The Song of the Cathar Wars

The Song of the Cathar Wars is the first translation into English of the Old Provençal Canso recounting the events of the years 1204-1218 in Southern France. In an effort to extirpate the Cathar heresy, Pope Innocent III launched what is now known as the Albigensian Crusade, but it was fiercely resisted by the lords and people of the Languedoc, if in the end in vain. This ’song’ was written in two parts, the first by William of Tudela, a supporter of the crusade; the second by an anonymous cont