The Prioress’s Prologue and Tale

Summary

I. “Lily from the Mouth of a Clerk” 599

(ed. Ruth Wilson Tryon)

II. “How a Jew putte his sone in a brennyngge ovene” 600

(ed. Carl Horstmann)

III. NA1 Alfonso X, El Sabio, Cantiga 6 605

(ed. Walter Mettmann)

IV. NA2 “De quodam monacho cantante Gaude Maria” 611

(Sidney Sussex College Cambridge MS 95)

V. NA3 “De quodam puero … psallere Alma Redemptoris Mater” 613

(Balliol College MS 228)

VI. NA4 “Gaude Maria responsorium puer cantans” 613

(Trinity College Dublin MS 167)

VIIa. NA5 “Monachus cantans responsorium Gaude Maria” 615

(Trinity College Dublin MS 167)

VIIb. NA6 [Alma Redemptoris Mater] 617

(Trinity College Dublin MS 277)

TEXTS FROM BROWN’s GROUP C

VIII. C1 [Boy killed for singing Alma Redemptoris Mater] 617

(Corpus Christi College, Oxford, MS 32)

IX. C2 Alma Redemptoris Mater 621

(British Library Additional MS 46919)

X. C3 [Boy sings Ave regina] 623

(British Library Additional MS 11579)

XI. C4 [Boy killed for singing Sancta Maria] 623

(British Library Royal MS 12.E.I)

XII. C5 “Hou þe Jewes … þrewe a Chyld in a Gonge” 624

(ed. Carl Horstmann)

(Vernon Version: Oxford Bodleian MS 3938)

XIII. C7 “De Puero Cantante Responsorium Gaude Maria” 629

(Sidney Sussex College Cambridge MS 95)

XIV. C8 “De Puero … Qui Antiphonam Alma Redemptoris Cantare” 631

(Sidney Sussex College Cambridge MS 95)

XV. C9 Alphonsus a Spina, “De Expulsione Judeorum de Regno

Anglorum” 633

(from Fortalicium fidei contra Iudeos … [Basil edition, c. 1475])

XVI. C10 “De Cantu Alma Redemptoris Mater” 639

(from Trinity College Cambridge MS O.9.38)

Chaucer’s Prioress tells a miracle of the Virgin, one of the most popular forms of narrative in the Middle Ages. These tales tend to be simple, focused exempla, designed to reinforce specific aspects of Marian devotion. In creating The Prioress’s Tale Chaucer has drawn on a number of cultural and literary influences to produce a complex and multi-layered narrative that transcends its genre. Because of these many layers, The Prioress’s Prologue and Tale present numerous challenges for those wishing to pursue its sources and analogues. Each makes direct and indirect reference to the Sarum Missal, Sarum Breviary, and Primer, as demonstrated by Madeleva, Hamilton, Wenk, Maltman and Collette.