lines. A typical eight-line strophe has one of the following rhyme schemes, sung to two
melodic phrases:
ab ab bc bC / ab ab cc dD / ab ab cd cD
A A B A A B A A B
Other common forms include septains in ababbcC, neuvains in ababccdcD, dizains in
ababbccdcD, onzains in ababccddedE, and douzains in ababbccddedE. Most ballades end
with an envoi that reproduces the rhyme scheme of the second half of the stanzas and
frequently begins with the apostrophe Prince.
Eglal Doss-Quinby
[See also: FORMES FIXES]
Poirion, Daniel. Le poète et le prince: l’évolution du lyrisme courtois de Guillaume de Machaut a
Charles d’Orléans. Paris: Presses Universitaires de France, 1965, pp. 361–95.
BALLETTE
. Under the rubric “ballettes,” MS Douce 308 (Oxford, Bodleian Library, ca. 1300)
groups monodic songs, most often composed of three stanzas, generally three to four
lines each, rhyming aa(a)b. The meter of each line varies from seven to twelve syllables.
A one- to three-line refrain, which may also precede the first verse, is repeated at the end
of each strophe. Its metrical and rhyme structure need not correspond to that of the
stanzas, although a typical two-line refrain (AB/BB/CB) is usually linked, through its
rhyme scheme, to the last line of each strophe. Ballettes were seemingly meant to
accompany dancing.
Eglal Doss-Quinby
Bec, Pierre. La lyrique française au moyen âge (XIIe-XIIIe siècles): contribution a une typologie
des genres poétiques médiévaux. 2 vols. Paris: Picard, 1977–78, Vol. 1, pp. 228–33.
BAN/BANALITÉ
. The ban (Lat. bannus, bannum) was the royal power to command and punish. The
Merovingians employed it primarily to summon free men to military service; the
Carolingians extended it to include royal protection of the defenseless (churches, widows,
orphans, minors) and jurisdiction over crimes of violence, such as assault, rape, and
arson. The counts exercised the ban by delegation in public courts until the 10th century;
thereafter, the ban devolved to castellans, great landlords, and monasteries with
immunities or their lay advocates.
As the ban was privatized, military service fell for the most part to a professional class
of knights who served their immediate lords. Philip IV later reestablished the principle of
The Encyclopedia 175