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The Duration of the Canterbury Pilgrimage

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  02 December 2020

John S. P. Tatlock
John S. P. Tatlock*
Affiliation:
University of Michigan
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Extract

The question as to how many days Chaucer conceived his Canterbury pilgrimage as occupying is of interest for a number of reasons. The consideration of it takes us more familiarly into the time and place where we may behold

“the nine and twenty ride Through those dim aisles their deathless pilgrimage, Lady and monk and rascal laugh and chide, Living and loving on the enchanted page.”

Type
Research Article
Information
PMLA , Volume 21 , Issue 2 , 1906 , pp. 478 - 485
Copyright
Copyright © Modern Language Association of America, 1906

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References

page 478 note 1 Vol. iv, 328–9 (London, 1830); p. 206 (Routledge, 1871).

page 478 note 2 Professor Skeat admits its possibility in his Chaucer, vol. v, p. 132, but denies it in iii, 375, and v, 415. Cf. also W. Hertzberg in his German translation of the Canterbury Tales (Hildburghausen, 1866), pp. 666–7.

page 478 note 3 Temporary Preface, pp. 41–3.

page 478 note 4 See Skeat, iii, 376; Mr. George Shipley, Modern Language Notes, x, columns 265–6; Mr. A. W. Pollard, Globe Chaucer, p. xxviii.

page 479 note 1 The Chronology of Chaucer's Writings (Chaucer Society, 1890), 59, 63; Pardoner's Tale (Berlin, 1902), p. xxi; Temp. Pref., 39.

page 479 note 2 Sometimes Eltham, for persons connected with the court; but it makes no difference, for these travellers all stopped over night at Dartford.

page 479 note 3 See Anglia, xxiii, 239–241; Temp. Pref., 14–15, 119–132, and corrections and additions to p. 15 (the citation from Froissart is the same as Flügel's fifth case; see Froissart's Chronicles, edited by Kervyn de Lettenhove, xvi, 221); Koch, Chronology, 79–80 (a note by Furnivall on 16th century royal journeys, which I do not consider; given again in Notes and Queries, 8 Ser., i, 474); Furnivall in Academy, l, 14; E. A. Bond in Archæologia, xxxv, 453–469. See also Notes and Queries, 8 Ser., i, 522–3, and Henry Littlehales, Notes on the Road between London and Canterbury (Ch. Soc., 1898). For an interesting essay on roads and travel in the Middle Ages, see F. S. Merry weather, Glimmerings in the Dark (London, 1850), pp. 40–63.

page 480 note 1 See Academy, l, 14, and Angl, xxiii, 240. Froissart curiously says that the latter went “à petites journées.”

page 480 note 2 See Flügel's quotation from Froissart; Professor Skeat is somewhat mistaken here (i, xix).

page 480 note 3 N. and Q., l. c., p. 523; Temp. Pref., 120–130.

page 480 note 4 It does not seem that time of year made very much difference, as has sometimes been suggested. One of the 1-day journeys was in June, and two in October; two of the 2-days in October and the other in March; of the 3-days, one was in April, one in December or January, and the other two seem to have been in winter, though this is not certain; the 4-days journeys were in June, October and July. This suggests that the state of the road was not very variable, and this that it cannot have been so bad after all; or else that three days was the usual time when the roads were in their worse state, and that, when they were best, people might either rush things, or else linger in order to enjoy themselves.

page 480 note 5 So with the 16th century journeys that have been adduced.

page 481 note 1 And appears to have been a friend of her youth (Archæologia, xxxv, 456). The Countess was a granddaughter of Edward I., and was married in 1305. Isabella was born in 1292, so was nearly seventy.

page 481 note 2 “Respecting Isabella's death, she is stated by chroniclers to have sunk, in the course of a single day, under the effect of a too powerful medicine, administered at her own desire. From several entries, however, in this account [the document from which all this information is gained contains many entries as to medicines and physicians for the queen, the latter, apparently, sometimes summoned in haste] it would appear that she had been in a state requiring medical treatment for some time previous to her decease” (Arch., xxxv, 462), which took place 22 August, 1358 (ib., 455), two or three months after her second pilgrimage. Considering all this, her two elaborate pilgrimages within nine months, her death shortly after, and St. Thomas’ repute as a healer, it seems pretty clear that she was seeking his help against a lingering and fatal disease. In this case we should expect her to travel slowly.

page 481 note 3 Isabella stopped here on her return, which thereafter followed a different route. Froissart himself did the same (Angl., xxiii, 241). On a different journey she went from Leeds Castle to Rochester in one day, thence to Dartford in a second, thence to London in a third (Arch., xxxv, 462). Leeds is 10 m. S. E. of Rochester. Froissart, with Richard II. and his suite, went from Leeds Castle through Rochester and Dartford to Eltham in two days or less (Chronicles, tr. by T. Johnes, iv, 65–6).

page 481 note 4 King John, and the citizens of Canterbury on their four journeys, dined at Sittingbourne, 11 miles from Rochester and 6 or 7 from Ospring. The Sumnour had promised to make the Friar wince before they came “to Sidingborne” (D, 847). So when he ends

“My tale is doon, we been almost at toune,”

this may refer, as Furnivall opines (Temp. Pref., 42), to such a stop. Or if Chaucer did not go into such minutiae—and it is easy to exaggerate the minor realisms of the poem—it may refer to the arrival at Ospring, which it can be shown must have come between Groups D and E, not (as is usually assumed—cf. Temp. Pref., p. 43) between E and F.

page 482 note 1 So Shipley, Mod. Lang. Notes, x, 264–6; Temp. Pref., 38–41 (though Furnivall leaves the 2-days journey a faint possibility); Skeat, iii, 375–6.

page 482 note 2 See, e. g., Skeat, iii, 376–7; Temp. Pref., 42.

page 483 note 1 Vol. v, 415.

page 483 note 2 Which is, precisely as Chaucer says, somewhat under five miles back from Boughton. A writer in Notes and Queries (8 Ser., i, 523) suggests Feversham, which seems unlikely and comes to the same thing as regards distance.

page 485 note 1 They started at a good rate (Prol., 825). Cf. New English Dictionary: “Canterbury pace—supposed originally to designate the pace of the mounted pilgrims”; “Canter. A Canterbury gallop; an easy gallop.” Furnivall casts aspersions on the road (Temp. Pref., 15–17), but the slough may have been only at the side (ib., Corr. and Add.). My scheme agrees well with 16th century customs. “Twenty miles a day in winter, and thirty in summer, were in the sixteenth century reckoned in official accounts a day's journey. Members of Parliament were paid on this basis.” E. Porritt, The Unreformed House of Commons (1903), p. 157.