Cantiga de amigo

The "cantiga de amigo" (modern Portuguese and Galician spelling), or "cantiga d'amigo" (the spelling found in medieval Galician-Portuguese manuscripts), "song about a boyfriend", was a kind of lyric poetry which seems to be a native product of the northwest quadrant of the Iberian Peninsula. It is essentially female voiced love lyric. The earliest examples that survive are dated from roughly the 1220's, and nearly all 500 were composed before 1300. "Cantigas d' amigo" are found mainly in the "Cancioneiro Colocci-Brancuti", now in Lisbon's Biblioteca Nacional, and in the "Cancioneiro da Vaticana", both copied in Italy at the beginning of the 16th century (possibly around 1525) at the behest of the Italian humanist Angelo Colocci.

In these "cantigas" the speaker is nearly always a girl, her mother, the girl's girl friend, or the girl's boyfriend. Stylistically, they are characterized by simple strophic forms, with repetition, variation, and parallelism, and are marked by the use of a refrain (around 90% of the texts). They constitute the largest body of female-voiced love lyric that has survived from ancient or medieval Europe. There are eighty-eight authors, all male, some of the most famous being Johan Airas de Santiago, King Dinis of Portugal, Martim Codax, Airas Nunes, Pero Meogo, Johan de Cangas, Meendinho and Johan Zorro.

The "cantigas de amigo" have been said to have characteristics in common with the Mozarabic "kharajat", but these may be merely coincidences of female speaker and erotic themes. [See Federico Corriente, "Poesía dialectal árabe y romance en Alandalús: cejeles y xarajāt de muwaššaḥāt" [Madrid: Gredos, 1997] .]

amples

Below are two "cantigas d’amigo" by Bernal de Bonaval (text from Cohen 2003 , tr. M. Boaz)

:Bernal de Bonaval 7

:"Rogar vos quer' eu, mha madre e mha senhor,"
:"que mi non digades oje mal, se eu for"
:"a Bonaval, pois meu amig' i ven"

:"Se vos non pesar, mha madre, rogar vos ei,"
:"por Deus, que mi non digades mal, e irei"
:"a Bonaval, pois meu amig' i ven"

:I want to ask you, my mother and my lady,
:That you not speak ill of me today, if I go
:To Bonaval, since my boy is coming there.

:If it doesn’t upset you, my mother, I will ask,
:By God, that you not speak ill of me, and I’ll go
:To Bonaval, since my boy is coming there.

:Bernal de Bonaval 8

:"Filha fremosa, vedes que vos digo:"
:"que non faledes ao voss' amigo"
:"sen mi, ai filha fremosa"

:"E se vós, filha, meu amor queredes,"
:"rogo vos eu que nunca lhi faledes"
:"sen mi, ai filha fremosa"

:"E al á i de que vos non guardades:"
:"perdedes i de quanto lhi falades"
:"sen mi, ai filha fremosa"

:Lovely daughter, look what I’m telling you:
:Do not talk with your boyfriend
:Without me, o lovely daughter.

:And, daughter, if you want my love,
:I ask you that you never talk with him
:Without me, o lovely daughter.

:And there’s something else you’re careless about:
:You lose every word you talk with him
:Without me, o lovely daughter.

Notes

References

* Rip Cohen, "500 Cantigas d'amigo: A Critical Edition" (Porto: Campo das Letras, 2003)

ee also

* "Cancioneiro da Ajuda"
* "Cancioneiro da Vaticana"
* "Cancioneiro Colocci-Brancuti", also known as "Cancioneiro da Biblioteca Nacional"
* "Cantigas de Santa Maria"
* Galician-Portuguese
* Martim Codax
* Occitan literature
* Pergaminho Sharrer