THE SCENE: This vulgar medieval French poem imagines a world in which farting can protect a man from eternal damnation.
THE TEXT:
A peasant was feeling unwell
Once long ago, and all of Hell
Made preparations to receive
The peasant’s soul, you may believe
My words. A devil was sent forth
To see that justice take its course.
This devil held, when he came near,
A leather bag up to his rear,
Convince the peasant’s soul would pass
Assuredly out through his ass,
But in hope of recovery
He’s just downed as a remedy
So much beef cooked with garlic cloves
And rendered fat hot from the stove
That both his guts and belly are
Taut as a string on a guitar
And he no long fears his end.
If he can only fart, he’ll mend.
Towards this end he strains and forces,
And all his effort and his force is
Put to it; he so tries and strives
And rolls around and twists and writhes
Until at last a fart explodes.
The bag filled up, and the imp closed
It. (For the fellow’s sins he’d been
Stomping on the man’s abdomen.)
Indeed, the proverb states, and rightly:
“One lets loose when one grips too tightly.”
The imp came to the gates of Hell
Toting both bag and fart as well,
And tossing the bag down when he entered,
And thereupon the fart was vented.
Then you could hear the devils holler,
Nettled and hot under the collar,
And lay a curse on peasants’ souls.
On the next day the chapter holds
A meeting and agrees to make
It law that henceforth no one take
Any soul a peasant expels.
There’s no avoiding it – it smells!
They agreed on this long ago.
Beyond a doubt, peasants can’t go
Either to Heaven or to Hell,
And for the reason you’ve heard tell.
Rutebeuf isn’t the one to know
Just where those peasants’ souls can go,
Banished from Satan’s realm and God’s.
Let them go sing among the frogs!
– The Peasant’s Fart, Rutebeuf, 13th Century AD
