Regret

Regret

Watching as his King had leapt into the boiling tub of water, the seneschal could not help but flinch. It was a horrifying sight, yes, but as soon as the shrieks calmed down, anger took over his mind. How could she? His own wife? With the King of all people? Grasping her by the head, he brought her down to the water, drowning and boiling her alive. A splash of water touched his skin and he yelped in pain, loosening his grip. But by the time she was free from his hold, it was far too late. Anger consumed him as he glared down at her body, holding himself a sadistic grin. How dare she cheat on him! This was her fault... she deserved this... right?

As he stared down at his wife; what remained of her, his anger replaced itself with regret. Why? Why had he done this? What kind of internal beast allowed itself to come out of hiding from within him? His lips parted, as if to say something, but he was cut off by the sound of loud footsteps coming towards him; quickly. Panic set itself in as he glanced to the doorway then quickly back to the tub. Sweat tripped down his forehead as he took a deep gulp. “I am sorry, my beloved...”

By the time the guards would arrive, there would not be one corpse in the tub, not two, but three.

The Transformation

"She looks at the silk cloth on the bed; she never saw such a good one except the one she gave with her daughter whom she hid." (Le Fresne, 413-416)

This quote has a significant and allegorical meaning to it because when the woman sees the cloth she realizes what she has done. The cloth symbolizes purity or innocence. When the cloth is first shown, it is wrapped around a baby girl who is left in a tree. At the climax of the story, the daughter of the woman puts the same cloth on the bed for the couple, as if to [consummate the marriage] relinquish her innocence. 

Rebounds from Ill-Intentions

"One who pursues another's harm may find the wrong rebounds on him," (De France, 309-310). 

This quote from the chapter "Equitan" is significant because of how controversial it is. Do you believe that when you wish harm upon others, the harm comes back your way instead? This touches on the idea of karma, which I believe in. This quote is also significant to the story, because all along, the wife and the king were planning on killing the seneschal. However, he caught onto their plan and ended up killing the both of them instead. 

Who makes the rules?

"She thought and said to herself that if she had known 
the sort of person Le Fresne was, 
Le Fresne would not have suffered loss for her daughter's sake 
nor would she have taken her lord from her," (De France, 385-388).



This quotation is significant to the story of Le Fresne because it shows the irony within the mother's actions. In the beginning, the mother was ready to kill Le Fresne because she did not want to have a bad reputation following her. However, after the mother knows how amazing of a person Le Fresne became she is ready to cater to her needs instead of Le Codre, her other daughter. 

Why was the mother pardon, but the other knight's wife carry a bad reputation? What goes on through the mother's mind to decide to easily kill one child, but now cater to that same child's needs? Who makes the rules in this land? 

In my opinion, this quote sums up the irony in this entire story. Additionally, this quote can be relatable to life today. People, hopefully, often feel regretful after making a mistake based on wrong information; if only they knew the truth, then they would not commit the error. 

What love is

I was surprised by the description of what love was. It made it sound like pure hell, which I guess is what it can feel like at times. There's so much insecurity involved such as "if he is ugly, he fears that she may despise his lack of beauty or may give her love to a more handsome man." That's insane from my perspective because I believe that personality and actions speak louder than looks. It's like an apple. It make look good on the outside, but once you bite into it, you can see the rot on the inside. People fear the exterior of themselves such as their homes, looks, wealth, etc. as if they define who they are and who will love them. How can you expect someone to love those things about you when you yourself don't?

There's another line that came off as sarcastic to me. "O what a wonderful thing is love, which makes a man shine with so many virtues and teaches everyone, no matter who he is, so many good traits of character!" It sounded like the writer was making a mockery of something he'd heard once before. Like love covers up the bad traits and only allows the good to shine through. He then refutes this when he discusses a man who is so passionate about love that he falls for every beautiful woman he meets. How is that love? Did they not know what lust was back when this was written? He compares them to animals who are only in it to screw around with the opposite sex whenever the opportunity presents itself. He even went so far as to say that there's no such thing as love between couples of the same sex because they would not be able to naturally procreate. So, now, you have to be able to have children in order for your love to be valid. That's how I interpreted it, anyway. This guy is all over the place about what love could be. These guidelines just aren't going to cut it. Love is painful and complicated, but it's also exhilarating and simple.

Rules of Love?

When reading Courtly Love, we see a man who meets a woman in a forest and before they even speak, he has already fallen in love. He begins to risk his life for someone that he just meets. And we see that there are a set of rules that are meant for people in love and I don’t think they make a lot of sense.

In today’s world, there are people out there that want to settle down and find the one they are meant to be with forever. this reminds me of my best friend. She always tells me about how she and her boyfriend met and how she instantly knew he was the one and that they were going to be together for a long time. The rules that are at the end of the reading are there to show us what being in love is meant to look like and just from watching my friends together, those rules don’t make any sense. Like the rule about the difficulty of finding love and how if it comes easy then it’s not love, my best friend met her boyfriend on Tinder and they were only talking for a day before they meet in person.

These rule that is for lovers to me don’t make sense nowadays because there are times when someone doesn’t get jealous or they meet while still in another relationship or they meet online or they don’t have a good character

Is Love Truly Blind?

"Blindness is a bar to love, because a blind man cannot see anything upon which his mind can reflect immoderately, so love cannot rise in him" (Capellanus, 33).

I found this quote to be significant because I found it very absurd. I have always heard the message that love is blind.  Well according to Chapter 5, love just seems very shallow as they placed boundaries on who is fit to love. Love has no boundaries to an extent, and there are many other factors to consider to fall in love with someone which is not just age and appearance.

Love for Everyone

I spent MLK Day spending time with other students and C Nicole Mason, who wrote Born Bright. Throughout the day, we discussed social injustice and how society can fight towards social justice. Reflecting back on The Art of Courtly Love and MLK day, I found myself mainly focused on "Chapter II. Between What Persons Love May Exist" and how this section reflects back into today's current climate. 

Taking the time period into consideration, I understand why it was believed that “love cannot exist except between persons of opposite sexes,” (Capellanus, 30). There are still many instances where the ideology from the older time period has remained true. For example, in 1998, Matthew Shepard was murdered in Wyoming because he identified as a gay man. Additionally, a bakery in Colorado refused to make a wedding cake for a same-sex couple in the summer of 2017. Same-sex couples were legally allowed to marry each other in all states in 2015. Today, there are still marches to fight for LGBTQ+ rights. 

In my opinion, this chapter contradicts the overarching theme of the work that someone should do whatever it takes to make love work. A person should do whatever it takes to show their love, but according to Capellanus there are many stipulations when it comes to love. On top of not being able to love someone of the same sex, one cannot be capable of love if they are too young, too blind, or too passionate. The Art of Courtly Love seems to appeal to some idea of what love should be, but the entire piece does not encompass what love is in today's society. 

Love

COURTLY LOVE

       According to the reading from our course, courtly love has a background which gives a senses to how love was practice back the days. Around the thirteen centuries, passionate love between the two sexes was seen as a punishment inflicted on men by the Gods. I do believe that the king from the story of Les Deux Amanz didn't really want to give his daughter in marriage to any young men. As a result he set up a plan hard his daughter's lovers to achieve in order for them to marry his daughter. also, Les Deux Amanz is a good example of Andrew's rule of love number 25. Stating that "A true lover considers nothing good except what he thinks will please his beloved" the love of the king's daughter was in love in the way that he did everything just to be with her. he died on top of the hill trying to do the impossible task provided by his father in law. 

          Also, in Les Deux Amanz, the lover couldn't control his love as shown in the way love may be retained is by keeping it secret (Andrew). Despite the fact that the lover of the king's daughter knew that he couldn't do the task asked, he had an kept seen his lover in secret until exposed by people. he still went and proposed even thought he saw previews men falling to succeed the task asked by the father in law. We can explain the rule number of love by Andrew in the fact that the king's daughter couldn't love someone else. so, she died from the loneliness after the death of her lover. 

Masculine Perspective of Love

During my reading of The Art of Courtly Love by Andreas Capellanus, and of the language and focus of the writing, specifically that of the chapter “Between What Persons Love May Exist” on page 30, a consistent, persistent use of an invariably uniform undertone was made apparent. Throughout the entirety of the reading, there was a distinct focus upon masculinity, but the language used was also masculine in perspective. Most of the points that are made are done so through an almost blatant objectification of women, in such cases men are the ‘lovers’ and women are that thing which is to be loved. This contrasts with the modern use of the term lovers, which is often considered in the plural sense to include both of the people who are in love. The use in this writing, however, seems to indicate that only a man may be a lover to his ‘beloved’ and that this status of being a lover is one which is exclusive to the male gender.

            This does not mean that the woman, or beloved, is necessarily looked down upon, or that it would be impermissible for a woman to be a lover, but rather indicates to a modern reader the way medieval men and women thought about love. Indeed, some of these traditions of a man being stereotypically chivalrous or doting to a woman have carried themselves onward into the modern age, but our language and usage of it has evolved, to some degree. As Capellanus states, “Every attempt of a lover tends toward the enjoyment of the embraces of her whom he loves…” (Capellanus, p. 30).  This sheds some insight on the thinking of the beloved woman being a static or inactive party which must be acted upon by a male lover.

Female Choice

While reading The Art of Courtly Love I was reminded frequently of the prospect of female choice in biological science. The story of the knight from Britain, I feel, is a good example of female choice. If the knight did not need to rely on the beautiful woman choosing him, but instead making it his own decision to form a relationship with the woman, he likely would not have had to complete the various tasks laid out for him.

            This stories theme is a common one, where the hero must complete feats of physical or mental strength to prove himself over those around him, much like the hero of this story battling knights and maintaining his composure and honor throughout his quest. Sheer feats of brute strength are not the only things the common hero needs to show, a sense of compassion towards others and the capability to show mercy towards those they have conflicts with, which can be seen in the battle on the bridge, “But when the Briton was about to smite off his head, the bridge keeper, by the most humble entreaties, sought and obtained mercy.” (Capellanus, 180).

The notion of female choice gives enormous power to those women seeking a spouse or lover, while simultaneously giving reason for the men to become the best that they can in every way they can.

Love Wins

After reading the story, The Art of Cortly Love, it gave me some interesting insight on how love was viewed in medieval times. After reading chapter two: "Between What Persons Love May Exist" I was not surprised to find that it stated that people of the same sex cannot love each other. This relates to a debate that continues today. The United States has come a long way in supporting homosexual couples. This includes legalizing same-sex marriages, but we have yet to reach full equality. There are still many people in the United States that believe being a homosexual is morally wrong. Many of these people have this belief because of their religion. My uncle is married to a man that he loves. It took a long time before they were able to become married; throughout this period of time, both of them have faced hardships due to their sexual orientation. There are still many people today that face these same troubles, and it upsets me to know that many of these people are not accepted for who they love. I do not believe that you can choose who you love; I think love is a feeling, whether it is felt towards someone of the same-sex or not. 

Surprise, God might actually be a woman

When I was reading Courtly Love I was very surprised to find out that women had more say in their relationships with their men/knight during this time. It was actually refreshing to know that there wasn't this sense of men over everything. Too often people, myself included, I feel like make the assumption that women did not have any room to speak in their relationships. However, after reading this, I have noticed that women do in fact have a say. They have so much of a say that they had the knights and men in these stories doing whatever they could to win over their hearts. That was also something that I enjoyed seeing was that the stories tended to be more focused on the journey of getting the girl and winning over her heart, rather than getting the girl and into her pants sort of thing.   In Courtly Love it stated what I thought was a cool point in that, "the "symptoms" of love as if it were a sickness." (Schwartz). The author mentioned this point was drawn up by a Latin poet and that it created an element that was special to the stories. That these knights who were trying to win over these girls were in love to the point of it being a sickness. Lovesick is a term that I think can be used today but as more of a way of saying someone has a crush not actually being in love with the person. 

Women Rule All

Courtly Love is a medieval conception of the way love was supposed to be between a noble knight and his "dream girl." Courtly Love surprised me when I started reading it because I thought that the knights, the men of the medieval times, would have complete control over his significant other and women would comply to what their knight wanted. After reading this, I realized it was the complete opposite! Women in this time period had way more control over their men! Women were definitely the target audience for Courtly Love because they held the dominance and they were in control of what they wanted, not what their knight wanted. In these stories, the knights would do anything for their lady to gain their lust. Courtly love goes hand in hand with romance movies and novels today because they also target women and they develop a misconceived idea of love. Romance novels and movies portray sappy love, where a man typically wins the heart of his desired women. Just like Courtly Love, men are winning their women over and women allowing that man to be in their life. However, Courtly Love was not so much about sexual desires, it was more about companionship and holding the hearts of one another. Courtly Love demonstrated chivalry and nobleness to gain the trust of their desired lady.

love changes everything

“O what a wonderful thing is love, which makes a man shine with so many virtues and teaches everyone, no matter who he is, many good traits of character!” (Capellanus, 31)

I choose this quote to analyze because I think it establishes the true definition of love and the characteristics that come with being in love. This quote reminds me of how we were taught to love and help each other at a younger age. The quote reveals that love is transforming which causes us to be humble and kind. For instance, if you are in love your positive energy tends to shine out on others which causes you to be nicer. Furthermore, love reflects positive energy and character which cause others to gravitate toward you. The section of the quote “which makes a man shine with so many virtues and teaches everyone” (Capellanus, 31) shows that love cause people to have good characteristic and confidence. “No matter who he is, many good traits of character” (Capellanus, 31), this shows that love causes people to be caring not only to their spouses but also to people around them. Being in love causes one's personality to change.

Only a Footman

When reading the story of the British knight, I couldn't help but think that he was sort of "blinded" by love, but not necessarily in a bad way. Any obstacles standing in his way were nothing in his eyes, as earning the love of the beautiful woman was far more important than the dangers of obtaining the gauntlet and fighting foes. Even though the end of the battle between the knight and doorkeeper saw the larger man begging for his life, the sheer fact that this giant man with a massive club wanted to fight and was boasting about his power; the knight seeing him only as a footman was pretty well savage. It was clear that the knight wasn't backing down once the doorkeeper kept pressing on. To the Briton, the girl was the only important thing, and this footman was simply a stepping stone on the path to earning love. (The Art of Courtly Love, 180-181)

Age Matters

Age is a number that matters during this time period because it determines if one is fit for love. "Age is a bar, because after the sixtieth year in a man and the fiftieth in a woman" one is too old to feel the enjoyment and passion one gets from love (Line 15,16 on page 32). However, if "a girl is under the age of twelve and a boy before the fourteenth year," they are too young to experience love and understand the complex rules of it (Line 21,22 on page 32). Therefore, age does matter and has an affect on how one views and understands the rules and complexities of love.

The Art of Courtly Love

As stated in the article “Backgrounds to Romance: Courtly Love” by Dr. Schwartz, the primary audience for romance and “early vernacular narratives” were women and ladies of the queens court. I learned this was primarily because the early narratives were not focused around violence and tended to appeal more to women. Women also played a lot of the central roles and had large parts in these narratives which women in the audience could connect to. I think this relates to our society today because most romance films and novels are targeted for a female audience, with the main characters being played by a strong female lead and the romantic genre of today tends to eliminate violence.  

In the middle ages, a courtly love narrative relationship was based around a “knight and his liege lord”. It was surprising to me that the lady was most often in complete control of the relationship because when I think of the middle ages, I assume that the men had all the power. An important quote to sum up the actual relationships of the middle ages is, “marriages amongst the nobility were typically based on practical and dynastic concerns rather than on love”. This explains why women of the middle ages enjoyed courtly love narratives because it was an idealized relationship and allowed them an escape from real-life where they for once had all the power and respect from men. I feel this relates to romantic novels and films today because most of the time the relationship depicted is a fantasy relationship that does not exist, or is rare, within the context of real-life. Individuals in the past, as well as the present, enjoy reading and watching romantic relationships that are an imagination or vision of what their lives could be.

A Link to the Past and a Gateway to the Future

When people hear the phrase, courtly love, they often might think of the act of courting someone for the purposes of marriage. This is not that. In fact, most stories on courtly love had nothing to do with marriage. The idea of courtly love stems from the relationship between knights and their lords or ladies. Often in these stories, the romance would be between a knight and a lady of noble birth and would revolve around the knight doing things to win the heart of the lady. These stories were typically targeted towards nobles, particularly women, because of the subject. Courtly love could be compared to themes found in The Symposium which was written by Plato in around 385 BC. This story takes place at a party where Socrates is debating what love is with other philosophers. During the party a theory was posed that humans used to have two faces, four legs and four arms. One day the Gods wanted to teach humanity a lesson and split humanity in half. Now humans have one face, two arms and two legs. This made them feel incomplete and want to look for their other half. To this day humans are running around looking for their other half.  

 Courtly love follows suit in that it tries to define love and paint a picture of what roles each person plays. In The Art of Courtly Love, Andreas Cappelanus states, "Marriage is no real excuse for not loving." (The Art of Courtly Love) This was a radical idea during the time because in the medieval period, people married for status or political alliances rather than love. 
In conclusion, The Art of Courtly Love had a major influence on how society today looks at romance and love. Originally love was not between two people who were married but rather knights and their ladies. Andreas defined the relationship between the lovers as one with a man trying to gain the favor of his lady. Additionally, The Symposium also tried to define what love is and painted the picture of soul mates. These people would be physically bound to one another. Furthermore, the idea of courtly love paved the way for modern ideas of chivalry and what courting for marriage means. Humanity can take these lessons from the past and strive to create a more loving society. 

Courtly Love

Courtly Love is most definitely a romantic notion as "Romance" is defined and thought of today but much different for medieval times. in the 12th century poetry and literature, romantic writings became popular. The audience was largely women. These romantic narratives were pure fantasy with no connection to reality. Women were dominant in the stories and men were more submissive and more focused on love. This was a stark difference from reality where marriages were based more on the nobility and what love. In 21st century narratives, the idea of Courtly Love typically did not involve love between husband and wife but more often a knight and possibly an often married woman. This notion could have been away that married women fantasized about escaping the reality of their own marriages which involved little in the way of romantic gestures or feelings. as pointed out in the article "Backgrounds to Romance", these narratives may have also served the purpose of showing young men the need to show some level of respect and compassion for women. I believe this could have been the beginnings of a culture shift in which men became more aware of women's feelings and the need for respect. Although I am sure at that time this awareness was very small, but the seeds were planted. Today there is a strong awareness of this need and has become a societal norm.

Marriage Is Torture

In The Art of Courtly Love, Andreas Capellanus defines the word love as “a certain inborn suffering derived from the sight of and excessive meditation upon the beauty of the opposite sex, which causes each one to wish above all things the embraces of the other and by common desire to carry out all of love’s precepts in the other’s embrace” (Capellanus). To find the word “suffering” in the definition of the word “love” is shocking. Capellanus later explains that the suffering comes from the constant fear of love ending, “if he is ugly, he fears that she may despise his lack of beauty” (Capellanus). Capellanus lists many other reasons why a lover may fear his love may be lost. To be in a marriage where there is true love would be torture because the constant fear would cause too much suffering. In contrast to modern day, if a person has all this constant fear that he or she will lose their significant other due to love being lost, that would be considered an unhealthy relationship. Modern relationships are built upon mutual love and trust, not fear and suffering. Considering marriage as torture or a prison in modern day is meant as a joke and is not meant to be taken seriously. The way love and relationships are viewed have gone through a major transition.

Capellanus, Andreas. The Art of Courtly Love. Columbia University Press, 1960.