Sempre, dona, t'amai de pura voglia

ballata by Bartolino da Padova

Sources

Florence: Biblioteca Medicea-Laurenziana, Palatino 87 (Squarcialupi Codex), fol. 112v (2/2);
Lucca: Archivio di Stato 184 (Mancini Codex), fol. 30v-31 (3/2);
Paris: Bibliothèque Nationale, fonds nouv. acq. français 6771 (Reina Codex), fol. 15v (3/2).

Facsimiles

1. The Lucca Codex. Codice Mancini. Introductory Study and Facsimile Edition, edited by John N das and Agostino Ziino, Lucca: Libreria musicale italiana editrice, 1990.
2. Il Codice Squarcialupi edited by F. Alberto GALLO, Lucca: Libreria Musicale Italiana, 1992.

Editions

1. Der Squarcialupi-Codex Pal. 87 der Biblioteca Medicea Laurenziana zu Florenz, edited by Johannes Wolf and H. Albrecht, Lippstadt: Kistner and Siegel, 1955, p. 179.
2. Italian Secular Music: Bartolino da Padova, Egidius de Francia, Giulielmus de Francia, Don Paolo da Firenze, edited by W. Thomas Marrocco, Monaco: Editions de L'Oiseau-Lyre, 1975. Polyphonic Music of the Fourteenth Century IX, p. 79 (Pn6771).
3. WILLIAMS, Carol J. The Mancini Codex: A Manuscript Study, Ph.D. dissertation (University of Adelaide), 3 vols., 1983, Vol. II, p. 23.

Text Editions

CORSI, Giuseppe. Poesie musicali del Trecento, Bologna: Commissione per i testi di lingua, 1970, p. 256.

Recordings

Every Delight and Fair Pleasure, Hartley Newnham (countertenor), Ruth Wilkinson (vielle), Lloyd Fleming (tenor), Ensemble of the Fourteenth Century, directed by John Griffiths and John Stinson (1991): Move MD 3092.

Text

Sempre, dona, t'amai de pura voglia,
e tu me da' per premio pena e noglia.

L'onor to sopra me stesso amava
e amo e fermo son sempre d'amare.
Vedert'e sopra ogn'altra pregiare
era mio bene e ziò desiderava.
Ma el bel viso to, che m'alegrava,
me fa' luntan, onde moro de doglia.

Se va' fra mile amanti recercando
che ardeno in i ochi de toa luce altera,
nessun con fé difese tanto intera
ma' to valore men di sé curando.
Donca perchè da ti me tien in bando
per cui morire me seria gran zoglia?

Ben rimembrava a me la greve sorte
di molti franchi amanti e di gran fede
a' quali done engrate per mercede
donò presone, esilio e ancor morte.
Ma 'l vero amor l'amante tien sì forte,
ch'ogni paura dal suo petto spoglia

Translation

Lady, I always loved you with a pure will,
and you have given me pain and vexation as a reward.

Your honour above myself I loved,
love and always will love.
My happiness consisted in looking at you
and prizing you above any other woman.
But your beautiful face which gave me joy
bids me to stay away, and thus I die of sorrow.

If you go searching among a thousand lovers
whose eyes burns with your exalted light,
you'll find no one who more faithfully defended
your valour, less caring about himself.
Then, why do you keep me banished from you,
for whom I would die with great pleasure?

I well remembered the sorry fate
of many honest and faithful lovers,
whom ungrateful women rewarded
with imprisonment, exile and even death.
But true love holds a lover so strongly
as to dispel every fear from his breast.

Text revision and translation © Giovanni Carsaniga