Four worldly virtues,
wisdom, courtly manners, honesty and self-restraint, were contrasted
with the ecclesiastical cardinal virtues. The courts of the princes
became centres of new life and art. The new spiritual-aesthetic concept
of feasting and enjoyment transformed the former orgies of eating and
drinking. Woman, who had heretofore been excluded from male society, was
all at once transferred to the very centre of being; for her sake men
controlled their brutal tempers and exerted themselves to please by
good manners, taste and art. She, whom the Church had done everything to
depreciate, who had been denied a soul at the Council of Macon (in the
sixth century), had become the very vessel of the soul; man looked up to
her and bent his knee before the newly-created goddess.
The cultivation of the new courtly manner coincided with the nascent art
of the troubadours. There was no gradual growth and development in the
latter; at the very outset it had reached perfection. The first
troubadour whose name has come down to us was Guillem of Poitiers, Duke
of Aquitania (about 1100); great lords and barons gloried in the
exercise of this new art.
Pages:
72
73
74
75
76
77
78
79
80
81
82
83
84
85
86
87
88
89
90
91
92
93
94
95
96