Una canzone d’Oltremare indirizzata a San Luigi

This paper analyses the anonymous Nuns ne poroit de mavaise raison (R. 1887), addressed to the King of France Louis IX to convince him to stay in the Holy Land after the defeat at Mansurah in 1250. It places the text it in its historical and literary context, in order to illustrate its role, and it compares it with the main chronicles of the Seventh Crusade. The highly formal and rhetorical quality of the text suggests a well-known and established author, familiar with the genre of crusade songs. The main proposals of attribution put forward by critics are also analysed, the arguments for and against them are weighed together with the supposed affinities between the content of the text and the positions expressed by Jean de Joinville in his Vie de saint Louis.