[1119] Obit, Anno 1142. Tanner.
[1120] See above, p. [394]. Both Ingulph. and Will. of Malmesb. had been very conversant among the Normans; who appear not to have had such prejudices against the minstrels as the Anglo-Saxons had.
[1121] Thus Leoꝺ, the Saxon word for a poem, is properly a song, and its derivative lied signifies a ballad to this day in the German tongue. And cantare we have seen above is by Alfred himself rendered, Be heaꞃpan ꞅιnᵹan.
[1122] The tabour or tabourin was a common instrument with the French minstrels, as it had also been with the Anglo-Saxon (vid. p. 393): thus in an ancient Fr. MS. in the Harl. collection (2253, 75), a minstrel is described as riding on horseback, and bearing his tabour.
"Entour son col porta son tabour,
Depeynt de Or, e riche Açour."
See also a passage in Menage's Diction. Etym. (v. menestriers,) where tabours is used as synonymous to menestriers.
Another frequent instrument with them was the viele. This, I am told, is the name of an instrument at this day, which differs from a guitar, in that the player turns round a handle at the top of the instrument, and with his other hand, plays on some keys, that touch the chords, and produce the sound.
See Dr. Burney's account of the vielle, vol. ii. p. 263, who thinks it the same with the rote or wheel. See p. [270] in the note.
"Il ot un Jougleor a Sens,
Qui navoit pas sovent robe entiere;
Sovent estoit sans sa viele."—Fabliaux & Cont. ii. 184, 5.
[1123] "Romanset Jutglar canta alt veux ... devant lo senyor Rey."—Chron. d'Aragon, apud Du Cange, iv. 771.