[Ansteorra] Social Status

[mikea]

On Fri, Sep 29, 2006 at 01:53:37PM -0500, Robert Fitzmorgan wrote:
>             So to make ends meet Bertran set himself up as a mercenary. On
> those occasions when peace broke out Bertran would write songs reminding the
> parties of all the wrongs they had suffered and calling them cowards for
> making peace.  Once the fighting resumed he could hire himself out to one
> side or the other.
>     Bertran did not get along with his brother, (Bertran didn't get along
> with most people) and at one point threw him out of the castle.  Constantine
> went to the King, (Henry II of England) and complained.  Henry gave the
> castle back to Constantine and threw Bertran out as punishment.  Bertran
> then wrote a song in which he complained that he would never be able to tell
> the truth about his neighbors again if he didn't have a strong castle in
> which to hide.  This apparently made sense to Henry since he gave Bertran
> back his half of the castle.

Those who have read Dante's _Inferno_ will recall Dante's encounter 
Bertran de Born in the ninth "bolgia" (ninth pouch or valley, reserved 
for schismatics) of the Eighth Circle (for fraudsters) of Hell, where 
Bertran (or Bertrand or Bertram) was placed for separating the members
of the royal family:

   I truly saw, and still I seem to see it,
     A trunk without a head walk in like manner
     As walked the others of the mournful herd.

   And by the hair it held the head dissevered,
     Hung from the hand in fashion of a lantern, 
     And that upon us gazed and said: "O me!"

   It of itself made to itself a lamp,
     And they were two in one, and one in two; 
     How that can be, He knows who so ordains it.

   When it was come close to the bridge's foot,
     It lifted high its arm with all the head, 
     To bring more closely unto us its words,

   Which were: "Behold now the sore penalty, 
     Thou, who dost breathing go the dead beholding;
     Behold if any be as great as this. 

   And so that thou may carry news of me, 
     Know that Bertram de Born am I, the same
     Who gave to the Young King the evil comfort.

   I made the father and the son rebellious; 
     Achitophel not more with Absalom 
     And David did with his accursed goadings. 

   Because I parted persons so united,
     Parted do I now bear my brain, alas! 
     From its beginning, which is in this trunk. 
 
He became a monk sometime before his death in 1215. 

-- 
Mike Andrews        /   Michael Fenwick    Barony of Namron, Ansteorra
mikea at mikea.ath.cx  /   Amateur Extra radio operator W5EGO
Tired old music Laurel; Journeyman Chirurgeon; SCAdian since AS XI