Geoffrey Chaucer

“ Todd, in his Illustrations of Chaucer, p. 372, gives a capital example of a roundel by Occleve; this is of full length, both refrains being of three lines, so that the whole poem is of fourteen lines. This is quite sufficient to shew that the definition of a roundel in Johnson's Dictionary (which is copied from the Dict. de Trevoux, and relates to the latter rondeau of thirteen lines) is quite useless as applied to roundels written in Middle English. ”

“ In the Roman de la Rose, 15980, Venus speaks of her bow (F. arc) and her firebrand or torch (brandon) . Cf. Merch. Tale, E 1777.
117. 'As surely as I saw thee in the north-north-west.' He here refers to the planet Venus. As this planet is never more than 47° from the sun, the sun must have been visible to the north of the west point at sunset; i. e. the poem must have been written in the summer-time. The same seems to be indicated by l. 21 (the longe day) , and still more clearly by ll. 85-88; Chaucer would hardly have gone to bed at sunset in the winter-time. ”

“ Near the end of Chaucer's Troilus, v. 1811, we have the singular passage:—
'And ther he saugh with ful avysement
The erratik sterres, herkening armonye
With sounes fulle of hevenish melodye'; &c.
This passage, by the way, is a translation from Boccaccio, Teseide, xi. 1. Cf. Rom. de la Rose, 17151-5.
See also Longfellow's poem on the Occultation of Orion, where the poet (heretically but sensibly) gives the lowest note to Saturn, and the highest to the Moon; whereas Macrobius says the contrary; lib. ii. c. 4. ”

“ Compare the well-known proverb—'sine Cerere et Libero friget Venus'; Terence, Eun. 2. 3. 4.
277. Read Cipryde, not Cupide; for in l. 279 we have hir twice, once in the sense of 'their,' but secondly in the sense of 'her.' Boccaccio also here speaks of Venus, and refers to the apple which she won from Paris. Cipride is regularly formed from the accus. of Cypris (gen. Cypridis) , an epithet of Venus due to her worship in Cyprus. Chaucer found the genitive Cypridis in Alanus de Planctu Naturæ (ed. Wright, p. 438) ; see note to l. 298. Cf. 'He curseth Ceres, Bacus, and Cipryde'; Troilus, v. ”

“ Erables haus, sapins et fresnes.'
Here ormes are elms; charmes, horn-beams; fos, beeches; codres, hasels; trembles, aspens; chesnes, oaks; erables, maples; sapins, firs; fresnes, ashes. Hence this list contains seven kinds of trees out of Chaucer's thirteen. See also the list of 21 trees in Kn. Tale, A 2921. Spenser has—
'The builder oake, sole king of forrests all.'
This tree-list is, in fact, a great curiosity. ”

“ The oak is called builder, because no other wood was used in building in this country in the middle ages, as may be seen in our old churches and farm-houses, in which the stairs are often made of solid blocks of the finest oak.'—Bell. ”

“ Writers (v. 271) , that the Roundel consists of thirteen lines, eight having one rime, and five another, is not to the point here, as it relates to the later French rondeau only. An examination of Old French roundels shews us that Littré's definition of the triolet is quite correct, and is purposely left somewhat indefinite; but we can apply a somewhat more exact description to the form of the roundel as used by Machault, Deschamps, and Chaucer.
The form adopted by these authors is the following. First come three lines, rimed abb; next two more, rimed ab, and then the first refrain ”

“ But the Candace of fiction was an Indian queen, who contrived to get into her power no less a person than the world's conqueror, Alexander the Great. See King Alisaunder, ed. Weber, l. 7646, and the Wars of Alexander, ed. Skeat, l. 5314. It is probable that Candace was sometimes confused with the Canace of Ovid's Heroides, Epist. xi. (wholly translated by Dryden) . In fact, we have sufficient proof of this confusion; for one MS. reads Candace in the Legend of Good Women, 265, where five other MSS. have Canace or Canacee. ”

“ Dunbar imitates Chaucer in his Thrissill and Rois, and describes Dame Nature as surrounded by beasts, birds, and flowers; see stanzas 10, 11, 18, 26, 27 of that poem.
The phrase 'Nature la déesse' occurs in Le Roman de la Rose, l. 16480.
309. Birds were supposed to choose their mates on St. Valentine's day (Feb. 14) ; and lovers thought they must follow their example, and then 'choose their loves.' Mr. Douce thinks the custom of choosing valentines was a survival from the Roman feast of the Lupercalia. See the articles in Brand, Pop. Antiq. ”

“ The great or mundane year, according to Macrobius, Comment, lib. 2. c. 11, contained 15,000 common years. In the Roman de la Rose, l. 17,018, Jeun de Meun makes it 36,000 years long; and in the Complaint of Scotland, ed. Murray, p. 33, it is said, on the authority of Socrates, to extend to 37,000 years. It is not worth discussion.
71. 'Ego vero, inquam, o Africane, siquidem bene mentis de patria quasi limes ad cæli aditum patet,' &c. 'Et ille, Tu vero enitere, et sic habeto, non esse te mortalem, sed corpus hoc.... Hanc [naturam] tu exerce in optimis rebus ”

“ Troilus, i. 15, where Chaucer again says he is no lover himself, but only serves Love's servants.
15. Cf. Prol. to Legend of Good Women, 29-39.
22. Men is here a weakened form of man, and is used as a singular sb., with the same force as the F. on or the G. man. Hence the vb. seith is in the singular. This construction is extremely common in Middle English. In ll. 23 and 25 com'th is monosyllabic.
31. Tullius, i. e. M. Tullius Cicero, who wrote a piece entitled Somnium Scipionis, which originally formed part of the sixth book of the De Republica. ”

“ Bras, brass. Boccaccio has rame, i. e. copper, the metal which symbolised Venus; see Can. Yeom. Tale, G 829. In fact, this temple is the very temple of Venus which Chaucer again describes in the Knightes Tale, ll. 1060-1108 (A 1918) ; which see.
234. Faire, beautiful by nature; gay, adorned by art.
236. Office, duty; viz. to dance round.
237. These are the dowves flikeringe in Kn. Tale, 1104 (A 1962) .
243. Sonde, sand. 'Her [Patience's] chief virtue is quiet endurance in the most insecure and unhopeful circumstances'; Bell.
245. Answering to Boccaccio's 'Promesse ad arte,' i. e. ”

“ Chaucer adapts his words to a known French tune. The words Qui bien aime, a tard [1] oublie (he who loves well is slow to forget) probably refer to this tune; though it is not quite clear to me how lines of five accents (normally) go to a tune beginning with a line of four accents. In Furnivall's Trial Forewords, p. 55, we find:—'Of the rondeau of which the first line is cited in the Fairfax MS., &c., M. Sandras found the music and the words in a MS. of Machault in the National Library, no. 7612, leaf 187. The verses form the opening lines of one of two pieces entitled Le Lay de plour ”

“ In Thynne's Animadversions on Speght's Chaucer, ed. Furnivall, p. 68 (Chau. Soc.) , we find:—'for Aristotle sayethe, and Bartholomeus de proprietatibus rerum, li. 12. c. 8, with manye other auctors, that yf the storke by any meanes perceve that his female hath brooked spousehedde, he will no moore dwell with her, but strykethe and so cruelly beateth her, that he will not surcease vntill he hathe killed her yf he maye, to wreake and reuenge that adulterye.' Cf. ”

“ Hence we find, at the end of ch. 14 of Mandeville's Travels, this remarkable experiment:—'Men taken the Ademand, that is the Schipmannes Ston, that drawethe the Nedle to him, and men leyn the Dyamand upon the Ademand, and leyn the Nedle before the Ademand; and yif the Dyamand be good and vertuous, the Ademand drawethe not the Nedle to him, whils the Dyamand is there present.' Cf. ”

“ Aleyn, Alanus de Insulis; Pleynt of Kynde, Complaint of Nature, Lat. Planctus Naturæ; see note to l. 298. Chaucer refers us to Aleyn's description on account of its unmerciful length; it was hopeless to attempt even an epitome of it. Lydgate copies this passage; see Political, Religious and Love Poems, ed. Furnivall, p. 45, l. 17; or his Minor Poems, ed. Halliwell, p. 47.
323. Foules of ravyne, birds of prey. Chaucer's division of birds into birds of prey, birds that eat worms and insects, water-fowl, and birds that eat seeds, can hardly be his own. In Vincent of Beauvais, lib. xvi. c. ”

“ The sparrow was sacred to Venus, from its amatory disposition (Meas. for Meas. iii. 2. 185) . In the well-known song from Lyly's Alexander and Campaspe, Cupid 'stakes his quiver, bow, and arrows, His Mother's doves, and team of sparrows; 'Songs from the Dramatists, ed. R. Bell, p. 50.
352. Cf. Holland's Pliny, bk. x. c. 29—'The nightingale ... chaunteth continually, namely, at that time as the trees begin to put out their leaues thicke.'
353. 'Nocet autem apibus sola inter animalia carnem habentia et carnem comedentia'; Vincent of Beauvais, De hyrundine; Spec. Nat. lib. xvi. c. 17. ”

“ In the Rom. de la Rose, l. 4750 (E. version, l. 5265) , it appears as: 'Nus fox ne scet sa langue taire,' i. e. No fool knows how to hold his tongue. In the Proverbs of Hendyng, it is: 'Sottes bolt is sone shote,' l. 85. In later English, 'A fool's bolt is soon shot'; cf. Henry V, iii. 7. 132, and As You Like It, v. 4. 67. Kemble quotes from MS. Harl. fol. 4—'Ut dicunt multi, cito transit lancea stulti.'
578. The sothe sadde, the sober truth.
595. Another proverb. We now say—'There's as good fish in the sea as ever came out of it'; or, 'as ever was caught.'
599. See Chaucer's tr. ”

“ Coward kyte. See Squi. Tale, F 624; and note. 'Miluus ... fugatur a niso, quamuis in triplo sit maior illo'; Vincent of Beauvais, lib. xvi. c. 108. 'A kite is ... a coward, and fearefull among great birds'; Batman on Bartholomè, lib. xii. c. 26.
350. Alanus has:—'Illic gallus, tanquam vulgaris astrologus, suæ vocis horologio horarum loquebatur discrimina.' Cf. Nonne Prestes Tale, B 4044. We also see whence Chaucer derived his epithet of the cock—'common astrologer'—in Troilus, iii. ”

“ Chaucer substitutes a brief description of his own, and represents the birds as real live ones, gathering around her; which is much more sensible. For the extracts from Alanus, see the Introduction, p. ”

“ The explanation of the phrase 'farewell feldefare,' occurring in Troil. iii. 861 and in Rom. Rose, 5510, and marked by Tyrwhitt as not understood, is easy enough. It simply means—'good bye, and we are well rid of you'; when the fieldfare goes, the warm weather comes.
371. Formel, perhaps 'regular' or 'suitable' companion; as F. formel answers to Lat. formalis. Tyrwhitt's Gloss. says: 'formel is put for the female of any fowl, more especially for a female eagle (ll. 445, 535 below) .' It has, however, no connection with female (as he seems to suppose) , but answers rather, in sense, to make, i. ”

“ Por connestable, et por vicaire', &c.
⁠Rom. de la Rose, 16970, &c.
Here Nature is supposed to be the speaker. Chaucer again uses vicaire of Nature, Phis. Tale, D 20, which see; and he applies it to the Virgin Mary in his A B C, l. 140. See also Lydgate, Compl. of Black Knight, l. 491.
380. That l. 379 is copied from Alanus is clear from the fact that ll. 380-1 are from the same source. At p. ”