BERZÉ, HUGUES de. - Burgundian trouvère, active between the twelfth and thirteenth centuries, author of a satirical-moral poem of 838 verses (Bible), in which, by recounting the history of the human race, he brings out the transience of earthly life and the evil produced by sin and human vices. The poem, which contains various allusions to the events of the years 1204-1207, may also be regarded as the sincere act of contrition of a man who had led a dissolute and unrestrained youth. Indeed, B. had taken part in the Fourth Crusade (1201-1205), leading a scandalous life in Constantinople, and had afterwards completely reformed. There also survives a collection of his lyric poems, published by K. Engelcke (Rostock 1885).
La Bible au Seigneur de B. was published by E. Barbazan and M. Méon, in Fabliaux et contes des poètes françois, II (Paris 1808), pp. 394-420, and more recently by F. Lecoy (ibid. 1938).