The diction of English romances of the fourteenth century in the alliterative long line without rhyme: Some studies in the conventional elements, with special reference to the use of recurring formulae

Abstract

The poems which form the object of this study, sixteen in number, comprise a total of roughly 41,000 lines of alliterative verse in the long line without rhyme. The list below represents the chronological order of the poems, in so far as general opinion is agreed upon this. The editions mentioned are those from which quotations of the poems in the following pages are taken, while the abbreviations are those used for the many line references which have to be made. 1. Quotations from The Wars of Alexander are from the Ashmole text unless the Dublin text (D) is specified. English alliterative poetry is very large, and, considering the large number of poetic genres which it covers and the variety of subjects with which it deals, the diction is on the whole fairly homogeneous. Consequently, what is said about the diction of the above group of poems may often apply with equal force to the diction of (for example) Piers Plowman (which is excluded from the list as belonging to the social-political group of alliterative poems) or to The Awntyrs of Arthure at the Terne Wathelyn (which is in rhymed stanzas) or to The Twa Mariit Wemen and the Wedo (which was written long after 1400) etc. etc. In a study which involves, however, the systematic search of the material over and over again for small points of illustration, the only practical course is to limit the number of lines of poetry to be studied - provided that the results of the research are not thereby injured. The above list of poems constitutes a fairly manageable body of poetry, and is at the same time large enough to yield good results. The three qualifications being arbitrary, there is no need for apology if they have not in each case been pressed as rigidly as they might. There can be little doubt, of course, which poems are in the alliterative long line without rhyme, but with regard to the other two qualifications, theremust be considerable disagreement among those qualified to judge - in the one case because of difference of opinion as to what constitutes a romance, and in the other case because of uncertainty about the dates of these poems. Not everyone would admit Wynnere and wastoure, for instance, under the heading of romance, but in spite of its social and political content, it undoubtedly uses the setting and language of romance. With regard to Patience and Cleanness, the similarity of language and diction which they share with Sir Gawain and the Green Knight, however different in temper they may be, makes it inadvisable to separate them from the latter poem in a study of this kind. The Pearl has been excluded, however, because of its totally different metrical structure. As far as date is concerned, the greatest amount of doubt appears to exist over The Wars of Alexander and Death and Life, both of which would be dated after 1400 by some scholars.