In the medieval world, love was something often left on the backburner of society. We often see marriages that are devoid of affection and are actually a tactical alliance between families to secure wealth and honor. So, it is no wonder that there were many instances of affairs driven by true love (if indeed such a thing exists). To have an affair was already wrong, but to have an affair with someone of a lower social status, as we see in some cases, was even worse. It completely jeopardized the social order that had been formed by the marriage in question. However, medieval literature seems to have a different view. Works such as troubadour poetry and the Andalusi Arabic poem Nuniyya actually romanticize affairs, specifically utilizing and idealizing the trope of the “unequal lovers". These poems reframe inequality between lovers as a denotation of the purity of their love, with it persisting through time, rejection and social and monetary barriers, and turning from juvenile love to adoring servitude. Thus, when forbidden love is presented in the form of an affair specifically between unequal lovers, what is actually a morally and socially reprehensible relationship is transformed into the purest form of love, with this inequality serving as its sturdy foundation.
Within both the Nuniyya and many troubadour poems, the affairs described often involve the poet writing from the perspective of a lowly man who yearns for a married noblewoman. However, rather than presenting this inequality as a barrier to love, the poets depict it as a propagator of it, pushing their love to last until they finally can be together. In Ibn Zaydun’s Nuniyya, the narrator laments over the distance between him and his lover, first describing their physical distance before noting their social distance. He states that he “could not afford [her]” in this life. However, this fact is not a deterrent of his love for her but actually propagates an eternal love that will push him to “find [her] in the stations of the last assembly” – referring to the afterlife – and “pay the price”. Thus, as he looks forward into their far future, when he can love her freely, it is clear that he anticipates loving her ceaselessly until then. So, this social inequality between them does not rebuff his love but strengthens it. His love is elevated from a finite feeling to an eternal longing.
In the works of famous troubadour poet Bernart de Ventadorn, this sociological power imbalance is not just a signifier of a love that will persist eternally. It also presents the narrator as a humble servant of the lady, whose unattainability only makes him love her more. In his poem Can vei la lauzeta mover, the poet asserts that he is no longer in control of himself, saying that “‘I’ has no power of ‘I’” ever since the day that he met this lady. He allows himself to be reduced to her servant, with no will nor control over himself. This social power imbalance thus has manifested as an emotional power imbalance where the poet fully submits himself to his lover, displaying how his love transcends his own autonomy.
Furthermore, the dynamic created by this power imbalance seems to make the poet love her more. He describes how the lady he loves rejects him and “scorns his behest”, noting that she shows herself as “a woman indeed”. The acknowledgement of his rejection paired with this laudatory comment suggests that he understands the social imbalances that keep them apart and is only urged to further compliment her for how much of a lady she is for abiding by social expectations. This very imbalance, which makes their love impossible, also propagates his love and admiration for her.
Thus, the power imbalance between lovers in an affair becomes central to the romantic appeal of these poems. It intensifies longing, making one’s love last eternally as he likely cannot be with his love in this lifetime. Since love cannot be shared on a peer-to-peer level, they adopt a servant and master dynamic, with the poet submitting themself to their lover. Even in cases where love is seemingly unrequited, the love-struck poet sees this to the merit of their beloved; by rejecting him, she upholds her nobility, making him love her only more. In this way, medieval love poetry reveals the paradoxical nature of love; the very constructs of society which make these relationships impossible are what elevate them to their purest form. By describing this type of unequal love, a love that can never be achieved in reality, the poets turn love itself into a perfect, purified and almost mythical concept.
Works Cited:
Ibn Zaydun, The Nuniyya in The Literature of al-Andalus, ed. María Rosa Menocal, Raymond P. Scheindlin and Michael Sells (Cambridge University Press, 2000).
Bernhart de Ventadorn, Can vei la lauzeta mover, in From Dawn to Dawn, trans. R.L. Kline (2009).
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