Luys Ycart (

fl. ''Floruit'' ( ; usually abbreviated fl. or occasionally flor.; from Latin for 'flourished') denotes a date or period during which a person was known to have been alive or active. In English, the unabbreviated word may also be used as a noun indic ...

1396–1433), or Lluís Icart () in modern orthography, was a Catalan poet. He left behind fourteen lyric poems and a long poem called ''Consolació i Avís d'amor'' ("Consolation and Advice of Love"). All of his poetry was produced before the composition of the

chansonnier A chansonnier (, , Galician and , or ''canzoniéro'', ) is a manuscript or printed book which contains a collection of chansons, or polyphonic and monophonic settings of songs, hence literally " song-books"; however, some manuscripts are call ...

Vega-Aguiló (1420–30), into which it was copied soon after it was written.

Life

Luys was a minor nobleman, the son of Pere Ycart and Johanna de Subirats from

Lleida Lleida (, ; ; '' see below'') is a city in the west of Catalonia, Spain. It is the capital and largest town in Segrià county, the Ponent region and the province of Lleida. Geographically, it is located in the Catalan Central Depression. It ...

. As early as 1396 he had a relationship with a woman known as Lionor de Pau. He was dubbed a knight in 1429 or 1430. He married a woman named Blanquina in an unknown year, but his four children were still young in 1433. Luys participated in the Lleidan feuds that dominated the local situation in the 1420s and 1430s. In 1430 the offenders, including Luys and his enemy Felip Claver, were fined by Queen Maria. In 1433 Maria confiscated Luys' property for his complicity in the assassination of the

archdeacon An archdeacon is a senior clergy position in the Church of the East, Chaldean Catholic Church, Syriac Orthodox Church, Anglican Communion, St Thomas Christians, Eastern Orthodox Church, Eastern Orthodox churches and some other Christian denomina ...

. Sometimes thereafter he adopted his mother's surname of "de Subirats", a common practice in those times.

Work

Luys participated in the ''

jocs florals Floral Games were any of a series of historically related poetry contests with floral prizes. In Occitan, their original language, and Catalan they are known as (, ; modern or ). In French, they became the (), and in Basque (). The origina ...

'' of the

Consistori del Gay Saber The (; "Consistory of the Gay Science") was a poetic academy founded at Toulouse in 1323 to revive and perpetuate the lyric poetry of the troubadours. Also known as the Acadèmia dels Jòcs Florals or Académie des Jeux Floraux ("Academy of th ...

, held annually in

Toulouse Toulouse (, ; ; ) is a city in southern France, the Prefectures in France, prefecture of the Haute-Garonne department and of the Occitania (administrative region), Occitania region. The city is on the banks of the Garonne, River Garonne, from ...

. One song composed by Luys for judgement in the Consistori's contests has survived, addressed appropriately to ''los senhors set'' of the ''gay sauber''. In this poem the artificial restraints imposed by the Consistori through its ''

Leys d'amor Guilhem Molinier or Moulinier ( 1330–50) was a Old Occitan, medieval Occitan poet from Toulouse. His most notable work is ''Leys d'amors'' ("Laws of Love"), a treatise on rhetoric and grammar that achieved great notoriety and, beyond the Occita ...

'' (laws of love, i.e. poetic composition) are evident in Luys' verse. The

rhyme scheme A rhyme scheme is the pattern of rhymes at the end of each line of a poem or song. It is usually referred to by using letters to indicate which lines rhyme; lines designated with the same letter all rhyme with each other. An example of the ABAB rh ...

is a simple '' rims capfinits''. The poem is uninspired, repetitive, and forced. The style of Luys' competitive work was atypical.

Martín de Riquer Martin may refer to: Places Antarctica * Martin Peninsula, Marie Byrd Land * Port Martin, Adelie Land * Point Martin, South Orkney Islands Europe * Martin, Croatia, a village * Martin, Slovakia, a city * Martín del Río, Aragón, Spain * M ...

describes his poetry as the pure and fluid unfolding of traditional

troubadour A troubadour (, ; ) was a composer and performer of Old Occitan lyric poetry during the High Middle Ages (1100–1350). Since the word ''troubadour'' is etymologically masculine, a female equivalent is usually called a ''trobairitz''. The tr ...

themes with discreet ornamentation. His poetry is filled with amorous laments ('). His most famous love piece is probably his '' cobla sparça'' dedicated to Lionor, the daughter of the chamberlain Francesc de Pau. Lionor we know to have been in the entourage of Violant de Bar and to have accompanied the six-month-old Joana de Perpinyà (youngest child of

John I of Aragon John I (27 December 1350 – 19 May 1396), called by posterity the Hunter or the Lover of Elegance, or the Abandoned in his lifetime, was the King of Aragon from 1387 until his death. Biography John was the eldest son of Peter IV and his third ...

) in 1396, around which time Luys' composed his poem. Using the form of a

madrigal A madrigal is a form of secular vocal music most typical of the Renaissance (15th–16th centuries) and early Baroque (1580–1650) periods, although revisited by some later European composers. The polyphonic madrigal is unaccompanied, and the ...

, Luys praises "Na Pau" (Lady Peace, a play on her name) and plays on the expression ''donar la pau'' (give a kiss): ''Na Pau, n'he pau'', "Lady Peace, have a kiss". In several other of his love poems Luys sings to a queen, probably the widowed

Margarida de Prades Margarida is a Portuguese female given name, which is a variant of the name Margaret, and which also means " daisy flower" in Portuguese.''Behind the Name''"Given Name Margarida". Retrieved on 28 January 2016. The given name may refer to: * Mar ...

, who also attracted the praise of Jordi de Sant Jordi and

Ausiàs March Ausiàs March (; 1400March 3, 1459) was a medieval Valencian poet and knight from Gandia, Valencia. He is considered one of the most important poets of the "Golden Century" (''Segle d'or'') of Catalan literature. Biography Not much is known of Ma ...

. The feudo-vassallic allegory of love pervades Luys' writings, no more so than in those dedicated to Margarida, wherein he sometimes describes the concrete realities of her court. The piece of Luys' that most stubbornly resists comprehension is a ''

tenso A ''tenso'' (; ) is a style of troubadour song. It takes the form of a debate in which each voice defends a position; common topics relate to love or ethics. Usually, the tenso is written by two different poets, but several examples exist in whic ...

'' with a certain Regadelh: ''Frayres molt cars, meravila•m de vós''. The identity of this Regadelh has never been ascertained: it could be the archdeacon Manuel de Rajadell, to whom Felip de Malla dedicated his ''Pecador remut'', or a Bernat Fajadell (or Rajadell),

benefice A benefice () or living is a reward received in exchange for services rendered and as a retainer for future services. The Roman Empire used the Latin term as a benefit to an individual from the Empire for services rendered. Its use was adopted by ...

d at

Barcelona Barcelona ( ; ; ) is a city on the northeastern coast of Spain. It is the capital and largest city of the autonomous community of Catalonia, as well as the second-most populous municipality of Spain. With a population of 1.6 million within c ...

, who was the inspiration behind a cycle of

satire Satire is a genre of the visual, literary, and performing arts, usually in the form of fiction and less frequently non-fiction, in which vices, follies, abuses, and shortcomings are held up to ridicule, often with the intent of exposin ...

s. The uneven ''tenso'' contains one stanza from Luys, one retort from Regadelh, and a third unassigned paragraph that certainly belongs to Luys. The debate is good-natured and designed to be entertaining, but many of the references and allusions elude interpretation. The longest of Luys' surviving works is his 523-line,

hexasyllabic The hexasyllable or hexasyllabic verse is a line of verse with six syllables. The orphan hexasyllable is a metric specificity of certain French epic poems. This kind of verse in the Garin de Monglane's Song in a 14th-century manuscript turns out ...

''Consolació o Avís d'amor'', which ends with a summary stanza in

decasyllable Decasyllable (Italian: ''decasillabo'', French: ''décasyllabe'', Serbian: ''десетерац'', ''deseterac'') is a poetic meter of ten syllables used in poetic traditions of syllabic verse. In languages with a stress accent ( accentual ...

s. The purpose of the work is as consolation (''consolació'') and counsel (''avís'') to a friend suffering from a disease of love. It is a ''lletovari'' ( electuarium). Unlike similar Catalan works of the same era, such as Johan Basset's ''Letovari'' and Bernat Metge's ''Medicina'', Luys' ''Consolació'' is heavy and serious in tone. The philosophy espoused is completely that of courtly love, and of

Ovid Publius Ovidius Naso (; 20 March 43 BC – AD 17/18), known in English as Ovid ( ), was a Augustan literature (ancient Rome), Roman poet who lived during the reign of Augustus. He was a younger contemporary of Virgil and Horace, with whom he i ...

, though whether consciously is doubtful.Riquer, 646.

Notes

External links

Incipitario de Lluís Icart
has all his works, edited but without translations {{DEFAULTSORT:Ycart, Luys Poets from Catalonia Medieval Catalan-language writers Medieval Catalan writers 15th-century Catalan people