113 Galician-Portuguese Troubadour Poems

by Richard Zenith

The poetry of the Provencal troubadours has been widely appreciated this century, but most modern readers of English are unaware of the trovador tradition on the Iberian Peninsula. Some 1,685 cantigas (sung poems), written in Galician-Portuguese between the twelfth and fourteenth centuries, survive in several cancioneiros (song books). The language of the cantigas reflects the vernacular spoken along the Minho river dividing Portugal from Galicia. It was the idiom of lyric poets in every Peninsular region except Catalonia.
One of the two main types of love songs is the fascinating cantiga d'amigo, derived from an oral tradition native to the peninsula and narrated from the woman's point of view. Satirical songs, on the other hand, provide insights into the history and politics of the day, or else take delight in pure invective and ribald fun far more daring (some would say 'vulgar') than the work of poets of our own day.

Genres: Poetry

280 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1995

About the author

Richard Zenith is an acclaimed translator and literary critic. His translations include Fernando Pessoa’s The Book of Disquiet and Fernando Pessoa and Co.: Selected Poems, which won the PEN Award for Poetry in Translation. The recipient of Portugal’s Pessoa Prize, Zenith lives in Lisbon, Portugal.