sirvente

English

Etymology

Borrowed from French sirvente, from Old Provençal sirventes, sirventesc, originally, the poem of, or concerning, a sirvent, from sirvent, properly, serving, n., one who serves (e.g., as a soldier), from servir (“to serve”), from Latin servīre.

Noun

sirvente (plural sirventes)

1. (music, historical) A typically satirical song sung by the troubadours of Provence.
   • 1819 December 20 (indicated as 1820), Walter Scott, chapter XVII, in Ivanhoe; a Romance. […], volume II, Edinburgh: […] Archibald Constable and Co.; London: Hurst, Robinson, and Co. […], →OCLC, page 42:

     The knight in the meantime, had brought the strings into some order, and after a short prelude, asked his host whether he would choose a sirvente in the language of oc, or a lai in the language of oui, or a virelai, or a ballad in the vulgar English.

   • 1891, A[rthur] Conan Doyle, The White Company, New York, N.Y., Boston, Mass.: Thomas Y[oung] Crowell & Company […], →OCLC, page 138:

     [T]here was a little, sleek, fat clerk of the name of Chaucer, who was so apt at rondel, sirvente, or tonson, that no man dare give back a foot from the walls, lest he find it all set down in his rhymes and sung by every underling and varlet in the camp.

Translations

satirical song

• Catalan: sirventès (ca) m
• French: sirventès (fr) m
• Italian: sirventese m
• Spanish: sirventés m

Further reading

• sirventes on Wikipedia.Wikipedia

Anagrams

• nerviest, reinvest, servient

French

Noun

sirvente m (plural sirventès)

1. Alternative form of sirventès

Further reading

• “sirvente”, in Trésor de la langue française informatisé [Digitized Treasury of the French Language], 2012.