by Guy Shaked
Keywords: Motets, Philip the Fair, Roman de Fauvel, Roman de Renard, Roman de Renart, Philippe de Vitry, Shaked
In several motets by Philippe de Vitry appears either directly or indirectly the subject of the exile of Jews.
For example, in the text of Garrit Gallus appear the family of Jacob who is expelled to the desert by another Pharaoh, the treacherous fox, the blind lion who allows the fox to act as he does, and the roosters – chickens who have to be careful from the threat of the fox.
The family of Jacob is said to be exiled:
Behold how the family of Jacob
once again flees from another Pharaoh:
no longer able, as before, to follow
the path of the Jews, it weeps.
In the desert it is tortured by hunger,
its arms and armour lack a helper.
If it cries out it will be despoiled;
the voice of the wretched exiles,
near death, is harsh [1].
This poem was shown to be a political allegory: the fox being Marigny and the blind lion - Philip the Fair. Enguerran de Marigny was a high and powerful finance minister and counselor to Philip the Fair. After Philip's death in November 1314, Marigny was tried and executed in April 1315, at the gallows of Montfaucon. His body was left as an example and released for burial only in 1317 [2].
The trial against Marigny by king Philip V was most probably the result of the workings of the king's uncle Charles de Valois and the nobles associated with him [3]. It seems that the Roman de Fauvel's anti Marigny poems and motets were also possibly results of an effort by de Valois and his circle [4].
I would like to suggest that in accordance with this allegory the roosters and chickens are to be understood as the Jews. Historically this text refers to the great exile of the Jews from France by Philip the Fair in 1306. This Philip did to enrich his treasury, taking possession of all the Jews’ property. He took possession also of the debts to them and extracted the payments from the Christians for their debts to the Jews for himself, showing not a religious motive was behind the exile but rather an economical one.
The fox who rules is of course Marigny. It is against him mainly that this political poem is directed. Harsh terms are used to describe him:
And the fox, like a grave-robber,
flourishing with the cunning of Belial,
reigns with the full consent of the lion himself.
and :
Since the blindness of the lion is subject
to the shadowy deceit of the treacherous fox,
whose arrogance encourages sin,
In describing the fox and the rooster the poem refers to the Roman de Renart. It specifically refers to the story in the second branch.
In the story in the roman de Renart, Renart the fox in his wanderings found the farm of Sir
Constant. He finds a place he can enter in the chickens’ henhouse and enters. The chickens
become suspicious an enemy had entered and run and hide.
The rooster Chanteclere meets them in their hurried retreat and tells them: 'A more foolish
tale I never heard' [5]. Pinte - the hen - describes to him the reason for their escape :
'What? I saw the hedges shaked and the cabbage leaves in the garden quake'. To this he
responds : '...be satisfied with my opinion – it makes no sense to worry. In side that sturdy
fence neither fox nor skunk would ever dare to come'. Following, Chanteclere doses off and
dreams something captures him. He prays to God to save him: 'Oh Holy Ghost, help me to stay
free and safe from my foes today' and runs to join the hens in their hidings place (the thorny
palisade). Pinte interprets to him that in his dream the fox captures him. He tells her she
lost her mind and there is no fox in the yard. He again exits and doses off in the dunghill.
Renart jumps on him but misses and Chanteclere escapes.
Renart by flattery convinces Chanteclere to sing with his eyes closed and then catches him
by the throat. But the housewife goes out of the house, notices the hens are missing and
sees Renart running with Chanteclere in his mouth. She shouts and the peasants come to the
chase after Renart with the dogs. Renart drops Chantclere who deceived him to speak and when
Renart calls 'Your rooster is mine' Chanteclere falls from his open mouth and escapes”.
Later Renart runs away from his pursuers.
But Vitry unlike the original story does not expect a happy end to the rooster or the hens
(=the Jews) as there is no Peasants in his poem to save them and as his words in the Duplum
: 'Woe to chickens' and in the Triplum :
'you must rise up:
otherwise what is left of your honor
slips away and will continue to slip away'.
In Garrit Gallus there is a second allegory, that of another Pharaoh, and the family of Jacob. Referring to the pseudo-exile (actually stay) of the family of Jacob out of Egypt described in Genesis 42:1-45:6. Again this is an allegory to the exile of the Jews, the Pharaoh being Philip the Fair and the house of the Jacob are the Jews (they are said explicitly to being unable anymore to 'follow the path of the Jews').
In another motet that Vitry composed there is also an indirect reference to an exile of the Jews. This is the case in the poem 'Cum statua Nabucodonasor', for it refers to the king that exiled the Jews from Judea to Babylon and destroyed their temple.
It is said about him (his statue):
In the manner in which the Lord suffered
the metals in the molded truck in Nebuchadnezzar's statue
to be made successively and stepwise less and less
(the statue was gold first, then silver.
the virtuous elements constituting its flesh up to this point.
then bronze, and finally, to repeat what is known.
clay and mud and iron).
This hints that following the exile of the Jews, Philip the Fair had gold and then was left only with silver and then simple metal and mud.
There is a reference to the exile of the Jews in yet another motet by Vitry – 'Florens'. It
tells of Haman humiliating Mordecai. This was in the Jewish exile at Persia. Haman is the
consultant to the king and a chief minister and is therefore an allegorical reference to
Marigny [6], Mordecai is the defender of the Jews at court. Yet in this allegory Haman
wanted the Jews to be killed, a fate even worse than exile (Esther 3:8-15)
The words of the motet mention the sizing of the property of the Jews, as was done in the
exile from France of 1306:
from envy follow
seizure of property.
affliction in prosperity.
slander, hateful and
harmful whispering,
In the Motetus there is a mention of a 'Judge' which is a reference to Roman de Renart
Another motet in the Roman de Fauvel as well - 'Aman Novi' - refers to Haman:
The fate of the new Haman
demonstrates how much it benefits one to
be too puffed up with pride in spirit.
with a greater lust for power than
is proper, to reach out too far.
to rise so fast that it is revolting...
The figure of Haman is of course a reference to Marigny as was already stated by Bent and Sanders [7].
The allegories of the Jewish exile can be shown in the following table:
| PLACE | KING | ADVISOR | JEWS |
| France | Philip the Fair | Marigny | French Jews |
| Garrit Gallus | Another Pharaoh | - | House of Jacob |
| Garrit Gallus | Blind lion | Fox | Roosters |
| Cum Statua | Nebuchadnezzar | - | Jews of Judea |
| Aman Novi | (Ahasuerus) | Haman | Jews of Persia |
| Floret | (Ahasuerus) | Haman | Jews of Persia |
It is possible that 'Floret' was added to the Roman de Fauvel only to the version by Chaillou de Pesstain, because there was already a motet on the subject of Haman in the Roman - Aman novi.
The abundance of critical motets by Vitry on the Jewish exile of 1306 might suggest he had perhaps an intimate connection with Judaism or Jews and was a Philo-Semitic.
The Feast from the Opera Amnon
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[1] The translations of the motets' texts are from the La Trobe university site: Medieval Music Database – Composers, The Works of Philippe de Vitry, http://www.lib.latrobe.edu.au/MMDB/composer/COM002.htm, 01/01/2006
[2] Bent, Margaret, Fauvel and Marigny: Which Came First?, "Fauvel Studies", Margaret Bent & Andrew Wathey (eds), Oxford, Oxford Uni. Press, 1998: 37; Sanders, Ernest H., The Early Motets of Philippe de Vitry,"JAMS", XXVIII (1975): 32
[3] Wathey, Andrew, Gerves du Bus, the Roman de Fauvel, and the Politics of the Later Capetian Court, "Fauvel Studies", Margaret Bent & Andrew Wathey (eds), Oxford, Oxford Uni. Press, 1998: 600;
[4] Maxwell, Kate, Authoring the Author: Innovation and Enigma in Biblioth?que Nationale MS fr.146 the Livre de Fauvel , "eSharp" online, Issue 2, Spring 2004, http://www.sharp.arts.gla.ac.uk/issue2/maxwell.htm
[5] The quotes of the Roman de Renart are from: Patricia Terry (tr.), Renard the Fox, Berkeley, Univ. of California Press, 1992
[6] Bent, Fauvel and Marigny, 37; Sanders, The Early Motets, 32
[7] Idem
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