This dissertation explores the ways in which feminine culpability is verbally articulated by the male courtly lover to his beloved lady within the amorous relationship in three fifteenth-century Spanish sentimental novels: Diego de San Pedro’s Cárcel de amor, published in 1492, and two of Juan de Flores' sentimental novels, Grimalte y Gradissa and Grisel and Mirabella, both published in approximately 1495, and how these motifs of feminine culpability are subverted in the anonymous fifteenth-century Catalan chivalric novel Curial e Güelfa. This subversion of culpability motifs is facilitated in Curial e Güelfa since there is also a subversion of gender roles within the amorous relationship of the novel's protagonists: a female lover, Güelfa, who courts her male beloved, Curial. To execute this study, I begin by discussing the origins of this rhetoric of feminine culpability in patristic, Biblical and philosophical texts, illustrating their sedimentation into the collective ideologies of medieval audiences. I also examine these feminine culpability models in Provençal lyric poetry written and recited by Occitan troubadours between the eleventh and thirteenth centuries, as one of its particular genres, the mala cansó, aims to not only blame the beloved lady, but also to publicly defame her, a threat that is also ever-present in the words of the male lover in the sentimental novel. After analyzing the tactics used by the male courtly lover to blame the beloved lady for his suffering and the demise of the relationship, I demonstrate how these same tactics are employed by the female characters of Curial e Güelfa toward the beloved man. However, feminine blame still occurs in Curial e Güelfa, manifested as feminine self-blame and blame between women, while the male characters engage in self-absolution, absolution of other men, and utter shirking of the blame. The theoretical framework employed is that of medieval canon law, and the way in which culpability was determined under this law from the twelfth century onward, which was by the intentions of the offender at the time of the crime or transgression rather than the consequences of the transgression. If we examine these fifteenth-century courtly love texts, it becomes clear that the beloved lady is innocent, while the male lover himself is the culpable party. Finally, following Rouben C. Cholakian's reading of the troubadour poetry through the work of twentieth-century psychoanalyst Jacques Lacan, I conclude that although the poet-lover verbally enunciates erotic metaphors and adulating language toward his beloved lady in the guise of courtly love, the true desire that he cannot articulate is to dominate, to overpower, and possibly to eradicate the feminine. Thus, in a Lacanian sense the notion that courtly love literature praises the woman is a fallacy. Both the poet-lover of the Provençal lyric and the courtly lover of the sentimental novel subvert the concept of alleged feminine superiority and exaltation in these texts. / Spanish

La thèse propose une nouvelle édition critique du corpus lyrique du troubadour Guilhem Figueira (BdT 217), originaire de Toulouse mais actif principalement en Italie du Nord dans la première moitié du XIIIe siècle. Poète représentatif du climat historique et culturel toulousain à l’époque de la croisade contre les Albigeois, protagoniste de la diaspora de poètes et intellectuels et membre d’un cercle idéal de troubadours frédériciens, Figueira nous a laissé une chanson d’amour, deux sirventes contre la papauté de Rome et les faux clergés, deux sirventes pour Frédéric II et deux chansons de croisade. Il échangea aussi deux coblas et une tenson avec Aimeric de Peguilhan (BdT 10). Par rapport à l’édition de référence (Emil Levy, 1880) on a inclus une cobla esparsa anonyme contre Sordel (BdT 437) conservé dans le chansonnier P ; par contre, on a décidé de ne pas accueillir les deux pièces qui lui sont attribuées par le chansonnier a2. On a fourni une étude de la tradition manuscrite, qui compte aujourd’hui cinq nouveaux témoins, avec une mise à jour de la bibliographie ; une étude des thèmes, de la métrique et de la langue de Figueira, une traduction des pièces en italien et un commentaire ponctuel des textes ; un glossaire complet et deux annexes (l’édition du sirventes BdT 217.4a qu’on n’a pas jugé authentique mais qui sert pour l’interprétation d’une autre poésie et les premiers résultats d’une recherche sur Emil Levy éditeur de troubadours, avec l’édition de neuf lettres qu’il envoya à Ernesto Monaci entre 1879 et 1887 et que nous avons trouvé à Rome). / The thesis proposes a new critical edition of the lyric production by Guilhem Figueira (BdT 217), who was born in Toulouse and active during the first half of the XIIIth century, mainly in Northern Italy. Figueira’s corpus is representative of the historical and cultural climate in Toulouse during the Albigensian crusade; he was himself a protagonist of the diaspora of poets and intellectuals and a member of an ideal circle of Friderician troubadours. He left a love song, two sirventes against the papacy and the false clergy, two sirventes for Frederic II and two crusade songs. He also exchanged two coblas and one tenson with Aimeric de Peguilhan (BdT 10). In comparison with the critical edition by Emil Levy (1880), we have included an anonymous cobla esparsa against Sordel (BdT 437), preserved by the chansonnier P; on the other hand, we have decided not to accept two other poems assigned to him by a2. The thesis opens with a study of the tradition, which today includes five new witnesses, with an update of the bibliography; we have provided a study of themes, metric and language of Figueira, an Italian translation and a punctual commentary of the poems; a complete glossary and two appendices (the edition of sirventes BdT 217.4a, which we considered inauthentic but helpful to the correct interpretation of another poem; and the first results of a research on Emil Levy editor of troubadours, with the edition of nine letters he sent to Ernesto Monaci between 1879 and 1887 that we have found in Rome).

1./1 Courtly Love in the context of ludic elements of courtly culture (Cantigas de Santa Maria and the troubadour chansonnier R) Matouš Jaluška Abstract Dissertation Courtly Love in the context of ludic elements of courtly culture (Cantigas de Santa Maria and the troubadour chansonnier R) strives to refine on the common notion that the me- dieval courtly poetry is a kind of game. It is based in the tradition of thinking about playing, which is based on the essay Homo ludens of Johan Huizinga and continues through works of Roger Cailloise, Jacques Henriot and Eugen Fink to the current trend of Game Studies. Close reading of the authorities in the introductory chapter shows that each of them assigns an im- portant role to the notion of discontinuity or rupture that enables them to establish the game as a non-binding and safe world. The concept of troubadour poetic creation as a safe activity is explored in the second chapter based on the works of the two founding figures of the trouba- dour tradition, Guilhem de Peitieu ("the Count of Poitiers") and Marcabru. The comparison shows that the safety of troubadour poetry is closely connected with the idea of binding or non-binding language. Binding speech is strongly linked to the image of female power and the ability of women to breed offspring and thus to keep...