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Introduction to the Source

This song has been transcribed from the Chansonnier Nivelle de la Chausée (Paris, Bibliothèque Nationale de France, Département de Musique, Res. Vmc MS 57), ff.79v-80r. The manuscript can be viewed here. It is also present in Paris, Bibliothèque Nationale Française, 1719. Different manuscripts attribute it to different composers: Agricola and Fesneau.

Introduction to the Text

This fifteenth-century love song is a virelai composed for three voices. Although it draws on a common theme for French love songs of this period - one lover's distress in the absence of the other - it is somewhat unusual in that it is written from a female perspective.

Credits

Transcription by Mae Velloso-Lyons, Translation by Mae Velloso-Lyons, Encoded in TEI P5 XML by Jordan Rosen-Kaplan