There are but three histories to which any man will listen,
Of France, and of Britain and of Rome the Great.
[5] And had the corpse (i. e. Antony’s) embalmed.
[6] And forth she fetched this dead corpse, and shut it in the shrine.
[7] sterte, sprang.
[8] God knows.
[9] contradicted.
[10] knows.
[11] or else something similar.
[12] fools.
[13] I had the thing I did not want.
[14] How he pays folk what he owes them.
[15]
No pike ever so wallowed in a galantine
As I wallow and am entangled in love.
[16]
Francis Petrarch, the laureat poet,
This clerk was called, whose rhetoric sweet
Illumined all Italy with poetry.
[17] Till fully dazed is thy look.
[18] The box in which dead bodies are put.
[19] Suitable for pipes.
[20] Evergreen oak.
[21] Tall fir.
[22] Cypress which mourns for death, i. e. is often found in churchyards.
[23] Yew-tree, of which bows are made.
[24] Aspen, suitable for making arrows.
[25] With cheerfulness.
[26] Here is no home.
[27] Keep to the highway, and let thy spirit lead thee.
[28] And there is no fear but that truth shall deliver (thee).
[29] scarcely.
[30] thus.
[31] head.
[32] death.
The passage is taken from Richard Rolle of Hampole’s Pricke of Conscience (Morris and Skeat, Specimens of Early English, Part II, p. 108).
[33] For a comparison of the French with the English romances see Professor Ker’s volume on Medieval Literature in this series, pp. 66-74.
[34] like me.
[35] obtained aught.
[36]
He was pale as a stone ball, in a palsy he seemed,
And clothed in rough cloth, I do not know how to describe it;
In an under-jacket and short coat, and a knife by his side;
The sleeves were like those of a friar’s habit.
Piers Plowman, V. 78-81.
[37] A pity.
[38] meadow.
[39] i. e. companion to another.
[40] of the most graceful shape.
[41] plowed.
[42] Thou art hard to carry.
[43] ignorant.
[44] tellers of tales or gestes.
[45] trumpet.
[46] journeys.
[47] delay.
[48] before he uttered a sound.
[49] many an hymn for your holy-days.
[50] will make fire dim.
[51] curled locks.
[52] embroidered.
[53] playing the flute.
[54] fine flour.
[55] complexion.
[56] worthless.
[57] The translations are taken from Chaucer’s Originals and Analogues, published by the Chaucer Society.
[58] This unusual list of the seven sciences is that given by Trivet.
[59] barbarous nation.
[60] died.
[61] commands.
[62] no matter if I am lost.
[63] grieve us but a little.
[64] sprinkled.
[65] All our joy ends in woe.
[66] maid.
[67] have pity on.
[68] rueful being.
[69] my love has gone away.
[70] eyes.
[71] Have the Greeks thus soon made you thin?
[72] Carving-tools.
[73] Slumberest thou as if in a lethargy.
[74] Friends cannot always be together.
[75] I am glad (lit. it is dear to me).
[76] And without doubt, to ease your heart.
[77] almost died for fear.
[78] the most timid person.
[79] pain.
[80] mine.
[81] be wroth with.
[82] cherish.
[83] sighed.
[84] i. e. I must act cautiously.
[85] jeopardy.
[86] No matter for the jangling of wicked tongues.
[87] blame.
[88] i. e. my name will be in everyone’s mouth.
[89] penitent.
[90] lap.
[91] bless.
[92] do reverence, bow.
[93] wreak, avenge.
[94] chain.
[95] toil.
[96] desires.
[97] seems good to her.
[98] glitters.
[99] i. e. as my brains tell me.
[100] simply by nature.
[101] i. e. an unpropitious conjunction of planets.
[102] i. e. change of disposition.
[103] Wallacia.
[104] Possibly this refers to the sea of sand and pebbles mentioned by Sir John Mandeville in his Travels. To go bareheaded was considered a great hardship.
[105] Probably the dangerous gulf of Quarnaro in the Adriatic.
[106] hear tell.
[107] Where there was likely to be foolish behaviour.
[108]
Let them be bread of pure wheat-flour,
And let us wives be called barley-bread.
[109] burned.
[110]
With scrips cramful of lies
Intermixed with news.
[111] bel ami, fair friend.
[112] jests.
[113] ribaldry.
[114] learn.
[115] take trouble to speak loudly.
[116] i. e. I have all my sermon by heart.
[117] Wherewith to colour my sermon.
[118] If their souls go blackberrying, i. e. I do not care where they go.
[119] i. e. curate of the parish.
[120] practised folly.
[121] kill.
[122] bees.
[123] And made guesses according to their fancy.
[124] The horse of Sinon the Greek.
[125] plot.
[126] whispered.
[127] ignorant.
[128] staff.
[129] ducks.
[130] kill.
[131] flew.
[132]
Groweth seed and bloweth mead
And springeth the wood now—
Sing cuckoo.
[133] goes.
[134] steady pace.
[135] maid.
[136] together.
[137] fall quickly from the linden tree.
[138] What need is there to tell of their array?
[139] i. e. Let us pay no attention to their greetings.
[140] fell to hunting.
[141] hot-foot.
[142] notes on the horn.
[143] roused itself.
[144] together.
[145] thrust.
[146] grave.
[147] size.
[148] Or looked well.
[149] Why should I be tedious.
[150] condition.
[151] bright.
[152] That steamed like a furnace of lead.
[153] condition.
[154] slim.
[155] girdle.
[156] apron.
[157] strings of her white cap.
[158] matched her collar.
[159] enticing eye.
[160] her eyebrows were fine.
[161] And they were arched, and black as any sloe.
[162] A kind of early pear.
[163] studded with brass.
[164] puppet.
[165] brisk.
[166] a sweet drink.
[167] mead.
[168] To have more flowers than the seven stars in the sky.
[169] This refers to the common practice of paying a poor and often illiterate priest to take charge of a parish while the vicar went to London and earned a handsome and easy livelihood by saying masses for the repose
of the souls of those who had left rich relatives.
[170] He was loth to excommunicate those whose tithe was in arrears.
[171] i. e. sow tares in our wheat.
[172] chorister.
[173] know.
[174] God grant that we may meet.
[175] Was eaten by the lion ere he could escape.
[176] slain.
[177] drowning.
[178] doctors.
[179] temperament.
[180] gluttony.
[181] dreamers.
[182] fiend.
[183] died and rose.
[184] wholly.
[185] servants.
[186] fairs.
[187] market.
[188] breaketh down my barn door.
[189] I scarcely dare look round, on account of him.
[190] tipped.
[191] guild-hall.
[192] daïs.
[193] suitable.
[194] Service held on the vigils of Saints’ Days.
[195] The name Langland is used for convenience sake, to denote the author, or authors of Piers Plowman.
[196] his own labour.
[197] unstable.
[198] chatter.
[199] dear at a Jane, i. e. a small Genoese coin.
[200] Your judgment is false, your constancy proves evil.
[201] i. e. one who farms taxes.
[202] pierced and cut into points.
[203] in secret and openly.
[204] birth.
[205] do not care a farthing.
[206] fetched.
[207] known.
[208] known.
[209] Entered were into religion, i. e. were placed in a monastery.
[210] Simple is my mind, and little my learning.
[211] repay.
[212] revengeful cruelty.
[213] isle.
[214] twigs.
[215] stanza.
[216] precious.
[217] neck.
[218] gore.
[219] perfect.
[220] grey stones.
[221] bees.
[222] float.
[223] tree-tops.
[224] buds.
[225] drops clear as beryl.
[226] flower of all rhetoricians.
[227] poets.
[228] proved.
* * *
Transcriber’s Notes:
Punctuation has been corrected without note.
Other than the corrections noted by hover information, inconsistencies in spelling and hyphenation have been retained from the original.
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Chaucer and His Times Page 18