Return to the index of "Other Women's Voices."
Updated 11-20-08
Gabrielle de Coignard (c.1550-1586)
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"POSTERITY WILL READ MY VERSE."
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Gabrielle de Coignard was born and, so far as we know, spent all of her life in Toulouse, which in the 1500s was the chief city of southern France. Its Parlement acted as the king's court of justice; its university was second in reputation only to that of Paris; and as the home of a 200-year-old poetry contest called the Jeux Floraux (Floral games), it was a literary center. In the second half of the century, the city became fully embroiled in the religious wars between Protestants and Catholics.
Jean de Coignard, Gabrielle's father, was a prosperous lawyer in the Parlement and for twenty years one of the directors of the Jeux Floraux. A year after his death in 1569, his daughter married a local nobleman, Pierre de Mansencal, lord of Miremont, who soon became president of the Parlement, but who died in 1573, leaving a young widow with two girls --- an infant and a two-year-old. Coignard never re-married (despite the urgings of relatives); she raised her daughters and tried to live a life devoted to prayer and to the writing of devotional poetry.
Coignard had reason to pray: the city of Toulouse had already been the site of religious conflict. In 1562, at the start of the wars, fighting in the streets between Catholics and Protestants had killed many; for the next ten years, sporadic battles occurred. In 1572, after the St. Bartholomew's Day massacre in Paris, Protestants living in Toulouse were imprisoned; later, perhaps as many as 300 of these were killed --- six lawyers were hanged in front of the Parlement building. After 1572, Toulouse became a royalist and Catholic stronghold, but it was at the edge of rebel-held lands (see the map online) and its citizens felt its territory to be an island in the middle of the Protestant south.
None of Coignard's poetry was published in her lifetime, although it appears that some of it circulated in manuscript. Eight years after her death, her daughters had her work published in Toulouse as Oeuvres chretiennes de feu dame G. de C. (Christian works...); a second edition was published the next year in Avignon. Oeuvres chretiennes includes 129 sonnets spirituels and 21 longer poems, including an epic poem on the biblical Judith, Imitation de la victoire de judich (Judith was a heroine popular with both Catholic and Protestant writers during the religious wars).
Coignard's sonnets are often personal, but they are not merely private meditations; Coignard frequently expresses the belief that her words will be read by posterity. The longer poems are less introspective, providing commentary on biblical readings --- especially the life and death of Jesus and the suffering of Mary --- and on the feasts of the Catholic church.
Only the 129 sonnets spirituels and Imitation de la victoire de judich are available in English, but from these you can hear the voice of a woman trying to find religious peace in a very unpeaceful world.
On this page you'll find:
Links to helpful sites online.
Excerpts from translations in print:
Les sonnets spirituels
Imitation de la victoire de judich
Information on secondary sources.
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1. In English, one poem, "The sky, all blackened with a liquid cloud," translated by Melanie E. Gregg, with the original and a comment by Ellen Moody on the translation.
2. In French:
(a) In this alphabetical list, go to "Coignard" for links to the originals of 12 poems from Oeuvres chretiennes.
(b) Links to two other sonnets: "Je n'ai jamais goute de l'eau de la fontaine," and "M'eveillant a minuit, dessillant la paupiere." Linking to "Oeuvres chrestiennes (bnf)" will download a PDF file of the 239-page second edition (1595) of the work.
3. A map showing the religious-political divisions of France in the later 1500s and the exposed position of Toulouse (the Huguenots were the French Protestants). At the bottom, click on "Back to Religious Wars" for a two-part essay on the wars, by C.T. Iannuzzo.
4. If you have forgotten (or never knew) the story told in the biblical Book of Judith, the subject of Coignard's epic, Imitation de la victoire de judich, you may want to look at a summary (for excerpts from Imitation, see below, under "In print").
5. Reviews (for excerpts from Gregg, see below, under "In print"; for more on Stocker's book, see "Secondary sources"):
(a) Megan C. Armstrong on Spiritual Sonnets, Gregg's 2004 translation of the first part of Coignard's Oeuvres chretiennes.
(b) Sara F. Matthews-Grieco on Margarita Stocker's 1998 study, Judith, Sexual Warrior: Women and Power in Western Culture; elsewhere, another review, this by Pamela Schaeffer.
6. For historical background, a link to the text of John Charles Dawson's study, published in 1923, Toulouse in the Renaissance; the Floral Games; University and Student Life; Etienne Dolet (1532-1534); the first part of the work discusses the Jeux Floraux and its influence on the literary life of the city in Coignard's lifetime. You can also dowload the text as a PDF file. (For information on the print version of the book, see "Secondary sources.")
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[Melanie E. Gregg has made a line-by-line translation of the 129 sonnets found in Coignard's Oeuvres chretiennes; the originals are given on the facing page. Also included are the dedication to the whole work by Coignard's daughters, the 1594 printer's address to the reader, and two anonymous introductory poems. Gregg's introduction discusses the style and themes of the sonnets; the notes are detailed; the bibliography includes the few earlier English-language studies. (See the book's table of contents online.):]
Coignard, Gabrielle de. Spiritual sonnets: a bilingual edition;
edited and translated by Melanie E. Gregg (The other voice in
early modern Europe). Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2004.
(xxxi,195 p.)
LC#: PQ1607.C56 A7613 2004; ISBN: 0226139832, 0226139840
Includes bibliographical references (p. 179-188) and index
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"Do not fly too high on a wing too bold."
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[Because of the Jeux Floraux competition, Toulouse was accustomed to a high standard of poetic effort (Pierre de Ronsard had won an award in 1554, Guillaume du Bartas in 1565). Coignard was apparently advised to circulate some of her poems --- or even to publish them --- but she says that she will write only for God:]
My verse, stay quiet in my room,
And never leave, no matter what anyone says to you.
Do not fly too high on a wing too bold,
But stop lower on some small bush.
One must be learned to compose a sonnet well,
Read night and day and study Homer,
And beg for the rich brush of the muses
To capture their beauty within a flawless painting.
Stay then, my verse, enclosed in my coffer;
I made you so that I might offer you
At the feet of the eternal one, who incited me to sing
All that I sang on my rusty lyre.
I have devoted myself entirely to Him,
Not wanting to give my labors to any other. [p.53]
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"I am abandoning the lute; I shall not sing any longer."
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[Yet it appears that some of Coignard's poems did circulate and were criticized. Here, the octet's anger at "dangerous envy" gives way to the sestet's --- perhaps a bit grudging --- acceptance of "the blame and the praise":]
I want to abandon these verses; I want to leave the muse;
I am abandoning the lute; I shall not sing any longer.
I hate that which sought to content my spirit
And which maintained my languorous life.
Since dangerous envy
Dares to violate my actions in order to afflict me,
I am taking leave of everything, I am absenting my self,
To find repose, solitary and reclusive.
We are sometimes favored by all,
And then, at the same time, by each despised.
We must receive the blame and the praise.
God permits this in order to humble us
And to remind us of what we must not forget:
We are not angels; we are sinners. [p.119]
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"God... gives them quite often the triumphant laurels."
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[In a less accepting spirit, Coignard adapts the Ovidian myth of Arachne, the mortal woman attacked by Pallas Athene for daring to compete with the goddess in the art of weaving. Here, God allows the humble poet to triumph over "the worldly ones." You can see the original online: "Instrument de Pallas":]
Pallas got angry at the kind workwoman,
Because she had made her most beautiful work.
Tearing the fabric and breaking the spindle,
And treading on the fine work at her feet,
She cruelly struck the ingenious girl,
Whose blood streamed from the highest part of her brain.
Jupiter, who saw this completely new quarrel,
Changed Arachne into a spinning spider.
Thus one often sees even the greatest ones get angry
If they see the little ones desirous of approaching
The rock of virtue so difficult to climb.
But God, who takes pleasure in His humble workers,
Gives them quite often the triumphant laurels,
Because the worldly ones despise their cloth. [p.153]
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"My verse... will render our souls inflamed with your love."
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[As in many of her poems, Coignard here apologizes to God for the inconstancy of her spiritual life. But she is sure that at least her writing will have value: she will praise God in such a way that readers in later years will be brought to the love of God:]
Lord, if ever my love diminishes
Or my heart chills to Your divine fire,
One cannot always remain, as they say,
In the same state or maintain constant strength.
Nothing is certain beneath the clouds.
Even the nocturnal star swells and wanes.
Thus when my desire cools little by little,
Recognizing my fault, I feel true remorse.
But, as long as the great sea nourishes the fish,
And the warm summer ripens the harvest,
And the woods bear their thick leafy boughs,
I will praise you, Lord, and posterity
Will read my verse, which warm with charity,
Will render our souls inflamed with your love. [p.123]
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"...this perverted century."
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[Coignard sees her writing about Jesus and his suffering not merely as a devotional act, but also as her readers' defense against heresy:]
I would not know how to write about anything else
But the Cross, where I have fixed my heart.
Within this object, my love is deeply nestled.
My muse does not compose any other song.
Whether I am writing in verse or prose,
My speech is attached to the Cross.
It is my shield, my defender against sin;
My soul rests beneath its branches.
It is quite right in this perverted century,
Where we see so many diverse enemies
Raise their arrogance against the Cross,
The good Christians, with a common voice,
Sing the honor of the divine Cross,
Which will be our defense against all. [pp.103-05]
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"...thinking that we were already living in security."
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[From the mid-1570s the actual battles of the religious wars spared the city of Toulouse, and Coignard saw her fellow citizens becoming indifferent to the fighting going on around them. For her, nature itself provides a portent of God's anger (the "ardent star" probably refers to a 1577 comet):]
Alas! As soon as a bloody war
Has ceased the rigor of its cruel effects,
And we think we see ourselves a little ravaged
By the calamity and preceding pain,
We are threatened by this powerful hand
That wants quite justly to chastise our misdeeds.
Seeing us become more imperfect every day,
He shows His wrath by an ardent star.
Alas! We were thinking that we were already living in security
Without receiving a single correction for our misdeeds,
Spared displeasure, regret, and repentance for our wrongs,
But our vain hope will be able to deceive us well,
For this just Lord is ready to strike us
If we do not appease him through our contrition. [p.
121]
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"Inhuman efforts of the heretic war upset the universe."
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[And an epidemic of whooping cough in Toulouse in 1580 is a sign of the "just Lord's" wrath:]
The inhuman efforts of the heretic war
Upset the universe with a strange power,
And, without bathing our eyes, we could no longer see
The persecution of the Catholic faith.
God, observing our iniquitous disposition
Untouched by all these misfortunes,
Tells us in His wrath: I will show you
How I punish public cowardice.
You fear risking your life for me,
Letting my holy law, so close to you, suffer loss.
Therefore, you will not die in doing service to me.
But I will strike you in your strong cities,
For the infinite number of your iniquities
Offends my pity and provokes my justice. [pp.65-67]
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"I do not expect this desired peace from mortals."
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[During one of the brief peaceful interludes between the wars, Coignard considers her own internal battle of body and spirit, and wishes for a peace that she seems to realize will not come in this life:]
I do not expect this desired peace from mortals.
For if the Almighty does not put His holy hand therein,
This peace will change from one day to the next,
And its pleasure will be short-lived.
But if the long labor of the war endured
Is then changed for us into certain repose,
Without offending in any way the honor of the Sovereign One,
This divine peace will be fully guaranteed.
But in order to taste the fruit of tranquility,
I would like for my heart to be free of turmoil
And rest its desires beneath the high power.
I would like for my body to be subject to the spirit,
Ardently embracing the Cross of Jesus Christ
In order that peace be enclosed within my conscience. [p.64]
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Imitation de la victoire de judich
[This anthology includes a translation of Imitation de la victoire de judich by Colette H. Winn and Robert H. McDowell. The introduction and notes point out where Coignard's telling of Judith's story differs from that of the biblical version. (See the book's table of contents online.):]
Writings by pre-revolutionary French women: from Marie de
France to Elizabeth Vigee-Le Brun / Anne R. Larsen and Colette
H. Winn, editors (Garland reference library of the humanities;
v. 2111. Women writers of the world; v. 2). New York: Garland
Pub., 2000. (xxiii, 592 p.: ill., facsims.)
LC#: PQ1113 .W75 2000; ISBN: 0815331908
Includes bibliographical references and index
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"Star... still shining... on our obscure night."
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[In the 1500s Judith's story was used by both Protestants (to justify war against a cruel oppressor) and by Catholics (to justify war against those who would destroy holy places and their defenders). For the Catholic Coignard, Judith was a "fair warrior" whose actions are to be an inspiration for the defenders of the Catholic Church. The poem opens with the epic's traditional announcement of purpose and invocation to God:]
Under Thy holy protection I wish to follow my path
And sing the glory of a fair warrior,
Star of her time, still shining
With a flaming radiance on our obscure night.
Thou, who blends in diverse tones
The high harmonies of this grand universe,
Tune my spirit to those celestial harmonies,
Give me therewith the voice to dispatch
Thousands of verses, holy couriers of Thy glory,
Singing with Judith a hymn to Thy victory. [lines
1-10; p.175]
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"O hearts too vile, devoid of virtue...."
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[Holofernes' armies had destroyed those cities whose citizens did not surrender to him. Coignard''s narrator speaks angrily to those who had surrendered (and perhaps to those French cities that had surrendered to Protestant armies):]
O hearts too vile, devoid of virtue,
Why did thou not, while dying, fight on,
Defending thy goods, thine honor, and thy country,
In liberty, free, though losing thy life? [ll.
107-110; p.177]
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"They picked their sweet fruits year after year."
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[Judith's city, Bethulia, guarded the route to Jerusalem, Holofernes' goal. Here the narrator describes the abundance of a peaceful Bethulia (and perhaps of a peaceful Toulouse):]
Summer would ripen their fertile straw,
Their grains would increase a hundredfold,
A thousand delicate fruits requiring no care
Grew abundantly in their pleasant orchards,
Woods, plants, flowers and meadows, fountains and rivers,
Decorated their manors with a rare grace.
Autumn produced raisins so thick
That two men could make their load of one grape.
They picked their sweet fruits year after year,
Obeying God and his commands.... [ll.169-78;
pp.178-79]
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"One sees the neighboring Narbonne...."
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[Coignard's Toulouse readers, knowing of a Protestant siege of the nearby city of Narbonne, would recognize the effect of Holofernes' army cutting off Bethulia's water supply:]
But someone noticed that the rich spring feeding
The fountains and wells flowed outside the city.
So if the course and beds of the springs were cut off,
The children of Jacob would lose all their water.
One sees the neighboring Narbonne in such a crisis,
When the enemy that surrounds its ramparts,
Cuts off its water, without which
Any human power would storm its walls in vain. [ll.515-22;
p.186]
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"...conceived in her heart an original enterprise."
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[Our introduction to Judith speaks first of her decision to act; only then are we told that her action was inspired by God. The besieged Bethulians had resolved to surrender to Holofernes if God did not come to their aid within five days:]
Now it came to pass that Judith, widow of Manasses,
Heard of these resolutions,
And conceived in her heart an original enterprise,
Bound to honor her with immortal glory.
And render her fair name famous throughout the universe,
Glorious subject of praise and subject of my verses.
God wished to use the arm of this woman,
To deliver his people, for she possessed a soul
Filled with virtue and holiness,
And the graces in heaven honored her beauty. [ll.619-28;
p.188]
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"...impelled her...to this glorious deed, born of her intention."
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[Throughout her epic, Coignard continues to balance praise for Judith's decision with acknowledgement that God was the impetus of her action:]
Now this divine love lodged within her soul,
Kindled her heart with its divine flame,
And impelled her spirit with untamed courage,
To this glorious deed, born of her intention. [ll.637-40;
p.188]
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"It may be written... that the hand of a woman scored such
a victory."
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[Before she leaves for Holofernes' camp, Judith prays:]
Let him be caught in the net of my eyes,
To drag him to an early death;
Therefore grant me, Lord, the necessary strength
To condemn this powerful adversary,
That it may be written in the course of years,
And be retold from father to son,
To celebrate Thy name worthy of all glory,
That the hand of a woman scored such a victory. [ll.795-802;
p.192]
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"His fierce power melted like wax in the fire of this bait."
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[Holofernes is indeed "caught in the net" of Judith's eyes; as soon as he sees her, he is turned into a stereotypical Petrarchan lover:]
But when she entered the prince's tent,
And he saw her two fiery stars,
He was distraught, and his fierce power
Melted like wax in the fire of this bait;
His heart was squeezed with an iron chain,
Already blind Cupid could conquer it....
And seeing her standing before him,
Full of majesty and marvelous grace,
Examining carefully her kindly visage,
He inhaled through his eyes this amorous poison,
Transforming his fierce cruelty into sweet love. [ll.943-48,
970-74; pp.195-96]
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"Hitting him twice, she kills the tyrant."
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[Alone with the sleeping Holofernes, Judith first prays, then:]
Having thus prayed, all soaked in tears,
She approaches the bed and draws out the sword
That hung at the bedside of the tyrannical enemy,
Deeply sunk in a heavy sleep,
And holding it in her hand with pious steadfastness,
She takes hold of the hair of his drowsy head,
Crying aloud to God: "I pray to Thee this time,
Answer the sighs of my doleful voice."
Then she strikes her blow with the sharp blade,
Hitting him twice, she kills the tyrant,
Slicing through all his vital arteries with the sword
That opened the channels of boiling blood.
[ll.1297-1308; pp.202-203]
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"Slaughtering the flocks with tooth and claw."
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[Judith returns to Bethulia with Holofernes' head; there she give the citizens detailed directions on how to defeat the now leaderless besieging army. Her orders are carried out, and Coignard describes the destruction of the besiegers with an epic simile:]
The besieged, victorious, transported with great joy,
Descended down the path with untamed courage,
Slaying and wounding with the triumphant sword
Those who had menaced them in the past.
Their shafts are thrown at the fleeing soldiers,
Or the outrageous sword jumps up to the guards,
They flee, jostling each other and in such haste
That they are soon out of breath and stagger to their deaths.
Just as one can see on the highest mountains
A famished wolf running in the countryside,
Slaughtering the flocks with tooth and claw,
Killing everything he sees before his blazing eyes,
With no one able to prevent
Or delay his bloody hunt. [ll.1485-98;
pp.206-207]
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"The praises and shouts... gave birth to an echo."
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[The biblical Book of Judith end with the heroine's return to her quiet life, to live alone until her death. Coignard's epic ends with the community reunited in peace, and with praise of God and Judith resounding --- through time as well as through space:]
The conflict ended, the victory won,
The triumphant people return to Bethulia,
Where the good Joachim, the high priest of God,
And all the priests of the humble Hebrew people,
Had already assembled to acknowledge
The divine favors and good deeds of their Master,
Wishing to see Judith who, in their great need,
Triumphed through the will of God, sword in hand.
The noise was so loud in the huge crowd,
And the shouts redoubled in such cheerful joy,
That the praises and shouts of the assembled people
Gave birth to an echo in the neighboring wood. [ll.
1537-48; p.208]
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[Paula Sommers' article compares Coignard's Imitation de la victoire de judich with another epic poem about Judith, published by the Protestant Guillaume du Bartas in 1574; Sommers looks at each poet's use of the biblical story. The article includes the original of several passages of Coignard's Imitation:]
Sommers, Paula. "Gendered Readings of The Book of Judith:
Guillaume du Bartas and Gabrielle de Coignard." Romance
Quarterly, 48 (2001), 211-20.
LC#: PB1 .K42; ISSN: 0883-1157
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[This earlier article by Sommers discusses the use by three
French poets of the image of weaving ("women's work")
to comment on their own poetry. Sommers givs her own translation
of two of Coignard's sonnets and parts of others. (See
the issue's table of contents online.):]
Sommers, Paula. "Female Subjectivity and the Distaff:
Louise Labe, Catherine des Roches, and Gabrielle de Coignard,"
Explorations in Renaissance Culture, 25 (1999), 139-50.
LC#: CB361 .E9; ISSN: 0098-2474
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[Terence Cave's 1969 study includes a valuable introduction to the poetry of Coignard and her contemporaries; Cave discusses not only Coignard's sonnets but also her longer poems, most as yet unavailable in English. Quoted passages are not translated but their meaning is usually made clear in the discussion. An appendix gives the original of one longer poem, "Complainte de la Vierge Marie" (pp.312-319):]
Cave, Terence. Devotional poetry in France c.1570-1613. London,
Cambridge U.P., 1969. (356 p.)
LC#: BV4818 .C3
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[Margarita Stocker's study on the changing interpretations of the biblical Judith does not mention Coignard, but one chapter, "Worshipping Women: The Battle of the Sexes in Reformation Europe," describes the treatment of Judith both by Protestant writers and by Catholics like Coignard. (See the book's table of contents online.):]
Stocker, Margarita. Judith, sexual warrior: women and power
in Western culture. New Haven [Conn.]: Yale University Press,
c1998. (viii, 278 p., [24] p. of plates: ill. (some col.)
LC#: BS1735.2 .S76 1998; ISBN: 0300073658
Includes bibliographical references (p. [253]-266) and index
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[The first two of the three essays in John Charles Dawson's 1923 book (available online) provide useful historical background on the influence of Jeux Floraux and the university on Toulouse in the 1500s:]
Dawson, John Charles. Toulouse in the Renaissance; the Floral
games; university and student life; Etienne Dolet (1532-1534)
(Columbia University studies in Romance philology and literature).
New York, Columbia University Press, 1923. (xi, 190 p. plates,
2 facsim. (incl. front.)
LC#: PQ3807.T6 D3 1923
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Updated 11-20-08