Triboulet (playwright)

Triboulet (fl. 1447–1479)[1] was a jester and comedy playwright for René of Anjou. There have been at least three Triboulets, as homonymy was widespread among French court jesters.[2] The Triboulet for René of Anjou was the first one. The name, equivalent to modern French phrase souffre-douleur, comes from the archaic French verb tribouler.[3]

For the jester of Francis I, see Triboulet.
1461 medal depicting Triboulet

Works mentioning biography

Triboulet's biography was summarized by Maurice Lever.[4] Medievalist Bruno Roy, confirmed the intuitions of Gustave Cohen and Eugénie Droz, studying the jester-playwright in his articles[1][5][6] and book.[7] A bilingual edition of the works by Triboulet was published by Thierry Martin.[8]

Career

Having microcephaly and dwarfism, Triboulet was predisposed to novelty entertainment. In the beginning at the court, he had a character playing as a governor named Jacquet and another named Nicolas de Haultet. Throughout his career, he would have two servants: his wife La Triboulette and her mother, who both lived in the court.[1]

Triboulet led a theatrical troupe and was a praised author of farces and sotties. He composed several comic pieces, five of which were preserved: the sotties Roi des Sots (c. 1454), La Farce de maître Pathelin (c. 1457[9][lower-alpha 1]), Vigiles Triboulet (c. 1458), Copieurs et lardeurs (c. 1461), and Sots qui corrigent le magnificat (c. 1462). At the end of his career, he wrote Débat de Triboulet et de la Mort (c. 1480).

René of Anjou rewarded himself by dressing up as a king, marrying him with the greatest pomp on 30 August 1452, and having his medal engraved in 1461.[1] Charles gifted Triboulet a magnificent mare.[1]

The sottie Vigiles Triboulet describes the overall language of a work composed by Villon, titled Oncques maistre Françoys Villon / Ne composa si bon jargon. This implies that the two authors could have met at the Anjou court in 1457, but the date of this sottie is controversial[10] The exact date and author of the Stockholm manuscript jargon ballads is uncertain.[11]

Notes
  1. According to Halina Lewicka (Études sur l’ancienne farce française, Klincksieck, 1974, p. 100), Pathelin was written after 1456, and Guillaume Alécis had it in mind while he made Feintes du monde, shortly after 1460.

References
  1. Roy, Bruno (January 1980). "Triboulet, Josseaume et Pathelin à la Cour de René d'Anjou". Le Moyen Français (in French). 7: 7–56. doi:10.1484/J.LMFR.3.71. ISSN 0226-0174.
  2. Berthon, Guillaume. "« Triboulet a frères et sœurs » – Fou de cour et littérature au tournant des XVe et XVIe siècles" (in French). Retrieved September 18, 2019.
  3. Lacroix, Paul. Romans relatifs à l'histoire de France aux XVe et XVIe siècles (in French).
  4. Le Sceptre et la marotte : histoire des Fous de cour, p. 115-6. (Hachette-Pluriel, 1985.)
  5. Roy, Bruno: C’est ung Guillaume qui a seurnom de Joceaume. (Le Moyen Âge, t. 96, 1990.)
  6. Roy, Bruno (2016-07-18), Hüe, Denis; Smith, Darwin (eds.), "Préhistoire du "Bee!"", Maistre Pierre Pathelin : Lectures et contextes, Interférences (in French), Rennes: Presses universitaires de Rennes, pp. 79–93, ISBN 978-2-7535-4571-7, retrieved 2023-09-17
  7. Roy, Bruno (2009). "Pathelin": l'hypothèse Triboulet. Medievalia. Orléans: Paradigme. ISBN 978-2-86878-281-6.
  8. Triboulet : La Farce de Pathelin et autres pièces homosexuelles, QuestionDeGenre/GKC, 2011. This edition is the only one since late 15th century to publish La Farce de Pathelin as credited to Triboulet, and its biased interpretation of the text is unanimously rejected by experts.
  9. "Bouffon ! quand le roi s'amuse - Ép. 3/4 - Histoire du rire". France Culture (in French). Retrieved 2021-04-19..
  10. See Le Recueil des Repues Franches, édition critique par Jelle Koopmans et Paul Verhuyck, Genève, Droz, 1995, p. 37-39.
  11. T. Martin <Villon : Ballades en argot homosexuel. Mille et une Nuits, 1998> est le seul auteur à en attribuer trois sur cinq à Villon et à les dater d’avant 1456.
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