About the corpus

By to make pilgrimage, I'm in my heart.
 [to go] to Santiago one day, for praying
 and to see my friend log in.


 And if there is time, and my mother is not gone,
 I will want to walk very slowly, and look better,
 and to see my friend logu' i.


 I want to try very soon if I can
 go burn my candles, with great care that I,
 and to see my friend logu' i.

 (11.10)

In the text, not only is there an explicit reference to making a pilgrimage , but also to the actions that are usually carried out at these festivals (in which it seems customary to be very merry ): making a prayer and burning candles . And it is natural that, since many people attend the celebration (the texts mainly refer to the mothers of the protagonists, as if it were a “pilgrimage of women”; see Riquer 1993), the young woman has the opportunity – particularly if she is not under the watchful eye of her guardian mother, who could prevent her – to see her friend , which really seems to be her main objective and is therefore the touchstone of the proverb.

Other pieces show, with the same meaning, variants of the expressions mentioned, such as ir / vâyir en romaria ; pray, beg go to prayer , burn estaads or bogias instead of candles . And they can add the quintessential playful action that occurs in a pilgrimage: dancing . Filgueira Valverde (1977: 132-134) complements these basic traits with others that are quite common in friend songs in general (the date, the existence of the errand , loneliness, the arrival of the friend, the girl's sadness because the lover does not went to the meeting...). These particulars indicate that, although these songs take place in a space linked to religion, they harmoniously mix the sacred and secular elements.

The summary of what has just been said can be seen in the following table, which indicates the presence of some of these essential features (regardless of the specific form they take in each case) in the cantigas under study:

The existence of the described characteristics has led critics to sometimes use the name of cantigas de romaria (Brea – Lorenzo Gradín, 1998: 256-261) to identify a specific group of compositions in Galician-Portuguese lyric poetry, the list of which varies from one scholar to another according to the elements considered essential to that textual typology ( see , above all, Brea 1999, Correia 1993, Monteagudo 1998). In any case, as can be seen, the total number of cantigas that offer at least part of the precise requirements for the existence of a romaria (or, as a variant not entirely equivalent, of a pilgrimage –specifically, to Santiago (14.3)–) is smaller than what is obtained by considering the simple mention of a hagiotoponym, an element that does not exclude, but does not make explicit, that a religious manifestation in honor of the saint took place. For this reason, Filgueira Valverde (1977) already proposed to speak of “poetry of sanctuaries”, because this label covers a more extensive, but quite well-defined set (although not without problems), of pieces that refer to a sacred place (hermitage, church, sacred…) as a place of a possible –desired, realized or frustrated– love encounter (past, present or future). Of this group, in any case, the cantigas de romáría stricto sensu could constitute a subset. In any case, the name “cantigas de romáría” may be appropriate, as long as it is kept in mind that it does not systematically imply the action of going on a 'romáría' on the day of the saint's feast day (or on another date, as a pure devotional practice), but only involves going to a place characterized by a sacred building that is recognized by the existence of a popular religious manifestation. 

The table on the Texts and Manuscripts page (ordered according to the compositions in B and V) indicates, therefore, those that can be considered sanctuary songs , of which only a part (see the previous table) responds to the model that should minimally characterize the pilgrimages. Some texts are left out here (although they cannot be completely separated from the rest) in which only an invocation to the same saint is observed that in other pieces does appear clearly as a hagiotoponym (that is, as a spatial reference); this is the case of “Por San Servando” which appears in two compositions by Johan Servando (77.8 and 77.14); “Por San Leuter”, by the xograr Lopo (86.6); or “mui ben o sab'ora Santa Maria”, by Pero de Veer (123.4). The case of Ai, Santiago, padrón sabido! presents more uncertainty. , by Pai Gomez Charinho (114.2), considering that the fact of mentioning the saint as a “patron” may indicate that the request (and remember that prayer is part of the pilgrimages) that the girl addresses to the apostle to bring her friend takes place in a sanctuary dedicated to him (whether in Compostela or not). A somewhat peculiar case is the production by Martin Codax, which does not directly use a hagiotoponym but makes the name of Vigo function as such by specifying “the church of Vigo” (91.5) or “sacred place, in Vigo” (91.3), which leads us –not without certain reservations– to also include in the group Ai Deus, se sab'ora meu amigo (91.1), in which it specifies “sign I am in Vigo”, and Mandad'ei comigo (91.4), where the protagonist declares that she is going to Vigo to meet her lover, because that Vigo could allude to the same church in 91.5 and 91.3; We do not, however, find justification for taking into account (even if the sanctuary were actually on the seashore) the three remaining cantigas (91.2; 91.6 and 91.7), because in them the predominant element is the sea and, more particularly, the waves. We also admit that the insertion of the texts of Bernal de Bonaval is debatable, because only Diss' a fremosa en Bonaval assi (22.7) mentions the “sagraçon de Bonaval”, but, as in the case of Martin Codax, this leads us to think that the omission of the name of the saint to whom the church would be consecrated may be due to the fact that it was better known by the name of the place in which it was located than by its patron, or simply because it was the only existing sanctuary in the place of Bonaval.

In a considerable number of texts the girl asks and pleads with the mother to allow her to go to the meeting with the friend at the sanctuary. The presence of the mother figure (almost always severe) shows the reality of women in the feudal system. As happens in the songs of friends, the mother is responsible for monitoring the behavior of the daughter, to keep her away from the 'bad steps' of love in order to protect her most precious value: virginity. It is well known that this was the virtue that ensured an arranged marriage that favored the socio-economic interests of the lineages; hence the girl's honor was protected with special care. Only on rare occasions is the interlocutor of the speech a trusted friend/ sister to whom the protagonist appeals to share her feelings or to accompany her to meet her lover (15.3; 15.4; 39.1; 67.2 ; 91.5; 91.7).

authors

Most of the authors of the sanctuary songs preserved in the codices are considered playboys. In this regard, it should be borne in mind that in the Middle Ages the medieval noun jograr had different meanings, which in Latin were expressed by words as diverse as balatrons , saltatores, thymelici, nugatores, mimi or the actual joculatores . This cast of voices gives an account of the variety of functions covered by the practice of jugrária, which, depending on their specialty(s), included acrobats, imitators, acrobats, puppeteers, instrumentalists, singers... More the professional that interests us here in a particular way does not belong to any of the aforementioned typologies, nor is it the juggler who recites or performs with his musical instrument the works of other authors (known or anonymous), but is that other that composes the verses and the melody of the lyrical texts.

            When going through the Italian codices B and V , ordered to be copied by the humanist Angelo Colocci ca. 1525-1526 (Ferrari 1979, 1993a and 1993b), the Portuguese historian António Resende de Oliveira (1994: 100-205) distinguished in them an anthology of “Galician xograres”, which was integrated into the manuscript tradition –along with other materials– in the lost songbook which, drawn up between ca. 1325 and 1350, is the source from which the aforementioned Renaissance apographs derive. But what are the reasons that can explain why the xograres production was grouped in an independent anthology? To a large extent, the answer to this question is found in historical and literary sources, which reveal the significance that the stay of the Occitan troubadour Guiraut Riquier at the court of Alfonso X had for this issue. Barely beginning the decade of the 70s of the 13th century, the poet from Narbonne arrived in Castile to exercise his literary activity under the protection of the Wise King. Precisely, in 1274, Guiraut addressed the Castilian monarch the famous Supplicatio (Bertolucci-Pizzorusso 1966) , in which he asked him to establish various steps in the game of chance , since in his native Provence the term “to play” offers vague contours when applied both to individuals who possess unequal literary and spectacular abilities and to men who exercise their artistic abilities in totally marginal social environments. The fact that there is no distinction between some minstrels and others at the terminological level significantly harms those professionals who, due to their training and artistic skills, deserve the economic stability that only the royal and stately courts can offer. Alfonso X's response – known as the Declaratio and written by the Provençal with the king's placet – was published in 1275. The text has great documentary value, as it captures the situation of minstrels in the kingdom of Castile-León in the last quarter of the 13th century. The monarch establishes the following typology in his verses: a) a minstrel is someone who knows how to play an instrument, recite texts or interpret poems by other authors; b) a minstrel is someone who is capable of imitating animals or people through gestural language, the inflection of the voice, the way they walk, etc.; c) cazurros are blind or deaf men who frequent low environments and who earn a living by singing or playing infamous pieces in squares and streets, and, finally, d) the term troubadour-player only applies to those artists of poetry who exhibit their literary expertise in the courts: "e sels, on es sabers / de trobar motz e sos, / d'aquels mostra razos / com deu hom nommar; / because who knows how to dance / and couplets and ballads / and mastered d’azaut, / albas and serventes, / people and be razos es / c’om l’apel troubadour.” (Bertolucci-Pizzorusso, 1966: 105, vv. 246-255) ['and those who have the knowledge to trobar verses and melodies, reasoning itself indicates how they should be called, since whoever knows how to make dances, cobras and ballads composed in an appropriate way, as well as albas and sirventeses, it is just and sensible that he receives the name of troubadour'.]. The Wise King -through the pen of Guiraut- deepens in this last category to grant a higher position to the doctors of trobar , who would be those who write notable facts and provide useful advice to govern the court: "e sian dig doctor / de trobar li valen / c'ab saber et ab sen / fan vers e cansos / e d'autres trobar bos / profichans e plazens / per bels ensenhamens," ( Ead. , vv. 368-374 ) .

In the list of composers of sanctuary songs (cf. the table on the Texts and Manuscripts page), the small number of troubadours belonging to the nobility and clergy is striking, as the manuscripts only include pieces by three noble authors (Afonso Lopez de Baian, Airas Carpancho and Pai Gomez Chariño) and two others linked to the ecclesiastical estate (Airas Nunez and Sancho Sanchez), as well as a sixth who could belong to the petty nobility or the bourgeoisie, Pero Viviaez. As with the xograres, these isolated 'voices' that found their source of inspiration in the pilgrimages are almost all Galician, since the only author of Portuguese descent is Don Afonso de Baian, but, in addition to the fact that his lands of origin were not far from Galicia, he participated together with other troubadours and xograres in the conquest of Seville (1247-1248). The Portuguese rich man met Chariño (in circumstances that, for the moment, are not easy to specify), as demonstrated by the scornful Don Afonso Lopez de Baiam quer (114.9), which the Pontevedra admiral composed based on the Portuguese song En Arouca ũa casa faria (6.3) to give rise to a playful communicative exchange.

Chronology

The six authors cited in the previous paragraph cultivate trobar as an elite literary activity, as a pure intellectual exercise, so their presence in the cast of sanctuary singers represents a sociological discontinuity with respect to those xograres who use literature as a means of livelihood. Precisely, the social origin of the latter only allows us to establish vague chronological limits in their biographical trajectories; in fact, only for those who are mentioned by troubadours registered in the documentation, or for those who participate in satirical cycles that contain historical references or who intervene in polemics with identified authors, is it possible to trace the approximate period in which they were active. In the case of the composers of “sanctuary songs” this condition only occurs in Bernal de Bonaval, who participates in a dispute with the nobleman Abril Perez (22.2 / 1.1), and who, in addition to being alluded to by Alfonso X in a satirical song addressed to Pero da Ponte (18.34), is directly attacked by Pero da Ponte himself (120.8), Airas Perez Vuitoron (16.3) and Johan Baveca (64.10), so his activity can be placed between ca. 1240-1280. With the sole exception of Alfonso X (who is also the only one who provides the full name of the xograr), Bernal is called “Don Bernaldo” in all cases, which could contradict a xograr-esque condition (unless that “Don” is precisely of a burlesque nature). On the other hand, if Lopo is the disastrous gambler that Martin Soarez mocks in four of his texts (97.4, 97.8, 97.9 and 97.13), it is feasible to place part of his life in the Castilian court of Ferdinand III, a circle frequented by Soarez in the last years of the 1340s as a supporter of Sancho II of Portugal (Oliveira 1994: 387-388), who, as is known, was exiled to Toledo in 1247 because of the civil war that confronted him with his brother Alfonso de Boulogne (the future Alfonso III). Likewise, the reference present in one of Lopo's texts to the expeditions carried out by the king from sea to sea (86.9), although it does not make it possible to introduce an exact chronological nuance, is likely to refer to some of the military campaigns carried out by Ferdinand III himself (and his heir Alfonso) in Al-Andalus between ca. 1240 and 1250 (Murcia, Alicante, Lorca, Jerez, Cadiz, Cartagena, etc.). In this period, the capture of Jaén (1246) and, above all, that of Seville (1248) stand out. In the conquest of this city, the action of the maritime fleet - commanded by Ramón Bonifaz and made up of Cantabrian and Galician sailors - played a leading role in defeating the Sevillian ships and preventing reinforcements from the Maghreb from entering the Atlantic to help the Muslim troops.

On the contrary, the troubadours belonging to the estates of the bellatores and the orators (in accordance with their own social status) almost always left direct or indirect traces in the documentary sources. In any case, it is impossible to know who started the aesthetic trend of 'pilgrimage / shrine songs' in the genre of friend songs.

Regarding the chronological information provided by the texts, the data that can be provided are not much more explicit, since, lacking references or specific historical details, it is not easy to establish their date of composition. For this reason, the cantiga A Santiagu'en romaria ven (14.3) by the cleric Airas Nunez is of particular interest, a text in which the author celebrates the pilgrimage of King Sancho IV to Compostela in 1286. Although Charinho, in Ai Santiago, padrón sabido! (114.2), mentions the “towers of Geén”, this detail does not seem to provide much chronological information, since Jaén (if the place name refers to this city) had been reconquered by Fernando III in 1246 and Charinho's text must be later.      

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