Although there are differences between the various sources of Thibaut’s musical repertory, meaning that a melody was rarely transmitted identically in two different sources, these differences are not significant enough to prevent a standard melody from being established. In general two groups or families of manuscripts can be established, taking note of both melodic and textual variants. Both the Chansonnier du roi de Navarre and the Manuscrit du Roi, which contain four of his compositions, pertain to one of these groups, while the Arsenal manuscript and the Chansonnier Cangé, constitute part of the other.
Troubadours and trouvères
Thibaut’s repertory consists of 36 chansons d’amour, 14 jeux-partis, three chansons dedicated to the Virgin, another three crusade songs, two pastourelles, a serventois and a devotional lai. His output forms part of the art of the trouvères, among the most illustrious of whom were Gace Brulé, Colin Muset and Thibaut himself. Like their immediate predecessors the troubadours, trouvères were both exquisite poets and musicians who were active during the latter part of the twelfth century until the end of the thirteenth century. For many scholars, the last of the trouvères -who numbered over 200 in total- was Adam de la Halle (d. 1288), who spent part of his career in Arras, one of the most important centres of late trouvère activity. The most important centre of early trouvère activity was the court of Troyes, in Champagne, as a result of the patronage of Thibaut’s paternal grandparents, Count Henry the Liberal and especially his wife Marie, the daughter of Louis VII of France and Eleanor of Aquitaine. Following the example of her mother, Eleanor surrounded herself with such illustrious literary figures as Chrétien de Troyes, Gautier d’Arras and Gace Brulé, among others.
The transformation of the art of the troubadours, active throughout the southern courts of France, into trouvères seems to have taken place at the court of Champagne. The trouvères moved through the courts of northern France and Flanders, although this probably had a lot to do with the numerous connections, both commercial and cultural, with northern and southern France, as well as travel and the pilgrim routes, especially that leading to Santiago de Compostela. Whatever the case, the poetry and music of the trouvères must clearly be considered as a direct consequence of the activity of the troubadours, although the latter expressed themselves in the langue d’oc and the trouvères in the langue d’oil, the predecessor of modern French. Both groups were made up of people from low social backgrounds, whose talent and the opportunity to receive an education allowed them to make their way into the noble class (in exchange for their art they were given protection and sustenance) as well as members of the nobility with a gift for music and poetry. While there was even a king among the trouvères, Thibaut of Navarre, William (Guilhem) IX, Duke of Aquitaine (d. 1127), is said to be the first known troubadour.
While a large proportion of troubadour poetry was based on the concept of fin’amors, ‘refined love’ as the maximum expression of civilised man’s feelings, a large part of trouvère poetry, consisting of no less than 2.400 poems, of which around 1.700 are preserved with music, deals with fine amour. The canso is the troubadour genre par excellence, equivalent to the trouvère grand chant, which was perhaps not as fresh as the canso considering that both in this and other genres the French model kept to the tradition of the Occitan model. However, its richness and interest lies in the many subtle variations obtained from a theme that was inexhaustible itself.
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