ABSTRACT
This chapter examines whether to a certain extent Bertran de Born might have been orienting the Occitan sirventés in a direction that could have a lot to do with the existing or emerging occupation of heralds. The rivalry between Toulouse Raymond V and the king of Aragon Alfonso II had been going on for so long that it is hard to give an exact date for the composition of Bertran de Born’s chansso, though a certain number of historical allusions point to 1181. Modesty is not Bertran de Born’s strong point, to say the least. Unlike composers of cansos, the most highly prized troubadour genre, he does not feel the need to explain the reasons for him being the best poet. Bertran confirmed his accusation of lack of firmness in a sirventés composed in the same period on the structure of a fashionable love song by Giraut de Bornelh.
