Crusade Poems of Rutebeuf

This chapter presents the crusade poems of Rutebeuf. Between 1255 and 1277, the poet writing under the name Rutebeuf penned eleven poems related to the contemporary crusading movement, one of which eulogizes Eudes of Nevers. Described variously as a minstrel, poet-preacher, poet-journalist, propagandist, and pamphleteer, he left behind fifty-five poems that range in tone from the playful and humorous to the moralizing and religious. Now recognized as a major figure in thirteenth-century French poetry, Rutebeuf’s crusade poems reveal a poet engaged in the historical moment through the creation of a poet-preacher persona charged with exhorting the faithful to mend their ways and save the Holy Land. The recurring themes in his poems include the inexorable passage of time, the uncertain destination of the soul after the body is gone, the guarantee of judgment before God, and the crusade as an instrument of salvation and purification of the soul.