Elias Fonsalada

Who is Elias Fonsalada?

Elias Fonsalada was a troubadour from Bergerac in the Périgord. Only two cansos of his survive.

His vida goes further in describing him as a handsome man of the middle class, the son of a burgher and jongleur, who himself became a jongleur. The biographer did not regard him as an accomplished trobaire but as a noellaire. This word has been open to interpretation. Boutière and Schutz in their French compilation of the vidas of the troubadours translate it as "auteur d'un genre particulier" or "beau parleur". Later Levy traced its etymology to novelador, "auteur de novelles", and Egan, in her English translation, has taken this up as "storyteller". A nova was probably a narrative, as opposed to lyric, work. Thus Elias' vida provides a rare glimpse of narrative vernacular writing in Occitan at the height of the troubadour art.

The poem En Abriu is assigned to Elias in manuscript C. This attribution, however, is contradicted by other sources and the poem is usually given to Marcabru.