A critical edition of the Cheulere Assigne, from the fifteenth century MS Cotton Caligula A II, with introduction, notes, glossary and bibliography

Abstract

This edition of the Cheuelere Assigne attempts to provide an accurate and intelligible text together with an adequate apparatus. The poem has been re-transcribed from the original. MS, compared throughout with the two major previous editions, and provided with a punctuation based on modern usage. Brief descriptions of the MS and of earlier printed editions have been given. The Introduction to the Early English Text Society edition of 1868 includes a certain amount of linguistic and metrical material, but in the present work these subjects have been treated afresh in the light of more recent information. The Phonology and Dialect have been examined, the Morphology described, and the Versification analysed. Particular attention has been paid to Syntax and Style, and a detailed Glossary provided. The 1868 edition also gives some account of the poem's sources, and an attempt has here been made to add to this information by describing a few of the more important analogues, and examining the poem's connection with the legend of the Swan-Knight and with the French Crusade cycle. A comment on the major folk-lore elements has been added. The Textual Notes are intended chiefly to aid in problems of meaning and to illustrate points of interest, and the edition concludes with a Bibliography of relevant books and articles.