Christine de Pizan, Le Dit de la Pastoure,
dans Oeuvres poétiques de Christine de Pisan,
Paris, Firmin Didot, 1891, 225-27.
Translation (c) Jeay and Garay

When I was a young shepherdess,
I haunted these woods
And these wild moors
Looking after my father's
Sheep among the pastures.
Unlike the way I live now,
For many years
I used to guard them,
So that I was well-versed
In the pastoral craft
Without ever being tired of it.
I enjoyed the life, and getting up
Early, as my craft required.
Nothing pleased me more
Than to return in the fields
And the woods, where I often listened
To the sweet songs of the birds;
I had no other friends
But shepherds and shepherdesses.
I knew all the tricks
Of the pastoral craft:
Taking care of the lambs,
Putting hay in the shed,
Placing fresh straw on the roof;
Also sorting out the sheep on one side,
Rubbing them and pulling them apart;
Milking the ewes, and suckling the lambs
At regular periods, and putting
The fodder in the rack above them.
Nobody knew better than me
How to take care of what
Is necessary for the trade.
I knew how to collect
Bran and oats for feeding
The ewes after they had given birth;
Also how to shear them
In May, sitting in the shade,
In the morning and the evening;
And bring grass for the little lambs
From the meadows
To give them an appetite
During the season
When we had to keep them inside.
I also used to bring back from the fields
Some naughty ewes,
Old, with hairless rumps.
And if some had given birth
Outside, I would carry
The lamb in my arms
Into my cottage.
I knew also how to treat them against the scab.
There was no such task
I could not master:
I was a model shepherdess.
I was careful in everything.
At the proper time, I hurried
To have the sheep climb
Onto a hillock where they had fine grass.
When the sun was in the sky,
With the dew moistening
The earth in the Summer,
I knew well in the morning,
How to lead my sheep
To the shaded pastures;
And to gather my herd
So that the wolf could not
Steal a single head or tail from me,
And that no sheep would be hunted.
Then I would sit in the shade
Under an oak, and I would try
To do fancy work with wool threads,
While singing out loud.
I made fine belts,
Finely worked as if they had been silk.
With them I tied up little things;
Nicely done,
Well woven throughout.
Or I made purses for storing
The bread and the cheese.
There, under the branches of the oak,
The shepherdesses got together.
Not by themselves:
Indeed, in the evening and the morning,
You could see their sweethearts at their sides.