The portrayal of music in
Sir Orfeo
This essay by BA English Literature and Irish Studies student, Jacob Hussain, was selected for
publication by Dr Alex Broadhead, leader of the first-year module ENGL111: Literature in Time.
If there is one element in Sir Orfeo that remains consistent throughout,
it is the element of music. We first hear mention of music in line 3 of
the poem, “[l]ayes that ben in harping”, and this continues throughout
the rest of the introduction. When we are eventually introduced to the
character of Orfeo (a King), he is said to “...mest of ani thing / [Love] the
gle of harping” (line 26), with several lines dedicated to the tales that are
played in his court on the harp. During his exile, we see Orfeo taking only
his “[s]chert, ne no other gode, / Bot his harp he tok algate”. Whilst in the
Fairie World he uses his “harp so miri of soun” to charm the Fairie King.
When he returns home it is under the guise of a minstrel, who has found
“this ich harp” (line 540), and finally, in line 600: “Gode is the lay, swete is
the note”, as music is restored to the Kingdom. From the beginning to the
middle and the end, the presence of music is felt in Sir Orfeo, and it is because
of this that we must delve deeper into any ulterior meanings it may represent.
According to the Oxford English Dictionary, there are eight meanings for
the word: “harping” and each of them pertain to either singing, or playing
the harp. The issue with trying to understand exactly which meaning is
supposed in Sir Orfeo, is a lot more complicated than it initially may seem.
According to Bullock-Davies (1973, p.18) neither Dante nor De Grocheo
(Medieval writers who covered the theory of singing and composition)
saw anything in a Breton Lay that they considered noteworthy enough to
write about . In fact, a Lay in Germany and in France was quite different
from those found in Breton, and it is only when “Breton” is qualified before
“Lay” that we see this unique combination of harping (meaning to literally
play the harp) and singing, being used synonymously with one another.
As is the case in the German tale, Tristan of Gottfried von Strassbourg,
only Bretons could play the harp so enthralling that the audience “forgot
their own names,” (Bullock-Davies, 1973 p. 19) Evidence exists to show
this style being recreated by European minstrels and harpists, but the
effect of their harping was said to be different than that of a native Breton
minstrel (ibid.). The running theme of Orfeo’s skill on the harp therefore
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