5] As in the Floral Games celebrated in southern France and Spain, the prizes awarded by the puys could be flowers, such as lilies or roses, or sometimes palms. These floral prizes could be redeemable for money. Besides these, the puys sometimes bestowed signet rings (engraved with imagery or poetry). The puys could attract professionals and men of fame, such as Jean Froissart, who competed and won at Abbeville, Lille, Tournai, and Valenciennes. They also attracted local amateurs.
Rhys awarded two chairs as prizes, one for the winner of the poetry competition and the other for music. The bardic chair went to a poet from Gwynedd, while the musical chair went to the son of Eilon the Crythwr, a member of Rhys's court.[7] Armchairs were a valuable asset, normally reserved for people of high status.[8]
In 2007, Welsh historian Roger Turvey, writing of Dinefwr Castle, suggested that The Lord Rhys' idea for a competitive festival of music and poetry at Cardigan Castle may have been inspired by similar contests in other parts of Catholic Europe. In those other countries, aspiring poets were trained through apprenticeship to master craftsmen or by attending schools run by poets' guilds such as the Puy of France, the Meistersingers of the Holy Roman Empire, or the Rederijkerskamers of the Netherlands, all of which also organized eisteddfod-like contests between poets on patronal feast days of the Roman Catholicliturgical year. The Lord Rhys, Turvey suggested, may have learned about the Puy tradition from the Cambro-Normans in the Welsh Marches or from Welsh mercenary soldiers returning from France.[9]
When asked about Turvey's theory, recognized eisteddfod historian Hywel Teifi Edwards said, "It's conjecture, but there's no doubt that there was a bardic tradition of competition for status before this time." Edwards further stated that any foreign influence was an indication of how very cosmopolitan Medieval Wales had been. "It's a sign of a healthy culture to accept – and marry with – other cultures," he added.[9]
Notes
↑ Elizabeth C. Teviotdale, "Puy", Grove Music Online, Oxford Music Online (accessed 16 August 2008). Adam de la Halle, who was associated with the Puy d'Arras, was the first to use the word to mean "a society holding literary competitions". There is some reason to believe that they may have their name from the Massif Central (a plateau in central France), where troubadour competitions are known from the period circa 1162–96. See also "Puy", The Oxford Companion to Music, Alison Latham, ed., Oxford Music Online (accessed 17 August 2008).
↑ Margarita Egan, ed. (1984), The Vidas of the Troubadours (New York: Garland, ISBN0-8240-9437-9), 70.
↑ At Amiens every year, the refrain was publicised on a scroll alongside the Virgin and some illustrious contemporaries on a painted panel in the cathedral. Copies of these paintings, along with the winning chants royaux, from the period 1460–1517 are preserved in the Bibliothèque nationale de France, Paris, French MS 145, a work made for Louise of Savoy.
↑ Pierre Fabri wrote Le grant et vrai art de pleine rhétorique (1521) for puy of Rouen.
Rhys ap Gruffydd or ap Gruffudd was the ruler of the kingdom of Deheubarth in south Wales from 1155 to 1197. Today, he is commonly known as The Lord Rhys, in Welsh Yr Arglwydd Rhys, although this title may have not been used in his lifetime. He usually used the title "Proprietary Prince of Deheubarth" or "Prince of South Wales", but two documents have been discovered in which he uses the title "Prince of Wales" or "Prince of the Welsh". Rhys was one of the most successful and powerful Welsh princes, and, after the death of Owain Gwynedd of Gwynedd in 1170, the dominant power in Wales.
Deheubarth was a regional name for the realms of south Wales, particularly as opposed to Gwynedd. It is now used as a shorthand for the various realms united under the House of Dinefwr, but that Deheubarth itself was not considered a proper kingdom on the model of Gwynedd, Powys, or Dyfed is shown by its rendering in Latin as dextralis pars or as Britonnes dexterales and not as a named land. In the oldest British writers, Deheubarth was used for all of modern Wales to distinguish it from Hen Ogledd, the northern lands whence Cunedda originated.
In Welsh culture, an eisteddfod is an institution and festival with several ranked competitions, including in poetry and music. The term eisteddfod, which is formed from the Welsh morphemes: eistedd, meaning 'sit', and fod, meaning 'be', means, according to Hywel Teifi Edwards, "sitting-together." Edwards further defines the earliest form of the eisteddfod as a competitive meeting between bards and minstrels, in which the winner was chosen by a noble or royal patron.
Cardigan is both a town and a community in the county of Ceredigion, Wales. Positioned on the tidal reach of the River Teifi at the point where Ceredigion meets Pembrokeshire, Cardigan was the county town of the historic county of Cardiganshire. Cardigan is the second-largest town in Ceredigion. The largest town, Aberystwyth, is one of the two administrative centres; the other is Aberaeron.
Christian poetry is any poetry that contains Christian teachings, themes, or references. The influence of Christianity on poetry has been great in any area that Christianity has taken hold. Christian poems often directly reference the Bible, while others provide allegory.
The Crowning of the Bard is one of the most important events in a Welsh eisteddfod or Scottish Gaelic Mòd.
The Royal House of Dinefwr was a cadet branch of the Royal House of Gwynedd, founded by King Cadell ap Rhodri, son of Rhodri the Great. Their ancestor, Cunedda Wledig, born in late Roman Britain, was a Sub-Roman warlord who founded the Kingdom of Gwynedd during the 5th century, following the Anglo-Saxon settlement of Britain. As Celtic Britons, the House of Dinefwr was ruling before the Norman conquest, having to fight with their neighbors such as the Celtics, Anglo-Saxons and Vikings, before struggling with the Normans afterwards. Many members of this family were influential in Welsh history, such as Hywel Dda, who codified Welsh law under his rule, and achieved the important title of King of the Britons, or Lord Rhys, Prince of Wales, who rebelled against Richard the Lionheart, and became one of the most powerful Welsh leaders of the Middle ages.
Goronwy Owen was one of the 18th century's most notable Welsh poets. He mastered the 24 traditional bardic metres and, although forced by circumstances into exile, played an important role in the literary and antiquarian movement in Wales often described as the Welsh 18th-century Renaissance.
The Confrérie des jongleurs et bourgeois d'Arras was a fraternity of jongleurs founded in Arras, France, in or around 1175. As its name implies, it was intended for jongleurs and the bourgeoisie, not just the knightly class. It also did not hold poetic contests. In these ways it was distinct from the Puy d'Arras.
The Puy d'Arras, called in its own day the Puy Notre-Dame, was a medieval poetical society formed in Arras for holding contests between trouvères and pour maintenir amour et joie. The term puy is Old French for "place of eminence", from Latin podium. The president of the Puy, elected annually, was titled the Prince du Puy, and he presided over the competitions, which were decided by panels of judges. The Puy was under the nominal patronage of the Virgin Mary, referred to as "Notre Dame du Puy d'Arras". Other puys under her patronage were founded at Amiens, Boulogne-sur-Mer, Caen, Évreux, and Rouen.
The jeu-parti is a genre of French lyric poetry composed between two trouvères. It is a cognate of the Occitan partimen. In the classic type, one poet poses a dilemma question in the opening stanza, his or her partner picks a side in the second stanza, which replicates the versification of the first and is sung to the same melody. Typically, the jeu-parti has six stanzas, with the two interlocutors alternating stanza by stanza. Many jeux-partis also have final partial stanzas in which one or both of the interlocutors appoint judges and call for judgement. The outcome, however, is virtually never given within the jeu-parti itself and would have been the subject of audience discussion after the jeu-parti's performance. The form was particularly associated with the Puy d'Arras. Over 200 examples survive, of which around 180 are in the classic form.
Andrieu Contredit d'Arras was a trouvère from Arras and active in the Puy d'Arras. "Contredit" may not be, as it might appear, a nickname, since two other individuals with the name Contredit are attested in a manuscript associated with the Puy. It records his death at Arras in 1248 and the death of his wife in 1225. Contredit may therefore be a surname. Andrieu Contredit wrote mostly grand chants, but also a pastourelle, a lai, and a jeu-parti with Guillaume li Vinier.
Gerallt Lloyd Owen was a Welsh-language poet who lived in Llandwrog. He is considered to be one of Wales's leading "strict-metre" poets.
Evan Rees, known by the bardic name Dyfed, was a Calvinistic Methodist minister, poet, and Archdruid of the National Eisteddfod of Wales.
Christine James FLSW is a Welsh poet and academic. She served as the first female Archdruid of Wales from June 2013 until June 2016. She first presided over the ceremonies at the National Eisteddfod in the 2013 Eisteddfod in Denbigh. Like all holders, she qualified by winning a major literary prize at a previous National Eisteddfod. She was elected Cofiadur (Recorder) of the Gorsedd of Bards at the National Eisteddfod in 2017, again as the first woman to hold the post. She is a recipient of the Wales Book of the Year.
Evan Gwyndaf Evans or "Gwyndaf" was a Welsh poet who served as Archdruid of the National Eisteddfod of Wales from 1966 to 1969.
The 1176 Cardigan eisteddfod, as it is commonly described, was a cultural tournament involving bards and musicians, held in the grounds of Cardigan Castle, Cardigan, West Wales, by the Lord Rhys ap Gruffydd. Though the term eisteddfod was not commonly used until several centuries later, the 1176 gathering is commonly claimed to be the earliest recorded forerunner of the modern national eisteddfod event.
Gruffudd ap Nicolas or Gruffudd ap Nicholas was a powerful nobleman in Carmarthenshire, Wales. He organised several bardic eisteddfods in the county during the 1450s.
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