• Lay le Freine

the end of line 1. W emends this to read [ywri]te. I follow her reading. 8 This line highlights the ancient quality of the lay, an emphasis found frequently within the texts included in this volume, to establish authority. See

• Introduction

born into a medieval Islamic world that was increasingly fascinated by the study of philosophy, especially the work of the ancient Greeks; the Arabic word falsafa ("philosophy"), in fact, is a simple transliteration of the Greek philosophia.20 As Michael Marmura

• The York Corpus Christi Plays: Play 25, The Entry into Jerusalem

very strongly in the Pauline epistles. 152 Yf thei were dyme. The laws of Moses and the writings of the ancient prophets were considered dark, not capable of explanation without reference to the new dispensation; in iconography, this is illustrated

• The Assembly of Gods

fantasy is to link him with dreams. Compare Chaucer's The Hous of Fame, lines 66-80. The term derives from an ancient Greek concept of showing or making visible. Phantasos, who according to Pierre Bersuire's fourteenth-century commentary on Ovid's Metamorphoses (11.633),

• Henryson, Complete Works: Introduction

poet who, “like Chaucer, belongs to an older and wider tradition of ‘medieval humanism,’ which prizes the works of the ancient writers and delights in their sentence and humanitas.”9 But there is something adventurously original about the energy with which

• Emar

Johns Hopkins University Press, 1927; rpt. New York: Johnson, 1973); Mary G. Houston, Medieval Costume in England Mary G. Houston, Ancient Greek, Roman and Byzantine Costume and Decoration, 2nd ed., A Technical History of Costume, vol. 2 (London: Adam rpt.

• Confessio Amantis, vol. 1: Introduction

edition Second Edition, 2006 Enter Gower To sing a song that old was sung, From ashes ancient Gower is come, Assuming man's infirmities To glad your ear, and please your eyes. It hath been sung at festivals, On ember-eves and

• Caxton, The Game and Playe of the Chesse, Book Two

and the West Bank. Chaldea, the Western term for the ancient kingdom of Babylonia, usually refers to the region’s southern parts. It is now found in Iraq. Assyrie is an ancient kingdom that at its peak spanned much of the

• Athelston

romances. 154 Thanne the kyng his hand up raughte. The raising of the hand, usually the right hand, indicates an ancient ritual of oathtaking that originally involved placing the right hand on a sacred object, sometimes a sword, while speaking

• The Pistil of Swete Susan

ancients of the people appointed judges that year, of whom the Lord said: Iniquity came out from Babylon from the ancient judges, that seemed to govern the people. / These men frequented [frequentabunt] the house of Joakim, and all that

• Lydgate, Troy Book: Introduction

poet. 144), an anonymous sixteenth-century reader takes to heart Lydgate's protest that he writes true meaning but with little craft. Ancient English books, says this reader, show little art; ignorance darkened understanding in those earlier times, "but mark the substance

• THE BOKE OF CUPIDE,GOD OF LOVE: Introduction

that includes his own efforts alongside those of his beloved "Dan Chaucer."14 Indeed, Dryden remarked in his Preface to Fables Ancient and Modern that "Spenser more than once insinuates that the soul of Chaucer was transfused into his body; and

• Osbern Bokenham, Life of St. Anne

Syrach. Ecclesiasticus, also known as "Wisdom of Jesus Ben Sirach," is one of some fifteen books in the Septuagint, the ancient Greek version of the Hebrew Bible, that are generally either omitted from Protestant translations of the Bible or relegated

• Middle English Marian Lyrics: Introduction

Edmund. The Art of the Middle English Lyric: Essays in Criticism. Athens: University of Georgia Press, 1972. Rickert, Edith, ed. Ancient English Christmas Carols 1400 to 1700. New York: Oxford University Press, 1928. [Modernized spelling.] Robbins, Rossell Hope. "The Earliest

• Robin Hood and the Monk

York. 83-86 By reporting to the sheriff the presence of Robin Hood in the church, the monk has violated the ancient privilege of sanctuary. The betrayal is particularly heinous because Robin was attending mass when he was discovered. As the

• Codex Ashmole 61: Item 1, Saint Eustace

throughout both reigns. 452 a panne of brasse. Other versions specify a brass bull, recalling the brazen bull of the ancient tyrant Phalaris who tortured and killed his victims in a brass bull designed to make the screams of the

• The Sinner's Lament

yong, as nowe be ye. A: now as ye be; T: yowyng es now er ye. An instance of the ancient warning phrase Quod tu es, ego fui ("such as I am shall you be") common in funerary verse inscriptions;

• Sir Owain: Introduction

Studien 1 (1877), 57-121. Laing, David, and William B. D. D. Turnbull, eds. Owain Miles and Other Inedited Fragments of Ancient English Poetry. Edinburgh: [s.n.], 1837. The Auchinleck Manuscript. National Library of Scotland Advocates' MS 19.2.1. Facsimile with an introduction

• The Northern Homily Cycle: Homily 11, Fourth Sunday after Epiphany

V), see the Introduction. The word epiphany, which comes from Greek, means "illumination" or "divine manifestation." One of the most ancient annual liturgical celebrations, the Feast of the Epiphany was of Eastern origin. In the Egyptian calendar the winter solstice

• The Northern Homily Cycle: Homily 19, Annunciation

in the late seventh century. The date was chosen in relation to that of Christmas, but also because of an ancient tradition that the creation of the world, the Incarnation, and the Passion of Christ also occurred on that date.