Note 258 — Chapter III · THE MINSTREL LIFE
Reading edition
Petrarch, Epist. Rerum Senil. n. 3 ‘sunt homines non magni ingenii, magnae vero memoriae, magnaeque diligentiae, sed maioris audaciae, qui regum ac potentum aulas frequentant, de proprio nudi, vestiti autem carminibus alienis, dumque quid ab hoc, aut ab illo exquisitius materno praesertim charactere dictum sit, ingenti expressione pronunciant, gratiam sibi nobilium, et pecunias quaerunt, et vestes et munera.’ Fulke of Marseilles, afterwards bishop of Toulouse, wrote songs in his youth. He became an austere Cistercian; but the songs had got abroad, and whenever he heard one of them sung by a joglar, he would eat only bread and water (Sermo of Robert de Sorbonne in Hauréau, Man. Fr. xxiv. 2. 286).