Took. ↩
Love. ↩
Know. ↩
Company. ↩
Glad. ↩
By his journey to Bruges. ↩
Expenses. ↩
Always. ↩
Spent. ↩
A kind of estrangement, coolness. ↩
Was displeased. ↩
Borrowing. ↩
Care. ↩
Whit. ↩
Thriving, success; from the verb “the,” thrive. ↩
Profit, advantage. ↩
Danger, awkward position. ↩
In pledge. ↩
Liberal, lavish. ↩
Ever so much evil. Last means a load, quad, bad; and literally we may read “a thousand weight of bad years.” The Italians use mal anno in the same sense. ↩
Trick. ↩
To put an ape in one’s hood, on one’s head, is to befool or deceive him. ↩
Offend. ↩
Judge, decide. ↩
Tales of the murder of children by Jews were frequent in the Middle Ages, being probably designed to keep up the bitter feeling of the Christians against the Jews. Not a few children were canonised on this account; and the scene of the misdeeds was laid anywhere and everywhere, so that Chaucer could be at no loss for material. ↩
Psalms 8:1. “Domine, dominus noster, quam admirabile est nomen tuum in universa terra.” ↩
Praise. ↩
Glory. “Out of the mouths of babes and sucklings hast Thou ordained strength.” (Psalms 8:2). ↩
Goodness. ↩
Help. ↩
Bounteous. ↩
The spirit that on thee alighted; the Holy Ghost through whose power Christ was conceived. ↩
Lightened, gladdened. ↩
Skill, ability. ↩
Scarcely. ↩
A quarter which the Jews were permitted to inhabit; the Old Jewry in London got its name in this way. ↩
Go, walk. ↩
A young clerk or scholar. ↩
To study, go to school, was his wont. ↩
Simple, innocent. ↩
Learn. ↩
Who, even in his swaddling clothes—so says the Breviarium Romanum—gave promise of extraordinary virtue and holiness; for, though he sucked freely on other days, on Wednesdays and Fridays he applied to the breast only once, and that not until the evening. ↩
“O Alma Redemptoris Mater;” the beginning of a hymn to the Virgin. ↩
Book of anthems, or psalms, chanted in the choir by alternate verses. ↩
Nearer. ↩
Meant. ↩
Die. ↩
Learn; con. ↩
Disgraced. ↩
On the way home. ↩
Knew. ↩
Cease. ↩
Creditable, becoming. ↩
Seized. ↩
French, garderobe, a privy. ↩
Especially. ↩
Confirmed; from French, soulde; Latin, solidatus. ↩
Continually. ↩
See Revelations 14:3, 4. ↩
Asked, inquired; from Anglo-Saxon, frinan, fraegnian. Compare German, fragen. ↩
Emerald. ↩
Cut. ↩
Praised. ↩
Caused. ↩
Caused. ↩
Die. ↩
Countenance, overlook. ↩
Scarcely. ↩
Lasted. ↩
Embrace or salute; implore: from Anglo-Saxon hals, the neck. ↩
In course of nature. ↩
Glory. ↩
Fountain. ↩
Knowledge. ↩
Leave. ↩
Afraid. ↩
Praising. ↩
Grant; lend. ↩
A boy said to have been slain by the Jews at Lincoln in 1255, according to Matthew Paris. Many popular ballads were made about the event, which the diligence of the Church doubtless kept fresh in mind at Chaucer’s day. ↩
Merciful. ↩
This prologue is interesting, for the picture which it gives of Chaucer himself; riding apart from and indifferent to the rest of the pilgrims, with eyes fixed on the ground, and an elvish, morose, or rather self-absorbed air; portly, if not actually stout, in body; and evidently a man out of the common, as the closing words of the Host imply. ↩
Serious. ↩
Talk lightly. ↩
For the first time. ↩
Referring to the poet’s corpulency. ↩
Surly, morose. ↩
Dissatisfied. ↩
Know. ↩
Long. ↩
Expression, mien. ↩
“The Rhyme of Sir Thopas,” as it is generally called, is introduced by Chaucer as a satire on the dull, pompous, and prolix metrical romances then in vogue. It is full of phrases taken from the popular rhymesters in the vein which he holds up to ridicule; if, indeed—though of that there is no evidence—it be not actually part of an old romance which Chaucer selected and reproduced to point his assault on the prevailing taste in literature. ↩
Truly. ↩
Delight, solace. ↩
Gentle. ↩
