Chapter V: Part 5

829. _Ye woot_, ye know. Really false grammar, as the pl. of _woot_ (originally a past tense) is properly _witen_, just as the pl. of _rood_ is _riden_ in l. 825. As _woot_ was used as a present tense, its original form was forgotten. 'Ye know your agreement, and I recall it to your memory.' See l. 33.

830. 'If even-song and matins agree'; i. e. if you still say now what you said last night.

832. 'As ever may I be able to drink'; i. e. As surely as I ever hope to be able, &c. Cf. B. 4490, &c.

833. _be_, may be (subjunctive mood).

835. _draweth cut_, draw lots; see C. 793-804. The Gloss. to Allan Ramsay's poems, ed. 1721, has--'_cutts_, lots. These cuts are usually made of straws unequally cut, which one hides between his finger and thumb, whilst another draws his fate'; but the verb _to cut_ is unallied. See Brand, Pop. Antiq., iii. 337. The one who drew the shortest (or else the longest) straw was the one who drew the lot. Cf. '_Sors_, a kut, or a lotte'; Reliquiae Antiquae, i. 7. 'After supper, we drew _cuttes_ for a score of apricoks, the longest _cut_ stil to draw an apricoke'; Marston, Induction to _The Malcontent_.

_ferrer twinne_, depart further. Here _ferrer_ is the comp. of _fer_, far. _Twinnen_ is to separate, part in twain; hence, to depart.

844. _sort_, lot, destiny; O. F. _sort_; cf. E. _sort_.

847. _as was resoun_, as was reasonable or right.

848. _forward_, agreement, as in l. 33. _compositioun_ has almost exactly the same sense, but is of French origin.

853. _shal biginne_, have to begin.

854. _What_; used interjectionally, like the modern E. 'why!'

_a_, in. Here _a_ is for _an_, a form of _on_; the A. S. _on_ is constantly used with the sense of 'in.'

856. _riden_, rode; pt. pl. See l. 825. [60]

THE KNIGHTES TALE.

For general remarks on this tale, see vol. iii. p. 389.

It is only possible to give here a mere general idea of the way in which the Knightes Tale is related to the Teseide of Boccaccio. The following table gives a sketch of it, but includes many lines wherein Chaucer is quite original. The references to the Knightes Tale are to the lines of group A (as in the text); those to the Teseide are to the books and stanzas.

_Kn. Tale._ | _Teseide._
|
865-883 | I. and II.
893-1027 | II. 2-5, 25-95.
1030-1274 | III. 1-11, 14-20, 47, 51-54, 75.
1361-1448 | IV. 26-29, 59.
1451-1479 | V. 1-3, 24-27, 33.
1545-1565 | IV. 13, 14, 31, 85, 84, 17, 82.
1638-1641 | VII. 106, 119.
1668-1739 | V. 77-91.
1812-1860 | V. 92-98.
1887-2022 | VII. 108-110, 50-64, 29-37.
2102-2206 | VI. 71, 14-22, 65-70, 8.
2222-2593 | VII. 43-49, 68-93, 23-41, 67, 95-99,
| 7-13, 131, 132, 14,
| 100-102, 113-118, 19.
2600-2683 | VIII. 2-131.
2684-2734 | IX. 4-61.
2735-2739 | XII. 80, 83.
2743-2808 | X. 12-112.
2809-2962 | XI. 1-67.
2967-3102 | XII. 3-19, 69-83.

The MSS. quote a line and a half from Statius, Thebaid, xii. 519, 520, because Chaucer is referring to that passage in his introductory lines to this tale; see particularly ll. 866, 869, 870.

There is yet another reason for quoting this scrap of Latin, viz. that it is also quoted in the Poem of Anelida and Arcite, at l. 22, where the 'Story' of that poem begins; and ll. 22-25 of Anelida give a fairly close translation of it. From this and other indications, it appears that Chaucer first of all imitated Boccaccio's Teseide (more or less closely) in the poem which he himself calls 'Palamon and Arcite,' of which but scanty traces exist in the original form; and this poem was in 7-line stanzas. He afterwards recast the whole, at the same time changing the metre; and the result was the Knightes Tale, as we here have it. Thus the Knightes Tale is not derived _immediately_ from Boccaccio or from Statius, but _through the medium_ of an older poem [61] of Chaucer's own composition. Fragments of the same poem were used by the author in other compositions; and the result is, that the Teseide of Boccaccio is the source of (1) sixteen stanzas in the Parliament of Foules; (2) of part of the first ten stanzas in Anelida; (3) of three stanzas near the end of Troilus (Tes. xi. 1-3); as well as of the original Palamon and Arcite and of the Knightes Tale.

Hence it is that ll. 859-874 and ll. 964-981 should be compared with Chaucer's Anelida, ll. 22-46, as printed in vol. i. p. 366. Lines 882 and 972 are borrowed from that poem with but slight alteration.

859. The lines from Statius, Theb. xii. 519-22, to which reference is made in the heading, relate to the return of Theseus to Athens after his conquest of Hippolyta, and are as follows:--

Iamque domos patrias, Scythicae post aspera gentis
Proelia, laurigero subeuntem Thesea curru
Laetifici plausus, missusque ad sidera uulgi
Clamor, et emeritis hilaris tuba nuntiat armis.'

860. _Theseus_, the great legendary hero of Attica, is the subject of Boccaccio's poem named after him the Teseide. He is also the hero of the Legend of Ariadne, as told in Chaucer's Legend of Good Women. After deserting Ariadne, he succeeded his father Aegeus as king of Athens, and conducted an expedition against the Amazons, from which he returned in triumph, having carried off their queen Antiope, here named Hippolyta.

861. _governour._ It should be observed that Chaucer continually accents words of Anglo-French origin in the original manner, viz. on the _last_ or on the _penultimate_ syllable. Thus we have here _governóur_ and _conqueróur_; in l. 865, _chivalrý-e_; in l. 869, _contrée_; in l. 876, _manére_, &c. The most remarkable examples are when the words end in _-oun_ (ll. 893, 935).

864. _cóntree_ is here accented on the _first_ syllable; in l. 869, on the _last_. This is a good example of the unsettled state of the accents of such words in Chaucer's time, which afforded him an opportunity of licence, which he freely uses. In fact, _cóntree_ shows the _English_, and _contrée_, the _French_ accent.

865. _chivalrye_, knightly exploits. In l. 878, _chivalrye_ means 'knights'; mod. E. _chivalry_. So also in l. 982.

866. _regne of Femenye_, the kingdom (Lat. _regnum_) of the Amazons. _Femenye_ is from Lat. _femina_, a woman. Cf. Statius, Theb. xii. 578. 'Amazonia, womens land, is a Country, parte in Asia and parte in Europa, and is nigh Albania; and hath that name of Amazonia of women that were the wives of the men that were called Goths, the which men went out of the nether Scithia, as Isidore seith, li. 9.'--Batman upon Bartholomè, lib. xv. c. 12. Cf. Higden's Polychronicon, lib. i. cap. xviii; and Gower, Conf. Amant., ii. 73:--

'Pentasilee,
Which was the quene of Feminee.'

[62]

867. _Scithea_, Scythia. Cf. _Scythicae_ in the quotation from Statius in note to l. 859.

868. _Ipolita_, Shakespeare's _Hippolyta_, in Mids. Night's Dream. The name is in Statius, Theb. xii. 534, spelt _Hippolyte_.

880. In this line, _Athenes_ seems to mean 'Athenians,' though elsewhere it means 'Athens.' _Athénès_ is trisyllabic.

884. _tempest._ As there is no mention of a tempest in Boccaccio, Tyrwhitt proposed to alter the reading to _temple_, as there is some mention of Theseus offering in the temple of Pallas. But it is very unlikely that this would be alluded to by the mere word _temple_; and we must accept the reading _tempest_, as in all the seven MSS. and in the old editions.

I think the solution is to be found by referring to Statius. Chaucer seems to have remembered that a tempest is there described (Theb. xii. 650-5), but to have forgotten that it is merely introduced by way of _simile_. In fact, when Theseus determines to attack Creon (see l. 960), the advance of his host is likened by Statius to the effect of a tempest. The lines are:--

'Qualis Hyperboreos ubi nubilus institit axes
Iupiter, et prima tremefecit sidera bruma,
Rumpitur Aeolia, et longam indignata quietem
Tollit hiems animos, uentosaque sibilat Arctos;
Tunc montes undaeque fremunt, tunc proelia caesis
Nubibus, et tonitrus insanaque fulmina gaudent.'

885. _as now_, at present, at this time. Cf. the M. E. adverbs _as-swithe_, _as-sone_, immediately. From the Rom. de la Rose, 21479:--

'Ne vous voil or ci plus tenir,
A mon propos m'estuet venir,
Qu' autre champ me convient arer.'

889. _I wol nat letten eek noon of this route_, I desire not to hinder eke (also) none of all this company. _Wol_ = desire; cf. 'I _will_ have mercy,' &c.

890. _aboute_, i. e. in his turn, one after the other; corresponding to the sense 'in rotation, in succession,' given in the New English Dictionary. This sense of the word in this passage was pointed out by Dr. Kölbing in Engl. Studien, ii. 531. He instanced a similar use of the word in the Ormulum, l. 550, where the sense is--'and ay, whensoever that flock of priests, being twenty-four in number, had all served once _about_ in the temple.'

901. _crëature_ is here a word of three syllables. In l. 1106 it has _four_ syllables.

903. _nolde_, would not: the A. S. _nolde_ is the pt. t. of _nyllan_, equivalent to _ne willan_, not to wish; cf. Lat. _noluit_, from _nolle_.

_stenten_, stop. 'It _stinted_, and said aye.'--Romeo and Juliet, i. 3. 48.

908. _that thus_, i. e. _ye_ that thus.

911. _clothed thus_ (Elles.); _clad thus al_ (Harl.). [63]

912. _alle_ is to be pronounced _al-lè_. Tyrwhitt inserts _than_, then, after _alle_, against the authority of the best MSS. and of the old editions.

Statius (Theb. xii. 545) calls this lady _Capaneia coniux_; see l. 932, below. He says all the ladies were from Argos, and their husbands were kings.

913. _a deedly chere_, a deathly countenance or look.

918. _we biseken_, we beseech, ask for. For such double forms as _beseken_ and _besechen_, cf. mod. Eng. _dike_ and _ditch_, _kirk_ and _chirch_, _sack_ and _satchel_, _stick_ and _stitch_. In the Early Eng. period the harder forms with _k_ were very frequently employed by _Northern_ writers, who preferred them to the palatalised _Southern_ forms (perhaps influenced by Anglo-French) with _ch_. Cf. M. E. _brig_ and _rigg_ with _bridge_ and _ridge_.

926. This line means 'that ensureth no estate to be (always) good.' Suggested by Boethius; see bk. ii. pr. 2. ll. 37-41 (vol. ii. p. 27).

928. _Clemence_, Clemency, Pity. Suggested by 'il tempio ... di Clemenza,' Tes. ii. 17; which again is from 'mitis posuit Clementia sedem,' Theb. xii. 482.

932. _Capaneus_, one of the seven heroes who besieged Thebes: struck dead by lightning as he was scaling the walls of the city, because he had defied Zeus; Theb. x. 927. See note to l. 912, above.

937. The celebrated siege of 'The Seven against Thebes'; Capaneus being one of the seven kings.

941. _for despyt_, out of vexation; mod. E. 'for spite.'

942. _To do the dede bodyes vileinye_, to treat the dead bodies shamefully.

948. _withouten more respyt_, without longer delay.

949. _They fillen gruf_, they fell flat with the face to the ground. In M. E. we find the phrase _to fall grovelinges_ or _to fall groveling_. See _Gruflynge_ and _Ogrufe_ in the Catholicon Anglicum, and the editor's notes, pp. 166, 259.

954. _Himthoughte_, it seemed to him; cf. _methinks_, it seems to me. In M. E. the verbs _like_, _list_, _seem_, _rue_ (pity), are used impersonally, and take the dative case of the pronoun. Cf. the modern expression 'if you please' = if it be pleasing to you.

955. _mat_, dejected. 'Ententyfly, not feynt, wery ne _mate_.'--Hardyng, p. 129.--M.

960. _ferforthly_, i. e. _far-forth-like_, to such an extent.

965. _abood_, delay, awaiting, abiding.

966. _His baner he desplayeth_, i. e. he summons his troops to assemble for military service.

968. _No neer_, no nearer. Accent _Athén-es_ on the second syllable; but in l. 973 it is accented on the _first_.

970. _lay_, lodged for the night.

975. _státue_, the image, as depicted on the banner.

977. _feeldes_, field, is an heraldic term for the ground upon which the various charges, as they are called, are emblazoned. Some of this [64] description was suggested by the Thebais, lib. xii. 665, &c.; but the resemblance is very slight.

978. _penoun_, pennon. _y-bete_, beaten; the gold being hammered out into a thin foil in the shape of the Minotaur; see Marco Polo, ed. Yule, i. 344. But, in the Thebais, the Minotaur is upon Theseus' _shield_.

988. _In pleyn bataille_, in open or fair fight.

993. _obséquies_ (Elles., &c.); _exéquies_ (Harl.); accented on the _second_ syllable.

1004. _as him leste_, as it pleased him.

1005. _tas_, heap, collection. Some MSS. read _cas_ (_caas_), which might = downfall, ruin, Lat. _casus_; but, as _c_ and _t_ are constantly confused, this reading is really due to a mere blunder. Gower speaks of gathering 'a _tasse_' of sticks; Conf. Amant. bk. v. ed. Pauli, ii. 293. Palsgrave has--'On a heape, _en vng tas_'; p. 840. Hexham's Dutch Dict. (1658) has--'_een Tas_, a Shock, a Pile, or a Heape.' Chaucer found the word in Le Roman de la Rose, 14870: 'ung _tas_ de paille,' a heap of straw.

1006. _harneys._ 'And _arma_ be not taken onely for the instruments of al maner of crafts, but also for _harneys_ and weapon; also standards and banners, and sometimes battels.'--Bossewell's Armorie, p. 1, ed. 1597. Cf. l. 1613.

1010. _Thurgh-girt_, pierced through. This line is taken from Troilus, iv. 627: 'Thourgh-girt with many a wyd and blody wounde.'

1011. _liggyng by and by_, lying near together, as in A. 4143; the usual old sense being 'in succession,' or 'in order'; see examples in the New Eng. Dict., p. 1233, col. 3. In later English, _by and by_ signifies presently, immediately, as 'the end is not _by and by_.'

1012. _in oon armes_, in one (kind of) arms or armour, shewing that they belonged to the same house. Chaucer adapts ancient history to medieval time throughout his works.

1015. _Nat fully quike_, not wholly alive.

1016. _by hir cote-armures_, by their coat-armour, by the devices on the vest worn above the armour covering the breast. The _cote-armure_, as explained in my note to Barbour's Bruce, xiii. 183, was 'of no use as a defence, being made of a flimsy material; but was worn over the true armour of defence, and charged with armorial bearings'; see Ho. Fame, 1326. Cf. l. 1012. _by hir gere_, by their _gear_, i. e. equipments.

1018. _they._ Tyrwhitt (who relied too much on the black-letter editions) reads _tho_, those; but the seven best MSS. have _they_.

1023. _Tathenes_, to Athens (Harl. MS., which reads _for to_ for _to_). Cf. _tallegge_, l. 3000 (foot-note).

1024. _he nolde no raunsoun_, he would accept of no ransom.

1029. _Terme of his lyf_, the remainder of his life. Cf. 'The end and _term_ of natural philosophy.'--Bacon's Advancement of Learning, Bk. ii. p. 129, ed. Aldis Wright.

1035. Cf. Leg. of Good Women, 2425, 2426.

1038. _stroof hir hewe_, strove her hue; i. e. her complexion contested the superiority with the rose's colour. [65]

1039. _I noot_, I know not; _noot_ = _ne woot_.

1047. _May._ 'Against Maie, every parishe, towne, and village, assembled themselves together, bothe men, women, and children, olde and yonge, even all indifferently, and either going all together or devidyng themselves into companies, they goe, some to the woodes and groves, some to the hills and mountaines, some to one place, some to another, where they spend all the night in pastimes; in the morninge they return, bringing with them birche, bowes and branches of trees, to deck their assemblies withalle.'--Stubbes, Anatomy of Abuses, ed. 1585, leaf 94 (ed. Furnivall, p. 149). See also Strutt, Manners and Customs, iii. 177. Cf. Midsummer Night's Dream, i. 1, 167:--

'To do observance to a morn of May.'

See also l. 1500, and the note.

1049. _Hir yelow heer was broyded_, her yellow hair was braided. Yellow hair was esteemed a beauty; see Seven Sages, 477, ed. Weber; King Alisaunder, 207; and the instances in Burton, Anat. of Melancholy, pt. 3. sec. 2. mem. 2. subsec. 2. Boccaccio has here--'Co' biondi crini avvolti alla sua testa'; Tes. iii. 10.

1051. _the sonne upriste_, the sun's uprising; the _-e_ in _sonne_ represents the old genitive inflexion. _Upriste_ is here the dat. of the sb. _uprist_. It occurs also in Gower, Conf. Amantis, bk. i. ed. Pauli, i. 116.

1052. _as hir liste_, as it pleased her.

1053. _party_, partly; Fr. _en partie_.

1054. _sotil gerland_, a subtle garland; _subtle_ has here the exact force of the Lat. _subtilis_, finely woven.

1055. Cf. 'Con angelica voce'; Tes. iii. 10: and Troil. ii. 826.

1060. _evene-Ioynant_, joining, or adjoining.

1061. _Ther as this Emelye hadde hir pleyinge_, i. e. where she was amusing herself.

1063. In the Teseide (iii. 11) it is Arcite who first sees Emily.

1074. _by aventure or cas_, by adventure or hap.

1076. _sparre_, a square wooden bolt; the bars, which were of iron, were as thick as they must have been if wooden. See l. 990.

1078. _bleynte_, the past tense of _blenche_ or _blenke_ (to blench), to start, draw back suddenly. Cf. _dreynte_, pt. t. of _drenchen_. 'Tutto stordito, Gridò, Omè!' Tes. iii. 17.

1087. _Som wikke aspect._ Cf. 'wykked planete, as Saturne or Mars,' Astrolabe, ii. 4. 22; notes in Wright's edition, ll. 2453, 2457; and Piers the Plowman, B. vi. 327; and see Leg. of Good Women, 2590-7. Add to these the description of Saturn: 'Significat in _quartanis_, _lepra_, _scabie_, in mania, _carcere_, _submersione_, &c. Est infortuna.'--Johannis Hispalensis, Isagoge in Astrologiam, cap. xv. See A. 1328, 2469.

1089. _al-though_, &c., although we had sworn to the contrary. Cf. 'And can nought flee, _if I had it sworn_'; Lydgate, Dance of Machabre (The Sergeaunt). Also--'he may himselfe not sustene Upon his feet, _though he had it sworne_'; Lydgate, Siege of Thebes (The Sphinx), pt. i. [66]

'_Thofe_ the rede knyghte _had sworne_,
Out of his sadille is he borne.'
Sir Percevalle, l. 61.

1091. _the short and pleyn_, the brief and manifest statement of the case. Pronounce _this is_ as _this_; as frequently elsewhere; see l. 1743, E. 56, F. 889.

1100. Cf. 'That cause is of my torment and my sorwe': Troil. v. 654.

1101. Cf. 'But whether goddesse or womman, y-wis, She be, I noot'; Troil. i. 425.

_wher_, a very common form for _whether_.

1105. _Yow_ (used reflexively), yourself.

1106. _wrecche_, wretched, is a word of two syllables, like _wikke_, wicked, where the _d_ is a later and unnecessary addition.

1108. _shapen_, shaped, determined. '_Shapes_ our ends.'--Shakespeare, Hamlet, v. 2. 10. Cf. l. 1225.

1120. 'And except I have her pity and her favour.'

1121. _atte leeste weye_, at the least. Cf. _leastwise_ = _at the leastwise_: '_at leastwise_'; Bacon's Advancement of Learning, ed. Wright, p. 146, l. 23. See English Bible (Preface of 'The Translators to the Reader').

1122. 'I am not but (no better than) dead, there is no more to say.' Chaucer uses _ne_--_but_ much in the same way as the Fr. _ne--que_. Cf. North English 'I'm _nobbut_ clemmed' = I am almost dead of hunger.

1126. _by my fey_, by my faith, in good faith.

1127. _me list ful yvele pleye_, it pleaseth me very badly to play.

1128. This debate is an imitation of the longer debate (in the Teseide), where Palamon and Arcite meet in the grove; cf. l. 1580 below.

1129. _It nere_ = _it were not_, it would not be.

1132. 'It was a common practice in the middle ages for persons to take formal oaths of fraternity and friendship; and a breach of the oath was considered something worse than perjury. This incident enters into the plots of some of the medieval romances. A curious example will be found in the Romance of Athelston; Reliquiæ Antiquæ, ii. 85.'--Wright. A note in Bell's Chaucer reminds us that instances occur also in the old heroic times; as in the cases of Theseus and Peirithous, Achilles and Patroclus, Pylades and Orestes, Nysus and Euryalus. See _Sworn Brothers_ in Nares' Glossary; Rom. of the Rose, 2884.

1133. 'That never, even though it cost us a miserable death, a death by torture.' So in Troilus, i. 674: 'That certayn, for to deyen in the peyne.' Also in the E. version of The Romaunt of the Rose, 3326.

1134. 'Till that death shall part us two.' Cf. the ingenious alteration in the Marriage Service, where the phrase 'till death us depart' was altered into 'do part' in 1661.

1136. _cas_, case. It properly means event, hap. See l. 1074.

_my leve brother_, my dear brother.

1141. _out of doute_, without doubt, doubtless.

1147. _to my counseil_, to my adviser. See l. 1161.

1151. _I dar wel seyn_, I dare maintain. [67]

1153. _Thou shalt be._ Chaucer occasionally uses _shall_ in the sense of _owe_, so that the true sense of _I shall_ is _I owe_ (Lat. _debeo_); it expresses a strong obligation. So here it is not so much the sign of a future tense as a separate verb, and the sense is 'Thou art sure to be false sooner than I am.'

1155. _par amour_, with love, in the way of love. To love _par amour_ is an old phrase for to love excessively. Cf. Bruce, xiii. 485; and see A. 2112, below; Troil. v. 158, 332.

1158. _affeccioun of holinesse_, a sacred affection, or aspiration after.

1162. _I pose_, I put the case, I will suppose.

1163. 'Knowest thou not well the old writer's saying?' The _olde clerk_ is Boethius, from whose book, De Consolatione Philosophiae, Chaucer has borrowed largely in many places. The passage alluded to is in lib. iii. met. 12:--

'Quis legem det amantibus?
Maior lex amor est sibi.'

Chaucer's translation (vol. ii. p. 92, l. 37) has--'But what is he that may yive a lawe to loveres? Love is a gretter lawe ... than any lawe that men may yeven.' And see Troil. iv. 618.

1167. _and swich decree_, and (all) such ordinances.

1168. _in ech degree_, in every rank of life.

1172. _And eek it is_, &c., 'and moreover it is not likely that ever in all thy life thou wilt stand in her favour.'

1177. This fable, in this particular form, is not in any of the usual collections; but it is, practically, the same as that called 'The Lion, the Tiger, and the Fox' in Croxall's Æsop. Sometimes it is 'the Lion, the Bear, and the Fox'; the Fox subtracts the prey for which the others fight. It is no. 247 in Halm's edition of the 'Fabulae Æsopicae,' Lips., Teubner, 1852, with the moral:--[Greek: ho muthos dêloi, hoti allôn kopiôntôn alloi kerdainousin.] In La Fontaine's Fables, it appears as Les Voleurs et l'Âne. Thynne coolly altered _kyte_ to _cur_, and then had to insert _so_ after _were_ to fill up the line.

1186. _everich of us_, each of us, every one of us.

1189. _to theffect_, to the result, or end.

1196. From the Legend of Good Women, 2282.

1200. _in helle._ An allusion to Theseus accompanying Pirithous in his expedition to carry off Proserpina, daughter of Aidoneus, king of the Molossians, when both were taken prisoner, and Pirithous torn in pieces by the dog Cerberus. At least, such is the story in Plutarch; see Shakespeare's Plutarch, ed. Skeat, p. 289. Chaucer found the mention of Pirithous' visit to Athens in Boccaccio's Teseide, iii. 47-51. The rest he found in Le Roman de la Rose, 8186--

'Si cum vesquist, ce dist l'istoire,
Pyrithous apres sa mort,
Que Theseus tant ama mort.
Tant le queroit, tant le sivoit ...
Que vis en enfer l'ala querre.'

[68]

1201. Observe the expression _to wryte_, which shews that this story was not originally meant to be _told_. (Anglia, viii. 453.)

1212. Most MSS. read _or stounde_, i. e. or at any hour. MS. Dd. has _o stound_, one moment, any short interval of time.

'The storme sesed within a stounde.'
Ywaine and Gawin, l. 384.

On this slight authority, Tyrwhitt altered the reading, and is followed by Wright and Bell, though MS. Hl. really has _or_ like the rest, and the black-letter editions have the same.

1218. _his nekke lyth to wedde_, his neck is in jeopardy; lit. lies in pledge or in pawn.

1222. _To sleen himself he wayteth prively_, he watches for an opportunity to slay himself unperceived.

1223. This line, slightly altered, occurs also in the Legend of Good Women, 658.

1225. _Now is me shape_, now I am destined; literally, now is it _shapen_ (or appointed) for me.

1247. It was supposed that all things were made of the four elements mentioned in l. 1246. 'Does not our life consist of the four elements?'--Shakespeare, Twelfth Night, ii. 3. 10.

1255. Cf. P. Plowman, C. xiii. 236.

1257. 'And another man would fain (get) out of his prison.'

1259. _matere_; in the _matter_ of thinking to excel God's providence.

1260. 'We never know what thing it is that we pray for here below.' See Romans viii. 26.

1261. _dronke is as a mous._ This phrase seems to have given way to 'drunk as a rat.' 'Thus satte they swilling and carousyng, one to another, till they were both _as dronke as rattes_.'--Stubbes, Anatomie of Abuses; ed. Furnivall, p. 113.

'I am a Flemying, what for all that,
Although I wyll be _dronken_ otherwhyles _as a rat_.'
Andrew Boorde, ed. Furnivall, p. 147.

Cf. 'When that he is _dronke as a dreynt mous_'; Ritson, Ancient Songs, i. 70 (Man in the Moon, l. 31). 'And I will pledge Tom Tosspot, till I be _drunk as a mouse-a_'; Old Plays, ed. Hazlitt, iii. 339. See also Skelton, Colin Clout, 803; and D. 246.

1262. This is from Boethius, De Consolatione, lib. iii. pr. 2: 'But I retorne ayein to the studies of men, of whiche men the corage alwey reherseth and seketh the sovereyn good, al be it so that it be with a derked memorie; but he not by whiche path, _right as a dronken man not nat by whiche path he may retorne him to his hous_.'--Chaucer's Translation of Boethius; vol. ii. p. 54, l. 57.

1264. _slider_, slippery; as in the Legend of Good Women, l. 648. Cf. the gloss--'_Lubricum_, slidere'; Reliquiae Antiquae, i. 7.

1279. _pure fettres_, the very fetters. 'So in the Duchesse, l. 583, _the pure deeth_. The Greeks used [Greek: katharos] in the same sense.'--Tyrwhitt. [69]

1283. _at thy large_, at large. Cf. l. 2288.

1302. 'White like box-wood, or ashen-gray'; cf. l. 1364. Cf. 'And pale as box she wex'; Legend of Good Women, l. 866. Also 'asshen pale and dede'; Troil. ii. 539.

1308. Copied in Lydgate's Horse, Sheep, and Goose, 124:--'But here this schepe, rukkyng in his folde.' '_Rukkun_, or cowre down'; Prompt. Parv. In B. 4416, MSS. Cp. Pt. Ln. have _rouking_ in place of _lurking_.

1317. _to letten of his wille_, to refrain from his will (or lusts).

1333. Cf. the phrase 'paurosa gelosia'; Tes. v. 2.

1344. _upon his heed_, on pain of losing his head. 'Froissart has _sur sa teste, sur la teste_, and _sur peine de la teste_.'--T.

1347. _this questioun._ 'An implied allusion to the medieval courts of love, in which questions of this kind were seriously discussed.'--Wright.

1366. _making his mone_, making his complaint or _moan_.

1372. 'In his changing mood, for all the world, he conducted himself not merely like one suffering from the lover's disease of Eros, but rather (his disease was) like _mania_ engendered of melancholy humour.' This is one of the numerous allusions to the four humours, viz. the choleric, phlegmatic, sanguine, and melancholic. An excess of the latter was supposed to produce 'melancholy madness.' _gere_, flighty manner, changeableness; 'Siche _wilde gerys_ hade he mo'; Thornton Romances, Sir Percival, l. 1353. See note to l. 1536.

1376. _in his celle fantastyk._ Tyrwhitt reads _Beforne his hed in his celle fantastike_. Elles. has _Biforn his owene celle fantastik_. 'The division of the brain into cells, according to the different sensitive faculties, is very ancient, and is found depicted in medieval manuscripts. The _fantastic cell_ (_fantasia_) was in front of the head.'--Wright. Hence _Biforen_ means 'in the front part of his head.'

'Madnesse is infection of the formost cel of the head, with priuation of imagination, lyke as melancholye is the infection of the middle cell of the head, with priuation of reason, as Constant. saith in _libro de Melancolia_. Melancolia (saith he) is an infection that hath mastry of the soule, the which commeth of dread and of sorrow. And these passions be diuerse after the diuersity of the hurt of their workings; for by madnesse that is called _Mania_, principally the imagination is hurt; and in the other reson is hurted.'--Batman upon Bartholomè, lib. vii. c. 6. Vincent of Beauvais, bk. xxviii. c. 41, cites a similar statement from the _Liber de Anatomia_, which begins:--'Cerebrum itaque tribus cellulis est distinctum. Duae namque meringes cerebri faciunt tres plicaturas inter se denexas, in quibus tres sunt cellulae: phantastica scilicet ab anteriori parte capitis, in qua sedem habet imaginatio.' So in Batman upon Bartholomè, lib. v. c. 3:--'The Braine ... is diuided in three celles or dens.... In the formost cell ... imagination is conformed and made; in the middle, reason; in the hindermost, recordation and minde' [memory]. Cf. also Burton, Anat. of Melancholy, pt. 2. sec. 3. mem. 1. subsec. 2. [70]

1385-8. Probably from Claudian, De Raptu Proserpinae, i. 77:--

'Cyllenius astitit ales,
Somniferam quatiens uirgam, tectusque galero.'

See Lounsbury, Studies, ii. 382.

1390. _Argus_, Argus of the hundred eyes, whom Mercury charmed to sleep before slaying him. Ovid, Met. i. 714.

1401. Cf. 'Hir face ... Was al ychaunged in another kinde'; Troil. iv. 864.

1405. _bar him lowe_, conducted himself as one of low estate. Cf. E. 2013.

1409. Cf. 'in maniera di pover valletto'; Tes. iv. 22.

1428. In the Teseide, iv. 3, he takes the name of _Penteo_. _Philostrato_ is the name of another work by Boccaccio, answering to Chaucer's Troilus. The Greek [Greek: philostratos] means, literally, 'army-lover'; but it is to be noted that Boccaccio did not so understand it. He actually connected it with the Lat. _stratus_, and explained it to mean 'vanquished or prostrated with love'; and this is how the name is here used.

1444. _slyly_, prudently, wisely. The M. E. _sleigh_, _sly_ = wise, knowing: and _sleight_ = wisdom, knowledge. (For change of meaning compare _cunning_, originally knowledge; _craft_, originally power; _art_, &c.)

'Ne swa _sleygh_ payntur never nan was,
Thogh his _sleght_ mught alle other pas,
That couthe ymagyn of þair [devils'] gryslynes.'
Hampole's Pricke of Consc., ll. 2308, 2309.--M.

1463. The third night is followed by the fourth day; so Palamon and Arcite meet on the 4th of May (l. 1574), which was a Friday (l. 1534); the first hour of which was dedicated to Venus (l. 1536) and to lovers' vows (l. 1501). The 4th of May was a Friday in 1386.

1471. _clarree._ 'The French term _claré_ seems simply to have denoted a clear transparent wine, but in its most usual sense a compounded drink of wine with honey and spices, so delicious as to be comparable to the nectar of the gods. In Sloane MS. 2584, f. 173, the following directions are found for making _clarré_:--"Take a galoun of honi, and skome (skim) it wel, and loke whanne it is isoden (boiled), that ther be a galoun; thanne take viii galouns of red wyn, than take a pound of pouder canel (cinnamon), and half a pounde of pouder gynger, and a quarter of a pounde of pouder peper, and medle (mix) alle these thynges togeder and (with) the wyn; and do hym in a clene barelle, and stoppe it fast, and rolle it wel ofte sithes, as men don verious, iii dayes."'--Way; note to Prompt. Parv., p. 79. 'The Craft to make Clarre' is also given in Arnold's Chronicle of London; and see the Gloss. to the Babees Book. See Rom. of the Rose, 5971.

1472. Burton mentions 'opium Thebaicum,' which produced stupefaction; Anat. Met. pt. 3. sec. 2. mem. 6. subsec. 2. The words 'Opium Thebaicum' are written in the margin in MSS. E. and Hn. [71]

1477. _nedes-cost_, for _needes coste_, by the force of necessity. It seems to be equivalent to M. E. _needes-wyse_, of necessity. _Alre-coste_ (Icelandic _alls-kostar_, in all respects) signifies 'in every wise.' It occurs in Old English Homilies (ed. Morris), part i. p. 21: 'We ne ma[gh]en _alre-coste_ halden Crist(es) bibode,' we are not able in every wise to keep Christ's behests. The right reading in Leg. Good Women, 2697, is:--

'And nedes cost this thing mot have an ende.'

1494. A beautiful line; but copied from Dante, Purg. i. 20--'Faceva tutto rider l'oriente.'

1500. See note to l. 1047, where the parallel line from Shakespeare is quoted. And cf. Troil. ii. 112--'And lat us don to May som observaunce.' See the interesting article on May-day Customs in Brand's Popular Antiquities (where the quotation from Stubbes will be found); also Chambers, Book of Days, i. 577, where numerous passages relating to May are cited from old poems. An early passage relative to the 1st of May occurs in the Orologium Sapientiae, printed in Anglia, x. 387:--'And thanne is the custome of dyuerse contrees that yonge folke gone on the nyghte or erely on the morow to Medowes and woddes, and there they kutten downe bowes that haue fayre grene leves, and arayen hem with flowres; and after they setten hem byfore the dores where they trowe to haue amykes [friends?] in her lovers, in token of frendschip and trewe loue.' And see _May-day_ in Nares.

1502. From the Legend of Good Women, 1204.

1508. _Were it_ = if it were only.

1509. So in Troilus, ii. 920:--

'Ful loude sang ayein the mone shene.'

1522. 'Veld haueð hege, and wude haueð heare,' i. e. 'Field hath eye, and wood hath ear.'

'Campus habet lumen, et habet nemus auris acumen.'

This old proverb, with Latin version, occurs in MS. Trin. Coll. Cam. O. 2. 45, and is quoted by Mr. T. Wright in his Essays on England in the Middle Ages, vol. i. p. 168. Cf. Cotgrave's F. Dict. s. v. _Oeillet_.

'Das Feld hat Augen, der Wald hat Ohren'; Ida von Düringsfeld, Sprichwörter, vol. i. no. 453.

1524. _at unset stevene_, at a meeting not previously fixed upon, an unexpected meeting or appointment. This was a proverbial saying, as is evident from the way in which it is quoted in Sir Eglamour, 1282 (Thornton Romances, p. 174):--

'_Hyt ys sothe seyde_, be God of heven,
Mony metyn at on-sett stevyn.'

Cf. 'Wee may chance to meet with Robin Hood
Here _att some unsett steven_.'
Robin Hood and Guy of Gisborne; in Percy's
Reliques of Eng. Poetry.

[72]

'Thei _setten steuen_,' they made an appointment; Knight de la Tour-Landry, ch. iii. And see below, The Cokes Tale:

'And ther they _setten steven_ for to mete'; A. 4383.

1531. _hir queynte geres_, their strange behaviours.

1532. Now in the top (i. e. elevated, in high spirits), now down in the briars (i. e. depressed, in low spirits).

'Allas! where is this worldes stabilnesse?
_Here up, here doune_; here honour, here repreef;
Now hale, now sike; now bounté, now myscheef.'
Occleve, De Reg. Princip. p. 2.

1533. _boket in a welle._ Cf. Shakespeare's Richard II., iv. 1. 184. 'Like so many buckets in a well; as one riseth another falleth, one's empty, another's full.'--Burton's Anat. of Mel. p. 33.

1536. _gery_, changeable; so also _gerful_ in l. 1538. Observe also the sb. _gere_, a changeable mood, in ll. 1372, 1531, and Book of the Duchesse, 1257. This very scarce word deserves illustration. Mätzner's Dictionary gives us some examples.

'By revolucion and turning of the yere
A _gery_ March his stondis doth disclose,
Nowe reyne, nowe storme, nowe Phebus bright and clere.'
Lydgate, Minor Poems, p. 24.

'Her _gery_ Iaces,' their changeful ribands; Richard Redeless, iii. 130.

'Now _gerysshe_, glad and anoon aftir wrothe.'
Lydgate, Minor Poems, p. 245.

'In _gerysshe_ Marche'; id. 243. '_Gerysshe_, wylde or lyght-headed'; Palsgrave's Dict., p. 313. In Skelton's poem of Ware the Hauke (ed. Dyce, i. 157) we find:--

'His seconde hawke wexid _gery_,
And was with flying wery.'

Dyce, in his note upon the word, quotes two passages from Lydgate's Fall of Princes, B. iii. c. 10. leaf 77, and B. vi. c. 1. leaf 134.

'Howe _gery_ fortune, furyous and wode.'

'And, as a swalowe _geryshe_ of her flyghte,
Twene slowe and swyfte, now croked, now upright.'

Two more occur in the same, B. iii. c. 8, and B. iv. c. 8.

'The _gery_ Romayns, stormy and unstable.'

'The _geryshe_ quene, of chere and face double.'

See also in his Siege of Troye, ed. 1555, fol. B 6, back, col. 2; &c.

1539. A writer in Notes and Queries quotes the following Devonshire proverb: 'Fridays in the week are never aleek,' i. e. Fridays are unlike other days.

'Vendredy de la semaine est
Le plus beau ou le plus laid';
Recueil des Contes, par A. Jubinal, p. 375.

[73]

1566. Compare Legend of Good Women, 2629:--

'Sin first that day that _shapen was my sherte_,
Or by the _fatal sustren_ had my dom.'

So also in Troil. iii. 733.

1593. _I drede noght_, I have no fear, I doubt not.

1594. _outher ... or_ = either ... or.

1609. _To darreyne hir_, to decide the right to her. Spenser is very fond of this word; see F. Q. i. 4. 40; i. 7. 11; ii. 2. 26; iii. i. 20; iv. 4. 26, 5. 24; v. 2. 15; vi. 7. 41. See _deraisnier_ in Godefroy's O. Fr. Dict.

1622. _to borwe._ This expression has the same force as _to wedde_, in pledge. See l. 1218.

1625. The expression 'sooth is seyd' shews that Chaucer is here introducing a quotation. The original passage is the following, from the Roman de la Rose, 8487:--

'Bien savoient cele parole,
Qui n'est mençongiere ne fole:
Qu'onques Amor et Seignorie
Ne s'entrefirent companie,
Ne ne demorerent ensemble.'

Again, the expression 'cele parole' shews that Jean de Meun is also here quoting from another, viz. from Ovid, Met. ii. 846:--

'Non bene conueniunt, nec in una sede morantur
Maiestas et Amor.'

1626. _his thankes_, willingly, with good-will; cf. l. 2107. Cf. M. E. _myn unthonkes_ = ingratis. 'He faught with them in batayle _their unthankes_'; Hardyng's Chronicle, p. 112.--M.

1638. Cf. Teseide, vii. 106, 119; Statius, Theb. iv. 494-9.

1654. _Foynen_, thrust, push. It is a mistake to explain this, as usual, by 'fence,' as fence (= defence) suggests _parrying_; whereas _foinen_ means to thrust or push, as in attack, not as in defence. It occurs again in l. 2550. Hence it is commonly used of the pushing with spears.

'With speres ferisly [fiercely] they foynede.'
Sir Degrevant, 274 (Thornton, Rom. p. 188).

Strutt (Sports and Pastimes, bk. iii. c. 1. § 32) explains that a thrust is more dangerous than a cut, and quotes the old advice, that 'to foyne is better than to smyte.' 'And there kyng Arthur smote syr Mordred vnder the shelde wyth a _foyne_ of his spere thorughoute the body more than a fadom'; Sir T. Malory, Morte Darthur, bk. xxi. c. 4. This was a foine indeed!

1656. Deficient in the first foot. Scan:--In | his fight | ing, &c. The usual insertion of _as_ before _a_ is wholly unauthorised.

1665. _hath seyn biforn_, hath foreseen. Cf. Teseide, vi. 1. [74]

1668. From the Teseide, v. 77. Compare the medieval proverb:--'Hoc facit una dies quod totus denegat annus.' Quoted in Die älteste deutsche Litteratur; by Paul Piper (1884); p. 283.

1676. _ther daweth him no day_, no day dawns upon him.

1678. _hunte_, hunter, huntsman; whence _Hunt_ as a surname. I find this form as late as in Gascoigne's Art of Venerie: 'I am the _Hunte_'; Works, ed. Hazlitt, ii. 306.

1698. Similarly, Adrastus stopped the fight between Tydeus and Polynices; Statius, Theb. i. Lydgate describes this in his Siege of Thebes, pt. ii, and takes occasion to borrow several expressions from this part of the Knightes Tale.

1706. _Ho_, an exclamation made by heralds, to stop the fight. It was also used to enjoin silence. See ll. 2533, 2656; Troil. iv. 1242.

1707. _Up peyne_ is the old phrase; as in '_up peyne_ of emprisonement of 40 days'; Riley's Memorials of London, p. 580.

1736. _it am I._ 'This is the regular construction in early English. In modern English the pronoun _it_ is regarded as the direct nominative, and _I_ as forming part of the predicate.'--M.

1739. 'Therefore I ask my death and my doom.'

1747. _Mars the rede._ Boccaccio uses the same epithet in the opening of his Teseide, i. 3: '_O Marte rubicondo._' _Rede_ refers to the colour of the planet; cf. Anelida, 1.

1761. This line occurs again three times; March. Tale E. 1986; Squieres Tale, F. 479; Legend of Good Women, 503.

1780. _can no divisoun_, knows no distinction.

1781. _after oon_ = after one mode, according to the same rule.

1783. _eyen lighte_, cheerful looks.

1785. See the Romaunt of the Rose, 878-884; vol. i. p. 130.

1799. 'Amare et Sapere vix Deo conceditur.'--Publius Syrus, Sent. 15. Cf. Adv. of Learning, ii. proem. § 15--'It is not granted to man to love and to be wise'; ed. Wright, p. 84. So also in Bacon's 10th Essay. The reading here given is correct. _Fool_ is used with great emphasis; the sense is:--'Who can be a (complete) fool, unless he is in love?' The old printed editions have the same reading. The Harl. MS. alone has _if that_ for _but-if_, giving the sense: 'Who can be fool, if he is in love?' As this is absurd, Mr. Wright _silently_ inserted _not_ after _may_, and is followed by Bell and Morris; but the latter prints _not_ in italics. Observe that the line is deficient in the first foot. Read:--Whó | may bé | a fóol, &c.

1807. _jolitee_, joyfulness--said of course ironically.

1808. _Can ... thank_, acknowledges an obligation, owes thanks.

1814. _a servant_, i. e. a lover. This sense of _servant_, as a term of gallantry, is common in our dramatists.

1815, 1818. Cf. the Teseide, v. 92.

1837. _looth or leef_, displeasing or pleasing.

1838. _pypen in an ivy leef_ is an expression like 'blow the buck's-horn' in A. 3387, meaning to console oneself with any frivolous [75] employment; it occurs again in Troilus, v. 1433. Cf. the expression 'to go and whistle.' Cf. 'farwel the gardiner; he may pipe with an yue-leafe; his fruite is failed'; Test. of Love, bk. iii; ed. 1561, fol. 316. Boys still blow against a leaf, and produce a squeak. Lydgate uses similar expressions:--

'But let his brother blowe in an horn,
Where that him list, or pipe in a reede.'
Destruction of Thebes, part ii.

Again, in Hazlitt's Proverbs, we find 'To go blow one's flute,' which is taken from an old proverb. In Vox Populi Vox Dei (circa 1547), pr. in Hazlitt's Popular Poetry, iii. 284, are the lines:--

'When thei have any sute,
Thei maye goo blowe theire flute,
_This goithe the comon brute_.'

The custom is old. Cf. Zenobius, i. 19 (Paroem. Graec. I. p. 6):--

[Greek: aidein pros murrinên; ethos ên ton mê dunamenon en tois sumposiois aisai, daphnês klôna ê murrinês labonta pros touton aidein.]

1850. _fer ne ner_, farther nor nearer, neither more nor less. 'After some little trouble, I have arrived at the conclusion that Chaucer has given us sufficient _data_ for ascertaining both the days of the month and of the week of many of the principal events of the "Knightes Tale." The following scheme will explain many things hitherto unnoticed.

'On Friday, May 4, before 1 A.M., Palamon breaks out of prison. For (l. 1463) it was during the "third night of May, but (l. 1467) a little _after_ midnight." That it was Friday is evident also, from observing that Palamon hides himself at day's approach, whilst Arcite rises "for to doon his observance to May, remembring on the _poynt of his desyr_." To do this best, he would go into the fields at _sunrise_ (l. 1491), during the hour dedicated to _Venus_, i. e. during the hour after sunrise _on a Friday_. If however this seem for a moment doubtful, all doubt is removed by the following lines:--

"Right as the _Friday_, soothly for to telle,
Now it shyneth, now it reyneth faste,
Right so gan gery _Venus_ overcaste
The hertes of hir folk; right as _hir day_
Is gerful, right so chaungeth she array.
Selde is the _Friday_ al the wyke ylyke."

'All this is very little to the point unless we suppose Friday to be the day. Or, if the reader have _still_ any doubt about this, let him observe the curious accumulation of evidence which is to follow.

'Palamon and Arcite meet, and a duel is arranged for an early hour on the _day following_. That is, they meet on Saturday, May 5. But, as Saturday is presided over by the inauspicious planet Saturn, it is no wonder that they are both unfortunate enough to have their duel [76] interrupted by Theseus, and to find themselves threatened with death. Still, at the intercession of the queen and Emily, a day of assembly for a tournament is fixed for "_this day fifty wykes_" (l. 1850). Now we must understand "fifty wykes" to be a poetical expression for _a year_. This is not mere supposition, however, but a _certainty_; because the appointed day was in the month of _May_, whereas fifty weeks and no more would land us in _April_. Then "this day fyfty wekes" means "this day year," viz. on May 5. [In fact, Boccaccio has 'un anno intero'; Tes. v. 98.]

'Now, in the year following (supposed not a leap-year), the 5th of May would be _Sunday_. But this we are expressly told in l. 2188. It must be noted, however, that this is not the day of the _tournament_[23], but of the _muster_ for it, as may be gleaned from ll. 1850-1854 and 2096. The eleventh hour "inequal" of Sunday night, or the second hour before sunrise of Monday, is dedicated to _Venus_, as explained by Tyrwhitt (l. 2217); and therefore Palamon then goes to the temple of Venus. The next hour is dedicated to Mercury. The third hour, the first after sunrise on Monday, is dedicated to Luna or Diana, and during this Emily goes to Diana's temple. The fourth after sunrise is dedicated to Mars, and therefore Arcite then goes to the temple of Mars. But the rest of the day is spent merely in jousting and preparations--

"Al that _Monday_ justen they and daunce." (l. 2486.)

The tournament therefore takes place on Tuesday, May 7, on the day of the week presided over by _Mars_, as was very fitting; and this perhaps helps to explain Saturn's exclamation in l. 2669, "Mars hath his wille."'--Walter W. Skeat, in Notes and Queries, Fourth Series, ii. 2, 3; Sept. 12, 1868 (since slightly corrected).

To this was added the observation, that May 5 was on a Saturday in 1386, and on a Sunday in 1387. Ten Brink (Studien, p. 189) thinks it is of no value; but the coincidence is curious.

1866. 'Except that one of you shall be either slain or taken prisoner'; i. e. one of you must be fairly conquered.

1884. _listes_, lists. 'The lists for the tilts and tournaments resembled those, I doubt not, appointed for the ordeal combats, which, according to the rules established by Thomas, duke of Gloucester, uncle to Richard II., were as follows. The king shall find the field to fight in, and the lists shall be made and devised by the constable; and it is to be observed, that the list must be 60 paces long and 40 paces broad, set up in good order, and the ground within hard, stable, and level, without any great stones or other impediments; also, that the lists must be made _with one door to the east, and another to the west_ [see [77] ll. 1893, 4]; and strongly barred about with good bars 7 feet high or more, so that a horse may not be able to leap over them.'--Strutt, Sports and Pastimes; bk. iii. c. 1. § 23.

1889. The various parts of this round theatre are subsequently described. On the North was the turret of Diana, with an oratory; on the East the gate of Venus, with altar and oratory above; on the West the gate of Mars, similarly provided.

1890. _Ful of degrees_, full of steps (placed one above another, as in an amphitheatre). 'But now they have gone a nearer way to the wood, for with wooden galleries in the church that they have, and _stairy degrees of seats_ in them, they make as much room to sit and hear, as a new west end would have done.'--Nash's Red Herring, p. 21. See Shakespeare, Julius Cæsar, ii. 126, and also 2 Kings xx. 9. Cf. 'While she stey up from _gre_ to _gre_.'--Lives of Saints, Roxb. Club, p. 59. Lines 1187-1894 are more or less imitated from the Teseide, vii. 108-110.

1910. Coral is a curious material to use for such a purpose; but we find posts of coral and a palace chiefly formed of coral and metal in Guy of Warwick, ed. Zupitza, 11399-11401.

1913. _don wroght_, caused (to be) made; observe this idiom. Cf. _don yow kept_, E. 1098; _han doon fraught_, B. 171; _haf gert saltit_, Bruce, xviii. 168.

1918-32. See the analysis of this passage in vol. iii. p. 390.

1919. _on the wal_, viz. on the walls _within_ the oratory. The description is loosely imitated from Boccaccio's Teseide, vii. 55-59. It is remarkable that there is a much closer imitation of the same passage in Chaucer's Parl. of Foules, ll. 183-294. Thus at l. 246 of that poem we find:--

'Within the temple, of syghes hote as fyr,
I herde a swogh, that gan aboute renne;
Which syghes were engendred with desyr,
That maden every auter for to brenne
Of newe flaume; and wel aspyed I thenne
That al the cause of sorwes that they drye
Com of the bitter goddesse Ialousye.'

There is yet another description of the temple of Venus in the House of Fame, 119-139, where we have the very line 'Naked fletinge in a see' (cf. l. 1956 below), and a mention of the 'rose garlond' (cf. l. 1961), and of 'Hir dowves and daun Cupido' (cf. ll. 1962-3).

1929. _golde_, a marigold; _Calendula_. '_Goolde_, herbe: Solsequium, quia sequitur solem, elitropium, calendula'; Prompt. Parv. The corn-marigold in the North is called _goulans_, _guilde_, or _goles_, and in the South, _golds_ (Way). Gower says that Leucothea was changed

'Into a floure was named _golde_,
Which stant governed of the sonne.'
Conf. Am., ed. Pauli, ii. 356.

[78] Yellow is the colour of jealousy; see _Yellowness_ in Nares. In the Rom. de la Rose, 22037, Jealousy is described as wearing a 'chapel de _soussie_,' i. e. a chaplet of marigolds.

1936. _Citheroun_ = Cithaeron, sacred to Venus; as said in the Rom. de la Rose, 15865, q.v.

1940. In the Romaunt of the Rose, _Idleness_ is the _porter_ of the garden in which the rose (Beauty) is kept. In the Parl. of Foules, 261, the porter's name is _Richesse_. Cf. ll. 2, 3 of the Second Nonnes Tale (G. 2, 3).

1941. _of yore agon_, of years gone by. Cf. Ovid, Met. iii. 407.

1953-4. Imitated from Le Roman de la Rose, 16891-2.

1955. The description of Venus here given has some resemblance to that given in cap. v (De Venere) of Albrici Philosophi De Deorum Imaginibus Libellus, in an edition of the Mythographi Latini, Amsterdam, 1681, vol. ii. p. 304. I transcribe as much as is material. 'Pingebatur Venus pulcherrima puella, nuda, et in mari natans; et in manu sua dextra concham marinam tenens atque gestans; rosisque candidis et rubris sertum gerebat in capite ornatum, et columbis circa se volando, comitabatur.... Hinc et Cupido filius suus alatus et caecus assistebat, qui sagitta et arcu, quos tenebat, Apollinem sagittabat.' It is clear that Chaucer had consulted some such description as this; see further in the note to l. 2041.

1958. Cf. 'wawes ... clere as glas'; Boeth. bk. i. met. 7. 4.

1971. _estres_, the inner parts of a building; as also in A. 4295 and Leg. of Good Women, 1715. 'To spere the _estyrs_ of Rome'; Le Bone Florence, 293; in Ritson, Met. Rom. iii. 13. See also Cursor Mundi, 2252.

'For thow knowest better then I
Al the _estris_ of this house.'
Pardoner and Tapster, 556; pr. with Tale of Beryn (below).

'His sportis [portes?] and his _estris_'; Tale of Beryn, ed. Furnivall, 837. Cf. 'Qu'il set bien de l'ostel les _estres_'; Rom. de la Rose, 12720; and see Rom. of the Rose, 1448 (vol. i. p. 153).

By mistaking the long _s_ for _f_, this word has been misprinted as _eftures_ in the following: 'Pleaseth it yow to see the _eftures_ of this castel?'--Sir Thomas Malory, Mort Arthure, b. xix. c. 7.

1979. _a rumbel and a swough_, a rumbling and a sound of wind.

1982. _Mars armipotente._