Occitania, known today as the "south of France," had its own language and culture in the Middle Ages. Its troubadours created "courtly love" and a new poetic language in the vernacular, which were to influence European literature for centuries. There are many books on the troubadours, but this is the first comprehensive study of the society in which they lived. For readers of literature it offers a wide-ranging insight into the realities that lay behind the poetic mystique. For historians it opens up an important and neglected area of medieval Europe.

1. Introduction: Occitan identity and self-perception; 2. Occitan 'feudalism'; 3. Knights and non-knightly combatants; 4. The knight and chivalry; 5. Courts and courtiers; 6. Peasants; 7. Towns; 8. Doctors and medicine; 9. Women; 10. Children; 11. Clergy, heretics and inquisitors; Conclusion.