Poetic Composition and the Sources of the “Cançoner sagrat de vides de sants”: On the Construction of Sanctity in the “Cobles fetes en laor del gloriós sent Berthomeu”

Abstract

The Cançoner sagrat de vides de sants, composed by the Valencian notary Miquel Ortigues, offers a unique insight into the poetics of personal devotion in late medieval Spain. Characterized by Raymond Foulché-Delbosc (1912) as the work of a mere versifier without any great literary pretensions – a pious and simple soul in ecstasy before the images of the saints – the recent critical studies of Sergi Barceló Trigueros (2013) and Tomàs Martínez Romero (2014) have adopted a more careful and nuanced approach to the collection, commenting on aspects of individual technique and the emphasis of the poet’s devotional interests. This paper, which adopts the Cobles fetes en laor del gloriós sent Berthomeu as a test case, amplifies and extends their findings, offering an analysis of Ortigues’ approach to poetic composition in relation to his treatment of St Bartholomew, focusing particularly on the manipulation and synthesis of source materials. It argues that the poet adapted and combined an unusually wide range of sources, drawing on a detailed and impressive knowledge of art as well as literature, in the elaboration of a compelling, chronologically organized insight into the devotional significance of the saint.