amor) of the troubadours, which focused on the poet’s
devotion to an unattainable lady of equal or higher
rank. This concept is known as amor de lohn (distant
love, or love from far away). At the end of the 12th cen-
tury, ANDREAS CAPELLANUS composed a Latin treatise
commonly known as The Art of Courtly Love (ca. 1184–
86). According to Andreas, the love of a lady can enno-
ble a man’s character and enable him to accomplish
great deeds: “[T]he man in love becomes accustomed to
performing many services gracefully for everyone”
(book 1, ch. 4). Courtly love could only exist outside of
marriage, and its code dictated that the man must initi-
ate the love affair by pledging himself to a woman and
by submitting to her desires. The lady, meanwhile, had
the power to accept or reject her suitor, although he
would continue to serve her faithfully, regardless of her
decision. Thus, the courtly love relationship mirrored
the FEUDAL OATHS sworn between a knight and his liege-
lord. Recent critical analysis has demonstrated the
homosocial, if not homosexual, intent behind the “love
triangles,” whereby the competition between the lover-
knight and the husband supersedes the desire either
has for the woman.
The adulterous nature of courtly love stood in direct
contrast to the church’s teachings on adultery, but
many scholars believe that the prevalence of arranged
marriages required outlets for the expressions of roman-
tic love denied within the context of marriage. Gener-
ally, courtly love was considered an idealized state and
an achievable one, though consummation was not
strictly excluded. It was, of course, reserved strictly for
nobility and became tied to CHIVALRY.
PETRARCH borrowed from these conventions, leading
to the revitalized cult of courtly love celebrated by the
early modern writers of SONNETs. Renaissance courtly
love relied more heavily on chaste or platonic love,
although quite often the desire for (or intention of)
consummation is expressed, without hope of fulfi ll-
ment. Queen ELIZABETH I admired the ideals of courtly
love so much that she insisted the rhetoric of her court-
iers be expressed in amorous terms, resulting in the
politicization of courtly love during the Tudor age.
Modern critics have explored the boundaries of
courtly love, and a number have linked it to masoch-
ism. In particular, the early modern version features an
abject lover suffering mightily at the hands of his “cruel
fair” lady, who delights in his torment. Medieval
courtly love, more dependent on formal interrelation-
ships, tokens, and exchanges, is more closely aligned
with fetishism.
See also LOVESICKNESS.
FURTHER READING
Andreas Capellanus. The Art of Courtly Love. Translated by
John Jay Parry. New York: Columbia University Press,
1960.
Ferrante, Joan M., George D. Economou, and Frederick
Goldin, eds. In Pursuit of Perfection: Courtly Love in Medi-
eval Literature. Port Washington, N.Y.: Kennikat Press,
1975.
Paris, Gaston. “Etudes sur les romans de la Table Ronde:
Lancelot du Lac.” Romania 12 (1883): 459–534.
Porter, Pamela. Courtly Love in Medieval Manuscripts.
Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2003.
K. Sarah-Jane Murray, Hannah Zdansky, and
Michelle M. SauerCROWLEY, ROBERT (ca. 1518–ca. 1588)
Robert Crowley was probably born in Tetbury, Glouces-
tershire. He entered Magdalen College, Oxford, in
1534, received his BA in 1540, and became a fellow of
the college in 1542. Crowley most likely converted to
Protestantism while at Oxford. Leaving Magdalen in
1544, he returned to Gloucestershire and became a
tutor. Two years later, he moved to London and began
publishing political poems and pamphlets. Among
many others, he penned a response to the burning of
Anne Askew, the Protestant martyr. Crowley spent
most of 1549 translating and composing The Psalter of
David, becoming the fi rst to translate the entire Book of
Psalms into English. In 1550, he edited three editions
of WILLIAM LANGLAND’s The Vision of PIERS PLOWMAN. He
temporarily fl ed England when MARY I took the throne,
but returned to become vicar of St. Giles Cripplegate.
Crowley died on June 18, 1588.
See also “BALLAD WHICH ASKEW MADE AND SANG
WHEN IN NEWGATE, A”; “OF UNSACIABLE PURCHASERS.”
FURTHER READING
King, John. English Reformation Literature. Princeton, N.J.:
Princeton University Press, 1982.CROWLEY, ROBERT 131