THE CEMETERY IN THE “PARADISE OF LOVE”: TRANSFORMATION OF THE COURTLY “EARTHLY PARADISE” IN FRENCH ALLEGORICAL LITERATURE OF THE LATE MIDDLE AGES

The aim of this paper is to show how the representation of the court of Love (Amour), an ideal, “heavenly” space, is affected by the image of a cemetery. The court of Love is usually described as an ideal garden, a sort of “avatar” of the Earthly paradise. But this imagery changes in French allegorical texts of the 15th century. It becomes more complex in the texts of Achille Collier (Hospital of Love), Martin Le Franc (The Champion of Women) and Rene d’Anjou (The Book of The Love-Smitten Heart): the imagery contains not only a garden, but other locations, and specifically a cemetery. The descriptions of cemeteries are analyzed and com pared. It is revealed that the cemetery becomes a sort of “catalog” of positive and negative examples of courtly love; such a “catalog” also allows the authors to dem onstrate their scholarship, engage in literary debate, make a political statement. The description of cemeteries contains references to heaven and hell, more specifically, to “heaven” and “hell” of love: faithful lovers are rewarded and unfaithful lovers are punished. The results of this research show that the plot of visiting “paradise of Love” transforms into an endless search, as the court of Love loses its initial characteristics of “paradise”, and the true “paradise of Love” now lies beyond the reach of the hero; the reward for serving the god of Love thus becomes possible only after death.