Interest in love poetry was relatively new to the Middle Ages. In all of the surviving poetry of the ancients, we find few examples of love poetry. Consider, for instance, Odysseus' attitude toward Penelope in the Odyssey; and even in the Dido Aeneas love story in Virgil, their relationship is only an episode not a focus. In ancient literature the focus is on the bravery of the hero or his eternal reward for pleasing the gods. It is most emphatically not on what we would call today romantic love.

When ancient poetry deals with love it usually concerns either merry sensuality, domestic comfort or tragic madness. The most characteristic attitude of the ancient writers towards love (and the most influential) was Ovid's. In his Art of Love he ironically teaches the art of seduction. In mock seriousness, he pokes fun of physical love. For example, he offers the following advice to the apprentice lover:

Go early ere th' appointed hour to meet
The fair, and long await her in the street.
Through shouldering crowds on all her errands run,
Though graver business wait the while undone.
If she commands your presence on her way
Home from the ball to lackey her, obey!
Of if from rural scenes she bids you, 'Come',
Drive if you can, if not, then walk, to Rome,
And let nor Dog­star heats nor drifted load
Of whitening snows deter you from the road.
Cowards, fly hence! Our general, Love disdains
Your lukewarm service in his long campaigns.

This conduct recommended by Ovid is shameful and absurd; this is why he recommends it ­ as a comic example of the ridiculous lengths to which a man may be driven for love and as lesson to avoid such.

What is interesting to note is that this attitude is exactly that which the medieval courtly lover adopted: leaping up to attend errands, trudging through heat or cold at the bidding of one's lady was an honorable thing. (note the tradition is not dead ­ most men who have gone shopping with their lady or girlfriend uphold this tradition ­ even our code of etiquette with its rule that women always have precedence owes its legacy to courtly love).

How courtly love actually came to be, however, is not clear. What is clear is the distinguishing marks of courtly love: humility, courtesy, adultery, and the religion of love.

1. Humility: Subjection may be the better adjective for the lover subjected himself to the lady. This attitude is easily explained when we realize the feudal relationship between vassal and lord. If the lover's lady was also the feudal superior such subjection was even more natural.


2. Courtesy: As the social leader, the lady determined manners and it was naturally assumed that her lover would treat her with courtesy ­ a word that implies not only good manners, but loyalty as well.


3. Adultery: The medieval attitude towards adultery arouse because of the two following attitudes towards marriage in feudal society.


· Marriage had nothing to do with love ­ all marriages were matches of interest and convenience. When interests changed, the husband's object was to get rid of his wife as soon as possible. So marriage, far from being an institution of love, was but a dull background against which 'real' love stood out in vivid contrast.

· The medieval theory of marriage ­ according to medieval view passionate love itself was wicked, and did not cease to be wicked if the object of it were your wife (note this attitude toward love is often accused of having arisen from the Puritans). The medieval church felt: 1) on the hand, the physical act itself was not sinful, but 2) on the other hand, there was some evil element present in every physical act since the Fall.

· Some writers held that "the act is innocent but the desire is morally evil." Others excused the act provided it was meant to produce off­spring. Some went so far as to hold that "passionate love of a man's own wife [was] adultery." Whatever, the general impression left on the medieval mind was that all love ­ at least passionate and exalted devotion ­ was more or less wicked.


With such teaching hanging over their heads, it becomes easier to understand the preponderance of adultery. The courtly lover could rationalize: "If passionate love of my wife is sin, marriage cannot be the place to experience true love. I will seek love outside marriage. After all, what difference does it make, with whom I love if all love is sinful?"


4. Religion of love: The religion of love of the god Amor traces its inheritance to Ovid; in part this is due to that same law of transference which determined that all the emotion stored in the vassal's relation to his lord should attach itself to the new kind of love. Indeed, this erotic religion developed as a parody or rival of real religion (ie. Christianity) and emphasized the antagonism between religion and love. It thus became possible for poems to arise that were quasi­religious in one sense, and sensually provocative in the other. Good examples of this are Chaucer's poems "Merciless Beauty" and "To Rosamond" (699 ff).

The English notion of courtly love was strongly influenced by French poetry. Chretien de Troyes' Lancelot is the greatest representative. Troyes took the Arthurian stories of England, chose love as the central theme, and produced stories that stamped on men's minds the belief that Arthur's court was the home par excellence of true and noble love.

For instance, in Lancelot the hero allows himself to be humiliated at the request of and for the sake of Guinevere. During a jousting tournament in which Lancelot is unhorsing everyone, Guinevere commands him to do his poorest. Obediently, he allows himself to be unhorsed, and then even runs away frantically feigning fear. Everyone laughs and mocks him, but Guinevere is delighted; he has proven his love to her. Lancelot's submission reveals his courtesy, his humility, and his 'religious' devotion to her love. He treats Guinevere with saintly, if not divine, honors. Later, when he enters her bedroom, he kneels at her bed and worships her beauty; when leaving, he pauses to genuflect as to a holy shrine. The religion of love is obvious.

Another important French work was the theoretic handbook of love, Andreas Capellanus' The Art of Honest Love. Written as an instruction book to a certain, Walter, the book is concerned with the character and etiquette of the courtly lover. He must be truthful, modest, a good Catholic, clean in speech, hospitable, just, brave, generous, ready to return good for evil, and, at all times, courteous. According to Capellanus, love is viewed as the power of good operating in the world. "It is agreed among all men that there is no good thing in the world, and no courtesy, which is not derived from love as from its fountain." It is "the fountain and origin of all good things"; without it "all usages of courtesy would be unknown to man," (A side note: all the above courtesy only applied to ladies, not all women. Thus a man taken with a peasant woman need not concern himself with such decorum ­ he could take what he wanted).

Capellanus also develops the notion that love is necessarily excluded from the marriage relationship. He cites several reasons ­ marital affection cannot be love because it has about it an element of duty; it is not secretive; and its jealousy, so necessary to true love, it simply a pest in the marriage context. The major reason, however, that love is impossible in marriage concerns attitude. That is, the love which is to be the source of all that is beautiful in life and manners must be the reward freely given by the lady, and only our superiors can reward. A wife, however, is not a superior. For someone else she may be a superior, but for her husband she can only be a mere woman. Therefore, the lover's justification for adultery follows naturally from this and, thus, the great amount of medieval love poetry that borders on, if not in fact does glorify, adulterous love.

There is one further point concerning the medieval attitude toward love which should be mentioned. According to St. Augustine men and women could be stricken with what he termed "hot love." This kind of love ban with the visual perception of the object to be loved. For example, a man sees a woman; her image passes through his eyes where it is impressed into the memory. When he desires to remember her, his reason directs his will to reproduce the image of her in the "eye" of the mind. Thus, he dwells upon the image of the girl and becomes excited not by the actual person but by the image he has of her in his mind. The more he contemplates her in his mind, the more he desires her sexually. In a sense, he is more in love with the image he has in his mind than with the flesh and blood girl. Soon all he can do is contemplate her sexually.

Augustine points out that this is obviously bad. Because a human being is spirit, soul, and body (as created by God), men should emphasize the spiritual, not the sexual side of love. Since God is spirit, spiritual love is closer to God's love and people should thus marry for spiritual love. Hot love is obviously based solely on physical love. It is love at first sight and it causes a burning desire for sexual fulfillment. It follows that hot love is very selfish and jealousy is common because the hot lover become tremendously possessive. Often the hot lover becomes sick with love if he is unable to fulfill his love. Hot love, sooner or later, usually leads to disaster because it is so intense and so passionate. Medieval literature contains many examples of hot love.

For a Biblical example of hot love see II Sam. 13.