CARDENAL, PEIRE (c. 1205-1305), French troubadour, was born at Puy-en-Velay of good family, and unlike other trouba dours seems to have received a fair education, as he was intended for the Church. The national disorders, which led him to flee from Narbonne and Toulouse to escape the armies of Simon de Mont fort, are reflected in the pessimism of his work, which is also ex tremely anti-clerical. With little taste for amorous poetry, Car denal became one of the foremost cultivators of the moral sirventes.