Between 1349 and 1363. Quant j'ay l'espart is a polyphonic song by the fourteenth-century French composer Guillaume de Machaut. It is an example of the fixed form known as the rondeau, and is written for two voices: a tenor against which has been set a superius. As only the cantus has a text, it is safe to assume that the tenor would have been instrumentally performed. Schrade catalogues it as Rondeau No. 5.

Machaut was known in his own day primarily as a poet, although he is also the composer from whom we have the largest number of compositions. However, this dual role is quite normal, as the medievals did not make the same differentiation between poetry and music as is popular in the twentieth century. The rondeau, as other the fixed forms (the ballade and virelai) was also seen as a literary genre and was subject to literary conventions as well as musical ones. As with most fourteenth-century musicians, Machaut usually set his own poems.

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