An Unrecognized Old French Ballade

• Published in: Romance philology Vol. 54; no. 1; pp. 51 - 55
• Main Author: Rosenberg, Samuel N.
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Berkeley Brepols Publishers 01.10.2000; BREPOLS PUBLISHERS; University of California Press Books Division
• ISSN: 0035-8002; 2295-9017; 2295-9017
• DOI: 10.1484/J.RPH.2.304363

The ballade in a Medieval French manuscript containing the Rule of the Templars & owned by the Walters Art Gallery in Baltimore, Maryland, is examined, making references to its description in Lilian M. C. Randall's 1989 catalog of the gallery's holdings & brief analysis in Judith Oliver's (1981) article. The possible connection between this poem & the ballades found in the early 14th-century Lorraine manuscript preserved at the Bodleian Library, Oxford, England, (Douce 308) & the seven ballades transmitted in the manuscript at the French National Library in Paris (BNF fr. 146) is explored. It is concluded that the Walters poem is tied to the ballade tradition present in both Douce 308 & BNF fr. 146, as all contain the same formal structure & employ similar rhetoric of Troubadourian amorous discourse. A conjecture is made on how the ballade found its place on the final page of the Rule of the Templars. 15 References. Z. Dubiel