The Provençal school in Northern France began during the latter half of the twelfth century. The _chanson_ properly so called is naturally most strongly represented: but the Provençal forms, the _tençon_ (Prov. _tenso_) and a variant of it, the _jeu-parti_ (Prov. _jocs partitz_ or _partimens_) are also found, especially the latter. This was so called, because the opener of the debate proposed two alternatives to his interlocutor, of which the latter could choose for support either that [131] he preferred, the proposer taking the other contrary proposition: the contestants often left the decision in an _envoi_ to one or more arbitrators by common consent. Misinterpretation of the language of these _envois_ gave rise to the legend concerning the "courts of love," as we have stated in a previous chapter. One of the earliest representatives of this school was Conon de Bethune, born in 1155; he took part in the Crusades of 1189 and 1199. Blondel de Nesles, Gace Brulé and the Châtelain de Coucy are also well-known names belonging to the twelfth century. Thibaut IV., Count of Champagne and King of Navarre (1201-1253), shared in the Albigeois crusade and thus helped in the destruction of the poetry which he imitated. One of the poems attributed to him by Dante (_De Vulg. El._) belongs to Gace Brulé; his love affair with Blanche of Castile is probably legendary. Several crusade songs are attributed to Thibaut among some thirty poems of the kind that remain to us from the output of this school. These crusade poems exhibit the characteristics of their Provençal models: there are exhortations to take the cross in the form of versified sermons; there are also love poems which depict the poet's mind divided between his duty as a crusader and his reluctance to leave his lady; or we find the lady [132] bewailing her lover's departure, or again, lady and lover lament their approaching separation in alternate stanzas. There is more real feeling in some of these poems than is apparent in the ordinary chanson of the Northern French courtly school: the following stanzas are from a poem by Guiot de Dijon,[34] the lament of a lady for her absent lover-- Chanterai por mon corage Que je vueill reconforter Car avec mon grant damage Ne quier morir n'afoler, Quant de la terra sauvage Ne voi nului retorner Ou cil est qui m'assoage Le cuer, quant j'en oi parler Dex, quant crieront outree, Sire, aidiés au pelerin Por cui sui espoentee, Car felon sunt Sarrazin. De ce sui bone atente Que je son homage pris, E quant la douce ore vente Qui vient de cel douz païs Ou cil est qui m'atalente, Volontiers i tor mon vis: Adont m'est vis que jel sente Par desoz mon mantel gris. Dex, etc.