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“Homicide” in the Parson's Tale

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  02 December 2020

Dudley R. Johnson
Dudley R. Johnson*
Affiliation:
Yale University
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Extract

In that section of his “tale” which treats the deadly sin of Ire, Chaucer's Parson observes that from this sin come various “stynkynge engendrures,” including manslaughter, or homicide.

Type
Research Article
Information
PMLA , Volume 57 , Issue 1 , March 1942 , pp. 51 - 56
Copyright
Copyright © Modern Language Association of America, 1942

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References

Note 1 in page 31 I use Robinson's edition, pages 291–292.

Note 2 in page 31 Robinson places the quotation marks at the end of the line. I insert them here to designate the end of the biblical quotation.

Note 3 in page 52 Kate Petersen, The Sources of the Parson's Tale (Boston, 1901).

Note 4 in page 52 Ibid., p. 52; see also Folio cciiii of the Paris 1519 edition of Peraldus' Summa.

Note 5 in page 52 Parson's Tale, 1. 568. Petersen (p. 52) also cites some rather remote parallels between ll. 564–569 and Peraldus.

Note 6 in page 52 The problem—did Chaucer himself compile the Parson's Tale—or did he translate directly from some unknown source—remains unsolved. See Robinson, p. 874, and Petersen, p. 80.

Note 7 in page 53 I use the Verona edition of 1744, pp. 137 ff.

Note 8 in page 53 From the Vulgate, the First Epistle of John, iii, 15.

Note 9 in page 53 Line 566 of the PT which provides an illustration of backbiting does not closely resemble this excerpt from Pennaforte, who derived it from St. Augustine. However, the proverb which Chaucer attributes erroneously to Solomon has some affinity with the italicized quotation, from Psalms lvi, 5. Skeat suggests an “imperfect recollection” of Proverbs xxv, 18: “Jaculum, et gladius, et sagitta acuta, homo qui loquitur contra proximum suum falsum testimonium.” But the compiler may have called to mind the chapter “de peccato detractionis” in Peraldus (Folio ccxviii ff. of the Paris edition of 1519), in particular the following: “Detractor etiam monstrum est in ore gladios habens. Unde ad detractorem pertinet illud proverbium xxx [, 14]. Est generatio que pro dentibus gladios habet... Bernhardus. Gladius triceps lingua detractoris ... Dicit salomon proverbium xii [,1] quod melius est nomen bonum quam divitie multe. unus qui nomen bonum alicui aufert: magis nocet ei quam si ei multas divitias furaretur.”

Note 10 in page 53 This refers to the Decretum of Gratian, Pars i, Distinctio lxxxvi, Causa xxxi. See Migne, Patrologia Latina, clxxxvii, col. 412.

Note 11 in page 54 Marginal note: “SALOMON. In Parabolis, c. 26”; i.e., Proverbs xxvi, 18, 19.

Note 12 in page 54 Marginal note: “Ex Conc. Guarmac.”; i.e., Ex Concilio Wormaciense, capite 30. See Migne, PL, cxl, col. 933.

Note 13 in page 54 Marginal note: “Alex. iii. Tornacen. Episc”; i.e., Alexandri iii Papae, Epistolae et Privilegia, xv, “Ad episcopum Torncanesem.” Migne, PL, cc, col. 84.

Note 14 in page 54 Skeat, Works, v, 463.

Note 15 in page 55 Chaucer and Pennaforte also use the same quotation to illustrate this evil.

Note 16 in page 55 See above, page 52.

Note 17 in page 56 Petersen, 35 and 80.