Toynbee "Bertràm dal Bòrnio"
Bertran de Born, lord of Hautefort near Périgueux, one of the earliest and most famous of the troubadours [Bornio]; he was born of a noble Limousin family about 1140, and died at the age of about 75 (probably in 1215), as a monk in the Cistercian monastery of Dalon, near Hautefort, which he had entered some twenty years before, and to which he and his family had made numerous donations; his name occurs several times in the chartularies of the monastery between 1197 and 1202, and the date of his death is fixed with tolerable certainty by a laconic entry (in the year 1215) in the diary of a monk of Saint-Martial in Limoges:

. . . octava candela in sepulero ponitur pro Bertrando de Born; cera tres solidos empta est.

D. places Bertran among the sowers of discord in Bolgia 9 of Circle VIII of Hell (Malebolge), [Inf. xxviii. 134]; un busto sanza capo, [Inf. xxviii. 119]; quel, [Inf. xxviii. 123]; colui che già tenne Altaforte, [Inf. xxix. 29] [Scismatici]; among the company of sinners in this Bolgia D. sees a headless body going along with the rest, with the head held in its hand swinging by the hair like a lantern ([Inf. xxviii. 112-126]); on nearing D. it suddenly lifts up its arm with the head, which begins to speak, informing D. that it belonged to Bertran de Born, who gave the evil counsel to the young King ([Inf. xxviii. 127-135]); and that, as he, like Ahithophel, set father and son at variance, so in retaliation his head is parted from his trunk ([Inf. xxviii. 136-142]). [Altaforte: Arrigo_4.]

D. mentions Bertran as an example of munificence, [Conv. IV. xi.14]; and as the poet of arms par excellence, quoting the first line ('Non posc mudar, c'un cantar non exparja') of one of his sirventes (written on the occasion of the outbreak of hostilities between Philip Augustus and Richard Coeur de Lion in 1188), V.E. II. ii. 9.

More than forty of Bertran's poems have been preserved, the majority of them being of a warlike tone; the most famous is his lament (beginning 'Si tuit li dol elh plor elh marrimen') for the death of the Young King, i.e. Prince Henry, son of Henry II of England. Of the part played by Bertran in the rebellion of the Young King against his father, for which D. places him in Hell, little or nothing is known historically; and not much is to be gathered from Bertran's own poems. The sources of D.'s information on the subject were the old Provençal biographies of the troubadour and the razos or arguments to his poems. In one of these it is related that the king of England hated Bertran as the evil counsellor of his son, and the cause of the strife between them:

El reis Enrics, per so qu'el volia mal an Bertran, per so qu'el era amics e conseillaire del rei jove, son fil, lo quals avia aüda guerra ab el, e crezia qu'En Bertrans n'agues tota la colpa.

From these old biographies and notices which, though in many respects historically inaccurate, nevertheless represent the troubadour as he appeared to D., we get the following account:

Bertran de Born was viscount of Hautefort, a castle with nearly a thousand retainers, in the Bishopric of Périgueux in the Limousin. He had a brother Constantine, whom he would have dispossessed of his inheritance had it not been for the King of England. He was continually at war with his neighbours, the Count of Périgueux, and the Viscount of Limoges, as well as with his own brother, and Richard Coeur de Lion, so long as he was Count of Poitou. He was a good knight, and a good warrior, and a good wooer, and a good troubadour, and wise and well-spoken. And whenever he had a mind he was master of the King of England and of his son; but he always desired that father and son should be at war, and one brother with another:

Bons cavalliers fo e bons guerrers e bons domnejaire e bons trobaire e savis e ben parlanz; e saup ben tractar mals e bens. Seingner era totas ves quan se volia del rei Enric e del fils de lui, mas totz temps volia que ill aguessen guerra ensems, lo paire el fils el fraire.

And he likewise always desired the King of England and the King of France to be at war together. And if ever they made peace, straightway he tried by his songs to undo the peace and to show how each was dishonoured by it; whereby he gained for himself much good and much evil.

And he wrote many poems, and the King of Aragon used to say that the songs of Giraut de Bomeil were as the wives of his sirventes. And the jongleur who sang for him was called Papiol. And Bertran was gracious and courteous, and used to call Geoffrey, the Count of Brittany, Rassa; and the King of England, Oc e No [i.e. 'Yes and No'] ; and the Young King he called Marinier. And he loved to set the barons at war, and he set King Henry at war with his son until the Young King was slain in Bertran's castle. And Bertran used to boast that he had more wits than he had need of, and when King Henry took him prisoner he asked him whether he had not need of all his wits then and Bertran answered that he lost all his wits when the Young King died. Then King Henry wept and forgave him and gave him lands and honours:

E Bertran[s] de Born si-s vanava qu'el cujava tan valer que ja no cujava que totz sos sens l'agues mestier. E pueis lo reis lo pres, e quant l'ac pres. . . .En Bertrans ab tota sa gen fon menatz al pabaillon del rei Enric e-l reis lo receup molt mal. E-l reis Enrics si-l dis: Bertrans, Bertrans, vos avetz dig que anc la meitatz del vostre sen no-us ac mestier nuilis temps, mas sapchatz qu'ara vos a el be mestier totz.' 'Seingner,' dis En Bertrans, 'el es ben vers qu-eu o dissi, e dissi ben vertat.' E-l reis dis: 'Eu cre ben qu'el vos sia aras faillitz.' 'Seingner,' dis En Bertrans, 'ben m'es faillitz.' 'E com?' dis lo reis. 'Seingner,' dis en Bertrans, 'lo jorn que-l valens joves reis, vostre fillz, mori, eu perdi lo sen e-l saber e la conoissensa. 'E-l reis, quant auzi so qu'En Bertrans li dis en ploran, del fil, venc li granz dolors al cor, de pietat, et als oills, si que no-is poc tener qu'el non pasmes de dolor. E quant el revenc de pasmazon, el crida e dis en ploran: 'En Bertrans, En Bertrans, vos avetz ben drech, et es be razos, si vos avetz perdut lo sen per mon fill, qu'el vos volia meils que ad home del mon. Et eu, per amor de lui, vos quit la persona e l'aver e-l vostre castel e vos ren la mia amor e la mia gracia, e vos don cinc cenz marcs d'argen per os dans que vos avetz receubutz.' En Bertrans si-l cazec als pes, referent li gracias e merces.

And Bertran lived long in the world, and then joined the order of the Cistercians.

[See C. Appel ed., Die Lieder Bertrans von Born (Halle, 1932); 0. H. Moore, The Young King Henry Plantagenet, 1155-1183, in History, Literature, and Tradition (Ohio State University Contributions in Languages and Literatures, no. 3, 1925), pp. 35 ff.; J. L. Perrier, 'Bertran de Born, Patriot, and His Place in Dante's Inferno', Rom. Rev. xi (1920), 223-38; xii (1921), 21-43.]

©Oxford University Press 1968. From A Dictionary of Proper Names and Notable Matters in the Works of Dante by Paget Toynbee (1968) by permission of Oxford University Press