Our Lady's Tumbler is an anonymous Old French poem of 684 lines, probably written in the 1230s. It has characteristics of the Picard dialect and is preserved in five manuscripts. Its English title is conventional, derived from the title supplied by the scribe of one manuscript. It refers to Mary, mother of Jesus, and a performer who engages in tumbling.
Although the poem and stories derived from it circulated until the end of the Middle Ages, they were mostly forgotten until 1873. Our Lady's Tumbler was printed in that year. Since then it has inspired many works, usually under the title Le Jongleur de Notre Dame, a title also sometimes applied to the original poem.
The protagonist of the poem is a travelling performer, a type of minstrel who dances and engages in acrobatics. Growing weary of his worldly life, he enters the Abbey of Clairvaux as a lay brother. Knowing no Latin and failing to understand the liturgy of the hours, he grows despondent. When the monks gather in the choir to chant the liturgy, he enters the crypt to perform before a statue of Mary. He is discovered by one of the monks, who informs the abbot. While the two watch in secret, they see Mary appear and comfort the lay brother. Soon afterwords, the old tumbler dies and goes to Heaven. The performance observed by the abbot is described at lines 390âÂÂ409: