Andreas Capellanus, or André le Chapelain, is known for a single work, De amore (On Love), but it is generally considered to be among the most important and influential documents of medieval civilization. Written about 1185, De amore is the earliest and doubtless the most successful attempt to analyze and systematize the new attitudes toward love between the sexes that pervaded all the medieval vernacular literatures of Western Europe. The influence of De amore in the late Middle Ages is attested by a rich manuscript tradition, by many quotations from it in medieval authors, and especially by translations or adaptations of it into several vernacular languages. In modern times it has become a central document in the ongoing controversy concerning the existence and nature of the phenomenon known as courtly love. This factor has combined with the ambiguity of De amore to make it one of the most...