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Guillem de Cabestan (1162-1212)

A Catalan from Capestany in the County of Roussillon, his name in Occitan is Guilhem de Cabestaing, Cabestang, Cabestan, or Cabestanh. According to his legendary vida, he was the lover of Seremonda, or Soremonda, wife of Raimon of Castel Rossillon. Raimon killed Cabestan, and fed the lover's heart to her without her knowledge. On discovering what she had eaten, she threw herself from a window to her death. The legend appears later in Boccaccio's Decameron.

"It is Cabestan's heart in the dish! "

Ezra Pound - Canto IV
Aissi cum selh que baissa? l fuelh

Like to him who bends the leaves

And picks the loveliest flower of all

I from the highest branch have seized,

Of them, the one most beautiful,

One God has made, without a stain,

Made her out of His own beauty,

And He commanded that humility

Should her great worth grace again.

With her sweet glance, her gentle eyes

She made true joyous lover of me,

And the love whose pain applies

Heart's tears to my complexion, see,

I have never sought to explain;

But now I'll sing of her freely,

From whom is born such beauty

For I've not shown her plain.

I won't speak common boasts or praise,

But truth, with a thousand witnesses,

Let all desire what I wish always,

The lance of love for the joyous

That wounds the unprotected heart

With friendship's pleasant pleasing;

Yet I have felt such blow's assailing,

That from the deepest sleep I start.

Let her then show me mercy

And welcome, despite her grandeur,

Let me reveal the ill that pains me,

And how she adds to my dolour,

Into my heart now drives it further:

Love and sadness she grants to me,

For love of her, the best you'll see

From Le Puy down to Lleida.

Her rich worth is of the highest,

My lady they hold the noblest here,

Of all the world naked or dressed:

God made her gentle, to His honour,

She's chosen by the best wherever

She may choose to show her beauty,

And her true refined nobility

That with the best adorns her ever.

She is so noble, of sweet welcome,

I wish to take no other lover,

She's wise, mocks not at anyone,

With beauty blessed and with valour;

And not forgetting courtesy;

For usage of the courteous will

Protects her from all enmity still,

And every other infamy.

Note: Lleida, Lerida in English until the 20th century, is one of the oldest towns in Catalonia.

Lo jorn qu'ie?
us vi, dompna, primeiramen,

The day I saw you, lady that first time,

When you were pleased to let me see,

All other thoughts departed from my mind,

And my wishes turned to you, utterly.

For, lady, you set desire in the heart

With one sweet smile, and a simple glance

Made me forget myself, all circumstance.

That great beauty and sweet conversation,

The noble speech and loving pleasure

That I knew there so dazed all sensation,

That to this hour, lady, I've not its measure.

Yours the concession, to plea of my true heart

That seeks to exalt your worth and honour;

Yours my submission, I could love no better.

And since I am so loyal to you, lady,

That Love grants me no power to love elsewhere,

But lets me pay court to one, maybe,

Who might remove the heavy grief I bear;

So when I think of you to whom joy bows,

All other love's forgotten and displaced:

With her my heart holds dearest, there it stays.

Remember, if you will, the promises,

You know you made me when we parted,

My heart then gay and filled with happiness,

Because sweet hope in me you commanded:

Great joy I felt then, now my ills increase,

Yet, when you please, I shall that joy know

Once more, sweet lady, for I live in hope.

And no ill treatment ever makes me dread,

Solely because I think my life will gain

From you, lady, some certain pleasure;

Whereby ills will be joy, delight again,

Solely through pain, for I know Love demands

That true lovers great wrongs still must pardon,

And for their good must bear an evil burden.

Ai! Lady, were this the hour when I might see

You, in your mercy, granting me such honour

By simply deigning then to call me lover!

Anc mais no m? fo semblan

Never would I have conceived

That, for Love, my joy

And pleasure I would leave,

For sweetness tears employ:

Held in her power truly,

Love has me, for in me rise

Such sweet delights, I see

To serve her God made me

And for her worth I prize.

Often I have complained

Of her whom I do praise,

And then have thanked again

The root of my complaints,

And that's not strange, it's plain;

For those whom Love ennobles

Must suffer many things,

For often, the poet sings,

True good can conquer ills.

The lover can't complain

Nor confess to his harm,

Nor speak about his pain,

Nor praise the good, his balm,

If he seeks to change,

And is ever altering:

Many choose to talk

Knowing nothing of what

Brings joy or suffering.

None knows enough of love

To speak without trembling,

Yet I've seen laughter move,

Though not from joy arising,

And many the sighs that prove

No more than clever feigning;

Yet Love is leading me,

Towards the best I see,

Without shame or cheating.

Lady, the truest lovers

And the long-suffering too

And those that most flatter

Their lady and her truth,

Without orders, their ruler,

Through your courtliness

Will do what pleases you

And nothing I do rue,

Nothing but fears repress.

You so weigh on my mind

That when I pray I often

Think you are at hand,

Then your fresh complexion

Your body nobly planned,

So fill my memory

I think of nothing else,

And from this sweet thought well

Goodwill and courtesy.