o
centuries earlier. The narrative part of the work is a mere
introduction, the bulk of it consisting of moral reflections taken from
the _De Consolatione_.

[Sidenote: Second Period.]

It is only in the second period that Provencal literature becomes of
real importance. The stimulus which brought it to perfection has been
generally taken to be that of the crusades, aided by the great
development of peaceful civilisation at home which Provence and
Languedoc then saw. The spirit of chivalry rose and was diffused all
over Europe at this time, and in some of its aspects it received a
greater welcome in Provence than anywhere else. For the mystical, the
adventurous, and other sides of the chivalrous character, we must look
to the North, and especially to the Arthurian legends, and the Romans
d'Aventures which they influenced. But, for what has been well called
'la passion souveraine, aveugle, idolatre, qui eclipse tous les autres
sentiments, qui dedaigne tous les devoirs, qui se moque de l'enfer et du
ciel, qui absorbe et possede l'ame entiere[50],' we must come to the
literature of the south of France. Passion is indeed not the only motive
of the Troubadours, but it is their favourite motive, and their most
successful. The connection of this predominant instinct with the
elaborate and unmatched attention to form which characterises them is a
psychological question very interesting to discuss, but hardly suitable
to these pages. It is sufficient here to say that these various motives
and influences produced the Troubadours and their literature. This
literature was chiefly lyrical in form, but also included many other
kinds, of which a short account may be given.

_Girartz de Rossilho_ belongs in all probability to the earliest years
of the period, though the only Provencal manuscript in existence dates
from the end of the thirteenth century. In the third decade of the
twelfth Guillem Bechada had written a poem on the conquest of Jerusalem
by the Crusaders, which, however, has perished, though the northern
cycle of the Chevalier au Cygne may represent it in part. Guillem of
Poitiers also wrote a historical poem on the Crusades with similar ill
fate. But the most famous of historical poems in Provencal has
fortunately been preserved to us. This is the chronicle of the
Albigensian War, written in Alexandrines by William of Tudela and an
anonymous writer. We also possess a rhymed chronicle of the war of
1276-77 in Navarre,