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Percy's Essay “On the Ancient Metrical Romances”
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 02 December 2020
Extract
The essay “On the Ancient Metrical Romances,” introduced into the third volume of Percy's Reliques of Ancient English Poetry (1765), is an important landmark in the modern revival of interest in the medieval romances. Through the earlier part of the eighteenth century the infrequent comments on the romances had been incidental to something else (chivalry, for a conspicuous example) or had been concerned with theories, chiefly of origin, based on very little evidence. Of the romances themselves, little was known, but they were generally considered barbarous, uncultivated, and infantile. But in Percy's essay the subject is treated with some attempt at completeness, and includes not merely theories about their origin (though these are present) but a discussion of the romances themselves. Upon scrutiny, Percy's knowledge of the subject is found to be large, much larger than has been generally suspected, and toward the material he is seen to display a hesitating and diffident enthusiasm manifestly held in check by the disapproval of the current taste. A summary of his essay follows:
The purpose of primitive poetry (according to Percy) was at first to record the valiant deeds and the genealogies of the race heroes; but as letters began to prevail, the bards gave over their historical function and devoted themselves to entertainment. From these songs of the Gothic bards are derived the romances of chivalry, which existed in their elements among the Teutonic peoples long before the days of the Crusades. Though romances first developed in France, the English had a native taste for this type of fiction, and there is reason to believe that they had romances of their own without French originals. These old romances throw light on the manners of the time and often have poetic merit. The publication of a judicious collection of them would thus be desirable. Our classical poets—Chaucer, Shakespeare, Spenser—abound in allusions that are understood only by a knowledge of romances. To illustrate these points Percy quotes a passage from Richard Cure de Lyon that explains an allusion in King John, and gives a detailed abstract of Libius Disconius, one of the romances found in his manuscript. A catalogue of such romances as he knows to be extant closes the essay.
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References
1 The writer hopes a little later to present a study of the treatment of medieval romances in the eighteenth century prior to Percy's essay.
2 An edition was published at Dublin, 1766, and one at Francfort, 1790, both probably pirated. The four essays, as improved and enlarged in the second edition, were published in London in 1767.
3 Percy's theory is not discussed in this article.
4 He was made Dean of Carlisle in 1778 and Bishop of Dromore in 1782.
5 “I have commonly taken up these trifles, as other grave men have done cards, to unbend and amuse the mind when fatigued with graver studies.” Letter to Pinkerton, July 20, 1778, in Nichols, Illustrations of the Literary History of the Eighteenth Century, viii, 94.—See also the prefaces to the Reliques and Northern Antiquities, and other allusions in letters in Nichols.
6 Nichols, op. cit., viii, 94.—In 1773 Boswell had rather discouraged the idea of supplementary volumes. See Boswell's Letters, p. 191.
The plan of an additional series of volumes dates back at least to 1772, and on its details the following extract throws much light: “ Since the publication of my Reliques &c., a great Number of Ancient Poems both printed and manuscript have fallen in my way; and I have been strongly importuned to print some of them. I am inclined to comply, and to print three such Volumes as the former; but not as a continuation of that Work by any means: but to be a new distinct Independent Publication, under this Title, Ancient English and Scottish Poems, chiefly of the more popular cast, accompanied with some few modern pieces. 3 Vols. 12 mo. This selection will take in poems of a more elevated kind than the last; in grave, sublime & moral subjects; not wholly excluding some few Songs or Historical Ballads of superior merit which have come to my hands, since the former Work was finally closed. Each Volume is intended to contain a series of Poems from the earliest times down to the Present, in the manner of the former Publication viz. the Reliques &c. No pieces shall be admitted that have been rendered common in former Miscellanies: but either Poems extracted from ancient MSS or from such printed Books as are not very common.
To each Volume shall be prefixed an Essay: at present I have thought of the following Subjects for such Essays. (1) On the Origin, and Spirit of Chivalry. (2) On the State of Manners on the Borders of the two Nations, & the happy effects of the Union with respect to the National Security &c. (3) On the Effect of the Ancient English Longbow &c. Favour me with your opinion on these Subjects particularly the Second …. Will you allow me to solicit your generous Contributions for both the Poetical & Prosaic Parts of the Work (Extract from letter, Percy to Dalrymple, August 23, 1772, transcript furnished me by Mr. A. Watkin-Jones, of Rhodes University College, South Africa).“
7 See Nichols, op. cit., viii, 101, 107. The nephew had composed, in his eighth or ninth year, a poem of 600 lines on Caesar's excursion to Britain.
8 A letter to Dodsley, November 19, 1785, concerning a new edition of the Reliques, had merely asked for more time and made no mention of any other editor than Bishop Percy. See PMLA, xlvi (1931), 1195.
9 For example, see Nichols, op. cit., viii, 88, 334, 373.
10 Ibid., 309.
11 The use in the essays of both “the Editor” and “I” adds to the difficulty. At first glance one would infer that there might be a distinction, “I” referring to the elder, “the Editor” to the younger Percy. But such a distinction is impossible to maintain. Many of the uses remain unchanged from the earlier editions, so that both must refer to the original editor; the content of other passages makes the reference to the elder Percy practically certain. Usually, therefore, it may be taken for granted that both terms refer to Percy himself. Even some of the dealings with the publisher were carried on by him. See Nichols, op. cit., viii, 88, 308–312.
12 “ Sir Lancelot du Lake,” “The Boy and the Mantle,” “The Marriage of Sir Gawaine,” “King Ryence's Challenge,” “King Arthur's Death,” “The Legend of King Arthur,” “The Legend of Sir Guy,” “Guy and Amarant,” “Valentine and Ursine,” several on St. George, and several others burlesquing romances.
13 A fourth volume of the Reliques, to be published by the younger Percy, was still projected and is often referred to in the letters from 1801 to 1808. The nephew's death in 1808 and Percy's approaching blindness closed any such prospect, and the volume was never completed. The plan of publishing romances had been abandoned earlier. In 1804, Percy offered Thomas Park copies of those in his Folio to complete Ritson's series (Ancient Engleish Metrical Romanceës, 1802), but Park refused because he disapproved of Ritson's plan and because Ellis was preparing a collection of analyses (Specimens of Early English Romances in Metre, 1805). In 1812, after Percy's death in 1811, Thomas Park brought out a fifth edition of the Reliques, with some few changes (inconsiderable in our essay), but the fourth remains the definitive edition.
14 Gent. Mag., xxxv (1765), 180.—The instances are from John and Lear, allusions to Richard and Bevis.—The Critical Review (Feb., 1765) devotes much space to the “Essay on the Ancient English Minstrels,” but merely says of our essay: “The third volume is chiefly devoted to romantic subjects, and is introduced by a most curious dissertation on the ancient metrical romances, &c. Some of the larger metrical romances might come from the pen of the monks or others. …”—The Monthly Review (April, 1765) refers at length to the essays on the minstrels and the stage, but merely says: “To this third volume our Editor hath prefixed a curious treatise on the Ancient Metrical Romances.”
15 iv, 68.
16 Progress of Romance (1785).
17 The Complaynt of Scotland, Written in 1548, with a Preliminary Dissertation (1801).
18 Op. cit., i, 28.
19 The British Critic review of this 1802 production was not published till September, 1804. Four letters from Nares, April, 1803 to August, 1804 asked vainly for a review from Percy. At length Percy sent a brief reply, which was published almost verbatim in the British Critic for January, 1805. See also Nichols, op. cit., vii, 139, 601–607.
The revised edition of Ames, Typographical Antiquities (1785–90) refers often to the Reliques and the extracts printed in Warton's History, but gives no mention to this essay, neither to the extract from Richard Cure de Lyon nor material to derived from Percy's catalog.
20 That Percy's catalogue strongly influenced the editors of romances may be shown by the following figures: 10 out of 13 of Ritson's collection, 14 out of 20 of Ellis's, 4 out of 11 of Weber's are listed in Percy's essay. The totals of the collections count a number of lays that are not properly speaking romances at all. By the time of Percy's death (1811), in these three collections 24 out of the 37 items in Percy's list had been published. Of the remaining 13, 5 were titleless fragments in the Advocates' Library, Edinburgh, 3 were available only in Percy's Folio, and 2 or 3 were religious legends rather than romances. Items 38 and 39, which were added to the list after their publication in Pinkerton's Scotish Poems (1792), I have here disregarded.
21 I am indebted for these items to Professor Ronald S. Crane.
22 Nichols, op. cit., viii, 151.—The bracketed [F] indicates that the romances occur in the Percy Folio; the [Ch.] that they are named in Sir Thopas. With the Squire of Low Degree we know that he was early acquainted because he had directed Warton to a passage in that romance which was utilized in the Observations on the Fairy Queen (2d ed., 1762, i, 139 ff.). See Note 40 below. That he was already acquainted with Ipomydon I have no direct evidence, but I think it not unlikely. See Notes 34 and 45 below.
23 From Percy's diary (B. M. Addit. MS. 32, 336, fol. 55v) the following extracts were furnished me by Professor Crane: “Nov. 1, 1764, Corrected proof of ye
Essay on Metrical Romances …” On Nov. 3 he corrected “Proof of List of Metrical Romances.”
24 Useful, though they were none of them the easiest of things to use.
25 The asterisk indicates that the romance was known by Percy; “c” denotes a copy possessed by Percy;“B” indicates that the original was in the British Museum, “F” in Percy's Folio MS, “G” in the Garrick collection, “Cam” at Cambridge, “O” at Oxford, “E” at Edinburgh (all the Edinburgh items first appeared in the 2d edition), “Lin” Lincoln Cathedral Library, and “P” in Pinkerton, Scotish Poems.
26 A letter from Percy to Dr. Birch dated July 27, 1765 (Nichols, op. cit., vii, 277), makes it fairly clear that he would like the post of assistant librarian in the British Museum, a post to which he would hardly have aspired had he not felt himself to be fairly familiar with the place.
27 Launfal miles, Chev. assigne, Sege of Jerlam (see “Essay on Metre of P. Plowman”), Owayne Myles, Octav. imp., Eglamour of Artas.
28 Ypotis, Sege of Jerlam, Chev. assigne (see “Essay on P. Plowman”).
29 Lybeaus disconus, Launfal miles, Sir Isumbras, Eglamour of Artas (see “Essay on Minstrels,” Note T).
30 Lybeaus disconus, Launfal miles (identifying it with his MS. Sir Lambewell), Emarè, Tundale, Eustache, etc., Octav. Imp., Owayne Myles, Eglamour of Artas. See also “Essay on P. Plowman,” and “Essay on Minstrels,” Notes T, GG. He knew also Lanval, (Harl. MSS, No. 978) the French original of Launfal.
31 His reference gives Sir Isumbras as Caligula A12, where it should be A2. Tundale he gives as f. 17; it is 93. Eustache he gives as 136; it is 135.
32 In Percy's numbering the following are to be found in this Cottonian MS: 2, 7, 11, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20.
33 In the 1794 ed. only. See Notes S2, T, U, V2, GG. He believed that the romance was not a translation from the French but an English original.
34 A brief extract from Ipomydon is given is the “ Essay on Minstrels,” Note T.
35 The Robert of Cysell MS. (Harl. 1701, not 1703) he also states he has not seen.
36 The Oxford Catalogue lists for MS. No. 1073, in Caius College Library, but five items where the 1907 Gonville and Caius Catalogue lists six. Percy follows the older catalogue not only in the erroneous numbering but in the omission of what is now No. 5, the Romance of Athelstan, which no doubt Percy would have included in his list had he known of its existence. The reference to the Bennet College MS. Acta Arthuri Regis, was readily obtainable by looking in the index to the section on Cambridge Libraries under Arthur. Percy states that he does not know its contents.
37 For the Squyr of Lowe Degre see Note 22 above. See also “Essay on Minstrels,” Notes T, U, AA2. Percy concluded that the romance had no French original. Sir Isenbras is quoted in the Introduction to “Dowsabell,” and in the “Essay on Minstrels,” Note GG. For Syr Degore see ibid., Note AA2. Part of Sir Guy is transcribed in the Introduction to the “Legend of Sir Guy” from a copy in Garrick's collection, but Percy fails to mention the Garrick version in his catalog of the romances. Eglamour he quotes, but not from the Garrick version. He possessed two copies of Eglamour, however, and it seems likely that his second version and the copy of Syr Triamore (a romance to which I have found no reference in Percy except in his catalogue) were made from the Garrick texts; the two romances occur in the same volume.
38 The 4th edition changes “The following I have not seen” to “Of the following I have seen only No. 27 [The Erle of Tholouse] … of which the Editor hath also a copy from ‘Cod. MSS Mus. Ashmol. Oxon.‘ ”
39 See the “Text of the Percy-Warton Letters,” in PMLA, xlvi, 1171, 1172.
40 The extent of Warton's debt to Percy in this passage in not unamusing and has hitherto escaped detection. In the 1st ed. of the Observations (1754) had occurred a passage referring to Chaucer's list of trees burlesquing a similar list in Statius. Following this passage, the 2d edition (i, 139 ff.) inserts this statement: “But a ridicule of this kind was still more proper, as the popular poems of his times, often abounded with instances of prolix and needless numerations.” Then follows as an illustrative quotation the catalog of trees from the Squire of Lowe Degree, and an allusion to the similar catalog of birds. This information had been given him in a letter from Percy, which Warton appends to the passage in a footnote. The note sounds, on a casual reading, to be a comment on the passage, whereas the passage was in reality inspired by the note. I quote now from the footnote: “From this passage and another of the same sort in the same piece, an ingenious correspondent [Percy identifies himself in the ”Essay on Romances“] has taken occasion to consider Chaucer's Rime of Sir Thopas in a new light.” Warton then quotes from Percy's letter: ‘“The Rhyme of Sir Thopas was intended by Chaucer, as a kind of burlesque on the old ballad romances. … Most of these [The 1st ed. of the Reliques informs us that the reading should be ”Many of these.“] at least such of them as I have seen, are in the very same metre with Sir Thopas, and were sung to the harp, as appears from your own quotation. … Now in the old romances nothing is so common, as impertinent digressions, containing affected enumerations of trees, birds, &c. There is a specimen of the former in an old romance intitled the Squyer of lowe degre: where it is remarkable, that the author has reckoned the lily, the piany, the sother-wood, &c. as trees.‘ ”
The passage to which Percy alludes is the one that Warton quotes in his text, and the passage that Percy quotes in his letter is the one to which Warton alludes in the text. Percy then adds the burlesque list of herbs from Sir Thopas and has even collated the passage in several editions of Chaucer. With this the footnote ends.
This little incident is characteristic. Warton's knowledge was considerable, but is generally less large than it appears. Percy's, on the other hand, was generally much greater than it appears.
41 Catalogus impressorum Librorum Bibliothecae Bodleianae in Academia Oxoniensi (Oxonii, 1738).
42 Percy's reference to one other Oxford romance, The King of Tars (Bodleian, MS Vernon), shows no first-hand knowledge.
43 Extract from Percy's Diary: “Oct. 10, 1765 … Saw the Advocates Library.' (Furnished me by Mr. A. Watkin-Jones, of Rhodes University College, South Africa.)
44 A long extract from Richard is printed in the “Essay on Romances.” See also the “Essay on Minstrels,” Note GG. Extracts from Bevis are given in the introductions to “King Estmere,” “Birth of St. George,” “Valentine and Ursine,” “Dragon of Wantley,” and Note to “King Estmere.”
45 See “Essay on Minstrels,” Note T.
46 For hints of his struggle to establish his guess, see the “Text of the Percy-Warton Letters,” pp. 1174, 1176, 1179, 1182. Rowland's poem is not mentioned in Percy's catalog, doubtless because it was too late a version.
47 In addition, of course, he knew Malory and others of the prose romances—Bevis, Guy, the Seven Champions, the Knight of the Swan, and perhaps more. His allusions to Spanish and French romances show first-hand knowledge. A publication of a collection of Spanish romances to serve as background to Don Quixote was one of his many uncompleted projects. A distinct breadth of approach is revealed in the following extract: “Pray, are the Welsh romances, you have described, in prose or verse? If they are in prose, then let me ask if you have ever seen any in verse? I take it, those subjects were treated in verse before they came to plain prose in most nations. This, at least, I find to be the case in the old Erse and Islandic languages, as well as in the more modern Italian, French, Spanish, and English tongues. I have got curious specimens in the last I mentioned.” Percy to Evans, April 10, 1764, in Evans, Specimens of the Poetry of the Ancient Welsh Bards, 1862, p. 168.
48 Percy's interest in romances was probably at its height in 1764 and the first few years following the publication of the first edition of the Reliques. It then apparently dwindled, to be lashed into a furious researching of texts for illustrations to make his points in answering Ritson's attacks before the fourth edition.
49 Since the material is controversial and must be considered in direct relation to the theories of others, it seems a gain in clarity to discuss Percy's varying text in connection with other writers, in a future article.
50 Behind and partly accounting for these two intentions may be seen the influence of two friends of the young editor—Dr. Lye, Anglo-Saxon and Gothic scholar, who aided Percy in the philological field, and Shenstone, who always had an eye to public acceptance.
51 Letter to Shenstone, Jan. 9, 1758, “Thomas Percy und William Shenstone,” ed. Hans Hecht, in Quellen und Forschungen, ciii (1909), 9. The idea of publishing the Folio seems to have been Johnson's suggestion (ibid., p. 5).
The following extracts show the same attitude:
“… if it be certain that strict truth never was and never will be the poet's care, and therefore that historical ballads cannot, as historical documents, be of any importance, why should not their value as poetry be enhanced by lopping their tedious and retouching their feeble passages?” Monthly Rev., N.S., x (1793).
“What should we think of the taste of those who would assert that the original Nut brown Maid is superior in point of composition to that of Prior? Yet such there are, misled by the love of antiquity, or mistaken in the idea of simplicity.” Monthly Rev., xlv (1771), 96. See also British Critic, ix (1797), 16–22, 159–160.
52 Shenstone's death occurred February 11, 1763.
Shenstone's repeated warnings about including only things of merit may have been instrumental in deterring Percy from including romances in the Reliques. Shenstone was sure that publication of the Arthur and the Guy ballads would be fatal, and felt that genii, enchantments, etc., were endurable only when, having been believed by the writer, they revealed the simplicity of the mind (“Percy und Shenstone,” pp. 69, 79, 65, 66, 42, 47). See also Nichols, op. cit., vii, 220–221.
There was reason for some anxiety. In 1760, the reviewer of Prolusions, or Select Pieces of Ancient Poetry thought some of the selections (including the Nut-browne Maid) hardly worth the pains of reprinting. They may be old and scarce enough to engage the attention of an Antiquarian, but they are too barren of poetry or amusement to detain the critical reader.“ Monthly Rev., xxii, 218–219.
53 Letter to Jamieson, April 4, 1801, Nichols, op. cit., viii, 341.
54 See the prefaces, and letter to Birch, Feb. 2, 1765, Nichols, op. cit., vii, 577.—Part of this is no doubt conventional gesture, but on the whole his attitude seems sincere.
55 “Essay on Romances,” 1st ed., later unchanged.
56 Ibid., 1st ed., later unchanged.
57 Ibid., 1st ed., later unchanged. It need hardly be noted that the eighteenth century made little or no distinction between primitive and barbarous times and the Middle Ages.
58 4th ed. Previous editions read is laid.
59 4th ed.—Previous editions read are. The change in tense was no doubt due in the main to Warton's History of English Poetry, but the change speaks volumes.
60 Note the interesting understudy of this passage to be found in a letter to Dalrymple, September 8, 1763.
“My present undertaking [the Reliques] only admits of the smaller & more popular pieces: but if the public shd so far encourage the publication of these, as to induce Mr. Dodsley to venture a step further, I could select a small collection of those more ancient & larger poems that are much more valuable as well upon account of their poetical merit, as the curious picture they give us of ancient manners. Many of these run to eight or 9 parts or cantos, and tho' full of the wild romantic feats of Chivalry frequently display great descriptive & inventive powers in ye bards who composed them, tho' much obscured by the obsoleteness of the language & unevenness of ye numbers.—The antiquaries who have re-published the productions of our old English poets have generally been men totally void of all taste & feeling, and therefore have always fastidiously rejected these old poetical Romances, because founded on fictitious subjects: while they have been careful to grub up every petty fragment of Robert of Gloucester, Gower, Lydgate, Harding, and other wretched Rhymists of that stamp, whose merit was to obscure & deform true history.—Mr. Hurd's Letters on Chivalry (which you must have seen) may perhaps dispose the public to give a favourable reception to a few of the best of these ancient Romances; wherein they will frequently see the rich ore of a Tasso or Ariosto; tho' buried, as might be expected. among mineral substances of less value. (Transcript furnished me by Mr. A. Watkin-Jones.)”
61 These comments may be contrasted with those made by Wanley in the Harleian Catalogue: King Horn is, he says, “a Romance; rude enough, as the Age then was;” Amys and Amelyon is “the dull Fable of two Knightly brothers, in as dull & ill-written Verse.”