The Melody Web what each genre heard, and what it passed on

heard passed on Click or tap a node to recenter. Use a connecting line, or Influence, for the story.

Heard

Troubadour genre · 1100–1300

Court lyric already includes dance-song: estampida, dansa, refrain pieces with a usable pulse.

Influence
Trouvère genre · 1150–1300

Medieval dance takes trouvère dance-song and refrain forms (rondeau, virelai-like caroles, Adam’s stage dances) as northern French sung-step repertory beside the Occitan hop from…

Influence

Medieval dance

practice · 1100–1450

Also called estampie, carole, saltarello, medieval court dance

Twelfth- to fifteenth-century European dance as a named practice: sung carole, court estampie / estampida, ductia, and later Italian istampitta and saltarello. Notation is scarce; most of what we hear now is reconstruction. This node is the dance parent of Renaissance court dance (basse danse and ballo manuals). It hears Troubadour for Occitan dance-song and Trouvère for the langue d’oïl refrain and carole book. It is not a style of Medieval polyphony and not the high canso job of those lyric nodes. Carole leftover as a type on this node. Minstrel leftover as a job, not a node. Folk saltarello leftover as a later Italian recoding, not a parent here.

Listen

  1. Kalenda maya Raimbaut de Vaqueiras (1200) YouTube
  2. La quarte estampie royal Manuscrit du Roi dance repertory (13th century) YouTube
  3. La quinte estampie real Manuscrit du Roi (13th century) YouTube
  4. Lamento di Tristano / La Rotta Italian trecento instrumental tradition (14th century) YouTube
  5. Istampitta Ghaetta London BL Add. 29987 repertory (14th century) YouTube
  6. Saltarello London BL Add. 29987 (14th century) YouTube
  7. English dance (estampie type) British Library Harley 978 circle (13th century) YouTube

Passed on

Renaissance court dance practice · 1450–1600

The quattrocento ballo book and the Burgundian basse danse do not invent dancing.

Influence

Troubadour → Medieval dance

melodyform and structurefunction and contextmeter and groovestrength: mediumscholarly consensus1150–1250oraldancepatronage

Mechanism

Court lyric already includes dance-song: estampida, dansa, refrain pieces with a usable pulse. Those tunes and the idea of a sung step feed the medieval dance practice. Strength medium. High-style canso is not this hop; the carole and purely instrumental estampie have other, unnamed stocks.

Evidence

Kalenda maya as the usual sung estampida; Aubrey on dance-adjacent rhythm versus editorial lyric rhythm; Hoppin on estampie beside vernacular song.

Debate

Whether Kalenda maya is a dance first or a song later called a dance is old and unsettled. The edge claims a shared court job, not a proven choreography. Do not draw troubadour onto Renaissance court dance as a skip.

Mediators

artist: Raimbaut de Vaqueiras; community: Occitan and trouvère courts

Trouvère → Medieval dance

melodyform and structurefunction and contextstrength: mediumscholarly consensus1200–1300oralnotationdance

Mechanism

Medieval dance takes trouvère dance-song and refrain forms (rondeau, virelai-like caroles, Adam’s stage dances) as northern French sung-step repertory beside the Occitan hop from Troubadour. Strength medium. trouvere ars nova is the motet-tenor hop; this edge is the social-dance job. High canso leftover on the troubadour/trouvère lyric nodes.

Evidence

Adam de la Halle’s dance pieces; northern refrain-songs used as caroles; Aubrey, Hoppin, and Grove.

Debate

Whether this duplicates the troubadour hop. Troubadour supplies Occitan dance-song (Kalenda maya); trouvère supplies the langue d’oïl refrain and carole book.

Mediators

artist: Adam de la Halle

Medieval dance → Renaissance court dance

function and contextmeter and grooveform and structureperformance practicestrength: highscholarly consensus1430–1500danceoralpatronagenotation

Mechanism

The quattrocento ballo book and the Burgundian basse danse do not invent dancing. They write down and school a job the court already has: measured strains, a processional or jumping pulse, couples and files. Strength high for function and body. The new gift of the Renaissance node is the printed/manual named-step literacy (Domenico, Guglielmo, later Arbeau), not the idea of a court dance.

Evidence

Continuity from estampie/saltarello pulse and alta-band color into basse danse and early ballo; Grove on the medieval-to-Renaissance dance handoff; Domenico (c. 1450) as the usual first treatise object.

Debate

Footwork itself is thinly recovered before the manuals; the edge is the social-musical job, not a Seikilos-style step tape. Do not hang this on Renaissance polyphony or on Troubadour as a high hop — those are the donor’s donors. Unnamed village dance is a second stock, not a node.

Mediators

community: Burgundian and Italian dancing-masters; artist: Domenico da Piacenza