Peire Raimon

Peire Raimon de Tolosa (or Toloza; fl. 1180–1220) was a troubadour from the merchant class of Toulouse. He is variously referred to as lo Viellz ("the Old") and lo Gros ("the Fat"), though these are thought by some to refer to two different persons. Eighteen of Peire Ramon's poems survive, one canso with a melody. He imitated the troubadours Cadenet and Arnaut Daniel and was in turn imitated by Bertran de Born, especially as regards his use of natural imagery. Bertran went so far as to copy almost a whole stanza from Peire's "No.m puesc sofrir d'una leu chanso faire." In "Us noels pessamens", Peire even anticipates the Tuscan poet Dante Alighieri. Peire is complaining about a mistress who first beckoned him and then broke her promise to him when he says:

Que qui non a vezat aver

gran be, plus leu pot sostener

afan que tal es rics e bos;

que.l maltrag l'es plus angoyssos,

quan li soven benanansa.

Peire's sole surviving melody is florid like Cadenet's. His style employs an uncommonly high number of large intervals, including tritones. The poem with the melody is built on an innovative metaphor:

Atressi cum la candela

que si meteissa destrui

per far clartat ad autrui,

chant, on plus trac gren martire,

per plazer de l'autra gen.