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imself wrote many poems in the Galician or Portuguese dialect; perhaps his choice was dictated by reasons analogous to those which impelled Italian and Catalonian poets to write in Provencal. The general body of Portuguese poetry declares itself by form and content to be directly borrowed from the troubadours: it appeals to an aristocratic audience; the idea of love as a feudal relation is preserved with the accompanying ideas of _amour courtois_, and the lyric forms developed in Southern France are imitated. The Provencal manner took root in Portugal as it failed to do in Spain, because it found the ground to some extent prepared by the existence of a popular lyric poetry which was remodelled under Provencal influence. The most popular of the types thus developed were _Cantigas de amor e de amigo_ and _Cantigas de_ _escarnho e de maldizer_; the former were love songs: when the poet speaks the song was one _de amor_; when the lady speaks (and she is unmarried, in contrast to Provencal usage) the song was _de amigo_. This latter is a type developed independently by the Portuguese school. _Cantigas de escarnho_ correspond in intention [126] to the Provencal _sirventes_; if their satire was open and unrestrained they were _cantigas de maldizer_. They dealt for the most part with trivial court and personal affairs and not with questions of national policy upon which the troubadours so often expressed their opinions. Changes in taste and political upheavals brought this literature to an end about 1385 and the progress of Portuguese poetry then ceases for some fifty years. CHAPTER IX [127] PROVENCAL INFLUENCE IN GERMANY, FRANCE AND ENGLAND Provencal influence in Germany is apparent in the lyric poetry of the minnesingers. Of these, two schools existed, connected geographically with two great rivers. The earlier, the Austro-Bavarian school, flourished in the valley of the Danube: the later minnesingers form the Rhine school. In the latter case, Provencal influence is not disputed; but the question whether the Austro-Bavarian school was exempt from it, has given rise to considerable discussion. The truth seems to be, that the earliest existing texts representing this school do show traces of Provencal influence; but there was certainly a primitive native poetry in these Danube districts which had reached an advanced stage of development before Provencal
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