Of the Italian Jongleurs, Petrarch gives us a humble notion.

"They are a class," he says, "who have little wit, but a great deal of memory, and still more impudence.
Having nothing of their own to recite, they snatch at what they can get from others, and go about to the courts of princes to declaim verses, in the vulgar tongue, which they have got by heart.

At those courts they insinuate themselves into the favour of the great, and get subsistence and presents.

They seek their means of livelihood, that is, the verses they recite, among the best authors, from whom they obtain, by dint of solicitation, and even by bribes of money, compositions for their rehearsal.

I have often repelled their importunities, but sometimes, touched by their entreaties, I have spent hours in composing productions for them.