CSM Cantiga 10 Lyrics: Rósa das rósas e Fror das frores

Standard spelling
Rósa das rósas e Fror das frores
Cantiga 10: Rósa das rósas e Fror das frores
Please read the notes on using the texts and the IPA transcriptions Please read the notes on using the music transcriptions
   
Standard spelling
Epigraph  

Esta é de loor de Santa María, com' é fremosa e bõa e há gran poder.

Line Refrain  Metrics  
1 Rósa das rósas e Fror das frores, 9' A
2 Dona das donas, Sennor das sennores. CSM 10:2I don't make a habit of commenting on translations of the Cantigas, but in this case I feel the urge to make an exception. I have encountered more than one English version that translates Sennor das sennores, quite preposterously, as "Lord of lords". One of these appears in the book "The Spanish Song Companion" by Jacqueline Cockburn and Richard Stokes (1992), who make several other blunders both in translation and in reproduction of the source text that only serve to highlight their incompetence with medieval Galician-Portuguese. Another comes from "Lyrics of the Middle Ages", ed. James J. Wilhelm (1990), and was translated by the editor himself. One can only assume that these translators were influenced by the fact that the words "senhor" and "señor" in modern Portuguese and Galician are masculine nouns which refer only to men, whilst the female equivalent is "senhora" / "señora". Whilst that is true now, however, it was not so in the medieval language: sennor has its origins in a comparative adjective (= "older" or "senior" in English), and had no separate feminine form in the early medieval period—something which is still the case for the modern Portuguese and Galician words "melhor" / "mellor", "pior" / "peor", "maior" and "menor" and their Castilian counterparts "mejor", "peor" etc. In any case, the connecting word das (< de as = "of the") is quite plainly feminine here, so the meaning has to be "Lady of ladies"; "Lord of lords" would be Sennor dos sennores. 10' A
 
  Stanza I     
3 Rósa de beldad' e de parecer 10  b
4 e Fror d' alegría e de prazer, 10  b
5 Dona en mui pïadosa seer, 10  b
6 Sennor en toller coitas e doores. 10' A
  Rósa das rósas e Fror das frores...    
 
  Stanza II     
7 Atal Sennor dev' hóme muit' amar, 10  b
8 que de todo mal o póde guardar; 10  b
9 e póde-ll' os pecados perdõar, 10  b
10 que faz no mundo per maos sabores. 10' A
  Rósa das rósas e Fror das frores...    
Cantigas de Santa Maria for Singers ©2013 by Andrew Casson
www.cantigasdesantamaria.com/csm/10
 
  Stanza III     
11 Devemo-la muit' amar e servir, 10  b
12 ca punna de nos guardar de falir; 10  b
13 des i dos érros nos faz repentir, 10  b
14 que nós fazemos come pecadores. 10' A
  Rósa das rósas e Fror das frores...    
 
  Stanza IV     
15 Esta dona que tenno por Sennor 10  b
16 e de que quéro seer trobador, 10  b
17 se éu per ren póss' haver séu amor, 10  b
18 dou ao démo os outros amores. 10' A
  Rósa das rósas e Fror das frores...    
 

Footnotes

Line 2:

I don't make a habit of commenting on translations of the Cantigas, but in this case I feel the urge to make an exception. I have encountered more than one English version that translates Sennor das sennores, quite preposterously, as "Lord of lords". One of these appears in the book "The Spanish Song Companion" by Jacqueline Cockburn and Richard Stokes (1992), who make several other blunders both in translation and in reproduction of the source text that only serve to highlight their incompetence with medieval Galician-Portuguese. Another comes from "Lyrics of the Middle Ages", ed. James J. Wilhelm (1990), and was translated by the editor himself. One can only assume that these translators were influenced by the fact that the words "senhor" and "señor" in modern Portuguese and Galician are masculine nouns which refer only to men, whilst the female equivalent is "senhora" / "señora". Whilst that is true now, however, it was not so in the medieval language: sennor has its origins in a comparative adjective (= "older" or "senior" in English), and had no separate feminine form in the early medieval period—something which is still the case for the modern Portuguese and Galician words "melhor" / "mellor", "pior" / "peor", "maior" and "menor" and their Castilian counterparts "mejor", "peor" etc. In any case, the connecting word das (< de as = "of the") is quite plainly feminine here, so the meaning has to be "Lady of ladies"; "Lord of lords" would be Sennor dos sennores.

Standard spelling  
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Manuscript references

External links marked are to facsimiles on Greg Lindahl's Cantigas de Santa Maria website.

[E]10viewhttp://www.pbm.com/~lindahl/cantigas/facsimiles/E/075small.htmlExternal link
[T]10 
[To]10viewhttp://www.pbm.com/~lindahl/cantigas/facsimiles/To/bob010small.gifExternal link

Oxford CSM Database record

External link to poem data:  CSM 10http://csm.mml.ox.ac.uk/index.php?p=poemdata_view&rec=10

Links to the Oxford database are provided with the kind permission of the project team. When planning a concert or recording, I would recommend that you use (and credit) my more pragmatic texts and supporting materials in the preparation of your performance, but that you request permission from the Oxford database team to reproduce (and credit) their own critically edited texts in your programme or liner notes, as these adhere to stricter criteria that keep them closer to the original sources, and undoubtedly have the greater academic authority.

Metrical summary

Refrain

9'  10'

Stanzas

10  10  10  10'

Rhyme

AA / bbbA
 RIIIIIIIV
Aoɾes
b 

Estimated performance times

Average syllables / min. Time
Very slow505:22
Slow1002:41
Medium1501:47
Fast2001:20
Very fast2501:04

These are very approximate total times for a full sung (or spoken) performance of all stanzas with all repeats of the refrain. Note that the speed is in average syllables per minute, and no particular mensural interpretation is assumed. More ornamented music will reduce the syllabic speed considerably. Remember also to add time for instrumental preludes, interludes and postludes.

Total syllables: 269