DRAMATIS PERSONAE

Ages given for the year 1241, unless otherwise noted.

PRINCIPALS

Dolssa de Stigata, eighteen: a young noblewoman raised in the city of Tolosa

Botille Flasucra, seventeen: a peasant girl, tavern wench, and matchmaker in the seaside village (vila) of Bajas

Friar Lucien de Saint-Honore, twenty-five: a traveling friar of the newly founded Dominican Order of Friars-Preachers, from the Dominican convent in Tolosa

BOTILLE’S FAMILY

Plazensa Flasucra, twenty-one: Botille’s older sister, head tavern wench and brewer at the Three Pigeons

Sazia Flasucra, fifteen: Botille’s younger sister, of a fortune-telling and prognosticating persuasion

Jobau, fifties: a drunkard, and Sazia’s father, who makes his home with the three sisters

CHURCHMEN

Prior Pons de Saint-Gilles, middle-aged: head of the Order of Friars-Preachers in Tolosa, supervising the daily living, preaching, and inquisitorial activities of a group of Dominican brothers

Bishop Raimon de Fauga de Miramont, middle-aged: Dominican friar and bishop of Tolosa, originally from the city of Miramont

Dominus Bernard, forties: parish priest of the Church of Sant Martin, Bajas

Friar Arnaut d’Avinhonet, fifty-four at the time of his writing; a Dominican historian working in the archives of the Convent du Jacobins in Tolosa in 1290

TOLOSANS OF RANK

Count Raimon VII, forty-four: the count of Tolosa, with lands extending far throughout the region; the most powerful and influential lord in Provensa, in spite of heavy losses suffered when Pope Innocent III declared a holy crusade against his father, Raimon VI, and excommunicated him for harboring heretics

Senhor Hugo de Miramont, thirty-eight: a knight from Miramont who makes his home in Tolosa and serves as man-at-arms for Count Raimon VII

VILLAGERS OF RANK IN BAJAS

Senhor Guilhem de Bajas, late twenties: Lord of Bajas, and of its castrum, or grand fortified house

Na Pieret di Fabri, sixties: noble in origin, the childless widow of a prosperous vintner, owner of many of the vineyard plots in the countryside surrounding Bajas

Symo, twenty-two: Na Pieret’s nephew, originally from San Cucufati

Gui, twenty-one: Symo’s brother and Na Pieret’s nephew, also from San Cucufati

Lop, forties: the bayle (bailiff), an officer to Senhor Guilhem

PEASANT VILLAGERS

Martin de Boroc, thirty: a fisherman, husband to Lisette, and father to Ava

Lisette, twenty-five: daughter of the goat-cheese man, wife to Martin de Boroc, and mother to Ava

Ava, two: Martin and Lisette’s daughter

Paul Crestian, fifties: Lisette’s papà, the goat-cheese man

Joan de Prato, thirty-one: farmer, husband to Felipa, and father

Felipa de Prato, twenty-eight: wife to Joan and mother to two young children

Astruga, nineteen: an unmarried young woman in search of a husband, known for her beauty

Sapdalina, twenty-two: another unmarried young woman in search of a husband, a skilled seamstress

Focho de Capa, fifties: a musician, jack-of-all-trades, and master of revels at village celebrations

Azimar de Carlipac, forty-six: a shipbuilder

Amielh Vidal, thirty-three: raises and sells, among other things, ducks

Litgier, twenty-seven: a fisherman

Plastolf de Condomio, seventies: the oldest man in the village

Jacme, Andrio, and Itier, twenties: unmarried peasant farmhands to Na Pieret di Fabri

Garcia the elder, fifty: a trusted and experienced servant on Na Pieret di Fabri’s farm

Garcia the younger, fourteen: Garcia the elder’s only son

Saura, forty: Garcia the elder’s wife, the mother of Garcia the younger

Peire, thirty-three: a fisherman, Rixenda’s husband

Rixenda, twenty-nine: a fishwife, Peire’s wife