Chapter III: Introduction (2)

Short riddling stanzas of the kind, based upon the Latin phrases mentioned above, may have been popular in the thirteenth century, and this particular one was evidently known and used by the author of the _Song on the Times_.[21] The writer of the version preserved in MS. Harl. 913 seems to have been a more learned man, acquainted with poems like the Dialogues between _the Soul and the Body_, who elaborated the four lines of MS. Harl. 2253, and perhaps other verses of the same kind, into a poem of seven six-lined stanzas, the additional couplet often introducing a new idea precisely as in the case of the similarly expanded verse-form in MS. Porkington. Either this man or a later transcriber appears to have added the Latin rendering which accompanies the poem, and to have further exercised himself in varying the word-play. Heuser[22] points out that the mistakes in the MS. would support the view that the English text is a copy of an original in another dialect, and it is possible that the Latin version belongs to this MS. alone, since a second poem in the same MS. is accompanied by an unfinished translation into Latin.

This theory as to the origin of the two texts of the A version receives further support from the fact that it also accounts most satisfactorily for the development and popularity of the B version. Apart from the play on the word _erthe_ and the similarity of the theme, there is only one point of close verbal connexion between the two versions. In MS. Harl. 913 (A) the sixth stanza runs as follows:--

Erþ gette on erþ gersom & gold,
Erþ is þi moder, in erþ is þi mold.
Erþ uppon erþ be þi soule hold;
Er erþe go to erþe, bild þi long bold.
Erþ bilt castles, and erþe bilt toures;
Whan erþ is on erþe, blak beþ þe boures.

In the B version, the rimes _gold_ : _mold_, _toures_ : _boures_, regularly recur in the third and fourth stanzas, and line 5 of the A text is preserved in slightly modified form in the first line of verse 3:-- (MS. Harl. 4486, vv. 3 and 4)

Erthe apon erthe wynnethe castelles and towres.
Then seythe erthe to erthe: 'These bythe alle owres.'
When erthe apon erthe hath byggede vp his bowres,
Then schalle erthe for the erthe suffre scharpe schowres.

Erthe gothe apon erthe as molde apon molde.
So goethe erthe apon erthe alle gleterynge in golde,
Lyke as erthe unto erthe neuer go scholde,
And [gh]et schalle erthe into erthe rather then he wolde.

In the Cambridge text the rime-words _towres_ : _bours_ are introduced twice over, representing both the versions given above:--

(ll. 63, 64) Erthe bygyth hallys & erthe bygith towres,
When erth is layd in erth, blayke is his bours;

as in the _A_ version;

(ll. 5, 7) Erthe vpon erth has hallys & towris . . .
But quan erth vpon erth has bygyd his bowres,

as in the B version.

The two stanzas of the B version which contain these rime-words are the two which recur most frequently on tombstones and mural inscriptions, and it seems possible that they represent a second early form of the _Erthe_ poems. It is evident that the rime-words _gold_ : _mold_, _bowres_ : _towres_, depend upon an early tradition. Probably verses similar to the short stanza in MS. Harl. 2253, and containing these words, were in existence before the learned writer of the longer A text in MS. Harl. 913 introduced them in his poem, and, becoming widely known, formed the nucleus of the B version. Both the A and the B versions might therefore be held to depend upon popular stanzas of this kind, which gave rise about the end of the thirteenth century to the long poem of MS. Harl. 913, and during the fourteenth century to the original of the B version, a poem in seven four-lined stanzas. The earlier version is connected more particularly with the Southwest Midland district; the later seems to have originated rather in the North or North Midlands, but it soon became known all over England, and is found in the South of Scotland shortly after 1500. Only one fifteenth-century writer, the author of the Cambridge text, shows direct knowledge of the A text, but the B version was evidently widely known, and a favourite theme for additions and modifications. On tombstones and mural inscriptions it survived up to the nineteenth century.

LATER VERSIONS OF THE POEM.

As has been already pointed out, the Middle English texts of _Erthe upon Erthe_ occur for the most part in the Commonplace Books of the day, often on the spare leaves at the beginning or end of the MS., as if the collector or some later owner had been struck by the poem and anxious to preserve it. That this interest was not confined to the fifteenth century is shown by the occurrence of the text in the Maitland and Reidpeth MSS. A still later instance of it occurs in the Pillerton Hersey Registers, dating from 1559 onwards, where the following verse has been scribbled on the last leaf, probably by some seventeenth-century clerk (cf. C. C. Stopes, _Athenaeum_, Sept. 19, 1908):--

Earth upon earth bould house and bowrs,
Earth upon earth sayes all is ours.
Earth upon earth when all is wroght,
Earth upon earth sayes all is for nought.

Here the first two lines represent a corrupt type of the same lines in verse 3 of the B version, while the rimes _wroght_ : _nought_ recall verse 1.

Another interesting trace of a late popular version is mentioned in the _Gentleman's Magazine_ for March, 1824, where a certain Mr. J. Lawrence tells how he was invited, during a visit to Beaumont Hall, Essex, to see the following inscription, written and decorated by a cow-boy on an attic wall:--

Earth goes upon the earth, glittering like gold;
Earth goes to the earth sooner than 'twould;
Earth built upon the earth castles and towres;
Earth said to the earth, 'All shall be ours.'

Here portions of verses 3 and 4 of the B version have been combined as in the epitaphs at Melrose and Clerkenwell cited below, pointing either to a corrupt popular version of the B text, or possibly to an earlier type[23] in which the rimes _gold_ : _mold_, &c. were immediately associated with the rimes _towres_ : _bowres_ as in A (MS. Harl. 913, v. 6). The former assumption is the more probable, since the verse appears to be directly based upon stanzas 3 and 4 of the usual B version.

The majority of the later instances of the text occur on tombstones or memorial tablets. The poem was peculiarly adapted for this purpose, based as it was on the very words of the Burial Service. Indeed, the short verses from which it is here assumed to have originated might well be supposed to have been written in the first place as epitaphs, if evidence of the use of English epitaphs in the thirteenth century[24] were forthcoming. As has been already stated, the seven verses of the normal B version occurred in full among the mural paintings in the Chapel of the Holy Trinity at Stratford-on-Avon, belonging to the Guild of the Holy Cross, where they appear to have been used as a monumental inscription already in the latter part of the fifteenth century.

A well-known late instance of the text is the inscription on a tombstone in the parish churchyard which surrounds Melrose Abbey, mentioned by Scott. The stone is headed as follows:--

Memento Mori.
Here lyes James Ramsay, portioner of Melrose, who died
July 15th, 1761.

On the back is the following verse:--

The Earth goeth on the Earth
Glistring like gold,
The Earth goeth to the Earth
Sooner than it wold;
The Earth builds on the Earth
Castles & Towers,
The Earth says to the Earth:
'All shall be ours.'

This was translated into German by Theodor Fontane (_Poems_, 4th edit., Berlin, 1892, p. 447). Cf. Fiedler, _Mod. Lang. Review_, April 1908.

Other inscriptions are as follows:--

On an old brass, quoted by W. Williams, _Notes and Queries_, I. vii. 577, and thought by him to belong to the Church of St. Helen's, London[25]:--

'Here lyeth y^e bodyes of
James Pomley, y^e sonne of ould
Dominick Pomley and Jane his
wyfe: y^e said James deceased y^e 7th
day of Januarie Anno Domini 1592
he beyng of y^e age of 88 years, &
y^e sayd Jane deceased y^e -- day
of -- D --

Earth goeth upõ Earth as moulde upõ moulde;
Earth goeth upõ Earth all glittering as golde,
As though earth to y^e earth never turne sholde;
And yet shall earth to y^e earth sooner than he wolde.

On a tomb at Edmonton of unknown date (possibly sixteenth century), mentioned by Weever (_Ancient Funerall Monuments_) in 1631, and by Pettigrew (_Chronicles of the Tombs_, p. 67) in 1857:--

Erth goyth upon erth as mold upon mold,
Erth goyth upon erth al glisteryng in gold,
As though erth to erth ner turne shold,
And yet must erth to erth soner than he wolde.

Formerly on a headstone in St. James's Churchyard, Clerkenwell, deciphered about 1812, but already lost in 1851, probably owing to the dismantling of the churchyard. (Cf. _Notes and Queries_, III. i. 389):--

Earth walks on Earth like glittering gold;
Earth says to Earth 'We are but mold'.
Earth builds on Earth castles & towers;
Earth says to Earth, 'All shall be ours!'

Formerly on a tombstone at St. Martin's, Ludgate, to Florens Caldwell esq. of London & Ann Mary Wilde, his wife (Pettigrew, p. 67)[26]:--

Earth goes to Earth, as mold to mold;
Earth treads on Earth, glittering in gold:
Earth as to Earth returne ne'er shoulde;
Earth shall to Earth goe e'er he wolde.
Earth upon Earth consyder may;
Earth goes to Earth naked away.
Earth though on Earth be stowt & gay
Earth shall from Earth passe poore away.
Be mercifull & charitable,
Relieve the poor as thou art able.
A shrowd to the grave
Is all thou shalt have.

This interesting monument has unfortunately disappeared. Doubtless there are many other traces of the poem to be found, but it appears to have been rarely used on tombstones after 1700,[27] and earlier monuments, unless specially preserved, are rarely decipherable at the present day.

LITERARY INTEREST.

_Erthe upon Erthe_ cannot be said to possess great literary value in itself. The interest of the poem lies chiefly in its evident popularity, and in the insight it gives into the kind of literature which became popular in the Middle Ages. It belongs essentially to the same class as the _Soul and Body_ Poems, and the _Dance of Death_. In the early days of its introduction into Western Europe, Christianity made great use in its appeal to the mass of the people of the fear of death and dread of the Judgement. The early monastic writers dwelt upon the idea of man's mortality and decay, and the transitoriness of human rank and pleasure. Hence the frequency with which such themes as the _Dance of Death_ were treated in literature and in art. Closely allied with this idea of the fleeting nature of earthly things, and to some extent a result of it, was the conception of the separation of man's bodily from his spiritual self which pervades all mediaeval post-Christian literature. In Old English times already, this sense of a sharp division between the two is embodied in No. xliv of the O.E. _Riddles_:--

[28]Ic wat indryhtne æþelum deorne
[gh]iest in [gh]eardum, þæm se grimma ne mæg
hunger sceððan ne se hata þurst,
yldo ne adle [ne se enga deað],
[gh]if him arlice esne þenað,
se þe agan sceal [his [gh]eongorscipe]
on þam siðfæte: hy gesunde æt ham
findaþ witode him wiste [&] blisse,
cnosles unrim, care, [gh]if se esne
his blaforde hyreð yfle
frean on fore, ne wile forht wesan
broþer oþrum: him þæt bam sceðeð,
þonne hy from bearme begen hweorfað
anre magan ellorfuse
moddor [&] sweostor.

This sets forth the same conception of the duality in man as is represented in the O.E. _Speech of the Soul to the Body_, and in the whole group of _Soul and Body_ poems, and the idea recurs constantly in other monastic texts, cf. Morris, _O. E. Miscellany_, iii (_Sinners Beware_), p. 83:--

326. þe feondes heom forþ ledeþ
Boþe lychom and saule.

331-336. Þe saule seyþ to þe lychome,
Accursed wurþe þi nome,
Þin heaued and þin heorte.
Þu vs hauest iwroht þes schome,
And alle þene eche grome
Vs schall euer smerte.

_MS. Harl._ 2253, fol. 106, v^o, l. 7: þe fleysh stont a[gh]eyn þe gost.

These two fundamental ideas of the transitoriness and hence worthlessness of man's earthly part, and the cleavage between it and his spiritual part, lie at the root of much of the mediaeval literature, and represent the two not incompatible extremes to which the monastic ideal of life, from its very one-sidedness, was capable of leading: on the one hand a certain morbid materialism, on the other an ascetic mysticism. Nor can it be denied that the mediaeval mind took a certain grim pleasure in dwelling upon the more grotesque aspect of these things. The O.E. poet found the same enjoyment in describing his '[Gh]ifer'--

[29]se wyrm, þe þa [gh]ea[gh]las beoð
nædle scearpran: se genydeð to
ærest eallra on þam eorðsciæfe,

as the painters of the _Dance of Death_ in the drawing of their skeletons and emblems of mortality, or the Gothic carver in his gargoyles. Perhaps, too, some satisfaction in dwelling upon the hollowness of earthly joys, and the bitter fate of those who took their fill of them, was not lacking to a few of those who had turned their backs upon them.

_Erthe upon Erthe_ is perhaps more especially concerned with the first of the two conceptions mentioned above, man's mortality, but, as has already been shown, a close connexion exists between it and the _Soul and Body_ poems, and though the idea of the duality in man is not mentioned, it is certainly present. The poem is more popular in form than either the _Dance of Death_ or the various _Soul and Body_ Dialogues, perhaps because of its purely English origin, and seems to represent a later and more popular product of the ideas which gave rise to the other two groups. Its short mono-rimed stanza, its jingling internal rime, and its half-riddling, half-punning character, appear to have especially commended it to popular favour, and it is significant that it became most widely-known in its simpler forms.

EDITOR'S NOTE.

In preparing the text of this edition, all the available MSS. have been consulted, the only two not examined being William Billyng's MS. and the Brighton MS., which were formerly in the possession of private owners, and have eluded all search for them. As exhaustive a search as was possible has been made for other texts of the poem, but it has often escaped cataloguing, and it is probable that other copies of the B version, at least, exist.

The punctuation, inverted commas, and regular use of initial capitals in the text are the Editor's. The MSS. vary in their use of capitals, the same MS. being often inconsistent with itself, while the Cambridge text frequently employs them for unimportant words in the middle of the line, as p. 33, l. 45, Ar, &c. Capitals have been added in the case of all proper names. Letters and words which are obscure or illegible in the MS., or which appear to have been accidentally omitted, are enclosed in square brackets, and a hyphen has been inserted where the MS. separates a prefix or particle from the rest of the word. The MS. writings ff, þ, [gh], v for u and vice versa, have been retained in the text, and [ll], [th] expanded to ll{e}, th{e}, but it was not thought advisable to expand m~, n~, to m{e}, n{e}, nor other letters such as d, r, g, when written with a final flourish. Fifteenth-century scribes appear to have used such flourishes at the end of the word rather as a matter of habit than with any particular meaning, and the forms to which expansion of them would lead, such as _one_, _onne_ for _on_, are frequently most improbable. It was therefore thought better to ignore such flourishes, or to indicate the persistent use of them by a footnote.

[Transcriber's Note:
The mid-paragraph characters are "ll" and "th", each with a single
stroke through both letters.]

As the conclusions arrived at in the Introduction with regard to the relationship of the English and Latin versions in MS. Harl. 913, and the verbal connexion with the _Soul and Body_ Dialogues, agree, to some extent, with those indicated by Heuser, _Die Kildare-Gedichte_, pp. 176-80, it is only reasonable to state that the greater part of the work upon the subject had been done, and a projected article upon it written in reply to Professor Fiedler's in the _Modern Language Review_, before I had any knowledge of Heuser's text, and that my conclusions had been formed independently of his, though his have helped to strengthen and confirm them. Moreover I owe his work a very real debt, since I first learned from it of the existence of the Cambridge Text, which has been a most important link in the building up of the general theory as to the connexion between the different versions of the poem.

In conclusion, it is a pleasure to express thanks for kind and courteous assistance to the authorities of the British Museum, the Public Record Office, the Bodleian, Cambridge University Library and Lincoln Cathedral Library; to the librarian of Lambeth Palace Library, to whom I am indebted for the collation of the Lambeth text; to the authorities of Magdalene College, Cambridge, for permission to copy and print the Maitland text; to Lord Harlech for the loan of the Porkington MS.; to Professor Fiedler for permission to use the Brighton text; to Professor Priebsch, who pointed out the text in MS. Harl. 4486; to Miss Helen Sandison, of Bryn Mawr College, U.S.A., for the discovery of the text in the Appendix and for two of the Analogues, and to Professor Skeat for valuable advice and suggestions. In particular this text owes much to my Father, Sir James Murray of the _Oxford Dictionary_, who has read the proofs, and in the midst of his own arduous work has always been ready with help and advice, to my friend Miss K. S. Block, Lecturer in English at the Royal Holloway College, and, above all, to Dr. Furnivall, in whom all scholars and students of English mourn to-day the loss of a great pioneer, and an ever-ready friend and adviser.

OXFORD,
_July_ 1910.

Since this was sent to press two other copies of the B version have come to light at Cambridge, and have by kind permission been inserted on pp. 47, 48 as Appendix II:--

(B 19) MS. Trinity College R. 3. 21, fol. 33, v^o, a copy of the normal B version in seven stanzas.

(B 20) MS. Trinity College B. 15. 39, fol. 170, which contains nine stanzas of the expanded text preserved in MSS. Lambeth and Laud, and appears to represent a distinct copy of the original of these two (see Introd. p. xix).

[Footnote 1: A second Latin version of an _Erthe_ poem, together
with the same poem in Anglo-French, and in Middle English, occurs
on the back of a Roll in the Public Record Office, dating from the
time of Edward II (Ex^r. K. R. Proceedings, Bdle. 1; old No.
845/21), and in a 19th cent. transcript of this in MS. Brit. Mus.
Addit. 25478; it is given in the Appendix. Both the Latin and the
French appear to be translations or paraphrases of the English,
with an additional verse or two.]

[Footnote 2: The English text in the Appendix consists of nine
four-lined stanzas, and is distinct from either of the two current
versions of the poem. It appears to have been suggested by the
opening lines of A, and may be regarded as a single sub-type of A,
not affecting the main line of argument of the Introduction. (See
Appendix, p. 46.)]

[Footnote 3: This is repeated on each page of Bateman's text, and
is, perhaps, his own design.]

[Footnote 4: See Bateman's Preface.]

[Footnote 5: Probably not the author but the copier of the MS.:
see Notes.]

[Footnote 6: All the stanzas of the B version are four-lined
except MS. Porkington.]

[Footnote 7: v. Wanley's Catalogue.]

[Footnote 8: My attention was called to this MS. by the kindness
of Prof. Priebech.]

[Footnote 9: MS. Laud Misc. is not written throughout in metrical
lines, but the divisions of the stanzas, and, in most cases, of
the lines, are clearly indicated.]

[Footnote 10: The first leaf of this text has been torn out and
the verses in brackets are only conjectural.]

[Footnote 11: MS. Laud represents, in the main, the same version
as MS. Lamb., but the variant readings preclude the idea of its
being a copy of Lamb., unless the scribe deliberately tried to
modify his original on the lines of Harl. 4486 and Rawl. P. The
changes in the text (ll. 26, 27, 47: see Notes) show that it
cannot be the original of Lamb. It appears to be a transcript from
the same original made about the same date, or a little earlier
than the Lambeth text.]

[Footnote 12: Cf. MS. Brighton _nobley_.]

[Footnote 13: Cf. MS. Selden _delful_.]

[Footnote 14: The Latin and Anglo-French texts in the Appendix are
evidently renderings of the English poem which accompanies them.]

[Footnote 15: This is clearly seen in the Latin and French
versions in the Appendix where the Latin text uses _terra in
terra_, and the French _terre en terre_.]

[Footnote 16: Vernon MS. _to resten on_, Digby, _shal rest right
at_.]

[Footnote 17: Cotton MS. _þe rof þe firste_.]

[Footnote 18: Cf. Frendles ys þe dede (_Proverbs of Hendyng_,
l. 288).]

[Footnote 19: = heres þonkes, _of their own free will_.]

[Footnote 20: Compare with this the text in the Appendix which
begins:
Whanne eorthe hath eorthe wiþ wrong igete--
and in the French version:
Quant terre auera en terre large terre gayne.]

[Footnote 21: See the Appendix, p. 46.]

[Footnote 22: _Die Kildare-Gedichte_ (Bonn, 1904).]

[Footnote 23: See p. xxxiv above.]

[Footnote 24: The earliest known epitaphs in English date from the
fourteenth century.]

[Footnote 25: There is no record of this brass at the church of
St. Helen's, Bishopsgate.]

[Footnote 26: Dated 1590 by Ernest R. Suffling, _Epitaphia_
(1909), p. 382.]

[Footnote 27: A late instance of its use is given by Ch. Box
(_Elegies and Epitaphs_, Glouc. 1892) as found by him on the tomb
of a bricklayer, who died in 1837, aged 90:--
Earth walks upon Earth like glittering gold,
Earth says to Earth, 'We are but mould';
Earth builds upon Earth castles and towers,
Earth says to Earth, 'All is ours'!]

[Footnote 28: Printed from Grein-Wülcker, _Bibliothek der ags.
Poesie_, iii. 212.--(I know of a most noble guest in the
dwellings, hidden from men, whom fierce hunger cannot torment, nor
burning thirst, nor age, nor sickness [nor close-pressing death],
if the servant who shall [bear him company] in his course serves
him honourably: they, prospering, shall find abundance and bliss,
countless joys, allotted to them at home, but (they shall find)
sorrow, if the servant obeys his lord and master ill upon their
journey, and will not show him reverence, the one brother to the
other: that shall afflict them both, when they two depart,
hastening hence, from the bosom of their common kinswoman, mother
and sister.)]

[Footnote 29: Grein-Wülcker, iii. 105.--(The worm whose jaws are
sharper than needles, who first of all the worms in the grave
forces his way to him.)]

THE MIDDLE ENGLISH POEM

ERTHE UPON ERTHE.