XXV. HUMANISM AND MEDIAEVALISM (part 1 of 2)

XXV. HUMANISM AND MEDIAEVALISM (part 1 of 2)

[Bibliographical Note.—The literary discussions and collections of texts named in the bibliographical note to chap. xxiii and the material on the annals of the stage in that to chap. xxiv remain available. W. Creizenach, Geschichte des neueren Dramas, vols. i-iii (1893-1903), is the best general guide on the classical drama and its imitations during the Middle Ages and the Renascence. W. Cloetta, Beiträge zur Litteraturgeschichte des Mittelalters und der Renaissance: i. Komödie und Tragödie im Mittelalter (1890); ii. Die Anfänge der Renaissancetragödie (1892), deals very fully with certain points. C. H. Herford, Studies in the Literary Relations of England and Germany in the Sixteenth Century (1886), has an admirable chapter on The Latin Drama. G. Saintsbury, The Earlier Renaissance (1901), chap. vi, may also be consulted. Useful books on the beginnings of the Elizabethan forms of drama are R. Fischer, Zur Kunstentwicklung der englischen Tragödie von ihren ersten Anfängen bis zu Shakespeare (1893); J. W. Cunliffe, The Influence of Seneca on Elizabethan Tragedy (1893); L. L. Schücking, Studien über die stofflichen Beziehungen der englischen Komödie zur italienischen bis Lilly (1901); F. E. Schelling, The English Chronicle Play (1902). The best bibliographies are, for the Latin plays, P. Bahlmann, Die Erneuerer des antiken Dramas und ihre ersten dramatischen Versuche, 1314-1478 (1896), and Die lateinischen Dramen von Wimpheling’s Stylpho bis zur Mitte des sechzehnten Jahrhunderts, 1480-1550 (1893); and for English plays, W. W. Greg, A List of English Plays written before 1643 and printed before 1700 (1900). This may be supplemented from W. C. Hazlitt, A Manual for the Collector and Amateur of Old English Plays (1892). A list of early Tudor interludes will be found in Appendix X.]

The dramatic material upon which the interlude was able to draw had naturally its points of relation to and of divergence from that of the popular stage, whose last days it overlapped. It continued to occupy itself largely with the morality. The ‘moral interludes’ of the early Tudor period are in fact distinguished with some difficulty from the popular moralities by their comparative brevity, and by indications of the mise en scène as a ‘room’ or ‘hall’ rather than an open ‘place[591].’ The only clearly popular texts later than those of the fifteenth century, discussed in a previous chapter, are Sir David Lyndsay’s Scottish Satyre of the Thrie Estaitis, and the Magnificence, which alone survives of several plays from the prolific pen of the ‘laureate’ poet, John Skelton. A somewhat intermediate type is presented by the Nature of Cardinal Morton’s chaplain, Henry Medwall. This was certainly intended for performance as an interlude, but it is on the scale of the popular moralities, needing division into two parts to bring it within the limits of courtly patience; and like them it is sufficiently wide in its scope to embrace the whole moral problem of humanity. The conditions of the interlude, however, enforced themselves, and the later morals have, as a rule, a more restricted theme. They make their selection from amongst the battalions of sins and virtues which were wont to invade the stage together, and set themselves the task of expounding the dangers of a particular temperament or the advantages of a particular form of moral discipline. Hickscorner shows man led into irreligion by imagination and freewill. Youth concerns itself with pride, lechery, and riot, the specific temptations of the young. The Nature of the Four Elements and John Redford’s somewhat later Wit and Science preach the importance of devotion to study. The distinction between the episodic and the more comprehensive moralities was in the consciousness of the writers themselves; and the older fashion did not wholly disappear. William Baldwin describes his play for the Inns of Court in 1556 as ‘comprehending a discourse of the worlde[592]’; and mention is more than once made of an interesting piece called The Cradle of Security, which seems to have had a motive of death and the judgement akin to that found in The Pride of Life and in Everyman[593].

The morality was not, perhaps, quite such an arid type of drama as might be supposed, especially after the dramatists learnt, instead of leaving humanity as a dry bone of contention between the good and evil powers, to adopt a biographic mode of treatment, and thus to introduce the interest of growth and development[594]. But by the sixteenth century allegory had had its day, and the light-hearted court of Henry VIII and Katharine of Aragon might be excused some weariness at the constant presentation before it of argumentative abstractions which occasionally yielded nothing more entertaining than a personified débat[595]. Certainly it is upon record that Medwall’s moral of ‘the fyndyng of Troth,’ played at the Christmas of 1513, appeared to Henry so long, that he got up and ‘departyd to hys chambre[596].’ The offenders on this occasion were English and his company of household players. They seem to have been unwisely wedded to the old methods. They pursued the princess Margaret to Scotland with a ‘Moralite’ in 1503, and in the reign of Edward VI they were still playing the play of Self-Love[597]. Perhaps this explains why they make distinctly less show in the accounts of Tudor revels than do their competitors of the Chapel. Unfortunately none of the pieces given by this latter body have been preserved. But, to judge by the descriptions of Hall, many of them could only be called interludes by a somewhat liberal extension of the sense of the term. There was perhaps some slight allegorical or mythological framework of spoken dialogue. But the real amusement lay in an abundance of singing, which of course the Chapel was well qualified to provide, and of dancing, in which the guests often joined, and in an elaborately designed pageant, which was wheeled into the hall and from which the performers descended. They were in fact masques rather than dramas in the strict sense, and in connexion with the origin of the masque they have already been considered[598].

The popular stage, as has been said, had its farcical elements, but did not, in England, arrive at any notable development of the farce. Nor is any marked influence of the overseas habit even now to be traced. The name is not used in England, although it is in Scotland, where at the beginning of the sixteenth century the relations with France were much closer[599]. Whether directly or indirectly through French channels, the farce is perhaps the contribution of minstrelsy to the nascent interlude. That some dramatic tradition was handed down from the mimi of the Empire to the mimi of the Middle Ages, although not susceptible of demonstration, is exceedingly likely[600]. That solitary mediaeval survival, the Interludium de Clerico et Puella, hardly declares its origin. But the farce, in its free handling of contemporary life, in the outspokenness, which often becomes indecency, of its language, in its note of satire, especially towards the priest and other institutions deserving of reverence, is the exact counterpart of one of the most characteristic forms of minstrel literature, the fabliau. These qualities are reproduced in the interludes of John Heywood, who, though possibly an Oxford man, began life as a singer and player of the virginals at court, and belonged therefore to the minstrel class. He grew quite respectable, married into the family of Sir Thomas More and John Rastell the printer, and had for grandson John Donne. He was put in charge of the singing-school of St. Paul’s, the boys of which probably performed his plays. Of the six extant, Wit and Folly is a mere dialogue, and Love a more elaborate disputation, although both are presented ‘in maner of an enterlude.’ But the others, The Pardoner and the Friar, The Four P’s, The Weather, and John, Tib and Sir John are regular farces. And with them the farce makes good its footing in the English drama.

Those congeners of the French farce which took their origin from the Feast of Fools, the Sottie and the Sermon joyeux, are only represented in these islands by the Sermon of ‘Folie’ in Sir David Lyndsay’s Satyre of the Thrie Estaitis[601]. But the ‘fool’ himself, as a dramatic character, is in Shakespeare’s and other Elizabethan plays, and it must now be pointed out that he is in some of the earliest Tudor interludes. Here he has the not altogether intelligible name of the ‘vice.’ A recent writer, Professor Cushman of the Nevada State University, has endeavoured to show that the vice came into the interludes through the avenue of the moralities. Originally ‘an allegorical representation of human weaknesses and vices, in short the summation of the Deadly Sins,’ he lost in course of time this serious quality, and ‘the term Vice came to be simply a synonym for buffoon[602].’ This theory has no doubt the advantage of explaining the name. Unfortunately it proceeds by disregarding several plays in which the vice does occur, and reading him into many where there is none[603]. ‘Vicious’ had his pageant in the Beverley Paternoster play, and vices in the ordinary sense of the word are of course familiar personages in the morals, which generally moreover have some one character who can be regarded as the representative or the chief representative of human frailty. But the vice is not found under that name in the text, list of dramatis personae, or stage directions of any popular morality or of any pre-Elizabethan moral interlude except the Marian Respublica. The majority of plays in which he does occur are not morals, even of the modified Elizabethan type; and although in those which are he generally plays a bad part, even this is not an invariable rule. In The Tide Tarrieth for No Man, as in the tragedy of Horestes, he is Courage. Moreover, as a matter of fact, he comes into the interludes through the avenue of the farce. The earliest vices, by some thirty years, are those of Heywood’s Love, in which he is ‘Neither Loving nor Loved,’ who mocks the other disputants, and plays a practical joke with fireworks upon them, and The Weather, in which he is ‘Merry Report,’ the jesting official of Jupiter. And in the later plays, even if he has some other dramatic function, he always adds to it that of a riotous buffoon. Frequently enough he has no other. It must be concluded then that, whatever the name may mean—and irresponsible philology has made some amazing attempts at explanation[604]—the character of the vice is derived from that of the domestic fool or jester. Oddly enough he is rarely called a fool, although the description of Medwall’s Finding of Truth mentions ‘the foolys part[605].’ But the Elizabethan writers speak of his long coat and lathen sword, common trappings of the domestic fool[606]. Whether he ever had a cockscomb, a bauble, or an eared hood is not apparent. A vice seems to have been introduced into one or two of the later miracle-plays[607]. At Bungay in 1566 he ‘made pastime’ before and after the play, as Tarleton or Kempe were in time to do with their ‘jigs’ upon the London boards. And probably this was his normal function on such occasions.

From the moral the interlude drew abstractions; from the farce social types. The possibility of vital drama lay in an advance to the portraiture of individualities. The natural way to attain to this was by the introduction of historical, mythical, or romantic personages. The miracle-play had, of course, afforded these; but there is little to show that the miracle-play, during the first half of the sixteenth century, had much influence on the interlude[608]. The local players brought it to court, but, for the present, it was démodé. It was, however, to have its brief revival. The quarry of romantic narrative had hardly been opened by the Middle Ages. An old theme of Robert of Sicily, once used at Lincoln, was now remembered at Chester. Robin Hood had yielded dramatic May-games, and his revels were popular at Henry VIII’s court[609]. New motives, however, now begin to assert themselves. Some at least of these were suggested by the study of Chaucer. Ralph Radclif’s school plays at Hitchin included one on Griselda and one on Meliboeus[610]. Nicholas Grimald wrote one on Troilus, and another had been acted by the Chapel at court in 1516[611]. Radclif was also responsible for a Titus and Gisippus, while the king’s players, shaking off their devotion to the moral, prepared in 1552 ‘a play of Aesop’s Crow, wherein the most part of the actors were birds[612].’ An extant piece on ‘the beauty and good properties of women’ and ‘their vices and evil conditions’ is really a version through the Italian of the Spanish Celestina, one of the first of many English dramatic borrowings from South European sources.

So far I have written only of developments which were at least latent in mediaevalism. But the interlude had its rise in the very midst of the great intellectual and spiritual movement throughout Europe which is known as humanism; and hardly any branch of human activities was destined to be more completely transformed by the new forces than the drama. The history of this transformation is not, however, a simple one. Between humanism and mediaevalism there is no rigid barrier. As at all periods of transition, a constant action and reaction established themselves between the old and new order of ideas. Moreover, humanism itself held elements in solution that were not wholly reconcilable with each other. Many things, and perhaps particularly the drama, presented themselves in very different lights, according as they were viewed from the literary or the religious side of the great movement. Some brief indication of the in-and-out play of the forces of humanism as they affected the history of the interlude during the first half of the sixteenth century is, therefore, desirable.

The chief of these forces is, of course, the influence of classical comedy and tragedy. These, as vital forms of literature, did not long survive the fall of the theatres, with which, indeed, their connexion had long been of the slightest. In the East, a certain tradition of Christian book dramas begins with the anti-Gnostic dialogues of St. Methodius in the fourth century and ends with the much disputed Χριστὸς Πάσχων in the eleventh or twelfth[613]. It is the merest conjecture that some of these may have been given some kind of representation in the churches[614]. In the West the Aulularia of Plautus was rehandled under the title of Querolus at the end of the fourth century, and possibly also the Amphitruo under that of Geta[615]. In the fifth, Magnus, the father of Consentius, is said by Sidonius, as Shakespeare is said by Ben Jonson, to have ‘outdone insolent Greece, or haughty Rome[616].’ Further the production of plays cannot be traced. Soon afterwards most of the classical dramatists pass into oblivion. A knowledge of Seneca or of Plautus, not to speak of the Greeks, is the rarest of things from the tenth century to the fourteenth. The marked exception is Terence who, as Dr. Ward puts it, led ‘a charmed life in the darkest ages of learning.’ This he owed, doubtless, to his unrivalled gift of packing up the most impeccable sentiments in the neatest of phrases. His vogue as a school author was early and enduring, and the whole of mediaevalism, a few of the stricter moralists alone dissenting, hailed him as a master of the wisdom of life[617]. At the beginning of the eleventh century, Notker Labeo, a monk of St. Gall, writes that he has been invited to turn the Andria into German[618]. Not long before, Hrotsvitha, a Benedictine nun of Gandersheim in Saxony, had taken Terence as her model for half a dozen plays in Latin prose, designed to glorify chastity and to celebrate the constancy of the martyrs. The dramaturgy of Hrotsvitha appears to have been an isolated experiment and the merest literary exercise. Her plays abound in delicate situations, and are not likely to have been intended even for cloister representation[619]. Nor is there much evidence for any representation of the Terentian comedies themselves. A curious fragment known as Terentius et Delusor contains a dialogue between the vetus poeta and a persona delusoris or mime. The nature of this is somewhat enigmatic, but it certainly reads as if it might be a prologue or parade written for a Terentian representation. In any case, it is wholly unparalleled[620]. In fact, although the Middle Ages continued to read Terence, the most extraordinary ideas prevailed as to how his dramas were originally produced. Vague reminiscences of the pantomimic art of later Rome led to the mistaken supposition that the poet himself, or a recitator, declaimed the text from a pulpitum above the stage, while the actors gesticulated voicelessly below[621]. By a further confusion the name of Calliopius, a third- or fourth-century grammarian through whose hands the text of Terence has passed, was taken for that of a recitator contemporary with the poet, and the Vita Oxoniensis goes so far as to describe him as a powerful and learned man, who read the comedies aloud in the senate[622]. The same complete ignorance of things scenic declares itself in the notions attached to the terms tragoedia and comoedia, not only vulgarly, but in the formal definitions of lexicographers and encyclopaedists[623].

The characteristics which really differentiate the drama from other forms of literature, dialogue and scenic representation, drop out of account, the latter entirely, the former very nearly so. Both tragedy and comedy are regarded as forms of narrative. Tragedy is narrative which concerns persons of high degree, is written in a lofty style, and beginning happily comes to a sad conclusion. Comedy, on the other hand, concerns itself with ordinary persons, uses humble and everyday language, and resolves its complications in a fortunate ending[624]. Even these distinctions are not all consistently maintained, and the sad or happy event becomes the only fixed and invariable criterion[625]. The origin of such conceptions is to be found partly in the common derived classical use of tragoedia and comoedia to describe tragic and comic events as well as the species of drama in which these are respectively represented; partly in a misunderstanding of grammarians who, assuming the dialogue and the representation, gave definitions of tragedy and comedy in relation to each other[626]; and partly in the solecism of the fifth-century epic writer Dracontius, who seems to have called his Orestes a tragedy, merely because it was from tragedies that the material he used was drawn[627]. The comoedia and tragoedia of the Latin writers, thus defined, was extended to all the varieties of narrative, in the widest sense of the word. The epics of Lucan and Statius, the elegies of Ovid, are tragoediae; the epistles of Ovid, the pastoral dialogues of Virgil, are comoediae; the satires of Horace, Persius, Juvenal, are one or the other, according to the point of view[628]. It is curious that, with all this wide extension of the terms, they were not applied to the one form of mediaeval Latin composition which really had some analogy to the ancient drama; namely to the liturgical plays out of which the vernacular mysteries grew. These must have been written by learned writers: some of them were probably acted by schoolboys trained in Terence; and yet, if Hrosvitha, as she should be, is put out of the reckoning, no inward or outward trace of the influence of classical tragedy or comedy can be found in any one of them. In the manuscripts, they are called officium, ordo, ludus, miraculum, repraesentatio and the like, but very rarely comoedia or tragoedia, and never before 1204[629]. From the Latin the mediaeval notions of tragedy and comedy were transferred to similar compositions in the vernaculars. Dante’s Divina Commedia is just a story which begins in Hell and ends in Paradise[630]. Boccaccio[631], Chaucer[632], and Lydgate[633] use precisely similar language. And, right up to the end of the sixteenth century, ‘tragedy’ continues to stand for ‘tragical legend’ with the authors of the Mirror for Magistrates and their numerous successors[634]. Long before this, of course, humanistic research, without destroying their mediaeval sense, had restored to the wronged terms their proper connotation. There is a period during which it is a little difficult to say what, in certain instances, they do mean. When Robert Bower, in 1447, speaks of comoediae and tragoediae on the theme of Robin Hood and Little John, it is a matter for conjecture whether he is referring to dramatized May-games or merely to ballads[635]. Bale, in writing of his contemporaries, certainly applies the words to plays; but when he ascribes tragoedias vulgares to Robert Baston, a Carmelite friar of the time of Edward II, it is probable that he is using, or quoting a record which used, an obsolescent terminology[636]. What the comoediae of John Scogan, under Edward IV, may have been, must remain quite doubtful[637].

It is in the early fourteenth century and in Italy that a renewed interest in the Latin dramatists, other than Terence, can first be traced. Seneca became the subject of a commentary by the English Dominican Nicholas Treveth, and also attracted the attention of Lovato de’ Lovati and the scholarly circle which gathered round him at Padua. The chief of these was Albertino Mussato, who about 1314 was moved by indignation at the intrigues of Can Grande of Verona to write his Ecerinis on the fate of that Ezzelino who, some eighty years before, had tyrannized over Padua. This first of the Senecan tragedies of the Renascence stirred enthusiasm amongst the growing number of the literati. It was read aloud and Mussato was laureated before the assembled university. Two learned professors paid it the tribute of a commentary. The example of Mussato was followed in the Achilleis (1390) of Antonio de’ Loschi of Vicenza and the Progne (†1428) of Gregorio Corraro of Mantua. Petrarch was familiar not only with Terence, but also with Seneca and Plautus, and his Philologia, written before 1331 and then suppressed, may claim to take rank with the Ecerinis as the first Renascence comedy. It was modelled, says Boccaccio, upon Terence. A fresh impulse was given to the study and imitation of Latin comedy in 1427 by the discovery of twelve hitherto unknown Plautine plays, including the Menaechmi and the Miles Gloriosus, and various attempts were made to complete the imperfect plays. In 1441 Leonardo Dati of Florence introduced a motive from the Trinummus into his, not comedy, but tragedy of Hiempsal[638].

It must be borne in mind that during these early stages of humanism classical models and neo-Latin imitations alike were merely read and not acted. There is no sign whatever that as yet the mediaeval misconception as to the nature of Roman scenic representation had come to an end. It was certainly shared by Nicolas Treveth and probably by both Petrarch and Boccaccio[639]. It was not indeed in these regular dramas that the habit of acting Latin first re-established itself, but in a mixed and far less classical type of play. It is probable that in schools the exercise of reciting verse, and amongst other verse dialogue, had never died out since the time of the Empire. In the fourth century the Ludus Septem Sapientum of the Bordeaux schoolmaster Ausonius, which consists of no more than a set of verses and a ‘Plaudite!’ for each sage, was doubtless written for some such purpose[640]. Such also may have been the destiny of the ‘elegiac’ and ‘epic’ comedies and tragedies of which a fair number were produced, from the eleventh century to the thirteenth. These are comedies and tragedies, primarily, in the mediaeval sense. They are narrative poems in form. But in all of them a good deal of dialogue is introduced, and in some there is hardly anything else. Their subject-matter is derived partly from Terence and partly from the stock of motives common to all forms of mediaeval light literature. Their most careful student, Dr. Cloetta, suggests that they were intended for a half-dramatic declamation by minstrels. This may sometimes have been the case, but the capacity and the audience of the minstrels for Latin were alike limited, and I do not see why at any rate the more edifying of them may not have been school pieces[641]. By the fifteenth century it will be remembered, students, who had long been in the habit of performing miracle-plays, had also taken to producing farces, morals, and those miscellaneous comic and satiric pieces which had their origin in the folk-festivals. Many of these were in the vernaculars; but it is difficult to avoid classing with them a group of Latin dialogues and loosely constructed comedies, written in Terentian metres and presenting a curious amalgam of classical and mediaeval themes. Of hardly any of these can it be said positively that they were intended to be acted. This is, however, not unlikely in the case of the anonymous Columpnarium, which goes back to the fourteenth century. Pavia probably saw a performance of Ugolini Pisani’s Confabulatio coquinaria (1435), which has all the characteristics of a carnival drollery, and certainly of Ranzio Mercurino’s De Falso Hypocrita, which is stated in the manuscript to have been ‘acta’ there on April 15, 1437. The Admiranda of Alberto Carrara was similarly ‘acta’ at Padua about 1456. The exact way in which these pieces and others like them were performed must remain doubtful. Acting in the strict sense can only be distinctly asserted of Francesco Ariosto’s dialogue of Isis which was given ‘per personatos’ at the Ferrara carnival of 1444[642].

All this pseudo-classic comedy was looked upon with scorn by the purists of humanism. But it made its way over the Alps and had a considerable vogue in Germany. In France it found an exponent in Jean Tissier de Ravisy (Ravisius Textor), professor of rhetoric in the College of Navarre at Paris, and afterwards rector of the Paris University, who wrote, in good enough Latin, but wholly in the mediaeval manner, a large number of morals, farces, and dialogues for representation by his pupils[643]. Two at least of these were turned into English interludes. The classical element predominates in the pseudo-Homeric Thersites, the production of which can be fixed to between October 12 and 24, 1537; the mediaeval in Thomas Ingelend’s The Disobedient Child, which belongs to the very beginning of the reign of Elizabeth.

It was doubtless the study of Vitruvius which awakened the humanists to the fact that their beloved comedies had after all been acted after very much the fashion so long familiar in farces and miracle-plays. Exactly when the knowledge came is not clear. Polydore Vergil is still ignorant, and even Erasmus, at the date of the Adagia, uncertain. Alberti put a theatrum in the palace built on the Vatican for Nicholas V about 1452, but there is no record of its use for dramatic performances at that time, and the immediate successors of Nicholas did not love humanism. Such performances seem to have been first undertaken by the pupils of a Roman professor, Pomponius Laetus. Amongst these was Inghirami, who was protagonist in revivals of the Asinaria of Plautus and the Phaedra of Seneca. These took place about 1485. Several other representations both of classical plays and of neo-Latin imitations occurred in Italy before the end of the century; and the practice spread to other countries affected by the humanist wave, soon establishing itself as part of the regular sixteenth-century scheme of education. By this time, of course, Greek as well as Latin dramatic models were available. The Latin translation of the Plutus of Aristophanes by Leonardo Bruni (†1427) found several successors, and the play was acted at Zwickau in 1521. The study of Sophocles and Euripides began with Francesco Filelfo (†1481), but no representations of these authors are mentioned[644].

The outburst of dramatic activity in English schools and universities during the first half of the sixteenth century has already been noted. Wolsey may claim credit for an early encouragement of classical comedy in virtue of the performances of the Menaechmi and the Phormio given in his house by the boys of St. Paul’s in 1527 and 1528[645]. The master of St. Paul’s from 1522 to 1531 was John Ritwise, who himself wrote a Latin play of Dido, which also appears to have been acted before Wolsey[646]. The Plutus was given at St. John’s College, Cambridge, in 1536; the Pax at Trinity about a decade later[647]. A long series of English translations of classical plays begins with one of the Andria printed, possibly by John Rastell, under the title of Terens in Englysh[648].

A more important matter is the influence exercised by classical models upon the vernacular interludes. This naturally showed itself in school dramas, and only gradually filtered down to the professional players. Two plays compete for the honour of ranking as ‘the first regular English comedy,’ a term which is misleading, as it implies a far more complete break with the past than is to be discerned in either of them. One is Nicholas Udall’s Ralph Roister Doister, the performance of which can be dated with some confidence in 1553, by which time its author may already have been head master of Westminster; the other is Gammer Gurton’s Needle, which was put on the stage at Christ’s College, Cambridge, has been ascribed to John Still, afterwards bishop of Bath and Wells, and to John Bridges, afterwards bishop of Oxford, but is more probably the work of one William Stevenson, who was certainly superintending plays at Christ’s College in 1550-3. Both plays adopt the classical arrangement by acts and scenes. But of the two Gammer Gurton’s Needle is far closer to the mediaeval farce in its choice and treatment of subject. Ralph Roister Doister, although by no means devoid of mediaeval elements, is in the main an adaptation of the Miles Gloriosus of Plautus. A slighter and rather later piece of work, Jack Juggler, was also intended for performance by schoolboys, and is based upon the Amphitruo. The earliest ‘regular English tragedy’ on Senecan lines, or at least the earliest which oblivion has spared, is the Gorboduc or Ferrex and Porrex of 1561. This falls outside the strict scope of this chapter. But a fragment of a play from the press of John Rastell (1516-33) which introduces ‘Lucres’ and Publius Cornelius, suggests that, here as elsewhere, the Elizabethan writers were merely resuming the history of the earlier English Renascence, which religious and political disturbances had so wofully interrupted.

Towards the end of Henry VIII’s reign, the course of the developing interlude was further diverted by a fresh wave of humanist influence. This came from the wing of the movement which had occupied itself, not only with erudition, but also with the spiritual stirrings that issued in the Reformation. It must be borne in mind that the attitude of mere negation which the English Puritans, no doubt with their justification in ‘antiquity,’ came to adopt towards the stage, was by no means characteristic of the earlier Protestantism. The Lutheran reformers were humanists as well as theologians, and it was natural to them to shape a literary weapon to their own purposes, rather than to cast it aside as unfit for furbishing. About 1530 a new school of neo-Latin drama arose in Holland, which stood in much closer relations to mediaevalism than that which had had its origin in Italy. It aimed at applying the structure and the style of Terence to an edifying subject-matter drawn from the tradition of the religious drama. The English Everyman belongs to a group of related plays, both in Latin and in the vernaculars, on its moral theme. The Acolastus (1530, acted 1529) of William Gnaphaeus and the Asotus (1537, written †1507) of George Macropedius began a cycle of ‘Prodigal Son’ plays which had many branches. The movement began uncontroversially, but developed Protestant tendencies. It spread to Basle, where Sixt Birck, who called himself Xystus Betuleius, wrote a Susanna (1537), an Eva (1539), a Judith (1540), and to France, where the Scotchman George Buchanan added to the ‘Christian Terence’ a ‘Christian Seneca’ in the Jephthes (1554) and Baptistes (1564) performed, between 1540 and 1543, by his students at Bordeaux. In these, which are but a few out of many similar plays produced at this period, the humanists drew in the main upon such scriptural subjects, many of them apocryphal or parabolic, as were calculated, while no doubt making for edification, at the same time to afford scope for a free portrayal of human life. This on the whole, in spite of the treatment of such episodes as the Magdalen in gaudio, was a departure from the normal mediaeval usage[649].

A new note, of acute and even violent controversy, was introduced into the Protestant drama by the fiery heretic, Thomas Kirchmayer, or Naogeorgos. Kirchmayer wrote several plays, but the most important from the present point of view is that of Pammachius (1538), written during his pastorate of Sulza in Thuringia before his extreme views had led, not merely to exile from the Empire, but also to a quarrel with Luther. The Pammachius goes back to one of the most interesting, although of course not one of the most usual, themes of mediaeval drama, that of Antichrist; and it will readily be conceived that, for Kirchmayer, the Antichrist is none other than the Pope. It is interesting to observe that the play was dedicated to Archbishop Cranmer, whose reforming Articles of 1536 had roused the expectations of Protestant Germany. It was translated into English by John Bale, and was certainly not without influence in this country[650].

Both the merely edifying and the controversial type of Lutheran drama, indeed, found its English representatives. To the former belong the Christus Redivivus (1543) and the Archipropheta (1548) of the Oxford lecturer, Nicholas Grimald, one of which deals, somewhat exceptionally at this period, with the Resurrection, the other with John the Baptist. The Absalon of Thomas Watson, the Jephthes of John Christopherson (1546)[651], and the Sodom, Jonah, Judith, Job, Susanna, and Lazarus and Dives of Ralph Radclif (1546-56)[652], can only conjecturally be put in this class; and Nicholas Udall, who wrote an Ezechias in English, certainly did not commit himself irrecoverably in the eyes of good Catholics. John Palsgrave’s Ecphrasis or paraphrase of Acolastus (1540) is supplied with grammatical notes, and is conceived wholly in the academic interest. On the other hand controversy is suggested in the titles of Radclif’s De Iohannis Hussi Damnatione, and of the De Meretrice Babylonica ascribed by Bale to Edward VI[653], and is undeniably present in the Christus Triumphans (1551) of John Foxe, the martyrologist. This, like Pammachius, to which it owes much, belongs to the Antichrist cycle.

Nor was controversy confined to the learned language. As Protestantism, coquetted with by Henry VIII, and encouraged by Cromwell, became gradually vocal in England and awakened an equally resonant reply, the vernacular drama, like every other form of literary expression, was swept into the war of creeds. This phase, dominating even the professional players, endured through the reigns of Edward VI and Mary, and still colours the early Elizabethan interludes. Its beginnings were independent of the Lutheran influences that so profoundly affected its progress. The morality already contained within itself that tendency to criticism which was perhaps the easiest way to correct its insipidity. Historically it was politics rather than religion with which the interlude first claimed to interfere. The story begins, harmlessly enough, at court, with an allegorical ‘disguising’ during the visit of the Emperor Charles V to London in 1523, in which the French king, typified by an unruly horse, was tamed by Amitie, who stood for the alliance between Charles and Henry[654]. In 1526 John Roo’s morality, played at Gray’s Inn, of ‘Lord Governaunce’ and ‘Lady Publike-Wele’ wrung Wolsey’s withers, although as a matter of fact it was twenty years old[655]. Religion was first touched in 1527 in a piece of which one would gladly know more. It was played, as it seems, in Latin and French by the St. Paul’s boys under John Ritwise, before ambassadors from France. The subject was the captivity of the Pope, and amongst the singular medley of characters named are found ‘the herretyke, Lewtar’ and ‘Lewtar’s wyfe, like a frowe of Spyers in Almayn[656].’ This was, no doubt, all in the interests of orthodoxy; and a similar tone may be assumed in the comedies acted before Wolsey in the following year on the release of the Pope[657]. But much water passed under the mill in the next few years, and in 1533 there was a comedy at court ‘to the no little defamation of certain cardinals[658].’ In the same year, however, a proclamation forbade ‘playing of enterludes’ ‘concerning doctrines in matters now in question and controversie[659].’ This is a kind of regulation which it is easier to make than to enforce. Its effect, if it had any, was not of long duration. In 1537 much offence was given to Bishop Gardiner, the Chancellor of Cambridge University, by the performance amongst the youth of Christ’s College of a ‘tragedie,’ part at least of which was ‘soo pestiferous as were intolerable.’ This ‘tragedie’ was none other than the redoubtable Pammachius itself[660]. In the same year, strict orders were issued to stay games and unlawful assemblies in Suffolk, on account of a ‘seditious May-game’ which was ‘of a king, how he should rule his realm,’ and in which ‘one played Husbandry, and said many things against gentlemen more than was in the book of the play[661].’ These were exceptional cases. Both the students of Christ’s and the Suffolk rustics had in their various ways overstepped the permitted mark. Certainly Henry was not going to have kingship called in question on a village green. But it is notorious that, in matters of religion, he secretly encouraged many obstinate questionings which he openly condemned. And there is evidence that Cromwell at least found the interlude a very convenient instrument for the encouragement of Protestantism. Bale tells us that he himself won the minister’s favour ob editas comedias[662]; and there is extant amongst his papers a singular letter of this same year 1537, from Thomas Wylley, the vicar of Yoxford in Suffolk, in which he calls attention to three plays he has written, and asks that he may have ‘fre lyberty to preche the trewthe[663].’ Cranmer, too, seems to have been in sympathy with Cromwell’s policy, for in 1539 there was an enterlude at his house which a Protestant described as ‘one of the best matiers that ever he sawe towching King John,’ and which may quite possibly have been John Bale’s famous play[664].

The position was altered after 1540, when Cromwell had fallen and the pendulum of Henry’s conscience had swung back to orthodoxy. Foxe records how under the Act Abolishing Diversity in Opinions (1539), known as the Act of the Six Articles, one Spencer, an ex-priest who had become an interlude-player, was burned at Salisbury for ‘matter concerning the sacrament of the altar’; and how, in London, one Shermons, keeper of the Carpenters’ Hall in Shoreditch, ‘was presented for procuring an interlude to be openly played, wherein priests were railed on and called knaves[665].’ But the stage was by now growing difficult to silence. In 1542 the bishops petitioned the king to correct the acting of plays ‘to the contempt of God’s Word[666]’; and in 1543 their desire was met by the Act for the Advauncement of true Religion and for the Abolishment of the Contrary, which permitted of ‘plays and enterludes for the rebukyng and reproching of vices and the setting forth of vertue’; but forbade such as meddled with ‘interpretacions of scripture, contrary to the doctryne set forth or to be set forth by the kynges maiestie[667].’ This led to a vigorous protest from John Bale, writing under the pseudonym of Henry Stalbridge, in his Epistel Exhortatorye of an Inglyshe Christian. Its repeal was one of the first measures passed under Edward VI[668].

Lord Oxford’s men were playing in Southwark at the very hour of the dirge for Henry in the church of St. Saviour’s[669]. Almost immediately ‘the Poope in play’ and ‘prests in play’ make their appearance once more[670]. Edward himself wrote his comedy De Meretrice Babylonica. In 1551 the English comedies ‘in demonstration of contempt for the Pope’ were reported by the Venetian ambassador to his government[671]. But the players were not to have quite a free hand. It was now the Catholic interludes that needed suppression. A proclamation of August 6, 1549, inhibited performances until the following November in view of some ‘tendyng to sedicion[672].’ The Act of Uniformity of the same year forbade interludes ‘depraving and despising’ the Book of Common Prayer[673]. A more effective measure came later in a proclamation of 1551, requiring either for the printing or the acting of plays a licence by the king or the privy council[674]. Mary, at whose own marriage with Philip in 1554 there were Catholic interludes and pageants[675], issued a similar regulation in 1553, though naturally with a different intention[676]. But this was not wholly effectual, and further orders and much vigilance by the Privy Council in the oversight of players were required in the course of the reign[677].

Only a few texts from this long period of controversial drama have come down to us. On the Catholic side there is but one, the play of Respublica (1553). In this, and in the Protestant fragment of Somebody, Avarice and Minister, the ruling literary influence is that of Lyndsay’s Satyre of the Thre Estaitis. Of the remaining Protestant plays, Nice Wanton (1560) and Thomas Ingelend’s The Disobedient Child (n.d.) derive from the Dutch school of Latin drama and its offshoots. Nice Wanton is an adaptation of the Rebelles (1535) of Macropedius. The Disobedient Child has its relations, not only to the play of Ravisius Textor already mentioned, but also to the Studentes (1549) of Christopher Stymmelius. More distinctly combative in tendency is the Lusty Juventus (n.d.) of R. Wever, who may be reckoned as a disciple of John Bale. The activity of Bale himself can be somewhat obscurely discerned as the strongest impelling force on the Protestant side. He had his debts both to Lyndsay and to Kirchmayer, whose Pammachius, if not his other plays, he translated. But he is very largely original, and he is set apart from the other great figures of the Lutheran drama by the fact that all his plays were written in idiomate materno. Moreover, though not without classical elements, they were probably intended for popular performance, and approach more closely to the mediaeval structure than to that of the contemporary interlude. In his Scriptores he enumerates, under twenty-two titles, some forty-six of them. The five extant ones were probably all ‘compiled’ about 1538 while he was vicar of Thorndon in Suffolk. But some of them were acted at the market-cross of Kilkenny in 1553, and the others show signs of revision under Edward VI or even Elizabeth. In God’s Promises, John Baptist, and The Temptation, Bale was simply adapting and Protestantizing the miracle-play. The first is practically a Prophetae, and they are all ‘actes,’ or as the Middle Ages would have said ‘processes’ or ‘pageants,’ from a scriptural cycle. Of similar character were probably a series of eleven plays extending from Christ in the Temple to the Resurrection. A Vita D. Joannis Baptistae in fourteen libri perhaps treated this favourite sixteenth-century theme in freer style. The polemics are more marked in Three Laws, which is a morality; and in King John, which is a morality varied by the introduction of the king himself as a champion against the Pope and of certain other historical figures. It thus marks an important step in the advance of the drama towards the treatment of individualities. With the Three Laws and King John may be grouped another set of lost plays whose Latinized titles point unmistakably to controversy. An Amoris Imago might be merely edifying; but it would be difficult to avoid meddling in matters of doctrine with such themes to handle as De Sectis Papisticis, Erga Momos et Zoilos, Perditiones Papistarum, Contra Adulterantes Dei Verbum, De Imposturis Thomae Becketi. A pair of plays Super utroque Regis Coniugio, must have been, if they were ever acted, a climax of audacity even for John Bale.

What then, in sum, was the heritage which the early Elizabethan writers and players of interludes received from their immediate predecessors? For the writers there were the stimulus of classical method and a widened range both of intention and of material. Their claim was established to dispute, to edify, or merely to amuse. They stood on the verge of more than one field of enterprise which had been barely entered upon and justly appeared inexhaustible. ‘Tragedy, comedy, history, pastoral, pastoral-comical, historical-pastoral, tragical-historical, tragical-comical-historical-pastoral’; they possessed at least the keys to them all. Their own work is a heterogeneous welter of all the dramatic elements of the past and the future. Belated morals and miracle-plays jostle with adaptations of Seneca and Plautus. The dramatis personae of a single play will afford the abstractions of the allegory and the types of the farce side by side with real living individualities; and the latter are drawn indifferently from contemporary society, from romance, from classical and from national history. These are precisely the dry bones which one day, beneath the breath of genius, should spring up into the wanton life of the Shakespearean drama. The players had made good their footing both in courts and amongst the folk. But their meddlings with controversy had brought upon them the hand of authority, which was not to be lightly shaken off. Elizabeth, like her brother, signalized the opening of her reign by a temporary inhibition of plays[678]; and her privy council assumed a jurisdiction, by no means nominal, over things theatrical. In their censorship they had the assistance of the bishop of London, as ‘ordinary.’ The lesser companies may have suffered from the statute of 1572 which confined the privilege of maintaining either minstrels or players of interludes to barons and personages of higher degree[679]. But the greater ones which had succeeded in establishing themselves in London, grew and flourished. They lived down the competition of the amateurs which during the greater part of the century threatened to become dangerous, by their profitable system of double performances, at court and in the inn yards. Thus they secured the future of the drama by making it economically independent; and the copestone of their edifice was the building of the permanent theatres. But for courtesy and a legal fiction, they were vagabonds and liable to whipping: yet the time was at hand when one player was to claim coat armour and entertain preachers to sack and supper at New Place, while another was to marry the daughter of a dean and to endow an irony for all time in the splendid College of God’s Gift at Dulwich.

APPENDICES

A

THE TRIBUNUS VOLUPTATUM

[The tribunus voluptatum was a municipal officer of the later Empire charged with the superintendence of the spectacula. He seems to have been appointed for life by the Emperor, and to have taken over functions formerly discharged by the praetors and quaestors. Mommsen, Ostgothische Studien (Neues Archiv, xiv. 495), says that he first appears in the fifth century. Possibly, therefore, Suetonius, Tiberius, 42, ‘novum denique officium instituit a voluptatibus, praeposito equite R. T. Caesonio Prisco’ refers to some other post. A titulus, ‘de officio tribuni voluptatū qd a temelicis et scenariis,’ which should be C. Th. i. 19, is missing from the text. C. Th. xv. 7, 13 (413), is addressed to the tribunus voluptatum of Carthage. The office was maintained in Italy under Theodoric (493-526). The formula of appointment here given is preserved by Cassiodorus, Variae, vii. 10; cf. Var. vi. 19 ‘cum lascivae voluptates recipiant tribunum.’ The Senate is informed by Var. i. 43 (†509) of the promotion of Artemidorus, who had held the office, to be praefectus urbanus. The tribunus voluptatum of Rome is referred to in two inscriptions of 522 and 526 (Rossi, Inscr. Christ. i. Nos. 989, 1005). One Bacauda is appointed tribunus voluptatum in Milan by Var. v. 25 (523-6). Constantine Porphyrogenitus de Caer. i. 83 mentions an ἄρχων τῆς θυμέλης in the tenth-century court of Byzantium, who may be the same officer.]

Formula Tribuni Voluptatum.

Quamvis artes lubricae honestis moribus sint remotae et histrionum vita vaga videatur efferri posse licentia, tamen moderatrix providit antiquitas, ut in totum non effluerent, cum et ipsae iudicem sustinerent. amministranda est enim sub quadam disciplina exhibitio voluptatum. teneat scaenicos si non verus, vel umbratilis ordo iudicii. temperentur et haec legum qualitate negotia, quasi honestas imperet inhonestis, et quibusdam regulis vivant, qui viam rectae conversationis ignorant. student enim illi non tantum iucunditati suae, quantum alienae laetitiae et condicione perversa cum dominatum suis corporibus tradunt, servire potius animos compulerunt. Dignum fuit ergo moderatorem suscipere, qui se nesciunt iuridica conversatione tractare. locus quippe tuus his gregibus hominum veluti quidam tutor est positus. nam sicut illi aetates teneras adhibita cautela custodiunt, sic a te voluptates fervidae impensa maturitate frenandae sunt. age bonis institutis quod nimia prudentia constat invenisse maiores. leve desiderium etsi verecundia non cohibet, districtio praenuntiata modificat. agantur spectacula suis consuetudinibus ordinata, quia nec illi possunt invenire gratiam, nisi imitati fuerint aliquam disciplinam. Quapropter tribunum te voluptatum per illam indictionem nostra fecit electio, ut omnia sic agas, quemadmodum tibi vota civitatis adiungas, ne quod ad laetitiam constat inventum, tuis temporibus ad culpas videatur fuisse transmissum. cum fama diminutis salva tua opinione versare. castitatem dilige, cui subiacent prostitutae: ut magna laude dicatur: ‘virtutibus studuit, qui voluptatibus miscebatur.’ optamus enim ut per ludicram amministrationem ad seriam pervenias dignitatem.

B

TOTA IOCULATORUM SCENA

John of Salisbury, Polycraticus i. 8 (†1159, P. L. cxcix, 406), says, Satius enim fuerat otiari quam turpiter occupari. Hinc mimi, salii vel saliares, balatrones, aemiliani, gladiatores, palaestritae, gignadii, praestigiatores, malefici quoque multi, et tota ioculatorum scena procedit.’ The specific terms belong to John of Salisbury’s classical learning rather than to contemporary use; but his generic ioculator is the normal mediaeval Latin term for the minstrel in the widest sense. Classically the word, like its synonym iocularis, is an adjective, ‘given to ioca,’ ‘merry.’ Thus Cicero, ad Att. iv. 16. 3 ‘huic ioculatorem senem illum interesse sane nolui.’ Similarly Firmicus Maternus (fourth century), Mathesis, viii. 22 ‘histriones faciat, pantomimos, ac scaenicos ioculatores,’ and 4 Conc. Carthag. (398), c. 60 (C. I. C. Decr. Gratiani, i. 46. 6) ‘clericum scurrilem et verbis turpibus ioculatorem ab officio retrahendum censemus.’ Here the technical meaning is approached, which Gautier, ii. 12, declares to be complete in Salvian (fifth century), de gubernatione Dei. I cannot, however, find the word in Salvian, though I do find iugulator, ‘cut-throat.’ I have not come across ioculator as a noun before the eighth century (vol. i. p. 37), but thenceforward it is widely used for minstrels of both the scôp and the mimus type. A rarer form is iocista. Ioculator gives rise to the equally wide French term jouglere, jougleur, which seems to merge with the doublet jogeler, jougler, from iocularis. Similarly ioca becomes jeu, the equivalent of the classical and mediaeval Latin ludus, also in the widest sense. In Provençal ioculator becomes joglar, in English jugelour, jugelere, jogeler, &c. Thus S. Eng. Leg. i. 271 (†1290) ‘Is iugelour a day bifore him pleide faste And nemde in his ryme and in is song þene deuel atþe laste’; King Horn (ed. Ritson), 1494 (†1300) ‘Men seide hit were harperis, Jogelers, ant fythelers.’ The incorrect modern French form jongleur seems due to a confusion between jougleur and jangleur, ‘babbler,’ and the English jangler has a similar use; cf. Piers the Plowman, B. Text, passus x. 31 (ed. Skeat, i. 286) ‘Iaperes and Iogeloures, and Iangelers of gestes.’ Here both words appear side by side. The English jogelour sometimes has the full sense of the French jougleur, as in the instances just given, but as a term for minstrels of the higher or scôp type it has to compete, firstly, with the native gleeman, from O. E. gleoman, gligman, and secondly, with minstrel; and as a matter of fact its commoner use is for the lower type of minstrel or buffoon, and in particular, in the exact sense of the modern juggler, for a conjuror, tregetour or prestigiator. The latter is the usual meaning of jogelour, with the cognate jogelrye, in Chaucer; for the former, cf. Adam Davie (†1312) ‘the minstrels sing, the jogelours carpe.’ In English documents the Latin ioculator itself to some extent follows suit; the ioculator regis of late fifteenth or early sixteenth-century accounts is not a minstrel or musician, but the royal juggler (cf. vol. i. p. 68). On the other hand the Provençal joglar is differentiated in the opposite sense, to denote a grade of minstrelsy raised above the mere bufos (vol. i. p. 63).

A street in Paris known at the end of the thirteenth century as the ‘rue aus Jugléeurs,’ came later to be known as the rue des Ménétriers (Bernhard, iii. 378). This is significant of a new tendency in nomenclature which appears with the growth during the fourteenth century of the household entertainers at the expense of their unattached brethren of the road. Minister is classical Latin for ‘inferior’ and so ‘personal attendant.’ The ministeriales of the later Empire are officers personally appointed by the Emperor. Towards the end of the thirteenth century minister, with its diminutives ministellus and ministrallus (French menestrel), can be seen passing from the general sense of ‘household attendant’ to the special sense of ‘household ioculator.’ A harper was one of the ministri of Prince Edward in 1270 (vol. i. p. 49). Gautier, ii. 13, 51, quotes li famles (famuli) as a synonym for such ioculatores, and such doublets as ‘menestrel et serviteur,’ ‘menestrel et varlet de chambre.’ The ministeralli of Philip IV in 1288 include, with the musicians, the rex heraudum and the rex ribaldorum. From the beginning of the fourteenth century, however, ministrallus, with French menestrel, menestrier, and English menestrel, mynstral, is firmly established in the special sense. The antithesis between the ministrallus and the unattached ioculator appears in the terminology of the 1321 statutes of the Paris guild, ‘menestreus et menestrelles, jougleurs et jougleresses’; but even this disappears, and the new group of terms becomes equivalent to the ioculator group in its widest sense. So too, ministralcia, menestrardie, minstralcie, although chiefly used, as by Chaucer, for music, are not confined to that; e.g. Derby Accounts, 109, ‘cuidam tumblere facienti ministralciam suam.’ The word is here approaching very near its kinsman métier (vol. ii. p. 105). Wright-Wülcker, 596, 693, quotes from the fifteenth-century glossaries, ‘simphonia, mynstrylsy,’ and ‘mimilogium, mynstrisye.’

Ioculator and ministrallus are in their technical sense post-classical. But it is to be noted that the classical histrio and mimus, widened in connotation to an exact equivalent with these, remain in full use throughout the Middle Ages. They are indeed the more literary and learned words, as may be seen from the fact that they did not give rise to Romance or English forms; but they are not differentiated as to meaning. In particular, I do not find that mimus is used, as I have occasionally for convenience used it, to denote the lower minstrel of classical origin, as against the higher minstrel or scôp. Here are a few of many passages which go to establish this complete fourfold equivalence of ioculator, ministrallus, mimus and histrio; Gloss. in B.N. MS. 4883ᵃ, f. 67ᵇ (Du Méril, Or. Lat. 23) ‘istriones sunt ioculatores’; Constit. regis Minorcae (1337, Mabillon, Acta SS. Bened. Ian. iii. 27) ‘In domibus principum, ut tradit antiquitas, mimi seu ioculatores licite possunt esse’; Conc. Lateran. (1215), c. 16 ‘mimis, ioculatoribus et histrionibus non intendant.’ This triple formula, often repeated by ecclesiastics, is of course conjunctive, like ‘rogues and vagabonds.’ Guy of Amiens (†1068) calls Taillefer both histrio and mimus (vol. i. p. 43). At the beginning of the sixteenth century the royal minstrels are histriones in the accounts of Shrewsbury, ministralli in those of Winchester College (App. E. (iv)), mimi in those of Beverley (Leach, Beverley MSS. 171). The ioculator regis, as already said, is by this time distinct. The Scottish royal minstrels appear in the Exchequer Rolls for 1433-50 as mimi, histriones, ioculatores (L. H. T. Accounts, i, cxcix). The town musicians of Beverley, besides their specific names of waits and spiculatores, have indifferently those of histriones, ministralli, mimi (Leach, Beverley MSS. passim). It is largely a matter of the personal taste of the scribe. Thus the Shrewsbury accounts have both histriones and menstralles in 1401, histriones in 1442, ministralli regularly from 1457 to 1479, and histriones regularly from 1483 onwards.

Many other names for minstrels, besides these dominant four, have been collected by scholars (Gautier, ii. 10; Julleville, Les Com. 17; Gröber, ii. 489; Bédier, 366). From the compliments exchanged in the fabliau of Des Deux Bordeors Ribaux (Montaiglon-Raynaud, i. 1) one may extract the equivalence of menestrel, trouvère, ribaud, bordeor, jougleur, chanteur, lecheor, pantonnier. Of such subordinate names many are specific, and have been dealt with in their turn in chh. iii, iv. Others, again, are abusive, and found chiefly in the mouths of ecclesiastics, or as distinctive of the lower orders of minstrels. There are garcio, nebulo, delusor, saccularius, bufo, ribaud, harlot. There are bourdyour, japer, gabber, jangler (vol. i. p. 84). There is scurra, an early and favourite term of this class; cf. Ælfric’s gloss (Ducange, s.v. Iocista), ‘Mimus, iocista, scurra, gligmon’; Wright-Wülcker, 693 (fifteenth-century gloss), ‘scurra, harlot’; and vol. i. p. 32. There is leccator, leccour (cf. above and App. F. s.v. Chester). And finally, there are a few terms of general, but not very common, application. Scenici and thymelici come from the early Christian prohibitions (vol. i. pp. 12, 17, 24). More important are a group derived from ludus, which like jeu has itself the widest possible sense, covering every possible kind of amusement. The Sarum Statutes of 1319, in a titulus dealing with histriones, speak of those ‘qui “menestralli” et quandoque “ludorum homines” vulgari eloquio nuncupantur’ (vol. i. p. 40). In the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries appear such terms as lusor, lusiator, ludens, interlusor, interludens. The two latter of these are always specific, meaning ‘actor’; the three former are usually so, although they may occasionally have the more general sense, and this is probably also true of the English player. This question is more fully discussed in vol. i. pp. 84, 393, and vol. ii. p. 185.

C

COURT MINSTRELSY IN 1306

[From Manners and Household Expenses of England in the Thirteenth and Fifteenth Centuries, 141 (Roxburghe Club, 1841), from Exchequer Roll (King’s Remembrancer’s Dept.) in Rolls Office. The Pentecost feast of 1306 was that at which Prince Edward, who became in the next year Edward II, was knighted. It is described in the Annales Londonienses (Chronicles of Edward I and Edward II, R. S. i. 146).]

Solutio facta diversis Menestrallis die Pentecostes anno xxxiiiiᵗᵒ.

[A. D. 1306.]

Le Roy de Champaigne } Le Roy Capenny } cuilibet v.marc.; Le Roy Baisescue } summa, xvj.li. Le Roy Marchis } i.marc. Le Roy Robert }

Phelippe de Caumbereye lx.s.; summa, lx.s.

} cuilibet iiij.marc.; Robert le Boistous } summa, Gerard de Boloigne } c. vj.s. viij.d. }

Bruant } cuilibet xl.s.; Northfolke } summa, iiij.li.

Carltone } Maistre Adam le Boscu } cuilibet xx.s.; Devenays } summa, lx.s.

Artisien } cuilibet xxx.s.; Lucat } summa, iiij.li. Henuer } [x.s.]

Le menestral Mons. de Montmaranci } Le Roy Druet } Janin le Lutour } Gillotin le Sautreour } Gillet de Roos } Ricard de Haleford } Le Petit Gauteron } cuilibet xl.s.; Baudec le Tabourer } summa, xxvj.li. Ernolet } Mahu qui est ove la dammoisele de Baar } Janin de Brebant } Martinet qui est ove le Conte de Warwike } Gauteron le Grant }

Le Harpour Levesque de Duresme x.s.

Guillaume le Harpour qui est ove le Patriarke } Robert de Clou } Maistre Adam de Reve } Henri le Gigour } Corraud son compaignon } Le tierz Gigour } Gillot le Harpour } cuilibet ij.marc.; Johan de Newentone } summa, Hugethun le Harpour lour compaignon } xxj.li. di.marc. Adekin son compaignon } Adam de Werintone } Adam de Grimmeshawe } Hamond Lestivour } Mahuet qui est ove Mons. de Tounny } Johan de Mochelneye } Janin Lorganistre } Simond le Messager }

Les ij. Trumpours Mons. Thomas de Brothertone } Martinet le Taborour } Richard Rounlo } Richard Hendelek } Janin de La Tour son compaignon } Johan le Waffrer le Roy } Pilk } Januche } } Gillot } Trumpours Mons. le Prince } Le Nakarier } Le Gitarer } cuilibet j.marc.; Merlin } summa, xl.marc. Tomasin, Vilour Mons. Le Prince } Raulin qui est ove le Conte Mareschal } Esvillie qui est ove Mons. Pierres de Maule } Grendone } Le Taborer La Dame de Audham } Gaunsaillie } Guillaume sanz maniere } Lambyn Clay } Jaques Le Mascun } Son compaignon } Mahu du North } Le menestral ove les cloches } Les iij. menestraus Mons. de Hastinges } Thomelin de Thounleie } Les ij. Trompours le Comte de Hereforde } Perle in the eghe } Son compaignon } Janyn le Sautreour qui est ove Mons. de Percy } Les ij. Trumpours le Comte de Lancastre } Mellet } Henri de Nushom } Janyn le Citoler }

Gilliame } Fairfax } cuilibet xx.s.; Monet } summa, iiij.li. Hanecocke de Blithe }

Summa totalis,—cxiiij.li. x.s.—Et issi demoerent des cc.marc., pur partir entre les autres menestraus de la commune,—xviij.li. xvj.s. viij.d.—Et a ceste partie faire sunt assigne Le Roy Baisescu, Le Roy Marchis, Le Roy Robert, et Le Roy Druet, Gauteron le Graunt, Gauteron le Petit, Martinet le Vilour qui est ove le Conte de Warewike, et del hostiel Mons. le Prince, ij. serjantz darmes ... clerke.

[Five lines of which only a few words are legible.]

Richard le Harpour qui est ove le Conte de Gloucestre. Wauter Bracon Trounpour Wauter le Trounpour Johan le Croudere Tegwaret Croudere Geffrai le Estiveur Guillot le Taborer Guillot le Vileur Robert le Vilour Jake de Vescy Richard Whetacre

A ceux xj., por toute la commune, xvii.li. iiii.s. viii.d.

Denarii dati Menestrallis.

Vidulatori Dominae de Wak’ v.s. Laurentio Citharistae di.marc. Johanni du Chat, cum Domino J. de Bur’ di.marc. Mellers v.s. Parvo Willielmo, Organistae Comtissae Herefordiae v.s. Ricardo de Quitacre, Citharistae di.marc. Ricardo de Leylonde, Citharistae di.marc. Carleton Haralde v.s. Gilloto Vidulatori Comitis Arundelliae di.marc. Amakyn Citharistae Principis v.s. Bolthede v.s. Nagary le Crouder Principis v.s. Matheu le Harpour v.s. Johanni le Barber v.s. ij. Trumpatoribus J. de Segrave di.marc. Ricardo Vidulatori Comitis Lancastriae v.s. Johanni Waffrarario Comitis Lancastriae xl.d. Sagard Crouther xl.d. William de Grymesar’, Harpour xl.d. Citharistae Comitissae Lancastriae xl.d. ij. Menestrallis J. de Ber[wyke] xl.d. Henrico de Blida xl.d. Ricardo Citharistae xl.d. William de Duffelde xl.d. v. Trumpatoribus Principis, pueris, cuilibet ij.s. x.s. in toto. iiijᵒʳ. Vigil’ Regis, cuilibet di.marc. xx.s. Adinet le Harpour Perote le Taborer Adae de Swylingtone Citharistae ij.s. David le Crouther xij.d. Lion de Normanville ij.s. Gerardo xij.d. Ricardo Citharistae ij.s. Roberto de Colecestria iij.s. Jhanni le Crouther de Salopia xij.d. Johanni le Vilour domini J. Renaude xij.d. Johanni de Trenham, Citharistae ij.s. Willielmo Woderove, Trumpatori ij.s. Johanni Citharistae J. de Clyntone ij.s. Waltero de Brayles xij.d. Roberto Citharistae Abbatis de Abbyndone xij.d. Galfredo Trumpatori domini R. de Monte Alto Richero socio suo ij.s. Thomae le Croudere ij.s. Rogero de Corleye, Trumpatori ij.s. Audoeno le Crouther xij.d. Hugoni Daa Citharistae ij.s. Andreae Vidulatori de Hor’ ij.s. Roberto de Scardeburghe xij.d. Guilloto le Taborer Comitis Warrewici iij.s. Paul’ Menestrallo Comitis Marescalli iij.s. Matheo Waffraris domini R. de Monte Alto ij.s. iij. diversis menestrallis, cuilibet iij.s. ix.s. Galfrido Citharistae Comitis Warrenniae ij.s. Matill’ Makejoye xij.d. Johanni Trumpatori domini R. de Filii Pagani xij.d. Adae Citharistae domini J. Lestraunge xij.d. Reginaldo le Menteur, Menestrallo domini J. de Buteturt xij.d. Perle in the Eghe xij.d. Gilloto Citharistae Domini P. de Malo Lacu x.s. Roberto Gaunsillie xl.d. Item. xl.d. Jacke de Vescy di.marc. Magistro Waltero Leskirmissour et fratri suo, cuilibet iij.s. vj.s.

D

THE MINSTREL HIERARCHY

The term rex is not seldom applied as a distinction amongst minstrels. At the wedding of Joan of England in 1290 were present King Grey of England and King Caupenny of Scotland, together with Poveret, minstrel of the Marshal of Champagne (Chappell, i. 15). Poveret is perhaps the ‘roy de Champaigne’ of the 1306 list, which also includes the ‘roys’ Capenny, Baisescue, Marchis, Robert, and Druet (Appendix C). A ‘rex Robertus,’ together with ‘rex Pagius de Hollandia,’ reappears in accounts of the reign of Edward II (1307-27), while one of the minstrels of the king was William de Morlee, ‘roy de North’ (Percy, 416-8; cf. vol. i. p. 49). In France a list of the ‘ministeralli’ of Philip IV in 1288 includes the ‘rex Flaiolatus,’ ‘rex Heraudum,’ and ‘rex Ribaldorum.’ A certain Pariset, who was minstrel to the Comte de Poitiers in 1314, signs the statutes of the Paris guild in 1321 as ‘Pariset, menestrel le roy,’ and the various ‘roys des menestreuls du royaume de France’ who appear in and after 1338 may have been heads at once of the king’s household minstrels and of the guild (Appendix F; cf. Bernhard, iii. 380). Further, the title is claimed by the authors of various pieces of minstrel literature. ‘Adenet le roi’ is the author of Cleomadès (Paris, 84; Percy, 416-8), and ‘Huon le roi,’ perhaps identical with ‘Huon de Cambrai’ and ‘Huon Paucele,’ of the fabliau of Du Vair Palefroi (Bédier, 438; Montaiglon-Raynaud, i. 3). The term rex is of course common enough in connexion with temporary or permanent associations of all sorts, and is probably of folk origin (vol. i. chaps. iv, viii). It is possible that some of these ‘rois’ may have been crowned by ‘puis’ (Lavoix, ii. 377), but it is more probable that they had some official pre-eminence amongst their fellows, and perhaps some jurisdiction, territorial or otherwise. Clearly this was the case with the ‘roy des ministralx’ at Tutbury. The appearance of the ‘rex Flaiolatus’ with the ‘rex Heraudum’ and the ‘rex Ribaldorum’ in the French list of 1288 is thus significant, for the latter had just such a jurisdiction over the riff-raff of the court (Ducange, s.v.), and I conceive the relation of the minstrel ‘roys’ to their fellows to have been much that of the ‘Kings at arms’ to the ordinary heralds. It seems that minstrels and heralds belonged to the same class of ministri. The order of the Emperor Henry II (vol. i. p. 52) couples ‘ioculatores et armaturi’ and ‘Carleton Haralde’ is actually rewarded in the 1306 list (App. C, p. 237). If one may quote a Celtic parallel, the Arwyddfardd or heralds formed a regular division (†1100) of Welsh minstrelsy (E. David, La Poésie et la Musique dans la Cambrie, 72-91). Under Richard II the head of the English royal minstrels was a rex, but from 1464 onwards the term used is marescallus (Rymer, xi. 512), and this again may be paralleled from the supreme position of the Earl Marshal in heraldry. At the head of the Earl of Lancaster’s minstrels in 1308 was an armiger. I only find this term again in the burlesque account of the ‘auncient minstrell’ shown before Elizabeth at Kenilworth (Appendix H). He was ‘a squier minstrel of Middilsex’ and, as he bore the arms of Islington, presumably a ‘wait.’

E

EXTRACTS FROM ACCOUNT BOOKS

I. DURHAM PRIORY.

[The entries, unless otherwise specified, are amongst the extracts (generally of Dona Prioris) from the Bursars’ Rolls between 1278 and 1371, printed by Canon Fowler in vols. ii, iii of the Durham Account Rolls (Surtees Soc.). D. H. B. = Durham Household Book (Surtees Soc.), F. P. = Inventories and Account Rolls of Finchale Priory (Surtees Soc.). This was a cell of Durham Priory. The minstrelsy often took place at the ludi Domini Prioris, either in his camera (D. A. ii. 424) or at Beaurepaire, Witton, or other maneria of the Priory. There seem to have been in most years four ludi ordinarii (D. A. ii. 296), though occasionally only two or three are mentioned. These were at the feasts of Candlemas, Easter, St. John Baptist, and All Saints (D. A. i. 242, iii. 932). But the Prior, Sub-Prior, and brethren seem often to have been ludentes, spatiantes, or in recreacione (D. A. i. 118, 235), without much regard to fixed dates. In 1438-9 they were ludentes for as much as eleven weeks and four days at Beaurepaire (D. A. i. 71). See also D. A. i. 16, 116, 120, 129, 137, 138, 142, 166, 207, 263; ii. 287, 419, 456, 515; iii. 810, s.vv. Ludi, &c.; D. H. B. 9, 13, 54, 141, 240, 339; F. P. 30, ccxcv, ccccxxxvi.]

1278. Menestrallo Regis Scociae. Menestrallo de Novo Castro.

1299. Roberto le Taburer.

1300-1. Cuidam hystrioni Regis.

1302-3. Histrionibus domini Regis.

1310-11. Hugoni de Helmeslaye stulto domini Regis. Cuidam Iugulatori d’ni Regis. Cuidam Cytharistae.

†1310. Histrionibus d’ni H. de Bello Monte. In scissura tunicae stulti. †1315. Histrionibus ad Natale.

1330-1. In uno garniamento pro Thoma fatuo empto. Histrionibus ad Natale. ” in fest. S. Cuthberti in Marcio. ” ad fest. S. Cuthberti in Sept. ” d’ni Henrici de Beaumond. Citharistae (in another roll ‘citharatori’) d’ni Roberti de Horneclyff ex precepto Prioris.

1333-4. Duobus histrionibus in die Veneris proximo post octavam beati Martini. Histrionibus d’ni Regis quando d’nus noster Rex rediit de Novo Castro. Stulto d’ni Episcopi. Histrionibus comitis Warenne. Histrionibus Regis Scociae.

1334-5. Histrionibus ad Natale.

1335-6. Histrionibus d’ni Regis Scociae. Duobus histrionibus die Sci. Cuthberti. Duobus histrionibus ex precepto Prioris. Histrionibus Novi Castri ad fest. S. Cuthberti. Histrionibus d’ni R. de Nevill, per Priorem. In 1 Cythara empta pro Thom. Harpour. 3ˢ. Cuidam histrioni apud Beaurepaire per R. de Cotam ex dono Prioris. Thomae fatuo ex precepto eiusdem.

†1335. Istrionibus d’ni Regis. Istrionibus Reginae apud Pytingdon. Istrionibus [die Dominica proxima post festum Epiphaniae, quo die d’nus Episcopus epulabatur cum Priore]. Will’o de Sutton, Citharaedo d’ni Galfridi Lescrop eodem die. Istrionibus die Natalis Domini.

†1336. Duobus istrionibus d’ni Regis. Edmundo de Kendall, Cytharaeto, de dono Prioris ad Pascha. Menestrallis de dono [quando Episcopus epulabatur cum Priore].

†1337. In 1 pari sotularium pro Thoma fatuo.

1338-9. Several payments to ‘istriones’ and ‘menestralli.’ In 4 ulnis burelli scacciati emptis pro garniamento Thomae Fole per preceptum Prioris.

1339-40. In panno empto in foro Dunelm. pro uno garniamento pro Thoma fatuo. Willelmo Piper istrioni d’ni Radulphi de Nevill die Circumcisionis.

1341. Pelidod et duobus sociis suis histrionibus d’ni Regis post Natale Domini.

1341-42. In garniamentis emptis pro ... Thoma fatuo (and similar entries, or for ‘Russet,’ ‘pannus,’ ‘Candelwykstret’ in other years).

†1343. Various payments to ‘Istriones.’

1347-8. ‘Istrionibus,’ &c.

1350-51. Istrionibus ad Natale. ” ad S. Cuthbertum in Sept.

1355-6. Will’o Pyper et aliis istrionibus ad Natale. Item duobus istrionibus d’ni Episcopi et duobus istrionibus Comitis de Norhamton in festo Sci. Cuthberti in Marcio. Item istrionibus d’ni Episcopi ad festum Paschae. Item istrionibus in festo Sci. Cuthberti in Sept.

1356-7. In sepultura Thomae fatui et necessariis expensis circa corpus eius, per manus d’ni Prioris (similar entry in miscellaneous roll, ‘Thomae Fole,’ D. A. iii. 719). Diversis ministrallis (D. A. iii. 718).

†1357. Et Will’o Blyndharpour ad Natale. Et Ioh’i Harpour d’ni Ioh’is de Streuelyn et Will’o Blyndharpour de Novo Castro. Et duobus Trompours Comitis de Norhamton apud Wyuestow. Et cuidam Harpour vocato Rygeway. Istrionibus d’ni Episcopi (and Harpers, &c.).

†1360. Petro Crouder apud Pityngton, per Capellanum. Item eidem Petro pro uno quarterio ordii sibi dato per Priorem. Duobus Istrionibus Episcopi in festo Assensionis Domini. Et cuidam Istrioni Maioris villae Novi Castri per Capellanum.

1360-61. Will’o Pyper et aliis istrionibus ad Natale per manus Ioh’is del Sayles. Cuidam Welsharpour d’ni Will’i de Dalton. Item histrionibus aliorum dominorum.

1361-2. In uno viro ludenti in uno loyt et uxori eius cantanti apud Bewrpayr (D. A. i. 127, Hostiller’s Accounts).

1362. Item cuidam histrioni harper episcopi Norwychiae in festo Transl. Sᶜⁱ. Cuthberti. Cuidam Istrioni Jestour Jawdewyne in festo Natalis Domini. Will’o yᵉ kakeharpour ad idem festum. Et Barry similem sibi ad id. festum. Et cuidam ystrioni caeco franco cum uno puero fratre suo. Barry harper ex precepto Prioris in una tunica empta.

1363-4. Item cantoribus in Adventu Domini cum histrionibus ibidem ex dono Prioris. Item cuidam histrioni die Dominica Quasimodo geniti.

1364-5. To two players of the Lord Duke at the said feast (of St. Cuthbert) (Raine, St. Cuthbert, 109, Surtees Soc.).

1365-6. Barry Harpour, ystrionibus, &c.

1366-8. Ministrallis, Istrionibus.

1368-9. Rob’o Trompour et Will’o Fergos ministrallo in die Sci. Cuthberti.

1373-4. Duobus Ministrallis cum uno Weyng.

1374. 12 ministrallis in festo Sᶜⁱ. Cuthb.

1375-6. Ministrall. in die S. Cuthb. in Mar. Cuidam ministrallo ludenti coram domino Priori in camera sua. Tribus ministrallis Comitis del Marchie ludentibus coram domino Priore. Cuidam ministrallo domini Regis veniente cum domino de Neuill. 12 ministrallis in festo Sci. Cuthb. in Sept. 4 ministrallis domini Principis in festo exaltacionis Sᶜᵉ. Crucis. Cuidam ministrallo in festo Sᶜⁱ. Mathaei. Ministrallis in festo Sᶜⁱ. Cuthb. in Marcio anno Domini, &c. lxxvᵗᵒ. Duobus ministrallis in die Pasche.

1376-7. Willielmo Fergos et Rogero Harpour caeco ad Natale Domini. Aliis ministrallis domini de Percy in eadem fest.

1377-8. Haraldis, histrionibus et nunciis, ut patet per cedulam.

1378-9. Histrionibus ... dominorum Regis, Ducis, et aliorum dominorum.

1380-1. Iohanni Momford ministrallo domini Regis.

1381-2. Ministrallis domini de Neuill apud Beaurepaire cum domina de Lomly. Ministrallo domini Ducis cum uno saltante in camera domini Prioris. (and others.)

1384-5. Ministrallis domini Regis.

1394-5. Ministrallis in festo S. Cuthb., Henrici Percy, domini Ducis Lancastr., domini de Neuill, Ducis Eborac., de Scocia, comitis Canciae, ad Nat. Domini, de Hilton, Ric. Brome ministrallo, in fest. S. Cuthb. in Marc. Uni Trompet domini Regis. Uni Rotour de Scocia.

1395. Item, in vino, speciebus, in donis datis Confratribus, ministrallis et aliis diversis, ex curialitate (F. P. cxv).

1399-1400. Ministrallis.

1401-2. Ministrallis.

1416-7. Ministrallis. Diversis pueris ludentibus coram eodem priore in festo Sᶜⁱ. Stephani hoc anno.

1441-2. Per ... capellanum [et] ... per bursarium ministrallis domini Regis et aliorum dominorum supervenientibus.

1446-7. Ministrallis.

1449-50. Ministrallis.

1464-5. Et solvit Iohanni Andrewson et sociis suis operantibus pro nova tectura unius camerae vocatae le Playerchambre (F. P. ccxcv).

1465. Item j por de ferro in camera Prioris, j in le plaer cha ... (F. P. ccxcviii).

1496. Paid to Robert Walssch for two days playing John Gibson of Elvet ‘herper’ (D. H. B. 340).

1532-3. ... bus lusoribus ... Regis, in regardis, in auro, 15ˢ. Et custodi ursorum et cimearum dominae Principis. Et capellano, per bursarium, pro 4 lusoribus domini Comitis de Darby, in auro, 7ˢ. 6ᵈ. (D. H. B. 143, the last two items crossed out).

1536-7. In diversis donis datis ministrallis diversorum dominorum.

1538. Paid to the ministrels (ministrallis) at ‘le musters’ upon ‘le Gelymore.’

1539-40. Paid to the players (lusoribus) of Auklande at Christmas before Master Hyndley, as a present (D. H. B. 340).

1554-5. [Cathedral Account.] Paid for two mynstralles.

II. MAXSTOKE PRIORY.

[Printed by Hazlitt-Warton, ii. 97, ‘ex orig. penes me.’]

‘In the Prior’s accounts of the Augustine canons of Maxstoke in Warwickshire, of various years in the reign of Henry VI (1422-61), one of the styles or regular heads is De Ioculatoribus et Mimis....

Ioculatori in septimana S. Michaelis, ivᵈ. Citharistae tempore natalis domini et aliis iocatoribus, ivᵈ. Mimis de Solihull, viᵈ. Mimis de Coventry, xxᵈ. Mimo domini Ferrers, viᵈ. Lusoribus de Eton, viiiᵈ. Lusoribus de Coventry, viiiᵈ. Lusoribus de Daventry, xiiᵈ. Mimis de Coventry, xiiᵈ. Mimis domini de Asteley, xiiᵈ. Item iiij mimis domini de Warewyck, xᵈ. Mimo caeco, iiᵈ. Sex mimis domini de Clynton. Duobus mimis de Rugeby, xᵈ. Cuidam citharistae, viᵈ. Mimis domini de Asteley, xxᵈ. Cuidam citharistae, viᵈ. Citharistae de Coventry, viᵈ. Duobus citharistis de Coventry, viiiᵈ. Mimis de Rugeby, viiiᵈ. Mimis domini de Buckeridge, xxᵈ. Mimis domini de Stafford, iiˢ. Lusoribus de Coleshille, viijᵈ.... [1432] Dat. duobus mimis de Coventry in die consecrationis Prioris, xiiᵈ.’

III. THETFORD PRIORY.

[From Collier, i. 55, 84, on the authority of a ‘MS. of the expenses of the Priory of Thetford, from 1461 to 1540, lately in the collection of Mr. Craven Orde, and now of the Duke of Newcastle.’]

‘The mention of “plays” and “players” does not begin until the 13ᵗʰ of Henry VII; but “Minstrels” and “Waytes” are often spoken of there as receiving rewards from the convent. The following entries, regarding “plays” and “players,” occur between the 13ᵗʰ and 23ʳᵈ of Henry VII:—

13 Henry VII [1497-8]. Itᵐ. sol. in regard 12 capital plays, 4ˢ. Itᵐ. sol. to menstrell and players in festo Epiphaniae, 2ˢ.

19 Henry VII [1503-4]. Itᵐ. sol. to the play of Mydenale, 12ᵈ.

21 Henry VII [1505-6]. Itᵐ. sol. in regard lusoribus et menstrall, 17ᵈ.

23 Henry VII [1507-8]. Itᵐ. sol. in regard lusoribus div. vices, 3ˢ 4ᵈ. Itᵐ. sol. in regard to Ixworth play, 16ᵈ. Itᵐ. sol. in regard to Schelfanger play, 4ᵈ.

... From the 1ˢᵗ to the 31ˢᵗ Henry VIII, the King’s players, the King’s jugglers, the King’s minstrels, and the King’s bearwards were visitors of Thetford, and were paid various sums, from 4ᵈ to 6ˢ 8ᵈ, by the Prior of the convent there, as appears by the entries in the account-book during that period. On one occasion, 16 Henry VIII, Cornyshe, “the master of the King’s chapel,” was paid 3ˢ 4ᵈ by the prior; but he was then, probably, attendant upon the King, who is not unfrequently spoken of as having arrived, and being lodged at the Priory. Mr. Brandon and Mr. Smith are more than once rewarded as “Jugglers of the King.” The Queen’s players, the Prince’s players, and the players of the Queen of France, also experienced the liberality of the Prior, as well as those of the Duke of Norfolk, the Duke of Suffolk, the Earl and Countess of Derby, Lord and Lady Fitzwater, the Lord Privy Seal, the Lord Chancellor, Sir Thomas Challoner and two gentlemen who are called Marks and Barney.’

IV. WINCHESTER COLLEGE.

[Extracts from computi partly by Hazlitt-Warton, ii. 98, and partly by M. E. C. Walcott, William of Wykeham and his Colleges, 206. The satrapae of 1466 and 1479 are said by Mr. Walcott to have been local notables, but a collation to them would not cost so little or be grouped with rewards to minstrels in the computus. Ducange says that the word is used ‘pro quodam ministro vel satellite.’ The Magdalen accounts use it for the ‘serjeants’ of the mayor of Oxford (Macray, Register, i. 15).]

1400. In dono lusoribus civitatis Wynton venient. ad collegium cum suo tripudio ex curialitate, xijᵈ.

1412. In dat. Ricᵒ. Kent bochier tempore regno suo vocat. Somerkyng, xijᵈ.

1415. In dat. diversis hominibus de Ropley venientibus ad coll. die Sanct. Innoc. et tripudiantibus et cantantibus in aula coram Epō. scholarium, xxᵈ.

1422. Dat. histrioni dⁿⁱ epi Wynton et ioculatori ejusdem 5ᵗⁱ die Ianuarii, cuilibet, xxᵈ.

1425. Dat. Gloucester ioculatori ludenti coram custode et sociis penultimo die Iulii, ob reverentiam ducis Exon. xijᵈ.

1426. Dat. ministrellis d. epi Wynton tempore Nat. Dni. ex curialitate et honestate, ijˢ viiiᵈ. Dat. ij ministrallis comitissae de Westmorland vęnient’ ad coll. xxᵈ.

1433. In dat. mimis dⁿⁱ cardinalis venient’ ad collegium erga festum natale Dⁿⁱ iiijˢ.

1462. Dat’ Epo Nicholatensi visitanti Dominum custodem in hospitio suo de nocte Sᵗⁱ. Nicholai, iiijᵈ.

1464. Et in dat. ministrallis comitis Kanciae venient. ad coll. in mense Iulii, iiijˢ iiijᵈ.

1466. Et in dat. satrapis Wynton venientibus ad coll. festo Epiphaniae, cum ijˢ dat. iiij. interludentibus et J. Meke citharistae eodem festo, iiijˢ.

1467. Et in datis iiijᵒʳ mimis dom. de Arundell venient. ad coll. xiij. die Febr. ex curialitate dom. custodis, ijˢ. In dat. Ioh. Pontisbery et socio ludentibus in aula in die circumcisionis, ijˢ.

1471. In dat. uni famulo dⁿⁱ regis Angliae venienti ad collegium cum Leone mense Ianuarii, xxᵈ.

1472. Et in dat. ministrallis dom. Regis cum viijᵈ. dat. duobus Berewardis ducis Clarentiae, xxᵈ. Et in dat. Iohanni Stulto quondam dom. de Warewyco, cum iiijᵈ dat. Thomae Nevyle taborario. Et in datis duobus ministrallis ducis Glocestriae, cum iiijᵈ. dat. uni ministrallo ducis de Northumberland, viijᵈ. Et in datis duobus citharatoribus ad vices venient. ad collegium viijᵈ.

1477. Et in dat. ministrallis dom. Principis venient. ad coll. festo Ascensionis Domini, cum xxᵈ. dat. ministrallis dom. Regis, vˢ.

1479. Et in datis satrapis Wynton venientibus ad coll. festo Epiphaniae, cum xijᵈ dat. ministrallis dom. episcopi venient. ad coll. infra octavas epiphaniae, iiiˢ. Dat. lusoribus de civitate Winton. venientibus ad collegium in apparatu suo mens. Iulii, vˢ vijᵈ.

1481. Et in sol. ministrallis dom. regis venientibus ad collegium xv die Aprilis cum xijᵈ solut. ministrallis dom. episcopi Wynton venientibus ad collegium iᵒ die Iunii, iiijˢ iiijᵈ. Et in dat. ministrallis dom. Arundell ven. ad coll. cum viijᵈ dat. ministrallis dom. de la Warr, ijˢ iijᵈ.

1483. Sol. ministrallis dom. regis, ven. ad coll. iijˢ iiijᵈ.

1484. Et in dat. uni ministrallo dom. principis et in aliis ministrallis ducis Glocestriae v die Iulii, xxᵈ.

1536. In dat. ministrallis dⁿⁱ regis venientibus ad coll. xiij die April pro regardo, ijˢ.

1573. In regardis dat’ tibicinis dominae reginae cum vino, vijˢ iiijᵈ. In regardis dat. lusoribus dominae reginae, vjˢ viijᵈ.

V. MAGDALEN COLLEGE, OXFORD.

[Extracts from account books made by J. R. Bloxam and W. D. Macray, _A Register of the Members of St. Mary Magdalen College, Oxford_, First Series, ii. 235; New Series, i. 3; ii. 3. The dates given below are for the year in which the account begins.]

1481. pro cerothecis pro chorustis, iiijᵈ.

1482. vᵒ die Decembris pro cerothecis episcopi in festo S. Nicholai iiijᵈ.

1483. pro cerothecis datis ad honorem Sancti Nicolai duobus choristis, viijᵈ.

1484. pro cerothecis Episcopi in festo Sancti Nicholai et eius crucem ferentis, viijᵈ.

1485. ‘Ursarii’ of Lord Stanley dined with the Fellows.

1486. pro factura sepulturae erga pascham, xijᵈ. ‘Sex vagatores’ dined with the servants. Solut. viᵒ die Ian. citharistis et mimis tempore ludi in aula in regardo, in tempore Nativitatis Domini, viijᵈ. Solut. pro quodam ornamento lusorum vocato ly Cape mayntenawnce, ixᵈ.

1487. pro vestimentis lusorum tempore Nativ. Domini, consilio unius decani, iiˢ ijᵈ. pro clavis ad pannos in ornatum aulae pendendos, jᵈ.

1488. Sol. Iohanni Wynman pro scriptura unius libri de servicio episcopi pro die Innocencium, vᵈ.

1490. Singers from Abingdon, London and Hereford entertained.

1494. Sol. Pescode servanti quandam bestiam vocatam ly merumsytt ex consilio seniorum, quia Rex erat apud Woodstocke, xijᵈ.

1495. Sol. Henrico Mertyn pro lino, alyn, et aliis emptis pro ludo in die Paschae, xvijᵈ ob. Sol. Pescod ducenti duo animalia nuncupata mermosettes.

1502. Sol. in expensis factis tempore Nativitatis Domini, in biberiis post interludia et alia, xiijˢ iiijᵈ.

1506. To John Burgess, B.A., ... xᵈ were paid for writing out a miracle-play (‘scriptura lusi’) of Sᵗ. Mary Magd., and vˢ. for some music; and viijᵈ to a man who brought some songs from Edward Martyn, M.A. For his diligence with regard to the above miracle-play, Kendall, a clerk, was rewarded with iˢ. pro expensis mimi, iiijˢ, at Christmas.

1507. in quatuor refectionibus citharistae, at Epiphany.

1508. Sol. famulo Regis ducenti ursam ad collegium, ex mandato Vice-presidentis, xijᵈ.

1509. Sol. pane, cibo et aliis datis pueris ludentibus in die Paschae, mandato Vicepr. xvijᵈ ob.

1510. Sol. pro expensis factis in aula tempore Nativitatis Domini, xiijˢ iiijᵈ. Sol. cuidam mimo tempore Nativitatis Domini in regardo, viijᵈ.

1512. Sol. Petro Pyper pro pypyng in interludio nocte Sancti Iohannis, vjᵈ. Sol. Iohanni Tabourner pro lusione in interludio Octavis Epiphaniae, vjᵈ. Sol. Roberto Johnson pro una tunica pro interludiis, iiijˢ.

1514. pro carnibus [? carbonibus] consumptis in capella tribus noctibus ante Pascha et in tempore Nativitatis, ijˢ.

1518. To Perrot, the Master of the choristers, ‘pro tinctura et factura tunicae eius qui ageret partem Christi et pro crinibus mulieribus, ijˢ vjᵈ.’

1520. pro pane ... datis clericis in vigiliis Sᵗⁱ. Nicolai. pro cerothecis puerorum in festo Sancti Nicolai.

1526. pro merendis datis episcopo capellanis clericis et aliis in vigilia Sᵗ. Nicolai.

1529. pro ... episcopo Nicholai.

1530. pro pueris in festo Sancti Nicholai.

1531. Solut. mimis dominae principisshae, xxᵈ. Pro biberio dato sociis et scolaribus post interludia in tempore Natalis Domini, vjˢ viijᵈ.

1532. To the Queen’s players, by the President’s order, xiiᵈ. pro biberio dato sociis post ludum baccalaureorum in magna aula, vjˢ viijᵈ.

1535. pro merenda facta in vigilia Sancti Nicolai. Actors at Christmas, iiiiˢ iiijᵈ. pro merenda facta post comediam actam, ixˢ iijᵈ. ‘ioculatoribus Regis,’ by the President’s order, xxᵈ.

1536. pro biberio in nocte Sancti Nicholai. Sol. mimo pro solatiis factis sociis et scholasticis tempore Nativitatis Domini, viijˢ.

1537. pro carbonibus consumptis in sacrario, per custodes sepulchri, et per pueros in festis hiemalibus, ijˢ [and in other years].

1539. pro bellariis datis sociis cum ageretur comedia, viijˢ.

1540. pro epulis datis sociis eo tempore quo agebatur tragedia, viijˢ iiijᵈ. pro bellariis datis sociis et clericis vigilia divi Nicolai, iiijˢ viijᵈ. pro pane et potu datis semicommunariis dum curabant publicam exhibere comediam, xxᵈ.

1541. A ‘tympanista’ was hired at Christmas and comedies acted.

1554. 30 Ian. in adventu [dom. Matravers] ad tragedias per duas noctes, xlijˢ viijᵈ ob. Pro epulis datis sociis post exactas tragedias, xˢ ixᵈ.

The only Elizabethan entry I need note is:—

1561. Sol. Joyner, pictori, depingenti portenta religiosorum in spectaculo Baulino, iijˢ iiijᵈ ... depingenti nomina haeresium in spectaculo (in aula) quod choristarum moderator [Richard Baull] ordinavit.

VI. SHREWSBURY CORPORATION.

[Extracts from the Bailiffs’ accounts by Owen and Blakeway, Hist. of Shrewsbury (1825), i. 262, 267, 275, 284, 290, 292, 325 sqq.; and by W. D. Macray in Hist. MSS. xv. 10. 25. It is not always clear to which calendar year an entry belongs. The accounts run from Michaelmas to Michaelmas, but Owen and Blakeway generally quote entries under one calendar year and sometimes under one regnal year.]

1401. ‘Histriones’ of the Prince and the Earl of Stafford. ‘Menstralles’ of the Earls of Worcester and Stafford.

1409. Players [i.e. in these early accounts, ‘histriones,’ not ‘lusores’] of the countess and earl of Arundel, of Lord Powis, Lord Talbot, and Lord Furnivall. Players ‘in honorem villae’ at the marriage of a cousin of David Holbache.

1437. Minstrels of earl of Stafford.

1438. Livery to two town minstrels, ‘voc. waytes.’

1442. Some town minstrels called ‘histriones.’ In same year, ‘histrionibus regis,’ and in subsequent years ‘histrionibus’ of earl of Shrewsbury and others, including one ‘voc. Trumpet.’

1450. Players and minstrels at coming of duke of York from Ireland.

1457. Denaria soluta uni ministrallo domini principis [Edward] pro honestate villae. Quatuor ministrallis domini ducis de Bukyngham. Duobus ministrallis d’ni de Powys. 1 lagenae vini de Ruyn dictis ministrallis. Denaria data uni ministrallo d’ni principis et suo puero. iiij. ministrallis d’ni ducis de Eboraco. iv. ministrellis d’ni ducis de Excestro.

1474. Regardo ministrallis d’ni ducis de Clarence.

1478. Waltero Harper ministrallo d’ni principis. Regardo dato uni ministrallo ducis Gloucestris vocato le Taborer. Regardo sex ministrallis d’ni Regis.

1479. Soluta pro liberata ministrallorum vocatorum Wayts, quilibet eorum. Soluta pro conductu unius ministralli vocati Wayt a villa de Norhampton usque Salop. Soluta pro quodam regardo dato uni ministrallo d’ni Regis via elemosinaria causa eius paupertatis et aetatis.

[From this point histriones replaces ministralli in the accounts.]

1483. Soluta pro quodam regardo dato sex histrionibus domini Regis pro honestate villae. Pro vino dato dictis histrionibus in praesencia ballivorum et aliorum proborum hominum pro honestate villae. Pro liberatura communium histrionum vocatorum le Wayts villae. Soluta ursenario domini Regis pro honestate villae.

1495. Pro vino dato domino Principi [Arthur] ad ludum in quarell.

1496. Wine given to the minstrels of our Lord the King. To the King’s minstrels. To the Queen’s minstrels. To the Prince’s players. To the Earl of Derby’s players. To the Earl of Shrewsbury’s players.

1503. In regardo dato ij Walicis histrionibus domini Regis.

1510. ‘Lusoribus’ in feast of Pentecost. ‘Histrionibus’ of Earl of Shrewsbury and King.

1516. In vino, pomis, waffers, et aliis novellis datis et expenditis super abbatem Salop et famulos suos ad ludum et demonstrationem martiriorum Felicianae et Sabinae in quarera post muros. In regardo dato lusoris eiusdem martirii tunc temporis hoc anno.

1517. Regardo ursinario comitis Oxoniae. In regardo dato ursinario domini Regis pro agitacione bestiarum suarum ultra denarios tunc ibidem collectos.

1518. In vino expendito super tres reges Coloniae equitantibus in interludio pro solacio villae Salop in festo Pentecost.

1520. Ralph Hubard, minstrel of Lord de ‘Mountegyle.’ In regardo dato iiijᵒʳ interlusoribus comitis Arundele ostendentibus ballivis et comparibus suis diversa interludia. Et in vino dato eis et aliis extraneis personis intuentibus interludia, ultra denarios collectos. In regardo dato histrionibus Iohannis Talbot militis pro melodia eorum facta in presencia ballivorum. In regardo dato iij histrionibus comitis Arundelle pro honestate villae Salop. In regardo dato Benet & Welles histrionibus comitis Salop. In regardo ij histrionibus comitissae de Derby pro honestate villae Salop. Et in vino expendito per ballivos et compares suos audientes melodiam eorum. Histrionibus domini Regis ex consuetudine. In regardo dato et vino expendito super Willelmum More histrionem domini Regis eo quod est caecus et principalis citherator Angliae.

1521. Regardo dato M. Brandon ioculatori domini Regis pro honestate villae Et in vino expendito par ballivos & compares suos videntes lusum et ioculationem dicti ioculatoris ultra ij denarios collectos de qualibet persona villae extraneis exceptis. Soluta pro una roba nova depicta, sotularibus & aliis necessariis regardis & expensis factis super Ricardum Glasyer, abbatem de Marham, pro honestate & iocunditate villae. In regardo dato portitori communis campanae circa villam pro proclamacione facta pro attendencia facienda super abbatem de Marham tempore Maii hoc anno. In regardo dato iiijᵒʳ histrionibus domini Regis de consuetudine. Histrionibus comitis Derby. Regardo dato ursinario ducis Suffolke ultra 2ˢ. 3ᵈ. de pecuniis collectis de circumstantibus ad agitacionem ursarum suarum. Pro ursinario domini marchionis Dorsett.

1522. ‘Ursenarius’ of duke of Suffolk. In regardo dato ioculatori domini Regis.

1524. ‘Histrio’ of Henry Knight. ‘Histriones’ of Earl of Derby. ‘Histriones’ of Lord Mount Egle.

1525. In regardo dato iiij histrionibus comitis Arundell. Et in vino expendito super ballivos & compares suos audientes melodiam et ludentes inspicientes. In regardo dato iiijᵒʳ interlusoribus ducis Suffolk. Interludes of the Lady Princess, and wine spent at hearing their interludes.

1526. In regardo dato custodi cameli domini Regis ostendenti ballivis et comparibus suis ioca illius cameli. Interlusoribus dominae principissae. Ralph Hubard, minstrel of Lord de ‘Mountegyle,’ with one Lokkett.

1527. In regardo dato lusoribus villae tempore veris et mensis Maii pro iocunditate villae. Interlusoribus dominae principissae. Interluders of our Lord the King. ‘Histriones,’ of Sir John Talbot, Arthur Neuton and Sir John Lyngen.

1528. ‘Ursenarius’ of marquis of Exeter.

1530. ‘Histrio’ of baron of Burford.

1531. Data interlusoribus dominae principissae.

1533. Soluta Thomae Eton pro factura unius mansionis de duobus stagiis pro domino presidenti [Bishop of Exeter] et ballivis tempore ludi septimana Pentecostes. Et in regardo dato lusoribus ad dictum lusum et pro reparacione ornamentorum suorum. In vino dato domino presidenti & ballivis in mansione sua tempore lusi in Quarrera pone muros. In regardo dato lusoribus & interlusoribus domini Regis ostendentibus & offerentibus ioca sua. Et in vino expendito super eos et comitivam ballivorum & comparium suorum audientium & supervidentium lusum & melodiam eorum. In expensis factis in garniamentis, liberatis et histrion[ibus] pro domino abbate de Marham tempore mensis Maii pro honestate villae hoc anno.

1535. In regardo m[agistro] Brandon, ioculatori domini Regis. In regardo dato histrionibus extraneis melodiam et cantilenas eorum coram ballivis et comparibus pronunciantibus.

1538. Data in regardo lusoribus domini privati sigilli. Data in regarda lusoribus domini principis [Edward]. Expendita super lusores domini principis, domini privati sigilli, domini visitatoris ... pro honestate villae. ‘Histriones’ of Sir Thomas Cornewall and of Thomas Newport. Rogero Philipps, goldsmyth, pro argento et emendacione colarium histrionum villae. ‘Ursenarius’ of marquis of Exeter.

1540. Data in regardo quibusdam interlusoribus de Wrexam ludentibus coram ballivis et comparibus suis in vino tunc expendito. ‘Item, Mr. Bayleffes left on pᵈ more the same day at aftʳ the play. ‘Item, the vj men spend appon the kyng’s pleyers in wyne. ‘Item, there was left on pᵈ by Mr. Bayleffs wᵗ my Lorde Prinssys plears on Sonday after Seint Bartlaumew day. ‘Item, there was sent them the nyght to supper a poˡ of red and a poˡ of claret. ‘Item, Mr. Bayleffs left on pᵈ on Sonday after owre Lade day wyth my Lord Prinsys plears.’ Cuidam iugulatori ludenti coram ballivis.

1541. ‘Ursenario ducis Norfoxiae.’

1542. In vino dato interlusoribus post interlusum in cimitirio sancti Cedde coram commissariis domini Regis ballivis et aliis. Cuidem ursuario de la Northewiche. Ursiatori praepotentis viri comitis Derby ad ij tempora. Pro reparacione et pictura ornamentorum abbatis de Mayvole. Et soluta pro una toga de nova facta dicto abbati de Mayvole. Soluta Ricardo Glasier pro labore suo in ludendo abbatem de Mardall.

1548. Interlusoribus ludentibus cum domino abbate de Marall. Soluta Iohanni Mason, peynter, pro pictura togae pro dicto domino de Marrall. In regardo istrionibus ludentibus ante viros armatos. Cuidam istrioni ludenti ante viros equiles equitantes ad Scociam.

1549. James Lockwood ‘servienti et gestatori domini Regis.’ Interluders of Sir John Bridges and of Sir Edward Braye. William Taylor, and others, interluders of the town of Salop, playing there in the month of May. ‘Histriones’ of William Sheldon and of Lord Ferrers [last use of term histrio].

1552. Interluders of Lord Russell. Soluta domino de abbott Marram et pro apparatu eorum videlicet pro calciamentis tunicis et aliis vestibus.

1553. Expendita per ballivos et associatos suos die lunae in le Whitson wuck post visum lusum. Pro tunicis et aliis vestimentis ac pistura eorundem pro Robyn Hood. In vino dato eisdem interlusoribus. In regardo le tomlers.

1554. In regardo Thomae Staney le jugler. Wyett le gester.

1559. Regardo lusiatoribus domini Stafford.

1561. Item, gyvyn unto my lord Wyllybe’s playarys in reward. Item, spent at the gullet on the saem playarys.

1565. To Master Baly Pursell with the Quenes players.

1566. Yeven Mr. Justes Throgmerton’s mynstrell.

1574. Paid and geven to my L. Sandwayes man, the berwart. The players of noblemen and others and ber-wards of noblemen and mynstrells of noblemen, this yere, viiiˡⁱ xˢ viijᵈ.

1576. Leid out to my lord of Derby and my lord Staffart’s musicions.

1582. Bestowed on her Majesty’s players this yere.

1591. To my lord of Derby’s musysyons, and to the erle of Woster’s players ... to my L. Beachem men, beinge players.

[From Books of Council Orders in Hist. MSS. xv. 13, 16, 18.]

1556. 16 May. The bailiffs to set forward the stage play this next Whitsontide for the worship of the town and not to disburse above £5 about the furniture of the play.

1570. 8 July. Lease of pasture ‘behind the walles, exceptinge the Quarrell where the plases have bine accustomyd to be usyd.’

1575. 17 July. Five marks to be given to Mr. Churchyard for his pains taken in setting forth the show against the Queen’s coming, being sent hither by the Lord President.

VII. THE HOWARDS OF STOKE-BY-NAYLAND, ESSEX.

[From accounts of Sir John Howard, in Manners and Household Expenses (Roxburghe Club, 1841), 325, 511.]

2 May, 1465. Item that he [my master] delyverd the pleyers at Moleyns [a servant of Sir John’s] weddynge, ijˢ.

12 Jan. 1466. And the sonday nexte after the xij day, I ȝafe to the pleyeres of Stoke, ijˢ.

[From accounts of John, Lord Howard, afterwards Duke of Norfolk, in _Household Books of John, Duke of Norfolk, and Thomas, Earl of Surrey_ (ed. Collier, Roxburghe Club, 1844), 104, 145, 146, 148, 149, 202, 336, 339.]

29 Aug. 1481. I paid to the pleirs of Turton [Thorington] Strete, xxᵈ.

26 Dec. 1481. Item, the xxvj day of December, my Lord toke the Plaiers of Kokesale [Coggeshall], iijˢ iiijᵈ.

27 Dec. 1481. Item, to the Plaiers of Hadley [Hadleigh], and the olde man and ij. children, vjˢ viijᵈ.

7 Jan. 1482. Item, to the Plaiers of Esterforde, iijˢ iiijᵈ.

9 Jan. 1482. Item, to Senclowe, that he paid to my Lord of Essex [Henry Bourchier] men, plaiers, xxᵈ. Thei are of Canans.

22 May, 1482. Item, that my Lord yaffe to the cherche on Whitson Monday at the pley, xˢ.

25 Dec. 1482. Item, on Crystemas day, my Lord gaff to iiij pleyers of my lord of Gloucestres, iijˢ iiijᵈ. Item, the same day, my Lord gaff to iiij pleyers of Coksale, iijˢ iiijᵈ.

9 Jan. 1483. Item, the same day, my Lord paid to Garard, of Sudbury, for all suche stoffe as folewyth, that he bought for the Dysgysing [a schedule of paper, gunpowder, ‘arsowde,’ pack-thread, &c., follows]. Summe totall, xxjˢ ob.

[From accounts of Thomas, Earl of Surrey, in Household Books (ut supra), 515, 517, 519.]

20 Dec. 1490. Payd for xviij yardes of lynen cloth, that M. Leynthorpe had for dysgysyng, at iiijᵈ the yard, ... vjˢ iiijᵈ.

[Other expenses for the disguising follow.]

27 Dec. 1490. Item, payd to the playars of Chemsford, vjˢ. viijᵈ.

2 Jan. 1491. Item, the said day, in reward to the panget [pageant (?)], iijˢ iiijᵈ. Item, payd to ——, when he went to Bury to fach stuff for dygysers on Saynt Stevens day, xvjᵈ.

8 Jan. 1492. Item, in reward to the players of Lanam [Lavenham], xlˢ.

[The Howard accounts also include many payments for minstrelsy, &c. The Duke of Norfolk kept singers, a harper, children of the chapel, and two fools, ‘Tom Fool’ and Richard, ‘the fool of the kitchen.’]

VIII. THE ENGLISH COURT.

[From Rymer, Foedera, x. 387. A memorandum de strenis, liberatis et expensis, at Christmas, 1427.]

A Jakke Travail et ses compaignons feisans diverses jeuues et entreludes dedeins le feste de Noell devant notre dit sire le roi, 4 lib.

Et as autres jeweis de Abyndon feisantz autres entreludes dedeins le dit feste de Noel, 20 sol.

[Extracted by Collier, i. 50, from the Household Book of Henry VII, 1491-1505, and the Book of King’s Payments, 1506-9. I cannot identify the former; the latter appears to be vol. 214 of the Miscellanea of the Treasury of the Receipt of the Exchequer (Scargill-Bird, Guide to the Public Records, 228). I omit, here and below, entries referring to minstrelsy, disguisings, and plays by the King’s players and the Chapel. Probably some of the performances were given at London; others before the King on progress. I have corrected some of Collier’s dates from the similar entries in Bentley, Excerpta Historica, 85, taken from a transcript in B. M. Add. MS. 7099.]

1 Jan. 1492. To my Lorde of Oxon pleyers, in rewarde, £1.

7 Jan. 1493. To my Lorde of Northumberlande Pleyers, in rewarde, £1.

1 Jan. 1494. To four Pleyers of Essex in rewarde, £1. To the Pleyers of Wymborne Minster, £1.

6 Jan. 1494. To the Frenche Pleyers for a rewarde, £1.

31 Dec. 1494. To 3 Pleyers of Wycombe in rewarde, 13ˢ 4ᵈ.

4 Jan. 1495. To the Frenshe Pleyers in rewarde, £2.

20 July, 1498. To the pleyers of London in rewarde, 10ˢ.

14 June, 1499. To the pleyers with Marvells, £4.

6 Aug. 1501. To the Pleyers at Myles End, 3ˢ 4ᵈ.

2 Jan. 1503. To the Pleyers of Essex in rewarde, £1.

20 May, 1505. To the Players of Kingeston toward the bilding of the churche steple, in almasse, 3ˢ 4ᵈ.

1 Jan. 1506. To the players that played afore the Lord Stewarde in the Hall opon Sonday nyght, 6ˢ 8ᵈ. To my lorde Princes players that played in hall on new-yeres even, 10ˢ.

25 Dec. 1506. To the Players that played affore the Lord Stewarde in the Hall opon Tewesday nyght, 10ˢ.

2 Jan. 1509. To my lord of Buckingham’s pleyers that playd in the Hall at Grenewich, 6ˢ 8ᵈ.

[Extracted by Collier, i. 76, from the _Book of King’s Payments_ for 1509-17, now vol. 215 of the _Miscellanea of the Treasury of the Receipt of the Exchequer_. The document is more fully analysed in Brewer, ii. 1441. It is an account of the Treasurer of the Chamber.]

6 Jan. 1512. To the Players that cam out of Suffolke, that playd affore the Lorde Stewarde in the Kings Hall opon Monday nyght, 13ˢ 4ᵈ.

1 Jan. 1515. To the Erle of Wiltyshires playres, that shulde have played in the Kings Hall oppon Thursday at nyght, in rewarde, 13ˢ 4ᵈ.

1 Jan. 1516. To the Erle of Wilshire’s players, 13ˢ 4ᵈ.

[From Accounts of Treasurer of Chamber in Trevelyan Papers (C.S.), i. 146, 161, 174.]

1 Jan. 1530. To the Prince’s plaiers.

1 Jan. 1531. To the Princes pleyers. Item, paid to certain Players of Coventrye, as in wey of the Kinges rewarde, for playnge in the Corte this last Cristmas.

1 Jan. 1532. To the Princesse plaiers.

F

MINSTREL GUILDS

A. FRANCE.

1. Arras, †1105.

The famous Pui d’Arras (vols. i. p. 376, ii. p. 88) was in a sense a minstrel guild. According to tradition a plague was stayed by a simultaneous apparition of the Virgin in a dream to two minstrels, which led to the acquisition of ‘le joyel d’Arras,’ the miraculous ‘cierge de notre Dame.’ This was about 1105, and the result was the foundation of the Confrérie or Carité de N. D. des Ardents, which afterwards developed into the pui. This was not confined to minstrels, but they were predominant. The Statutes say, ‘Ceste carité est estorée des jogleors, et les jogleors en sont signors[680].’ The objects of the pui, however, were religious, social, and literary. It was not a craft guild, such as grew up two centuries later.

2. Paris, 1321.

Ordinances were made in 1321 ‘à l’acort du commun des menestreus et menestrelles, jougleurs et jougleresses’ of Paris for the reformation of their ‘mestier,’ and registered with the provost of Paris in 1341. They chiefly regulate the employment of minstrels within the city. The ‘mestres du dit mestier’ are to be ‘ii ou iii preudes hommes’ appointed by the provost on behalf of the King. A number of ‘guètes’ and other minstrels sign, beginning with ‘Pariset, menestrel le roy,’ and ending with ‘Jaque le Jougleur.’ As a possible head of the ‘mestier’ is named ‘li prevost de Saint-Julian.’ This seems to contemplate the foundation of the hospice et confrérie under the patronage of SS. Julian and Genesius, and in close connexion with the ‘mestier,’ which actually took place 1328-35. But in the later Statutes of 1407 the head of the guild is called the ‘roy des ménestriers,’ and as by this time the guild seems to claim some authority over the whole of France, it is probable that this ‘roy’ was identical with the ‘roy des menestreuls du royaume de France,’ a title which occurs in various documents from 1338 onwards. He may also have been identical with the ‘roy’ of the King’s household minstrels (cf. p. 239). The Paris guild lasted until the suppression of all such privileged bodies in 1776[681].

3. Chauny.

The corporation of ‘les Trompettes jougleurs’ of Chauny was founded during the fifteenth century. This town claimed to provide bateleurs for all the north of France[682].

B. ENGLAND.

There are two early jurisdictions over minstrelsy, which are not strictly of the nature of guilds.

1. Chester.

Tradition has it that †1210 Randal Blundeville, Earl of Chester, besieged by the Welsh in Rhuddlan Castle, was relieved by Roger Lacy, constable of Cheshire, with a mob of riff-raff from Chester Midsummer fair. Randal gave to Lacy, and Lacy’s son John gave to his steward Hugh de Dutton and his heirs the ‘magistratum omnium leccatorum et meretricum totius Cestriae.’ The fact of the jurisdiction is undoubted. It was reserved by the charter to the London guild in 1469, claimed by Laurence de Dutton in 1499, admitted upon an action of quo warranto as a right ‘from time immemorial,’ further reserved in the first Vagrant Act (1572) which specifically included minstrels, and in the successive Acts of 1597, 1603, 1628, 1641, 1713, 1740, 1744. It lapsed when this last Act was repealed in 1822. Up to 1756 the heir of Dutton regularly held his curia Minstralciae at Chester Midsummer fair, and issued licences to fiddlers in the city and county for a fee of 4½_d._, afterwards raised to 2_s._ 6_d._ Thomas Dutton (1569-1614), under puritan influences, inserted a proviso against piping and dancing on Sundays[683].

2. Tutbury.

Letters patent of John of Gaunt dated 1380 and confirmed by an ‘inspeximus’ of Henry VI in 1443 assigned ‘le roy des ministralx’ in the honour of Tutbury to arrest all minstrels within the honour not doing service on the feast of the Assumption. It was a custom that the prior of Tutbury should provide a bull for a bull-running by the assembled minstrels on this feast. The court was still held by an annual ‘king of the fiddlers,’ with the steward and bailiff of the honour (including Staffs., Derby, Notts., Leicester, and Warwick), at the end of the seventeenth century, and the minstrels claimed to be exempt, like those of Chester, from vagrancy legislation. But their rights were not reserved, either by the Charter of 1469 or the Vagrant Acts[684].

The first English craft guild of minstrels is later by a century and a half than that of Paris.

3. London.

A charter of Edward IV (1469), ‘ex querelosa insinuatione dilectorum nobis Walteri Haliday, marescalli [and seven others] ministrallorum nostrorum,’ declares that ‘nonnulli rudes Agricolae et Artifices diversarum Misterarum Regni nostri Angliae finxerunt se fore Ministrallos. Quorum aliqui Liberatam nostram, eis minime datam, portarunt, seipsos etiam fingentes esse Ministrallos nostros proprios. Cuius quidem Liberatae ac dictae Artis sive Occupationis Ministrallorum colore in diversis Partibus Regni nostri praedicti grandes Pecuniarum Exactiones de Ligeis nostris deceptive colligunt et recipiunt.’ Hence illegitimate competition with the real minstrels, decay of the art, and neglect of agriculture. The charter then does two things. It makes the royal minstrels a corporation with a marshall elected by themselves, and it puts them at the head of a ‘Fraternitatem sive Gildam’ of minstrels already existing in the chapel of the Virgin in St. Paul’s, and in the royal free chapel of St. Anthony. All minstrels in the country are to join this guild or be suppressed. It is to have two custodes and to make statutes and ordinances. The jurisdiction of Dutton over Chester minstrels is, as already stated, reserved[685]. A ‘serviens’ or ‘serjeant’ seems to have been an officer of the guild[686]. With this exception nothing more is heard of it until 1594, when a dispute as to the office of the Master of the Musicians’ Company called for the intervention of the Lord Keeper[687].’ In 1604 the Company received a new charter, which gave it jurisdiction within the city and a radius of three miles from its boundaries. It was further restricted to the city itself under Charles I. It still exists as the Corporation of the Master, Wardens, and Commonalty of the Art or Science of the Musicians of London[688].

The London guild would appear, from its peculiar relation to the royal household minstrels, and its claim to jurisdiction throughout the country, to have been modelled upon that of Paris. This claim was evidently not maintained, and in fact at least three other local guilds can be shown to have existed in the sixteenth century. A search, which I have not undertaken, would probably readily discover more.

4. Canterbury.

Ordinances, dated 1526, of the ‘felowshyp of the craft and mystery of mynstrells’ give the prerogative right to perform in the city to the members of this body, saving the privileges of the city waits, and ‘the King’s mynstrells, the Queane’s, my Lord Prince’s, or any honorable or wurshipfull mann’s mynstrells of thys realme[689].’

5. Beverley.

An order of the Governors of the city (1555) recites an old custom ‘since Athelstan’ of the choice by minstrels between Trent and Tweed of aldermen of their fraternities during Rogation days, and renews orders for the ‘fraternity of our Lady of the read arke in Beverley.’ The statutes deal with the employment of minstrels in Beverley, and with their ‘castells’ at the Rogation-day procession. A new member must be ‘mynstrell to some man of honour or worship or waite of some towne corporate or other ancient town or else of such honestye and conyng as shalbe thought laudable and pleasant to the hearers.’ It is claimed that such are excluded from the ‘Kyng’s acts where they speake of vacabonds and valiant beggers.’ Quite in the spirit of the London charter of 1469 it is ordered that ‘no myler shepherd or of other occupation or husbandman or husbandman servant’ shall assume the functions of a minstrel outside his own parish[690]. The earliest notice of this guild in the Beverley archives seems to be in 1557[691], but the terms of the order and the existence of pillars put up by the minstrels in fifteenth-century churches in Beverley[692] point to some informal earlier association.

6. York.

A craft of Mynstrells certainly existed by 1561, in which year they undertook the pageant of Herod at the Corpus Christi plays[693].

G

THOMAS DE CABHAM

[The following extract from a Penitential formerly ascribed to John of Salisbury, but now to Thomas de Cabham, Bishop of Salisbury (†1313), is printed by B. Hauréau, Notices et Extraits de Manuscrits, xxiv. 2, 284, from B. N. MSS. Lat. 3218 and 3529ᵃ, and by F. Guessard and C. Grandmaison, Huon de Bordeaux, vi., from B. N. Sorbonne MS. 1552, f. 71. The two texts differ in several points. According to Gautier, ii. 22, there are several similar thirteenth-century Penitentials, and it is difficult to say which was the original. The doctrine laid down about minstrels is often repeated in later treatises. See e.g. a passage from the fifteenth-century Le Jardin des Nobles in P. Paris, Manuscrits français, ii. 144.]

Tria sunt histrionum genera. Quidam transformant et transfigurant corpora sua per turpes saltus et per turpes gestus, vel denudando se turpiter, vel induendo horribiles larvas, et omnes tales damnabiles sunt, nisi reliquerint officia sua. Sunt etiam alii qui nihil operantur, sed criminose agunt, non habentes certum domicilium, sed sequuntur curias magnatum et dicunt opprobria et ignominias de absentibus ut placeant aliis. Tales etiam damnabiles sunt, quia prohibet Apostolus cum talibus cibum sumere, et dicuntur tales scurrae vagi, quia ad nihil utiles sunt, nisi ad devorandum et maledicendum. Est etiam tertium genus histrionum qui habent instrumenta musica ad delectandum homines, et talium sunt duo genera. Quidam enim frequentant publicas potationes et lascivas congregationes, et cantant ibi diversas cantilenas ut moveant homines ad lasciviam, et tales sunt damnabiles sicut alii. Sunt autem alii, qui dicuntur ioculatores, qui cantant gesta principum et vitam sanctorum, et faciunt solatia hominibus vel in aegritudinibus suis vel in angustiis, et non faciunt innumeras turpitudines sicut faciunt saltatores et saltatrices et alii qui ludunt in imaginibus inhonestis et faciunt videri quasi quaedam fantasmata per incantationes vel alio modo. Si autem non faciunt talia, sed cantant in instrumentis suis gesta principum et alia talia utilia ut faciant solatia hominibus, sicut supradictum est, bene possunt sustineri tales, sicut ait Alexander papa. Cum quidam ioculator quaereret ab eo utrum posset salvare animam suam in officio suo, quaesivit Papa ab eo utrum sciret aliquod aliud opus unde vivere posset: respondit ioculator quod non. Permisit igitur Papa quod ipse viveret de officio suo, dummodo abstineret a praedictis lasciviis et turpitudinibus. Notandum est quod omnes peccant mortaliter qui dant scurris vel leccatoribus vel praedictis histrionibus aliquid de suo. Histrionibus dare nichil aliud est quam perdere.

H

PRINCELY PLEASURES AT KENILWORTH

[From Robert Laneham’s Letter (ed. F. J. Furnivall for New Shakspere Society (1890); and in Nichols, Progresses of Elizabeth, i. 420) describing the entertainment of Elizabeth by the Earl of Leicester at Kenilworth, in July, 1575. G. Gascoigne, The Princelye Pleasures at the Courte at Kenelworth (1576, in Nichols, i. 502), leaves undescribed what he calls the ‘Coventrie’ (ed. 2, ‘Countrie’) shows.]

I. A SQUIRE MINSTREL.

Mary, syr, I must tell yoo: Az all endeuoour waz too mooue mirth & pastime (az I tolld ye): éeuen so a ridiculoous deuise of an auncient minstrell & hiz song waz prepared to haue been profferd, if méet time & place had béen foound for it. Ons in a woorshipfull company, whear, full appointed, he recoounted his matter in sort az it should haue been vttred, I chaunsed too be: what I noted, heer thus I tel yoo: A parson very méet séemed he for the purpoze, of a xlv. yéers olld, apparelled partly as he woold himself. Hiz cap of: his hed séemly roounded tonster wyze: fayr kemb, that with a spoonge deintly dipt in a littl capons greaz was finely smoothed too make it shine like a Mallard’s wing. Hiz beard smugly shauen: and yet hiz shyrt after the nu trink, with ruffs fayr starched, sléeked, and glistening like a payr of nu shooz: marshalld in good order: wyth a stetting stick, and stoout, that euery ruff stood vp like a wafer: a side gooun of kendall green, after the freshnes of the yéer noow, gathered at the neck with a narro gorget, fastened afore with a white clasp and a keepar close vp to the chin: but easily for heat too vndoo when he list: Séemly begyrt in a red caddiz gyrdl: from that a payr of capped Sheffield kniuez hanging a to side: Out of hiz bozome drawne forth a lappet of his napkin, edged with a blu lace, & marked with a trulooue, a hart, and A. D. for Damian: for he was but a bachelar yet.

Hiz gooun had syde sleeuez dooun to midlegge, slit from the shooulder too the hand, & lined with white cotten. Hiz doobled sleeuez of blak woorsted, vpon them a payr of poynets of towny Chamblet laced a long the wreast wyth blu threeden points, a wealt toward the hand of fustian anapes: a payr of red neatherstocks: a pair of pumps on hiz féet, with a cross cut at the toze for cornz: not nu indéede, yet cleanly blakt with soot, & shining az a shoing horn.

Aboout hiz nek a red rebond sutable too hiz girdl: hiz harp in good grace dependaunt before him: hiz wreast tyed to a gréen lace, and hanging by: vnder the gorget of hiz gooun a fair flagon cheyn, (pewter, for) siluer, as a squier minstrel of Middilsex, that trauaild the cuntrée this soommer seazon vnto fairz & worshipfull mens hoousez: from hiz chein hoong a Schoochion, with mettall & cooller resplendant vpon hiz breast, of the auncient armez of Islington:

[Apparently the minstrel was got ready; but not shown. He was to have recited an Arthurian romance in verse.]

II. THE COVENTRY HOCK-TUESDAY SHOW.

And héertoo folloed az good a sport (me thooght) prezented in an historicall ku, by certain good harted men of Couentrée, my Lordes neighboors thear: who, vnderstanding amoong them the thing that coold not bee hidden from ony, hoow carefull and studious hiz honor waz, that by all pleazaunt recreasions her highnes might best fynd her self wellcom, & bee made gladsum and mery, (the ground-worke indeede, and foundacion, of hiz Lordship’s myrth and gladnesse of vs all), made petition that they moought renu noow their olld storiall sheaw: Of argument, how the Danez whylom héere in a troubloous seazon wear for quietnesse born withall, & suffeard in peas, that anon, by outrage & importabl insolency, abuzing both Ethelred, the king then, and all estates euerie whear beside: at the greuoous complaint & coounsell of Huna, the king’s chieftain in warz, on Saint Brices night, Ann. Dom. 1012 (Az the book sayz) that falleth yéerely on the thirtéenth of Nouember, wear all dispatcht, and the Ream rid. And for becauz the matter mencioneth how valiantly our English women for looue of their cuntrée behaued themseluez: expressed in actionz & rymez after their maner, they thought it moought mooue sum myrth to her Maiestie the rather.

The thing, said they, iz grounded on story, and for pastime woont too bee plaid in oour Citee yéerely: without ill exampl of mannerz, papistry, or ony superstition: and elz did so occupy the heads of a number, that likely inoough woold haue had woorz meditationz: had an auncient beginning, and a long continuauns: tyll noow of late laid dooun, they knu no cauz why, onless it wear by the zeal of certain theyr Preacherz: men very commendabl for their behauiour and learning, & swéet in their sermons, but sumwhat too sour in preaching awey theyr pastime: wisht therefore, that az they shoold continu their good doctrine in pulpet, so, for matters of pollicy & gouernauns of the Citie, they woold permit them to the Mair and Magistratez: and seyed, by my feyth, Master Martyn, they woold make theyr humbl peticion vntoo her highnes, that they might haue theyr playz vp agayn.

But aware, kéep bak, make room noow, heer they cum! And fyrst, ... Captain Cox cam marching on valiantly before, cléen trust, & gartered aboue the knée, all fresh in a veluet cap (master Goldingha_m_ lent it him) floorishing with hiz tonswoord, and another fensmaster with him: thus in the foreward making room for the rest. After the_m_ proudly prickt on formost, the Danish launsknights on horsbak, and then the English: each with their allder poll marcially in their hand. Eeuen at the first entrée the méeting waxt sumwhat warm: that by and by kindled with corage a both sidez, gru from a hot skirmish vnto a blazing battail: first by speare and shield, outragious in their racez az ramz at their rut, with furious encoounterz, that togyther they tumbl too the dust, sumtime hors and man: and after fall too it with sworde & target, good bangz a both sidez: the fight so ceassing; but the battail not so ended: folloed the footmen, both the hostez, ton after toother: first marching in ranks: then warlik turning, the_n_ fro_m_ ranks into squadrons, then in too trianglz; fro_m_ that intoo rings, & so winding oout again: A valiant captain of great prowez, az fiers az a fox assauting a gooz, waz so hardy to giue the first stroke: then get they grisly togyther: that great waz the actiuitée that day too be séen thear a both sidez: ton very eager for purchaz of pray, toother vtterly stoout for redemption of libertie: thus, quarrell enflamed fury a both sidez. Twise the Danes had _th_e better; but at the last conflict, beaten doun, ouercom, and many led captiue for triumph by our English wéemen.

This waz the effect of this sheaw, that, az it waz handled, made mooch matter of good pastime: brought all indéed intoo the great court, een vnder her highnes windo too haue been séen: but (az vnhappy it waz for the bride) that cam thither too soon, (and yet waz it a four a clok). For her highnes beholding in the chamber delectabl dauncing indéed: and héerwith the great throng and vnrulines of the people, waz cauz that this solemnitee of Brideale & dauncing, had not the full muster waz hoped for: and but a littl of the Couentrée plea her highnes also saw: commaunded thearfore on the Tuisday folloing to haue it ful oout: az accordingly it waz prezented, whearat her Maiestie laught well: they wear the iocunder, and so mooch the more becauz her highnes had giuen them too buckes, and fiue marke in mony, to make mery togyther: they prayed for her Maiesty, long, happily to reign, & oft to cum thither, that oft they moought sée héer: & what, reioycing vpon their ampl reward, and what, triumphing vpon the good acceptauns, they vaunted their play waz neuer so dignified, nor euer any players afore so beatified....

Tuisday, according to commandement, cam oour Couentrée men: what their matter waz, of her highnes myrth and good acceptauns, and rewarde vntoo them, and of their reioysing thearat, I sheawd you afore, and so say the less noow.

I

THE INDIAN VILLAGE FEAST

[From Sir Walter Elliot, _On the Characteristics of the Population of Central India_, in _Journal of the Ethnological Society of London_, N. S. i. 94 (1869).]

In the north-east corner of the central mountainous region represented on the map, between the Mahanadi and Godavery rivers, is found a tribe which has preserved its normal character remarkably free from change and from external influence. The Konds, or, as they call themselves, the Kuingas, although only discovered within the last thirty-five years, are better known than most of the other barbarous tribes from the fact that for ages they have been in the habit of sacrificing human victims in great numbers to secure the favour of the deities presiding over their dwellings, fields, hills, &c., but especially of the earth-goddess.

The successful efforts employed to abolish this barbarous rite have made the subject familiar to all, and it is remarkable that such knowledge should have failed to attract attention to a practice precisely similar in its objects and in its details, which is observed in every village of Southern India, with this single difference, that a buffalo is substituted for a human victim. My attention was early drawn to this practice, which is called the festival of the village goddess (Devi, or Grama Devati), the descriptions of which led me to believe it might throw light on the early condition of the servile classes, and resolving to witness its celebrations, I repaired to the village of Serúr, in the Southern Mahratta country, in March, 1829. It would occupy too much time to describe the ceremony in full, which is the less necessary as the details vary in different places; but the general features are always the same.

The temple of the goddess is a mean structure outside the village. The officiating priests are the Parias, who, on this occasion, and on it alone, are exempt from the degrading condition which excludes them from the village, and from contact with the inhabitants. With them are included the Mangs or workers in leather, the Asádis or Dásaris, paria dancing-girls devoted to the service of the temple, the musician in attendance on them called Rániga, who acts also as a sort of jester or buffoon, and a functionary called Pót-raj, who officiates as pujári to a rural god named also Pót-raj, to whom a small altar is erected behind the temple of the village goddess. He is armed with a long whip, which he cracks with great dexterity, and to which also at various parts of the ceremony divine honours are paid.

All the members of the village community take part in the festival with the hereditary district officers, many of them Brahmans. The shepherds or Dhangars of the neighbouring villages are also invited, and they attend with their priests called Virgars or Irgars, accompanied by the dhol or big drum peculiar to their caste. But the whole is under the guidance and management of the Parias.

The festival commences always on a Tuesday, the day of rest among the agricultural classes, both for man and beast. The most important and essential ceremonies take place on the second and fifth days. On the former, the sacred buffalo, which had been purchased by the Parias, an animal without a blemish, is thrown down before the goddess, its head struck off by a single blow and placed in front of the shrine with one fore-leg thrust into its mouth. Around are placed vessels containing the different cereals, and hard by a heap of mixed grains, with a drill plough in the centre. The carcase is then cut up into small pieces, and each cultivator receives a portion to bury in his field. The blood and offal are collected into a large basket, over which some pots of the cooked food which had been presented as a meat offering (naivedya) had previously been broken, and Pót-raj taking a live kid called the hari-mariah, hews it in pieces over the whole. The mess (cheraga) is then mixed together, and the basket being placed on the head of a naked Mang, he runs off with it, flinging the contents into the air, and scattering them right and left, as an offering (bhut-bali) to the evil spirits, and followed by the other Parias, and the village Paiks, with drawn swords. Sometimes the demons arrest the progress of the party, when more of the mess is thrown about, and fowls and sheep are sacrificed, till the spirits are appeased.

During the whole time of the sacrifice the armed paiks keep vigilant guard, lest any intruder should secrete a morsel of flesh or a drop of blood, which, if carried off successfully, after declaring the purpose, would transfer the merit of the offering to the strangers’ village.

On the return of the party from making the circuit of the village another buffalo, seized by force wherever it can be found (zulmi-khulga) is sacrificed by decapitating it in the same manner as the former; but no particular importance is attached to it, and the flesh is distributed to be eaten.

The third and fourth days are devoted to private offerings. On the former all the inhabitants of caste, who had vowed animals to the goddess during the preceding three years for the welfare of their families, or the fertility of their fields, brought the buffaloes or sheep to the paria pujári, who struck off their heads. The fourth day was appropriated exclusively to the offerings of the Parias. In this way, some fifty or sixty buffaloes and several hundred sheep were slain, and the heads piled up in two great heaps. Many women on these days walked naked to the temple in fulfilment of vows, but they were covered with leaves and boughs of trees and surrounded by their female relations and friends.

On the fifth and last day (Saturday) the whole community marched in procession, with music, to the temple, and offered a concluding sacrifice at the Pót-raj altar. A lamb was concealed close by. The Pót-raj having found it after a pretended search, struck it simply with his whip, which he then placed upon it, and, making several passes with his hands, rendered it insensible; in fact, mesmerised it. When it became rigid and stiff he lifted it up and carried it about on the palm of his hand, to the amazement of the spectators, and then laid it down on the ground. His hands were then tied behind his back by the pujári, and the whole party began to dance round him with noisy shouts, the music and the shepherd’s drum making a deafening noise. Pót-raj joined in the excitement, his eyes began to roll, his long hair fell loose over his shoulders, and he soon came fully under the influence of the numen. He was now led up, still bound, to the place where the lamb lay motionless. He rushed at it, seized it with his teeth, tore through the skin, and ate into its throat. When it was quite dead, he was lifted up, a dishful of the meat offering was presented to him; he thrust his bloody face into it, and it was then, with the remains of the lamb, buried beside the altar. Meantime his hands were untied, and he fled the place, and did not appear for three days. The rest of the party now adjourned to the front of the temple, where the heap of grain deposited the first day was divided among the cultivators, to be buried by each one in his field with the bit of flesh. After this a distribution of the piled-up heads was made by the hand of the Rániga. About forty sheep’s heads were given to certain privileged persons, among which two were allotted to the Sircar! For the rest a general scramble took place, paiks, shepherds, Parias, and many boys and men of good caste, were soon rolling in the mass of putrid gore. The heads were flung about in all directions, without regard to rank or caste, the Brahmans coming in for an ample share of the filth. The scramble for the buffalo heads was confined to the Parias. Whoever was fortunate enough to secure one of either kind carried it off and buried it in his field. The proceedings terminated by a procession round the boundaries of the village lands, preceded by the goddess, and the head of the sacred buffalo carried on the head of one of the Mangs. All order and propriety now ceased. Rániga began to abuse the goddess in the foulest terms; he then turned his fury against the government, the head man of the village, and every one who fell in his way. The Parias and Asádis attacked the most respectable and gravest citizens, and laid hold of the Brahmans, Lingayats, and Zamindars without scruple. The dancing-women jumped on their shoulders, the shepherds beat the big drum, with deafening clangor, and universal license reigned.

On reaching a little temple, sacred to the goddess of boundaries (polimera-amma), they halted to make some offerings, and bury the sacred head. As soon as it was covered, the uproar began again. Rániga became more foul-mouthed than ever. In vain the head-men, the government officers, and others tried to pacify him by giving him small copper coins. He only broke out with worse imprecations and grosser abuse, till the circuit being completed, all dispersed; the Parias retired to their hamlet outside the town, resuming their humble, servile character, and the village reverted to its wonted peaceful appearance.

Next day (Sunday) the whole population turned out to a great hunting-party.

I found this remarkable institution existing in every part of India where I have been, and I have descriptions of it corresponding in all essential points, from the Dekhan, the Nizam’s country, Mysore, the Carnatic, and the Northern Circars. The details vary in different places, but the main features agree in all, and correspond remarkably with the Mariah sacrifice of the Konds, which also varies considerably on minor points in different places.

J

SWORD-DANCES

I. SWEDEN (Sixteenth Century).

[From Olaus Magnus, Historia de gentibus septentrionalibus (1555), Bk. xv. chh. 23, 24.]

Ch. 23, de chorea gladiatoria vel armifera saltatione.

Habent septentrionales Gothi et Sueci pro exercenda iuventute alium ludum, quod inter nudos enses et infestos gladios seu frameas sese exerceant saltu, idque quodam gymnastico ritu et disciplina, aetate successiva, a peritis et praesultare sub cantu addiscunt: et ostendunt hunc ludum praecipue tempore carnisprivii, maschararum Italico verbo dicto. Ante etenim tempus eiusdem carnisprivii octo diebus continua saltatione sese adolescentes numerose exercent, elevatis scilicet gladiis sed vagina reclusis, ad triplicem gyrum. Deinde evaginatis itidemque elevatis ensibus, postmodo manuatim extensis, modestius gyrando alterutrius cuspidem capulumque receptantes, sese mutato ordine in modum figurae hexagoni fingendi subiiciunt, quam rosam dicunt: et illico eam gladios retrahendo elevandoque resolvunt ut super uniuscuiusque caput quadrata rosa resultet: et tandem vehementissima gladiorum laterali collisione, celerrime retrograda saltatione determinant ludum, quem tibiis vel cantilenis, aut utrisque simul, primum per graviorem, demum vehementiorem saltum et ultimo impetuosissimum moderantur. Sed haec speculatio sine oculari inspectione vix apprehenditur quam pulchra honestaque sit, dum unius parcissimo praecepto etiam armata multitudo quadam alacritate dirigitur ad certamen: eoque ludo clericis sese exercere et immiscere licet, quia totus deducitur honestissima ratione.

Ch. 24. Alia etiam iuvenum exercitatio est, ut certa lege arcualem choream ducant et reducant, aliis quidam instrumentis, sed eadem ut gladiatorum saltantium disciplina reducta. Arcubus enim seu circulis inclusis [inclusi?], primum modesto cantu heroum gesta referente vel tibiis aut tympanis excitati, gyrando incedunt seque dirigentis, qui rex dicitur, sola voce reducunt, tandem solutis arcubus aliquantulum celerius properantes mutua inclinatione conficiunt, veluti alias per gladios, rosam, ut formam sexangularem efficere videantur. Utque id festivius sonoriusque fiat, tintinnabula seu aereas campanulas genu tenus ligant.

II. SHETLAND (Eighteenth Century).

[From Sir Walter Scott’s Diary for August 7, 1814, printed in Lockhart, Life of Scott (1837), iii. 162; (1878) i. 265.]

At Scalloway my curiosity was gratified by an account of the sword-dance, now almost lost, but still practised in the Island of Papa, belonging to Mr. Scott. There are eight performers, seven of whom represent the Seven Champions of Christendom, who enter one by one with their swords drawn, and are presented to the eighth personage, who is not named. Some rude couplets are spoken (in English, not Norse), containing a sort of panegyric upon each champion as he is presented. They then dance a sort of cotillion, as the ladies described it, going through a number of evolutions with their swords. One of my three Mʳˢ. Scotts readily promised to procure me the lines, the rhymes, and the form of the dance.... A few years since a party of Papa-men came to dance the sword-dance at Lerwick as a public exhibition with great applause.... In a stall pamphlet, called the history of Buckshaven [Fifeshire], it is said those fishers sprung from Danes, and brought with them their war-dance or sword-dance, and a rude wooden cut of it is given.

[A footnote by Lockhart adds:—]

Mr. W. S. Rose informs me that, when he was at school at Winchester, the morris-dancers there used to exhibit a sword-dance resembling that described at Camacho’s wedding in Don Quixote; and Mr. Morritt adds that similar dances are even yet performed in the villages about Rokeby [Yorks, N.R.] every Christmas.

[The following account was inserted in a note to Scott’s _The Pirate_ (1821).]

To the Primate’s account of the sword-dance, I am able to add the words sung or chanted, on occasion of this dance, as it is still performed in Papa Stour, a remote island of Zetland, where alone the custom keeps its ground. It is, it will be observed by antiquaries, a species of play or mystery, in which the Seven Champions of Christendom make their appearance, as in the interlude presented in All’s Well that ends Well. This dramatic curiosity was most kindly procured for my use by Dr. Scott of Haslar Hospital [died 1875], son of my friend Mr. Scott of Melbie, Zetland. Dr. Hibbert has, in his Description of the Zetland Islands, given an account of the sword-dance, but somewhat less full than the following:—

‘WORDS USED AS A PRELUDE TO THE SWORD-DANCE, A DANISH OR NORWEGIAN BALLET, COMPOSED SOME CENTURIES AGO, AND PRESERVED IN PAPA STOUR, ZETLAND.

PERSONÆ DRAMATIS[694].

(Enter MASTER, in the character of SAINT GEORGE.)

Brave gentles all within this boor[695], If ye delight in any sport, Come see me dance upon this floor, Which to you all shall yield comfort. Then shall I dance in such a sort, As possible I may or can; You, minstrel man, play me a Porte[696], That I on this floor may prove a man.

[He bows, and dances in a line.

Now have I danced with heart and hand, Brave gentles all, as you may see, For I have been tried in many a land, As yet the truth can testify; In England, Scotland, Ireland, France, Italy, and Spain, Have I been tried with that good sword of steel.

[Draws, and flourishes.

Yet I deny that ever a man did make me yield; For in my body there is strength, As by my manhood may be seen; And I, with that good sword of length, Have oftentimes in perils been, And over champions I was king. And by the strength of this right hand, Once on a day I kill’d fifteen, And left them dead upon the land. Therefore, brave minstrel, do not care, But play to me a Porte most light, That I no longer do forbear, But dance in all these gentles’ sight. Although my strength makes you abased, Brave gentles all, be not afraid, For here are six champions, with me, staid, All by my manhood I have raised.

[He dances.

Since I have danced, I think it best To call my brethren in your sight, That I may have a little rest, And they may dance with all their might; With heart and hand as they are knights, And shake their swords of steel so bright, And show their main strength on this floor, For we shall have another bout Before we pass out of this boor. Therefore, brave minstrel, do not care To play to me a Porte most light, That I no longer do forbear, But dance in all these gentles’ sight.

[He dances, and then introduces his knights as under.

Stout James of Spain, both tried and stour[697], Thine acts are known full well indeed; And champion Dennis, a French knight, Who stout and bold is to be seen; And David, a Welshman born, Who is come of noble blood; And Patrick also, who blew the horn, An Irish knight amongst the wood. Of Italy, brave Anthony the good, And Andrew of Scotland King; Saint George of England, brave indeed, Who to the Jews wrought muckle tinte[698]. Away with this!—Let us come to sport, Since that ye have a mind to war. Since that ye have this bargain sought, Come let us fight and do not fear. Therefore, brave minstrel, do not care To play to me a Porte most light, That I no longer do forbear, But dance in all these gentles’ sight.

[He dances, and advances to JAMES of Spain.

Stout James of Spain, both tried and stour, Thine acts are known full well indeed, Present thyself within our sight, Without either fear or dread. Count not for favour or for feid, Since of thy acts thou hast been sure; Brave James of Spain, I will thee lead, To prove thy manhood on this floor.

[JAMES dances.

Brave champion Dennis, a French knight, Who stout and bold is to be seen, Present thyself here in our sight, Thou brave French knight, Who bold hast been; Since thou such valiant acts hast done, Come let us see some of them now With courtesy, thou brave French knight, Draw out thy sword of noble hue.

[DENNIS dances, while the others retire to a side.

Brave David a bow must string, and with awe Set up a wand upon a stand, And that brave David will cleave in twa[699].

[DAVID dances solus.

Here is, I think, an Irish knight, Who does not fear, or does not fright, To prove thyself a valiant man, As thou hast done full often bright; Brave Patrick, dance, if that thou can.

[He dances.

Thou stout Italian, come thou here; Thy name is Anthony, most stout; Draw out thy sword that is most clear, And do thou fight without any doubt; Thy leg thou shake, thy neck thou lout[700], And show some courtesy on this floor, For we shall have another bout, Before we pass out of this boor. Thou kindly Scotsman, come thou here; Thy name is Andrew of Fair Scotland; Draw out thy sword that is most clear, Fight for thy king with thy right hand; And aye as long as thou canst stand, Fight for thy king with all thy heart; And then, for to confirm his band, Make all his enemies for to smart.

[He dances.—Music begins.’

‘FIGUIR[701].

‘The six stand in rank with their swords reclining on their shoulders. The Master (Saint George) dances, and then strikes the sword of James of Spain, who follows George, then dances, strikes the sword of Dennis, who follows behind James. In like manner the rest—the music playing—swords as before. After the six are brought out of rank, they and the Master form a circle, and hold the swords point and hilt. This circle is danced round twice. The whole, headed by the Master, pass under the swords held in a vaulted manner. They jump over the swords. This naturally places the swords across, which they disentangle by passing under their right sword. They take up the seven swords, and form a circle, in which they dance round.

‘The Master runs under the sword opposite, which he jumps over backwards. The others do the same. He then passes under the right-hand sword, which the others follow, in which position they dance, until commanded by the Master, when they form into a circle, and dance round as before. They then jump over the right-hand sword, by which means their backs are to the circle, and their hands across their backs. They dance round in that form until the Master calls “Loose,” when they pass under the right sword, and are in a perfect circle.

‘The Master lays down his sword, and lays hold of the point of James’s sword. He then turns himself, James, and the others, into a clew. When so formed, he passes under out of the midst of the circle; the others follow; they vault as before. After several other evolutions, they throw themselves into a circle, with their arms across the breast. They afterwards form such figures as to form a shield of their swords, and the shield is so compact that the Master and his knights dance alternately with this shield upon their heads. It is then laid down upon the floor. Each knight lays hold of their former points and hilts with their hands across, which disentangle by figuirs directly contrary to those that formed the shield. This finishes the ballet.

‘EPILOGUE.

‘Mars does rule, he bends his brows, He makes us all agast[702]; After the few hours that we stay here, Venus will rule at last. Farewell, farewell, brave gentles all, That herein do remain, I wish you health and happiness Till we return again.

[Exeunt.’

The manuscript from which the above was copied was transcribed from a very old one, by Mr. William Henderson, jun., of Papa Stour, in Zetland. Mr. Henderson’s copy is not dated, but bears his own signature, and, from various circumstances, it is known to have been written about the year 1788.

K

THE LUTTERWORTH ST. GEORGE PLAY

[From W. Kelly, Notices Illustrative of the Drama, &c., ... from ... Manuscripts of the Borough of Leicester (1865), 53. The version is that ‘performed in some of the villages near Lutterworth, at Christmas 1863.’]

THE CHRISTMAS MUMMERS’ PLAY.

DRAMATIS PERSONÆ.

1. CAPTAIN SLASHER, in military costume, with sword and pistol. 2. King of England, in robes, wearing the crown. 3. PRINCE GEORGE, King’s Son, in robes, and sword by his side. 4. Turkish Champion, in military attire, with sword and pistol. 5. A Noble Doctor. 6. Beelzebub. 7. A Clown.

Enter Captain Slasher. I beg your pardon for being so bold, I enter your house, the weather’s so cold, Room, a room! brave gallants, give us room to sport; For in this house we do resort,—Resort, resort, for many a day; Step in, the King of England, And boldly clear the way.

Enter King of England. I am the King of England, that boldly does appear; I come to seek my only son,—my only son is here.

Enter Prince George. I am Prince George, a worthy knight; I’ll spend my blood for England’s right. England’s right I will maintain; I’ll fight for old England once again.

Enter Turkish Knight. I am the Turkish Champion; From Turkey’s land I come. I come to fight the King of England And all his noble men.

Captain Slasher. In comes Captain Slasher, Captain Slasher is my name; With sword and pistol by my side, I hope to win the game.

King of England. I am the King of England, As you may plainly see, These are my soldiers standing by me; They stand by me your life to end, On them doth my life depend.

Prince George. I am Prince George, the Champion bold, And with my sword I won three crowns of gold; I slew the fiery dragon and brought him to the slaughter, And won the King of Egypt’s only daughter.

Turkish Champion. As I was going by St. Francis’ School, I heard a lady cry ‘A fool, a fool!’ ‘A fool,’ was every word, ‘That man’s a fool, Who wears a wooden sword.’

Prince George. A wooden sword, you dirty dog! My sword is made of the best of metal free. If you would like to taste of it, I’ll give it unto thee. Stand off, stand off, you dirty dog! Or by my sword you’ll die. I’ll cut you down the middle, And make your blood to fly.

[They fight; Prince George falls, mortally wounded.

Enter King of England. Oh, horrible! terrible! what hast thou done? Thou hast ruin’d me, ruin’d me, By killing of my only son! Oh, is there ever a noble doctor to be found, To cure this English champion Of his deep and deadly wound?

Enter Noble Doctor. Oh yes, there is a noble doctor to be found, To cure this English champion Of his deep and deadly wound.

King of England. And pray what is your practice?

Noble Doctor. I boast not of my practice, neither do I study in the practice of physic.

King of England. What can you cure?

Noble Doctor. All sorts of diseases, Whatever you pleases: I can cure the itch, the pitch, The phthisic, the palsy and the gout; And if the devil’s in the man, I can fetch him out. My wisdom lies in my wig, I torture not my patients with excations, Such as pills, boluses, solutions, and embrocations; But by the word of command I can make this mighty prince to stand.

King. What is your fee?

Doctor. Ten pounds is true.

King. Proceed, Noble Doctor; You shall have your due.

Doctor. Arise, arise! most noble prince, arise, And no more dormant lay; And with thy sword Make all thy foes obey.

[The Prince arises.

Prince George. My head is made of iron, My body is made of steel, My legs are made of crooked bones To force you all to yield.

Enter Beelzebub. In comes I, old Beelzebub, Over my shoulder I carry my club, And in my hand a frying-pan, Pleased to get all the money I can.

Enter Clown. In come I, who’s never been yet, With my great head and little wit: My head is great, my wit is small, I’ll do my best to please you all.

Song (all join). And now we are done and must be gone, No longer will we stay here; But if you please, before we go, We’ll taste your Christmas beer.

[Exeunt omnes.

L

THE PROSE OF THE ASS

[The text is taken from the following sources:—

i. Beauvais, thirteenth century.—(a) [Duc.]—Ducange, Glossarium (ed. 1733-6), s.v. Festum, from a lost MS.; copied incorrectly by Gasté, 23, and apparently also by Clément, 158: (b) [B¹]—Brit. Mus. Egerton MS. 2615, f. 1, with music for singing in unison: (c) [B²]—Same MS. f. 43, with music harmonized in three parts; partly facsimiled in Annales Archéologiques (1856), xvi. 259, 300.

ii. Sens, thirteenth century.—[S]—MS. Senonense, 46ᵃ, as printed by G. M. Dreves, Analecta Hymnica, xx. 217. The text has also been given from the MS. by F. Bourquelot, in Bull. de la Soc. Arch. de Sens (1858), vi. 79, and others. The version of Clément, 126 is probably, like the facsimile given by him in Ann. Arch. vii. 26, based on one ‘calqué’ from the MS. by a M. Amé, and, where it differs from that of Dreves, is the less trustworthy. Dreves, xx. 257 (cf. infra) and Millin, Monum. Ant. Inédits, ii. 348, also give the music of the opening lines. Modern settings are provided by B. De la Borde, Essai sur la Musique (1780), and Clément, in Ann. Arch. vii. 26, and Chantes de la Sainte Chapelle. An old French translation of the text is printed in Leber, ix. 368.

On these Beauvais and Sens MSS. cf. ch. xiii.

iii. Bourges.—[Bo.]—The first verse with the music and variants in the later verses are given by A. Gachet d’Artigny, Nouveaux Mémoires (1756), vii. 77, from a copy of a book given to Bourges cathedral by a canon named Jean Pastoris. Part of the Bourges music is also given by Millin, loc. cit.

I print the fullest version from Ducange, italicizing the lines not found elsewhere, and giving all variants, except of spelling, for the rest.

Outside Beauvais, Sens, and Bourges the only localized allusion to the prose that I have found is the Autun order of 1411 (vol. i. p. 312) ‘nec dicatur cantilena quae dici solebat super dictum asinum.’ It is not in the Puy officium for the Circumcision, which, though in a MS. of 1553, represents a ceremony as old as 1327 (U. Chevalier, Prosolarium Ecclesiae Aniciensis, 1894). The officium is full of conductus and farsumina, and the clericuli at second Vespers tripudiant firmiter. The sanctum Praepucium was a relic at Puy.

The following passage is from Theoph. Raynaudus, Iudicium de puerorum symphoniacorum processione in festo SS. Innocentium (Opera Omnia, 1665, xv. 209): ‘Legi prosam quandam de asino e Metropolitanae cuiusdam Ecclesiae rituali exscriptam; quae super sacrum concinebatur in die S. Stephani, et dicebatur prosa fatuorum, qua nihil insulsius aut asino convenientius. Similis prosa de bove, quae canebatur in die S. Ioannis, intercidisse dicitur, haud magno sane dispendio. Itaque hae prosae erant particulae festi fatuorum, occoepti a die S. Stephani.’ I have never come across the ‘Prose of the Ox,’ or any notice of it which appears to be independent of Raynaud’s.]

I.

Orientis partibus Adventavit Asinus, Pulcher et fortissimus, Sarcinis aptissimus. 4 Hez, Sire Asnes, car chantez, Belle bouche rechignez, Vous aurez du foin assez Et de l’avoine a plantez. 8

II.

Lentus erat pedibus, Nisi foret baculus, Et eum in clunibus Pungeret aculeus. 12 Hez, Sire Asnes, etc.

III.

Hic in collibus Sichen Iam nutritus sub Ruben, Transiit per Iordanem, Saliit in Bethleem. 20 Hez, Sire Asnes, etc.

IV.

Ecce magnis auribus Subiugalis filius Asinus egregius Asinorum dominus. 28 Hez, Sire Asnes, etc.

V.

Saltu vincit hinnulos, Dammas et capreolos, Super dromedarios Velox Madianeos. 36 Hez, Sire Asnes, etc.

VI.

Aurum de Arabia, Thus et myrrham de Saba Tulit in Ecclesia Virtus Asinaria. 44 Hez, Sire Asnes, etc.

VII.

Dum trahit vehicula, Multa cum sarcinula, Illius mandibula Dura terit pabula. 52 Hez, Sire Asnes, etc.

VIII.

Cum aristis hordeum Comedit et carduum: Triticum e palea Segregat in area. 60 Hez, Sire Asnes, etc.

IX.

Amen dicas, Asine, Iam satur de gramine, Amen, Amen, itera, Aspernare vetera. 68 Hez va, hez va! hez va, hez! Bialx Sire Asnes, car allez: Belle bouche, car chantez. 71

B¹ has heading Conductus asi<ni ubi> adducitur; S, Conductus ad tabulam.

5-8 B¹, ² Hez, hez, sire Asnes, hez; S. Hez, Sir asne, hez; Bo. He, he, he, Sire Ane. He.

18. B¹, ²; S, Enulritus.

21-4. B¹ Hez, hez (and so in all verses but last); B² Hez (and so in all verses); S, Hez, Sir asne, hez (and so in all verses).

vi. B¹, ² omit; Bo. places after viii.

59. Duc. a palea.

65. Duc. adds (hic genuflectebatur).

66. Bo. Iam satis de carmine.

69-71. B² Hez; Clément,

Hez va! hez va! hez va! hez! Bialx, sir asnes, car chantez, Vous aurez du foin assez Et de l’avoine a plantez.

I append the air of the Sens prose, as given by Dreves, Analecta Hymnica, xx. 257.

[Music:

Orientis partibus Adventavit Asinus, Pulcher et fortissimus, Sarcinis aptissimus. Hez, Sir Asne, hez.]

M

THE BOY BISHOP

I. THE SARUM OFFICE.

[From C. Wordsworth, Ceremonies and Processions of the Cathedral Church of Salisbury (1901), 52, which follows the practically identical texts of the printed Processionals of 1508 (ed. Henderson, 1882, 17) and 1555 and the printed Breviary (ed. Procter-Wordsworth, I. ccxxix). Mr. Wordsworth also found the office in two MS. breviaries (Sarum Chapter MS. 152 and Peterhouse, Cambridge, MS. 270). In the MS. (†1445) processional from Salisbury Cathedral (Chapter MS. 148), on which his book is mainly based, there is a lacuna, probably due to intentional mutilation, where the office should come. I find no allusion to the Boy Bishop in the printed Sarum Missal (ed. Dickinson, 67), or in the Sarum Consuetudinary, Custumary, or Ordinal (Frere, Use of Sarum).]

⸿ In die sancti Johannis.

[De Episcopo Puerorum.]

_Ad uesperas, post memoriam de S. Stephano eat processio Puerorum ad altare Innocencium, uel Sancte Trinitatis et Omnium Sanctorum quod dicitur Salue, in capis sericis, cum cereis illuminatis et ardentibus in manibus, cantando, Episcopo Puerorum pontificalibus induto (executore officij, siue Episcopo presente) incipiente hoc responsorium._

Solus Episcopus Innocencium, si assit, Christum Puerum, uerum et eternum, Pontificem designans, incipiat:

R. Centum quadraginta quattuor millia qui empti sunt de terra: hij sunt qui cum mulieribus non sunt coinquinati, uirgines enim permanserunt. Ideo regnant cum Deo et Agno, et Agnus Dei cum illis.

Tres pueri dicant hunc uersum.

V. Hij empti sunt ex omnibus, primicie Deo et Agno, et in ore illorum non est inventum mendacium. Ideo.

Omnes pueri dicant cantando simul hanc prosam

Sedentem in superne.

Chorus post vnumquemque uersum respondeat cantum prose super vltimam literam E.

V. Sedentem in superne maiestatis arce-e.

V. Adorant humillime proclamantes ad te-e.

V. Sancte · Sancte · Sancte · Sabaoth rex-e.

V. Plena sunt omnia glorie tue-e.

V. Cum illis vndeuiginti quinque-e.

V. Atque cum innocentissimo grege-e.

V. Qui sunt sine vlla labe-e.

V. Dicentes excelsa uoce-e.

V. Laus Tibi, Domine-e.

Rex eterne glorie-e.

Chorus respondeat Ideo regnant.

Ad hanc processionem non dicatur Gloria Patri sed dum prosa canitur tunc Episcopus Puerorum thurificet altare: deinde ymaginem Sancte Trinitatis.

Et postea dicat Sacerdos, modesta uoce, hunc uersum.

V. Letamini in Domino, et exvltate iusti.

R. Et gloriamini omnes recti corde.

Deinde dicat Episcopus Puerorum, sine Dominus uobiscum, sed cum Oremus, oracionem.

Deus, cuius hodierna die preconium innocentes martires non loquendo sed moriendo confessi sunt: omnia in nobis uitiorum mala mortifica, vt fidem tuam, quam lingua nostra loquitur, eciam moribus uita fateatur. Qui cum Deo Patre.

In redeundo precentor puerorum incipiat responsorium de S. Maria, uel aliquam antiphonam de eadem.

R. Felix namque es, sacra uirgo Maria, et omni laude dignissima. Quia ex te ortus est Sol iusticie, Christus Deus noster.

Et, si necesse fuerit, dicatur uersus:

V. Ora pro populo, interueni pro clero, intercede pro deuoto femineo sexu: senciant omnes tuum leuamen, quicumque celebrant tuam solempnitatem. Quia ex te Gloria · Quia ·

Et sic processio chorum intret, per ostium occidentale, vt supra. Et omnes pueri, ex vtraque parte chori, in superiori gradu se recipiant; et ab hac hora vsque post processionem diei proximi succedentis nullus clericorum solet gradum superiorem ascendere, cuiuscumque condicionis fuerit.

Ad istam processionem pro disposicione puerorum scribuntur canonici, ad ministrandum eisdem, maiores ad thuribulandum, et ad librum deferendum, minores ad candelabra deferenda.

Responsorio finito, cum suo uersu, Episcopus Puerorum in sede sua dicat uersum modesta uoce:

V. Speciosus forma pre filijs hominum:

R. Diffusa est gracia in labijs tuis.

Oracio. Deus qui salutis eterne beate Marie uirginitate fecunda humano generi premia prestitisti; tribue, quesumus, vt ipsam pro nobis intercedere senciamus, per quam meruimus Auctorem uite suscipere, Dominum nostrum Jesum Christum Filium tuum. Que sic terminetur: Qui Tecum uiuit et regnat in vnitate Spiritus Sancti Deus. Per omnia secula seculorum. Amen.

Pax uobis.

R. Et cum spiritu tuo.

Sequatur Benedicamus Domino, a duobus uicarijs, uel a tribus, extra regulam.

Tunc Episcopus Puerorum intret stallum suum, et in sede sua, benedicat populum.

Et interim cruciferarius accipiat baculum episcopi, conuersus ad Episcopum, et cum uenerit ad istum versum Cum mansuetudine conuertat se ad populum et incipiat hanc antiphonam sequentem (que non dicatur Episcopo absente): et cantet totam antiphonam vsque ad finem.

Ant. Princeps ecclesie, pastor ouilis, cunctam plebem tuam benedicere digneris. Hic conuertat se ad populum sic dicendo:

Cum mansuetudine et caritate, humilitate uos ad benediccionem.

Chorus respondeat: Deo gracias.

Deinde retradat baculum Episcopo, et tunc Episcopus Puerorum, primo signando se in fronte, dicat, hoc modo incipiens:

Adiutorium nostrum in nomine Domini:

Chorus respondeat sic: Qui fecit celum et terram.

Item Episcopus, signando se in pectore, dicat sic:

Sit nomen Dei benedictum:

Chorus respondeat: Ex hoc nunc, et vsque in seculum.

Deinde Episcopus Puerorum, conuersus ad clerum, eleuet brachium suum, et dicat hanc benediccionem:

Crucis signo uos consigno:

Hic conuertat se ad populum, sic dicendo:

Nostra sit tuicio.

Deinde conuertat se ad altare, dicens:

Qui nos emit et redemit,

Postea ad seipsum reuersus ponat manum suam super pectus suum dicendo:

Sue carnis precio,

Chorus respondeat, vt sequitur, Amen.

His itaque peractis incipiat Episcopus Puerorum COMPLETORIUM de die, more solito, post Pater Noster et Aue Maria.

Et post Completorium dicat Episcopus Puerorum ad chorum conuersus sub tono supradicto.

Adiutorium nostrum in nomine Domini,

Chorus respondeat: Qui fecit celum et terram.

Episcopus Puerorum dicat:

Sit nomen Domini benedictum:

Chorus. Ex hoc nunc, et vsque in seculum.

Deinde dicat Episcopus:

Benedicat nos omnipotens Deus, Pater, et Filius, et Spiritus Sanctus.

Chorus: Amen.

⸿ In die SS. Innocencium

si in DOMINICA euenerit:

Eodem modo processio fiat vt in die S. Stephani, excepto quod hac die tres pueri prosam in eundo dicant, in medio procedentes: que in ipsa stacione ante crucem ab eisdem terminetur.

In eundo, R. Centum quadraginta.

V. Hij empti.

Prosa. Sedentem in superne.

Sequatur. Gloria Patri, et Filio.

Ideo.

In introitu chori, de Natiuitate, vt supra.

AD MATUTINAS in Die Innocencium:

In tercio Nocturno, post lecciones et cetera, ad gradum altaris omnes pueri incipiant nonum Responsorium.

R. Centum quadraginta, ut supra.

Omnes simul dicant uersum:

V. Hij empti. Gloria Patri. Ideo.

V. Justi autem.

IN LAUDIBUS, post Ps. Laudate, Episcopus Puerorum dicat modesta uoce, quasi legendo, Capitulum, loco nec habitu mutato, quia per totum diem capa serica vtitur (Apoc. xix.)

Cap. Vidi supra montem Syon Agnum stantem, &c.

Ympnus. Rex gloriose martirum. De Communi plurimorum martirorum (Brev. Sarum, ii. 406).

V. Mirabilis Deus.

Ant. Hij sunt qui cum mulieribus, et cetera, quam precentor dabit Episcopo.

Ps. Benedictus.

Oracio. Deus, cuius hodierna, &c. Qui tecum uiuit.

Tunc omnes pueri dicant, loco Benedicamus, Verbum Patris (Brev. Sarum, i. p. cxc).

Chorus respondeat.

Consequenter dicat Episcopus Puerorum benediccionem super populum eodem modo quo ad uesperas precedentes.

Post tres Memorias (scilicet de Natiuitate Domini, de S. Stephano, et de S. Johanne) dicat Episcopus Puerorum benediccionem super populum, sicut et post Completorium supra dictum est.

Deinde tres de secunda forma dicant Benedicamus Domino, more solito.

AD VESPERAS. Episcopus Puerorum incipiat.

Deus in adiutorium meum intende.

Ant. Tecum principium.

Ps. Dixit Dominus (cix).

Capitulum. Vidi supra montem.

R. Centum quadraginta.

Hoc Responsorium ab vno solo Puero, scilicet Cancellario, incipiatur ad gradum chori, in capa serica, et suus versus ab omnibus pueris cantetur in superpelliceis in stacione puerorum, cum prosa, si placet, et eciam cum Gloria Patri.

V. Hij empti sunt.

Ympnus. Rex gloriose martirum. De Communi.

V. Mirabilis Deus.

Episcopus Puerorum incipiat antiphonam:

Ant. Ecce vidi Agnum stantem.

Ps. Magnificat.

Oracio. Deus, cuius hodierna.

Dicta oracione, omnes pueri loco Benedicamus dicant Verbum Patris.

Ant. ad gradum altaris.

Et chorus totum respondeant.

⸿ IN DIE S. THOMAE ARCHIEPISCOPI MARTYRIS.

Ad Vesperas, post memoriam de S. Johanne, accipiat cruciferarius baculum Episcopi Puerorum, et cantet antiphonam Princeps ecclesie, sicut ad primas uesperas.

Similiter Episcopus Puerorum benedicat populum supradicto modo.

Et sic compleatur seruicium (officium Puerorum) huius diei.

II. THE YORK COMPUTUS.

[I have expanded the following document from the copy printed with all the contractions by Dr. E. F. Rimbault in The Camden Miscellany (C.S.), vii (1875), 31. The original roll was in the possession of the late Canon Raine.]

Compotus Nicholay de Newerk custodis bonorum Johannis de Cave Episcopi Innocencium Anno domini etc. nonagesimo sexto.

[Sidenote: Clausura.]

In primis receptum de xij denariis receptis in oblacione die Nativitatis domini. Et de xxiiij solidis j denario receptis in oblacione die Innocentium et j cochleare argenteum ponderis xx_d._ et j annulum argenteum cum bursa cerica eodem die ad missam. Et de xx_d._ rec. de Magistro Willelmo de Kexby precentore. Et de ij_s._ rec. de Magistro Johanne de Schirburne cancellario. Et de vj_s._ viij_d._ rec. de Magistro Johanne de Newton thesaurario ad Novam. Et de vj_s._ viij_d._ rec. de Magistro Thoma Dalby archidiacono Richmunde. Et de vj_s._ viij_d._ rec. de Magistro Nicholao de Feriby. Et de vj_s._ viij_d._ rec. de Magistro Thoma de Wallworthe.

Summa lv_s._ v_d._

[Sidenote: Villa.]

Item rec. de vj_s._ viij_d._ rec. de Domino Abbate Monasterii beatae Mariae virginis extra Muros Eboraci. Et de iij_s._ iiij_d._ rec. de Magistro Willelmo de Feriby Archidiacono Estridinge.

Summa x_s._

[Sidenote: Patria.]

Item de iij_s._ iiij_d._ rec. de domino Thoma Ugtreht milite. Et de ij_s._ rec. de priore de Kyrkham. Et de vj_s._ viij_d._ rec. de priore de Malton. Et de xx_s._ rec. de comitissa de Northumbria et j anulum aureum. Et de vj_s._ viij_d._ de priore de Bridlyngtone. Et de iij_s._ iiij_d._ de priore de Watton. Et de iij_s._ iiij_d._ de rectore de Bayntone. Et de iij_s._ iiij_d._ de Abbate de Melsa. Et de xx_d._ rec. de priore de Feriby. Et de vj_s._ viij_d._ rec. de domino Stephano de Scrope. Et de ij_s._ de priore de Drax. Et de vj_s._ viij_d._ de Abbate de Selby. Et de iij_s._ iiij_d._ rec. de priore de Pontefracte. Et de vj_s._ viij_d._ rec. de priore Sancti Oswaldi. Et de iij_s._ iiij_d._ rec. de priore de Munkbretton. Et de vj_s._ viij_d._ rec. de domino Johanne Depdene. Et de vj_s._ viij_d._ rec. de domina de Marmeon et j anulum aureum cum bursa cerica. Et de iij_s._ iiij_d._ de domina de Harsay. Et de vj_s._ viij_d._ de domina de Rosse. Et de ij_s._ rec. de Abbate Ryavalli. Et de ij_s._ rec. de Abbate Bellalandi. Et de ij_s._ rec. de priore de Novoburgo. Et de xx_d._ rec. de priore de Marton.

Summa v lib. x_s._

Summa totalis Receptorum viij lib. xv_s._ v_d._

De quibus dictus Nicholaus compotat.

[Sidenote: Expensae infra civitatem.]

Ad ‘O virgo virginum.’ In pane pro speciebus j_d._ In cervisia vj_d._

Item in sua Cena. In pane vij_d._ Et in pane dominico iiij_d._ In cervisia xxj_d._ In carne vitulorum et mutulorum ix_d._ obolus. In sawcetiis iiij_d._ In ij anatibus iiij_d._ In xij gallinis ij_s._ vj_d._ In viij wodkoks et j pluver ij_s._ ij_d._ In iij dos̄ et x feldfars xix_d._ In parvis avibus iij_d._ In vino ij_s._ iij_d._ In diversis speciebus xj_d._ In lx wardons v_d._ ob. In melle ij_d._ ob. In cenapio j_d._ In ij libris candelorum ij_d._ ob. In floure ij_d._ In focali j_d._ ob. Item coco vj_d._

Summa xv_s._ vj_d._ ob.

Item die Innocentium ad cenam. In pane iij_d._ In cervisia v_d._ In carne vitulorum et mutulorum vij_d._ In pipere et croco j_d._

Diebus veneris et sabbati nichil quia non visitarunt.

Item dominica prima sequentibus diebus lunae Martis Mercurii nichil quia non visitarunt.

Die Jovis seu die Octavarum Innocentium inierunt versus Kexby ad dominum de Ugtrehte et revenerunt ad cenam. In pane ij_d._ In cervisia iiij_d._ In carne v_d._

Diebus veneris et sabbati nichil quia non visitarunt.

Dominica ija seu die Sancti Willelmi devillaverunt. In pane ad Jantaculum ij_d._ In cervisia iij_d._ In carne v_d._

Die lunae cum ebdomade sequente nichil quia extra villam.

Dominica iija cum ebdomade sequente extra villam.

Die sabbati revenerunt ad cenam. In pane j_d._ ob. In cervisia iij_d._ In lacte et piscibus iij_d._

Dominica iiija nichil.

Die lunae inierunt ad scolas et post Jantaculum devillaverunt. In pane ij_d._ In cervisia iij_d._ ob. In carne vij_d._

Die sabbati revenerunt ad cenam. In pane ij_d._ ob. In cervisia ij_d._ In piscibus vj_d._

Dominica va usque ad finem Purificationis nichil.

Summa v_s._ vij_d._ ob.

[Sidenote: Variae expensae per totam viam.]

In primis. In zona empta pro episcopo iij_d._ In emendacione pilii sui j_d._ In pane equino ante arreptum itineris ij_d._ In oblacione apud Bridlyngtone ij_d._ In elemosina ibidem j_d._ In ferilay apud Melsam iiij_d._ In ferilay apud Drax iiij_d._ In pane equino apud Selby iiij_d._ Item barbitonsori j_d._ In j garth apud Bridlyngton j_d._ In emendacione j garth ibidem ob. In ij pectinibus equinis emptis apud Bridlyngtone et Eboracum iiij_d._ In j garth apud Beverlacum j_d._ In ferracione equorum apud Feriby viij_d._ ob. In emendacione j garth ob. In cena apud Ledes xvij_d._ In feno et avena ibidem xiij_d._ Item in cena apud Riplay xvj_d._ In feno et avena ibidem xij_d._ ob. In ferracione equorum apud Fontans iiij_d._ In ferilay versus Harlsay iiij_d._ In bayting apud Allertone vj_d._ In vino pro episcopo viij_d._ In pane et feno equorum apud Helmslay vj_d._ In ferracione equorum apud Novumburgum iij_d._

Summa x_s._ vij_d._

[Sidenote: Variae expensae ad usum episcopi infra civitatem.]

In primis. In j torchio empto ponderis xij lib. iiij_s._ iij_d._ In j pilio ix_d._ In j pari cirothecarum linearum iij_d._ In j pari manicarum iij_d._ In j pari cultellorum xiiij_d._ In j pari calcarium v_d._ Item pro factura robae xviij_d._ In furura agnina empta pro supertunica ij_s._ vj_d._ In fururis ex convencione vj_s._ In tortricidiis per totum tempus viij_d._ In carbone marino vij_d._ In carbone ligneo x_d._ In paris candelorum iiij_d._ ob. In xxviij paribus cirothecarum emptis pro vicariis et magistris scolarum iij_s._ iiij_d._ ob. Item pro emendacione capae cericae ij_d._

Summa xxiij_s._ j_d._

[Sidenote: Stipendia servientium et equorum.]

In primis Nicholao de Newsome tenori suo xiij_s._ iiij_d._ Et eidem pro suo equo conducto ij_s._ Item Roberto Dawtry senescallo vj_s._ viij_d._ Et pro predicationibus ejusdem in capella ij_s._ j_d._ ob. Item Johanni Baynton cantanti medium x_s._ Item Johanni Grene v_s._ Item Johanni Ellay iij_s._ iiij_d._ Item Johanni Schaptone servienti eidem cum ij equis suis x_s._ ij_d._ Item Thomae Marschale pro j equo iij_s._ iiij_d._ Item j sellare pro j equo iij_s._ vj_d._ Item pistori pro j equo iij_s._ vj_d._ Item Ricardo Fowler pro ij equis v_s._

Summa lxvij_s._ xj_d._ ob.

[Sidenote: Feoda ministrorum in ecclesia ministrancium.]

In primis succentori vicariorum ij_s._ Subcancellario xij_d._ Item cerae puerorum xij_d._ Item clericis de vestibus xij_d._ Item sacristis xij_d._ Item pro ornacione cathedrae episcopalis iiij_d._ Item in ligno pro stallis iiij_d._ Item in denariis communibus xviij_d._ Item custodi choristarum iij_s._ iiij_d._

Summa xj_s._ vj_d._

Summa totalis Expensarum vj lib. xiiij_s._ x_d._ ob. Et sic Recepta excedunt expensas xl_s._ vj_d._ ob. ad usum Episcopi.

N

WINTER PROHIBITIONS

I. 190-200. TERTULLIAN.

[From De Idololatria (Tertulliani Opera, ed. A. Reifferscheid and G. Wissowa, in Corpus Script. Eccles. xx; P. L. i. 674). Part of the argument of c. 15 is repeated in De Corona Militari, c. 13 (P. L. ii. 97). In De Fuga in Persecutione, c. 13 (P. L. ii. 119), bribes given by Christians to avoid persecution are called ‘saturnalitia’ given to soldiers.]

c. 10. [de ludimagistris]. Ipsam primam novi discipvli stipem Minervae et honori et nomini consecrat ... quam Minervalia Minervae, quam Saturnalia Saturni, quae etiam serviculis sub tempore Saturnalium celebrari necesse est. Etiam strenuae captandae et septimontium, et Brumae et carae cognationis honoraria exigenda omnia, Florae scholae coronandae: flaminicea et aediles sacrificant creati; schola honoratur feriis; idem fit idolo natali: omnis diaboli pompa frequentatur. Quis haec competere Christiano existimabit, nisi qui putabit convenire etiam non magistris?

c. 14. Quemadmodum, inquit, omnibus per omnia placeo, nimirum Saturnalia et Kalendas Ianuarias celebrans hominibus placebat? ... Sabbata, inquit, vestra et numenias et ceremonias odit anima mea; nobis, quibus sabbata extranea sunt et numeniae et feriae a deo aliquando dilectae, Saturnalia et Ianuariae et Brumae et Matronales frequentantur, munera commeant et strenae, consonant lusus, convivia constrepunt.

c. 15. Sed luceant, inquit, opera vestra; at nunc lucent tabernae et ianuae nostrae, plures iam invenias ethnicorum fores sine lucernis et laureis, quam Christianorum ... ergo, inquis, honor dei est lucernae pro foribus et laurus in postibus? ... certi enim esse debemus, si quos latet per ignorantiam litteraturae saecularis, etiam ostiorum deos apud Romanos, Cardeam a cardinibus appellatam et Forculum a foribus, et Limentinum a limine et ipsum Ianum a ianua ... si autem sunt qui in ostiis adorantur, ad eos et lucernae et laureae pertinebunt; idolo feceris, quicquid ostio feceris ... scis fratrem per visionem eadem nocte castigatum graviter, quod ianuam eius subito adnuntiatis gaudiis publicis servi coronassent. Et tamen non ipse coronaverat aut praeceperat; nam ante processerat et regressus reprehenderat factum ... accendant igitur quotidie lucernas, quibus lux nulla est; affigant postibus lauros postmodum arsuras, quibus ignes imminent; illis competunt et testimonia tenebrarum et auspicia poenarum. Tu lumen es mundi et arbor virens semper; si templis renuntiasti, ne feceris templum ianuam tuam, minus dixi; si lupanaribus renuntiasti, ne induaris domui tuae faciem novi lupanaris.

II. 190-200. TERTULLIAN.

[Apologeticus, c. 42 in P. L. i. 492.]

Sed si ceremonias tuas non frequento, attamen et illa die homo sum. Non lavo sub noctem Saturnalibus, ne et noctem et diem perdam: attamen lavo et debita hora et salubri.

III. †348. PRUDENTIUS.

[Contra Symmachum, i. 237 in P. L. lx. 139.]

Iano etiam celebri de mense litatur auspiciis epulisque sacris, quas inveterato heu! miseri sub honore agitant, et gaudia ducunt festa Kalendarum.

IV. †370. PACIANUS, BISHOP OF BARCELONA.

[Pacianus, Paraenesis ad Poenitentiam (P. L. xiii. 1081). Jerome, de Viris illustribus, c. 106 (P. L. xxiii. 703), says of Pacianus, ‘scripsit varia opuscula, de quibus est Cervus.’]

Hoc enim, puto, proximus Cervulus ille profecit, ut eo diligentius fieret, quo impressius notabatur.... Puto, nescierant Cervulum facere, nisi illis reprehendendo monstrassem.

V. 374-397. ST. AMBROSE.

[From De Interpellatione Job et David, ii. 1 (P. L. xiv. 813), concluding a passage on the cervus as a type of David and of Christ. The Benedictine editors think that if the allusion were to the Cervulus, St. Ambrose would have reprobated it. But in any case it is only a passing allusion.]

Sed iam satis nobis in exordio tractatus, sicut in principio anni, more vulgi, cervus allusit.

VI. 380-397. ST. CHRYSOSTOM.

[Oratio Kalendis Habita (P. G. xlviii. 953). A sermon preached at Antioch.]

Ἀλλὰ πρὸς ἕτερα κατεπείγοντα ἡμῖν ὁ λόγος ὥρμηται, τὰ σήμερον ὑπὸ τῆς πόλεως ἁπάσης ἁμαρτηθέντα ... καὶ γὰρ καὶ ἡμῖν πόλεμος συνέστηκε νῦν ... δαιμόνων πομπευσάντων ἐπὶ τῆς ἀγορᾶς. αἱ γὰρ διαβολικαὶ παννυχίδες αἱ γινόμεναι τήμερον, καὶ τὰ σκώμματα, καὶ αἱ λοιδορίαι, καὶ αἱ χορεῖαι αἱ νυκτεριναί, καὶ ἡ καταγέλαστος αὕτη κωμῳδία, παντὸς πολεμίου χαλεπώτερον τὴν πόλιν ἡμῶν ἐξῃχμαλώτισαν ... περιχαρὴς ἡμῖν ἡ πόλις γέγονε καὶ φαιδρά, καὶ ἐστεφάνωται, καὶ καθάπερ γυνὴ φιλόκοσμος καὶ πολυτελής, οὕτως ἡ ἀγορὰ φιλοτίμως ἐκαλλωπίσατο σήμερον, χρυσία περιτιθεμένη, καὶ ἱσμάτια πολυτελῆ, καὶ ὑποδήματα, καὶ ἕτερά τινα τοιαῦτα, τῶν ἐν τοῖς ἐργαστηρίοις ἐκάστου τῇ τῶν οἰκείων ἔργων ἐπιδείξει τὸν ὁμότεχνον παραδραμεῖν φιλονεικοῦντος. Ἀλλ’ αὕτη μὲν ἡ φιλοτιμία, εἰ καὶ παιδικῆς ἐστι διανοίας, καὶ ψυχῆς οὐδὲν μέγα οὐδὲ ὑψηλὸν φανταζομένης, ἀλλ’ ὅμως οὐ τοσαύτην ἐπισύρεται βλάβην.... Ἀλλ’, ὅπερ ἔφην, οὐ τοσούτων ἐγκλημάτων ἀξία αὕτη ἡ φιλοτιμία· οἱ δὲ ἐν τοῖς καπηλείοις ἀγῶνες γινόμενοι τήμερον, οὗτοι μὲν μάλιστα ὀδυνῶσι, καὶ ἀσωτίας καὶ ἀσεβείας ἐμπεπλημένοι πολλῆς· ἀσεβείας μέν, ὅτι παρατηροῦσιν ἡμέρας οἱ ταῦτα ποιοῦντες, καὶ οἰωνίζονται, καὶ νομίζουσιν, εἰ τὴν νουμηνίαν τοῦ μηνὸς τούτου μεθ’ ἡδονῆς καὶ εὐφροσύνης ἐπιτελέσαιεν, καὶ τὸν ἅπαντα τοιοῦτον ἕξειν ἐνιαυτόν· ἀσωτίας δὲ, ὅτι ὑπὸ τὴν ἕω γυναῖκες καὶ ἄνδρες φιάλας καὶ ποτήρια πληρώσαντες μετὰ πολλῆς τῆς ἀσωτίας τὸν ἄκρατον πίνουσι.... Ταῦτα ἀπὸ νουμηνίας φιλοσόφει, ταῦτα ἀπὸ τῆς περιόδου τῶν ἐνιαυτῶν ἀναμιμνήσκου.... Τὸ παρατηρεῖν ἡμέρας οὐ Χριστιανικῆς φιλοσοφίας, ἀλλ’ Ἑλληνικῆς πλάνης ἐστίν.... Οὐδὲν ἔχεις κοινὸν πρὸς τὴν γῆν, ἔνθα ἡλίου δρόμοι, καὶ περίοδοι, καὶ ἡμέραι.... Τὸ πρὸς ἡμέρας ἐπτοῆσθαι τοιαύτας, καὶ πλείονα ἐν αὐταῖς δέχεσθαι ἡδονήν, καὶ λύχνους ἅπτειν ἐπὶ τῆς ἀγορᾶς, καὶ στεφανώματα πλέκειν, παιδικῆς ἀνοίας ἐστίν.... Μὴ τοίνυν ἐπὶ τῆς ἀγορᾶς ἀνακαύσῃς πῦρ αἰσθητόν, ἀλλ’ ἐπὶ τῆς διανοίας ἄναψον φῶς πνευματικόν.... Μὴ τὴν θύραν τῆς οἰκίας στεφανώσῃς, ἀλλὰ τοιαύτην ἐπίδειξαι πολιτείαν, ὥστε τὸν τῆς δικαιοσύνης στέφανον σῇ κεφαλῇ παρὰ τῆς τοῦ Χριστοῦ δέξασθαι χειρός.... Ὅταν ἀκούσῃς θορύβους, ἀταξίας καὶ πομπὰς διαβολικάς, πονηρῶν ἀνθρώπων καὶ ἀκολάστων τὴν ἀγορὰν πεπληρωμένην, οἴκοι μένε, καὶ τῆς ταραχῆς ἀπαλλάττου ταύτης, καὶ ἔμεινας εἰς δόξαν Θεοῦ.

VII. 380-397. ST. CHRYSOSTOM.

[Concio de Lazaro 1 (P. L., xlviii. 963). Preached at Antioch on the day after No. vi.]

Τὴν χθὲς ἡμέραν, ἑορτὴν οὖσαν σατανικήν, ἐποιήσατε ὑμεῖς ἑορτὴν πνευματικήν ... Διπλοῦν τούνυν οὕτω τὸ κέρδος ὑμῖν γέγονεν, ὅτι καὶ τῆς ἀτάκτου τῶν μεθυόντων ἀπηλλάγητε χορείας, καὶ σκιρτήματα ἐσκιρτήσατε πνευματικά, πολλὴν εὐταξίαν ἔχοντα· καὶ μετέσχετε κρατῆρος, οὐκ ἄκρατον ἐκχέοντος, ἀλλὰ διδασκαλίας πεπληρωμένου πνευματικῆς· καὶ αὐλὸς ἐγένεσθε καὶ κιθάρα τῷ Πνεύματι τῷ ἁγίῳ· καὶ τῶν ἄλλων τῷ διαβόλῳ χορευόντων, ὑμεῖς ... ἐδώκατε τῷ Πνεύματι κροῦσαι τὰς ὑμετέρας ψυχάς.

VIII. 388. ST. JEROME.

[Comm. in Ephes. vi. 4 in P. L. xxvi. 540.]

Legant episcopi atque presbyteri, qui filios suos saecularibus litteris erudiunt, et faciunt comoedias legere, et mimorum turpia scripta cantare, de ecclesiasticis forsitan sumptibus eruditos; et quod in corbonam pro peccato virgo aut vidua, vel totam substantiam suam effundens quilibet pauper obtulerat, hoc kalendariam strenam, et Saturnalitiam sportulam et Minervale munus grammaticus, et orator, aut in sumptus domesticos, aut in templi stipes, aut in sordida scorta convertit.

IX. †396. ASTERIUS OF AMASEA.

[Sermo adv. Kal. Festum, in P. G. xl. 215.]

Δύο κατὰ ταυτὸν ἑορταὶ συνέδραμον ἐπὶ τῆς χθιζῆς καὶ τῆς ἐνεστώσης ἡμέρας, οὐ σύμφωνοί τε καὶ ἀδελφοί, πᾶν δὲ τοὐναντίον ἐχθρῶς τε καὶ ἐναντίως ἔχουσαι πρὸς ἀλλήλας. Ἡ μὲν γὰρ ἐστι τοῦ ἔξωθεν συρφετοῦ, πολὺ συνάγουσα τοῦ μαμωνᾶ τὸ ἀργύριον ... φιλεῖται μὲν τὸ στόμα, ἀγαπᾶται δὲ τὸ νόμισμα· τὸ σχῆμα διαθέσεως, καὶ τὸ ἔργον πλεονεξίας ... τὰ δὲ ἄλλα πῶς ἄν τις εἴποι; μὴ καὶ ἐκκαλυψάμενος γυναικίζεται ὁ ἀριστεύς; κ.τ.λ.

X. 387-430. ST. AUGUSTINE.

[Sermo cxcviii in P. L. xxxviii. 1024. In Sermones cxcvi and cxcvii Augustine also attacks the Calends, but in more general terms.]

Et modo si solemnitas gentium, quae fit hodierno die in laetitia saeculi atque carnali, in strepitu vanissimarum et turpissimarum cantionum, in conviviis et saltationibus turpibus, in celebratione ipsius falsae festivitatis, si ea quae agunt gentes non vos delectent, congregabimini ex gentibus.... Qui ergo aliud credit, aliud sperat, aliud amat, vita probet, factis ostendat. Acturus es celebrationem strenarum, sicut paganus, lusurus alea, et inebriaturus te: quomodo aliud credis, aliud speras, aliud amas?... Noli te miscere gentibus similitudine morum atque factorum. Dant illi strenas, date vos eleemosynas. Avocantur illi cantionibus luxuriarum, avocate vos sermonibus scripturarum: currunt illi ad theatrum, vos ad ecclesiam; inebriantur illi, vos ieiunate. Si hodie non potestis ieiunare, saltem cum sobrietate prandete.... Sed dicis mihi; quando strenas do, mihi accipio et ego. Quid ergo, quando das pauperi, nihil accipis?... Etenim illa daemonia delectantur canticis vanitatis, delectantur nugatorio spectaculo, et turpitudinibus variis theatrorum, insania circi, crudelitate amphitheatri, certaminibus animosis eorum qui pro pestilentibus hominibus lites et contentiones usque ad inimicitias suscipiunt, pro mimo, pro histrione, pro pantomimo, pro auriga, pro venatore. Ista facientes, quasi thura ponunt daemoniis de cordibus suis.

XI. †400. SEVERIAN.

[Homilia de Pythonibus et Maleficis (Mai, Spicilegium Romanum, x. 222). The author’s name is given as Severian. A Severian was bishop of Gabala in Syria †400, a prolific preacher and an opponent of St. Chrysostom in Constantinople. It seems, however, a little hazardous to ascribe to him a Latin homily.]

Ecce veniunt dies, ecce kalendae veniunt, et tota daemonum pompa procedit, idolorum tota producitur officina, et sacrilegio vetusto anni novitas consecratur. Figurant Saturnum, faciunt Iovem, formant Herculem, exponunt cum venantibus suis Dianam, circumducunt Vulcanum verbis haletantem turpitudines suas, et plura, quorum, quia portenta sunt, nomina sunt tacenda; quorum deformitates quia natura non habet, creatura nescit, fingere ars laborat. Praeterea vestiuntur homines in pecudes, et in feminas viros vertunt, honestatem rident, violant iudicia, censuram publicam rident, inludunt saeculo teste, et dicunt se facientes ista iocari. Non sunt ioca, sed sunt crimina. In idola transfiguratur homo. Et, si ire ad idola crimen est, esse idolum quid videtur?... Namque talium deorum facies ut pernigrari possint, carbo deficit; et ut eorum habitus pleno cumuletur horrore, paleae, pelles, panni, stercora, toto saeculo perquiruntur, et quidquid est confusionis humanae, in eorum facie collocatur.

XII. 408-410. ST. JEROME.

[Comm. in Isaiam, lxv. 11 (P. L. xxiv. 638).]

Et vos qui dereliquistis Dominum, et obliti estis montem sanctum meum. Qui ponitis fortunae mensam et libatis super eam.... Est autem in cunctis urbibus, et maxime in Aegypto, et in Alexandria idololatriae vetus consuetudo, ut ultimo die anni et mensis eorum qui extremus est, ponant mensam refertam varii generis epulis, et poculum mulso mixtum, vel praeteriti anni, vel futuri fertilitatem auspicantes. Hoc autem faciebant Israelitae, omnium simulacrorum portenta venerantes: et nequaquam altari victimas, sed huiusce modi mensae liba fundebant.

XIII. †412-†465. MAXIMUS OF TURIN.

[Homilia ciii, de Calendis Gentilium (P. L. lvii. 491).]

Bene quodammodo Deo providente dispositum est, ut inter medias gentilium festivitates Christus Dominus oriretur, et inter ipsas tenebrosas superstitiones errorum veri luminis splendor effulgeret.... Quis enim sapiens, qui dominici Natalis sacramentum colit, non ebrietatem condemnet Saturnalium, non declinet lasciviam calendarum?... Sunt plerique, qui trahentes consuetudinem de veteri superstitione vanitatis, calendarum diem pro summa festivitate procurent; et sic laetitiam habere velint, ut sit magis illis tristitia. Nam ita lasciviunt, ita vino et epulis satiantur, ut qui toto anno castus et temperans fuerit, illa die sit temulentus atque pollutus; et quod nisi ita fecerit, putet perdidisse se ferias; quia non intelligit per tales se ferias perdidisse salutem. Illud autem quale est, quod surgentes mature ad publicum cum munusculo, hoc est, cum strenis unusquisque procedit; et salutaturus amicos, salutat praemio antequam osculo? ... Adhuc et ipsam munificentiam strenas vocant, cum magis strenuum, quod——cogitur.... Hoc autem quale est quod, interposita die, tali inani exordio, velut incipientes vivere, aut auspicia colligant, omniaque perquirant; et exinde totius anni sibi vel prosperitatem, vel tristitiam metiuntur? ... Hoc autem malis suis addunt, ut quasi de auspicatione domum redeuntes ramusculos gestent in manibus, scilicet pro omine, ut vel onusti ad hospitium redeant.

XIV. †412-†465. MAXIMUS OF TURIN.

[Homilia xvi, de Cal. Ian. (P. L. lvii. 255).]

Quamquam non dubitem vos ... universas calendarum supervenientium vanitates declinare penitus et horrere ... necessarium, nec superfluum reor ... precedentium patrum vobis repetantur alloquia.... Et illorum gravior atque immedicabilis languor est, qui superstitionum furore et ludorum suavitate decepti sub specie sanitatis insaniunt. An non omnia quae a ministris daemonum illis aguntur diebus falsa sunt et insana, cum vir, virium suarum vigore mollito, totum se frangit in feminam, tantoque illud ambitu atque arte agit, quasi poeniteat illum esse, quod vir est? Numquid non universa ibi falsa sunt et insana, cum se a Deo formati homines, aut in pecudes, aut in feras, aut in portenta transformant? Numquid non omnem excedit insaniam, cum decorem vultus humani Dei specialiter manibus in omnem pulchritudinem figuratum, squalore sordium et adulterina foeditate deturpant? ... Post omnia, ad offensionis plenitudinem, dies ipsos annum novum vocant.... Novum annum Ianuarias appellant calendas, cum vetusto semper errore et horrore sordescant. Auspicia etiam vanissimi colligere se dicunt, ac statum vitae suae inanibus indiciis aestimantes, per incerta avium ferarumque signa imminentis anni futura rimantur.

XV. †412-†465. MAXIMUS OF TURIN?

[Sermo vi, de Cal. Ian. (P. L. lvii. 543). The Sermo is ascribed to Maximus in three good MSS. and the style agrees with his. Other MSS. give it to St. Augustine or St. Ambrose, and it is printed in the Benedictine edition of the latter’s works (Sermo vii. in P. L. xvii. 617). The editors, however, do not think it his.]

Est mihi adversus plerosque vestrum, fratres, querela non modica: de iis loquor qui nobiscum natale Domini celebrantes gentilium se feriis dediderunt, et post illud coeleste convivium superstitionis sibi prandium praepararunt.... Quomodo igitur potestis religiose Epiphaniam Domini procurare, qui Iani calendas quantum in vobis est devotissime celebratis? Ianus enim homo fuit unius conditor civitatis, quae Ianiculum nuncupatur, in cuius honore a gentibus calendae sunt Ianuariae nuncupatae; unde qui calendas Ianuarias colit peccat, quoniam homini mortuo defert divinitatis obsequium. Inde est quod ait Apostolus: Dies observastis, et menses, et tempora, et annos; timeo ne sine causa laboraverim in vobis. Observavit enim diem et mensem qui his diebus aut non ieiunavit, aut ad Ecclesiam non processit. Observavit diem qui hesterna die non processit ad ecclesiam, processit ad campum. Ergo, fratres, omni studio gentilium festivitatem et ferias declinemus, ut quando illi epulantur et laeti sunt, nunc nos simus sobrii, atque ieiuni, quo intelligant laetitiam suam nostra abstinentia condemnari.

XVI. Fifth century. ST. PETER CHRYSOLOGUS.

[Sermo clv in P. L. lii. 609.]

Ubi nostram Christus pie natus est ad salutem, mox diabolus divinae bonitati numerosa genuit et perniciosa portenta, ut ridiculum de religione componeret, in sacrilegium verteret sanctitatem.... Quorum formant adulteria in simulacris, quorum fornicationes imaginibus mandant, quorum titulant incesta picturis, quorum crudelitates commendant libris, quorum parricidia tradunt saeculis, quorum impietates personant tragoediis, quorum obscaena ludunt, hos qua dementia deos crederent, nisi quia criminum desiderio, amore scelerum possidentur, deos exoptant habere criminosos?... Haec diximus, quare gentiles hodie faciant deos suos talia committere, quae sustinemus, et faciant tales qui videntibus et horrori sunt et pudori; faciant ut eos aliquando et ipsi qui faciunt horreant et relinquant, et Christiani glorientur a talibus se liberatos esse per Christum: si modo non eorum ex spectaculis polluantur.... Et si tanta est de assensione damnatio, quis satis lugeat eos qui simulacra faciunt semetipsos?... Qui se deum facit, Deo vero contradictor existit; imaginem Dei portare noluit, qui idoli voluerit portare personam; qui iocari voluerit cum diabolo, non poterit gaudere cum Christo.... Abstrahat ergo pater filium, servum dominus, parens parentem, civem civis, homo hominem, Christianus omnes qui se bestiis compararunt, exaequarunt iumentis, aptaverunt pecudibus, daemonibus formaverunt.

XVII. 470-542. CAESARIUS OF ARLES?

[Sermo Pseud.-Augustin. cxxix de Kal. Ian. in P. L. xxxix. 2001. Parts of this sermon are reproduced ‘mutatis mutandis’ in the eighth-century Frankish Homilia de Sacrilegiis (§§ 23-26), edited by Caspari (cf. No. xxxix, below), and also in a MS. homily, De Kalendis Ianuariis, in Cod. Lat. Monac. 6108 (tenth century), f. 48ᵛ. The rest of that homily is mainly from Maximus Taurinensis, Hom. 16 (No. xiv, above). And nearly the whole of the present Sermo is included in the Homiliarium of Burchardus of Würzburg and printed from his MS. by Eckart, Francia Orientalis, i. 837.

On the date and authorship of the Sermo, cf. Caspari, 67. It is ascribed to Augustine by a Codex Colbertinus. His editors, Blancpain and Coutant, treat it as not his (a) on account of the difference of style, (b) on account of the reference to the ieiunium prescribed by the sancti antiqui patres (i.e. amongst others, Augustine himself: cf. No. x). A Codex Aceiensis ascribes it to Faustinus (i.e. Faustus of Raji), and this is accepted by the Bollandists (Acta SS. Ian. i. 2), and by Eckart, op. cit. i. 433. Finally a codex Navarricus assigns it to Maxentius. This can hardly be the Scythian monk of that name (†520). Caspari suggests that there has been a scribal error. The sermo is headed ‘De natali Domini. In calendis ianuariis.’ There is nothing about the Nativity in it, and possibly a Nativity sermon and the author’s name of the Kalends sermon which followed it have dropped out. He also thinks Maximus Taurinensis may be meant. However Caspari finally agrees with Blancpain and Coutant, that the style and the allusion to the triduum ieiunii so closely resembling that of the Council of Tours (No. xxii) point to a writer of the first half of the sixth century, and that he may very likely be Caesarius of Arles, who, as his Vita (cf. No. xx) states, did preach against the Kalends.]

Dies calendarum istarum, fratres carissimi, quas Ianuarias vocant, a quodam Iano homine perdito ac sacrilego nomen accepit. Ianus autem iste dux quidam et princeps hominum paganorum fuit: quem imperiti homines et rustici dum quasi regem metuunt, colere velut Deum coeperunt.... Diem ergo calendarum hodiernarum de nomine Iani, sicut iam dictum est, nuncuparunt: atque ut ei homini divinos honores conferre cupiebant, et finem unius anni et alterius initium deputarunt. Et quia apud illos Ianuariae calendae unum annum implere, et alterum incipere dicebantur, istum Ianum quasi in principio ac termino posuerunt, ut unum annum implere, alterum incipere diceretur. Et hinc est, quod idolorum cultores ipsi Iano duas facies figurarunt.... Hinc itaque est quod istis diebus pagani homines perverso omnium rerum ordine obscenis deformitatibus teguntur; ut tales utique se faciant qui colunt, qualis est iste qui colitur. In istis enim diebus miseri homines, et, quod peius est, aliqui baptizati, sumunt formas adulteras, species monstrosas, in quibus quidem sunt quae primum pudenda, aut potius dolenda sunt. Quis enim sapiens poterit credere, inveniri aliquos sanae mentis qui cervulum facientes, in ferarum se velint habitum commutare? Alii vestiuntur pellibus pecudum; alii assumunt capita bestiarum, gaudentes et exsultantes, si taliter se in ferinas species transformaverint, ut homines non esse videantur.... Iamvero illud quale et quam turpe est, quod viri nati tunicis muliebribus vestiuntur, et turpissima demum demutatione puellaribus figuris virile robur effeminant, non erubescentes tunicis muliebribus inserere militares lacertos: barbatas facies praeferunt, et videri feminae volunt.... Sunt enim qui calendis ianuariis auguria observant, ut focum de domo sua, vel aliud quodcumque beneficium, cuicumque petenti non tribuant. Diabolicas etiam strenas, et ab aliis accipiunt, et ipsi aliis tradunt. Aliqui etiam rustici, mensulas in ista nocte quae praeteriit, plenas multis rebus, quae ad manducandum sunt necessariae, componentes, tota nocte sic compositas esse volunt, credentes quod hoc illis calendae ianuariae praestare possint, ut per totum annum convivia illorum in tali abundantia perseverent.... Qui enim aliquid de paganorum consuetudine in istis diebus observare voluerint, timendum est ne eis nomen christianum prodesse non possit. Et ideo sancti antiqui patres nostri considerantes maximam partem hominum diebus istis gulae vel luxuriae deservire, et ebrietatibus et sacrilegis saltationibus insanire, statuerunt in universum mundum, ut per omnes Ecclesias publicum indiceretur ieiunium.... Ieiunemus ergo, fratres carissimi, in istis diebus.... Qui etiam in istis calendis stultis hominibus luxuriose ludentibus aliquam humanitatem impenderit, peccati eorum participem se esse non dubitet.

XVIII. ?470-542. CAESARIUS OF ARLES?

[Sermo Pseud.-Augustin. cxxx in P. L. xxxix. 2003. The authorship is generally taken to follow that of No. xvii, although a Fleury MS. ascribes it to Bp. Sedatus of Besiers †589.]

Sic enim fit ut stultae laetitiae causa, dum observantur calendarum dies aut aliarum superstitionum vanitas, per licentiam ebrietatis et ludorum turpem cantum, velut ad sacrificia sua daemones invitentur.... Quid enim est tam demens quam virilem sexum in formam mulieris, turpi habitu commutare? Quid tam demens quam deformare faciem, et vultus induere, quos ipsi etiam daemones expavescunt? Quid tam demens quam incompositis motibus et impudicis carminibus vitiorum laudes inverecunda delectatione cantare? indui ferino habitu, et capreae aut cervo similem fieri, ut homo ad imaginem Dei et similitudinem factus sacrificium daemonum fiat?... Quicunque ergo in calendis ianuariis quibuscunque miseris hominibus sacrilego ritu insanientibus, potius quam ludentibus, aliquam humanitatem dederint, non hominibus, sed daemonibus se dedisse cognoscant. Et ideo si in peccatis eorum participes esse non vultis, cervulum sive iuvencam[703], aut alia quaelibet portenta, ante domos vestras venire non permittatis.... Sunt enim aliqui, quod peius est, quos ita observatio inimica subvertit, ut in diem calendarum si forte aut vicinis aut peregrinantibus opus sit, etiam focum dare dissimulent. Multi praeterea strenas et ipsi offerre, et ab aliis accipere solent. Ante omnia, fratres, ad confundendam paganorum carnalem et luxuriosam laetitiam, exceptis illis qui prae infirmitate abstinere non praevalent, omnes auxiliante Deo ieiunemus; et pro illis miseris qui calendas istas, pro gula et ebrietate, sacrilega consuetudine colunt, Deo, quantum possumus, supplicemus.

XIX. 470-542. CAESARIUS OF ARLES?

[Sermo Pseud.-Augustin. 265, _De Christiano Nomine cum Operibus non Christianis_, in P. L. xxxix. 2239.]

Licet credam quod illa infelix consuetudo ... iam ... fuerit ... sublata; tamen, si adhuc agnoscatis aliquos illam sordidissimam turpitudinem de hinnicula vel cervula exercere ... castigate.

XX. 470-542. CAESARIUS OF ARLES.

[Episcopi Cyprianus, Firminus et Viventius, Vita S. Caesarii Arelatensis, i. 5. 42; P. L. lxvii. 1021.]

Predicationes ... contra calendarum quoque paganissimos ritus ... fecit.

XXI. †554. CHILDEBERT.

[Constitutio Childeberti, De Abolendis Reliquiis Idolatriae, in Mansi, ix. 738; Boretius, i. 2.]

Noctes pervigiles cum ebrietate, scurrilitate, vel canticis, etiam in ipsis sacris diebus, pascha, natale Domini, et reliquis festivitatibus, vel adveniente die Dominico dansatrices per villas ambulare. Haec omnia, unde Deus agnoscitur laedi, nullatenus fieri permittimus.

XXII. 567. COUNCIL OF TOURS.

[Maassen, i. 121; Mansi, ix. 803.]

c. 18. [De ieiuniis monachorum]

Quia inter natale Domini et epyfania omni die festivitates sunt, idemque prandebunt excepto triduum illud, quod ad calcandam gentilium consuetudinem patris nostri statuerunt, privatas in kalendis Ianuarii fieri letanias, ut in ecclesia psalletur et ora octava in ipsis kalendis circumcisionis missa Deo propitio celebretur.

c. 23. Enimvero quoniam cognovimus nonnullos inveniri sequipedes erroris antiqui, qui Kalendas Ianuarii colunt, cum Ianus homo gentilis fuerit, rex quidam, sed esse Deus non potuit; quisquis ergo unum Deum Patrem regnantem cum Filio et Spiritu Sancto credit, non potest integer Christianus dici, qui super hoc aliqua custodit.

XXIII. 572-574. MARTIN OF BRAGA.

[Martin von Bracara, De Correctione Rusticorum, ed. C. P. Caspari, Christiania, 1883.]

c. 10. Similiter et ille error ignorantibus et rusticis hominibus subrepit, ut Kalendas Ianuarias putent anni esse initium, quod omnino falsissimum est. Nam, sicut scriptura dicit, viii. kal. Aprilis in ipso aequinoctio initium primi anni est factum.

c. 11. ... Sine causa autem miser homo sibi istas praefigurationes ipse facit, ut, quasi sicut in introitu anni satur est et laetus ex omnibus, ita illi et in toto anno contingat. Observationes istae omnes paganorum sunt per adinventiones daemonum exquisitae.

c. 16. ... Vulcanalia et Kalendas observare, menses ornare, lauros ponere, pedem observare, effundere [in foco] super truncum frugem et vinum, et panem in fontem mittere, quid est aliud nisi cultura diaboli?

XXIV. †560. MARTIN, BISHOP OF BRAGA.

[Quoted in the Decretum Gratiani, Pars ii, Causa 26, Quaestio 7, c. 13 (C. I. Can. ed. Friedberg, i. 1044), as from ‘Martinus Papa,’ or ‘Martinus Bracarensis’ [c. 74]. Mansi, ix. 857, gives the canon with a reference to C. of Laodicea, c. 39, which is a more general decree against taking part in Gentile feasts. Burchardus, x. 15, quotes it ‘ex decreto Martialis papae.’ Martin of Braga ob. 580. His Capitula are collected from the councils of Braga and the Great Councils. Caspari, Martin von Bracara’s De Con. Rusticorum, xl, thinks that several of them, including c. 74, were his own additions.]

Non licet iniquas observationes agere calendarum, et otiis vacare gentilibus, neque lauro aut viriditate arborum cingere domos: omnis enim haec observatio paganismi est.

XXV. 573-603. COUNCIL OF AUXERRE.

[Maassen, i. 179.]

c. 1. Non licet kalendis Ianuarii vetolo aut cervolo facere vel streneas diabolicas observare, sed in ipsa die sic omnia beneficia tribuantur, sicut in reliquis diebus.

c. 5. Omnino inter supra dictis conditionibus pervigilias, quos in honore domini Martini observant, omnimodis prohibite.

c. 11. Non licet vigilia paschae ante ora secunda noctis vigilias perexpedire, quia ipsa nocte non licet post media nocte bibere, nec natale Domini nec reliquas sollemnitates.

XXVI. 6th cent. ST. SAMSON, BISHOP OF DÔLE.

[Anonymi Vita S. Samsonis, ii. 13 (Acta S. S. Iulii, vi. 590).]

Nam cum quodam tempore in Resia insula praedicaret, veniente per annuam vertiginem Kalenda Ianuaria, qua homines supradictae insulae hanc nequam solemnem inepte iuxta patrum abominabilem consuetudinem prae ceteris sane celebrare consueverant, ille providus spiritu ob duritiam eorum mitigandam, convenire eos omnes in unum fecit, ut, Deo revelante, sermo ad detestanda tam gravia mala sit. Tum hi omnes verum de eo amantes, pravos ritus anathematizaverunt, ac verum iuxta praecepta tenus sine suscipere spoponderunt. Ille nihilominus in Domino secundum Apostolos gaudens, omnes parvulos qui per insulam illam ob hanc nefariam diem discurrebant, vocavit ad se, eisque singulis per sobriam vocem mercedem nummismunculi auro quod est mensura domuit, praecipiens in nomine Domini, ne ulterius ab illis haec sacrilega consuetudo servaretur. Quod ita Deo operante factum est, ut usque hodie ibidem spiritales ioci eius solide et catholice remanserint.

XXVII. 588-659. ST. ELIGIUS OF ROUEN?

[Sermo in Vita Eligii of Audoënus of Rouen (P. L. lxxxvii. 524). According to E. Vacandard in R. des Questions historiques, lxiv. 471, this is largely a compilation from the sermons of St. Caesarius of Arles.]

Nullus in Kalendis Ianuarii nefanda et ridiculosa, vetulas aut cervulos, aut iotticos[704] faciat, neque mensas supra noctem componat, neque strenas aut bibitiones superfluas exerceat.

XXVIII. †636. ST. ISIDORE OF SEVILLE.

[De Ecclesiasticis Officiis, i. 41; De Ieiunio Kalendarum Ianuariarum (P. L. lxxxiii. 774). This is the chief source of the similar passage in the ninth-century Pseudo-Alcuin, De Div. Offic. c. 4 (P. L. ci. 1177).]

1. Ieiunium Kalendarum Ianuariarum propter errorem gentilitatis instituit Ecclesia. Ianus enim quidam princeps paganorum fuit, a quo nomen mensis Ianuarii nuncupatur, quem imperiti homines veluti Deum colentes, in religione honoris posteris tradiderunt, diemque ipsam scenis et luxuriae sacraverunt.

2. Tunc enim miseri homines, et, quod peius est, etiam fideles, sumentes species monstruosas, in ferarum habitu transformantur: alii, femineo gestu demutati, virilem vultum effeminant. Nonnulli etiam de fanatica adhuc consuetudine quibusdam ipso die observationum auguriis profanantur; perstrepunt omnia saltantium pedibus, tripudiantium plausibus, quodque est turpius nefas, nexis inter se utriusque sexus choris, inops animi, furens vino, turba miscetur.

3. Proinde ergo sancti Patres considerantes maximam partem generis humani eodem die huiusmodi sacrilegiis ac luxuriis inservire, statuerunt in universo mundo per omnes Ecclesias publicum ieiunium, per quod agnoscerent homines in tantum se prave agere, ut pro eorum peccatis necesse esset omnibus Ecclesiis ieiunare.

XXIX. †685. ST. ALDHELM.

[Epist. iii in Eahfridum (P. L. lxxxix. 93).]

Et ubi pridem eiusdem nefandae natricis ermuli[705] cervulique cruda fanis colebantur stoliditate in profanis, versa vice discipulorum gurgustia (imo almae oraminum aedes) architecti ingenio fabre conduntur.

XXX. 692. QUINISEXTINE COUNCIL.

[Conc. Quinisextinum or in Trullo, held at Constantinople, versio Latina, c. 62 (Mansi, xi. 971).]

Kalendas quae dicuntur, et vota [Gk. βότα], et brumalia quae vocantur; et qui in primo Martii mensis die fit conventum ex fidelium universitate omnino tolli volumus: sed et publicas mulierum saltationes multam noxam exitiumque afferentes: quin etiam eas, quae nomine eorum, qui falso apud gentiles dii nominati sunt, vel nomine virorum ac mulierum fiunt, saltationes ac mysteria more antiquo et a vita Christianorum alieno, amandamus et expellimus; statuentes, ut nullus vir deinceps muliebri veste induatur, vel mulier veste viro conveniente. Sed neque comicas vel satyricas, vel tragicas personas induat; neque execrati Bacchi nomen, uvam in torcularibus exprimentes, invocent; neque vinum in doliis effundentes risum moveant, ignorantia vel vanitate ea, quae ab insaniae impostura procedunt, exercentes.

XXXI. 714. GREGORY II.

[Gregorius II. Capitulare datum episcopo et aliis in Bavariam ablegatis, c. 9 (Mansi, xii. 260).]

Ut incantationes, et fastidiationes, sive diversae observationes dierum Kalendarum, quas error tradidit paganorum, prohibeantur.

XXXII. 731-741. GREGORY III.

[Indicia, c. 23 (P. L. lxxxix. 594). In Epist. 3 sent to Germany on the return of Boniface from Rome in 739, Gregory gives the more general direction ‘abstinete et prohibete vosmetipsos ab omni cultu paganorum’ (P. L. lxxxix. 579).]

Si quis ... ut frater in honore Iovis vel Beli aut Iani, secundum paganam consuetudinem, honorare praesumpserit, placuit secundum antiquam constitutionem sex annos poeniteant. Humanius tres annos iudicaverunt.

XXXIII. †742. ST. BONIFACE (alias WINFRID).

[Bonifatius, Epistola xlix (P. L. lxxxix. 746). Epistola xlii (Jaffé, Monumenta Moguntina), Epistola 1 (Dümmler, Epistolae Merowingici et Karolini Aevi, i. 301): cf. Kögel, i. 28; Tille, Y. ad C. 88. The letter is Ad Zachariam Papam.]

Quia carnales homines idiotae Alamanni, vel Bagoarii, vel Franci, si iuxta Romanam urbem aliquid fieri viderint ex his peccatis quae nos prohibemus, licitum et concessum a sacerdotibus esse putant; et dum nobis improperium deputant, sibi scandalum vitae accipiunt. Sicut affirmant se vidisse annis singulis in Romana urbe, et iuxta ecclesiam sancti Petri, in die vel nocte quando Kalendae Ianuariae intrant, paganorum consuetudine choros ducere per plateas, et acclamationes ritu gentilium, et cantationes sacrilegas celebrare, et mensas illa die vel nocte dapibus onerare, et nullum de domo sua vel ignem, vel ferramentum, vel aliquid commodi vicino suo praestare velle. Dicunt quoque se ibi vidisse mulieres pagano ritu phylacteria et ligaturas in brachiis et in cruribus ligatas habere, et publice ad vendendum venales ad comparandum aliis offerre. Quae omnia eo quod ibi a carnalibus et insipientibus videntur, nobis hic improperium et impedimentum praedicationis et doctrinae faciunt.

XXXIV. †742. POPE ZACHARY.

[Zacharias Papa, Epistola ii (P. L. lxxxix. 918), Epistola li (Dümmler, Epist. Merow. et Karol. Aevi, i. 301). Written Ad Bonifatium in reply to No. xxxiii. The constitutio of Pope Gregory referred to appears to be No. xxxii.]

De Kalendis vero Ianuariis, vel ceteris auguriis, vel phylacteriis, et incantationibus, vel aliis diversis observationibus, quae gentili more observari dixisti apud beatum Petrum apostolum, vel in urbe Roma; hoc et nobis et omnibus Christianis detestabile et perniciosum esse iudicamus.... Nam et sanctae recordationis praedecessoris atque nutritoris nostri domini Gregorii papae constitutione omnia haec pie ac fideliter amputata sunt et alia diversa quam plura.

XXXV. 743. COUNCIL OF ROME.

[Conc. Romanum, c. 9: Mansi, xii. 384. A slightly different version, headed ‘Zacharias Papa in Conc. Rom. c. 9,’ is in Decretum Gratiani, ii. 26. 7, c. 14 (C. I. Can. ed. Friedberg, i. 1045). This seems to be a result of Nos. xxxiii, xxxiv.]

Ut nullus Kalendas Ianuarias et broma ritu paganorum colere praesumpserit, aut mensas cum dapibus in domibus praeparare, aut per vicos et plateas cantiones et choreas ducere, quod maxima iniquitas est coram Deo: anathema sit.

XXXVI. †750. PRIMINIUS.

[Dicta Abbatis Priminii, c. 22 (Caspari, _Kirchenhistorische Anecdota_, i. 172). Priminius was a German contemporary of Boniface.]

Nam Vulcanalia et Kalendas observare ... quid aliut nisi cultura diabuli est?... Cervulos et vetulas in Kalendas vel aliud tempus nolite anbulare. Viri vestes femineas, femine vestes virilis in ipsis Kalandis vel in alia lusa quam plurima nolite vestire.

XXXVII. †766. EGBERT.

[Penitentiale Egberti, viii. 4 (Haddan and Stubbs, iii. 424).]

Kalendas Ianuarias secundum paganam causam honorare, si non desinit, v annos poeniteat clericus, si laicus, iii annos poeniteat.

XXXVIII. †790-800. LOMBARD CAPITULARY.

[Capit. Langobardicum, c. 3; Boretius, i. 202; Gröber, _Zur Volkskunde aus Concilbeschlüssen und Capitularien_ (1893), No. 11.]

De pravos homines qui brunaticus colunt et de hominibus suis subtus maida[706] cerias incendunt et votos vovent: ad tale vero iniquitas eos removere faciant unusquisque.

XXXIX. †Eighth century. HOMILIA DE SACRILEGIIS.

[C. P. Caspari, Eine Augustin fälschlich beilegte Homilia de Sacrilegiis (1886), § 17. Caspari (pp. 71, 73) assigns the homily to a Frankish clerk, probably of the eighth century. Later on (§§ 23-26) is another passage on the Kalends taken from the pseud-Augustine, Sermo cxxix, which is No. xvii, above.]

Quicumque in kalendas ienuarias mensas panibus et aliis cybis ornat et per noctem ponet et diem ipsum colit et [in eo] auguria aspicet vel arma in campo ostendit et feclum[707] et cervulum et alias miserias vel lusa [facit] quę in ipso die insipientes solent facere, vel qui in mense februario hibernum credit expellere, vel qui in ipso mense dies spurcos ostendit, [et qui in kalendis ianuariis] aliquid auguriatur, quod in ipso anno futurum sit, non christianus, sed gentilis est.

XL. Ninth century. PSEUDO-THEODORE.

[Penit. Pseudo-Theod. c. xii (Wasserschleben, ut infra, 597; cf. Haddan and Stubbs, iii. 173). This Penitential, quoted by Tille, Y. and C. 98, and others as Theodore’s, and therefore English, is really a Frankish one, partly based, but not so far as these sections are concerned, on the genuine Penitential of Theodore. I do not quote all the many Penitentials which copy from each other, often totidem verbis, prohibitions of the Cervulus and Vetula. They may be found in F. W. H. Wasserschleben, Bussordnungen der abendländ. Kirche, 368, 382, 395, 414, 424, 428, 480, 517; H. J. Schmitz, Die Bussbücher und die Bussdisciplin der Kirche, 311, 379, 479, 633. On the general character of these compilations and their filiation, see Schaff, vii. 371. Their ultimate authority for the particular prohibition of cervulus and vetula, under these names, is probably No. xxv.]

§ 19. Si quis in Kalendas ianuarii in cervolo aut vetula vadit, id est, in ferarum habitus se communicant et vestiuntur pellibus pecudum, et assumunt capita bestiarum: qui vero taliter in ferinas species se transformant, iii annos poeniteant, quia hoc daemoniacum est.

§ 24. Qui ... kalendas Ianuarii, more paganorum, honorat, si clericus est, v annos poeniteat, laicus iii annos poeniteat.

XLI. †915. REGINO OF PRÜM.

[Regino von Prüm, De synodalibus causis et disciplina ecclesiastica (ed. Wasserschleben, 1840), i. 304.]

Fecisti aliquid quod pagani faciunt in Kalendis januariis in cervulo vel vetula tres annos poeniteas.

XLII. Before 1024. BURCHARDUS OF WORMS.

[Collectio Decretorum, xix. 5 (Grimm, iv. 1743; P. L. cxl. 960). The larger part of the book is from earlier Penitentials, &c., but the long chapter from which these extracts are taken appears to be based upon the writer’s own knowledge of contemporary superstition. On the collection generally, cf. A. Hauck, in Sitzb. Akad. Leipzig, phil.-hist. Kl., xlvi (1894), 65.]

Observasti Kalendas Ianuarias ritu paganorum, ut vel aliquid plus faceres propter novum annum, quam antea vel post soleres facere, ita dico, ut aut mensam tuam cum lapidibus vel epulis in domo tua praeparares eo tempore, aut per vicos et per plateas cantores et choros duceres, aut supra tectum domus tuae sederes ense tuo circumsignatus, ut ibi videres et intelligeres, quid tibi in sequenti anno futurum esset? vel in bivio sedisti supra taurinam cutem, ut et ibi futura tibi intelligeres? vel si panes praedicta nocte coquere fecisti tuo nomine, ut, si bene elevarentur et spissi et alti fierent, inde prosperitatem tuae vitae eo anno praevideres?

Credidisti ut aliqua femina sit quae hoc facere possit, quod quaedam a diabolo deceptae se affirmant necessario et ex praecepto facere debere, id est, cum daemonum turba in similitudinem mulierum transformatam, quam vulgaris stultitia holdam[708] vocat, certis noctibus equitare debere super quasdam bestias, et in eorum se consortio annumeratam esse?

Fecisti quod quidam faciunt in Kalendis Ianuarii, i.e. in octava Natalis Domini; qui ea sancta nocte filant, nent, consuunt, et omne opus quodcunque incipere possunt, diabolo instigante propter novum annum incipiunt?

Fecisti ut quaedam mulieres in quibusdam temporibus anni facere solent, ut in domo tuo mensam praeparares, et tuos cibos et potum cum tribus cultellis supra mensam poneres, ut si venissent tres illae sorores quas antiqua posteritas et antiqua stultitia parcas nominavit, ibi reficerentur; et tulisti divinae pietati potestatem suam et nomen suum, et diabolo tradidisti, ita dico, ut crederes illas quas tu dicis esse sorores tibi posse aut hic aut in futuro prodesse?

O

THE REGULARIS CONCORDIA OF ST. ETHELWOLD

[The following extracts are taken from the text printed by W. S. Logemann in Anglia, xiii (1891), 365, from Cotton MS. Tiberius A. III, †1020-1030. This MS. has Anglo-Saxon glosses. Other MSS. are in Cotton MS. Faustina B. III, and Bodleian MS. Junius, 52, ii. Earlier editions of the text are in Reyner, De Antiquitate Ordinis Benedictinorum in Anglia, App. iii. p. 77, and Dugdale, Monasticum Anglicanum, i. xxvii. The literary history is discussed by W. S. Logemann in Anglia, xv (1893), 20; M. Bateson, Rules for Monks and Canons in English Hist. Review, ix (1894), 700; and F. Tupper, History and Texts of the Benedictine Reform of the Tenth Century, in Modern Language Notes, viii. 344. The Prooemium of the document states that it was drawn up by the bishops, abbots, and abbesses of England upon the suggestion of King Edgar at a Council of Winchester, and that certain additions were made to it by Dunstan. The traditional ascription by Cotton’s librarian and others of the authorship of the Regularis Concordia to Dunstan is probably based on this record of the revision which, as archbishop, he naturally gave it. The actual author is thought by Dr. Logemann, and by Dr. Stubbs (Memorials of Dunstan, R. S. cx) to have been Ælfric, a monk, first of Abingdon and then of Winchester, who became abbot of Cerne, and in 1005 of Eynsham, and was a considerable writer in Anglo-Saxon. Dr. Logemann’s view is based on a theory that the Concordia is the ‘Regula Aluricii, glossata Anglice’ which occurs amongst the titles of some tracts once in the library of Christ Church, Canterbury (Anglia, xv. 25). But the Concordia is more likely to have been the ‘Consuetudines de faciendo servitio divino per annum, glossatae Anglice,’ which is in the same list, and in fact the Canterbury copy is probably that in Cotton MS. Faustina, B. III (E. H. R. ix. 708). Perhaps the ‘Regula Aluricii’ was a copy of the letter to the monks of Eynsham, which Ælfric at some date after 1005 based upon the Concordia and the De Ecclesiasticis Officiis of Amalarius of Metz. This is printed, from C. C. C. C. MS. 265, by Miss Bateson, in Dean Kitchin’s Obedientiary Rolls of St. Swithin’s, Winchester, 173 (Hampshire Record Soc.). It omits the Sepulchrum and its Visitatio. In any case this letter makes it clear that Ælfric was not the author of the Concordia, for he says ‘haec pauca de libro consuetudinum quem sanctus Aethelwoldus Wintoniensis episcopus cum coepiscopis et abbatibus tempore Eadgari felicissimi regis Anglorum undique collegit ac monachis instituit observandum.’ The author, therefore, so far as there was a single author, was Ethelwold, whom I take to be the ‘abbas quidam’ of the Prooemium. He became Abbot of Abingdon about 954, and Bishop of Winchester in 963. In 965 Elfrida, who is also mentioned in the Prooemium, became queen. The date of the Concordia probably falls, therefore, between 965 and the death of Edgar in 975. There were Councils of Winchester in 969 and 975 (Wilkins, i. 247, 261): but the Council at which the Concordia was undertaken may be an earlier one, not otherwise recorded. The Concordia is said in the Prooemium to have been based in part upon customs of Fleury and of Ghent. It is worth pointing out that Ethelwold had already reformed Abingdon after the model of Fleury, and that Dunstan, during his banishment, had found refuge in St. Peter’s at Ghent (Stephens-Hunt, Hist. of the English Church, i. 347, 349). Miss Bateson suggests that another source is to be found in the writings of an earlier Benedictine reformer, Benedict of Aniane (E. H. R. ix. 700).]

De Consuetudine Monachorum.

Prohemum Regularis Concordiae Anglicae Nationis Monachorum Sanctimonialiumque Orditur.

[The Prooemium opens with an account of the piety of King Edgar ‘abbate quodam assiduo monente’ and the purification of the English monasteries.]

... Regulari itaque sancti patris Benedicti norma honestissime suscepta, tam abbates perplurimi quam abbatissae cum sibi subiectis fratrum sororumque collegiis sanctorum sequi vestigia una fide non tamen uno consuetudinis usu certatim cum magna studuerunt hilaritate. Tali igitur ac tanto studio praefatus rex magnopere delectatus arcana quaeque diligenti cura examinans synoda le concilium Wintoniae fieri decrevit ... cunctosque ... monuit ut concordes aequali consuetudinis usu ... nullo modo dissentiendo discordarent.... Huius praecellentissimi regis sagaci monitu spiritualiter conpuncti non tantum episcopi verum etiam abbates et abbatissae ... eius imperiis toto mentis conamine alacriter obtemperantes, sanctique patroni nostri Gregorii documenta quibus beatum Augustinum monere studuit, ut non solum Romanae verum etiam Galliarum honestos ecclesiarum usus rudi Anglorum ecclesia decorando constitueret, recolentes, accitis Floriacensibus beati Benedicti nec non praecipui coenobii quod celebri Gent nuncupatur vocabulo monachis quaeque ex dignis eorum moribus honesta colligentes, ... has morum consuetudines ad vitae honestatem et regularis observantiae dulcedinem ... hoc exiguo apposuerunt codicello.... Hoc etenim Dunstanus egregius huius patriae archiepiscopus praesago afflatus spiritu ad corroborandum praefati sinodalis conventus conciliabulum provide ac sapienter addidit, ut videlicet.

[On Maundy Thursday] In qua missa sicut in sequentium dierum communicatio prebetur tam fratribus quam cunctis fidelibus reservata nihilominus ea die eucharistia quae sufficit ad communicandum cunctis altera die....

In die Parascevae agatur nocturna laus [i.e. the Tenebrae] sicut supra dictum est. Post haec venientes ad primam discalceati omnes incedant quousque crux adoretur. Eadem enim die hora nona abbas cum fratribus accedat ad ecclesiam.... Postea legitur passio domini nostri Ihesu Christi secundum Iohannem.... Post haec celebrentur orationes.... Quibus expletis per ordinem statim preparetur crux ante altare interposito spatio inter ipsam et altare sustentata hinc et inde a duobus diaconibus. Tunc cantent.... Deferatur tunc ab ipsis diaconibus ante altare, et eos acolitus cum pulvillo sequatur super quem sancta crux ponatur.... Post haec vertentes se ad clerum nudata cruce dicant antiphonam Ecce lignum crucis.... Ilico ea nudata veniat abbas ante crucem sanctam ac tribus vicibus se prosternat cum omnibus fratribus dexterioris chori scilicet senioribus et iunioribus et cum magno cordis suspirio viiᵐ poenitentiae psalmos cum orationibus sanctae cruci competentibus decantando peroret.... Et eam humiliter deosculans surgat. Dehinc sinisterioris chori omnes fratres eadem mente devota peragant. Nam salutata ab abbate vel omnibus cruce redeat ipse abbas ad sedem suam usque dum omnis clerus ac populus hoc idem faciat. Nam quia ea die depositionem corporis salvatoris nostri celebramus usum quorundam religiosorum imitabilem ad fidem indocti vulgi ac neofitorum corroborandam equiparando sequi si ita cui visum fuerit vel sibi taliter placuerit hoc modo decrevimus. Sit autem in una parte altaris qua vacuum fuerit quaedam assimilatio sepulchri velamenque quoddam in gyro tensum quod dum sancta crux adorata fuerit deponatur hoc ordine. Veniant diaconi qui prius portaverunt eam et involvant eam sindone in loco ubi adorata est. Tunc reportent eam canentes antiphonas ... donec veniant ad locum monumenti depositaque cruce ac si domini nostri Ihesu Christi corpore sepulto dicant antiphonam.... In eodem loco sancta crux cum omni reverentia custodiatur usque dominicae noctem resurrectionis. Nocte vero ordinentur duo fratres aut tres aut plures si tanta fuerit congregatio, qui ibidem psalmos decantando excubias fideles exerceant.... [The Missa de Praesanctificatorum follows] ... Sabbato sancto hora nona veniente abbate in ecclesiam cum fratribus novus ut supra dictum est afferatur ignis. Posito vero cereo ante altare ex illo accendatur igne. Quem diaconus more solito benedicens hanc orationem quasi voce legentis proferens dicat....

In die sancto paschae ... eiusdem tempore noctis antequam matutinorum signa moveantur sumant editui crucem et ponant in loco sibi congruo.... Dum tertia recitatur lectio quatuor fratres induant se, quorum unus alba indutus ac si ad aliud agendum ingrediatur atque latenter sepulchri locum adeat, ibique manu tenens palmam quietus sedeat. Dumque tertium percelebratur responsorium residui tres succedant, omnes quidem cappis induti turribula cum incensu manibus gestantes ac pedetemptim ad similitudinem querentium quid veriant ante locum sepulchri. Aguntur enim haec ad imitationem angeli sedentis in monumento atque mulierum cum aromatibus venientium ut ungerent corpus Ihesu. Cum ergo ille residens tres velut erraneos ac aliquid querentes viderit sibi adproximare incipiat mediocri voce dulcisono cantare Quem quaeritis: quo decantato fine tenus respondeant hi tres uno ore Ihesum Nazarenum. Quibus ille, Non est hic: surrexit sicut praedixerat. Ite nuntiate quia surrexit a mortuis. Cuius iussionis voce vertant se illi tres ad chorum dicentes Alleluia: resurrexit dominus. Dicto hoc rursus ille residens velut revocans illos dicat antiphonam Venite et videte locum: haec vero dicens surgat et erigat velum ostendatque eis locum cruce nudatum sed tantum linteamina posita quibus crux involuta erat. Quo viso deponant turribula quae gestaverunt in eodem sepulchro sumantque linteum et extendant contra clerum, ac veluti ostendentes quod surrexerit dominus, etiam non sit illo involutus, hanc canant antiphonam, Surrexit dominus de sepulchro, superponantque linteum altari. Finita antiphona Prior, congaudens pro triumpho regis nostri quod devicta morte surrexit, incipiat hymnum Te deum laudamus: quo incepto una pulsantur omnia signa.

P

THE DURHAM SEPULCHRUM

[From A Description or Breife Declaration of all the Ancient Monuments, Rites and Customes belonginge or beinge within the Monastical Church of Durham before the Suppression (ed. J. Raine, Surtees Soc. xv). This anonymous tract was written in 1593. A new edition is in course of preparation for the Surtees Society.]

p. 9. THE QUIRE—THE PASSION.

Within the Abbye Church of Durham, uppon Good Friday theire was marvelous solemne service, in the which service time, after the PASSION was sung, two of the eldest Monkes did take a goodly large CRUCIFIX, all of gold, of the picture of our Saviour Christ nailed uppon the crosse, lyinge uppon a velvett cushion, havinge St. Cuthbert’s armes uppon it all imbroydered with gold, bringinge that betwixt them uppon the said cushion to the lowest greeces in the Quire; and there betwixt them did hold the said picture of our Saviour, sittinge of every side, on ther knees, of that, and then one of the said Monkes did rise and went a pretty way from it, sittinge downe uppon his knees, with his shooes put of, and verye reverently did creepe away uppon his knees unto the said Crosse, and most reverently did kisse it. And after him the other Monke did so likewise, and then they did sitt them downe on every side of the Crosse, and holdinge it betwixt them, and after that the Prior came forth of his stall, and did sitt him downe of his knees, with his shooes off, and in like sort did creepe also unto the said Crosse, and all the Monkes after him one after another, in the same order, and in the mean time all the whole quire singinge an himne. The seruice beinge ended, the two Monkes did carrye it to the SEPULCHRE with great reverence, which Sepulchre was sett upp in the morninge, on the north side of the Quire, nigh to the High Altar, before the service time; and there lay it within the said SEPULCHRE with great devotion, with another picture of our Saviour Christ, in whose breast they did enclose, with great reverence, the most holy and blessed Sacrament of the Altar, senceinge it and prayinge unto it upon theire knees, a great space, settinge two tapers lighted before it, which tapers did burne unto Easter day in the morninge, that it was taken forth.

THE QUIRE—THE RESURRECTION.

There was in the Abbye Church of Duresme verye solemne service uppon Easter Day, betweene three and four of the clocke in the morninge, in honour of the RESURRECTION, where two of the oldest Monkes of the Quire came to the Sepulchre, being sett upp upon Good Friday, after the Passion, all covered with red velvett and embrodered with gold, and then did sence it, either Monke with a pair of silver sencers sittinge on theire knees before the Sepulchre. Then they both rising came to the Sepulchre, out of which, with great devotion and reverence, they tooke a marvelous beautifull IMAGE of our SAVIOUR, representing the resurrection, with a crosse in his hand, in the breast wherof was enclosed in bright christall the holy Sacrament of the Altar, throughe the which christall the Blessed Host was conspicuous to the behoulders. Then, after the elevation of the said picture, carryed by the said two Monkes uppon a faire velvett cushion, all embrodered, singinge the anthem of Christus resurgens, they brought it to the High Altar, settinge that on the midst therof, whereon it stood, the two Monkes kneelinge on theire knees before the Altar, and senceing it all the time that the rest of the whole quire was in singinge the foresaid anthem of Christus resurgens. The which anthem beinge ended, the two Monkes tooke up the cushions and the picture from the Altar, supportinge it betwixt them, proceeding, in procession, from the High Altar to the south Quire dore, where there was four antient Gentlemen, belonginge to the Prior, appointed to attend theire cominge, holdinge upp a most rich CANNOPYE of purple velvett, tached round about with redd silke and gold fringe; and at everye corner did stand one of theise ancient Gentlemen, to beare it over the said image, with the Holy Sacrament, carried by two Monkes round about the church, the whole quire waitinge uppon it with goodly torches and great store of other lights, all singinge, rejoyceinge, and praising God most devoutly, till they came to the High Altar againe, whereon they did place the said image there to remaine untill the Ascension day.

p. 26. THE SOUTH ALLEY OF THE LANTERN.

Over the [second of the iij Alters in that plage] was a merveylous lyvelye and bewtiful Immage of the picture of our Ladie, so called the LADY OF BOULTONE, which picture was maide to open with gymmers from her breaste downdward. And within the said immage was wrowghte and pictured the immage of our Saviour, merveylouse fynlie gilted, houldinge uppe his handes, and houlding betwixt his handes a fair large CRUCIFIX OF CHRIST, all of gold, the which crucifix was to be taiken fourthe every Good Fridaie, and every man did crepe unto it that was in that church at that daye. And ther after yt was houng upe againe within the said immage.

Q

THE SARUM SEPULCHRUM

[I give the various directions and rubrics referring to the sepulchre from the Consuetudinary (†1210), Ordinal (†1270), Customary (first half of fourteenth century), Processional (1508, &c.), Missal (1526, &c.), and Breviary (1531). The printed sixteenth-century rubrics practically reproduce the later Ordinal of the middle of the fourteenth century.]

The Depositio.

[From the Processional, with which the Missal practically agrees.]

Finitis vesperis, exuat sacerdos casulam, et sumens secum unum de praelatis in superpelliceis discalceati reponant crucem cum corpore dominico [scilicet in pixide, Missal] in sepulcrum incipiens ipse solus hoc responsorium Aestimatus sum, genuflectendo cum socio suo, quo incepto statim surgat. Similiter fiat in responsorio Sepullo Domino. Chorus totum responsorium prosequatur cum suo versu, genuflectendo per totum tempus usque ad finem servitii. Responsoria ut sic: Aestimatus sum. Chorus prosequatur cum descendentibus in lacum.... Dum praedictum responsorium canitur cum suo versu, praedicti duo sacerdotes thurificent sepulcrum, quo facto et clauso ostio, incipiet idem sacerdos responsorium Sepulto Domino.... Item praedicti duo sacerdotes dicant istas tres antiphonas sequentes genuflectendo continue: In pace.... In pace factus est.... Caro mea.... His finitis, et dictis prius orationibus ad placitum secrete ab omnibus cum genuflexione, omnibus aliis ad libitum recedentibus, ordine [non, Missal] servato, reinduat sacerdos casulam, et eodem modo quo accessit in principio servitii, cum diacono et subdiacono et ceteris ministris abscedat.

The Sepulchre Light.

[From the Consuetudinary.]

In die parasceues post repositum corpus domini in sepulcro, duo cerei dimidie libre ad minus in thesauraria tota die ante sepulcrum ardebunt. In nocte sequente et exinde usque ad processionem quae fit in die pasche ante matutinas, unus illorum tantum, magnum eciam cereum paschalem.

[From the Processional, with which the Missal and Customary practically agree.]

Exinde [i.e. from the Depositio] continue ardebit unus cereus ad minus ante sepulcrum usque ad processionem quae fit in Resurrectione Dominica in die Paschae: ita tamen quod dum Psalmus Benedictus canitur et cetera quae sequuntur, in sequenti nocte extinguatur: similiter et extinguatur in Vigilia Paschae, dum benedicitur novus ignis, usque accendatur cereus paschalis.

The Elevatio.

[From the Consuetudinary.]

In die pasche ante matutinas conueniant clerici ed ecclesiam accensis cunctis cereis per ecclesiam: duo excellenciores presbiteri in superpelliceis ad sepulchrum accedant prius incensato ostio sepulchri cum magna ueneratione, corpus dominicum super altare deponant: deinde crucem de sepulchro tollant, excellenciore presbitero inchoante antiphonam Christus resurgens et sic eant, per ostium australe presbiterii incedentes, per medium chori regredientes, cum thuribulario et ceroferariis precedentibus, ad altare sancti martini canentes praedictam antiphonam cum uersu suo. Deinde dicto uersiculo Surrexit dominus de sepulchro, et dicta oracione ab excellenciore sacerdote post debitam campanarum pulsacionem inchoentur matutine.

[From the Ordinal.]

In Die Pasche

Ad Processionem ante Matutinas conueniant omnes clerici ad ecclesiam ac accendantur luminaria per ecclesiam. Episcopus uel decanus in superpelliceo cum ceroferariis thuribulariis et clero in sepulcrum accedant, et incensato prius sepulcro cum magna ueneracione corpus domini assumant et super altare ponant. Iterum accipientes crucem de sepulcro inchoet episcopus uel decanus Ant. Christus resurgens. Tunc omnes cum gaudio genua flectant et ipsam crucem adorent, idipsum canentes cum ℣. Dicant nunc. Tunc omnes campane in classicum pulsentur, et cum magna ueneracione deportetur crux ad locum ubi prouisum sit, clero canente predictam antiphonam. Quo facto dicat Sacerdos ℣. Surrexit dominus de sepulcro. Or. Deus qui pro nobis. Que terminetur sic, Per eundem christum dominum nostrum.

[From the Breviary, with which the Processional, although less full, practically agrees.]

In die sancto Paschae ante Matutinas et ante campanarum pulsationem conveniant Clerici ad ecclesiam, et accendantur luminaria per totam ecclesiam. Tunc duo excellentiores Presbyteri in superpelliceis cum duobus Ceroferariis, et duobus thuribulis, et clero ad sepulchrum accedant: et incensato a praedictis duobus Presbyteris prius sepulchro cum magna veneratione, videlicet genuflectendo, statim post thurificationem corpus Dominicum super altare privatim deponant: iterum accipientes crucem de sepulchro, choro et populo interim genuflectente incipiat excellentior persona Ant. Christus resurgens. Et Chorus prosequatur totam antiphonam sic, ex mortuis ... Alleluya. Et tunc dum canitur Antiphona, eat processio per ostium australe presbyterii incedens et per medium chori regrediens [per ostium presbyterii australe incedendo per medium chori, et ingrediens, Processional] cum praedicta cruce de sepulchro inter praedictos duos Sacerdotes supereorum brachia venerabiliter portata, cum thuribulis et Ceroferariis praecedentibus, per ostium presbyterii boreale exeundo, ad unum altare ex parte boreali ecclesiae, Choro sequente, habitu non mutato, minoribus [excellentioribus, Processional] praecedentibus: ita tamen quod praedicti duo excellentiores in fine processionis subsequantur, corpore Dominico super altare in pixide dimisso et sub Thesaurarii custodia [in subthesaurarii custodia, Processional], qui illud statim in praedicta pixide in tabernaculo deponat [dependat ut potest in ista statione praecedente, Processional]: et tunc pulsentur omnes campanae in classicum.

Finito Antiphona praedicta, sequatur a toto Choro

V. Dicant nunc Iudei ... Alleluya.

Finita autem Antiphona cum suo Versu a toto Choro, dicat excellentior persona in sua statione ad altare conversus hunc Versum.

V. Surrexit Dominus de sepulchro.

R. Qui pro nobis pependit in ligno. Alleluya.

Oremus.

Oratio. Deus, qui pro nobis.... Per Christum Dominum nostrum.

Et terminetur sub Dominicali tono ad processionem: nec praecedat nec subsequatur Dominus vobiscum.

Finita Oratione omnes cum gaudio genuflectent ibidem et ipsam crucem adorent, in primis digniores, et tunc secrete sine processione in chorum redeant.

His itaque gestis discooperiantur ymagines et cruces per totam ecclesiam: et interim pulsentur campanae, sicut in Festis principalibus, ad Matutinas more solito.

The Censing in Easter Week.

[From the Customary.]

Ad primas uesperas ... post inchoacionem antiphone super psalmum Magnificat procedat executor officii cum alio sacerdote ... ad thurificandum altare.... In die tamen pasche et per ebdomadam thurificetur sepulchrum domini post primam thurificacionem altaris, scilicet antequam thurificator altaris circumeat.

The Removal of the Sepulchre.

[From the Customary.]

Die ueneris in ebdomada pasche ante missam amoueatur sepulchrum.

R

THE DUBLIN QUEM QUAERITIS

[From Bodleian MS. 15,846 (Rawlinson Liturg. D. 4), f. 130, a Sarum processional written in the fourteenth century and belonging in the fifteenth to the church of St. John the Evangelist, Dublin. A less good text from Dublin, Abp. Marsh’s Library, MS. V. 3, 2, 10, another fourteenth century processional from the same church, is facsimiled by W. H. Frere, Winchester Troper, pl. 26ᵇ, and printed therefrom by Manly, i. xxii. I give all the important variants of this version.]

[709]Finito iij ℟ᵒ cum suo ℣ et G_lo_ria p_at_ri uenient tres p_er_sone in s_upe_rpell_iceis_ et i_n_ capis[709] s_er_icis capitib_us_ uelatis quasi tres Marie querentes Ih_esu_m[710], si_n_gule portantes pixidem in manib_us_ q_uas_i aromatib_us_, qua_rum_ prima ad ingressu_m_ chori usque sepulcru_m_ procedat p_er_ se[711] quasi lamentando dicat:

Heu! pius pastor occiditur, Quem nulla culpa infecit: O mors lugenda!

Factoq_ue_ modico int_er_uallo, i_n_tret s_e_c_un_da M_a_ria co_n_simili[712] modo et dicat:

Heu! nequam gens Iudaica, Quam dira frendet uesania, Plebs execranda!

Deinde iij Maria consimili m_od_o d_ica_t[713]:

Heu! uerus doctor obijt, Qui uita_m_ f_un_ctis contulit: O res plangenda!

Ad huc paululu_m_ procede_n_do prima Maria dicat[714]:

Heu! misere cur contigit[715] Uidere mortem Saluatoris?

Deinde secunda Maria d_ica_t[716]:

Heu! Consolacio nostra, Ut quid mortem sustinuit!

Tu_n_c[717] iij Maria:

Heu! Redempcio nostra, Ut quid taliter agere uoluit!

Tu_n_c se co_n_iu_n_ga_n_t et procedant ad gradu_m_ cho_ri_ an_te_ altar_e_ si_mu_l[718] dice_n_tes:

Iam, iam, ecce, iam properemus ad tumulum Unguentes[719] Delecti[720] corpus sanctissimum

[721]Dei_n_de proceda_n_t si_mi_l_iter_ p_ro_pe sepulchru_m_ et p_ri_ma Maria d_ica_t p_er_ se

Condumentis aromatu_m_ Ungam_us_ corpus sanctissimu_m_ Quo preciosa[721].

Tu_n_c s_e_c_un_da Maria dicat p_er_ se:

Nardi uetet commixtio, Ne putrescat in tumulo Caro beata!

Deinde iij Maria [722]dicat per se[722]:

Sed nequimus hoc patrare sine adiutorio. Quis nam saxum reuoluet[723] a monumenti ostio?

Facto int_er_uallo, ang_e_l_us_ nix_us_ sepulcru_m_ apparuit[724] eis et dicat hoc modo:

Quem queritis ad sepulcrum, o Cristicole?

Deinde respo_n_deant tres Marie simul d_ice_nt_es_[725]:

Ih_esu_m Nazarenum crucifixum, o celicola!

Tu_n_c angelus dicet[726]:

Surrexit, non est hic, sicut dixit; Uenite et uidete locum ubi positus fuerat.

Deinde p_re_d_i_c_t_e M_a_rie sepulcru_m_ intrent et[727] inclinantes se et prospicientes undiq_ue_ intra sepulcru_m_, alta uoce quasi gaudentes[728] et admirantes et paru_m_ a sepulcro recedentes sim_u_l dica_n_t[729]:

Alleluya! resurrexit Dominus! Alleluya! resurrexit Dominus hodie! Resurrexit potens, fortis, Christus, Filius Dei!

Deinde ang_e_l_us_ ad eas[730]:

Et euntes dicite discipulis eius et Petro quia surrexit.

In quo reu_er_tant ad angelum quasi mandatu_m_ suu_m_ ad imple_n_du_m_ parate simul dicentes[731]:

Eya! pergamus propere Mandatum hoc perficere!

Int_er_im ueniant ad ingressu_m_ cho_ri_ due p_er_sone nude pedes sub personis ap_osto_lo_rum_ Iohannis et Pet_ri_ indute albis sine paruris cu_m_ tunicis, quo_rum_ Ioh_ann_es amictus tunica alba palma_m_ in manu gestans, Petrus uero rubea tunica indutus claues in manu ferens[732]; et p_re_dicte mulieres de sepulcro reuertentes et quasi de choro simul exeuntes, dicat prima Maria [733]p_er_ se[733] sequentiam:

Victime paschali laudes Immolant _Christ_iani. Agnus redemit oues: Christus innocens Patri Reconsiliauit peccatores. Mors et uita duello Conflixere mirando: Dux uite mortuis[734] Regnat uiuus.

Tu_n_c obuiantes eis in medio chori predicti discipuli, interrogantes simul dicant:

Dic nobis, Maria, Quid uidisti in uia?

Tu_n_c p_ri_ma Maria respondeat quasi monstrando:

Sepulcrum Christi uiuentis Et gloriam uidi resurgentis.

Tu_n_c ij Maria r_espon_det si_mi_l_iter_[735] mo_n_strando:

Angelicos testes, Sudarium et uestes.

Tunc iij[736] M_a_ria respondeat:

Surrexit Christus, spes nostra, Precedet uos in Galileam.

Et sic p_ro_cedant sim_u_l ad ostium chori; int_er_im[737] currant duo ad monumentu_m_; ueru_m_ptamen ille discip_u_l_u_s que_m_ diligebat Ih_esus_ uenit p_ri_or ad monume_n_tu_m_, iuxta eu_a_ng_e_liu_m_: ‘Currebant au_tem_ duo sim_u_l et ille alius discipulus p_re_cucurrit cicius Petro et uenit p_ri_or ad monume_n_tu_m_, non t_ame_n introiuit.’ Uidentes discipuli p_re_d_ic_ti[738] sepulcru_m_ uacuu_m_ et uerbis Marie credentes reu_er_ta_n_t se ad chorum dicentes[739]:

Credendum est magis soli Marie ueraci Q_uam_ Iudeo_rum_ turbe fallaci!

Tunc audita[740] _Christ_i resurreccione, chorus p_ro_seq_ua_t_ur_ alta uoce quasi gaude_n_tes et exultantes s_ic_ dicentes[741]:

Scimus _Christu_m surrexisse A mortuis uere. Tu nobis, uictor Rex, miserere!

Qua fi_ni_ta, executor officii incipiat:

Te Deum laudamus.

[742]Tu_n_c receda_n_t s_a_n_ctae_ Mar_i_e ap_os_t_ol_i et angelus[742].

S

THE AUREA MISSA OF TOURNAI

[Communicated from Lille Bibl. Munic. MS. 62 (sixteenth century) by L. Deschamps de Pas to the Annales archéologiques, xvii (1857), 167.]

Sequuntur ceremonie et modus observandus pro celebratione misse MISSUS EST GABRIEL ANGELUS, &c., vulgariter dicte AUREE MISSE quolibet anno in choro ecclesie Tornacensis decantande feria xᵃ ante festum nativitatis Domini nostri Iesu-Christi, ex fundatione venerabilis viri magistri Petri Cotrel, canonici dicti ecclesie Tornacensis et in eadem archidiaconi Brugensis, de licentia et permissione dominorum suorum decani et capituli predicte ecclesie Tomacensis.—Primo, feria tercia, post decantationem vesperum, disponentur per carpentatorem ecclesie in sacrario chori dicte ecclesie Tornacensis, in locis iam ad hoc ordinatis et sibi oppositis, duo stallagia, propter hoc appropriata, que etiam ornabuntur cortinis et pannis cericeis ad hoc ordinatis per casularium iam dicte ecclesie, quorum alterum, videlicet quod erit de latere episcopi, serviet ad recipiendam beatam virginem Mariam, et alterum stallagium ab illo oratorio oppositum, quod erit de latere decani, serviat ad recipiendum et recludendum Angelum.—Item similiter eodem die deputatus ad descendendum die sequenti columbam, visitabit tabernaculum in altis carolis dispositum, disponet cordas, et parabit instrumentum candelis suis munitum, per quod descendet Spiritus Sanctus in specie columbe, tempore decantationis ewangelii, prout postea dicetur, et erit sollicitus descendere cordulam campanule, et illam disponere ad stallagium Angeli, ad illam campanulam pulsandam suo tempore, die sequenti, prout post dicetur.—Item in crastinum durantibus matutinis, magistri cantus erunt solliciti quod duo iuvenes, habentes voces dulces et altas, preparentur in thesauraria, hostio clauso, unus ad modum virginis seu regine, et alter ad modum angeli, quibus providebitur de ornamentis et aliis necessariis propter hoc per fundatorem datis et ordinatis.—Item post decantationem septime lectionis matutinarum, accedent duo iuvenes, Mariam videlicet et Angelum representantes, sic parati de predicta thesauraria, ad chorum intrando per maius hostium dicti chori, duabus thedis ardentibus precedentibus: Maria videlicet per latus domini episcopi, in manibus portans horas pulchras, et Angelus per latus domini decani, portans in manu dextra sceptrum argenteum deauratum, et sic morose progredientur, cum suis magistris directoribus, usque ad summum altare, ubi, genibus flexis, fundent ad Dominum orationem. Qua facta, progredientur dicti iuvenes quilibet ad locum suum, Maria videlicet ad stallagium, de parte episcopi preparatum, cum suo magistro directore, et Angelus ad aliud stallagium de parte decani similiter preparatum, etiam cum suo alio magistro directore, et ubique cortinis clausis. Coram quibus stallagiis remanebunt predicte thede, ardentes usque ad finem misse.—Item clerici thesaurarie, durantibus octava et nona lectionibus matutinarum, preparabunt maius altare solemniter, ut in triplicibus festis, et omnes candele circumquaque chorum sacrarum de rokemes, et in corona nova existentes accendentur. Et clerici revestiarii providebunt quod presbyter, dyaconus, subdiaconus, choriste, cum pueris revestitis, sint parati, in fine hymni TE DEUM, pro missa decantanda, ita quod nulla sit pausa inter finem dicti himpni TE DEUM et missam. Et in fine praedicte misse sit paratus presbiter ebdomarius cantandi versum Ora pro nobis, et deinde, Deus in adiutorium, de laudibus illas perficiendo per chorum, et in fine psalmi De profundis dicendi, in fine matutinarum, more consueto, adiungetur collecta Adiuva nos pro fundatore ultra collectam ordinariam.—Item, cum celebrans accesserit ad maius altare, pro incipienda missa, et ante Confiteor immediate cortine circumquaque oratorium Virginis solum aperientur, ipsa Virgine attente orante et ad genua existente suo libro aperto, super pulvinari ad hoc ordinato, Angelo adhuc semper clauso in suo stallagio remanente.—Item cum cantabitur Gloria in Excelsis Deo tunc cortine stallagii, in quo erit Angelus, aperientur. In quo stallagio stabit dictus Angelus erectus, tenens in manibus suis suum sceptrum argenteum, et nichil aliud faciens, quousque fuerit tempus cantandi ewangelium, nec interim faciet Virgo aliquod signum videndi dictum angelum, sed, submissis oculis, erit semper intenta ad orationem.—Item cum appropinquarit tempus cantandi dictum ewangelium, diaconus cum subdiacono, pueris cum candelis et cruce precedentibus, progredientur ad locum in sacrario sibi preparatum, et cantabit ewangelium Missus est Gabriel, et etiam cantabunt partes suas Maria et Angelus, prout ordinatum et notatum est in libro ad hoc ordinato.—Item cum Angelus cantabit hec verba ewangelii, Ave, gratia plena, Dominus tecum, faciet tres ad Virginem salutationes; primo ad illud verbum Ave, humiliabit se tam capite quam corpore, post morose se elevando; et ad illa verba, gratia plena, faciet secundam humiliationem, flectendo mediocriter genua sua, se postea relevando; et ad illa verba, Dominus tecum, quae cantabit cum gravitate et morose, tunc faciet terciam humiliationem ponendo genua usque ad terram et finita clausula assurget, Virgine interim se non movente. Sed dum Maria virgo cantabit Quomodo fiet istud, assurget et vertet modicum faciem suam ad Angelum cum gravitate et modestia, non aliter se movendo. Et dum cantabit Angelus Spiritus Sanctus superveniet in te, etc., tunc Angelus vertet faciem suam versus columbam illam ostendendo, et subito descendet ex loco in altis carolis ordinato, cum candelis in circuitu ipsius ardentibus, ante stallagium sive oratorium Virginis, ubi remanebit, usque post ultimum Agnus Dei, quo decantato, revertetur ad locum unde descenderat.—Item magister cantus, qui erit in stallagio Angeli, sit valde sollicitus pro propria vice pulsare campanam in altis carolis, respondente in initio ewangelii, ut tunc ille qui illic erit ordinatus ad descendendum columbam sit preadvisatus et preparet omnia necessaria et candelas accendat. Et secunda vice sit valde sollicitus pulsare dictam campanulam, ita quod precise ad illud verbum Spiritus Sanctus descendat ad Virginem columbam ornatam candelis accensis, et remaneat ubi descenderit, usque ad ultimum Agnus Dei decantatum, prout dictum est. Et tunc idem magister cantus iterum pulsabit pro tercia vice eamdem campanulam, ut revertatur columba unde descenderit. Et sit ille disponendus vel deputandus ad descendendum dictam columbam bene preadvisatus de supra dicta triplici pulsatione et quid quilibet significabit ne sit in aliquo defectus.—Item predicti, diaconus, Maria, et Angelus complebunt totum ewangelium in eodem tono prout cuilibet sibi competit, et ewangelio finito reponet se Maria ad genua et orationem, et Angelus remanebit rectus, usque in finem misse, hoc excepto, quod in elevatione corporis Christi ponet se ad genua.—Item postea proficietur missa, Maria et Angelo in suis stallagiis usque in fine permanentibus.—Item missa finita, post Ite, missa est, Maria et Angelus descendent de suis stallagiis et revertentur cum reliquiis et revestitis usque ad revestiarium predictum eorum, flambellis precedentibus. In quo revestiario presbiter celebrans cum predictis revestitis Maria et Angelo dicet psalmum De profundis, prout in choro cum adiectione collecte Adiuva pro fundatore.—Item fiet missa per omnia, ut in die Annunciationis dominice cum sequentia sive prosa Mittit ad virginem, cum organis et discantu prout in triplicibus.

T

SUBJECTS OF THE CYCLICAL MIRACLES

[This comparative table is based on that drawn up by Prof. Hohlfeld in Anglia, xi. 241. The episodes are taken in their scriptural order, which is not always that of the plays. I have added the Cornish data, using O. P. R. to indicate the Origo Mundi, Passio Domini, and Resurrectio Domini of the older text, and J. for William Jordan’s Creation of the World. I have quoted Halliwell’s divisions of the Ludus Coventriae, really a continuous text, for convenience sake.]

-------------------------------+--------------+--------------+----------+ Episodes. | York. | Townley. |Chester.| -------------------------------+--------------+--------------+----------+ 1. Fall of Lucifer | i | i | i | 2. Creation and Fall of Man | ii-vi | i[744] | ii | 3. Cain and Abel | vii | ii | ii | 4. Wanderings of Cain | —— | —— | —— | 5. Death of Cain | —— | —— | —— | 6. Seth in Paradise and Death | —— | —— | —— | of Adam | | | | 7. Enoch | —— | —— | —— | 8. Noah and the Flood | viii, ix | iii | iii | 9. Abraham and Melchisedec | —— | —— | iv | 10. Abraham and Isaac | x | iv | iv | 11. Jacob’s Blessing | —— | v[744] | —— | 12. Jacob’s Wanderings | —— | vi | —— | 13. Moses and the Exodus | xi | viii | —— | 14. Moses in the Wilderness | —— | vii | v | 15. Balaam | —— | —— | v | 16. David and the Rods | —— | —— | —— | 17. David and Bathsheba | —— | —— | —— | 18. Building of the Temple | —— | —— | —— | 19. Prophecy of Maximilla | —— | —— | —— | 20. Bridge over Cedron | —— | —— | —— | 21. Prophetae | xii[746] | vii | —— | 22. Joachim and Anna | —— | —— | —— | 23. Mary in the Temple | —— | —— | —— | 24. Betrothal of Mary | —— | x[743] | —— | 25. Annunciation | xii | x | vi | 26. Salutation of Elizabeth | xii | xi | vi | 27. Suspicion of Joseph | xiii | x | vi | 28. Purgation of Mary | —— | —— | —— | 29. Augustus and Cyrenius | —— | ix | —— | 30. Nativity | xiv | —— | vi | 31. Conversion of Octavian | —— | —— | vi | 32. Pastores | xv |xii, xiii[747]| vii | 33. Purification | xli[748] | xvii[749] | xi | 34. Magi before Herod |xvi, xvii[744]| xiv | viii | 35. Offering of Magi | xvii | xiv | ix | 36. Flight into Egypt | xviii | xv | x | 37. Massacre of Innocents | xix | xvi | x | 38. Death of Herod | —— | —— | —— | 39. Presentation in Temple | xx | xviii[746] | —— | 40. Baptism | xxi | xix | —— | 41. Temptation | xxii | —— | xii | 42. Marriage in Cana | [lost] | —— | —— | 43. Transfiguration | xxiii | —— | | 44. Woman in Adultery | xxiv | —— | xii | 45. Healing of Blind in Siloam | —— | —— | xiii | 46. Raising of Lazarus | xxiv | xxxi[745] | xiii | 47. Healing of Bartimaeus | —— | —— | —— | 48. Entry into Jerusalem | xxv | —— | xiv | 49. Cleansing of Temple | —— | —— | xiv | 50. Jesus in House of Simon | [lost] | xx[743] | xiv | the Leper | | | | 51. Conspiracy of Jews | xxvi | xx | xiv | 52. Treachery of Judas | xxvi | xx | xiv | 53. Last Supper | xxvii | xx | xv | 54. Gethsemane | xxviii | xx | xv | 55. Jesus before Caiaphas | xxix | xxi | xvi | 56. Jesus before Pilate | xxx | —— | xvi | 57. Jesus before Herod | xxxi | —— | xvi | 58. Dream of Pilate’s Wife | xxx | —— | —— | 59. Remorse and Death of Judas | xxxii | xxxii[750] | —— | 60. Condemnation | xxxiii | xxii | xvi | 61. Cross Brought from Cedron | —— | —— | —— | 62. Bearing of the Cross | xxxiv | xxii | xvii | 63. Veronica | xxxiv | —— | —— | 64. Crucifixion | xxxv | xxiii | xvii | 65. Casting of Lots | xxxv | xxiii, xxiv | xvii | 66. Planctus Mariae | xxxvi | xxiii | xvii | [cf. p. 39] | | | | 67. Death of Jesus | xxxvi | xxiii | xvii | 68. Longinus | xxxvi | xxiii | xvii | 69. Descent from Cross | xxxvi | xxiii | xvii | 70. Burial | xxxvi | —— | —— | 71. Harrowing of Hell | xxxvii | xxv | xviii | 72. Release of Joseph and | —— | —— | —— | Nicodemus | | | | 73. Setting of Watch | xxxviii | xxvi | xix | 74. Resurrection | xxxviii | xxvi | xix | 75. Quem Quaeritis | xxxviii | xxvi | xix | 76. Hortulanus | xxxix | xxvi | xix[751]| 77. Peregrini | xl | xxvii | xx | 78. Incredulity of Thomas | xlii | xxviii | xx | 79. Death of Pilate | —— | —— | —— | 80. Veronica and Tiberius | —— | —— | —— | 81. Ascension | xliii | xxix | xxi | 82. Pentecost | xliv | [? lost] | xxii | 83. Death of Mary | xlv | —— | —— | 84. Burial of Mary | [lost] | —— | —— | 85. Apparition of Mary to | xlvi | —— | —— | Thomas | | | | 86. Assumption and Coronation | xlvii[752] | —— | [lost] | 87. Signs of Judgement | —— | —— | xxiii | [cf. p. 53] | | | | 88. Antichrist [cf. p. 62] | —— | —— | xxiv | 89. Doomsday | xlviii | xxx | xxv | -------------------------------+--------------+--------------+----------+

-------------------------------+------------+---------------------------- Episodes. |Ludus Cov.| Cornwall. -------------------------------+------------+---------------------------- 1. Fall of Lucifer | i | O. 48[743]: J. 114-334. 2. Creation and Fall of Man | i, ii | O. 1-437: J. 1-113, | | 335-1055. 3. Cain and Abel | iii | O. 438-633: J. 1056-1317. 4. Wanderings of Cain | —— | J. 1332-1393. 5. Death of Cain | iv | J. 1431-1726. 6. Seth in Paradise and Death | —— | O. 634-916: J. 1318-1331, of Adam | | 1394-1430, 1727-2093, | | 2146-2210. 7. Enoch | —— | J. 2094-2145. 8. Noah and the Flood | iv | O. 917-1258: J. | | 2211-2530[745]. 9. Abraham and Melchisedec | —— | 10. Abraham and Isaac | v | O. 1259-1394. 11. Jacob’s Blessing | —— | 12. Jacob’s Wanderings | —— | 13. Moses and the Exodus | vi | O. 1395-1714. 14. Moses in the Wilderness | vi | O. 1715-1898. 15. Balaam | —— | 16. David and the Rods | —— | O. 1899-2104. 17. David and Bathsheba | —— | O. 2105-2376. 18. Building of the Temple | —— | O. 2377-2628. 19. Prophecy of Maximilla | —— | O. 2629-2778. 20. Bridge over Cedron | —— | O. 2779-2824. 21. Prophetae | vii | 22. Joachim and Anna | viii | 23. Mary in the Temple | ix | 24. Betrothal of Mary | x | 25. Annunciation | xi | 26. Salutation of Elizabeth | xiii | 27. Suspicion of Joseph | xii | 28. Purgation of Mary | xiv | 29. Augustus and Cyrenius | —— | 30. Nativity | xv | 31. Conversion of Octavian | —— | 32. Pastores | xvi | 33. Purification | xviii | 34. Magi before Herod | xvii | 35. Offering of Magi | xvii | 36. Flight into Egypt | xix | 37. Massacre of Innocents | xix | 38. Death of Herod | xix | 39. Presentation in Temple | xx | 40. Baptism | xxi | 41. Temptation | xxii | P. 1-172. 42. Marriage in Cana | —— | 43. Transfiguration | | 44. Woman in Adultery | xxiii | 45. Healing of Blind in Siloam | —— | 46. Raising of Lazarus | xxiv | 47. Healing of Bartimaeus | —— | P. 393-454. 48. Entry into Jerusalem | xxvi | P. 173-330. 49. Cleansing of Temple | —— | P. 331-392. 50. Jesus in House of Simon | xxvii | P. 455-552. the Leper | | 51. Conspiracy of Jews | xxv | P. 553-584. 52. Treachery of Judas | xxvii | P. 585-616. 53. Last Supper | xxvii | P. 617-930. 54. Gethsemane | xxviii | P. 931-1200. 55. Jesus before Caiaphas | xxx | P. 1200-1504. 56. Jesus before Pilate | xxx | P. 1567-1616. 57. Jesus before Herod | xxix, xxx | P. 1617-1816. 58. Dream of Pilate’s Wife | xxxi | P. 1907-1968, 2193-2212. 59. Remorse and Death of Judas | xxxii | P. 1505-1566. 60. Condemnation | xxxii | P. 1817-2533. 61. Cross Brought from Cedron | —— | P. 2534-2584. 62. Bearing of the Cross | xxxii | P. 2585-2662. 63. Veronica | xxxii | —— 64. Crucifixion | xxxii | P. 2663-2840. 65. Casting of Lots | —— | P. 2841-2860. 66. Planctus Mariae | xxxii | P. 2925-2954. [cf. p. 39] | | 67. Death of Jesus | xxxii | P. 2861-3098. 68. Longinus | xxxiv | P. 3003-3030. 69. Descent from Cross | xxxiv | P. 3099-3201. 70. Burial | xxxiv | P. 3202-3216. 71. Harrowing of Hell | xxxiii, | P. 3031-3078: | xxxv | R. 97-306. 72. Release of Joseph and | —— | R. 1-96, 307-334, 625-662. Nicodemus | | 73. Setting of Watch | xxxv | R. 335-422. 74. Resurrection | xxxv | R. 423-678. 75. Quem Quaeritis | xxxvi | R. 679-834. 76. Hortulanus | xxxvii | R. 835-892. 77. Peregrini | xxxviii | R. 1231-1344. 78. Incredulity of Thomas | xxxviii | R. 893-1230, 1345-1586. 79. Death of Pilate | —— | R. 1587-2360. 80. Veronica and Tiberius | —— | R. 1587-2360. 81. Ascension | xxxix | R. 2361-2630. 82. Pentecost | xl | 83. Death of Mary | xli | 84. Burial of Mary | xli | 85. Apparition of Mary to | —— | Thomas | | 86. Assumption and Coronation | xli | 87. Signs of Judgement | —— | [cf. p. 53] | | 88. Antichrist [cf. p. 62] | —— | 89. Doomsday | xlii[753] | -------------------------------+------------+----------------------------

U

INTERLUDIUM DE CLERICO ET PUELLA

[Printed by Wright and Halliwell, Reliquiae Antiquae (1841), i. 145, from an early fourteenth-century MS., then belonging to the Rev. R. Yerburgh, of Sleaford. On the piece and its sources in the Latin, French, and English fabliaux of Dame Siriz, cf. Ten Brink, i. 255; ii. 295; Jusserand, Lit. Hist. i. 446. Ten Brink assigns the dramatic text, which is in the South Northumbrian dialect, to the reign of Edward I (1272-1307).]

Hic incipit Interludium de Clerico el Puella.

[Scene 1.]

Clericus. Damishel, reste wel.

Puella. Sir, welcum, by Saynt Michel!

Clericus. Wer esty sire, wer esty dame?

Puella. By Gode, es noner her at hame.

Clericus. Wel wor suilc a man to life, That suilc a may mithe have to wyfe!

Puella. Do way, by Crist and Leonard, No wily lufe, na clerc fayllard, Na kepi herbherg, clerc, in huse no y flore Bot his hers ly wit-uten dore. Go forth thi way, god sire, For her hastu losye al thi wile.

Clericus. Nu, nu, by Crist and by sant Jhon, In al this land ne wis hi none, Mayden, that hi luf mor than the, Hif me mithe ever the bether be. For the hy sory nicht and day, Y may say, hay wayleuay! Y luf the mar than mi lif, Thu hates me mar than gayt dos chuief. That es noute for mys-gilt, Certhes, for thi luf ham hi spilt. A, suythe mayden, reu ef me That es ty luf, hand ay salbe. For the luf of [the] y mod of efne; Thu mend thi mode, and her my stevene.

Puella. By Crist of heven and sant Jone! Clerc of scole ne kepi non; For many god wymman haf thai don scam. By Crist, thu michtis haf be at hame.

Clericus. Synt it nothir gat may be, Jhesu Crist, by-tethy the, And send neulit bot thar inne, That thi be lesit of al my pyne.

Puella. Go nu, truan, go nu, go, For mikel thu canstu of sory and wo.

[Scene 2.]

Clericus. God te blis, Mome Helwis.

Mome Helwis. Son, welcum, by san Dinis!

Clericus. Hic am comin to the, Mome, Thu hel me noth, thu say me sone. Hic am a clerc that hauntes scole, Y hidy my lif wyt mikel dole; Me wor lever to be dedh, Than led the lif that hyc ledh, For ay mayden with and schen, Fayrer ho lond hawy non syen. Tho hat mayden Malkyn, y wene; Nu thu wost quam y mene, Tho wonys at the tounes ende, That suyt lif, so fayr and hende. Bot if tho wil hir mod amende, Neuly Crist my ded me send. Men send me hyder, vyt uten fayle, To haf thi help anty cunsayle. Thar for amy cummen here, That thu salt be my herand-bere, To mac me and that mayden sayct, And hi sal gef the of my nayct, So that hever al thi lyf Saltu be the better wyf. So help me Crist! and hy may spede, Rithe saltu haf thi mede.

Mome Ellwis. A, son, wat saystu? benedicite, Lift hup thi hand, and blis the. For it es boyt syn and scam, That thu on me hafs layt thys blam. For hic am an ald quyne and a lam. Y led my lyf wit Godis love. Wit my roc y me fede, Cani do non othir dede, Bot my pater noster and my crede, Tho say Crist for missedede, And my navy Mary, For my scynne hic am sory, And my de profundis, For al that yn sin lys. For cani me non othir think, That wot Crist, of heven kync. Ihesu Crist, of heven hey, Gef that hay may heng hey, And gef that by may se, That thay be henge on a tre, That this ley as leyit onne me. For aly wymam (sic) ami on.

V

TERENTIUS ET DELUSOR

[I follow the text of P. de Winterfeld, Hrotsvithae Opera (1902), xx; the piece was previously edited by C. Magnin in Bibliothèque de l’École des Chartes, i (1840), 517; A. de Montaiglon in L’Amateur des Livres (1849); A. Riese, in Zeits. f. d. österreich. Gymn. xviii. 442; R. Sabbadini (1894). The only manuscript is B. N. Lat. MS. 8069 of the late tenth or early eleventh century. Various scholars have dated the poem from the seventh to the tenth century; Winterfeld declares for the ninth. It might have been intended as a prologue to a Terentian revival or to a mime. The homage paid to the vetus poeta by the delusor in his asides rather suggests the former; cf. Cloetta, i. 2; Creizenach, i. 8.]

[DELUSOR.]

Mitte recordari monimenta vetusta, Terenti; cesses ulterius: vade, poeta vetus. vade, poeta vetus, quia non tua carmina curo; iam retice fabulas, dico, vetus veteres. dico, vetus veteres iamiam depone camenas, quae nil, credo, iuvant, pedere ni doceant. tale decens carmen, quod sic volet ut valet istud; qui cupit exemplum, captet hic egregium. huc ego cum recubo, me taedia multa capescunt: an sit prosaicum, nescio, an metricum. dic mihi, dic, quid hoc est? an latras corde sinistro? dic, vetus auctor, in hoc quae iacet utilitas?

Nunc TERENTIUS exit foras audiens haec et ait:

quis fuit, hercle, pudens, rogo, qui mihi tela lacessens turbida contorsit? quis talia verba sonavit? hic quibus externis scelerosus venit ab oris, qui mihi tam durum iecit ridendo cachinnum? quam graviter iaculo mea viscera laesit acuto! hunc ubi repperiam, contemplor, et hunc ubi quaeram? si mihi cum tantis nunc se offerat obvius iris, debita iudicio persolvam dona librato.

Ecce persona DELUSORIS praesentatur et hoc audiens inquit:

quem rogitas ego sum: quid vis persolvere? cedo; huc praesens adero, non dona probare recuso.

TERENTIUS.

tunc, sceleste, meas conrodis dente Camenas? tu quis es? unde venis, temerarie latro? quid istis vocibus et dictis procerum me, a! perdite, caedis? tene, superbe, meas decuit corrumpere Musas?

PERSONA DELUSORIS.

si rogitas, quis sum, respondeo: te melior sum: tu vetus atque senex, ego tyro valens adulescens; tu sterilis truncus, ego fertilis arbor, opimus. si taceas, vetule, lucrum tibi quaeris enorme.

TERENTIUS.

quis tibi sensus inest? numquid melior me es? ... nunc, vetus atque senex quae fecero, fac adolescens. si bonus arbor ades, qua fertilitate redundas? cum sim truncus iners, fructu meliore redundo.

PERSONA secum.

nunc mihi vera sonat; set huic contraria dicam— quid magis instigas? quid talia dicere certas? haec sunt verba senum, qui cum post multa senescunt tempora, tunc mentes in se capiunt pueriles.

TERENTIUS.

hactenus antiquis sapiens venerandus ab annis inter et egregios ostentor et inter honestos. sed mihi felicem sapientis tollis honorem, qui mihi verba iacis et vis contendere verbis.

PERSONA.

si sapiens esses, non te mea verba cierent. o bone vir, sapiens ut stultum ferre libenter, obsecro, me sapias; tua me sapientia firmet.

TERENTIUS.

cur, furiose, tuis lacerasti carmina verbis? me retinet pietas, quin haec manus arma cerebro implicet ista tuo: pessumdare te miseresco.

PERSONA secum.

quam bene ridiculum mihi personat iste veternus.— te retinet pietas? nam fas est credere, credo. me, peto, ne tangas, ne sanguine tela putrescant.

TERENTIUS.

cur, rogo, me sequeris? cur me ludendo lacessis?

[PERSONA.]

sic fugit horrendum praecurrens damna leonem.

[TERENTIUS.]

vix ego pro superum teneor pietate deorum, ad tua colla meam graviter lentescere palmam.

PERSONA.

vae tibi, pone minas: nescis quem certe minaris. verba latrando, senex cum sis vetus, irrita profers. i, rogo, ne vapules et, quod minitare, reportes; nunc ego sum iuvenis: patiarne ego verba vetusti?

TERENTIUS.

o iuvenis, tumidae nimium ne crede iuventae: saepe superba cadunt, et humillima saepe resurgunt. o mihi si veteres essent in pectore vires, de te supplicium caperem quam grande nefandum. si mihi plura iacis et tali voce lacessis, p....

W

REPRESENTATIONS OF MEDIAEVAL PLAYS

[I have attempted to bring together, under a topographical arrangement, the records of such local plays of the mediaeval type as I am acquainted with. Probably the number could be increased by systematic search in local histories and transactions of learned societies. But my list is a good deal longer than those of L. T. Smith, York Plays, lxiv; Stoddard, 53; or Davidson, 219. For convenience I have also noted here a few records of Corpus Christi processions, and of folk ‘ridings’ and other institutions. The following index-table shows the geographical distribution of the plays. The names italicized are those of places where plays have been reported in error or are merely conjectural.]

INDEX.

BEDFORDSHIRE.

Dunstable, page 366.

BERKSHIRE.

Abingdon, 337. Reading, 392. Windsor, 396.

BUCKINGHAMSHIRE.

Wycombe, 398.

CAMBRIDGESHIRE.

Bassingbourne, 338. Cambridge, 344.

CHESHIRE.

Chester, 348.

CORNWALL.

Camborne, 344. Penrhyn, 390. Per Ranzabulo, 390. St. Just, 393.

DENBIGHSHIRE.

Wrexham, 398.

DEVONSHIRE.

Morebath, 384.

DORSETSHIRE.

Wimborne Minster, 396.

DURHAM.

Bishop Auckland, 342.

ESSEX.

Baddow, 338. Billericay, 341. Boreham, 342. Braintree, 342. Brentwood, 342. Burnham, 343. Chelmsford, 345. Coggeshall, 357. Colchester, 357. Easterford, 367. Hadleigh, 367. Halstead, 367. Hanningfield, 368. Heybridge, 370. High Easter, 370. Kelvedon, 373. Lanchire (?), 375. Little Baddow, 379. Malden, 384. Manningtree, 384. Nayland, 385. Sabsford (?), 393. Saffron Walden, 393. Stapleford (?), 395. Stoke-by-Nayland, 395. Witham, 397. Woodham Walter, 397. Writtle, 398.

GLOUCESTERSHIRE.

Bristol, 342. Tewkesbury, 396.

HAMPSHIRE.

Winchester, 396.

HEREFORDSHIRE.

Hereford, 368.

KENT.

Appledore, 337. Bethersden, 338. Brookland, 343. Canterbury, 344. Folkestone, 367. Great Chart, 367. Ham Street, 367. Herne, 370. High Halden, 370. Hythe, 371. Lydd, 383. New Romney, 385. Ruckinge, 393. Stone, 396. Wittersham, 397. Wye, 398.

LANCASHIRE.

Lancaster, 375. Preston, 392.

LEICESTERSHIRE.

Foston, 367. Leicester, 376.

LINCOLNSHIRE.

Holbeach, 370. Lincoln, 377. Louth, 383. Sleaford, 395.

MIDDLESEX.

London, 379. Mile End, 384.

NORFOLK.

Croxton, 363. Garboldisham, 367. Harling, 368. Kenninghall, 374. King’s Lynn, 374. Lopham, 383. Middleton, 384. Norwich, 386. Shelfhanger, 393. Wymondham, 398. Yarmouth, 399.

NORTHAMPTONSHIRE.

Daventry, 363. Northampton, 386.

NORTHUMBERLAND.

Newcastle, 385.

OXFORDSHIRE.

Fyfield, 367. Idbury, 371. Langley, 375. Lyneham, 383. Milton, 384. Oxford, 389. Shipton, 394.

SHROPSHIRE.

Shrewsbury, 394.

SOMERSETSHIRE.

Bath, 338. Tintinhull, 396.

STAFFORDSHIRE.

Lichfield, 377.

SUFFOLK.

Boxford, 342. Bury St. Edmunds, 343. Bungay, 343. Ipswich, 371. Ixworth, 373. Lavenham, 375. Mildenhall, 384.

SURREY.

Hascombe, 368. Kingston, 374.

SUSSEX.

Rye, 393.

WARWICKSHIRE.

Coleshill, 357. Coventry, 357. Maxstoke, 384. Nuneaton, 389.

WESTMORELAND.

Kendal, 373.

WILTSHIRE.

Salisbury, 393.

WORCESTERSHIRE.

Worcester, 398.

YORKSHIRE.

Beverley, 338. Hull, 370. Leconfield, 375. Leeds, 375. Wakefield, 396. Woodkirk, 398. York, 399.

SCOTLAND.

Aberdeen, 330. Edinburgh, 366.

IRELAND.

Dublin, 363. Kilkenny, 374.

ABERDEEN, SCOTLAND.

I summarize the references to plays and pageants in the Burgh Records[754].

May 13, 1440. Richard Kintor, abbot of Boneacord, was granted ‘unus burgensis futurus faciendus’ (i.e. the fees on taking up the freedom), ‘pro expensis suis factis et faciendis in quodam ludo de ly Haliblude ludendo apud ly Wyndmylhill.’

Sept. 5, 1442. ‘Thir craftes vndirwritten sal fynd yerly in the offerand of our Lady at Candilmes thir personnes vnderwrittin; that is to say,

The littistares sal fynd, The empriour and twa doctoures, and alsmony honeste squiares as thai may. The smythes and hammermen sal fynd, The three kingis of Culane, and alsmony honeste squiares as thai may. The talzoures sal fynd, Our lady Sancte Bride, Sancte Helone, Joseph, and alsmony squiares as thai may. The skynnares sal fynd, Two bischopes, four angeles, and alsmony honeste squiares as thai may. The webstares and walkares sal fynd, Symon and his disciples, and alsmony honeste squiares, etc. The cordinares sal fynd, The messyngear and Moyses, and alsmony honeste squiares, etc. The fleschowares sal fynd, Twa or four wodmen, and alsmony honest squiares, etc. The brethir of the gilde sall fynd, The knyghtes in harnace, and squiares honestely araiit, etc. The baxsteiris sal fynd, The menstralis, and alsmony honest squyares as thai may.’

May 21, 1479. Order for the alderman ‘to mak the expensis and costis of the comon gude apon the arayment, and uthris necessaris, of the play to be plait in the fest of Corpos Xristi nixttocum.’

Feb. 1, 1484/5. Order for all craftsmen to ‘beyr thare takyinis of thare craft apon thare beristis, and thare best aray on Canddilmes day at the Offerand.’

Feb. 3, 1502/3. Fine imposed upon certain websters, because ‘thai did nocht it that accordit thame to do one Candilmese day, in the Passioun [? Pr’ssioun, “Procession”],’ owing to a dispute as to precedence with the tailors.

Jan. 30, 1505/6. Order for continuance of ‘the ald lovabile consuetud and ryt of the burgh’ that the craftsmen ‘kepit and decorit the procession one Candilmes day yerlie; ... and thai sale, in order to the Offering in the Play, pass tua and ij togidr socialie; in the first the flesshoris, barbouris, baxturis, cordinaris, skineris, couparis, wrichtis, hat makars [and] bonat makars togidr, walcaris, litstaris, wobstaris, tailyeouris, goldsmiths, blaksmithis and hammermen; and the craftsmen sal furnyss the Pageants; the cordinaris, the Messing[er]; wobstaris and walcaris, Symeon; the smyths [and] goldsmiths, iij Kingis of Cullane; the litstaris, the Emperour; the masons, the Thrie Knichtis; the talyors, our Lady, Sanct Brid, and Sanct Elene; and the skynners, the Tua Bischopis; and tua of ilke craft to pass with the pageant that thai furnyss to keip thair geir.’

May 28, 1507. Order for precedence ‘in ale processiounis, baitht in Candilmes play and utheris processionis.’

Jan. 30, 1510/1. The order of Jan. 30, 1505/6 repeated verbatim.

Feb. 3, 1510/1. Citizens fined ‘becauss thai passt not in the procession of Candilmes day to decoir the samyn.’

Feb. 5, 1523/4. Johne Pill, tailor, to do penance, ‘for the disobeing of David Anderson, bailze, becaus he refusit to pas in the Candilmess processioun with his taikin and sing of his craft in the place lemit to his craft, and in likewise for the mispersoning of the said Dauid Andersoun, the merchandis of the said guid town, in calling of thame Coffeis, and bidding of thame to tak the salt pork and herboiss in thair handis.’

May 22, 1531. Order for the craftsmen to ‘keipe and decoir the processioun on Corpus Cristi dais, and Candilmes day ... every craft with thair awin baner.... And euery ane of the said craftis, in the Candilmes processioun, sall furneiss thair pageane, conforme to the auld statut, maid in the yeir of God jai vᶜ and x yeris....

The craftis ar chargit to furneiss thair panzeanis vnder writtin.

The flescharis, Sanct Bestian and his Tourmentouris.

The barbouris, Sanct Lowrance and his Tourmentouris.

The skynnaris, Sanct Stewin and his Tourmentouris.

The cordinaris, Sanct Martyne.

The tailzeouris, the Coronatioun of Our Lady.

Litstaris, Sanct Nicholes.

Wobstaris, walcaris, and bonet makaris, Sanct John.

Baxstaris, Sanct Georg.

Wrichtis, messonis, sclateris, and cuparis, The Resurrectioun.

The smithis and hemmirmen to furneiss The Bearmen of the Croce.’

June 13, 1533. A very similar order, but without the list of pageants, and so worded as to extend the obligation of furnishing pageants to the Corpus Christi, as well as the Candlemas procession:—‘The craftismen ... sall ... keip and decoir the processionis on XXi day and Candelmes day ... euery craft with thair avin banar ... with thair pegane.... And euery craft in the said processionis sall furneiss thair pegane and banar honestlie as effers, conforme to the auld statut maid in the yeir of God jaj vᶜ and tene yers.’

June 21, 1538. Dispute between goldsmiths and hammermen as to precedence ‘in the processioun of Corpus Xri.’

June 25, 1546. Litsters ordered to ‘haue thar banar and Pagane, as uther craftis of the said Burgh hes, ilk yeir, on Corpus Xhri day, and Candilmess dayis processiounis.’

June 4, 1553. Disputes as to ordering of Corpus Christi procession.

May 21, 1554. Similar disputes. A ‘Pagane’ in procession mentioned.

May 29, 1556. Order for observance of statute as to Corpus Christi procession.

The interpretation of these notices is not quite clear. Davidson, 220, seems to think that there was never more than a mystère mimé at Candlemas. But the ‘play’ is mentioned in 1506, 1507, and 1510. I conjecture that the Passion and Nativity cycles were not merged in Aberdeen. The Passion (Haliblude play) was performed, perhaps only occasionally, on Corpus Christi day; the Nativity annually, at Candlemas. The ‘persones’ of 1442 and the ‘Pageants’ of 1505/6 are practically identical, and would furnish a short play, with Moses and Octavian to represent the Prophetae, a Stella, and a Presentation in the Temple. But there was certainly also a procession in which the ‘honest squiares’ of 1442 figured. This may have preceded the play, but it may have been in some way introduced into it at ‘the offerand’ (of the Virgin in the Temple, or of the Magi?). The pageants in the list of 1531 are such as cannot all have formed part of a connected cycle. But some of them might come from the ‘Haliblude’ play, and I take it that this list was meant for the Corpus Christi procession only, the Candlemas procession being still regulated by the order of 1507.

Bon Accord.

The Haliblude play of 1440 was directed by the Abbot of Bon Accord. This was the Aberdeen name for the Lord of Misrule. There are many notices of him.

April 30, 1445. Order ‘for letting and stanching of diuerse enormyteis done in time bygane be the abbotis of this burgh, callit of bone acorde, that in time to cum thai will giue na feis to na sic abbotis. Item, it is sene speidful to thame that for the instant yher thai will haue na sic abbot; but thai will that the alderman for the tyme, and a balyhe quhom that he will tak til him, sall supple that faute.’

August 17, 1491. Dispute as to fee of ‘Abbat of Bonacord.’

May 8, 1496. Choice, ‘for vphaldin of the auld lovable consuetud, honour, consolacioun, and pleasour of this burgh,’ of two ‘coniunctlie abbotis and priour of Bonacord,’ with fee of five marks.

Nov. 30, 1504. All ‘personis burges nichtbours, and burgyes sonnys’ to ride with ‘Abbot and Prior of Bonaccord’ on St. Nicholas day annually when called on by them.

[In 1511 and 1515 this function of the Abbot has passed to the provost and baillies.]

May 16, 1507. ‘All manere of youthis, burgeis and burges sonnys salbe redy everie halyday to pass with the Abbat and Prior of Bonacord.’

May 8, 1508. ‘All personis that are abill within this burghe sall be ready with thair arrayment maid in grene and yallow, bowis, arrowis, brass, and all uther convenient thingis according thairto, to pass with Robyne Huyd and Litile Johnne, all tymes convenient tharto, quhen thai be requirit be the saidis Robyne and Litile Johnne.’

Nov. 17, 1508. Order for St. Nicholas riding ‘with Robert Huyid and Litile Johne, quhilk was callit, in yers bipast, Abbat and Prior of Bonacord.’

April 13, 1523. Choice of ‘Lordis of Bonaccord,’ young men ‘to rise and obey to thame.’ They are also to be ‘Mastris of Artuilyery.’

April 30, 1527. Grant of ‘x marks of the fyrst fremen that hapynnis to be frathinfurht’ to ‘the Lord of Bonnacord and his fellow.’

Aug. 3, 1528. Similar grant to ‘thair lovits, Jhone Ratray and Gilbert Malisoun, thair Abbatis out of ressoun.’

April 16, 1531. One of those chosen to be ‘lords of Bonacord, to do plesour and blythnes to the toune in this sessoun of symmir incumming’ protests against his appointment.

Oct. 11, 1533. Grant of fee to ‘lordis of Bonaccord.’

April 30, 1535. Order ‘that all the zoung abil men within this guid [toune] haue thair grene cottis, and agit men honest cottis, efferand to thame, and obey and decor the lordis of Bonaccord.’

April 4, 1539. ‘The lordis of Bonacordis desyr’ for their fee, and for ‘all the yong able men within this guid towne to conwey ws euery Sunday and halyday, and wther neidfull tymes, aboulzeit as your M. has deuisit, and agit men to meit us at the crabstane or kirkyard’ is granted.

June 23, 1539. Fee to ‘lordis of Bonacord.’

April 17, 1541. Similar fee ‘to help to the decoration and plesour to be done be thaim to this guid towne.’

April 17, 1542. Similar fee.

April 24, 1542. ‘Alex. Kayn, accusit in gugment for his wyff ... for the hawy strublens and vile mispersoning of Alex. Gray and Dauid Kintoir, lordis of Bonacord, and thair company present with thame for the tyme, sayand common beggaris and skafferis, thair meltyd was but small for all thair cuttit out hoyss, with moy oder inurious wordis, unleful to be expremit.’

July 24, 1545. Grant of ‘compositioun siluer’ as fee.

April 20, 1548. Similar fee.

April 14, 1552. ‘The said day, the counsell, all in ane voce, havand respect and consideratioune that the lordis of Bonnacord in tymes bygane hase maid our mony grit, sumpteous, and superfleous banketing induring the tyme of thair regnn, and specialie in May, quhilks wes thocht nother profitabill nor godlie, and did hurt to sundry young men that wer elekit in the said office, becaus the last elekit did aye pretent to surmont in thair predecessouris in thair ryetouss and sumpteous banketing, and the causs principal and gud institutiounn thairof, quhilk wes in halding of the gud toun in glaidnes and blythtnes, witht danssis, farsiis, playis, and gamis, in tymes convenient, necleckit and abusit; and thairfor ordinis that in tyme cummin all sic sumpteous banketing be laid doun aluterlie except thre sobir and honest, vizt., upoun the senze day, the first Sonday of May, and ane [ ] upoun Tuisday efter Pasche day, and na honest man to pass to ony of thair banketis except on the said thre dais allanerlie; and in ane place of the forsaid superfleouss banketing to be had and maid yeirly to generall plais, or ane at the lest, with danssis and gammes usit and wont; and quha souer refuisis to accept the said office in tyme cumming, beand elekit thairto be the toun, to tyne his fredome, priuelege, takis, and profit he hes or ma haf of the toun, and neuer to be admittit frathinfurtht to office, honour, nor dingnete.’

May 27, 1552. Grant of fee, larger than usual, ‘be ressoune that thai ar put to grytar coist this yeir nor utheris that bar office before thaim hes bene put to, and that be ressoune of cummyng of the quenis grace, my lord governor, and the maist of the lords and grit men of this realme, presently to this toun.’

[1555. Parliament ‘statute and ordanit that in all tymes cumming na maner of persoun be chosin Robert Hude nor Lytill Johne, Abbot of vnressoun, Quenis of Maij, nor vtherwyse, nouther in Burgh nor to landwart in ony tyme to cum, and gif ony Prouest, Baillies, counsall, and communitie, chesis sic ane Personage as Robert Hude, Lytill Johne, Abbottis of vnressoun, or Quenis of Maij within Burgh, the chesaris of sic sall tyne thair fredome for the space of fyve zeiris, and vther wyse salbe punist at the Quenis grace will, and the acceptar of sicklyke office salbe banist furth of the Realme. And gif ony sic persounis sic as Robert Hude, Lytill Johne, Abbottis of vnresson, Quenis of Maij, beis chosin outwith Burgh and vthers landwart townis, the chesars sall pay to our Souerane Lady x pundis, and thair persounis put in waird, thair to remane during the Quenis grace plesoure. And gif ony wemen or vthers about simmer treis singand makis perturbatioun to the Quenis liegis in the passage throw Burrows and vthers landwart townis, the wemen perturbatouris for skafrie of money or vtherwyse salbe takin handellit and put upon the Cukstulis of everie Burgh or towne.’]

May 4, 1562. ‘John Kelo, belman, wes accusit in jugement for the passing throw the rewis of the toune with the hand bell, be oppin voce, to convene the haill communitie, or sa mony thairof as wald convene, to pass to the wood to bring in symmer upoun the first Sonday of Maii, contravinand the actis and statutis of the quenis grace, and lordis of consell, eppeirandlie to raise tumult and ingener discord betuix the craftismen and the fre burgessis of gild, and the saidis craftismen to dissobey and adtempt aganis the superioris of the toun, gif it stuid in thair power, as the saidis prowest and baillies ar informit, the said Johnne hawing na command of the saidis prowest and baillies to do the same; and inlykwyise, Alexander Burnat alias Potter wes accusit for passing throw the toun with ane swech, to the effect and occasioun aboun wryttin.’

May 14 and 18, 1565. Several citizens disfranchised for disobeying the proclamation made by ‘Johnne Kelo, belman,’ forbidding any persons ‘to mak ony conventione, with taburne plaing, or pype, or fedill, or have anseinges, to convene the quenis legis, in chusing of Robin Huid, Litill Johnne, Abbot of Ressoune, Queyne of Maii, or sicklyk contraveyne the statutis of parliament, or mak ony tumult, scism, or conventione.’

Royal Entry.

The entertainment of Queen Margaret, wife of James IV, in May, 1511, seems to have included some of the pageants from the Nativity cycle. The following extract is from Dunbar’s The Quenis Reception at Aberdein[755]:—

‘Ane fair processioun mett hir at the Port, In a cap of gold and silk, full pleasantlie, Syne at hir entrie, with many fair disport, Ressauet hir on streittis lustilie; Quhair first the salutatioun honorabilly Of the sweitt Virgin, guidlie mycht be seine; The sound of menstrallis blawing to the sky; Be blyth and blisfull, burgh of Aberdein.

And syne thow gart the orient kingis thrie Offer to Chryst, with benyng reuerence, Gold, sence, and mir, with all humilitie, Schawand him king with most magnificence; Syne quhow the angill, with sword of violence, Furth of the joy of paradice putt clein Adame and Eve for innobedience; Be blyth and blisfull, burgh of Aberdein.

And syne the Bruce, that euir was bold in stour, Thow gart as roy cum rydand vnder croun, Richt awfull, strang, and large of portratour, As nobill, dreidfull, michtie campioun; The [nobill Stewarts] syne, of great renoun, Thow gart upspring, with branches new and greine, Sa gloriouslie, quhill glaided all the toun: Be blyth and blisfull, burgh of Aberdein.

Syne come thair four and twentie madinis ȝing, All claid in greine of mervelous bewtie, With hair detressit, as threidis of gold did hing, With quhyt hattis all browderit rycht bravelie, Playand on timberallis, and syngand rycht sweitlie; That seimlie sort, in ordour weill besein, Did meit the quein, hir saluand reverentlie: Be blyth and blisfull, burgh of Aberdein.

The streittis war all hung with tapestrie, Great was the press of peopill dwelt about, And pleasant padgeanes playit prattelie; The legeiss all did to thair lady loutt, Quha was convoyed with ane royall routt Off gryt barrounes and lustie ladyis [schene]; Welcum, our quein! the commoness gaif ane schout: Be blyth and blisfull, burgh of Aberdein.

ABINGDON, BERKSHIRE.

Certain ‘jeweis de Abyndon’ were at Court at Xmas 1427 (Appendix E, viii).

A seventeenth-century account of the Hospital of Christ says that the fraternity held their feast on May 3 (Holy Cross day), 1445, with ‘pageantes and playes and May games.’ They employed twelve minstrels[756].

APPLEDORE, KENT.

Appledore players were at New Romney in 1488.

BADDOW, ESSEX.

The Chelmsford (q.v.) wardrobe was hired by ‘children of Badow’ during 1564-6.

BASSINGBOURNE, CAMBRIDGESHIRE.

A play ‘of the holy martyr St. George’ was held in a field at Bassingbourne on the feast of St. Margaret, July 20, 1511. The churchwardens’ accounts for the play show, besides payments for refreshments:—

‘First paid to the garnement man for garnements and propyrts and playbooks, xxˢ.

To a minstrel and three waits of Cambridge....

Item ... for setting up the stages.

Item to John Beecher for painting of three Fanchoms and four Tormentors.

Item to Giles Ashwell for easement of his croft to play in, iˢ.

Item to John Hobarde, Brotherhood Priest, for the play book, iiˢ. viiiᵈ.’

Twenty-seven neighbouring villages contributed to these expenses[757].

BATH, SOMERSETSHIRE.

The accounts of St. Michael’s, Bath, for 1482, include ‘pro potatione le players in recordacione [‘rehearsing’?] ludorum diversis vicibus,’ with other expenditure on players and properties. As one item is ‘et Iohī Fowler pro cariando le tymbe a cimiterio dicto tempore ludi,’ the play was perhaps a Quem quaeritis[758].

Chaucer’s Wife of Bath, in her husband’s absence at London during Lent, would make her ‘visitaciouns’—

‘To pleyes of miracles and mariages[759].’

BETHERSDEN, KENT.

The churchwardens’ accounts record ludi beatae Christinae, in 1522. St. Christina’s day was July 24[760]. Bethersden players were at New Romney in 1508.

BEVERLEY, YORKSHIRE.

A thirteenth-century continuator of the Vita of St. John of Beverley records a recent (†1220) miracle done in the Minster:—

‘Contigit, ut tempore quodam aestivo intra saepta polyandri ecclesiae B. Ioannis, ex parte aquilonari, larvatorum, ut assolet, et verbis et actu fieret repraesentatio Dominicae resurrectionis. Confluebat ibi copiosa utriusque sexus multitudo, variis inducta votis, delectationis videlicet, seu admirationis causa, vel sancto proposito excitandae devotionis. Cum vero, prae densa vulgi adstante corona, pluribus, et praecipue statura pusillis, desideratus minime pateret accessus, introierunt plurimi in ecclesiam; ut vel orarent, vel picturas inspicerent, vel per aliquod genus recreationis et solatii pro hoc die taedium evitarent.’ Some boys climbed into the triforium, in order that, through the windows, ‘liberius personarum et habitus et gestus respicerent, et earundem dialogos auditu faciliori adverterent.’ One of these fell into the church, but was miraculously preserved[761].

The Corpus Christi play is first mentioned in 1377. It was ‘antiqua consuetudo’ in 1390, when an ‘ordinacio ludi Corporis Christi cum pena’ was entered in the Great Guild Book, requiring the crafts or ‘artes’ to produce ‘ludos suos et pagentes’ under a penalty of 40_s._ The plays were held annually, subject to an order by the oligarchical town council of twelve custodes or gubernatores on St. Mark’s day. The custodes ‘governed’ the play, and met certain general expenses. In 1423 they paid Master Thomas Bynham, a friar preacher, for writing ‘banis’; also the waits (‘spiculatores’) who accompanied the ‘banis.’ In the same year they gave a breakfast to the Earl of Northumberland. In 1460 they put up a scaffold for their own use. Apparently the pageants and properties belonged to them, for in 1391 they handed over to John of Arras, on behalf of the ‘hairers,’ for his life and under surety, the necessaries for the play of Paradise; ‘viz. j karre, viij hespis, xviij stapels, ij visers, ij wenges angeli, j fir-sparr, j worme, ij paria caligarum linearum, ij paria camisarum, j gladius.’ Otherwise the expenses were met by the crafts, whose members paid a fixed levy towards the play, the ‘serge’ or light maintained by the craft in some chapel, and the wooden ‘castle’ erected at the procession of St. John of Beverley on Monday in Rogation week. Thus the Barbers’ Ordinances in 1414 require their members to pay 2_s._ and a pound of wax on setting up shop, and 2_s._ on taking an apprentice. Certain fines also were in this company appropriated to the same purposes. In 1469 journeymen cappers paid 8_d._ for any year when there was a play, and 6_d._ when there was not. The town Ordinances of 1467 contemplate annual payments by all craftsmen. In 1449 the custodes contributed 4_s._ to the Skinners’ play as ‘alms of the community.’ If a craft failed to produce its play, the custodes exacted the whole or a part of the fine of 40_s._ specified in the Ordinacio of 1390. They also levied other disciplinary fines; as on John ‘cordewainer’ in 1423, for hindering the play, on Henry Cowper, ‘webster,’ in 1452, ‘quod nesciebat ludum suum’; on the alderman of the ‘paynetors,’ in 1520-1 ‘because their play was badly and confusedly played, in contempt of the whole community, before many strangers’; and so forth. The order of 1390 specified thirty-eight crafts to play; ‘viz. mercers et drapers, tannatores, masons, skynners, taillors, goldsmyths, smyths, plummers, bollers, turnors, girdelers, cutlers, latoners, broche-makers, horners, sponers, ladilers, furburs, websters, walkers, coverlid-wevers, cartwrightes, coupars, fletchers, bowers, cordewaners, baksters, flesshewers, fysshers, chaundelers, barburs, vynters, sadilers, rapers, hayrers, shipmen, glovers, and workmen.’ As elsewhere, changing conditions of social life led to alterations in this list, and consequent divisions and mergings of the plays. Thus in 1411 it seems to have been felt as a grievance that certain well-to-do inhabitants of Beverley, who belonged to no craft, escaped all charge for the plays, and it was agreed that in future the ‘digniores villae’ should appoint four representatives and contribute a play. In 1493 the Drapers formed a craft of their own apart from the Mercers, and consequently a play was divided, the Drapers taking ‘Demyng Pylate,’ and leaving to the Mercers ‘Blak Herod.’ On the fly-leaf of the Great Guild Book is a list of crafts and their plays, dated by Mr. Leach †1520, which differs considerably from that of 1390. It is as follows:—

‘Gubernacio Ludi Corporis Christi.

Tylers: the fallinge of Lucifer. Saddelers: the makinge of the World. Walkers: makinge of Adam and eve. Ropers: the brekinge of the Comaundments of God. Crelers: gravinge and Spynnynge. Glovers: Cayn. Shermen: Adam and Seth. Wattermen: Noe Shipp. Bowers and Fletshers: Abraham and Isaak. Musterdmakers and Chanlers: Salutation of Our Lady. Husbandmen: Bedleem. Vynteners: Sheipherds. Goldsmyths: Kyngs of Colan. Fyshers: Symeon. Cowpers: fleyinge to Egippe. Shomakers: Children of Ysraell. Scryveners: Disputacion in the Temple. Barbours: Sent John Baptyste. Laborers: the Pynnacle. The Mylners: rasynge of Lazar. Skynners: ierusalem. Bakers: the Mawndy. Litsters: prainge at the Mownte. Tailyours: Slepinge Pilate. Marchaunts [i.e. Mercers]: Blak Herod. Drapers: Demynge Pylate. Bocheours: Scorgynge. Cutlers and Potters: the Stedynynge. Wevers: the Stanginge. Barkers: the Takinge of the Crose. Cooks: Haryinge of hell. Wrights: the Resurrection. Gentylmen: Castle of Emaut. Smyths: Ascencion. Prestes: Coronacion of Our Lady. Marchaunts: Domesday.

The thirty-eight pageants of 1390 have become thirty-six in 1520. Besides the ‘Gentylmen,’ dating from 1411, the ‘Prestes’ are noticeable. These are probably the ‘clerus Gildae Corporis Christi,’ who in 1430 led the Corpus Christi procession in which many of the crafts with their lights took part. Procession and play, though on the same day, seem to have been in 1430 quite distinct. The play lasted only one day, and was given in 1449 at six stations; viz. at the North Bar, by the Bull-ring, between John Skipworth and Robert Couke in Highgate, at the Cross Bridge, at the Fishmarket (now called Wednesday Market), at the Minster Bow, and at the Beck. Poulson stated that the performances lasted into the reign of James I. Mr. Leach could find no trace of them in the municipal archives after 1520[762]. But the Ordinances, dated 1555, of the Minstrels’ guild ‘of our Lady of the read arke’ provide that certain forfeits shall go to the ‘comon place’ (which I take to be ‘common plays’) of Beverley.

A second craft-play appears in 1469, when a number of crafts, thirty-nine in all, gave a Pater Noster play on the Sunday after St. Peter and Vincula (August 1). Copies of the text (registra) were made for the crafts. The stations were those of the Corpus Christi play. There were eight ‘pagends’ named after the eight principal ‘lusores,’ viz. ‘Pryde: Invy: Ire: Avaryce: Sleweth (also called ‘Accidie’): Glotony: Luxuria: Vicious.’ A number of crafts united to furnish each of these; apparently the most important was that of ‘Vicious,’ provided by the ‘gentilmen, merchands, clerks and valets.’ Aldermen of the pageants were appointed[763].

BILLERICAY, ESSEX.

The Chelmsford (q.v.) wardrobe was twice hired by men of ‘Beleryca,’ or ‘Belyrica’ during 1564-6.

BISHOP AUCKLAND, DURHAM.

The lusores of ‘Auklande’ received a present from Durham Priory for playing before Master Hyndley, at Christmas, 1539. (App. E, i.)

BOREHAM, ESSEX.

‘Casse of Boreham’ hired the Chelmsford (q.v.) wardrobe in 1566 and 1573, and the ‘players of Boreham,’ at Twelfth Night, 1574.

BOXFORD, SUFFOLK.

A play appears in the churchwardens’ accounts for 1535[764].

BRAINTREE, ESSEX.

The churchwardens’ accounts of St. Michael’s include the following:—

‘Anno 1523. A Play of Sᵗ Swythyn, acted in the Church on a Wednesday, for which was gathered 6: 14: 11½; Pᵈ at the said Play, 3: 1: 4; due to the Church, 3: 13: 7½.

Anno 1525. There was a Play of Sᵗ Andrew acted in the Church the Sunday before Relique Sunday; Rcᵈ, 8: 9: 6; Pd, 4: 9: 9; Due to the Church, 3: 19: 8.

Anno 1529. A Play in Halstead Church.

Anno 1534. A Play of Placidas alias Sᵗ Eustace. Rᵈ, 14: 17: 6½; Pᵈ, 6: 13: 7½; due, 8: 2: 8½.

Anno 1567. Rᵈ of the Play money, 5: 0: 0.

Anno 1570. Recᵈ of the Play money, 9: 7: 7; and for letting the Playing garments, 0: 1: 8.

Anno 1571. Rcᵈ for a Playbook, 20ᵈ; and for lending the Play gere, 8: 7ᵈ.

Anno 1579. For the Players Apparel, 50ˢ[765].’

Nicholas Udall was vicar of Braintree, 1533-1537. The plays were probably in aid of the large expenditure on the fabric of the church between 1522 and 1535.

The Chelmsford (q.v.) play was given at Braintree in 1562.

BRENTWOOD, ESSEX.

‘Mr. Johnston of Brentwoode’ hired the Chelmsford (q.v.) wardrobe in 1566.

BRISTOL, GLOUCESTERSHIRE.

A town-clerk’s account of municipal customs, after describing the banquet on St. Katharine’s Eve (Nov. 24), concludes:—

‘And then to depart, euery man home: the Maire, Shiref, and the worshipfull men redy to receyue at theire dores Seynt Kateryns players, makyng them to drynk at their dores, and rewardyng theym for theire plays[766].’ Were these plays more than a ‘catterning’ quête (vol. i. p. 253)?

There is no mention of plays amongst the records, including several craft-guild ordinances, in the Little Red Book of Bristol (ed. W. B. Bickley, 1901). But ‘the Shipwrights Pageannt’ was used at the reception of Henry VII in 1486 (p. 175).

BROOKLAND, KENT.

Brookland players were at New Romney in 1494.

BUNGAY, SUFFOLK.

On the night after Corpus Christi day, June 16, 1514, certain persons ‘brake and threw down five pageants of the said inhabitants, that is to saye, hevyn pagent, the pagent of all the world, Paradyse pagent, Bethelem pagent, and helle pagent, the whyche wer ever wont tofore to be caryed abowt the seyd town upon the seyd daye in the honor of the blissyd Sacrement.’

The churchwardens’ accounts of St. Mary’s show payments in 1526 for copying the game-book, and to Stephen Prewett, a Norwich priest, for his labour in the matter.

The accounts of Holy Trinity show payments: in 1558, to a man riding to Yarmouth for the ‘game gear,’ ‘to William Ellys for the interlude and game booke, iiijᵈ,’ ‘for writing the partes, ijˢ’; in 1566, on occasion of ‘the interlude in the churchyarde,’ for apparel borrowed from Lord Surrey, ‘for visors,’ and ‘to Kelsaye, the vyce, for his pastyme before the plaie, and after the playe, both daies, ijˢ.’ In 1577, a churchwarden gave a receipt to his predecessor for ‘game pleyers gownes and coats, that were made of certayne peces of olld copes.’ In 1591, 5_s._ was received for ‘players cootes[767].’

BURNHAM, ESSEX.

‘Wᵐ Crayford of Burnam’ hired the Chelmsford (q.v.) wardrobe in 1568.

BURY ST. EDMUND’S, SUFFOLK.

The Ordinances of the Weavers (1477) assign half of certain fines to ‘the sustentacione and mayntenaunce of the payent of the Assencione of oure Lord God and of the yiftys of the Holy Gost, as yt hath be customed of olde tyme owte of mynde yeerly to be had to the wurschepe of God, amongge other payenttes in the processione in the feste of Corpus Xr̄i.’

Journeymen weavers are to pay ‘iiijᵈ’ yearly to the ‘payent’ and all ‘foreyne’ as well as ‘deyzin’ weavers are to be contributory to it[768].

It is not clear whether the ‘payent’ had a ludus or was a dumb-show.

CAMBORNE, CORNWALL.

See Texts (i), Cornish Plays, St. Meriasek.

CAMBRIDGE, CAMBRIDGESHIRE.

William de Lenne and Isabel his wife, joining the guild of Corpus Christi (†1350), spent half a mark ‘in ludo Filiorum Israelis[769].’

Warton says:—

‘The oldest notice I can recover of this sort of spectacle [Latin plays] in an English University is in the fragment of an ancient accompt-roll of the dissolved college of Michael-House in Cambridge; in which, under 1386, the following expense is entered: ‘Pro ly pallio brusdato et pro sex larvis et barbis in comedia[770].’

CANTERBURY, KENT.

A Burghmote order (†1500) directed ‘a play called Corpus Christi play ... maintained and played at the costs of the Crafts and Mysteries,’ although ‘of late days it hath been left and laid apart,’ to be revived at Michaelmas[771].

A book of the play of Abraham and Isaac, belonging to the ‘schaft’ or parochial guild of St. Dunstan’s, lay in the keeping of the churchwardens of that church from 1491 to 1520[772].

On Jan. 6, 1503, the corporation paid for a play of the Three Kyngs of Coleyn in the guildhall. The account mentions three ‘bests’ made of hoops and laths and painted canvas, ‘heddyng of the Hensshemen,’ a castle in the courthall, and a gilt star.

Annual accounts for ‘the pagent of St. Thomas’ on the day of his martyrdom (Dec. 29), appear amongst the financial records of the corporation from 1504-5 until ‘far on in the reign of Queen Elizabeth.’ I select some items:—

‘1504-5.

Paied to Sampson Carpenter and hys man hewyng and squeryng of tymber for the Pagent. For makyng Sᵗ Thomas Carte with a peyer of whyles. To iiij men to helpe to cary the Pagent. For a newe myghter. For two bagges of leder. For payntyng of the awbe and the hedde. For gunpowder. For lynnen cloth bought for Sᵗ Thomas garment. For forgyng and makyng the knyghts harnes. For the hyre of a sworde. For wasshynge of an albe and an amys.’

In later years.

‘Pro le yettyng sanguynem. Pro le payntyng capitis Sci Thomae. For them that holpe to dress the Pagent and for standyng of the same in the barne. For a payer of new gloves for Seynt Thomas. For payntyng of the hede and the Aungell of the pagent. Paied to hym that turned the vyce. Paied for wyre for the vyce of the Angell. For 1 quarter of lambe and brede and drynke gevyn to the children that played the knyghtes, and for them that holpe to convey the Pagent abowte. For a new leder bag for the blode. For wasshyng of the albe and other clothys abowte the Auter, and settyng on agayn the apparell.’

Until 1529 the pageant stood in the barn of St. Sepulchre’s convent; thenceforward in the archbishop’s palace. In 1536-7 ‘Seynt Thomas’ became ‘Bysshop Bekket,’ and the show was suppressed, to be revived with some added ‘gyaunts’ under Mary[773].

This pageant was probably a dumb-show of the martyrdom of Becket.

CHELMSFORD, ESSEX.

The Earl of Surrey rewarded the players of ‘Chemsford’ on Dec. 27, 1490 (Appendix E, vii).

The churchwardens’ accounts give minute details of a play held in 1562 and 1563. The following are the chief items:—

‘Inprms paid unto the Mynstrolls for the Show day and for the play day.

Unto Willm. Hewet for makinge the vices coote, a fornet of borders, and a Jerken of borders.

To John Lockyer for making iiij shep hoks and for iron work that Burle occupied for the hell.

Item paide to Robᵗ Mathews for a pair of wombes.

to Lawrence for watching in the Churche when the temple was a-dryenge.

for carrying of plonk for the stages.

for ... the scaffold.

to M. Browne for the waightes of Bristowe.

for makyng the conysants.

forty Mynstrells meate and drinke.

to William Withers for making the frame for the heaven stage and tymber for the same.

for writtinge.

to William Withers for makynge the last temple, the waies, and his paynnes.

to John Wryght for makynge a cotte of lether for Christ.

to Solomon of Hatfild for parchmente.

to Mother Dale and her company for reaping flagges for the scaffold.

to Polter and Rosse for watching in the pightell on the play show.

for fyftie fadam of lyne for the cloudes.

for tenn men to beare the pagiante.

to Browne for keapinge the cornehill on the showe daye.

to Roistone for payntenge the Jeiants, the pagiante, and writing the plaiers names.

for paper to wright the Bookes.’

There are many other payments to workmen and for refreshments, and large sums to various people ‘for suinge the play.’ Is this ‘showing,’ ‘stage-managing’? One Burles, who was twice paid for ‘suinge,’ was also boarded with his boy for three weeks.

An inventory of garments made in February, 1564, includes, with many velvet gowns and jerkins, &c.:—

‘ij vyces coates, and ij scalpes, ij daggers (j dagger wanted).

v prophets cappes (one wantinge).

iij flappes for devils.

iiij shepehoks, iiij whyppes (but one gone).’

I infer that the play was a cyclical one, extending at least from Creation to Crucifixion. The temple, which required renewing, was probably rent in twain. There were heaven, hell, Prophetae, Pastores. The performance was not in the church, although the temple was put to dry there, but in a ‘pightell’ or enclosure, upon a scaffold, with stages for the spectators. It was held in connexion with a ‘showe,’ which was on Cornhill, and to which I assign the ‘pagiante’ and ‘jeiantes.’ The time was therefore probably Midsummer.

The accounts seem to cover two years and at least four performances. In 1562, Midsummer day with its show fell on a Saturday. The play was on Monday. On Tuesday it was repeated at Braintree, and later on at Malden, and possibly elsewhere. Then in 1563 it was again given in Chelmsford at Midsummer.

The total expenditure was over £50, although, unless the forty minstrels acted, nothing was paid to actors. Against this was received ‘at the seconde play’ £17 11_s._ 3_d._, and ‘at the ij last plaies’ £19 19_s._ 4_d._, and £2 19_s._ was realized by letting out the garments to the men of Sabsford in 1562 and 1563, and 16_s._ more for letting them to ‘Mʳ William Peter, Knyght.’ Nor did this source of income soon close. A second inventory of 1573 shows that the garments were carefully preserved. They became a valuable stock. In 1564-6 alone the hire of them brought in £10 14_s._ 3_d._ They were let to men of Colchester, Walden, Beleryca, Starford, Little Badow, and to ‘children of Badow.’ Further loans are noted as follows in later years:—

‘Receipts, June 3, 1566.

Sabsforde men. Casse of Boreham. Somers of Lanchire. Barnaby Riche of Witham. Willᵐ Monnteyne of Colchester. Mʳ. Johnston of Brentwoode, the 10th Dec. Richard More of Nayland. Frauncis Medcalfe, the iiij of June, 1568. Wᵐ Crayford of Burnam, the ij of June, 1568.

1570-1572.

High Ester men. Parker of Writtell. Mʳˢ Higham of Woodham Walter.

1572.

Parker of Writtell, Aprill. The Earle of Sussex players. John Walker of Hanfild.

1573.

Casse of Boreham.

1574.

Players of Boreham, till the mondaye after twelfe day.

In 1574 the ‘playe books’ were valued at £4, and in the same year all the garments, &c., included in the inventory of 1573 were sold to George Studley and others for £6 12_s._ 4_d._ In 1575 one Mr. Knott was paid 8_d._ ‘for the makinge of two oblijacyons for the assurance of the players garments belonginge to the Pyshe[774].’

CHESTER, CHESHIRE.

[Authorities.—(i) Editions of the plays by Wright and Deimling, described on p. 408. (ii) Notices in Furnivall, Digby Plays, xviii, from (a) Harl. MSS. 1944, 1948, which are versions of a Breviary of the City of Chester, compiled in 1609 by David Rogers from the collections of his father, Robert Rogers, Archdeacon of Chester, who died in 1595; (b) local Annales in Harl. 2125 (Randle Holme’s Collections), and Daniel King’s Vale-Royall (1656). (iii) Notices in R. H. Morris, Chester in the Plantagenet and Tudor Reigns (1894), from (a) Corporation archives, (b) accounts of the Smiths’ Company in Harl. 2054, (c) a copy in Harl. 2150 (cited in error as Harl. 2050) of part or all of the contents of a record known as the White Book of the Pentice. This was bound with other documents by Randle Holme, and indexed by him in 1669. I do not find any mention of such a ‘White Book’ in the calendar of extant Corporation archives by Mr. J. C. Jeaffreson, in Hist. MSS. viii. 1. 355, unless it is identical with the Pentice Chartulary compiled in 1575-6 on the basis, partly of an older ‘Black Book,’ ‘translated oute of Laten and Frenche’ in 1540, and partly of loose ‘sceduls, papers and books’ in the Treasure House.]

The Whitsun Plays: The Tradition.

The Chester plays are traditionally ascribed to the mayoralty of one John Arneway. As ‘John Arneway,’ ‘de Arnewey,’ ‘Hernwey,’ or ‘Harnwey’ served continuously as mayor from 1268 to 1277[775], and as no other of the great English cycles of municipal plays can claim anything like this antiquity, it is worth while to examine the evidence pretty closely. I therefore put the versions of the tradition in chronological order.

(a) 1544. The following document is headed ‘The proclamation for the Plaies, newly made by William Newhall, clarke of the Pentice, the first yere of his entre.’ It is dated ‘tempore Willi Sneyde, draper, secundo tempore sui maioritatis’ [Oct. 9, 1543-1544], endorsed as made ‘opon the rode ee’ [Rood-eye], and stated on an accompanying sheet to be ‘of laten into Englishe translated and made by the said William Newhall the yere aforesaid[776].’

‘For as moche as of old tyme, not only for the Augmentacon and increase of [the holy and catholick] faith of our Savyour, Jhu’ Crist, and to exort the mynds of the co’mon people to [good devotion and holsome] doctryne thereof, but also for the co’men Welth and prosperitie of this Citie a plaie [and declaration—] and diverse stories of the bible, begynnyng with the creacon and fall of Lucifer, and [ending with the general] jugement of the World to be declared and plaied in the Witson wek, was devised [and made by one Sir] Henry Fraunces, somtyme monk of this dissolved monastery, who obtayned and gate of Clement, then beyng [bushop of Rome, a thousand] daies of pardon, and of the Busshop of Chester at that time beyng xlᵗⁱ daies of pardon graunted from thensforth to every person resortyng in pecible maner with good devocon to here and se the sayd [piaies] from tyme to tyme as oft as they shalbe plaied within this Citie [and that every person disturbing the same piaies in any manner wise to be accursed by thauctoritie of the said Pope Clement bulls unto such tyme as he or they be absolved therof (erased)], which piaies were devised to the honour of God by John Arneway, then maire of this Citie of Chester, and his brethren, and holl cominalty therof to be brought forthe, declared and plead at the cost and charges of the craftsmen and occupacons of the said Citie, whiche hitherunto have frome tyme to tyme used and performed the same accordingly.

Wherfore Maister Maire, in the Kynges name, straitly chargeth and co’mandeth that every person and persons of what estate, degre or condicion soever he or they be, resortyng to the said piaies, do use [themselves] pecible without makyng eny assault, affrey, or other disturbance whereby the same piaies shalbe disturbed, and that no maner person or persons who soever he or they be do use or weare eny unlaufull wepons within the precynct of the said Citie duryng the tyme of the said piaies [not only upon payn of cursyng by thauctoritie of the said Pope Clement Bulls, but also (erased)] opon payn of enprisonment of their bodies and makyng fyne to the Kyng at Maister Maires pleasure. And God save the Kyng and Mr. Maire, &c.[777]’

(b) †1544-7[778]. The documents concerning the plays copied for Randle Holme out of the ‘White Book of the Pentice[779]’ are (1) a list of the plays and the crafts producing them (cf. p. 408); (2) a note that ‘On Corpus Χρi day the colliges and prestys bryng forth a play at the assentement of the Maire’; (3) a note that all the arrangements detailed are subject to alteration by the Mayor and his brethren; (4) a version, without heading, of Newhall’s proclamation which entirely omits the allusions to Sir Henry Fraunces and the pardons, while retaining that to Arneway; (5) verses headed ‘The comen bannes to be proclaymed and Ryddon with the Stewardys of every occupacon.’ These are printed in Morris, 307. They give a list of the plays (cf. p. 408), and add that there will be a ‘solempne procession’ with the sacrament on Corpus Christi day from ‘Saynt Maries on the Hill’ to ‘Saynt Johns,’ together with ‘a play sett forth by the clergye In honor of the fest.’ The passage referring to Corpus Christi is marked by Randle Holme’s copyist as ‘Erased in the Booke[780].’ The only historical statement in the Banns is that

‘Sir John Arnway was maire of this citie When these playes were begon truly.’

(c) †1551-1572. The later Banns, given most fully in Rogers’s Breauarye of Chester (cf. Furnivall, xx), but also more or less imperfectly in MSS. h and B of the plays (Deimling, i. 2), were probably written for one or other of the post-Reformation performances, but not that of 1575, as they contemplate a Whitsun performance, while that of 1575 was after Midsummer. They state that

‘some tymes there was mayor of this Citie Sir John Arnway, Knyght, who most worthilye contented hym selfe to sett out in playe The devise of one done Rondall, moonke of Chester abbe.’

(d) 1609. The Breauarye itself, in an account probably due to the elder Rogers, who may have himself seen some of the later performances, says (Furnivall, xviii):—‘Heare note that these playes of Chester called yᵉ whitson playes weare the woorke of one Rondoll, a monke of yᵉ Abbaye of Sᵗ Warburge in Chester, who redused yᵉ whole history of the byble into Englishe storyes in metter, in yᵉ englishe tounge; and this moncke, in a good desire to doe good, published yᵉ same, then the firste mayor of Chester, namely Sir Iohn Arneway, Knighte, he caused the same to be played [“anno domini, 1329”][781].’ In a list of Mayors contained in the same MS. is given (Furnivall, xxv), under the year 1328 and the mayoralty of Sir John Arneway, ‘The whitson playes Inuented, in Chester, by one Rondoll Higden, a monke in Chester abbaye.’

(e) 1628. On the cover of MS. H of the plays (Harl. MS. 2124) is this note:—‘The Whitsun playes first made by one Don Randle Heggenet, a Monke of Chester Abbey, who was thrise at Rome, before he could obtain leaue of the Pope to haue them in the English tongue.

The Whitsun playes were playd openly in pageants by the Cittizens of Chester in the Whitsun Weeke.

Nicholas the fift Then was Pope in the year of our Lord 1447.

Ano 1628.

Sir Henry ffrancis, sometyme a Monke of the Monestery of Chester, obtained of Pope Clemens a thousand daies of pardon, and of the Bishop of Chester 40 dayes pardon for every person that resorted peaceably to see the same playes, and that every person that disturbed the same, to be accursed by the said Pope untill such tyme as they should be absolued therof.’

(f) 1669. Randle Holme made a note upon his copy of the ‘White Book of the Pentice’ (Harl. 2150, f. 86ᵇ), of the ‘Whitson plaies ... being first presented and putt into English by Rand. Higden, a monck of Chester Abbey.’

(g) Seventeenth century. A ‘later hand’ added to the copy of Newhall’s proclamation on the fly-leaf of MS. h (1600) of the plays:

‘Sir Io Arnway, maior 1327 and 1328, at which tyme these playes were written by Randall Higgenett, a monk of chester abby, and played openly in the witson weeke.’

(h) Seventeenth century. An account of the plays amongst Lord De Tabley’s MSS.[782] assigns them to ‘Randall Higden, a monk of Chester Abbey, A. D. 1269.’

Up to a certain point these fragments of tradition are consistent and, a priori, not improbable. About 1328 is just the sort of date to which one would look for the formation of a craft-cycle. Randall or Randulf Higden[783], the author of the Polychronicon, took the vows at St. Werburgh’s in 1299 and died in 1364. An accident makes it possible also to identify Sir Henry Francis, for he is mentioned as senior monk of Chester Abbey in two documents of May 5, 1377, and April 17, 1382.[784] The occurrence of the name of this quite obscure person in a tradition of some 200 years later is, I think, evidence that it is not wholly an unfounded one. It is true that Newhall’s proclamation states that Francis ‘devised and made’ the plays, whereas the Banns of 1575 and the later accounts assign the ‘devise’ to ‘done Rondall.’ But this discrepancy seems to have afforded no difficulty to the writer of 1628, who clearly thought that Heggenet ‘made’ the plays, and Francis obtained the ‘pardon’ for them. The Pope Clement concerned is probably Clement VI (1342-52), but might be the Antipope Clement VII (1378-94). The one point which will not harmonize with the rest is that about which, unfortunately, the tradition is most uniform, namely, the connexion of the plays with the mayoralty of Sir John Arneway. For neither Higden nor Francis could have worked for a mayor whose terms of office extended from 1268 to 1277. But even this difficulty does not appear to be insoluble. I find from Canon Morris’s invaluable volume that a later mayor bearing a name very similar to Arneway’s, one Richard Erneis or Herneys, was in office from 1327 to 1329, precisely at the date to which the tradition, in some of its forms, ascribes the plays. Is it not then probable that to this Richard Herneys the establishment of the plays is really due, and that he has been confused in the memory of Chester with his greater predecessor, the ‘Dick Whittington’ of the city, John Arneway or Hernwey? I am glad to be the means of restoring to him his long withheld tribute of esteem.

The Records.

If the plays were actually established in 1327-9, the first hundred years of their history is a blank. The earliest notice in any record is in 1462, when the Bakers’ charter refers to their ‘play and light of Corpus Christi.’ The Saddlers’ charter of 1471 similarly speaks of their ‘paginae luminis et ludi corporis Christi[785].’ It will be observed that the play is here called a Corpus Christi play. The term ‘Whitson Playe’ first occurs in a record of 1520[786], but there is no doubt that during the sixteenth century the regular season for the performances was Whitsuntide. As the ‘White Book’ (†1544) still speaks of ‘pagyns in play of Corpus Χρi[787],’ it is possible that a cyclical play was so called, whether actually given on Corpus Christi day or not. It is also, I think, possible that the Chester plays may have been transferred from Corpus Christi to Whitsuntide in order to avoid clashing with the procession, without quite losing their old name; and this may be what is meant by the statement on the cover of MS. ‘H’ of the plays that they were ‘playd openly ... in the Whitsun Weeke’ in 1447. It was in 1426 that a question as to the clashing of procession and plays arose in York (cf. p. 400).

Nearly all the extant notices of the plays belong to the sixteenth century. Originally annual, they became occasional at the Reformation. They can be traced in 1546, 1551, 1554, 1561, 1567 (at Christmas), 1568, 1569, 1572, and 1575. The two last performances aroused considerable opposition. In 1572 Mayor John Hankey ‘would needs have the playes go forward, against the wills of the Bishops of Canterbury, York and Chester.’ Apparently an inhibition was sent by Archbishop Grindal; ‘but it came too late.’ In 1575, under Mayor Sir John Savage, the plays were subjected to revision, and such of them as were thought suitable given ‘at the cost of the inhabitants’ on Sunday, Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday after Midsummer. This performance was ‘to the great dislike of many, because the playe was in on parte of the Citty.’ It was also in direct contravention of inhibitions from the Archbishop and the Earl of Huntingdon. As a result both Hankey and Savage were cited before the Privy Council, but the aldermen and common council took the responsibility upon themselves, and apparently nothing further came of the matter[788].

Probably 1575 was the last year in which the plays were given as a whole. A performance in 1600 has been alleged[789], but this date is probably taken from the heading of the Banns in MS. ‘h’ of the plays, which runs:—

‘The reading of the banes, 1600.

The banes which are reade Beefore the beginning of the playes of Chester 1600.

4 June 1600.’

Doubtless 1600 is the date of the transcript, as it is repeated after the signature to several of the plays. It is quite possible that this manuscript was made in view of an intended performance. George Bellin, the scribe, seems to have been of a Chester family. But if so, the intention was frustrated, for the annalists declare that Henry Hardware, mayor in 1600 ‘would not suffer any Playes.’ It is to be noted also that David Rogers, whose Breauarye was completed in 1609 and certainly contains matter subsequent to the death of his father in 1595, states that 1575 was the last time the plays were played[790].

Mode of Performance.

The Banns were proclaimed on St. George’s day by the city crier, with whom rode the Stewards of each craft. The Mayor’s proclamation against disturbers of the peace was read upon the Roodee. The plays themselves lasted through the first three week-days of Whitsuntide. Nine were given on the Monday, nine on the Tuesday, and seven on the Wednesday. The first station was at the Abbey gates, the next by the pentice at the high cross before the Mayor, others in Watergate Street, Bridge Street, and so on to Eastgate Street. Scaffolds and stages were put up to accommodate the spectators, and in 1528 a law-suit is recorded about the right to a ‘mansion, Rowme, or Place for the Whydson plaies.’ Rogers describes the ‘pagiente’ or ‘cariage’ as

‘a highe place made like a howse with ij rowmes, being open on yᵉ tope: the lower rowme they apparrelled & dressed them selues; and in the higher rowme they played; and they stood vpon 6 wheeles [Harl. 1944. It is “4 wheeles” in Harl. 1948].’

The term ‘pageant’ is used at Chester both for the vehicle and for the play performed on it; but, contrary to the custom elsewhere, more usually for the latter. The vehicle is generally called a ‘carriage.’ It was kept in a ‘caryadghouse’ and occasionally served two crafts on different days. The expenses of carriage, porters, refreshments, actors, and rehearsals fell, as shown by the extant Accounts of the Smiths’ company, on the crafts. They were met by a levy upon each member and journeyman. Vestments were hired from the clergy; both minstrels and choristers were in request for songs and music. The Corporation supervised the performances, questions as to the incidence of the burden upon this or that craft coming before the Pentice court. In 1575 the Smiths submitted two alternative plays for the choice of the aldermen. The authoritative copy or ‘originall booke’ of the plays seems to have belonged to the city. The Smiths paid for reading the ‘Regenall,’ ‘an Rygynall’ or ‘orraginall.’ In 1568 one ‘Randall Trevor, gent.’ seems to have lost the book. There is an interesting allusion to the unprofessional quality of the actors, in the copy of the later Banns preserved by Rogers. The plays are not

‘contryued In such sorte & cunninge, & by such playeres of price, As at this day good playeres & fine wittes coulde devise, ... By Craftes men & meane men these Pageauntes are played And to Commons and Contryemen acustomablye before. If better men & finer heades now come, what canne be saide? But of common and contrye playeres take thou the storye; And if any disdaine, then open is yᵉ doore That lett him in to heare; packe awaye at his pleasure; Oure playeinge is not to gett fame or treasure[791].’

Exceptional Performances.

In 1567 ‘Richard Dutton, mayor, kept a very worthy house for all comers all the tyme of Christmas with a Lorde of Misrule and other pastymes in this city as the Whitson Plays.’

Single plays from the cycle were similarly used for purposes of special entertainment. In 1488 was the Assumption before Lord Strange at the High Cross; in 1497 the Assumption before Prince Arthur at the Abbey gates and the High Cross; in 1515 the Assumption again together with the Shepherds’ play in St. John’s churchyard. In 1576, the Smiths had ‘our plas’ (the Purification) ‘at Alderman Mountford’s on Midsomer Eve.’ Finally, in 1578, Thomas Bellin, mayor, caused the Shepherds’ play ‘and other triumphs’ to be played at the high cross on the Roodee before the Earl of Derby, Lord Strange, and others[792].

Other plays.

The play by the ‘colliges and prestys’ on Corpus Christi day mentioned in the ‘White Book’ and in the ‘Banes’ preserved therein has already been noted.

In 1529 King Robert of Sicily was shown at the High Cross. This is doubtless the play on the same subject referred to in a fragmentary letter to some ‘Lordshypp’ among the State Papers as to be played on St. Peter’s day at the cost of some of the companies. It was said to be ‘not newe at thys time, but hath bin before shewen, evyn as longe agoe as the reygne of his highnes most gratious father of blyssyd memorye, and yt was penned by a godly clerke.’

In 1563 ‘upon the Sunday after Midsommer day, the History of Eneas and Queen Dido was play’d in the Roods Eye. And were set out by one William Croston, gent. and one Mr. Man, on which Triumph there was made two Forts, and shipping on the Water, besides many horsemen well armed and appointed.’

The entertainment of Lords Derby and Strange by Thomas Bellin in 1578 included a ‘comedy’ by the ‘scollers of the freescole’ at the mayor’s house. Was this theatrical mayor a relative of George Bellin, the scribe of MSS. ‘W’ and ‘h’ of the Chester plays?

In 1589 King Ebranke with all his Sons was shown before the Earl of Derby at the High Cross[793].

The Midsummer Show.

This was doubtless in its origin a folk procession. Traditionally, it was founded in 1498 and only went in years when there were no Whitsun plays. The crafts were represented by personages out of their plays, ‘the Doctors and little God’ riding for the Smiths, the Devil for the Butchers, Abraham and Isaac for the Barbers, Balaam and his Ass for the Bricklayers, and so forth. It does not appear that the ‘carriages’ were had out. Other features of the ‘Show’ were four giants, an elephant and castle, an unicorn, a camel, a luce, an antelope, a dragon with six naked boys beating at it, morris-dancers, the ‘Mayor’s Mount’ and the ‘Merchants’ Mount,’ the latter being of the nature of a hobby-ship. In 1600, Mayor Henry Hardware, a ‘godly zealous man,’ would not let the ‘Graull’ go at Midsummer Watch, but instead a man in white armour. He suppressed also ‘the divill in his fethers,’ a man in woman’s clothes with another devil called ‘cuppes and cans,’ ‘god in stringes,’ the dragon and the naked boys, and had the giants broken up. But next year the old customs were restored. The Midsummer Show again suffered eclipse under the Commonwealth, but was revived at the Restoration and endured until 1678[794].

COGGESHALL, ESSEX.

Lord Howard rewarded the players of ‘Kokesale’ or ‘Coksale’ on Dec. 26, 1481, and Dec. 25, 1482 (Appendix E, vii).

COLCHESTER, ESSEX.

The Chelmsford (q.v.) wardrobe was twice hired by Colchester men during 1564-6; also by William Monnteyne of Colchester in 1566.

COLESHILL, WARWICKSHIRE.

The ‘lusores de Coleshille’ played at Maxstoke Priory between 1422 and 1461 (Appendix E, ii).

COVENTRY, WARWICKSHIRE.

[Authorities.—The facts are taken, where no other reference is given, from T. Sharp, A Dissertation on the Pageants or Dramatic Mysteries Anciently Performed at Coventry (1825), and J. B. Gracie, The Weavers’ Pageant (1836: Abbotsford Club). The latter accounts of J. O. Halliwell-Phillipps, Outlines of the Life of Shakespeare (ninth edition, 1890), i. 335, ii. 289, and M. D. Harris, Life in an Old English Town, 319, add a little. The Leet-Book and other municipal archives used by Sharp are described by Harris, 377; his private collection passed into that of Mr. Staunton at Longbridge House, and thence into the Shakespeare Memorial Library at Birmingham, where it was burnt in 1879. It included two craft-plays, the account-books of the Smiths, Cappers, Drapers, and Weavers, and one or two MSS. (one of which is referred to as ‘Codex Hales’) of a set of brief local seventeenth-century Annales, of which other texts are printed by Dugdale, Hist. of Warwickshire, i. 147, and Hearne, Fordun’s Scotichronicon, v. 1438. Several versions of these Annales are amongst the manuscripts of the Coventry Corporation (cf. E. S. Hartland, Science of Fairy Tales, 75). On their nature, cf. C. Gross, Bibl. of Municipal History, xviii.]

Corpus Christi Craft-Plays.

The earliest notice is a mention of the ‘domum pro le pagent pannarum’ in a deed of 1392. There must therefore be an error, so far as the pageants go, in the statement of the Annals, under the mayoral year 1416-7, ‘The pageants and Hox tuesday invented, wherein the king and nobles took great delight[795].’ Henry V was more than once at Coventry as prince, in 1404 for example, and in 1411. His only recorded visit as king was in 1421, too early for Corpus Christi or even Hox Tuesday[796]. There is frequent reference to the plays in corporation and craft documents of the fifteenth century. In 1457 they were seen by Queen Margaret, who ‘lodged at Richard Wodes, the grocer,’ whither the corporation sent an elegant collation, including ‘ij cofyns of counfetys and a pot of grene gynger.’ With her were the Duke and Duchess of Buckingham, Lord and Lady Rivers, the elder and younger Lady of Shrewsbury, and ‘other mony moo lordes and ladyes.’ They were seen also by Richard III in 1485 and twice by Henry VII. The first occasion was on St. Peter’s day (June 29) in 1486, and the second in 1493, when say the Annals, rather oddly (cf. p. 420), ‘This yeare the King came to se the playes acted by the Gray Friers, and much commended them.’ In 1520 the Annals record ‘New playes at Corpus Christi tyde, which were greatly commended.’ In 1539 the mayor of Coventry, writing to Cromwell, told him that the poor commoners were at such expense with their plays and pageants that they fared the worse all the year after[797]. In the sixteenth century the Coventry plays were probably the most famous in England. The C. Mery Talys (1526) has a story of a preacher, who wound up a sermon on the Creed with ‘Yf you beleue not me then for a more suerte & suffycyent auctoryte go your way to Couentre and there ye shall se them all playd in Corpus Cristi playe[798].’ And John Heywood, in his Foure PP, speaks of one who

‘Oft in the play of Corpus Cristi He had played the deuyll at Couentry[799].’

Foxe, the martyrologist, records that in 1553 John Careless, in Coventry gaol for conscience sake, was let out to play in the pageant about the city. There is some confusion here, as Careless was only in gaol in Coventry for a short time in November before he was sent to London[800].

When the Annals say that in 1575-6 ‘the Pageants on Hox Tuesday that had been laid down eight years were played again,’ there is probably some confusion between ‘Hox Tuesday’ and ‘the Pageants,’ for the account-books show that the latter were played regularly, except in 1575, until 1580, when the Annals report them as ‘again laid down.’ In 1584 a different play was given (cf. infra), and possibly also in 1591, although the fact that the songs of the Taylors and Shearmen’s pageant are dated 1591 rather suggests that after all the regular plays may have been revived that year. Some of the pageants were sold in 1586 and 1587, but the Cappers preserved the properties of their play in 1597, and the Weavers had still players’ apparel to lend in 1607. According to the Annals, by 1628 the pageants had ‘bine put downe many yeares since.’

The plays were given annually and in one day at the feast of Corpus Christi. Contrary to the custom of the northern towns, there were only some ten or twelve pageants, each covering a fairly wide range of incident (cf. p. 423). Nor can the performances be shown to have been repeated at more than three or four stations. ‘Gosford Street,’ ‘Mikel’ or ‘Much Park Street end’ and ‘Newgate’ are recorded, and in one of these may have been the house of Richard Wodes, where Queen Margaret lay. The Drapers only provided three ‘worlds’ for their pageant, and probably one was burnt at each station. According to the Annals, part of the charges of the plays was met by the enclosure of a piece of common land (possibly to build pageant houses upon). Otherwise they fell wholly upon the crafts, to some one of which every artisan in the town was bound to become contributory for the purpose. The principal crafts were appointed by the Leet to produce the pageants, and with each were grouped minor bodies liable only for fixed sums, varying from 3_s._ 4_d._ to 16_s._ 8_d._ In 1501 an outside craft, the Tilemakers of Stoke, is found contributing 5_s._ to a pageant. These combinations of crafts varied considerably from time to time. Within the craft the necessary funds were raised, in part at least, by special levies. Strangers taking out their freedom were sometimes called upon for a contribution. Every member of the craft paid his ‘pagent pencys.’ In several crafts the levy was 1_s._ Amongst the Smiths it must have been less, as they only got from 2_s._ 2_d._ to 3_s._ 4_d._ in this way, whereas the Cappers in 1562 collected 22_s._ 4_d._ In 1517 William Pisford left a scarlet and a crimson gown to the Tanners for their play, together with 3_s._ 4_d._ to each craft that found a pageant. The total cost of the Smiths’ play in 1490 was £3 7_s._ 5½_d._ In 1453 we find the Smiths contracting with one Thomas Colclow to have ‘the rewle of the pajaunt’ for twelve years, and to produce the play for a payment of 46_s._ 8_d._ A similar contract was made in 1481. But as a rule, the crafts undertook the management themselves, and the account-books studied by Sharp afford more detailed information as to the mode of production than happens to be available for any other of the great cycles.

It is therefore worth while to give some account of the chief objects of expenditure. First of all there was the pageant itself. The name appears in every possible variety of spelling in Coventry documents. Dugdale, on the authority of eye-witnesses, describes the pageants as ‘Theaters for the severall Scenes, very large and high, placed upon wheels.’ Painted cloths were used ‘to lap aboubt the pajent,’ and there was a carved and painted top, adorned with a crest, with vanes, pencils, or streamers. On the platform of the pageant such simple scenic apparatus as a seat for Pilate, a pillar for the scourging, a ‘sepulchre,’ and the like, was fixed. The Weavers’ pageant seems to have had an ‘upper part’ representing the Temple; also divisions described in the stage directions as ‘the for pagand’ and ‘the tempull warde.’ The Cappers’ pageant was fitted up with a ‘hell-mouth.’ The Drapers also had a ‘hell-mouth,’ with a windlass, and fire at the mouth, and a barrel for the earthquake, and three worlds to be set afire. ‘Scaffolds,’ distinct from the pageant itself, were drawn round with it. These, according to Sharp, were for spectators, but they may have been supplementary stages, made necessary by the number of episodes in each play at Coventry. Certainly the action was not wholly confined to the pageant, for in the Shearmen and Taylors’ play, ‘Here Erode ragis in the pagond & in the strete also’; and again, ‘the iij Kyngis speykyth in the strete.’ The pageant was constantly in need of repairs. A pageant-house had to be built or hired for it. On the day of the feast it was cleaned, strewn with rushes; and the axle was greased with soap. Men were paid to ‘drive’ or ‘horse’ it, and the Cappers expected their journeymen to undertake this job.

The players received payments varying with the importance of their parts. The sums allowed by the Weavers in 1525 ranged from 10_d._ to 2_s._ 4_d._ Minstrels, both vocalists and instrumentalists, were also hired, and in 1573 one Fawston, evidently an artist of exceptional talent, received from the Smiths, besides 4_d._ ‘for hangyng Judas,’ another 4_d._ ‘for Coc croyng.’ The Drapers paid as much as 3_s._ 4_d._ ‘for pleayng God,’ and 5_s._ ‘to iij whyte sollys’ or ‘savyd sowles,’ 5_s._ ‘to iij blake sollys,’ or ‘dampnyd sowles,’ 16_d._ ‘to ij wormes of conscyence,’ and the like. Payments also occur for speaking the prologue, preface, or ‘protestacyon.’

The corporation exercised control over the players, and in 1440 ordered under a penalty of 20_s._ ‘quod Robertus Gñe et omnes alii qui ludunt in festo Corporis Christi bene et sufficienter ludant ita quod nulla impedicio fiat in aliquo ioco.’ In 1443, an order forbade members of certain crafts to play in any pageant except their own without the mayor’s licence.

The players required refreshment at intervals during the day, and probably the craftsmen who attended the pageant took their share. Further expenses, both for refreshment, and for the hire of a room or hall, were incurred at rehearsals. The Smiths in 1490 had their first ‘reherse’ in Easter week, and their second in Whitsun week.

Each craft had its own ‘orygynall’ or ‘play-boke,’ and paid for making the necessary copies, for setting or ‘pricking’ songs, for ‘beryng of ye Orygynall’ or prompting, and occasionally for bringing the text up to date. Thus the Smiths had a ‘new rygenale’ in 1491, and in 1573 a ‘new play,’ by which is apparently meant an additional scene to their existing play (cf. p. 423). The Drapers added ‘the matter of the castell of Emaus’ in 1540. The Weavers paid 5_s._ ‘for makyng of the play boke’ in 1535, and the colophon of their extant text shows it to have been ‘newly translate’ in that year by Robert Croo. This was a regular theatrical man of all work. The matter of the Shearmen and Taylors’ play was ‘nevly correcte’ by him in the same year. In 1557 he got 20_s._ from the Drapers ‘for makyng of the boke for the paggen.’ The Smiths paid him in 1563 ‘for ij leves of our pley boke.’ And between 1556 and 1562 he further assisted the Drapers, by playing God, mending the ‘devells cottes,’ supplying a hat for the Pharisee, and manufacturing the requisite ‘iij worldys.’

Finally, there was the not inconsiderable cost of costumes and properties, including the gloves for the performers which figure so invariably in mediaeval balance sheets. Further details as to these and all other objects of expenditure than I have here room for will be found in the invaluable volumes of Mr. Sharp.

The Destruction of Jerusalem.

In 1584, four years after the ordinary Corpus Christi plays were laid down, the Annals record ‘This year the new Play of the Destruction of Jerusalem was first played.’ This is confirmed by the accounts of the corporation, which include a sum of £13 6_s._ 8_d._ ‘paid to Mr. Smythe of Oxford the xvᵗʰ daye of Aprill 1584 for hys paynes for writing of the tragedye.’ This was one John Smythe, a scholar of the Free School in Coventry and afterwards of St. John’s College, Oxford. The play was produced at considerable expense upon the pageants of the crafts, but the day of performance is not stated. From the detailed accounts of the Smiths and the Cappers, Mr. Sharp infers that it was based upon the narrative of Josephus.

In 1591, the old Corpus Christi plays seem to have been proposed for exhibition, as the MS. of the Shearmen and Taylors’ songs bears the date of May 13 in that year. But on May 19 the corporation resolved ‘that the destruction of Jerusalem, the Conquest of the Danes, or the historie of K[ing] E[dward] the X [Confessor], at the request of the Comons of this Cittie shal be plaied on the pagens on Midsomer daye & St. Peters daye next in this Cittie & non other playes.’ The two last-named plays may have been inspired by the traditional interpretations of the Hox Tuesday custom (cf. vol. i. p. 154). Which was chosen does not appear; but some performance or other was given. Several of the crafts had by this time sold their pageants. Those who had not lent them; and all compounded for the production of a scene by the payment of a sum down. This appears to have gone to one Thomas Massey, who contracted for the production. He had already supplied properties in 1584. In 1603 he quarrelled with the corporation about certain devices shown on the visit of the Princess Elizabeth to Coventry. In 1606 he hired some acting-apparel from the Weavers’ company[801].

Miscellaneous Plays.

The Annals record:—

1490-1. ‘This year was the play of St. Katherine in the little Park.’

1504-5. ‘This yeare they played the play of St. Crytyan in the little parke[802].’

In 1511, one of the pageants at the entry of Henry VIII had a ‘goodly Stage Play’ upon it[803].

The Dyers in 1478, the Cappers in 1525, and the Drapers in 1556, 1566, and 1568 appear to have had plays at their dinners. Probably ‘the Golden Fleece,’ for which the Cappers paid the inevitable Robert Crowe and two others, was a play[804].

The ‘lusores de Coventry’ played at Maxstoke Priory between 1422 and 1461 (Appendix E, ii). ‘Certain Players of Coventrye’ were at court in 1530 (Appendix E, viii).

Towards the end of the sixteenth century occur notices of travelling ‘players of Coventrie.’ They were at Bristol and Abingdon in 1570, and at Leicester in 1569 and 1571. At Abingdon they are described as ‘Mr. Smythes players of Coventree.’ John Smythe, the writer of the Destruction of Jerusalem, was only seven years old in 1570. Mr. Halliwell-Phillipps would read ‘the Smythes’ players[805].’

The Corpus Christi Procession.

The procession or ‘Ridyng’ on Corpus Christi day is first mentioned in the Leet Book in 1444, and in 1446 is an order ‘quod le Ruydyng in festo Corporis Christi fiat prout ex antiquo tempore consueverint.’ It took place early in the day after a ‘breakfast.’ The craft-guilds rode in it, and provided minstrels and torchbearers. The Trinity Guild seems to have borne a crucifix, and the Guild of Corpus Christi and St. Nicholas the host under a canopy. The accounts of the Smiths include the following items:—

‘1476. Item ffor hors hyre to Herod, iijᵈ.

1489. Item payd for Aroddes garment peynttyng that he went a prossasyon in, xxᵈ.’

The other extant guild accounts throw no light on the presence of representatives of the plays in the procession; but the Corpus Christi guild itself provided dramatic personages.

‘1501. payd for a Crown of sylver & gyld for the Mare on Corpus Christi day, xliijˢ ixᵈ.

1539. peny bred for the appostells, vjᵈ. beiff for the appostles, viijᵈ. to the Marie for hir gloves and wages, ijˢ. the Marie to offer, jᵈ. Kateryne & Margaret, iiijᵈ. viij virgyns, viijᵈ. to Gabriell for beryng the lilly, iiijᵈ. to James & Thomas of Inde, viijᵈ. to x other apostells, xxᵈ.

1540. for makyng the lilly, iijˢ iiijᵈ.

1541. to Gabryel for beryng the light [lilly?] iiijᵈ. xij torches of wax for the apostles.

1544. a new coat & a peir of hoes for Gabriell, iijˢ. iiij.[806]’

CROXTON, NORFOLK(?).

See s.v. Texts (i), Croxton Play, The Sacrament.

DAVENTRY, NORTHAMPTONSHIRE.

The ‘lusores de Daventry’ played at Maxstoke Priory between 1422 and 1461 (Appendix E, ii).

DUBLIN, IRELAND.

The version of the Quem quaeritis used at the Church of St. John the Evangelist in the fourteenth century is printed in Appendix R.

The Chain Book of the City contains the following memorandum, apparently entered in 1498.

Corpus Christi day a pagentis:—

‘The pagentis of Corpus Christi day, made by an olde law and confermed by a semble befor Thomas Collier, Maire of the Citte of Divelin, and Juries, Baliffes and commones, the iiiith Friday next after midsomer, the xiii. yere of the reign of King Henri the VIIth [1498]:

‘Glovers: Adam and Eve, with an angill followyng berryng a swerde. Peyn, xl.s.

‘Corvisers: Caym and Abell, with an auter and the ofference. Peyn, xl.s.

‘Maryners, Vynters, Shipcarpynderis, and Samountakers: Noe, with his shipp, apparalid acordyng. Peyn, xl.s.

‘Wevers: Abraham [and] Ysack, with ther auter and a lambe and ther offerance. Peyn, xl.s.

‘Smythis, Shermen, Bakers, Sclateris, Cokis and Masonys: Pharo, with his hoste. Peyn, xl.s.

‘Skynners, House-Carpynders, and Tanners, and Browders: for the body of the camell, and Oure Lady and hir chil[d]e well aperelid, with Joseph to lede the camell, and Moyses with the children of Israell, and the Portors to berr the camell. Peyn, xl.s. and Steyners and Peyntors to peynte the hede of the camell. [Peyn,] xl.s.

‘[Goldsmy]this: The three kynges of Collynn, ridyng worshupfully, with the offerance, with a sterr afor them. Peyn, xl.s.

‘[Hoopers]: The shep[er]dis, with an Angill syngyng Gloria in excelsis Deo. Peyn, xl.s.

‘Corpus Christi yild: Criste in his Passioun, with three Maries, and angilis berring serges of wex in ther hands. [Peyn,] xl.s.

‘Taylors: Pilate, with his fellaship, and his lady and his knyghtes, well beseyne. Peyn, xl.s.

‘Barbors: An[nas] and Caiphas, well araied acordyng. [Peyn,] xl.s.

‘Courteours: Arthure, with [his] knightes. Peyn, xl.s.

‘Fisshers: The Twelve Apostelis. Peyn, xl.s.

‘Marchauntes: The Prophetis. Peyn, xl.s.

‘Bouchers: tormentours, with ther garmentis well and clenly peynted. [Peyn,] xl.s.

‘The Maire of the Bulring and bachelers of the same: The Nine Worthies ridyng worshupfully, with ther followers accordyng. Peyn, xl.s.

‘The Hagardmen and the husbandmen to berr the dragoun and to repaire the dragoun a Seint Georges day and Corpus Christi day. Peyn, xl.s.’

This list is immediately followed by a second, practically identical with it, of ‘The Pagentys of Corpus Christi Processioun.’

These pageants, though the subjects are drawn from the usual Corpus Christi play-cycle (with the addition of King Arthur and the nine Worthies), appear, from their irregular order, to be only dumb-show accompaniments of a procession. In 1569 the crafts were directed to keep the same order in the Shrove Tuesday ball riding (cf. vol. i. p. 150), ‘as they are appointed to go with their pageants on Corpus Christi daye by the Chayne Boke[807].’

The same intermixture of profane and sacred elements marks the late and scanty records of actual plays in Dublin.

‘Tho. Fitzgerald, Earl of Kildare and Lord Lieutenant of Ireland in the year 1528, was invited to a new play every day in Christmas, Arland Usher being then mayor, and Francis Herbert and John Squire bayliffs, wherein the taylors acted the part of Adam and Eve; the shoemakers represented the story of Crispin and Crispinianus; the vintners acted Bacchus and his story; the Carpenters that of Joseph and Mary; Vulcan, and what related to him, was acted by the Smiths; and the comedy of Ceres, the goddess of corn, by the Bakers. Their stage was erected on Hoggin Green (now called College Green), and on it the priors of St. John of Jerusalem, of the blessed Trinity, and All Hallows caused two plays to be acted, the one representing the passion of our Saviour, and the other the several deaths which the apostles suffered[808].’ In 1541 there were ‘epulae, comoediae, et certamina ludicra’ when Henry VIII was proclaimed King of Ireland. These included ‘the nine Worthies.’ On the return of Lord Sussex from an expedition against James MacConnell in 1557, ‘the Six Worthies was played by the city[809].’

A seventeenth-century transcript of a lost leaf of the Chain Book has the following order for the St. George’s day procession:—

‘The Pageant of St. George’s day, to be ordered and kept as hereafter followeth:

‘The Mayor of the yeare before to finde the Emperour and Empress with their followers, well apparelled, that is to say, the Emperor, with two Doctors, and the Empress, with two knights, and two maydens to beare the traynes of their gownes, well apparelled, and [the Guild of] St. George to pay their wages.

‘Item: Mr. Mayor for the time being to find St. George a-horseback, and the wardens to pay three shillings and four pence for his wages that day. And the Bailives for the time being to find four horses, with men upon them, well apparelled, to beare the pole-axe, the standard, and the Emperor and St. George’s sword.

‘Item: The elder master of the yeald to find a mayd well aparelled to lead the dragon; and the Clerk of the Market to find a good line for the dragon.

‘Item: The elder warden to find St. George, with four trumpettors, and St. George’s [Guild] to pay their wages.

‘Item: the yonger warden to finde the king of Dele and the queene of Dele, and two knightes to lead the queene of Dele, with two maydens to beare the trayne of her goune, all wholy in black apparell, and to have St. George’s chappell well hanged and apparelled to every purpose with cushins ... russhes and other necessaries belonging for said St. George’s day[810].’

DUNSTABLE, BEDFORDSHIRE.

One Geoffrey, a Norman, was ‘apud Dunestapliam, expectans scholam S. Albani sibi repromissam; ubi quendam ludum de S. Katerina (quem Miracula vulgariter appellamus) fecit; ad quae decoranda petiit a Sacrista S. Albani, ut sibi capae chorales accommodarentur, et obtinuit.’ Unfortunately the ‘capae’ were burnt. This must have been early in the twelfth century, as Geoffrey in grief became a monk, and was Abbot of St. Albans by 1119[811].

EDINBURGH, SCOTLAND.

The civic records show traces of municipal plays in 1554, but it is not clear that they were miracle-plays proper or of long standing. Sir David Lyndsay’s Satyre of the Thrie Estaitis was played in the Greenside between 1550 and 1559 (cf. p. 442). On June 15, 1554, a payment was made to Sir William Makdougall, ‘maister of werk,’ for those ‘that furneist the grayth to the convoy of the moris to the Abbay and of the play maid that samyn day the tent day of Junii instant.’ Makdougall was to deliver to the dean of guild the handscenye [ensign] and canves specifiit in the said tikkit to be kepit to the behuif of the town.’ Sums were also paid this summer for ‘the playing place’ or ‘the play field now biggand in the Grenesid.’

On Oct. 12 Walter Bynnyng was paid for ‘the making of the play graith’ and for painting the ‘handsenye’ and ‘playariss facis.’ He was to ‘mak the play geir vnderwrittin furthcumand to the town, quhen thai haif ado thairwith, quhilkis he has now ressauit; viz. viij play hattis, ane kingis crown, ane myter, ane fulis hude, ane septour, ane pair angell wingis, twa angell hair, ane chaplet of tryvmphe.’

On Dec. 28 ‘the prouest, baillies and counsale findis it necessar and expedient that the litill farsche and play maid be William Lauder be playit afoir the Quenis grace[812].’ I trace a note of regret for the doubtful morals and certain expense of the entertainments which the presence in Edinburgh of the newly-made Regent, Mary of Lorraine, imposed upon the burghers.

EASTERFORD, ESSEX.

Lord Howard rewarded the players of ‘Esterforde’ on Jan. 7, 1482 (Appendix E, vii). This place is now known as Kelvedon.

FOLKESTONE, KENT.

Folkestone players were at New Romney in 1474, and at Lydd in 1479.

FOSTON, LEICESTERSHIRE.

In 1561 the players of ‘Fosson’ borrowed ‘serten stufe’ from the churchwardens of St. Martin’s, Leicester[813].

FYFIELD, OXFORDSHIRE.

See s.v. SHIPTON.

GARBOLDISHAM, NORFOLK.

‘Garblesham game’ was at Harling (q.v.) in 1457.

GREAT CHART, KENT.

‘Chart’ players were at New Romney in 1489.

HADLEIGH, ESSEX.

Lord Howard rewarded the ‘Plaiers of Hadley’ on Dec. 27, 1481 (Appendix E, vii).

HALSTEAD, ESSEX.

There was a play in the church in 1529[814].

HAM STREET, KENT.

Ham players were at Lydd in 1454.

HANNINGFIELD, ESSEX.

‘John Walker of Hanfild’ hired the Chelmsford (q.v.) wardrobe in 1572.

HARLING, NORFOLK.

In 1452 the wardens paid for the ‘original of an Interlude pleyed at the Cherch gate.’ In 1457 payments were made for ‘Lopham game,’ and ‘Garblesham game,’ in 1463 for ‘Kenningale game,’ in 1467 to the ‘Kenyngale players[815].’

HASCOMBE, SURREY.

Amongst the Loseley MSS. is a deposition of 1578/9:

‘Coram me Henr. Goringe, ar. xijᵒ die Januar. 1578. George Longherst and John Mill exᵈ sayeth, that on Sondaye last they were together at widow Michelles house, in the parish of Hascombe, and there delyvered their mares to kepe till they came agayne, and sayde that they wold goo to Hascombe Churche, to a kynge playe wᶜʰ then was there. And sayeth yᵗ they went thither and there contynued about an houre, at which tyme the sonne was then downe[816].’

The date suggests a performance on Jan. 6. Evidently a May ‘kynge playe’ is out of the question; but a Twelfth Night King, or a ‘Stella’ belated in the afternoon, are both possible.

HEREFORD, HEREFORDSHIRE.

On April 30, 1440, John Hauler and John Pewte sued Thomas Sporyour in the city court ‘de placito detencionis unius libri de lusionibus, prec. ii_s._ iiij_d._[817]’

The Register of the Corporation for 1503 contains a list of

‘The paiants for the procession of Corpus Christi:

Furst, Glovers. Adam, Eve, Cayne and Abell (erased).

Eldest seriant. Cayne, Abell, and Moysey, Aron.

Carpenters. Noye ship.

Chaundelers. Abram, Isack, Moysey cum iiiiᵒʳ pueris.

Skynners. Jesse.

Flacchers. Salutac̄on of our Lady.

Vynteners. Nativite of our Lord.

Taillours. The iii Kings of Colen.

The belman. The purificac̄on of our Lady, with Symyon.

Drapers. The ... (blank) deitours, goyng with the good Lord.

Sadlers. Fleme Jordan.

Cardeners. The castell of Israell.

Walkers. The good Lord ridyng on an asse (“judging at an assize,” in Johnson!) with xii Appostelles.

The tanners. The story of Shore Thursday.

Bochours. The takyng of our Lord.

The eldest seriant. The tormentyng of our Lord with iiii tormentoures, with the lamentac̄on of our Lady [and Seynt John the evaungelist: faintly added by another hand].

[Cappers. Portacio crucis usque montem Oilverii: added.]

Dyers. Iesus pendens in cruce [altered by the second hand from Portacio crucis et Iohanne evangelista portante Mariam].

Smythes. Longys with his knyghtes.

The eldest seriant. Maria and Iohannes evangelista (interlined).

Barbours. Joseth Abarmathia.

Dyers. Sepultura Christi.

The eldest seriant. Tres Mariae.

Porters. Milites armati custodes sepulcri.

Mercers. Pilate, Cayfes, Annas, and Mahounde. [This last name has been partly erased.]

Bakers. Knyghtes in harnes.

Journeymen cappers. Seynt Keterina with tres(?) tormentors[818].’

At a law day held on Dec. 10, 1548, it was agreed that the crafts who were ‘bound by the grantes of their corporacions yerely to bring forthe and set forward dyvers pageaunttes of ancient history in the processions of the cytey upon the day and fest of Corpus Χρi, which now is and are omitted and surceased’ should instead make an annual payment towards the expense of repairing walls, causeways, &c.[819] The 1503 list seems to concern a dumb-show only, and it cannot be positively assumed that the lusiones of 1440 were a Corpus Christi play.

In 1706 a labourer went through the city in the week before Easter, being Passion week, clothed in a long coat with a large periwig, with a great multitude following him, sitting upon an ass, to the derision of our Saviour Jesus Christ’s riding into Jerusalem, to the great scandal of the Christian religion, to the contempt of our Lord and his doctrine, and to the ill and pernicious example of others[820].

HERNE, KENT.

Herne players were at New Romney in 1429.

HEYBRIDGE, ESSEX.

The churchwardens’ accounts for 1532 show a play, with ‘a fool’ and ‘pagent players,’ apparently in the church[821].

HIGH EASTER, ESSEX.

High Easter men hired the Chelmsford (q.v.) wardrobe in 1570-2.

HIGH HALDEN, KENT.

‘Haldene’ players were at New Romney in 1499.

HOLBEACH, LINCOLNSHIRE.

In 1548 the churchwardens paid vˢ viijᵈ for the ‘costs of the iij kyngs of Coloyne[822].’

HULL, YORKSHIRE.

The accounts of the Trinity House, a guild of master mariners and pilots, contain entries concerning a play of Noah.

‘1483. To the minstrels, vjᵈ. To Noah and his wife, jˢ vjᵈ. To Robert Brown playing God, vjᵈ. To the Ship-child, jᵈ. To a shipwright for clinking Noah’s ship, one day, vijᵈ. 22 kids for shoring Noah’s ship, ijᵈ. To a man clearing away the snow, jᵈ. Straw, for Noah and his children, ijᵈ. Mass, bellman, torches, minstrels, garland, &c., vjˢ. For mending the ship, ijᵈ. To Noah for playing, jˢ. To straw and grease for wheels, ¼ᵈ. To the waits for going about with the ship, vjᵈ. 1494. To Thomas Sawyr playing God, xᵈ. To Jenkin Smith playing Noah, jˢ. To Noah’s wife, viijᵈ. The clerk and his children, jˢ vjᵈ. To the players of Barton, viijᵈ. For a gallon of wine, viijᵈ. For three skins for Noah’s coat, making it, and a rope to hang the ship in the kirk, vijˢ. To dighting and gilding St. John’s head, painting two tabernacles, beautifying the boat and over the table, vijˢ ijᵈ. Making Noah’s ship, vˡⁱ viijˢ. Two wrights a day and a half, jˢ vjᵈ. A halfer (rope) 4 stone weight, iiijˢ viijᵈ. Rigging Noah’s ship, viijᵈ.’

Hadley, the historian of Hull, extracts these items ‘from the expences on Plough-day,’ and says, ‘This being a maritime society, it was celebrated by a procession adapted to the circumstance[823].’ There are continental parallels for ship-processions at spring feasts (vol. i. p. 121); but evidently that at Hull had been assimilated, perhaps under the influence of Beverley, to a miracle-play or pageant. A recent writer, apparently from some source other than Hadley, says that the entries in the accounts run from before 1421 to 1529. Amongst his additional extracts are:—

‘A payr of new mytens to Noye, iiijᵈ. Amending Noye Pyleh, iiijᵈ. Nicholas Helpby for wrytᵍ the pley, vijᵈ. A rope to hyng the shipp in ye kyrk, ijᵈ. Takyng down shype and hyngyng up agayn, ijˢ. Wyn when the shype went about, ijᵈ. 1421. New shype, vˡⁱ viijˢ iiijᵈ[824].’

HYTHE, KENT.

Hythe players were at New Romney in 1399 and at Lydd in 1467.

IDBURY, OXFORDSHIRE.

See s.v. SHIPTON.

IPSWICH, SUFFOLK.

In 1325 the former Guild Merchant was reconstituted as a Guild of Corpus Christi. The Constitution provides for a procession, on Corpus Christi day, unless it is hindered ‘pro qualitate temporis[825].’

The notices in the seventeenth-century Annals of the town point to a play as well as a procession[826]. The Guild included all the burgesses; each paying 16_d._ a year and attending the dinner on Corpus Christi day.

In 1443 the common marsh was devised ‘to maintaine and repaire the pageants of the Guilde.’

In 1445 J. Causton was admitted burgess on condition of maintaining for seven years ‘the ornaments belonging to Corpus Χⁱ pageant and the stages, receiving the Charges thereof from the farmers of the Common Marshe and the Portmen’s medow, as the Bayliffs for the time being shall think meete.’ Arrears were paid to J. Caldwell for his charge of ‘Corpus Chr. pageant.’

In 1491 an order was made, laying down, ‘Howe euery occupacion of craftsmen schuld order themselves in the goyng with their pageantes in the procession of Corpus Christi.’ The list closes with the ‘Friers Carmelites,’ ‘Friers Minors,’ and ‘Friers Prechors.’ The subjects of the pageants are unfortunately not given. The pageant cost 45_s._ 1_d._

In 1492 ‘areres of yᵉ Pageant’ were paid, and ‘kepers of the Ornaments and utensiles of Corpus Christi appointed.’

In 1493, 1494, 1495, 1496 orders were made for the provision of the ‘pageant.’ In 1495 there was a grant of £3 11. 0 for it. In 1496 it was ‘at the charge of such as have been used.’

In 1502 ‘Corpus Christi pageant shall hereafter be observed, and a convenient artificer shall be intertained to that end, and shall have 40_s._’ Each Portman was to pay 1_s._ 4_d._, each of the ‘twenty-four’ 8_d._; the other 6_s._ 8_d._ to be levied. ‘Noe Bayliff shall interrupt or hinder the pageant, unless by order of the great court or uppon special cause.’ Collectors for the pageant were chosen.

In 1504 the ‘collectors for the play of Corpus Christi’ were ‘to make a free burgess for their expences at Corpus Christi play.’ These collectors are again mentioned in 1505 and 1506, and in the latter year ‘ornaments’ and ‘stageing for Corpus Christi play.’

In 1509 all inhabitants are to have ‘their Tabernas and attendance at the ffeast of Corpus Christi’ and ‘everyone shall hold by the order of their procession, according to the Constitutions.’

In 1511 a contribution is ordered to a pageant of St. George, and the Corpus Christi dinner and pageant are laid aside.

From 1513 to 1519 the play is ordered to be laid aside in every year except 1517. In 1520 it ‘shall hold this yere,’ and the pageant is ordered to be ready. It is laid aside in 1521 until further order, and the master of the pageant called ‘the shipp’ is to have the same ready under forfeiture of £10. It is ‘deferred’ in 1522 and ‘laid aside for ever’ in 1531.

Probably it was never revived. But there is an order for the procession with the Sacrament in 1540, and in 1542 this had its ‘pageants’ to which each householder was rated at 1_d._

In 1552 the guild is held on the Sunday after Trinity Sunday, and similar meetings continue until 1644.

On a possible performance of Bale’s King John at the visit of Elizabeth to Ipswich in 1561 see Texts (iii), s.v. Bale.

IXWORTH, SUFFOLK.

Thetford Priory made a payment ‘in regard to Ixworth play,’ in 1507-8 (Appendix E, iii).

KELVEDON, ESSEX.

See s.v. EASTERFORD.

KENDAL, WESTMORELAND.

The ‘Boke of Record,’ a municipal register begun at the incorporation in 1575, refers to the Corpus Christi play by the crafts as established at that date. On Feb. 14, 1575, the corporation forbade feasts of more than twelve guests;

‘Such lyke ... as have bene comonlye used at ... metyings of men off Occupacyons aboute orders for their severall pagiands off Corpus xpi playe ... exceptyd and reserved.’

An order ‘ffor the playe’ of Sept. 22, 1586, forbade the alderman to give permission for the acting of the play in any year without the consent of his brethren[827].’

The plays lasted into the seventeenth century. Thomas Heywood says in 1612, that, ‘to this day,’ Kendall holds the privilege of its fairs and other charters by yearly stage-plays[828]. And Weever, about 1631, speaks of—

‘Corpus Christi play in my countrey, which I have seene acted at Preston, and Lancaster, and last of all at Kendall, in the beginning of the raigne of King James; for which the Townesmen were sore troubled; and upon good reasons the Play finally supprest, not onely there, but in all other Townes of the Kingdome[829].’

In the MS. life of the Puritan vicar of Rotherham, John Shaw, is a description of how he spoke to an old man at Cartmel of salvation by Christ:—

‘Oh Sir,’ said he, ‘I think I heard of that man you speak of once in a play at Kendall, called Corpus Christ’s play, where there was a man on a tree, and blood ran down, &c. And afterwards he professed he could not remember that he ever heard of salvation by Jesus, but in that play[830].’

KENNINGHALL, NORFOLK.

‘Kenningale game’ was at Harling (q.v.) in 1463, and the ‘Kenyngale players’ in 1467.

KILKENNY, IRELAND.

John Bale, in his description of his brief episcopate of Ossory, gives an account of the proclamation of Queen Mary, at Kilkenny, on August 20, 1553, ‘The yonge men, in the Forenone, played a Tragedye of God’s Promyses in the olde Lawe, at the Market Crosse, with Organe, Plainges, and Songes very aptely. In the Afternone agayne they played a Commedie of Sanct Johan Baptistes Preachinges, of Christes Baptisynge, and of his Temptacion in the Wildernesse, to the small contentacion of the Prestes and other Papistes there[831].’

These plays are extant; cf. Texts (iii), s.v. Bale.

KING’S LYNN, NORFOLK.

There was a Corpus Christi guild as early as 1400, and the Tailors’ Ordinances of 1449 require them to take part in the Corpus Christi procession; but I do not find evidence of regular annual plays. The Chamberlains’ Accounts for 1385, however, include:—

‘iijˢ iiijᵈ to certain players, playing an interlude on Corpus Christi day.’

‘iijˢ iiijᵈ paid by the Mayor’s gift to persons playing the interlude of St. Thomas the Martyr.’

And those for 1462—

‘iijˢ paid for two flagons of red wine, spent in the house of Arnulph Tixonye, by the Mayor and most of his brethren, being there to see a certain play at the Feast of Corpus Christi.’ In the same year the Skinners and Sailors ‘of the town’ received rewards ‘for their labour about the procession of Corpus Christi this year[832].’

In 1409-10 Lady de Beaufort came to see a play[833].

See also s.v. MIDDLETON.

KINGSTON-ON-THAMES, SURREY.

On May 20, 1505, Henry VII made a payment

‘To the Players of Kingeston toward the bilding of the churche steple, in almasse, iijˢ iiijᵈ[834].’

The churchwardens’ accounts for 1505-6 include

‘That we, Adam Backhous and Harry Nycol, amountyd of a play, 4ˡⁱ.’

A few later items relate to plays at Easter.

‘1513-4. For thred for the resurrection, jᵈ. For 3 yards of dorneck for a player’s cote, and the makyng, xvᵈ.

1520-1. Paid for a skin of parchment and gunpowder for the play on Ester-day, viijᵈ. For bred and ale for them that made the stage and other thinges belonginge to the play, jˢ ijᵈ.

1565. Recᵈ. of the players of the stage at Easter, jˢ ijᵈ ob.[835]’

LANCASTER.

A Corpus Christi play was acted within the lifetime of Weever, who was born 1576, and wrote 1631[836].

LANCHIRE(?), ESSEX.

‘Somers of Lanchire’ hired the Chelmsford (q.v.) wardrobe in 1566. But I can find no such place.

LANGLEY, OXFORDSHIRE.

See s.v. SHIPTON.

LAVENHAM, SUFFOLK.

The Earl of Surrey rewarded the players of ‘Lanam’ on Jan. 8, 1492 (Appendix E, vii).

LECONFIELD, YORKSHIRE.

The list of customary rewards given by the fifth Earl of Northumberland to his servants, drawn up †1522, includes:—

‘Them of his Lordschipes Chapell if they doo play the Play of the Nativite uppon Cristynmes-Day in the mornynge in my Lords Chapell befor his Lordship, xxˢ.

... Them of his Lordship Chappell and other, if they doo play the play of Resurrection upon Esturday in the morning in my Lords Chapell, xxˢ[837].’

LEEDS, YORKSHIRE.

Ten Brink, ii. 256, says that Leeds formed a centre ‘for the art of the cyclic plays, which were represented yearly’; and Ward, i. 55, that at Leeds ‘the religious drama was assiduously cultivated by the citizens.’ I cannot find any authority for this, and can only suggest that it is a misapprehension of an entry in the Catalogue of Ralph Thoresby’s manuscripts appended to his Ducatus Leodensis (1715), 517. This was copied by Sharp, 141. But it refers to the York Plays, then in Thoresby’s possession.

LEICESTER.

The Hall book of the Corporation contains the following entries:—

1477, March 26. ‘The pleyers the which pleed the passion play the yere next afore brought yne a byll the whiche was of serten devties of mony and whedʳ the passion shulbe put to crafts to be bounden or nay. And at yᵗ tyme the seid pleyers gaff to the pachents yʳ mony which that thei had getten yn playng of the seid play euer fore to that day and all yʳ Rayments wʰ al othʳ maner of stuff yᵗ they had at that tyme. And at the same Common Halle be the advyse of all the Comons was chosen thies persones after named for to have the gydyng and Rule of the said play’ [19 persons with 2 ‘bedalls’ named][838].

1495, Friday after xijᵗᵉ day. ‘Yᵗ ys ordent agreyt stabelechyd & acte for the comon well of the towne and of seche guds as ys yn a store hows in the Setterday marcat yᵗ ys to say wodde tymber and vdyr playyng germands yf ther be ony her hys chosyn to be ouersears thereof’ [6 names][839].

It is not clear on what day the Passion play took place. There were great processions on Whit Monday from the churches of St. Martin and St. Mary to that of St. Margaret, and in these the Twelve Apostles figured[840].

The accounts of the same churches show plays apparently distinct from the Passion play.

St. Mary’s.

1491. Paid to the Players on New-year’s day at even in the church, vjᵈ.

1499. Paid for a play in the church, in Dominica infra Octavam Epiphaniae, ijˢ.

1504. Paid for mending the garment of Jesus and the cross painting, jˢ iijᵈ. Paid for a pound of hemp to mend the angels heads, iiijᵈ. Paid for linen cloth for the angels heads, and Jesus hoose, making in all, ixᵈ.

1507. Paid for a pound of hemp for the heads of the angels, iijᵈ. Paid for painting the wings and scaff, &c., viijᵈ[841].

These entries suggest a Quem quaeritis, but perhaps only a puppet-show.

St. Martin’s.

1492. Paid to the players on New-year’s day at even in the church, vjᵈ.

1546-7. Pᵈ. for makynge of a sworde & payntynge of the same for Harroode.

1555-6. Pᵈ. to the iij shepperds at Whytsontyde, vjᵈ.

1559-60. Pᵈ. to ye plears for ther paynes.

1561. Rᵈ. for serten stufe lent to the players of Fosson[842].

In 1551 the Corporation came not to a feast ‘because of the play that was in the church[843].’

LICHFIELD, STAFFORDSHIRE.

The Cathedral Statutes of Bishop Hugh de Nonant (1188-98) provide for the Pastores at Christmas and the Quem quaeritis and Peregrini at Easter.

‘Item in nocte Natalis representacio pastorum fieri consueuit et in diluculo Paschae representacio Resurreccionis dominicae et representacio peregrinorum die lunae in septimana Paschae sicut in libris super hijs ac alijs compositis continetur.’

Similarly in the account of the officium of the Succentor it is provided:

‘Et prouidere debet quod representacio pastorum in nocte Natalis domini et miraculorum in nocte Paschae et die lunae in Pascha congrue et honorifice fiant[844].’

LINCOLN.

About 1244 Bishop Grosseteste names ‘miracula’ amongst other ‘ludi’ which the archdeacons, so far as possible, are to exterminate in the diocese[845].

Chapter computi for 1406, 1452, and 1531 include entries of payments, ‘In serothecis emptis pro Maria et Angelo et Prophetis ex consuetudine in Aurora Natalis Dñi hoc anno[846].’

‘In 1420 tithes to the amount of 8ˢ 8ᵈ were assigned to Thomas Chamberleyn for getting up a spectacle or pageant (“cuiusdam excellentis visus”) called Rubum quem viderat at Christmas.... An anthem sung at Lauds on New Year’s day ... begins thus[847]’ (cf. Sarum Breviary, ccxciii). Was this spectacle a Moses play forming part of, or detached from, an Ordo Prophetarum?

A set of local annals (1361-1515) compiled in the sixteenth century records the following plays:—

1397-8. Ludus de Pater Noster lvi anno. 1410-11. Ludus Pater Noster. 1424-5. Ludus Pater Noster. 1441-2. Ludus Sancti Laurentii. 1447-8. Ludus Sanctae Susannae. 1452-3. Ludus de Kyng Robert of Cesill. 1455-6. Ludus de Sancta Clara. 1456-7. Ludus de Pater Noster. 1471-2. Ludus Corporis Christi. 1473-4. Ludus de Corporis Christi.

Canon Rock, apparently quoting the same document, also mentions a ‘Ludus de Sancto Iacobo[848].’

On Dec. 13, 1521, the Corporation ‘agreed that Paternoster Play shall be played this year[849].’

In 1478-80 the Chapter Curialitates include ‘In commun’ canonicorum existent’ ad videndum ludum Corporis Christi in camera Iohannis Sharpe infra clausum, 17ˢ 11ᵈ[850].’

But the Corpus Christi play, although so called, would appear not to have been played upon Corpus Christi day, but to be identical with the visus or ‘sights’ of St. Anne’s day (July 26). These are mentioned almost yearly in the city minute-books of the early sixteenth century, and appear to have been cyclic and processional. They certainly included Noah’s Ship, the Three Kings of Cologne, the Ascension, and the Coronation of the Virgin. The Corporation ordered them to be played; the mayor and the ‘graceman,’ or chief officer of the guild of Saint Anne, directed them; the guild priest gave his assistance in the preparations. In 1517 Sir Robert Denyer was appointed on condition of doing this. Garments were often borrowed from the priory and the local magnates. In 1521 Lady Powys lent a gown for one of the Maries, and the other had a crimson gown of velvet belonging to the guild. Each craft was bound under penalty to provide a pageant. In 1540 some of the crafts had broken their pageants and were ordered to restore them. In the same year a large door was made at the late school-house that the pageants might be sent in, and 4_d._ was charged for housing every pageant, ‘and Noy schippe 12ᵈ.’ In 1547 the valuables of the procession were sold, but the ‘gear’ (i.e. the theatrical properties) still existed in 1569. During the Marian reaction in 1554 and 1555 ‘it was ordered that St. Anne’s Gild with Corpus Christi Play shall be brought forth and played this year[851].’

The friendly relations of the Cathedral Chapter to the civic play are noteworthy. In 1469 the chapter paid the expenses of the visus of the Assumption given on St. Anne’s day in the nave of the church. In 1483 it was similarly agreed to have ‘Ludum, sive Serimonium, de Coronatione, sive Assumptione, beatae Mariae, prout consuetum fuerat, in navi dictae Ecclesiae.’ This was to be played and shown in the procession to be made by the citizens on St. Anne’s day. Apparently the crafts played the earlier plays of the cycle during the progress of the St. Anne’s procession through the streets, and the Chapter gave the Assumption as a finale to the whole in the cathedral itself. But their interest extended beyond their own visus. In 1488 Robert Clarke received an appointment, because ‘he is so ingenious in the show and play called the Ascension, given every year on St. Anne’s Day[852].’

Under Elizabeth a new play appears. In 1564 the Corporation ordered ‘that a standing [i.e. non-processional?] play of some story of the Bible shall be played two days this summertime.’ The subject chosen was Tobias, and the place the Broadgate. Some of the properties, e.g. ‘Hell mouth, with a nether chap,’ were possibly the old ‘gear’ of St. Anne’s guild. In 1567 ‘the stage-play of the story of Toby’ was again played at Whitsuntide[853].

LITTLE BADDOW, ESSEX.

Little Baddow men hired the Chelmsford (q.v.) wardrobe during 1564-6.

LONDON.

William Fitzstephen (†1170-82), in a description of London prefatory to his Vita of St. Thomas à Becket, says:—

‘Lundonia pro spectaculis theatralibus, pro ludis scenicis, ludos habet sanctiores, representationes miraculorum quae sancti confessores operati sunt, seu representationes passionum quibus claruit constantia martyrum[854].’

Nothing more is heard of plays in London until 1378, when the scholars of St. Paul’s petitioned Richard II,

‘to prohibit some unexpert people from representing the History of the Old Testament, to the great prejudice of the said Clergy, who have been at great expence in order to represent it publickly at Christmas[855].’

The chronicler Malvern records that in 1384,—

‘Vicesimo nono die Augusti clerici Londoniae apud Skynnereswelle fecerunt quendam ludum valde sumptuosum, duravitque quinque diebus[856].’

In 1391 Malvern again records,—

‘Item xviijᵒ die Iulii clerici Londonienses fecerunt ludum satis curiosum apud Skynnereswell per dies quatuor duraturum, in quo tam vetus quam novum testamentum oculariter ludendo monstrabant[857].’

In 1393, according to the London Chronicle, ‘was the pley of seynt Katerine[858].’

Other chronicles record a play in 1409:—

‘This yere was the play at Skynners Welle, whiche endured Wednesday, Thorsday, Friday, and on Soneday it was ended[859].’

The accounts of the royal wardrobe show that a scaffold of timber was built for the King (Henry IV), prince, barons, knights, and ladies on this occasion, and that the play showed,—

‘how God created Heaven and Earth out of nothing, and how he created Adam and so on to the Day of Judgment[860].’

Finally, the Grey Friars Chronicle mentions a yet longer play in 1411:—

‘This year beganne a gret pley from the begynnyng of the worlde at the skynners’ welle, that lastyd vij dayes contynually; and there ware the moste parte of the lordes and gentylles of Ynglond[861].’

The performers in most, if not all, of this group of plays were the clerks in minor orders who naturally abounded in London. The Guild of St. Nicholas of Parish Clerks had existed since 1233. In 1442 they received a charter, which refers to ‘diversis charitatis et pietatis operibus per ipsos annuatim exhibitis et inventis[862].’ These opera possibly include the plays, which may have become annual between 1411 and 1442. They seem to have been given at various times of year, and hard by the well, variously described as Skinners Well or Clerkenwell. The Priory of St. Bartholomew is not far, and the plays may have had some connexion, at one time or another, with the famous Bartholomew Fair[863]. It was probably the double name of the well that led Stowe to say that ‘the skinners of London held there certain plays yearly, played of Holy Scripture[864].’

There is another gap of a century in the history of these greater London plays. But on July 20, 1498, Henry VII rewarded ‘the pleyers of London’ (Appendix E, viii), and of 1508 the annalist of Henry VII, Bernard Andrew, says:—

‘Spectacula vero natalis divi Iohannis vespere longe praeclarissima hoc anno ostensa fuerunt, quemadmodum superioris mensis huiusque aliquot festis diebus pone Christi ecclesiam circa urbis pomaria divinae recitatae fuere historiae[865].’

Some of the London churches had their own plays, as may be seen from their churchwardens’ accounts. Those of St. Margaret’s, Southwark, have the following entries:—

‘1444-5. Peid for a play vpon Seynt Lucy day [Dec. 13], and for a pley vpon Seynt Margrete day [July 20], xiijˢ iiijᵈ. 1445-6. [Similar entry.] 1447-8. Also peid for a pley vpon Seynt Margrete day, vijˢ. 1449-50. Item, peyd vpon Seynt Lucy day to the Clerkes for a play, vjˢ viijᵈ. 1450-1. [Similar entry.] 1451-2. Fyrste, peyd to the Pleyrs vpon Seynt Margretes day, vijˢ. Also peyd for hyryng of Germentes xiiijᵈ. 1453-7 and 1459 [a play on St. Margaret’s day in each year[866]].’

Towards the end of Henry VIII’s reign the Revels office was able to borrow ‘frames for pageants’ from the wardens of St. Sepulchre’s[867].

Probably the guild of Parish Clerks made it a profession to supply such church plays as these for a regular fee. They were employed also at the feasts of the city guilds. The Brewers, for instance, had plays in 1425 and 1433, and in 1435 paid ‘4 clerkis of London, for a play[868].’ The Carpenters paid iiijˢ iiijᵈ for a play in 1490[869]. London players occasionally performed before Henry VII. Besides ‘the players of London’ in 1498, he rewarded in 1501 the players at ‘Myles ende[870].’

Attempts were made to revive religious plays during the Marian reaction. On June 7, 1557, ‘be-gane a stage play at the Grey freers of the Passyon of Cryst[871].’ On St. Olave’s day, July 29, in the same year ‘was the church holiday in Silver street; and at eight of the clock at night began a stage play of a goodly matter, that continued until xij at mydnyght, and then they mad an end with a good song[872].’

The last such play in London was ‘the acting of Christ’s Passion at Elie house in Holborne when Gundemore [Gondomar] lay there, on Good-Friday at night, at which there were thousands present[873].’ This would be between 1613 and 1622.

Midsummer Watch.

A ‘marching watch’ was kept on the eves of Midsummer and SS. Peter and Paul (June 29) until 1538, and revived, for one year only, in 1548. Some 2,000 men went in armour; lamps and bonfires were lit in the streets, and ‘every man’s door shadowed with green birch, long fennel, St. John’s wort; orpine, white lilies and such like, garnished upon with garlands of beautiful flowers.’ It seems to have been customary for the guilds to which the Lord Mayor and Sheriffs for the year belonged to furnish pageants. Stowe says that ‘where the mayor had besides his giant three pageants, each of the sheriffs had besides their giants but two pageants, each their morris dance.’ In 1505 the Grocers had ‘a pageant for the maire [Sir John Wyngar] at Midsomer.’ In 1510 Henry VIII, disguised as a groom, came to see the Midsummer Watch, and on St. Peter’s eve came openly with the queen. There were ‘diverse goodlie shewes, as had beene accustomed.’ In 1522 the Drapers resolved ‘that there shall be no Mydsomʳ pageant becaus there was so many pageants redy standyng for the Emperors coming into London,’ and ‘for divers considerations’ to ‘surcease the said pageants and find xxx men in harness instead.’ But later they decided to ‘renew all the old pageants for the house; including our newe pageant of the Goldyn Flees for the mayr against mydsomʳ; also the gyant, lord Moryspyks, and a morys daunce, as was used the last year.’ The account-books mention Lord Moryspyks or ‘Marlingspikes,’ and a ‘king of the Moors,’ with a ‘stage’ and ‘wyld fire.’ In 1523, the King of Denmark being in London, the Drapers allowed the Sheriff two pageants, ‘but to be no precedent hereafter.’ They paid ‘for garnyshyng and newe repayring of th’ Assumpcion, and also for making a new pageant of St. Ursula.’ The King of Denmark was duly brought to see the watch. In 1524 they again had a pageant, the nature of which is not specified[874].

LOPHAM, NORFOLK.

‘Lopham game’ was at Harling (q.v.) in 1457.

LOUTH, LINCOLNSHIRE.

An inventory of documents in the rood-loft in 1516 includes the ‘hole Regenall of corpus xr̄i play.’ In 1558 the corporation paid for a play ‘in the markit-stede on corpus xr̄i day.’[875]

LYDD, KENT.

The town accounts show a play of St. George on July 4, 1456, and payment to the ‘bane cryars’ of ‘our play’ in 1468. In 1422 the Lydd players acted at New Romney, and in 1490 the chaplain of the guild of St. George at New Romney went to see a play at Lydd, with a view to reproducing it. Between 1429 and 1490 the New Romney players acted often at Lydd, and also players of Ruckinge (1431), Wytesham (1441), Ham (1454), Hythe (1467), Folkestone (1479), Rye (1480), Stone (1490). Unnamed players were in the high street in 1485[876].

LYNEHAM, OXFORDSHIRE.

See s.v. SHIPTON.

MALDEN, ESSEX.

The Chelmsford (q.v.) play was shown at Malden in 1562.

MANNINGTREE, ESSEX.

John Manningham, of the Middle Temple, wrote in his Diary, on Feb. 8, 1602, ‘The towne of Manitree in Essex holds by stage plays[877].’ So Heywood, in his Apology for Actors (1612), ‘To this day there be townes that hold the priviledge of their fairs and other charters by yearly stage-plays, as at Manningtree in Suffolke, Kendall in the North, and others[878].’ There are further allusions to these plays in T. Nash, The Choosing of Valentines,

‘a play of strange moralitie, Showen by bachelrie of Manning-tree, Whereto the countrie franklins flock-meale swarme[879]’;

and in Dekker, Seven Deadly Sins of London (1607), ‘Cruelty has got another part to play; it is acted like the old morals at Manning-tree[880].’

MAXSTOKE, WARWICKSHIRE.

The accounts of Maxstoke Priory (a house of Augustinian canons) for 1430 include, ‘pro ientaculis puerorum eleemosynae exeuntium ad aulam in castro ut ibi ludum peragerent in die Purificationis, xivᵈ. Unde nihil a domini [Clinton] thesaurario, quia saepius hoc anno ministralli castri fecerunt ministralsiam in aula conventus et Prioris ad festa plurima sine ullo regardo[881].’

MIDDLETON, NORFOLK.

In 1444 the corporation of Lynn (q.v.) showed a play with Mary and Gabriel before Lord Scales[882].

MILDENHALL, SUFFOLK.

Thetford Priory made a payment to ‘the play of Mydenale’ in 1503-4 (Appendix E, iii).

MILE END, MIDDLESEX.

Henry VII rewarded ‘the Pleyers at Myles End’ on Aug. 6, 1501 (Appendix E, viii).

MILTON, OXFORDSHIRE.

See s.v. SHIPTON.

MOREBATH, DEVONSHIRE.

The churchwardens’ accounts record an Easter play at some date between 1520 and 1574[883].

NAYLAND, ESSEX.

Richard More, of Nayland, hired the Chelmsford (q.v.) wardrobe in 1566.

NEWCASTLE-ON-TYNE, NORTHUMBERLAND.

The craft-plays on Corpus Christi day are mentioned in several fifteenth-century ordinaries, the earliest being that of the Coopers in 1426/7. The last years in which performances can be proved to have been given are 1561 and 1562. Ordinaries dated from 1578 to 1589 stipulate for a performance by the crafts ‘whensoever the generall plaies of the town of Newcastle, antiently called the Corpus Christi plays, shall be plaied,’ or the like. The determination of this point rested with the Corporation. The Goldsmiths drew up an ‘invoic of all the players apperell pertainyng to’ them in 1598/9. The cost of the plays fell on the crafts, who took fixed contributions from their members. The Taylors in 1536 required iijᵈ from each hireling, and vijᵈ from each newly admitted member. The Fullers and Dyers paid 9_s._ in 1561 for ‘the play lettine’ to four persons.

The mentions of ‘bearers of the care and baneres’ of them ‘that wated of the paient’ and of ‘the carynge of the trowt and wyn about the town’ seem to show that the plays were processional. On the other hand the one extant play (cf. p. 424) ends with a remark of the Diabolus to ‘All that is gathered in this stead.’ Perhaps the pageants first took part in the Corpus Christi procession proper and afterwards gathered in a field. The Mercers’ ordinary of 1480 shows that the procession was ‘by vij in morning,’ and the plays were certainly in the evening, for it was deposed in a law-suit at Durham in 1569 that Sir Robert Brandling of Newcastle said on Corpus Christi day, 1562, that ‘he would after his dinner draw his will, and after the plays would send for his consell, and make it up’ (Norfolk Archaeology, iii. 18).

For the list of plays, so far as it can be recovered, see p. 424. The ordinary of the Goldsmiths (1536) requires their play (Kynges of Coleyn) to be given at their feast[884].

NEW ROMNEY, KENT.

There are many notices of a play in the town accounts between 1428 and 1560. In 1456 the wardens of the play of the Resurrection are mentioned. In 1463 the jurats paid Agnes Ford 6_s._ 8_d._ ‘for the play of the Interlude of our Lord’s Passion.’ From 1474 the banns of the play are mentioned. In 1477 the play was on Whit-Tuesday. In 1518 the Lord Warden of the Cinque Ports forbade the play, but it was revived elaborately in 1560. The accounts mention the purchase of copes and vestures from the corporation of Lydd, and refer to ‘a fool,’ ‘the Cytye of Samarye,’ ‘our last play,’ ‘the iijᵗʰ play,’ ‘the iiijᵗʰ play,’ and the ‘bane cryers.’ No crafts are mentioned: perhaps the play was produced by the corporation itself. The performances may have been on Crockhill or Crockley Green. ‘Playstool’ is a common name for a bit of land in Kent. Performances were often given in other towns: see s.v. LYDD. The play seems to have been only a Passion and Resurrection play, and not a complete cycle. ‘Le Playboke’ is mentioned from 1516. It is in an Elizabethan inventory of town records. A second play of St. George was probably started in 1490 when a chaplain of the guild of St. George went to see the Lydd St. George play, with a view to reproducing it. In 1497 the chaplains received the profits of the play. Players from the following towns are found acting at New Romney: Hythe (1399), Lydd (1422), Wittersham (1426, they ‘shewed th’ interlude’), Herne (1429), Ruckinge (1430), Folkestone (1474), Appledore (1488), Chart (1489), Rye (1489), Wye (1491), Brookland (1494), Halden (1499), Bethersden (1508)[885].

NORTHAMPTON, NORTHAMPTONSHIRE.

Brotanek (Anglia, xxi. 21) conjectures that the Abraham and Isaac of the Dublin MS. may come from Northampton (cf. p. 427), and hints at an explanation of the ‘N. towne’ in the prologue to the Ludus Coventriae as ‘N[orthampton] towne’ (cf. p. 421).

But the only allusion even remotely suggesting miracle-plays that I can find in the printed civic records is in 1581, in which year some interrogatories as to St. George’s Hall contain a deposition by an old man to the effect that he had known the hall fifty years, and that the mayor and chamberlains had been wont to lay therein pageants, &c.[886]

NORWICH, NORFOLK.

Whitsun Plays.

J. Whetley writes from Norwich on Corpus Christi even (May 20), 1478, to Sir John Paston in London, of a visit of Lord Suffolk to Hellesden, ‘at hys beyng ther that daye ther was never no man that playd Herrod in Corpus Crysty play better and more agreable to hys pageaunt than he dud[887].’

I do not know whether it is fair to infer from this that in 1478 the Norwich plays were not at Whitsuntide, but at Corpus Christi; but this would account for J. Whetley’s trope.

On Sept. 21, 1527, the guild of St. Luke, composed of painters, braziers, plumbers, &c., made a presentment to the Assembly of the town that,—

‘where of longtime paste the said Guylde of Seynt Luke yerly till nowe hath ben used to be kept and holden within the citie aforesaid upon the Mundaye in pentecoste weke at which daye and the daye next ensuyng many and divers disgisyngs and pageaunts, as well of the lieffs and martyrdoms of divers and many hooly Saynts, as also many other light and feyned figurs and picturs of other persones and bests; the sight of which disgisings and pageaunts, as well yerly on the said Mondaye in pentecoste weke in the time of procession then goyng about a grett circuitte of the forsaid citie, as yerly the Tuysday in the same weke [serving] the lord named the Lord of Misrule at Tumlond within the same citie, hath ben and yet is sore coveted, specially by the people of the countre.’

The presentment goes on to show that much resort and profit have accrued to the city, but all the cost has fallen on the guild, which ‘is almost fully decayed’; and urges an order,—

‘that every occupacion wythyn the seyd Citye maye yerly at the said procession upon the Mondaye in Pentecost weke sette forth one pageaunt.’

It was agreed that each craft should play,—

‘one such pageaunt as shalbe assigned and appoynted by Master Mair and his brethern aldermen, as more playnly appereth in a boke thereof made.’

In the same hand is a list of crafts and plays (cf. p. 425)[888].

Some extracts made in the eighteenth century from the, now lost, books of the Grocers’ Company, contain (a) two versions of their play on The Fall, dating from 1533 and 1565 respectively (cf. p. 425), and (b) various notices of the same from the Assembly Book.

The latter begin in 1534, when ‘4 Surveyors of yᵉ Pageant’ with a ‘Bedell’ were chosen, and an assessment of 22_s._ 10_d._ made for the pageant and the Corpus Christi procession. The expenses include, besides repairs to the pageant, fees to actors, refreshments, &c.,—

‘It. to Sʳ Stephen Prowet for makyng of a newe ballet, 12ᵈ.

House ferme for ye Pageant, 2ˢ.’

The pageant went in 1535 and 1536. In 1537 it ‘went not at Wytsontyde,’ but went in October ‘in yᵉ Processyon for yᵉ Byrthe of Prynce Edward.’ From 1538 to 1546 it went, the assessment for pageant and procession being about 20_s._ to 30_s._ As to 1547 the record is not clear. Then there is a gap in the extracts, and from 1556 onwards the ‘Gryffon,’ ‘Angell,’ and ‘Pendon’ of the Corpus Christi procession, with flowers, grocery, and fruit ‘to garnish yᵉ tre wᵗʰ,’ &c., appear alone in the accounts. In 1559 was ‘no solemnite’ at all. In 1563 it was agreed that the pageant should be ‘preparyd ageynst yᵉ daye of Mʳ Davy his takyng of his charge of yᵉ Mayralltye,’ with a ‘devyce’ to be prepared by the surveyors at a cost of 6_s._ 8_d._ The play cannot have quite lapsed, for in 1565 a new version was written (cf. p. 425). It was apparently contemplated that it might be played either alone or in a cycle. To the same year belongs the following

‘Inventory of yᵉ p’ticulars appartaynyng to yᵉ Company of yᵉ Grocers, a.d. 1565.

A Pageant, yᵗ is to saye, a Howse of Waynskott paynted and buylded on a Carte wᵗ fowre whelys.

A square topp to sett over yᵉ sayde Howse.

A Gryffon, gylte, wᵗ a fane to sette on yᵉ sayde toppe.

A bygger Iron fane to sett on yᵉ ende of yᵉ Pageante.

iiijˣˣ iij small Fanes belongyng to yᵉ same Pageante.

A Rybbe colleryd Red.

A cote & hosen wᵗ a bagg & capp for doloʳ, steyned.

2 cotes & a payre hosen for Eve, stayned.

A cote & hosen for Adam, Steyned.

A cote wᵗ hosen & tayle for yᵉ serpente, steyned, wᵗ a wᵗ heare.

A cote of yellow buckram wᵗ yᵉ Grocers’ arms for yᵉ Pendon bearer.

An Angell’s Cote & over hoses of Apis Skynns.

3 paynted clothes to hang abowte yᵉ Pageant.

A face & heare for yᵉ Father.

2 hearys for Adam & Eve.

4 head stallis of brode Inkle wᵗʰ knopps & tassells.

6 Horsse Clothes, stayned, wᵗ knopps & tassells.

Item, Weights, &c.’

There is a final memorandum that in 1570 the pageant was broken to pieces for six years ‘howse ferm’ due. There had been no ‘semblye nor metynge’ of the Company for eight years. The pageant had stood for six years in a ‘Gate howse,’ and then ‘at yᵉ Black Fryers brydge in open strete,’ where it became ‘so weather beaten, yᵗ yᵉ cheife parte was rotton[889].’

Processions.

There were three notable annual processions at Norwich.

(a) The Corpus Christi Procession, in which the crafts were held to take part in 1489, and which appears, as above stated, in the Grocers’ records until 1558. They seem to have been represented by the ‘griffon’ from the top of their pageant, a banner with their arms, a crowned angel, and an emblematic ‘tree’ of fruit and grocery (possibly the ‘tree of knowledge’)[890].

(b) The Procession of the Guild of St. Thomas à Becket on the day of his Translation (July 7) to his chapel in the wood. Here interludes were played[891].

(c) The Riding of the Guild of St. George on his day (April 23). This dates from at least 1408, and a good many details as to it are preserved[892].

NUNEATON, WARWICKSHIRE.

The ‘lusores de Eaton’ played at Maxstoke Priory between 1422 and 1461 (Appendix E, ii).

OXFORD, OXFORDSHIRE.

The following extracts from the Bursars’ computi of Magdalen College point to a Quem quaeritis of the longer type, with the ‘Noli me tangere’ episode.

1486-7. ‘pro factura sepulturae erga pascham. xijᵈ.’

1506-7. ‘pro scriptura lusi’ of St. Mary Magdalen. xᵈ.’

[There were further payments in connexion with this play, and for music.]

1509-10. ‘pro pane, cibo et aliis datis pueris ludentibus in die Paschae ... xvijᵈ ob.’

1514-5. ‘pro carnibus consumptis in capella tribus noctibus ante Pascha et in tempore Nativitatis. ijˢ.’

1518-9. ‘pro tinctura et factura tunicae eius qui ageret partem Christi et pro crinibus mulieribus. ijˢ vjᵈ.’

1536-7. ‘pro carbonibus consumptis in sacrario per custodes sepulchri, et per pueros in festis hiemalibus.’

[Repeated in other years.]

A chapel inventory of 1495 includes ‘unum frontale ... et unum dorsale cum quibus solet sepulcrum ornari.’

The same accounts (cf. p. 248) show items for plays in the hall at various seasons, and for the Boy Bishop at Christmas[893].

The churchwardens of St. Peter’s in the East kept between 1444 and 1600 a stock of players’ garments, and let them out on hire[894].

PENRHYN, CORNWALL.

See Texts (i), Cornish Plays, Origo Mundi.

PERRANZABULO, CORNWALL.

The earliest historical notice of plays in Cornwall is by Richard Carew in 1602:—

‘The Guary miracle, in English, a miracle-play, is a kinde of Enterlude, compiled in Cornish out of some Scripture history, with that grossenes which accompanied the Romanes vetus Comoedia. For representing it they raise an earthen Amphitheatre in some open field, hauing the Diameter of his enclosed playne some 40 or 50 foot. The Country people flock from all sides, many miles off, to hear and see it: for they haue therein, deuils and deuices, to delight as well the eye as the eare; the players conne not their parts without booke, but are prompted by one called the Ordinary, who followeth at their back with the book in his hand, and telleth them softly what they must pronounce aloud.’

Whereupon Carew has a story of a ‘pleasant conceyted gentleman’ who raised laughter by repeating aloud all the Ordinary’s asides to himself.

One Mr. Scawen (†1660) describes the Guirremears as—

‘solemnized not without shew of devotion in open and spacious downs, of great capacity, encompassed about with earthen banks, and in some part stonework of largeness to contain thousands, the shapes of which remain in many places to this day, though the use of them long since gone.’

Bp. Nicholson, writing in 1700, says that the plays were:—

‘called Guirimir, which Mʳ Llhuyd supposes a corruption of Guarimirkle, and in the Cornish dialect to signify a miraculous play or interlude. They were composed for begetting in the common people a right notion of the Scriptures, and were acted in the memory of some not long since deceased.’

The eighteenth-century antiquary, Borlase, identifies the places in which the miracle-plays were given with those known as ‘rounds’ or, in Cornish, plân an guare. Of these he describes and figures two. That of St. Just was of stone, 126 feet in diameter, with seven rows of seats inside. It was much decayed when Norris wrote in 1859. That of Perranzabulo, or Piran-sand, was of earth, 130 feet in diameter, with a curious pit in the centre, joined to the outer ring by a narrow trench. Borlase thought that this was used for a Hell[895]. It was more likely filled with water for Noah’s ship to float upon.

The Ordinalia printed by Mr. Norris take the Cornish plays back to at least the fourteenth, if not the thirteenth century. The circular diagrams in the manuscript exactly fall in with the round plân an guare described by Borlase and others. They show a ring of eight loci or sedes (cf. p. 83), for which the terms used in the stage-directions are pulpita or tenti, with an open circular space in the middle, which the stage-directions call the platea. The action is partly at the pulpita, partly in the platea. A new character often marks his appearance by strutting about his pulpitum, or perhaps around the ring—Hic pompabit Abraham, &c.

In the English stage-directions to the later (before 1611) Creation of the World, the platea becomes the playne, and for pulpitum the term room is used. The manager of the play is the ‘conveyour.’ Some of the directions are curious and minute. At the opening, ‘The father must be in a clowde, and when he speakethe of heaven let yᵉ levys open.’ Within is a ‘trone,’ which Lucifer tries to ascend. After the fight, ‘Lucifer voydeth & goeth downe to hell apareled fowle wᵗʰ fyre about hem turning to hell and every degre of devylls of lether & spirytis on cordis runing into yᵉ playne and so remayne ther.’ Meanwhile are got ready ‘Adam and Eva aparlet in whytt lether in a place apoynted by the conveyour & not to be sene tyll they be called & thei knell & ryse.’ Paradise has ‘ii fayre trees in yt’ and a ‘fowntaine’ and ‘fyne flowers,’ which appear suddenly. Similarly, a little later, ‘Let fyshe of dyuers sortis apeare & serten beastis as oxen kyne shepe & such like.’ Lucifer incarnates as ‘a fyne serpent made wᵗʰ a virgyn face & yolowe heare vpon her head.’ Presently comes the warning, ‘ffig leaves redy to cover ther members,’ and at the expulsion, ‘The garmentis of skynnes to be geven to adam and eva by the angell. Receave the garmentis. Let them depart out of paradice and adam and eva following them. Let them put on the garmentis and shewe a spyndell and a dystaff’ The Cain and Abel scene requires ‘a chawbone’ (‘Cain’s jawbone, that did the first murder’). Seth is led to Paradise and ‘Ther he vyseth all thingis, and seeth ij trees and in the one tree sytteth mary the virgyn & in her lappe her son jesus in the tope of the tree of lyf, and in the other tree yᵉ serpent wᶜʰ caused Eva to eat the appell.’ When Adam dies, his soul is taken ‘to lymbo,’ and he is buried ‘in a fayre tombe wᵗʰ som churche songis at hys buryall.’ The Noah scene requires ‘tooles and tymber redy, wᵗʰ planckis to make the arcke, a beam a mallet a calkyn yre[n] ropes mass[t]es pyche and tarr.’ Presently ‘let rayne appeare’ and ‘a raven & a culver ready.’ When the flood ends, ‘An alter redy veary fayre,’ at which ‘som good church songes’ are sung, and ‘a Rayne bowe to appeare.’ Like the earlier plays, this ends with a call on the minstrels to pipe for a dance.

A study of the place names in the Ordinalia led Mr. Pedler to suggest that they probably belonged to the neighbourhood of Penrhyn, and may have been composed at the collegiate house of Glasney. The St. Meriasek play is assigned by Mr. Stokes to Camborne, of which that saint was patron. It ends with an invocation of St. Meriasek, St. Mary of Camborne, and the Apostles.

PRESTON, LANCASHIRE.

A Corpus Christi play was acted within the lifetime of Weever, who was born 1576 and wrote 1631[896].

I find no trace of plays at the meetings of the Guild Merchant, although there was always a great procession, which from 1762 or earlier included such allegorical figures as Adam and Eve for the Tailors, Vulcan for the Smiths, &c.[897]

READING, BERKSHIRE.

The churchwardens’ accounts of St. Lawrence’s record ‘a gaderyng of a stage-play’ in 1498.

In 1507 a play of Adam and Eve was held on ‘the Sonday afore Bartylmastyde’ ‘in the Forbury.’ There was a ‘schapfold,’ but ‘pagentts’ were also used. A Corpus Christi procession is also mentioned in 1509, 1512, and 1539.

In 1512 also was the ‘play of Kayme,’ and in 1515, ‘Cayme’s pageaunt’ in the market-place.

On May 1, 1499, and again in 1539, was the Kings of Cologne. This was distinct, no doubt, from the ‘king play,’ with its ‘tree,’ ‘king game,’ or ‘kyng ale,’ which took place at Whitsuntide (cf. vol. i. p. 173). But the date, May 1 (for which cf. Abingdon), is curious for a miracle-play, and must have been influenced by the folk feast.

A payment for ‘rosyn to the resurrecyon pley’ (possibly for making a blaze: cf. p. 23, note 5) occurs in 1507, and in 1533-5 payments to ‘Mʳ Laborne’ ‘for reforming the Resurrecon pley,’ and ‘for a boke’ of it.

In 1508 was a ‘pageaunt of the Passion on Easter Monday[898].’

RUCKINGE, KENT.

Ruckinge players were at New Romney in 1430, and Lydd in 1431.

RYE, SUSSEX.

Rye players were at Lydd in 1480, and at New Romney in 1489.

SABSFORD (?), ESSEX.

‘Sabsforde men’ hired the Chelmsford (q.v.) wardrobe in 1562, 1563, and 1566. But I can find no such place.

SAFFRON WALDEN, ESSEX.

‘Men of Waldyne’ hired the Chelmsford (q.v.) wardrobe during 1564-6.

ST. JUST, CORNWALL.

See s.v. PERRANZABULO.

SALISBURY, WILTSHIRE.

A cathedral inventory of 1222 includes:—

‘Coronae ij de latone ad representationes faciendas.’

These latten ‘coronae’ may, I suppose, have been either crowns for the Magi, or ‘stellae[899].’

The churchwardens’ accounts of St. Edmund’s for 1461 include an item ‘for all apparel and furniture of players at the Corpus Christi[900].’

SHELFHANGER, NORFOLK.

Thetford Priory made a payment ‘in regard to Schelfanger play’ in 1507-8 (Appendix E, iii).

SHIPTON, OXFORDSHIRE.

It was decided (†1220-28), as part of an award concerning the rights of collation to the churches of Shipton and Bricklesworth, both being prebends in Sarum cathedral, as follows:—

‘Actiones autem, si quae competant, in villa de Fifhide et de Idebire cedant canonico de Brikeleswrth. Actiones vero, si quae competant, in villa de Mideltone et de Langele, cedant canonico de Schiptone. Emolumentum vero actionum, si quae competant, in villa de Linham aequaliter inter se dividant[901].’

The editor of the Sarum Charters can only explain actiones as ‘plays.’ Ducange gives the word in the sense of spectacula.

All the places named, Fyfield, Idbury, Milton, Langley, and Lyneham, are in Wychwood, and may have formed in the thirteenth century, if they do not all now, part of the parish of Shipton-under-Wychwood.

SHREWSBURY, SHROPSHIRE.

The civic orders and accounts refer occasionally to plays. The first on record was given before Prince Arthur in 1495. In 1516 the abbot of Shrewsbury, in 1533 the bishop of Exeter, and in 1542 the royal commissioners were present. The subject in 1516 was the martyrdoms of Saints Feliciana and Sabina. In 1518 it was the Three Kings of Cologne. In 1510, 1518, 1533, 1553, and 1556 the performances were at Whitsuntide. The bailiffs, according to a notice in 1556, ‘set forward’ the plays, and the ‘lusores’ belonging to the town, who are mentioned in 1527 and 1549, were perhaps the performers. The locality was, in 1542, the churchyard of St. Chad’s. In 1495, 1516, and 1533 it was the quarry outside the walls, where it is stated in 1570 that ‘the plases have bin accustomyd to be usyd[902].’ Here there were traces of a seated amphitheatre as late as 1779[903]. Thomas Ashton became master of the free school in 1561, and he produced plays in the quarry. Elizabeth was to have been at his Julian the Apostate in 1565, but came too late. In 1567 he gave the Passion of Christ[904]. An undated list of Costs for the Play includes ‘a desert’s (disard’s) hed and berd,’ ‘vi dossen belles’ for a morris, ‘gonne poudoʳ’ and other attractions for a devil[905].

Shrewsbury Show.

The craft-guilds took part in the Corpus Christi procession, and the guild of Mercers inflicted a penalty of 12_d._ on brethren who on that feast should ‘happen to ride or goe to Coventre Faire or elleswhere out of the town of Shrewesburye to by or sell[906].’ Until about 1880 Shrewsbury Show was held on the Monday after Corpus Christi day. The crafts had tableaux which, after the Reformation at least, were emblematic rather than religious[907]; thus—

Tailors. Adam and Eve or Elizabeth. Shearmen. St. Blasius or Edward IV. Skinners and Glovers. King of Morocco. Smiths. Vulcan. Painters. Rubens. Bricklayers. King Henry VIII. Shoemakers. SS. Crispin and Crispinian. Barbers. St. Katharine. Bakers. Venus and Ceres.

SLEAFORD, LINCOLNSHIRE.

The accounts of the guild of Holy Trinity for 1480 include:—

‘It. payd for the Ryginall of ye play for ye Ascencon & the wrytyng of spechys & payntyng of a garmet for god, iijˢ. viijᵈ.[908]’

Miss Toulmin Smith finds in the same accounts for 1477, a ‘kyngyng,’ i.e. Three Kings of Cologne on Corpus Christi day[909]; but I read the entry:—

‘It. payd for the ryngyng of ye same day, ijᵈ.’

Oliver, the historian of the guild, reads ‘hymnall’ for ‘Ryginall’ in the 1480 entry. He also asserts that there was a regular Corpus Christi play by the crafts. This seems improbable in a place of the size of Sleaford, and in fact Oliver’s elaborate description is entirely based upon data from elsewhere, especially the Gubernacio Ludi of Beverley (cf. p. 340)[910].

STAPLEFORD, ESSEX.

‘Men of Starford’ hired the Chelmsford (q.v.) wardrobe during 1564-6. I find no Starford, but a Stapleford Tawney and a Stapleford Abbots in Essex.

STOKE BY NAYLAND, ESSEX.

Sir John Howard ‘ȝafe to the pleyeres of Stoke, ijˢ’ on Jan. 12, 1466.

Lord Howard ‘paid to the pleirs of Turton Strete xxᵈ’ on Aug. 29, 1481. Thorington is still the name given to part of Stoke. There is also an independent township so named in Essex.

On May 22, 1482, Lord Howard ‘yaff to the cherche on Whitson Monday at the pley xˢ.’

On Jan. 2, 1491, the Earl of Surrey paid iijˢ iiijᵈ ‘in reward to the panget’ [? pageant][911].

STONE, KENT.

Stone players were at Lydd in 1490.

TEWKESBURY, GLOUCESTERSHIRE.

The churchwardens’ accounts in 1578 mention payments for ‘the players’ geers, six sheep-skins for Christ’s garments’; and an inventory of 1585 includes ‘eight heads of hair for the Apostles, and ten beards, and a face or vizier for the Devil[912].’

TINTINHULL, SOMERSET.

The churchwardens’ accounts for 1451-2 include a receipt:—

‘de incremento unius ludi vocati Christmasse play[913].’

WAKEFIELD, YORKSHIRE.

See Texts (i), Towneley Plays.

WIMBORNE MINSTER, DORSETSHIRE.

Players of ‘Wymborne Minster’ were rewarded by Henry VII on Jan. 1, 1494 (Appendix E, viii).

WINCHESTER, HAMPSHIRE.

The early use of the Quem quaeritis in the liturgy of the cathedral served by the Benedictines of St. Swithin’s Priory has been fully discussed in Chapter xviii and Appendix O.

In 1486, Henry VII was entertained at dinner on a Sunday in the castle with a performance of Christi descensus ad inferos by the ‘pueri eleemosynarii’ of the monasteries of St. Swithin’s and Hyde[914].

WINDSOR, BERKS.

On May 24, 1416, Henry V invested the Emperor Sigismund with the Garter, the annual feast being deferred from April 23 for that purpose. Mr. John Payne Collier says, ‘A chronicle in the Cottonian collection gives a description of a performance before him and Henry V, on the incidents of the life of St. George. The representation seems to have been divided into three parts, and to have been accomplished by certain artificial contrivances, exhibiting, first, “the armyng of Seint George, and an Angel doyng on his spores [spurs]”; secondly, “Seint George riding and fightyng with the dragon, with his spere in his hand”; and, thirdly, “a castel, and Seint George and the Kynges daughter ledyng the lambe in at the castel gates.” Here we have clearly the outline of the history of St. George of Cappadocia, which often formed the subject of a miracle-play; but whether, in this instance, it was accompanied with dialogue, or was (as is most probable) merely a splendid dumb show, assisted by temporary erections of castles, &c., we are not informed.’ This performance is accepted from Collier, i. 29, by Ward, i. 50, Pollard, xx, and other distinguished writers. They ought to have known him better. The authority he quotes, Cotton. MS. Calig. B. II, is wrong. But in Cotton. MS. Julius B. I, one of the MSS. of the London Chronicle, is the following passage, ‘And the first sotelte was our lady armyng seint George, and an angel doyng on his spores; the ijᵈᵉ sotelte was seint George ridyng and fightyng with the dragon, with his spere in his hand; the iijᵈᵉ sotelte was a castel, and seint George, and the kynges doughter ledynge the lambe in at the castel gates. And all these sotelties were served to the emperor, and to the kyng, and no ferther: and other lordes were served with other sotelties after theire degrees[915].’ The representation, then, was in cake or marchpane. The term ‘soteltie’ is surely not uncommon[916]. But it has led a French scholar into another curious mistake. According to M. E. Picot ‘La sotelty paraît n’avoir été qu’une simple farce, comme la sotternie néerlandaise[917].’ A mumming by Lydgate in 1429-30 seems to have introduced a ‘miracle’ of St. Clotilda and the Holy Ampulla (cf. vol. i. p. 397).

WITHAM, ESSEX.

‘Barnaby Riche of Witham’ hired the Chelmsford (q.v.) wardrobe in 1566.

WITTERSHAM, KENT.

Wittersham players were at New Romney in 1426 and Lydd in 1441.

WOODHAM WALTER, ESSEX.

‘Mrs. Higham of Woodham Walter’ hired the Chelmsford (q.v.) wardrobe in 1570-2.

WOODKIRK, YORKSHIRE.

See Texts, (i) Towneley Plays.

WORCESTER, WORCESTERSHIRE.

A cathedral inventory of 1576 includes:—

‘players gere

A gowne of freres gyrdles. A woman’s gowne. A Kˢ cloke of Tysshew. A Jerkyn and a payer of breches. A lytill cloke of tysshew. A gowne of silk. A Jerkyn of greene, 2 cappes, and the devils apparell[918].’

There was a Corpus Christi play, mentioned in 1467 and 1559. It consisted of five pageants, maintained by the crafts, and was held yearly, if the corporation so decided. In 1584 a lease of the ‘vacant place where the pagantes do stand’ was granted for building, and there was a building known as the ‘Pageant House’ until 1738[919].

WREXHAM, DENBIGHSHIRE.

The corporation of Shrewsbury saw a play by ‘quibusdam interlusoribus de Wrexam’ in 1540 (Appendix E, vi).

WRITTLE, ESSEX.

‘Parker of Writtell’ twice hired the Chelmsford (q.v.) wardrobe during 1570-2. See also p. 184, n. 2.

WYCOMBE, BUCKINGHAMSHIRE.

Henry VII rewarded players of Wycombe on Dec. 31, 1494 (Appendix E, viii).

WYE, KENT.

Wye players were at New Romney in 1491.

WYMONDHAM, NORFOLK.

An account of the ‘husbands for the wache and play of Wymondham,’ made up to June, 1538, includes payments for ‘the play,’ ‘devyls shoes,’ ‘the giant,’ a man ‘in armour,’ ‘the revels and dances[920].’ It was at this play on July 1, 1549, that Kett’s rebellion broke out. According to Alexander Neville, the ‘ludi ac spectacula ... antiquitus ita instituta’ lasted two days and nights; according to Holinshed, ‘one day and one night at least[921].’

YARMOUTH, NORFOLK.

The churchwardens’ accounts of St. Nicholas’s contain items between 1462 and 1512 for ‘making a new star,’ ‘leading the star,’ ‘a new balk line to the star and ryving the same star.’ In 1473 and 1486 are mentioned plays on Corpus Christi day; in 1489, a play at Bartholomew tide; in 1493, a game played on Christmas day[922].

YORK, YORKSHIRE.

[Authorities.—The chief are R. Davies, Municipal Records of the City of York (1843); L. Toulmin Smith, York Plays (1885). From one or other of these all statements below, of which the authority is not given, are taken. The municipal documents used are enumerated in York Plays, ix. The earliest date from 1371. F. Drake, Eboracum (1736); R. H. Skaife, Guild of Corpus Christi (Surtees Soc.); H. T. Riley, in Hist. MSS. Comm. i. 109; M. Sellers, City of York in the Sixteenth Century, in Eng. Hist. Rev. ix. 275; and some craft-guild documents in Archaeological Review, i. 221; Antiquary, xi. 107; xxii. 266; xxiii. 27, may also be consulted.]

Liturgical Plays.

The traditional Statutes of York Cathedral, supposed to date in their present form from about 1255, provide for the Pastores and the Stella.

‘Item inueniet [thesaurarius] stellas cum omnibus ad illas pertinentibus, praeter cirpos, quos inueniet Episcopus Puerorum futurorum [? fatuorum], vnam in nocte natalis Domini pro pastoribus, et ijᵃˢ in nocte Epiphaniae, si debeat fieri presentacio iijᵘᵐ regum[923].’

Corpus Christi Plays.

The first mention is in 1378, when part of a fine levied on the Bakers is assigned ‘a la pagine des ditz Pestours de corpore cristi.’ In 1394 a civic order required all the pageants to play in the places ‘antiquitus assignatis,’ in accordance with the proclamation, and under penalty of a fine. In 1397 Richard II was present to view the plays. In 1415 the town clerk, Roger Burton, entered in the Liber Memorandorum a copy of the Ordo paginarum ludi Corporis Christi, which was a schedule of the crafts and their plays, together with the Proclamacio ludi corporis cristi facienda in vigilia corporis cristi. At this date the plays were given annuatim. About 1440 the existing manuscript of the plays was probably written. It was a ‘register,’ drawn up from the ‘regynalls’ or ‘origenalls’ in the possession of the several crafts, and kept by the city[924]. Halfway through the sixteenth century performances become irregular. In 1535 the Creed play, in 1558 the Paternoster play was given instead. In 1548 ‘certen pagyauntes ... that is to say, the deyng of our lady, the assumption of our lady, and the coronacion of our lady,’ were cast out. In 1550 and 1552 the play was suppressed on account of the plague, half the ‘pageant silver’ in 1552 being given to the sick. In 1562 the corporation attempted in vain to defer it to St. Barnabas day. In 1564, 1565, and 1566 it was not given, on account of war and sickness. In 1568 there was a dispute as to whether it should be played, and it was ordered that it must be ‘perused and otherwaise amended’ first. In 1569 it was given on Whit-Tuesday. It then seems to have lain dormant until 1579, when the Council made an order that it should be played but ‘first the booke shalbe caried to my Lord Archebisshop [Edwin Sandys] and Mr. Deane [Mathew Hutton] to correcte, if that my Lord Archebisshop doo well like theron.’ Various notes upon the ‘register,’ addressed to a ‘Doctor,’ and indicating that this or that play had been revised, were probably written at this time. In 1580 the citizens petitioned for the play, and the mayor replied that the request would be considered. There is no proof that any performance took place after this date; although the Bakers were still choosing ‘pageant-masters’ in 1656[925].

The ordering of the plays about 1415 was as follows: Yearly in the first or second week in Lent, the town clerk copied the ‘sedulae paginarum’ from the Ordo in the Liber Memorandorum and delivered it to the crafts ‘per vj servientes maioris ad clavam.’ On the eve of Corpus Christi a proclamation of mayor and sheriffs forbade ‘distorbaunce of the kynges pees, and ye play, or hynderyng of ye processioun of Corpore Christi.’ It went on to direct that the pageants must be played at the assigned places, that the men of the crafts are to come forth in customary array and manner, ‘careynge tapers of ye pagentz,’ that there shall be provided ‘good players, well arayed and openly spekyng,’ and that all shall be ready to start ‘at the mydhowre betwix iiijᵗʰ and vᵗʰ of the cloke in the mornynge, and then all oyer pageantz fast followyng ilk one after oyer as yer course is, without tarieng.’ Fines are imposed for any neglect or failure. At this date the play and the Corpus Christi procession were on the same day. In 1426 it is recorded that a Franciscan preacher, William Melton, while commending the play, ‘affirmando quod bonus erat in se et laudabilis valde,’ urged that it should be put on the day before Corpus Christi, so as not to interfere with the ecclesiastical feast[926]. This seems to have been agreed to, but the arrangement did not last. The procession was under the management of a Corpus Christi guild, founded in 1408, and the statutes of this guild dated in 1477 show that it was then the procession which was displaced, falling on the Friday after Corpus Christi day[927].

Thus the plays were essentially the affair of the whole community, and the control of them by the mayor and council may be further illustrated. In 1476 the council made an order regulating the choice of actors, and laid down—

‘That yerely in the tyme of lentyn there shall be called afore the maire for the tyme beyng iiij of the moste connyng discrete and able players within this Citie, to serche, here, and examen all the plaiers and plaies and pagentes thrughoute all the artificers belonging to Corpus Xᵗⁱ Plaie. And all suche as thay shall fynde sufficiant in personne and connyng, to the honour of the Citie and worship of the saide Craftes, for to admitte and able; and all other insufficiant personnes, either in connyng, voice, or personne to discharge, ammove, and avoide. And that no plaier that shall plaie in the saide Corpus Xᵗⁱ plaie be conducte and reteyned to plaie but twise on the day of the saide playe; and that he or thay so plaing plaie not ouere twise the saide day, vpon payne of xlˢ to forfet vnto the chaumbre as often tymes as he or thay shall be founden defautie in the same.’

By ‘twise’ is probably meant ‘in two distinct pageants’; for each pageant repeated its performance at several stations. In 1394 these stations were ‘antiquitus assignatis.’ In 1399 the commons petitioned the council to the effect that ‘le juer et les pagentz de la jour de corpore cristi’ were not properly performed on account of the number of stations, and these were limited to twelve. In later years there were from twelve to sixteen, and from 1417 the corporation made a profit by letting to prominent citizens the right to have stations opposite their houses. A list of ‘Leases for Corpuscrysty Play’ in 1554, for instance, shows twelve stations bringing in from xiijᵈ to iijˢ iiijᵈ each, while nothing was charged for the places ‘at the Trinitie yaits where the clerke kepys the register,’ ‘at the comon Hall to my Lord Maior and his bredren,’ ‘at Mr. Bekwyth’s at Hosyerlane end, where as my Lady Mayres and her systers lay’ and ‘uppon the Payment.’

Outward signs of the civic control were the ‘vexilla ludi cum armis civitatis,’ which were set up at the stations by order of the mayor on Corpus Christi eve. Apparently the city claimed also to put its mark on the pageants themselves, for in an agreement of 1422 merging the pageants of the Shoemakers, Tilemakers, Hayresters, and Millers it was declared, ‘quod nulla quatuor artium praedictarum ponet aliqua signa, arma, vel insignia super paginam praedictam, nisi tantum arma huius honorabilis civitatis.’ But the more important crafts, who had a pageant to themselves, may not have been subject to this restriction.

Although the corporation profited from the ‘dimissio locorum ludi Corporis Christi,’ they did not meet many of the expenses. They paid for the services of the minstrels employed, and for refreshments for themselves and for important visitors to the town. They occasionally helped out the resources of a poor craft. The following extract from the Chamberlains’ accounts for 1397 seems to be quite exceptional:—

‘Expens’ in festo de Corpore Xp’ i.

Item: pro steyning de iiijᵒʳ pannos ad opus paginae, iiijˢ.

Et pro pictura paginae, ijˢ.

Et pro vexillo novo cum apparatu, xijˢ ijᵈ.

Et in portacione et reportacione meremii ad barras coram Rege, ijˢ jᵈ.

Et pro xx fursperres ad barras praedictas coram Rege, vˢ xᵈ.

Et pro xix sapplynges emptis de Iohanne de Craven pro barris praedictis, vjˢ viijᵈ.

Et viij portitoribus ducentibus et moventibus paginam, vˢ iiijᵈ.

Et Ianitori Sanctae Trinitatis pro pagina hospitanda, iiijᵈ.

Et ludentibus, iiijᵈ.

Et ministrallis in festo de Corpore Xp’i, xiijˢ iiijᵈ.

Et in pane, cervisiis, vino, et carnibus, et focalibus pro maiore et probis hominibus in die ad ludum, xviijˢ viijᵈ.

Et in ministrallis domini Regis ac aliorum dominorum supervenientibus, vijˡⁱ vijˢ iiijᵈ.

Et ministris camerae in albo panno et rubeo pro adventu Regis, lviijˢ xᵈ.’

Certainly the corporation did not themselves provide a ‘pagina’ in 1415 or later years. I think that in 1397 they prepared one for some allegorical performance of welcome, distinct from the play itself, to Richard II. The king was evidently placed at the gate of Trinity Priory, where was the first station as late as 1569.

But the bulk of the cost fell upon the crafts. They had to build, repair, decorate, and draw the pageant (Latin, pagina; English, pagiaunt, paiaunt, pachent, pagende, pagyant, padgin, padgion, paidgion, padzhand, &c., &c.). They had to house it in one of the ‘pageant howses’ which until recently gave a name to ‘Pageant green,’ and for each of which a yearly rent of xijᵈ seems to have been the usual charge. They had also doubtless to provide dress and refresh the actors; and some of their members were bound personally to conduct the pageant on its journey. The fully organized craft-guilds appointed annual ‘pageant-masters,’ and met the ordinary charges by a levy of ‘pageant-silver’ upon each member according to his status. The amounts varied from 1_d._ to 8_d._, and were supplemented by the proceeds of fines and payments on admissions and on setting up shop. Smaller guilds were often grouped together, and produced one pageant amongst three or four of them. Even the unincorporated trades did not escape. In 1483 four Innholders undertook the responsibility of producing a pageant for eight years on condition of a fixed payment of 4_d._ from each innholder in the city. Exceptional expenses were sometimes met in exceptional ways. The Mercers gave free admission into their fraternity to one Thomas Drawswerd, on condition that he should ‘mak the Pagiant of the Dome ... of newe substanciale for vij marks and the old pageant.’[928] In 1501 the Cartwrights made four new wheels to a pageant, and were thereupon discharged from further charges for 6_d._ a year. Evidently the obligation of producing a pageant was considered an onerous one, and as trades rose and fell in York, the incidence of it upon this or that trade or trades was frequently altered. All such rearrangements came before the civic authorities, and many of them are upon record. Naturally they involved some corresponding revision, piecing together, or splitting up of plays (cf. p. 412). I only find one example of a play produced by any other body than a craft. The Hospital of St. Leonard produced the play of the Purification in 1415, but had ceased to do so some time before 1477. It is to be noted that in 1561 the Minstrels took their place with the other crafts, and became responsible for the Herod play[929].

Pater-Noster Play.

Wyclif in his De Officio Pastorali, cap. 15 (1378), says that,—

‘herfore freris han tauȝt in Englond þe Paternoster in Engliȝcsh tunge, as men seyen in þe pleye of Yorke[930].’ The reference here is to a performance distinct from the Corpus Christi play. The preamble to a return of the ordinances and so forth of the guild ‘Orationis Domini,’ made in 1389, states that

‘Once upon a time, a Play setting forth the goodness of the Lord’s Prayer was played in the city of York; in which play all manner of vices and sins were held up to scorn, and the virtues were held up to praise.’

The guild was formed to perpetuate this play, and the members were bound to produce it and accompany it through the streets. In 1389 they had no possessions beyond the properties of the play and a chest. A computus of the guild for 1399 contains an entry of an old debt of 2_s._ 2_d._, owed by John Downom and his wife for entrance fee:—

‘Sed dictus Iohannes dicit se expendisse in diuersis expensis circa ludum Accidiae ex parte Ric. Walker ijˢ jᵈ, ideo de praedicto petit allocari[931].’

It would appear that by 1488 the guild had been converted to or absorbed in a guild of the Holy Trinity, which was moreover the craft-guild of the Merchants or Mercers. Certainly in that year this guild chose four pageant-masters to bring forth the Paternoster play. They were to bring in the pageants ‘within iiij days next after Corpus Christi Day[932].’ In 1488 the Paternoster play was presumably a variant for the usual Corpus Christi plays. It was similarly played on Corpus Christi day in 1558. The management was in the hands of one of the few unsuppressed guilds, that of St. Anthony; but the corporation gathered ‘pageant silver’ from the crafts and met the charges. A ‘bayn,’ or messenger, rode to proclaim the play on St. George’s day, and another on Whit Monday. Another performance took place on Corpus Christi day (now called ‘Thursday next after Trinitie Sonday’), 1572. The book was ‘perused, amended and corrected.’ Nevertheless, on July 30 the council sent a ‘trewe copie’ of it, at his request, to the Archbishop [Grindal] of York, and although in 1575 they sent a deputation to urge him to appoint a commission to reform ‘all suche the play bookes as perteyne this cittie now in his grace’s custodie,’ there is no proof that his grace complied.

Creed Play.

As already stated, the guild of Corpus Christi had nothing to do with the regular craft-plays. But in 1446, William Revetor, a chantry priest and warden of the guild, bequeathed to it a ‘ludus incomparabilis’ called the ‘Crede play,’ to be performed every tenth year ‘in variis locis dictae civitatis.’ An inventory of 1465 includes:—

‘Liber vocatus Originale continens Articulos Fidei Catholicae in lingua anglicana, nuper scriptum, appreciatum xˡⁱ.

Et alius liber inveteratus de eodem ludo, cˢ.

Et alius liber de eodem anglice vocatus Crede Play continens xxij quaternos.’

There were also many banners and properties, amongst which

‘Et xij rotulae nuper scriptae cum articulis fidei catholicae, apprec’ iijˢ iiijᵈ.

Et una clavis pro sancto Petro cum ij peciis unius tunicae depictae, apprec’ xijᵈ.

Et x diademata pro Xp’o et apostolis cum una larva et aliis novem cheverons, vjˢ.’

Various performances of the Creed play are recorded. In 1483 it was given on Sunday, September 7, before Richard III, by order of the Council, ‘apon the cost of the most onest men of every parish in thys Cite.’ From 1495 decennial performances can be traced, generally about Lammas (August 1), and ‘at the common hall.’ In 1535 the Corpus Christi play proper was omitted, and the crafts contributed ‘pageant silver’ to the Creed play at Lammas. But they refused to give way to it again in 1545. The guild was suppressed in 1547, and the ‘original or regestre’ passed into the hands of the hospital of St. Thomas. In 1562 the corporation proposed the Creed play as a possible alternative for ‘th’ ystories of the old and new testament’ on St. Barnabas day; and in 1568 they again designed to replace the regular Corpus Christi play by it. But first they submitted it to the Dean of York, Matthew Hutton, who, in a letter still extant, advised that—

‘thogh it was plawsible to yeares ago, and wold now also of the ignorant sort be well liked, yet now in this happie time of the gospell, I knowe the learned will mislike it, and how the state will beare with it, I knowe not.’

Consequently the book was ‘delyveryd in agayn,’ and no more is heard of it.

Mr. Davies suggests that the play probably fell into twelve scenes, in each of which one of the apostles figured. If so, there is perhaps an allusion to a performance of it in a letter of Henry VIII to the justices of York in which he speaks of a riot which took place—

‘at the acting of a religious interlude of St. Thomas the Apostle made in the said city on the 23ʳᵈ of August now last past ... owing to the seditious conduct of certain papists who took a part in preparing for the said interlude.’

He requires them to imprison any who in ‘performing interludes which are founded on any portions of the Old or New Testament’ use language tending to a breach of the peace[933].

St. George Riding.

In April, 1554, the Council made an order for ‘Seynt George to be brought forth and ryde as hath been accustomed,’ and the following items in the accounts show that the personages in the procession were much the same as at Dublin (q.v.):—

‘to the waites for rydyng and playing before St. George and the play.’

‘to the porters for beryng of the pagyant, the dragon and St. Xp’ofer.’

‘to the King and Quene [of Dele] that playd.’

‘to the May [the Maid].’

‘to John Stamper for playing St. George[934].’

Midsummer Show.

As the regular plays waned, the ‘show’ or ‘watch’ of armed men on Midsummer eve became important. There is an ordinance for it in 1581. In 1584 it took place in the morning, and in the afternoon John Grafton, a schoolmaster, gave at seven stations a play with ‘certaine compiled speaches,’ for which the council allowed him to have ‘a pageant frame.’ Apparently the Baker’s pageant was repaired for the purpose. In 1585 Grafton borrowed the pageants of the Skinners, Cooks, Tailors, Innholders, Bakers, and Dyers, and gave another play. Grafton’s account for 1585 mentions ‘the hearse,’ ‘the angell,’ ‘the Queene’s crowne,’ ‘the childe one of the furyes bare.’ He got iijˢ, vjˢ, viijᵈ for his pains[935].

X

TEXTS OF MEDIAEVAL PLAYS AND EARLY TUDOR INTERLUDES

I. MIRACLE-PLAYS.

CHESTER PLAYS.

Manuscripts.

(i) Hg. †1475-1500. Hengwrt MS. 229, in the library of Mr. Wynne of Peniarth, containing Play xxiv (Antichrist) only. Probably a prompter’s copy, as some one has ‘doubled it up and carried it about in his pocket, used it with hot hands, and faded its ink.’

(ii) D. 1591. Devonshire MS., in the library of the Duke of Devonshire, written by ‘Edward Gregorie, a scholar of Bunbury.’

(iii) W. 1592. Brit. Mus. Addl. MS. 10,305. Signed at the end of each play ‘George Bellin.’

(iv) h. 1600. Brit. Mus. Harl. MS. 2013, also signed after some of the plays by ‘George Bellin’ or ‘Billinges.’ A verse proclamation or ‘banes’ is prefixed, and on a separate leaf a copy of the prose proclamation made by the clerk of the pentice in 1544 (cf. p. 349) with a note, in another hand.

(v) B. 1604. Bodl. MS. 175, written by ‘Gulielmus Bedford,’ with an incomplete copy of the ‘banes.’

(vi) H. 1607. Brit. Mus. Harl. MS. 2124, in two hands, the second being that of ‘Jacobus Miller.’ An historical note, dated 1628, is on the cover.

(vii) M. MS. in Manchester Free Library, containing fragment of Play xix (Resurrection) only.

[The MSS. D, W, h, B are derived from a common source, best represented by B. MS. H varies a good deal from this group, and is the better text. MS. Hg is probably related to H.]

Editions.

(a) 1818. Plays iii, x (Noah, Innocents) and Banes; J. H. Markland, for Roxburghe Club (No. 11).

(b) 1836. Play xxiv (Antichrist); J. P. Collier, Five Miracle-Plays.

(c) 1838. Plays iii, xxiv (Noah, Antichrist); W. Marriott, English Miracle-Plays.

(d) 1843-7, 1853. Cycle; Thomas Wright, from MS. W, for Shakespeare Society.

(e) 1883. Part of Play xix (Resurrection), from MS. M, in Manchester Guardian, for May 19, 1883.

(f) 1890. Plays iii, part of iv (Noah, Isaac); Pollard, 8.

(g) 1893-. Cycle (vol. i with Introduction, Banes and Plays i-xiii only issued by 1902); H. Deimling, from MS. H (with collation), for E. E. T. S. (Extra Series, lxii).

(h) 1897. Plays v, xxiv (Prophetae, Antichrist); Manly, i. 66, 170, from (g) and MS. Hg respectively.

[F. J. Furnivall, Digby Plays, xx, prints eighteen additional lines to the Banns as given by Deimling from MSS. h, B. These are from a copy in Rogers’s Breviary of Chester (cf. p. 350), Harl. MS. 1944. A distinct and earlier (pre-Reformation) Banns is printed by Morris, 307, from Harl. MS. 2150 (cited in error as 2050), which is a copy of the White Book of the Pentice belonging to the City of Chester.]

The Cycle.

The list of ‘pagyns in play of Corpus Χρi’ contained in the ‘White Book of the Pentice’ (Harl. MS. 2150, f. 85 b), and given apparently from this source, by Rogers (Furnivall, xxi), makes them twenty-five in number, as follows:—

i. The fallinge of Lucifer. ii. The creation of yᵉ worlde. iii. Noah & his shipp. iv. Abraham & Isacke. v. Kinge Balack & Balaam with Moyses. vi. Natiuytie of our Lord. vii. The shepperdes offeringe. viii. Kinge Harrald & yᵉ mounte victoriall. ix. Yᵉ 3 Kinges of Collen. x. The destroyeinge of the Childeren by Herod. xi. Purification of our Ladye. xii. The pinackle, with yᵉ woman of Canan. xiii. The risinge of Lazarus from death to liffe. xiv. The cominge of Christe to Ierusalem. xv. Christs maundy with his desiples. xvi. The scourginge of Christe. xvii. The Crusifienge of Christ. xviii. The harrowinge of hell. xix. The Resurrection. xx. The Castle of Emaus & the Apostles. xxi. The Ascention of Christe. xxii. Whitsonday yᵉ makeinge of the Creede. xxiii. Prophetes before yᵉ day of Dome. xxiv. Antecriste. xxv. Domes Daye.

The list of plays contained in the pre-Reformation Banns is the same as this, with one exception. Instead of twenty-five plays it has twenty-six. After Wyt Sonday is inserted the play ‘of our lady thassumpcon,’ to be brought forth by ‘the worshipfull wyves of this towne.’ This play of The Assumption was given in 1477, and as a separate performance in 1488, 1497, and 1515 (Morris, 308, 322, 323). Doubtless it was dropped, as at York, out of Protestantism. The post-Reformation Banns and the extant MSS. of the cycle have it not. Further, they reduce the twenty-five plays of the ‘White Book’ list to twenty-four, by merging the plays of the Scourging and Crucifixion into one. In MSS. B, W, h, the junction is plainly apparent (see Deimling, i. ix; Wright, ii. 50). In MS. H there is no break (Deimling, i. xxiv).

Literary Relations.

Wright, i. xiv, and Hohlfeld, in Anglia, xi. 223, call attention to the parallels between the Chester plays and the French Mystère du Viel Testament and to the occurrence in them of scraps and fragments of French speech. The chief of these are put into the mouths of Octavian, the Magi, Herod, and Pilate, and may have been thought appropriate to kings and lordings. They may also point to translation from French originals. Davidson, 254, suggests that the earliest performances at Chester were in Anglo-Norman, and points to the tradition of MS. H (cf. p. 351) as confirming this. There are slight traces of influence upon some of the Chester plays by the York cycle (Hohlfeld, loc. cit. 260; Davidson, 287). Hohlfeld, in M.L.N. v. 222, regards Chester play iv as derived from a common original with the Brome Abraham and Isaac. H. Ungemacht, Die Quellen der fünf ersten Chester Plays, discusses the relation of the plays to the Brome play and the French mystères, and also to the Vulgate, the Fathers, Josephus, and the Cursor Mundi.

YORK PLAYS.

Manuscripts.

(i) Brit. Mus. Addl. MS. 35,290, recently Ashburnham MS. 137, fully described by L. T. Smith, York Plays, xiii. The MS. dates from about 1430-40, and appears to be a ‘register’ or transcript made for the corporation of the ‘origenalls’ in the hands of the crafts. In 1554 the ‘register’ was kept by the clerk at the gates of the dissolved Holy Trinity Priory. After the plays ceased to be performed it got into the hands of the Fairfaxes of Denton. In 1695 it belonged to Henry Fairfax, and its ownership can be traced thence to the present day.

(ii) Sykes MS. in possession of the York Philosophical Society, fully described in York Plays, 455. This is of the early sixteenth century. It contains only the Scriveners’ play, of ‘The Incredulity of Thomas,’ is not a copy from the Ashburnham MS., and may be an ‘origenall,’ or a transcript for the prompter’s use. It has a cover with a flap, and has been folded lengthwise, as if for the pocket.

Editions.

(a) 1797. Play xlii (Incredulity of Thomas), from Sykes MS., in J. Croft, Excerpta Antiqua, 105.

(b) 1859. Play xlii (Incredulity of Thomas), from Sykes MS., ed. J. P. Collier, in Camden Miscellany, vol. iv.

(c) 1885. Cycle, from Ashburnham MS., in L. Toulmin Smith, York Plays.

(d) 1890. Play i (Creation and the Fall of Lucifer), from York Plays, in Pollard, 1.

(e) 1897. Plays xxxviii, xlviii (Resurrection, Judgment Day), from York Plays, in Manly, i. 153, 198.

The Cycle.

The subjects of the forty-eight plays and one fragment contained in the Ashburnham MS. are as follows:—

i. The Barkers. The Creation, Fall of Lucifer. ii. Playsterers. The Creation to the Fifth Day. iii. Cardmakers. God creates Adam and Eve. iv. Fullers. Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden. v. Cowpers. Man’s disobedience and Fall. vi. Armourers. Adam and Eve driven from Eden. vii. Glovers. Sacrificium Cayme et Abell. viii. Shipwrites. Building of the Ark. ix. Fysshers and Marynars. Noah and the Flood. x. Parchmyners and Bokebynders. Abraham’s Sacrifice. xi. The Hoseers. The Israelites in Egypt, the Ten Plagues, and Passage of the Red Sea. xii. Spicers. Annunciation, and visit of Elizabeth to Mary. xiii. Pewtereres and Foundours. Joseph’s trouble about Mary. xiv. Tille-thekers. Journey to Bethlehem: Birth of Jesus. xv. Chaundelers. The Angels and the Shepherds. xvi. Masonns. Coming of the three Kings to Herod. xvii. Goldsmyths. Coming of the three Kings, the Adoration. xviii. Marchallis. Flight into Egypt. xix. Gyrdillers and Naylers. Massacre of the Innocents. xx. Sporiers and Lorimers. Christ with the Doctors in the Temple. xxi. Barbours. Baptism of Jesus. xxii. Smythis. Temptation of Jesus. xxiii. Coriours. The Transfiguration. xxiv. Cappemakers. Woman taken in Adultery. Raising of Lazarus. xxv. Skynners. Entry into Jerusalem. xxvi. Cutteleres. Conspiracy to take Jesus. xxvii. Baxteres. The Last Supper. xxviii. Cordewaners. The Agony and Betrayal. xxix. Bowers and Flecchers. Peter denies Jesus: Jesus examined by Caiaphas. xxx. Tapiterers and Couchers. Dream of Pilate’s Wife: Jesus before Pilate. xxxi. Lytsleres. Trial before Herod. xxxii. Cokis and Waterlederes. Second accusation before Pilate: Remorse of Judas: Purchase of Field of Blood. xxxiii. Tyllemakers. Second trial continued: Judgment on Jesus. xxxiv. Shermen. Christ led up to Calvary. xxxv. Pynneres and Paynters. Crucifixio Christi. xxxvi. Bocheres. Mortificacio Christi. xxxvii. Sadilleres. Harrowing of Hell. xxxviii. Carpenteres. Resurrection: Fright of the Jews. xxxix. Wyne-drawers. Jesus appears to Mary Magdalen after the Resurrection. xl. The Sledmen. Travellers to Emmaus. xli. Hatmakers, Masons, and Laborers. Purification of Mary: Simeon and Anna prophesy. xlii. Escreueneres. Incredulity of Thomas. xliii. Tailoures. The Ascension. xliv. Potteres. Descent of the Holy Spirit. xlv. Draperes. The Death of Mary. xlvi. Wefferes. Appearance of our Lady to Thomas. xlvii. Osteleres. Assumption and Coronation of the Virgin. xlviii. Merceres. The Judgement Day.

(Fragment.) Inholders. Coronation of our Lady.

The majority of these plays were entered in the register about 1440. The fragment of a later play on The Coronation of Our Lady was added at the end of the fifteenth century. It was doubtless intended to supersede xlvii. Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden (iv) and The Purification of Mary, Simeon and Anna prophesy (xli) were inserted in 1558. The former is probably of the same date as the rest; the latter is thought by the editor to be later. It is misplaced both in the MS. and the printed text. It should follow xvii, but there was no room for it in the MS. Some notes, probably written when the plays were submitted to the Dean of York in 1579, state that xii, xviii, xxi, xxviii had been rewritten since the register was compiled.

The register does not represent quite all the plays ever performed at York. Spaces are left for The Marriage at Cana and Christ in the House of Simon the Leper, which were never written in; and the corporation archives refer to a play of Fergus or Portacio Corporis Mariae, which came between xlv and xlvi and was ‘laid apart’ in 1485; and to a scene of Suspencio Iudae, which was in 1422 an episode of xxxiii. In other respects the contents of the register agree substantially with the fifty-one plays of the Ordo paginarum entered by the Town Clerk in the Liber Memorandorum in 1415[936] and with the fifty-seven plays of a second Ordo of uncertain date which comes a little later in the same Liber[937]. The three lists show some variations in the grouping of the subject-matter into pageants, due to the constant shifting of responsibility amongst the crafts.

Literary Relations.

Davidson, 252 sqq., attempts to trace the growth of the York plays out of a parent cycle, from which the Towneley and Coventry plays borrowed. The biblical and apocryphal sources are discussed by L. Toulmin Smith, York Plays, xlvii; A. R. Hohlfeld, in Anglia, xi. 285; P. Kamann, Die Quellen der York-Spiele, in Anglia, x. 189; F. Holthausen, in Arch. f. d. Studium d. neueren Sprachen und Litteratur, lxxxv. 425; lxxxvi. 280; W. A. Craigie, in Furnivall Miscellany, 52. I have not been able to see O. Herrtrich, Studien zu den York Plays (Breslau Diss. 1886). There are textual studies by F. Holthausen as above, and in Philologische Studien (Sievers-Festgabe), 1896; E. Kölbing, in Englische Studien, xvi. 279; xx. 179; J. Hall, in Eng. Stud. ix. 448; Zupitza, in Deutsche Litteraturzeitung, vi. 1304; K. Luick, in Anglia, xxii. 384.

TOWNELEY PLAYS.

Manuscript.

Written in the second half of the fifteenth century, formerly in the library of Towneley Hall, long in the possession of Mr. Quaritch, the bookseller, and now in that of Major Coates, of Ewell, Surrey. There are thirty-two plays in all, but twenty-six leaves are missing.

Editions.

(a) 1822. Play xxx (Iudicium); F. Douce, for Roxburghe Club (Publications, No. 16).

(b) 1836. Play xiii (Secunda Pastorum); J. P. Collier, in Five Miracle-Plays.

(c) 1836. Complete cycle; for Surtees Soc. (It is uncertain whether the editor was J. Raine, J. Hunter, or J. S. Stevenson.)

(d) 1838. Plays viii, xiii, xxiii, xxv, xxx (Pharao, Secunda Pastorum, Crucifixio, Extractio Animarum ab Inferno, Iudicium); W. Marriott, English Miracle-Plays.

(e) 1867. Play iii (Processus Noe cum filiis), E. Mätzner, Altenglische Sprachproben, 360.

(f) 1875. Play ii (Mactacio Abel); T. Valke, Der Tod des Abel (Leipzig).

(g) 1885. Plays viii, xviii, xxv, xxvi, xxx (Pharao, Pagina Doctorum, Extraccio Animarum, Resurreccio Domini, Iudicium); L. Toulmin Smith, York Plays, 68, 158, 372, 397, 501 (not quite in full, for comparison with corresponding York plays).

(h) 1890. Play xiii (Secunda Pastorum), abridged; Pollard, 31.

(i) 1897. Cycle, G. England and A. W. Pollard, for E. E. T. S. (Extra Series, lxxi).

(k) 1897. Plays iii, v, vi, xiii (Processus Noe, Isaac, Iacob, Secunda Pastorum) from (i); Manly, i. 13, 58, 94.

The Cycle.

There are thirty-two extant plays, as follows:—

i. The Creation (The Barkers, Wakefeld). ii. Mactacio Abel (The Glovers). iii. Processus Noe cum filiis (Wakefeld). iv. Abraham (incomplete). v. [Isaac]. vi. Iacob. vii. Processus Prophetarum (incomplete). viii. Pharao (the Litsters or Dyers). ix. Cesar Augustus. x. Annunciacio. xi. Salutacio Elezabeth. xii. Una pagina Pastorum (Prima). xiii. Alia eorundem (Secunda). xiv. Oblacio Magorum. xv. Fugacio Iosep & Mariae in Egyptum. xvi. Magnus Herodes. xvii. Purificacio Mariae (incomplete at end). xviii. Pagina Doctorum (incomplete at beginning). xix. Iohannes Baptista. xx. Conspiracio (et Capcio). xxi. Coliphizacio. xxii. Fflagellacio. xxiii. Processus Crucis (et Crucifixio). xxiv. Processus Talentorum. xxv. Extraccio Animarum. xxvi. Resurreccio Domini. xxvii. Peregrini (the Fishers). xxviii. Thomas Indiae (et Resurreccio Domini). xxix. Ascencio Domini (incomplete). xxx. Iudicium. xxxi. Lazarus. xxxii. Suspencio Iudae (incomplete).

Plays xxxi and xxxii (a fragment) are obviously misplaced. The former should come between xix and xx; the latter, which is added to the MS. in an early sixteenth-century hand, between xxii and xxiii. Probably two plays at least are lost. Twelve leaves are missing after Play i, and twelve more after Play xxix. These doubtless contained plays of The Fall and Pentecost.

Literary Relations.

The Towneley Cycle is a composite one (Ten Brink, ii. 257; iii. 274; Davidson, 253; England-Pollard, xxi). Mr. Pollard distinguishes three fairly well-marked strata, and this classification is probably not exhaustive. There are (a) a group of plays of the ordinary didactico-religious type; (b) a group derived from the York plays in an earlier form than the extant text; (c) a group written by a single writer of marked power and a bold sense of humour. The plays of this group include iii, xii, xiii, xiv, xxi, and are, for literary quality, the pick of the vernacular religious drama. Mr. Pollard considers the cycle practically complete by about 1420. The horned female headdress (xxx. 269) which led the Surtees editor to put the composition in 1388, is found in miniatures of the later date. The relation of the cycle to that of York is also studied by Davidson, 271 sqq., and A. R. Hohlfeld, in Anglia, xi. 253, 285. Ten Brink, ii. 244; iii. 274, thinks that a much earlier (late thirteenth century) play is preserved in Plays v and vi (Isaac and Iacob). I agree with Mr. Pollard that this conjecture lacks proof.

A. Ebert has a study, Die englischen Mysterien, mit besonderer Berücksichtigung der Townley-Sammlung, in Jahrbuch f. rom. u. engl. Lit. i. 44, 131. The folk-lore incident of the Secunda Pastorum is supplied with parallels by E. Kölbing, in England-Pollard, xxxi, and by H. A. Eaton, in M.L.N. xiv. 265, from The Merry Tales of Gotham (H. Oesterley, A Hundred Merry Tales (1526), No. xxiv; Hazlitt, Shakespeare’s Jest-Books, iii. 4). There is an allusion to the ‘foles of Gotham,’ in Play xii. 180. J. Hugienen, in M.L.N. xiv. 255, finds in Play iv. 49 an adaptation of the French Viel Testament, 9511.

The Locality.

Douce described the manuscript for the sale of Towneley MSS. in 1814 as supposed to have ‘belonged to the Abbey of Widkirk, near Wakefield, in the county of York.’ In his Roxburghe Club edition of the Iudicium he substitutes the name of the Abbey of Whalley, near Towneley Hall. How far either of these statements or conjectures rests upon Towneley family tradition is unknown. Widkirk is merely another form (cf. Prof. Skeat, in Athenæum for Dec. 2, 1893) of Woodkirk, also called West Ardsley, a small place four miles north of Wakefield. There was not, strictly speaking, an abbey at Woodkirk, but a small cell of Augustinian canons, dependent upon the great house of St. Oswald at Nostel.

The MS. itself seems to bear witness to a connexion of the plays with the crafts of Wakefield. Play i is headed ‘Assit Principio, Sancta Maria, Meo. Wakefeld.’ In the margin of Play ii is written ‘Glover Pag.’ in a later hand. Play iii is headed ‘Processus Noe cum filiis. Wakefeld.’ In the margin of Play viii is ‘Litsters Pagonn’ in a later hand, and further down, in a third hand, is ‘lyster play.’ Under the title of Play xxvii is ‘fysher pagent’ in a later hand. Further in Play xiii is a mention of ‘Horbury Shroges,’ Horbury being a village two or three miles from Wakefield, and a ‘crokyd thorne’ which may be a ‘Shepherd’s Thorn’ near Horbury in Mapplewell. These indications are spread over the three groups of plays distinguished by Mr. Pollard, and certainly suggest that the whole cycle belonged to the Wakefield crafts. On the other hand, I find no hint of any plays in the local histories of Wakefield. The evidence for a connexion with Wakefield is strengthened by M. H. Peacock, The Wakefield Mysteries, in Anglia, xxiv. 509, from which it appears that there are places called Thornhill and Thornes to the E. and W. respectively of Horbury. Play ii, line 367 ‘bery me in gudeboure at the quarell hede’ points to Goodybower Close in Wakefield, which once had a quarry. Play xxiv, line 155 ‘from this towne vnto lyn’ suggests at least a borrowing from East Anglia.

Perhaps we may combine the data of the manuscript and of tradition by supposing that the plays were acted by the crafts of Wakefield, not in the town at Corpus Christi or Whitsuntide, but at one of the great fairs which the canons of Nostel held under charter at Woodkirk about the feasts of the Assumption (Aug. 15) and the Nativity (Sept. 8) of the Virgin. These fairs, run into one continuous horse fair, and known from a local family of Legh, as Lee fair, lasted until quite recently[938].

LUDUS COVENTRIAE.

Manuscript.

Brit. Mus. Cotton MS. Vespasian D. viii. Forty-two plays, the last incomplete. On f. 100ᵛ is the date 1468. At the beginning is written ‘Robert Hegge, Dunelmensis’ and before the twenty-ninth play ‘Ego R. H. Dunelmensis, Possideo: Ου κτησις αλλα χρησις.’ On the fly-leaf, in an Elizabethan hand, is ‘The plaie called Corpus Christi,’ and in the hand of Cotton’s librarian, Richard James, ‘Contenta Novi Testamenti scenice expressa et actitata olim per monachos sive fratres mendicantes: vulgo dicitur hic liber Ludus Coventriae, sive ludus Corporis Christi: scribitur metris Anglicanis.’ The following account was given by a later librarian, Dr. Smith, in his printed catalogue (1696) of the Cottonian MSS.: ‘A collection of plays, in Old English metre: h.e. Dramata sacra, in quibus exhibentur historiae veteris & N. Testamenti, introductis quasi in scenam personis illic memoratis quas secum invicem colloquentes pro ingenio finget Poeta. Videntur olim coram populo, sive ad instruendum sive ad placendum, a Fratribus mendicantibus representata.’

Editions.

(a) 1830. Plays i-v (Fall of Lucifer, Days of Creation and Fall of Adam, Cain and Abel, Noah’s Flood, Abraham and Isaac) in Dugdale, Monasticon Anglicanum (ed. 2). vi, pt. 3, 1534.

(b) 1836. Play x (Betrothal of Mary), Collier, Five Miracle-Plays.

(c) 1838. Plays xii, xiv (Doubt of Joseph, Trial of Mary), William Marriott, English Miracle-Plays.

(d) 1841. Cycle: J. O. Halliwell[-Phillipps] for Shakespeare Society.

(e) 1890. Play xi (Annunciation), Pollard, 44.

(f) 1897. Plays iv, xi (Noah’s Flood, Annunciation), Manly, i. 31, 82.

(g) A new edition of the complete cycle is promised in the ‘Extra Series’ of the Early English Text Society.

The Cycle.

The text is not definitely divided up into plays in the MS., although some such indication as an Explicit occasionally helps. Probably the following division is correct. Halliwell’s is clearly wrong, but for convenience of reference I give his numbers in brackets.

i. Fall of Lucifer (Halliwell, i). ii. Days of Creation. Fall of Adam (H. i, ii). iii. Cain and Abel (H. iii). iv. Noah’s Flood (H. iv). v. Abraham and Isaac (H. v). vi. Moses (H. vi). vii. Prophets (H. vii).

Then a prologue by Contemplacio, promising a ‘matere’ of ‘the modyr of mercy’ from her conception to the meeting with Elizabeth, and a ‘conclusyon.’

viii. Joachim and Anna (H. viii). ix. Mary in the Temple (H. ix). x. Betrothal of Mary (H. x). xi. Annunciation (H. xi).

Opens with scene between Contemplacio, Virtutes, Pater, Veritas, Misericordia, Iusticia, Pax, Filius.

xii. Doubt of Joseph (H. xii). xiii. Visit to Elizabeth (H. xiii).

This group of plays closes with the promised ‘conclusyon,’ namely ‘Ave regina coelorum,’ and Contemplacio disappears.

xiv. Trial of Mary (H. xiv). xv. Nativity (H. xv). xvi. Pastores (H. xvi). xvii. Magi (H. xvii). xviii. Purification (H. xviii). xix. Slaughter of Innocents (H. xix). xx. Death of Herod (H. xix). xxi. Dispute in Temple (H. xx). xxii. Baptism (H. xxi). xxiii. Temptation (H. xxii). xxiv. Woman Taken in Adultery (H. xxiii). xxv. Lazarus (H. xxiv). xxvi. Conspiracy of Jews (H. xxv). xxvii. Entry into Jerusalem (H. xxvi). xxviii. Last Supper (H. xxvii). xxix. Mount of Olives (H. xxviii).

Another group of scenes begins. Contemplacio, called in the stage direction ‘an exposytour, in doctorys wede,’ reappears; and after a procession has ‘enteryd into the place, and the Herowdys taken his schaffalde and Pylat and Annas and Cayphas here schaffaldys,’ says:—

‘Be the leve and soferauns of allemythty God, We intendyn to procede the matere that we lefte the last ȝere; ... The last ȝere we shewyd here how oure Lord for love of man Cam to the cety of Jherusalem mekely his deth to take; And how he made his mawndé. ... Now wold we procede, how he was browth than Beforn Annas and Cayphas, and sythe beforn Pylate: And so forth in his passyon how mekely he toke it for man.’

This group does not well bear splitting up into plays. The action is continuous, although it takes place now at one scaffold, now at another.

xxx. Herod desires to see Christ. Trial before Caiaphas (H. xxix, xxx). xxxi. Death of Judas. Christ before Pilate and Herod (H. xxx). xxxii. Pilate’s Wife’s Dream. The Condemnation (H. xxxi, xxxii). xxxiii. Crucifixion (H. xxxii, xxxiii). xxxiv. Longinus. Burial of Christ (H. xxxiv). xxxv. Harrowing of Hell. Resurrection (H. xxxv).

Here, possibly, the group ends. Then follow:—

xxxvi. Quem quaeritis (H. xxxvi). xxxvii. Hortulanus (H. xxxvii). xxxviii. Peregrini (H. xxxviii). xxxix. Incredulity of Thomas (H. xxxviii). xl. Ascension (H. xxxix). xli. Pentecost (H. xl). xlii. Assumption of Virgin (H. xli).

The Assumption play, according to Halliwell, is inserted in a hand of the time of Henry VIII.

xliii. Doomsday (H. xlii).

A few lines appear to be missing at the end.

In dividing the plays, I have been helped by a prologue which is put in the mouths of three Vexillatores. Says Primus:—

‘We purpose us pertly stylle in this prese, The pepyl to plese with pleys full glad. Now lystenyth us, lovely, bothe more and lesse, Gentyllys and ȝemanry of goodly lyff lad, This tyde.’

The Vexillatores then take turns to describe the ‘ffyrst pagent,’ ‘secunde pagent,’ and so on, up to ‘the xlᵗⁱ pagent.’ This should be ‘xlii,’ but by a slip two numbers are used twice. The prologue ends:—

‘A Sunday next, yf that we may, At vj of the belle we gynne oure play, In N. towne, wherfore we pray, That God now be ȝoure spede. Amen.’

The prologue so far agrees with the plays that it must have been written for them; but it was not written for them as they stand. It gives some of the incidents, especially of the trial scenes, in a different order from the text. Plays viii, xiii, xviii, xxvi, and xlii are omitted altogether. Of these xlii is a late interpolation in the text; but the fact that the numbers viii and xiii are skipped over in the enumeration, although the order in which the Vexillatores speak proceeds regularly, shows that the prologue is later in date than the text, and contemplates the omission of existing plays.

The Problem.

The exact nature of the Ludus Coventriae is a nice literary point. It is much doubted whether they have anything to do with Coventry at all. Cotton’s librarians regarded them as Coventry plays, acted not by craft-guilds, but by monks or begging friars. But what was their authority? The earliest possessor of the MS. who can be traced is Robert Hegge, a Durham man by birth, and a Fellow of C. C. C., Oxford. Hegge died in 1629, and probably the MS. then passed into Sir Robert Cotton’s collection through Richard James, who happened to be also a C. C. C. man, and was in the habit of picking up finds for Cotton in Oxford[939]. The note on the MS. may represent a tradition as to its origin gathered by James from Hegge.

With this note should be compared the following passage in Dugdale’s History of Warwickshire, referring to the house of Franciscans or Grey Friars at Coventry:—

‘Before the suppression of the monasteries, this city was very famous for the Pageants that were play’d therein, upon Corpus-Christi-day; which occasioning very great confluence of people thither from far and near, was of no small benefit thereto; which Pageants being acted with mighty state and reverence by the Friers of this House, had Theaters for the severall Scenes, very large and high, placed upon wheels, and drawn to all the eminent parts of the City, for the better advantage of Spectators: And contain’d the story of the New-Testament, composed into Old English Rithme, as appeareth by an antient MS. intituled Ludus Corporis Christi or Ludus Coventriae’ [in bibl. Cotton, sub effigie Vesp. D. 9].

‘I have been told by some old people, who in their younger years were eye-witnesses of these Pageants so acted, that the yearly confluence of people to see that shew was extraordinary great, and yielded no small advantage to this City[940].’

Dugdale, it is to be observed, has the MS. as one of his authorities, but he goes further than the librarians by ascribing the plays to a particular house of friars. Unfortunately his account will not hold water. He was born in 1605, and educated for five years in Coventry. Now there could have been no plays performed by the Grey Friars after 1538, for they were suppressed in that year. But the craft-plays survived, with great éclat, until 1580, and it is manifest that it is these plays which his informants described to him. They were acted on Corpus Christi day, obviously leaving no room for Grey Friars plays on the same day. The craft-plays seem to have been confined to the history of the New Testament (cf. p. 423), but the Ludus Coventriae is not. There is, however, a not very trustworthy bit of evidence which makes it just possible that the Grey Friars did act, not at Corpus Christi, but at Whitsuntide. This is the statement of the Coventry Annals that in 1492-3, Henry VII came to see the plays acted by the Grey Friars[941]. But the Annals only date from the seventeenth century, and they are not trustworthy (cf. p. 358) as to the history of the plays. I incline to think that the Grey Friars connexion is an Oxford guess of Hegge or his friends, which has found its way alike into the accounts of Richard James and Dugdale, and into the Annals. But is the connexion of the plays with Coventry also part of the guess, inspired by the fact that the Coventry mysteries, and these alone, obtained literary notice in the sixteenth century? Or have we Coventry guild-plays to deal with? The Ludus Coventriae is quite distinct from the two extant Coventry plays (p. 422); but those are of the sixteenth century, and appear to represent a recension in 1535 of ‘new plays’ produced, according to the Annals, in 1520 (p. 358). So far as this goes, the Ludus Coventriae might be the discarded fifteenth-century cycle of the Coventry crafts. Ten Brink points out certain features in the Ludus which seem, from the Cappers’ accounts extracted by Sharp, to have existed also at Coventry[942]. On the other hand, the Coventry plays, unlike the Ludus, seem to have been confined to the New Testament. The Ludus does not give those opportunities for showing off artisanship which are characteristic of other craft-cycles[943]. And, strongest of all, while the Coventry plays were processional, a study of the Ludus will make it quite clear that it was intended for a stationary performance. The ‘pagents’ contemplated by the prologue can only be episodes artificially distinguished in a practically continuous action. Often there is no well-marked break between pageant and pageant. The same personages appear and reappear in more than one; and the whole performance evidently takes place in and around a ‘place’ or locus interludii (Halliwell, 44) upon which are situated various ‘scaffolds’ or ‘stages[944],’ a heaven, a hell, a temple, a sepulchrum, and so forth. The navis for Noah is practicable, and can come and go.

If the plays are not from Coventry, can they be located elsewhere? They have been ascribed to Durham, but merely, I think, because Robert Hegge was ‘Dunelmensis.’ Mr. Pollard follows Ten Brink in assigning their dialect and scribal peculiarities to the North-East Midlands, and in ascribing them to a strolling company[945]. They regard ‘N. towne’ in the prologue as a common form (N = ‘nomen,’ as in the Church Catechism and Marriage Service). As to the dialect I offer no opinion; I am sorry not to have been able to see M. Kramer, Sprache und Heimath der Coventry-Plays. But I do not think that the strolling company is proved. The vexillatores may be merely proclaimers of banns sent round the villages hard by the town where the play was given. And ‘N.’ may be an abbreviation for a definite town name. Northampton (q.v.) has been suggested; but would not scan. Norwich (q.v.) would; and these might conceivably be a cycle played by the guild of St. Luke at Norwich before the crafts took the responsibility for the Whitsun plays from it. But the elaborate treatment of the legends of the Virgin suggests a performance, like that of the Lincoln plays, and of the Massacre of the Innocents in the Digby MS., on St. Anne’s day (July 26). It is to be observed that both these examples are in the E. Midland area to which philologists assign the text of the Ludus Coventriae.

Literary Relations.

Ten Brink, ii. 283, calls attention to the composite character of the cycle, in which groups of various origin are placed side by side without much attempt at imposing a literary unity upon them. He thinks, however, that all the plays received their form in the same part of England, and considers the dialect to be that of the North-East Midlands. In a note (iii. 276) he finds an analogy in the treatment of certain themes between the Ludus Coventriae and the Coventry plays proper. Davidson, 259, thinks that the author might have been ‘connected with one of the great religious houses of the Fen District.’ Hohlfeld (Anglia, xi. 219) has some interesting remarks on the cycle. It may be observed that Plays xxx-xxxv in my grouping are evidently taken from a cycle of which only a part was given in each year. The Purification and Presentation in the Temple of the Digby MS. affords a parallel example. Possibly Plays viii-xiii in which, as in Plays xxx-xxxv, Contemplacio appears, have the same source.

COVENTRY PLAYS.

[See also account of Ludus Coventriae.]

Manuscripts.

A copy, probably the ‘original’ of the Shearmen and Tailors’ play, was in the possession of Thomas Sharp. It is described in a colophon as ‘T[h]ys matter nevly correcte by Robert Croo the xiiijᵗʰ day of marche fenysschid in the yere of owre lorde god MCCCCC & xxxiiijᵗᵉ [1534/5].’ At the end are three songs, with the date 1591. A similar copy of the Weavers’ play ‘nevly translate be Robert Croo in the yere of oure Lorde God Mlvᶜ xxxiiijᵗᵉ ... yendide the seycond day of Marche in yere above sayde,’ was ‘unexpectedly discovered in 1832,’ and a transcript made by Sharp. This also has songs at the end, but no date. The collections of Sharp passed into the Staunton collection at Longbridge House, and thence into the Shakespeare Memorial Library at Birmingham, where they were burnt in 1879.

Editions.

(a) 1817. Shearmen and Tailors Play. Thos. Sharp in a series, separately paged, of Illustrative Papers of the History and Antiquities the City of Coventry. [Reprinted 1871 under editorship of W. G. Fretton.]

(b) 1825. Shearmen and Tailors’ Play. Reprinted from (a) by Thomas Sharp, with full illustrative matter, in A Dissertation on the Coventry Mysteries, 83.

(c) 1836. Weavers’ Play. J. B. Gracie for the Abbotsford Club.

(d) 1838. Shearmen and Tailors’ Play. William Marriott, English Miracle-Plays.

(e) 1897. Shearmen and Tailors’ Play. Manly, i. 120, from (b).

(f) 1902. Weavers’ Play. Edited from (c) by F. Holthausen, in Anglia, xxv. 209.

(g) 1903. Shearmen and Tailors’ Play. A. W. Pollard, in Fifteenth Century Prose and Verse (English Garner), 245.

(h) Both plays are being edited by H. Craig for the E. E. T. S.

The Cycle.

The Shearmen and Tailors’ Play has a prologue by ‘Isaye the profet.’ Then follow in order, the Annunciation, the Doubt of Joseph, the Journey to Bethlehem, the Nativity and Shepherds, a dialogue of two ‘Profettis,’ Herod and the Magi, the Flight to Egypt, the Massacre of the Innocents. The Weavers’ Play must have followed next in the cycle. It opens with a dialogue of two ‘Profetae’. Then come the Presentation in the Temple and the Dispute with the Elders. The subjects of four of the other plays can be pretty clearly identified. The Smiths’ accounts show them to have played the Trial and Crucifixion, to which was added in 1573 the ‘new play’ of the Death of Judas; the Descent from the Cross passed through various hands from the Pinners and Needlers in 1414 to the Coopers in 1547; the Cappers’ accounts point to the Resurrection, Harrowing of Hell, and Quem quaeritis, with from 1540 the ‘Castell of Emaus’; and those of the Drapers to Doomsday. It is difficult to say how many plays remain unidentified. The crafts were grouped and regrouped, and the total number of plays may have varied. But it would seem that besides the crafts already named, the Mercers, Whittawers, Girdlers, Cardmakers, and Tanners were playing in the middle of the fifteenth century. The ‘jest’ quoted on p. 358 points to a Pentecost play with the ‘xij Articles of the Creed,’ similar to that of Chester. It is noticeable that no Old Testament play can be established at Coventry.

Literary Relations.

These plays, of which the Weavers’ Play was, until recently, difficult to procure, have been but little studied. Two communications by C. Davidson and A. R. Hohlfeld in Modern Language Notes, vii. 184, 308, call attention to the fact that the larger part of the dialogue in the Dispute in the Temple scene is practically the same as that common to the York, Towneley, and Chester plays (cf. York Plays, 158, and A. R. Hohlfeld in Anglia, xi. 260).

NEWCASTLE-UPON-TYNE.

Manuscript.

The Shipwrights’ Play of Noah’s Ark was in the hands of its first editor, Henry Bourne; but is not known to be now preserved (Holthausen, 32).

Editions.

(a) 1736. Noah’s Ark; or, The Shipwrights’ Ancient Play or Dirge; in H. Bourne, Hist. of Newcastle, 139.

(b) 1789. Reprint of (a) in J. Brand, Hist. of Newcastle, ii. 373.

(c) 1825. Reprint of (a) in T. Sharp, Dissertation on Coventry Mysteries, 223.

(d) 1897. F. Holthausen, in Göteborg’s Högskola’s Ärsskrift, and separately.

(e) 1899. R. Brotanek, in Anglia, xxi. 165.

Both (d) and (e) are founded on Bourne’s text; but Brotanek has endeavoured to restore what he considers to have been the probable MS. text. This he dates, conjecturally, at about 1425-50.

The Cycle.

The Shipwrights’ play deals with the Making of the Ark, but stops short of the Deluge. The personages are Deus, Angelus, Diabolus, Noah, Uxor Noah. The subjects of most of the plays of the other crafts can be recovered, as follows:—

Creation of Adam. Noah’s Ark. Offering of Isaac. Israel in Egypt. Kings of Cologne. Flight into Egypt. Baptism. Last Supper. Bearing of Cross. Burial of Christ. Descent into Hell. Burial of Our Lady.

Of these, two, the Creation of Adam and the Flight into Egypt, were maintained, in 1454, by one craft, the Bricklayers and Plasterers. The Merchant Adventurers, in 1552, paid for ‘fyve playes, whereof the towne must pay for the ostmen playe.’ There are six guilds whose plays are not known; so that the total number may have been as many as twenty-three[946].

The accounts of the Merchant Adventurers also include in 1554 and 1558 charges in and about ‘Hoggmaygowyk’ or ‘Hogmagoge[947].’ I do not think, with Holthausen, that this was one of the Corpus Christi plays. I think it was a spring or summer folk-feast. One of the London ‘giants’ is Gogmagog.

NORWICH.

Manuscript.

The extracts, made early in the seventeenth century from the Grocers’ Book, and in the possession (1856) of Mr. Fitch, included two versions of the play of the Fall. The first was copied into the Book in 1533. It is headed The Story of yᵉ Creac̄on of Eve, wᵗ yᵉ expellyng of Adam & Eve out of Paradyce. It ends with a ‘dullfull song,’ perhaps the ‘newe ballet’ paid for in 1534 (cf. p. 388). It appears to have a lacuna. The second version is ‘newely renvid & accordynge unto yᵉ Skrypture, begon thys yere Aᵒ 1565. Aᵒ 7 Eliz.’ It is quite a new text. It is provided with two speeches by a Prolocutor, one to be used ‘when yᵉ Grocers Pageant is played wᵗ owte eny other goenge befor yᵗ,’ the other for use ‘yf ther goeth eny other Pageants before yᵗ.’ The former speaks of the ‘Pageants apparellyd in Wittson dayes’ that ‘lately be fallen into decayes.’

Editions.

(a) 1856. Robert Fitch in Norfolk Archaeology, v. 8, and separately.

(b) 1897. Manly, i. 1, from (a).

The Cycle.

The Grocers’ play begins in both versions with the creation of Eve. The first ends with the expulsion from Paradise. The dramatis personae are Pater, Adam, Eva, Serpens. In the second is added an Angel, and after the expulsion Adam and Eve depart ‘to yᵉ nether parte of yᵉ Pageants,’ are threatened by Dolor and Myserye, and comforted by the Holy Ghost.

A list, dating probably from 1527, makes it possible to complete the outline of the cycle[948]:—

Creation off the world. Paradyse [Grocers’ play]. Helle Carte. Abell & Cain. Noyse Shipp. Abraham & Isaak. Moises & Aaron, with the Children of Israel & Pharo with his Knyghts. Conflict off David and Golias. The Birth off Christ with Shepherds and iij Kyngs of Colen. The Baptysme of Criste. The Resurrection. The Holy Gost.

ABRAHAM AND ISAAC (Dublin MS.).

Manuscript.

Trinity College, Dublin, MS. D. iv. 18, f. 16ᵛ. In the same hand are a list of mayors and bailiffs of North[ampton] up to 1458 and a brief chronicle, in which N[orthampton] recurs.

Editions.

(a) 1836. J. P. Collier, in Five Miracle-Plays.

(b) 1899. R. Brotanek, in Anglia, xxi. 21.

Literary Relations.

The play has probably no connexion with Dublin, beyond the fact that the MS. is there. Brotanek conjectures from the character of the MS. that it belongs to Northampton (cf. p. 386). The dialect appears to be South Midland of about the first half of the fifteenth century, and the text to be based on the corresponding play (xi) in the Viel Testament (Julleville, Les Myst. ii. 363).

ABRAHAM AND ISAAC (Brome MS.).

Manuscript.

‘The Book of Brome,’ a commonplace book of 1470-80 in the possession of Sir Edward Kerrison of Brome Manor, Norfolk.

Editions.

(a) 1884. L. T. Smith, in Anglia, vii. 316.

(b) 1886. L. T. Smith, in A Commonplace Book of the Fifteenth Century.

(c) 1887. W. Rye, in Norfolk Antiquarian Miscellany, iii. 1.

(d) 1897. Manly, i. 41, from (a) and (b).

Literary Relations.

The play is 465 lines long. There is an epilogue by a Doctor, but no title or prologue, and nothing to show that it was, or was not, part of a cycle. The text is probably derived from a common source with that of the corresponding Chester play: cf. Pollard, 185; A. R. Hohlfeld, in M. L. N. v. 222.

F. Holthausen has some critical notes on the text in Anglia, xiii. 361.

CROXTON PLAY: THE SACRAMENT.

Manuscript.

Trinity College, Dublin, MS. F. 4. 20, of the latter half of the fifteenth century.

Editions.

(a) 1861. Whitley Stokes, in Transactions of Philological Society, 1860-1 (Appendix).

(b) 1897. Manly, i. 239.

There is a prologue by two Vexillatores, ending—

‘And yᵗ place yow, thys gaderyng that here yˢ, At Croxston on Monday yᵗ shall be sen; To see the conclusyon of this lytell processe Hertely welcum shall yow bene. ... Now, mynstrell, blow vp with a mery stevyn!’

Then comes a title: ‘Here after foloweth the Play of the Conversyon of Ser Jonathas the Jewe by Myracle of the Blyssed Sacrament.’ The play is 927 lines long, with occasional lines in Latin. It ends with a Te Deum. The colophon runs: ‘Thus endyth the Play of the Blyssyd Sacrament, whyche myracle was don in the forest of Aragon, in the famous cite Eraclea, the yere of ower Lord God Mˡcccc.lxi, to whom be honower. Amen!’ This account of the event on which the play is founded is confirmed by ll. 56-60 of the prologue. The date of composition cannot therefore be earlier than 1461, and probably is not much later. After the colophon is a list of the dramatis personae, who are twelve in all, and the note ‘IX may play it at ease,’ signed ‘R.C.’ The name Croxton is common to places in Norfolk, Cambridgeshire, Leicestershire, and other counties. Further identification may perhaps be helped by ll. 540-1—

‘Inquyre to the Colkote, for ther ys hys loggyng, A lytylle besyde Babwelle Mylle.’

The stage-directions imply a ‘place,’ with ‘stages’ for the chief players, a ‘tabyll,’ and a ‘chyrche’ (ll. 149, 288, 305, 445).

F. Holthausen has some textual criticism on the play in Englische Studien, xvi. 150, and Anglia, xv. 198.

SHREWSBURY FRAGMENTS.

On these, which are transitional between the liturgical play and the miracle-play proper, cf. p. 90.

DIGBY PLAYS.

[Authorities.—The best edition is that of Dr. Furnivall. The careful study by K. Schmidt, published partly as a Berlin dissertation (1884), partly in Anglia, viii (1885), 371, should be consulted.]

Manuscript.

Bodleian Digby MS. 133. The dramatic contents of this composite manuscript are as follows:—(i) f. 37. The Conversion of St. Paul. This is written in a single hand, except that a second has inserted on f. 45 a scene between two devils, Belial and Mercury. At the end (f. 50ᵛ), is ‘ffinis conuercionis sancti pauli.’ There is a prologue, headed Poeta, against which has been written in a later hand ‘Myles Blomefylde.’ Schmidt, Diss. 6, identifies a Miles Blomefylde as a monk of Bury born in 1525. (ii) f. 95. St. Mary Magdalen, written in the second hand of (i). At the beginning are the initials M. B.; at the end (f. 145) ‘Explycit oreginale de sancta Maria magdalena.’ (iii) f. 146. Massacre of Innocents and Purification, written in the first hand of (i). At the beginning is ‘candelmes day & the kyllynge of the children of Israell, anno domini 151’; at the end ‘Anno domini Millesimo, cccccxij,’ and after a list of ‘The Namys of the Pleyers’ the entry ‘Ihon Parfre ded wryte thys booke.’ None of these notes seem to be in the hand of the text. (iv) f. 158. Fragment of morality of Mind, Will, and Understanding, found complete in the Macro MS. (cf. p. 437), in a hand apparently distinct from those of (i), (ii), (iii). This also has ‘M. B.’ at the beginning.—The texts in the MS. are probably early sixteenth-century copies of late fifteenth-century plays. There is nothing to show that Parfre or Blomfield was concerned in the authorship. They may have been the copyists. If Blomfield was really the monk of Bury born in 1525, he was probably only an owner of the MS.

Editions.

(a) 1773. Massacre of Innocents, in T. Hawkins, Origin of the English Drama.

(b) 1835. Massacre of Innocents, Conversion of St. Paul, St. Mary Magdalen, in T. Sharp, Ancient Mysteries from the Digby Manuscripts (Abbotsford Club).

(c) 1838. Massacre of Innocents, in W. Marriott, English Miracle-Plays.

(d) 1882. Complete series in F. J. Furnivall, The Digby Mysteries (New Shakspere Soc., reprinted in 1896 for E. E. T. S.).

(e) 1890. St. Mary Magdalen (part only), from (d), in Pollard, 49.

(f) 1897. Conversion of St. Paul, from (d), in Manly, i. 215.

The Plays.

The plays appear to have been accidentally brought together in one MS., and should be treated separately for the purposes of literary history.

A. Conversion of St. Paul.

Schmidt, Diss. 28, assigns this to an East Midland author, and a Southern scribe. The play opens with a prologue by the Poeta who speaks of ‘owr processe.’ In the first scene or ‘station,’ Saul starts for Damascus and ‘rydyth forth with hys seruantes a-bout the place & owt of the place.’ There is a ‘conclusyon’ by the ‘Poeta—si placet,’—

‘ffynally of this stacon we mak a conclusyon, besechyng thys audyens to folow and succede with all your delygens this generall processyon.’

After a stage-direction ‘ffinis Istius stacionis, et altera sequitur,’ the Poeta introduces another ‘prosses,’—

‘Here shalbe brefly shewyd with all our besynes At thys pagent saynt poullys conuercyon.’

This scene takes place outside and in Damascus. There is a tempest, and ‘godhed spekyth in heuyn.’ Saul meets Ananias, and ‘thys stacion’ is concluded by the Poeta, and ‘ffinis istius secunde stacionis et sequitur tarcia.’

Again the Poeta calls on the audience ‘To vnderstond thys pagent at thys lytyll stacion.’ Saul returns to Jerusalem, preaches and plans to escape over the wall in a basket. Here the later hand inserted the devil scene. The Poeta has his ‘Conclusyo,’ which ends:—

‘Thys lytyll pagent thus conclud we as we can, lackyng lytturall scyens; besechyng yow all of hye and low degre, owr sympylnes to hold excusyd, and lycens, That of Retoryk haue non intellygens; Commyttyng yow all to owr lord Ihesus, To whoys lawd ye syng,—Exultet celum laudibus.’

The play, but for the devil scene, follows closely the biblical narrative. It was probably written for a small village, and for scene had a platea, and two loca, for Damascus and Jerusalem (with possibly a third for heaven). The audience moved with the actors from one ‘station’ or ‘pageant’ to the other, and back again. A later hand has inserted marginal directions for a ‘Daunce’ at various points in the speeches of the Poeta.

B. St. Mary Magdalen.

Schmidt, Anglia, viii. 385, assigns this to a West Midland author and Kentish scribe. Furnivall, 53, thinks the dialect East Midland. The plot covers the whole legendary life of the Magdalen, as it appears in the Golden Legend. The characters are very numerous, and include Satan and other devils, with allegorical figures such as the ‘Kyngs of the World and the Flesch’ and the ‘Seven Dedly Synnes.’ The action is not in any way divided in the manuscript, and implies an elaborate stationary mise en scène with various loca. These include the ‘castell of Maudleyn’ or Magdalum, thrones for the Imperator, who opens the play by calling for silence, Herod and Pilate, ‘a stage, and Helle ondyr-neth that stage’ for ‘the prynse of dylles,’ Jerusalem with a ‘place,’ an ‘erbyr’ or arbour, a tavern, the ‘howse of symont leprovs,’ a sepulchrum for Lazarus, and another for the Quem quaeritis and Hortulanus scenes which are introduced, a palace for the King of ‘Marcylle’ (Marseilles), a heathen temple, a ‘hevyne’ able to open, a lodge for the Magdalen in Marcylle, another castle, a rock, and a wilderness. There is also a practicable ship which goes to and from Marcylle (l. 1395 ‘Here xall entyre a shyp with a mery song’; l. 1445 ‘Her goth the shep owt of the place’; l. 1717 ‘Ett tunc navis venit in placeam’; l. 1797 ‘tunc remigat a montem’; l. 1879 ‘et tunc navis venit adcirca plateam’; l. 1915 ‘et tunc remigant a monte’; l. 1923 ‘Here goth the shep owȝt ofe the place’). The play ends with a Te Deum; but the following lines, added after the Explicit, suggest that the author had readers as well as spectators in mind:—

‘yff Ony thyng Amysse be, blame connyng, and nat me: I desyer the redars to be my frynd, yff ther be ony amysse, that to amend.’

C. Massacre of the Innocents.

Assigned by Schmidt, Diss. 18, to a Midland author and Southern scribe. Against the title of the play has been written, in a hand identified as that of the chronicler Stowe, ‘the vij booke.’ Evidently the play was one of a series, spread over successive years, and given on Saint Anne’s day (July 26). This is shown by the opening speech of a Poeta, from which I extract:—

‘This solenne fest to be had in remembraunce Of blissed seynt Anne moder to our lady, ... The last yeer we shewid you in this place how the shepherdes of Cristes birth made letificacion, And thre kynges that came fro ther Cuntrees be grace To worshipe Iesu, with enteer deuocion; And now we purpose with hooll affeccion To procede in oure mater as we can, And to shew you of our ladies purificacion That she made in the temple, as the vsage was than. ... ffrendes, this processe we purpose to pley as we can before you all, here in your presens, To the honour of god, our lady, & seynt Anne, besechyng you to geve vs peseable Audiens And ye menstrallis, doth your diligens, & ye virgynes, shewe summe sport & plesure, These people to solas, & to do god reuerens, As ye be appoynted; doth your besy cure! ¶ Et tripident.’

The action includes the Wrath of Herod, with a comic knight, Watkin, the Flight into Egypt, the Massacre of the Innocents, the Death of Herod, the Purification. The stage-directions mention a ‘place’ and a ‘tempill.’ In the latter are the virgins, who ‘tripident’ with Anne at the end. The Poeta excuses the ‘rude eloquens’ and ‘sympyll cunnyng’ of his company, promises ‘the disputacion of the doctours’ for next year, and calls on the minstrels and virgins for a final dance.

D. Morality of Wisdom.

See Texts (ii), s.v. Macro Morals.

BURIAL AND RESURRECTION.

Manuscript.

Bodleian MS. e Museo, 160, f. 140. Furnivall, vii. 166, asserts that this once formed part of the Digby MS. 133, but offers no proof. The copy seems to date from the early fifteenth century. After the Explicit, in a later hand, is ‘written by me ...’; unfortunately the name is torn off. Lines here and there in the earlier part of the piece have been crossed out.

Editions.

(a) 1843. Wright and Halliwell, Reliquiae Antiquae, ii. 124.

(b) 1882. F. J. Furnivall, The Digby Plays, 171 (New Shakspere Soc., reprinted 1896 for E. E. T. S.).

See study by K. Schmidt in Anglia, viii. 393.

The Play.

Schmidt assigns the play to a writer whose dialect was a mixture of Northern and East Midland forms; Morris to a Northern author and West Midland scribe. Ten Brink, ii. 287, also thinks it to be Northern, and to date from 1430-60. Apparently the author set out to write, not a drama, but a narrative poem, mainly in dialogue. The first fifteen lines are headed ‘The prologe of this treyte or meditatione off the buryalle of Criste & mowrnynge therat,’ and contain a request to ‘Rede this treyte.’ The first 419 lines have a few narrative phrases introducing the speeches, such as ‘Said Maudleyn,’ ‘Said Joseph.’ At this point the writer seems to have stopped these, crossed out such as he had already written, and inserted in the margin of his second page,—

‘This is a play to be playede, on part on gudfriday after-none, & the other part opon Esterday after the resurrectione, In the morowe, but at the begynnynge ar certene lynes [the prologue] which must not be saide if it be plaiede, which (... a line cut off).’

The Good Friday scene is an elaborate planctus. It is opened by Joseph of Arimathea, and the three Maries. Then comes Nicodemus, and the body of Christ is taken from the cross. The Virgin Mary enters with St. John, and the planctus is resumed. The body is laid in the sepulchre, and the scene is closed with—

‘Thus her endes the most holy Beriall of the body of Crist Iesu.’

The Easter morning scene begins with—

‘Her begynnes his resurrection On pashe daye at Morn.’

It contains a Quem quaeritis, a scene of lamentation between Peter, Andrew, and John, a Hortulanus, with a second apparition to all three Maries. They sing the first part of the Victimae paschali, ‘in cantifracto vel saltem in pallinodio,’ and the Apostles come in for the dialogue part. Then the tidings are announced, and Peter and John visit the sepulchre; after which, ‘Tunc cantant omnes simul Scimus Christum vell aliam sequentiam aut ympnum de resurrectione.’

UNIDENTIFIED PLAYS.

(i) C. Hastings, Le Théâtre Français et Anglais, 167, says:—

‘Il existe, en plus des quatre cycles de Mystères dont nous avons parlé dans les chapitres précédents, une cinquième collection (manuscrit), propriété d’un simple particulier, M. Nicholls.’

(ii) W. C. Hazlitt, Manual for the Collector and Amateur of Old English Plays, 274, says:—

‘Mr. F. S. Ellis told me (Dec. 10, 1864) that a gentleman at Leipsic then had a fragment of a large sheet on which was printed in types formed from a block and of a very large size an English Miracle-Play. In its perfect state it seems to have been intended to attach to a church door or any other suitable place.’

CORNWALL.

i. Origo Mundi: Passio Domini: Resurrexio Domini.

Manuscripts.

(i) Bodl. MS. 791. Fifteenth century, with some alterations and additional stage-directions in a later hand. The text is Cornish, not earlier in date than the fourteenth century. Mr. Pedler (Norris, ii. 506) puts it, not very convincingly, at the end of the thirteenth.

(ii) Bodl. MS. 28,556. Seventeenth-century copy of (i), with an English translation of the larger part of the text by John Keigwyn, of Mousehole, 1695.

Edition.

1859. In Edwin Norris, The Ancient Cornish Drama, from (i), with modern translation by the editor.

Analysis.

The text forms three dramas, intended, as the closing words of the first two show, for performance on three consecutive days. At the end of each is a diagram of the disposition of the pulpita or tenti (cf. p. 391) for the day. The action on each day is continuous, but for the sake of comparison I divide it into scenes. These are sometimes indicated by a Hic incipit or similar formula.

(1) Hic Incipit Ordinale de Origine Mundi.

Fall of Lucifer (line 48). Creation and Fall of Man (1-437). Cain and Abel (438-633). Seth in Paradise, and Death of Adam (634-916). Noah and the Flood (917-1258). Abraham and Isaac (1259-1394). Moses and the Exodus (1395-1708). Moses in the Wilderness (1709-1898). David and the Rods (1899-2104). David and Bathsheba (2105-2376). Building of the Temple (2377-2628). Prophecy of Maximilia (2629-2778). Bridge over Cedron (2779-2824).

The diagram gives Celum, Tortores, Infernum, Rex Pharao, Rex Dauid, Rex Sal[omon], Abraham, Ortus.

(2) Hic Incipit Passio Domini Nostri Jhesu Christi.

Temptation (1-172). Entry into Jerusalem (173-330). Cleansing of the Temple (331-392). Healing of Bartimaeus (393-454). Jesus in House of Simon the Leper (455-552). Conspiracy of Jews (533-584). Treachery of Judas (585-616). Last Supper (617-930). Gethsemane (931-1200). Jesus before Caiaphas (1200-1504). Remorse and Death of Judas (1505-1566). Jesus before Pilate (1567-1616). Jesus before Herod (1617-1816). Condemnation (1817-2533), including— Dream of Pilate’s Wife (1907-1968, 2193-2212). Cross brought from Cedron (2534-2584). Bearing of the Cross (2585-2662). Crucifixion (2663-2840). Casting of Lots (2841-2860). Death of Jesus (2861-3098), including— Planctus Mariae (2925-2954). Longinus (3003-3030). Harrowing of Hell (3031-3078). Descent from Cross (3099-3201). Burial (3202-3216).

The diagram gives Celum, Tortores, Doctores, Pilatus, Herodes, Princeps Annas, Cayaphas, Centurio.

(3) Hic Incipit Ordinale de Resurrexione Domini Nostri Jhesu Christi.

Release of Joseph and Nicodemus (1-96, 307-334, 625-662). Harrowing of Hell, resumed (97-306). Setting of Watch (335-422). Resurrection (423-678). Quem quaeritis (679-834). Hortulanus (835-892). Incredulity of Thomas (893-1230, 1345-1586). Peregrini (1231-1344). Death of Pilate (1587-2360), including— Veronica and Tiberius (1587-2360). Ascension (2361-2630).

The diagram gives Celum, Tortores, Infernum, Pilatus, Imperator, Josep Abar[imat], Nichodemus, Milites.

At the end of (1) and (3) the minstrels are directed to pipe for a dance.

Locality.

Mr. Norris prints an opinion of Mr. Pedler that the place-names suggest the neighbourhood of Penrhyn, and that the plays may have been composed in the collegiate house, hard by, of Glasney.

ii. Creation of the World.

Manuscripts.

(i) Bodl. 219, with colophon ‘Heare endeth the Creacion of the worlde wᵗʰ noyes flude wryten by William Jordan: the xiiᵗʰ of August, 1611.’ The text is Cornish, with English stage-directions containing forms earlier than 1611.

(ii) Bodl. 31,504 (MS. Corn. C. 1). Copy of (i), with English translation by John Keigwyn, 1693, written by ‘H. Usticke.’

(iii) Harl. 1867. Similar copy of (i), with Keigwyn’s translation.

(iv) MS. belonging (in 1864) to J. C. Hotten the bookseller, containing also a copy of the narrative Passion or Mount Calvary.

Editions.

(a) 1827. The Creation of the World, with Noah’s Flood. Edited from (iii) by Davies Gilbert (with Keigwyn’s translation).

(b) 1864. Gwreans an Bys. The Creation of the World. Edited from (i), with a [new] translation by Whitley Stokes, as appendix to Transactions of Philological Society (1863).

The Play.

The text is headed ‘The first daie [of] yᵉ playe’ and ends with a direction to minstrels to pipe for dancing, and an invitation to return on the morrow to see the Redemption. It is, therefore, probably unfinished. It appears to be based, with certain additions, on the Origo Mundi. It is continuous, but may be divided as follows:—

Creation and Fall of Lucifer (1-334). Temptation and Fall (335-1055). Cain and Abel. Birth of Seth (1056-1430). Death of Cain (1431-1726). Visit of Seth to Paradise (1727-1964). Death of Adam (1965-2093). Seth and Enoch (2094-2210). Noah’s Flood (2211-2530).

iii. St. Meriasek.

Manuscript.

In Hengwrt MSS. of Mr. Wynne at Peniarth. Cornish Ordinale de Vita Sancti Mereadoci Episcopi et Confessoris, written by ‘dominus Hadton’ in 1504. At the end is a circular diagram.

Edition.

1872. Beunans Meriasek: The Life of Saint Meriasek. Edited and translated by Whitley Stokes.

Locality.

Mr. Stokes suggests Camborne, of which place St. Meriasek was patron. The play invokes St. Meriasek and St. Mary of Camborne at the close.

II. POPULAR MORALITIES.

THE PRIDE OF LIFE.

Manuscript.

Written in two hands of the first half of the fifteenth century on blank spaces of a Computus of Holy Trinity Priory, Dublin, for 1343, preserved in the Irish Record Office, Dublin (Christ Church collection).

Editions.

1891. J. Mills in Proceedings of Royal Soc. of Antiquaries of Ireland.

1898. Brandl, 2.

Cf. H. Morley, English Writers, vii. 1730.

The play was probably written early in the fifteenth century. The dialect is that of the South of England, not far from London, modified by Northern scribes.

Only a fragment (502 ll.) is preserved, but a prologue gives the plot. There is no title; but ‘[A mens]ke gam schal gyn & ende’ (l. 7), and ‘[Of Kyng of] lif I wol ȝou telle’ (l. 17). The extant characters are Rex Vivus, Primus Miles Fortitudo, Secundus Miles Sanitas, Regina, Nuntius Mirth, Episcopus. The King rejoices with Mirth and his soldiers, and Queen and Bishop vainly call on him to repent. Later in the play Death and Life strove for the King, and Death took him. He was claimed by the ‘ffendis,’ but ‘oure lady mylde’ prayed to have him.

The play was out of doors (l. 10); the King had a tentorium which could be closed (l. 306); the Bishop sat on his ‘se’ (sedes); and so probably with the other actors, except Mirth, who perhaps came in ‘oure þe lake’ (l. 269); cf. Brandl, xix.

MACRO MORALS.

Manuscripts.

(a) Macro MS., formerly in the possession of Mr. Cox Macro, now in that of Mr. Gurney, of Keswick Hall, Norfolk. The MS. appears from a gloss in Mankind (l. 674; cf. Brandl, xxvi), naming King Edward, to have been written during the reign of Edward IV (1461-1483). At the end of two of the plays is the name of Hyngham, a monk, to whom the MS. belonged.

(b) Digby MS. 133, on which cf. p. 428, has on f. 158 the first 754 lines of Mind, Will, and Understanding. The handwriting is said to be the same as that of the Macro MS. (Collier, ii. 207).

[A complete edition of the three moralities of the Macro MS. has long been contemplated by the E. E. T. S.]

i. The Castle of Perseverance.

Edition.

1890. Pollard, 64 (408 lines only).

Pollard dates the play not later than the middle of the reign of Henry VI. It contains about 3,500 lines.

The subject is the struggle of good and bad qualities for Humanum Genus. On the one side are Malus Angelus and Mundus, Belial, and Caro, aided by the Seven Deadly Sins and Voluptas, Stultitia, Detractio: on the other Bonus Angelus, with Confessio, Schrift, Penitencia, and the Six Divine Graces. Amongst other episodes Humanum Genus is besieged in the Castle of Perseverance. At the end Misericordia, Iustitia, Pax, Veritas, dispute in heaven, and Pater sedens in trono inclines to mercy.

The indications of mise en scène are very valuable. On the first leaf of the MS. is a diagram of the playing place, reproduced by Sharp, 23. There is a large circle with a double circumference, in which is written, ‘This is the watyr a bowte the place, if any dyche may be mad ther it schal be pleyed; or ellys that it be stronglye barryd al a bowte: & lete nowth ower many stytelerys be withinne the plase.’ Within the circle is a rude representation of a castle, and above, ‘This is the castel of perseveranse that stondyth in the myddys of the place; but lete no men sytte ther for lettynge of syt, for ther schal be the best of all.’ Beneath the castle is a small bed, with the legend, ‘Mankynde is bed schal be under the castel, & ther schal the sowle lye under the bed tyl he schal ryse & pleye.’ At the side is a further direction, ‘Coveytyse cepbord schal be at the ende of the castel, be the beddys feet.’ Outside the circle are written five directions for scaffolds, ‘Sowth, Caro skaffold—West, Mundus skaffold—Northe, Belial skaffold—North Est, Coveytyse skaffold—Est, deus skaffold.’ At the foot of the page are some notes for costume: ‘& he that schal pley belyal, loke that he have gunne powder brennyng in pypys in his hands and in his ers, and in his ars whanne he gothe to batayle. The iiij dowters schul be clad in mentelys, Mercy in wyth, rythwysnesse in red al togedyr, Trewthe in sad grene, & Pes al in blake, and they schul pleye in the place al to gedyr tyl they brynge up the sowle.’

There is a prologue by two vexillatores, who declare—

‘These percell in propyrtes we spose us to playe, This day sevenenyt before you in syth, At N on the grene in ryal aray.’

They add that they will ‘be onward be underne of the day’ (9 a.m.).

ii. Mind, Will, and Understanding.

Editions.

1835. T. Sharp, Ancient Mysteries (Abbotsford Club, 754 lines from Digby MS.).

1837. W. B. D. D. Turnbull (Abbotsford Club, the rest from Macro MS.).

1882. F. J. Furnivall, Digby Plays, 139 (754 lines only).

Lucifer seduces Mind, Will, and Understanding. These are the three parts of Anima, who enters with devils running from under her skirts. Everlasting Wisdom effects a re-conversion. There are a number of mute persons attendant on the chief characters, whose coming and going, ‘dysgysyde,’ create scenic effects, as in a masque. There are minstrels and a hornpipe, songs and dances. At one point Lucifer snatches up ‘a shrewde boy’ (perhaps from the audience), and carries him off. An allusion to the Holborn quest suggests a London origin, but Schmidt (Anglia, viii. 390) thinks the dialect to be that of the north border of the West Midlands.

iii. Mankind.

Editions.

1897. Manly, i. 315.

1898. Brandl, 37.

The text is 901 lines long. A list of place-names (l. 491) makes it probable that it belongs to the borders of Norfolk and Cambridgeshire.

Mercy and Mischief, the latter helped by Nought, New Gyse, Nowadays, and the devil Titivillus, essay in turns to win the soul of Mankind.

The scene is divided. Part represents a tavern, of which Titivillus is host; part a ‘deambulatorye’ outside. A reference to the spectators (l. 29) runs, ‘O ȝe souerens, þat sytt, and ȝe brotherne, þat stonde ryghte wppe’: cf. Brandl, xxxii.

THE SUMMONING OF EVERYMAN.

Editions.

[1509-1530.] Richard Pynson (fragment in B. M.).

[1509-1530.] Richard Pynson (fragment in Bodl.).

[1521-1537.] John Skot. ‘Here begynneth a treatyse how the hye fader of heuen sendeth dethe to somon euery creature to come and gyue a counte of theyr lyues in this Worlde, and is in maner of a morall playe’ (B. M. and Huth Library).

[1529-1537.] John Skot (in St. Paul’s Churchyard).

There are modern editions by Hawkins (1773, vol. i), Gödeke (1865), Hazlitt-Dodsley (1874. vol. i), Pollard (1890, part only, and in full in Fifteenth Century Prose and Verse, 1903), H. Logeman, Elckerlijk and Everyman (1892), F. Sidgwick (1902). Another is announced in a series edited by I. Gollancz.

There are about 900 lines. Pollard, 202, assigns the text to the end of the fifteenth century; Ten Brink, ii. 302, to the reign of Edward IV. Prof. H. Logeman, Elckerlijk (1892), argues the play to be an English version of the closely similar Dutch Elckerlijk, attributed to Petrus Dorlandus of Diest, but K. H. de Raaf, Spyeghel der Salicheyt van Elckerlijk (1897), would invert the relation: cf. Brandl, xiv. The characters are Messenger, God, Death, Everyman, Fellowship, Kindred, Goods, Good Deeds, Knowledge, Confession, Beauty, Strength, Discretion, Five Wits, Angel, Doctor. The Messenger prologizes. God sends Death for Everyman, who finds that no one will accompany him save Good Deeds. The Doctor epilogizes. There are no indications of the mise en scène, except that there was a central scaffold for the ‘House of Salvation’ (Gödeke, 174, 200, cf. Brandl, xx).

THE WORLD AND THE CHILD.

Editions.

An Oxford bookseller, John Dorne, had a copy of ‘mundus, a play’ in 1520[949].

1522. Wynkyn de Worde. ‘Here begynneth a propre newe Interlude of the Worlde and the chylde, otherwyse called (Mundus & Infans)....’

1523. Wynkyn de Worde.

There are a reprint by Lord Althorp (Roxburghe Club, 1817) and modern editions in Hazlitt-Dodsley, vol. i; Manly, i. 353.

The dramatis personae are Mundus or the World, Infans or Dalliance or Wanton or Love-Lust and Liking or Manhood or Shame or Age or Repentance, Conscience, Folly, Perseverance. The representative of Man in various ages is alternately won over to good and evil. There are 979 lines. Collier, ii. 224; Pollard, li, assign the play to the reign of Henry VII; Brandl, xlii, thinks that the use of the Narrenmotif points to a date of composition not long before that of publication. Mundus says, ‘Here I sette semely in se’ (l. 22), and Manhood ‘Here in this sete sytte I’ (l. 285).

JOHN SKELTON. (Magnificence.)

Skelton was born, probably in Norfolk, about 1460. He studied at Cambridge and acquired fame as a scholar. Both universities honoured him with the degree of poeta laureatus. He was tutor to Henry VIII as a boy, and became rector of Diss in Norfolk. But he died in sanctuary at Westminster (1529), driven there on account of his bitter satires against Wolsey. In his Garland of Laurell (pr. 1523), a late work, he has a list of his writings, including—

‘Of Vertu also the souerayne enterlude: ... His commedy, Achademios callyd by name: ... And of Soueraynte a noble pamphelet; And of Magnyfycence a notable mater.’

Bale, Scriptores, i. 652, ascribes to him Comoediam de uirtute, Lib. 1; De magnificentia comoediam, Lib. 1; Theatrales ludos, Lib. 1; De bono or dine comoediam, Lib. 1. Magnificence is, however, his only extant play.

Warton (Hazlitt-Warton, iii. 287) describes a piece shown him by William Collins, the poet, at Chichester, about 1759. He says:—

‘It is the Nigramansir, a morall Enterlude and a pithie, written by Maister Skelton laureate, and plaid before the King and other estatys at Woodstoke on Palme Sunday. It was printed by Wynkyn de Worde in a thin quarto, in the year 1504. It must have been presented before Henry VII, at the royal manor or palace at Woodstock in Oxfordshire, now destroyed. The characters are a Necromancer or conjurer, the devil, a notary public, Simony, and Philargyria or Avarice. It is partly a satire on some abuses in the church.... The story, or plot, is the trial of Simony and Avarice.’

Warton proceeds to describe the action at some length. Nothing further is known of the play. Ritson, Bibliographia Poetica, 106, said ‘it is utterly incredible that the Nigramansir ... ever existed,’ and Mr. H. E. D. Blakiston (Eng. Hist. Rev. for April, 1896) has called attention to several cases in which Warton showed mala fides as a literary historian. In another place (iii. 310) Warton incidentally calls the piece ‘Skelton’s The Trial of Simonie.’ E. G. Duff, Hand Lists of English Printers, Part i, knows of no extant copy.

Magnificence.

Editions.

[1529-1533.] John Rastell. ‘Magnyfycence, a goodly interlude and a mery, deuysed and made by mayster Skelton, poet laureate, late deceasyd.’ Folio.

1533. John Rastell. Quarto.

1821. J. Littledale (Roxburghe Club).

1843. A. Dyce, Poetical Works of Skelton, i. 225.

1890. Pollard, 106 (extract).

The characters are Felicity, Liberty, Measure, Magnificence, Fancy, Counterfeit Countenance, Crafty Countenance, Cloked Collusion, Courtly Abusion, Folly, Adversity, Poverty, Despair, Mischief, Good Hope, Redress, Sad Circumspection, Perseverance. The plot shows Magnificence brought low by evil counsellors, and restored by good ones. The players come in and out of ‘the place.’ There are 2,596 lines. The play was written later than 1515, as a reference to the liberality of the dead Louis of France (l. 283) must intend Louis XII who died in that year, not the niggard Louis XI.

SIR DAVID LYNDSAY. (Ane Satyre of the Thrie Estaitis.)

Sir David Lyndsay ‘of the Mount’ in Fifeshire was born in 1490. By 1511 he was employed in the royal household, first as an actor or musician, then as ‘Keeper of the Kingis Grace’s person.’ In 1529 he became Lyon King at Arms, a post which included the charge of court entertainments. His satire did not spare the church, and he seems to have been in sympathy with Knox and other reformers, but he did not so far commit himself as to endanger his office, which he held until his death in 1555.

The Thrie Estaitis.

Performances.

(i) Jan. 6, 1540, Linlithgow, before James V. This performance, the first of which there is any satisfactory evidence, was described by Sir W. Eure in a letter to Cromwell (Ellis, Original Letters, 3rd Series, iii. 275; Brewer-Gairdner, xv. 36), enclosing a ‘Copie of the Nootes of the Interluyde.’ The version seems to have been different from that now extant. ‘Solaice’ figured as the presenter. Eure mentions the ‘scaffald’ and ‘the interluyds of the Play.’ He adds that, as a result, James V admonished the Bishops to reform their ways.

(ii) June 7 (Whit-Tuesday), 1552, Cupar of Fife. The Bannatyne MS. (see below) has the ‘Proclamation maid at Cowpar of Fyffe, upon the Castell-hill, 7 June, beginning at seven.’ This was therefore the extant version. The year is fixed by an incidental reference to the day (June 7) as Whit-Tuesday.

(iii) 1554 (?), Edinburgh. Henry Charteris, in his preface to Lyndsay’s Warkis of 1568 (Laing, iii. 231), says of the ‘makar’s’ relations to the clergy, ‘Sic ane spring he gaif thame in the Play, playit besyde Edinburgh, in presence of the Quene Regent, and are greit part of the Nobilitie, with ane exceding greit nowmer of pepill, lestand fra ix houris afoir none till vj houris at evin.’ The Bannatyne MS. gives the play as ‘maid in the Grenesyd besyd Edinburgh,’ and ‘in anno 155-ȝeiris.’ Cf. Appendix W, p. 366.

Editions.

(a) 1602. Robert Charteris. ‘Ane satyre of the thrie estaits, in commendation of vertew in vituperation of vyce. Maid be Sir Dauid Lindesay of the Mont, alias, Lyon King of Armes.’

Diligence, as presenter, summons the three estates before Rex Humanitas. Many ‘Vycis’ and other allegorical personages appear before the Rex on his ‘royall sait.’ In ll. 1288-1411 comes the first interlude (although the term is not used in the text) of ‘The Sowtar and Tailor.’ At l. 1931 is the ‘End of the First Part of the Satyre,’ with the direction, ‘Now sall the Pepill mak collatioun: then beginnis the Interlude: the Kings, Bischops, and principal Players being out of their seats.’ This interlude introduces the Pauper, Pardoner, Sowtar, and others. Part ii begins at l. 2298. At l. 4283, ‘Heir sall enter Folie,’ and at l. 4483, ‘Heir sall Folie begin his Sermon, as followis.’ The theme is, of course, Stultorum numerus infinitus, and at the close the preacher names recipients of his ‘Follie Hattis or Hudes’ (cf. ch. xvi). At l. 4629, the people are finally dismissed to dance and drink, Diligence calling on a minstrel.

(b) †1568. Bannatyne MS. (ed. Hunterian Club, 1873-1896, Part iv).

George Bannatyne included in his collection of pieces by the Scots ‘makaris’ (a) the ‘Proclamation’ at Cupar of Fife (see above), (b) a preliminary interlude, not in Charteris’s edition, of a Cottar, an Auld Man and his Wife, a ‘Fuill,’ &c.; (c) seven extracts from the play, headed, ‘Heir begynnis Schir Dauid Lyndsay Play maid in the Grenesyd besyd Edinburgh, quhilk I writtin bot schortly be Interludis, levand the grave mater thereof, becaws the samyne abuse is weill reformit in Scotland, praysit be God, quhairthrow I omittit that principall mater and writtin only Sertane mirry Interludis thairof verry pleasand, begynnyng at the first part of the Play.’

1869. F. Hall, Works of Lindsay, Pt. iv (E. E. T. S. o. s. 37).

1879. D. Laing, Works of Lindsay, vol. ii.

[Other editions are enumerated by Laing, iii. 259. There is an analysis of the play in T. F. Henderson, Scottish Vernacular Literature, 219.]

III. TUDOR MAKERS OF INTERLUDES.

HENRY MEDWALL.

Medwall was chaplain to John Morton, cardinal and Archbishop of Canterbury (1486-1500), who is probably the ‘my lord’ of Nature, i. 1438. Besides Nature, he wrote an interlude ‘of the fyndyng of Troth, who was carried away by ygnoraunce and ypocresy,’ played by the King’s players before Henry VIII at Richmond on Jan. 6, 1514. The ‘foolys part’ was the best, but the play was too long to please the King (cf. p. 201). See also s.v. Lucrece (p. 458).

Nature.

Editions.

[1530-4.] William Rastell. ‘A goodly interlude of Nature compyled by mayster Henry Medwall,’ &c.

1898. Brandl, 73.

There are two ‘partes’ of the ‘processe’ (i. 1434). The first (1439 ll.) has Mundus, Worldly Affection, Man, Nature, Innocency, Reason, Sensuality, Privy Council, Pride, a Boy, Shamefastness. In the second (1421 ll.), on a different day, some of these recur, with Bodily Lust, Wrath, Envy, Sloth, Gluttony, Humility, Charity, Abstinence, Liberality, Chastity, Good Occupation, and Patience. The personages come in and out at ‘dorys’ (i. 728) and sit down on ‘stole’ or ‘chayr.’ There was also a fire (ii. 518 sqq.). Probably the scene was in a room. At the end ‘they syng some goodly ballet.’

JOHN HEYWOOD.

John Heywood was born either in London or at North Mimms in Hertfordshire, about 1497. He is claimed as a member of Broadgates Hall, afterwards Pembroke College, Oxford. From about 1515 he was employed at Court; in 1519 he is called a ‘singer,’ later a ‘player at virginals,’ and finally he was master of a company of children, possibly the singing-school of St. Paul’s. His advancement with Henry VIII and the Princess Mary is ascribed to Sir Thomas More, whose kinsman he became. More’s sister Elizabeth married John Rastell, lawyer and printer. John Heywood’s wife was their granddaughter, Elizabeth. It may be added that their daughter, another Elizabeth, was the mother of John Donne. Heywood took More’s line in Church matters, but conformed to the Act of Supremacy. He was in high favour under Mary, and at her death retired to Malines. He was alive in 1577, but dead in 1587.

Heywood’s extant interludes are all early work; although Bale, writing in 1557 (Scriptores, ed. 2, ii. 110), only ascribes to him De Aura, comoediam; De Amore, tragoediam; De quadruplici P. The Pardoner and Friar, which mentions Leo X as alive, must be before 1521. Love and the Four Ps may be about as early: the rest may belong to the following decade (Brandl, li). In 1538 Heywood showed a play of children before Mary (Madden, 62). In 1539, Wolsey paid him for a masque of Arthur’s Knights, or Divine Providence, at court (Brewer, xiv. (2) 782). In 1553 he set out a play of children at court (Loseley MSS. 89). At Mary’s coronation he sat in a pageant under a vine against the school in St. Paul’s Churchyard and made speeches (Holinshed (1808), iv. 6).

See W. Swododa, J. Heywood als Dramatiker (1888).

Plays.

i. The Pardoner and the Friar.

Editions.

1533. Wyllyam Rastell. ‘A mery Play betwene the pardoner and the frere, the curate and neybour Pratte.’

There are modern editions in F. J. Child, Four Old Plays (1848); Hazlitt-Dodsley, vol. i; Pollard, 114 (extract).

The scene of the action is supposed to be a church. About 1,000 lines. The date of composition was under Leo X (1513-1521).

ii. Love.

Editions.

1533. William Rastell. ‘A play of loue, A newe and mery enterlude concerning pleasure and payne in loue, made by Ihon̄ Heywood.’

[Unique copy in Magd. Coll., Camb. See Greg, Plays, 143.]

[1546-1586.] John Waley.

[Unique copy, without title-page, in Bodl., bound with Weather and Four Ps. (Bodl. 4ᵒ, P. 33, Jur.). Copies of these three plays, with one now lost, of ‘Old Custom,’ are mentioned in an inventory of the effects of John, Earl of Warwick, 1545-1550 (Hist. MSS. ii. 102).]

1898. Brandl, 159.

Little more than a series of disputations between Lover Loved, Lover not Loved, Loved not Loving, and No Lover nor Loved. There are 1,573 lines. Towards the end, ‘Here the vyse cometh in ronnynge sodenly aboute the place among the audiens with a hye copyn tank on his bed full of squybs fyred.’

iii. Four Ps.

Editions.

[1541-1547.] William Myddleton. ‘The playe called the foure P. P. A newe and very mery enterlude of A palmer. A pardoner. A poticary. A pedler. Made by Iohn Heewood.’

[1549-1569.] William Copland.

1569. John Allde.

There are modern editions in W. Scott, Ancient British Drama, vol. i (1810): Hazlitt-Dodsley, vol. i; Manly, i. 483.

[Copyright, with that of Love and Weather transferred, Jan. 15, 1582, from late Sampson Awdeley to John Charlwood (Arber, ii. 405). The Four Pees is mentioned with other early plays in Sir Thomas More (Shakes. Soc. 1844).]

There are no indications of mise en scène. There are 1,236 lines.

iv. Weather.

Editions.

1533. William Rastell. ‘The Play of the wether. A new and very mery enterlude of all maner wethers made by Iohn̄ Heywood.’

[1564-1576.] Anthony Kytson.

1898. Brandl, 211.

1903. Gayley, 19.

The characters are Jupiter, Merry Report, ‘the vyce,’ Gentleman, Merchant, Ranger, Water Miller, Wind Miller, Gentlewoman, Launder, A Boy (‘the lest that can play’). All in turn petition different weather from Jupiter. The piece is 1,255 lines long. Jupiter has his ‘thron’ (l. 179).

v. John, Tib and Sir John.

Editions.

1533/4. William Rastell. ‘A mery play between Iohan Iohan the husbande, Tyb his wyfe and Syr Ihān the preest.’

1819. Chiswick Press.

1898. Brandl, 259.

1903. Gayley, 61.

The action proceeds in the ‘place’ (l. 667), which represents Johan’s house with a fire (ll. 399, 460). The door of the priest’s chamber is also visible (ll. 316, 673). There are 680 lines.

vi. Witty and Witless.

Manuscript.

Harl. MS. 367.

Edition.

1846. F. W. Fairholt (Percy Soc.). ‘A dialogue concerning witty and witless.’

Thomas Hacket entered the ‘pleye of wytles’ on S. R. in 1560-1 (Arber, i. 154). This piece is a mere dialogued débat or estrif.

vii. Gentleness and Nobility.

[1516-1533.] John Rastell. ‘Of Gentylnes and Nobylyte. A dyaloge ... compilid in maner of an enterlude with diuers toys and gestis addyt therto to make mery pastyme and disport.’

1829. J. H. Burn.

This resembles Witty and Witless in character. It is only conjecturally assigned to Heywood. The copy in the British Museum of Rastell’s edition (C. 40, i. 16) has a mounted woodcut portrait with the initials I. H., but I do not know whether that really belongs to it.

JOHN BALE.

[Authorities.—Collier, i. 123; ii. 159; Ward, i. 173; Lives of Bale in D. N. B. (article by Mandell Creighton) and Cooper, Athenae Cantabrigienses; his own works, especially Illustrium Maioris Britanniae Scriptorum Catalogus (1548, ed. 2, 1557-9, i. 704) and Vocacyon to Ossory (Harl. Miscellany, ed. 1808, i. 328); editions of plays named below, especially that of Schröer.]

John Bale was born in 1495 at Cove, near Dunwich, in Suffolk. He was placed as a boy in the Carmelite convent of Norwich, thence went to that of Holn, or Holm, in Northumberland, and finally to Jesus College, Cambridge. He took orders, but was converted to Protestantism by Lord Wentworth, and married a ‘faithful Dorothy.’ He became vicar of Thorndon, in Suffolk, and earned the protection of Thomas Cromwell ob editas comoedias. Cromwell’s accounts (Brewer, xiv. 2. 337) show payments to him for plays on Sept. 8, 1538, at St. Stephen’s, Canterbury, and on Jan. 31, 1539. At his patron’s fall in 1540 he fled to Germany, and joined vigorously in polemic. In his Epistel Exhortatorye of an Inglyshe Christian (1544), written under the pseudonym of Henry Stalbridge, he says: ‘None leave ye unvexed and untrobled—no, not so much as the poore minstrels, and players of enterludes, but ye are doing with them. So long as they played lyes, and sange baudy songes, blasphemed God, and corrupted men’s consciences, ye never blamed them, but were verye well contented. But sens they persuaded the people to worship theyr Lorde God aryght, accordyng to hys holie lawes and not yours, and to acknoledge Jesus Chryst for their onely redeemer and saviour, without your lowsie legerdemains, ye never were pleased with them.’ He returned in 1547, and in 1548 printed in his Scriptores the following list of his ‘in idiomate materno, comedias sub vario metrorum genere.’

1. ‘Lib. 14. Vitam D. Ioannis Baptistae. 2. Com. 1. de Christo duodenni. 3. Com. 2. de baptismo & tentatione. 4. Com. 1. de Lazaro resuscitato. 5. Com. 1. de consilio pontificum. 6. Com. 1. de Simone leproso. 7. Com. 1. de coena Domini & pedum lotione. 8. Com. 2. de passione Christi. 9. Com. 2. de sepultura & resurrectione. 10. Lib. 2. super utroque regis coniugio. 11. Lib. 2. de sectis Papisticis. 12. Lib. 2. erga Momos et Zoilos. 13. Lib. 2. Proditiones Papistarum. 14. Lib. 1. contra adulterantes Dei verbum. 15. Lib. 2. de Ioanne Anglorum rege. 16. Lib. 1. de imposturis Thomae Becketi. 17. Lib. 1. de magnis Dei promissionibus. 18. Lib. 1. de predicatione Ioannis. 19. Lib. 1. de Christi tentatione. 20. Lib. 1. Corruptiones legum divinarum. 21. Lib. 1. Amoris imaginem. 22. Lib. 4. Pammachii tragoedias transtuli.’

As Bale gives a Latin translation of the opening words of each piece, his five extant plays can be identified with those I have italicized. It is to be noted that Nos. 18 and 19 have the same subject as No. 3, which seems to form part of a complete Passion cycle (Nos. 2-9).

In 1547 Bale was made rector of Bishopstoke, Hants, in 1551 of Swaffham, Norfolk, and in 1553 Bishop of Ossory, in Ireland. On the day of the proclamation of Queen Mary he had some of his plays performed at the market-cross of Kilkenny (cf. p. 374). But he had to take refuge at Basle, and on the accession of Elizabeth found himself too old to resume his see, and retired on a prebend in Canterbury Cathedral, where he died in 1563.

Plays.

i. God’s Promises.

Editions.

(i) 1577. ‘A Tragedye or enterlude manyfestyng the chefe promyses of God vnto man by all ages in the olde lawe, from the fall of Adam to the incarnacyon of the lorde Jesus Christ. Compyled by John Bale, An. Do. 1538, and now fyrst imprynted 1577. [List of characters.] Iohn Charlwood for Stephen Peele, 1577.’

(ii) n.d. [Another edition]. ‘Compyled by Johan Bale, Anno Domini M.D.XVXXVIII.’ B. L.

(iii) 1874. Hazlitt-Dodsley, i. 277 (and in all earlier editions of Dodsley, from 1744).

A prologue by Baleus prolocutor is followed by seven ‘Actes,’ in which Adam, Noah, Abraham, Moses, David, Esaias, Iohannes Baptista discourse in turn with Pater Coelestis. Each Act ends with one of the pre-Christmas antiphons known as the seven Oes (cf. vol. i. p. 344), to be sung by a ‘Chorus cum organis’ in Latin or English. Baleus Prolocutor epilogizes, ending ‘More of thys matter conclude hereafter we shall.’ This play is practically a Prophetae.

ii. John Baptist.

Editions.

(i) n.d. ‘A Brefe Comedy or Enterlude of Johan Baptystes preachynge in the Wyldernesse; openynge the craftye assaultes of the hypocrytes, with the gloryouse Baptyme of the Lorde Jesus Christ. Compyled by Johan Bale, Anno M.D.XXXVIII.’

(ii) 1744. Harleian Miscellany, i. 97.

Praefatio by Baleus Prolocutor. Then Incipit Comoedia. Bale has a final speech. The Interlocutores are Pater Coelestis, Ioannes Baptista, Publicanus, Pharisaeus, Iesus Christus, Turba vulgaris, Miles armatus, Sadducaeus.

iii. Temptation.

Editions.

(i) n.d. ‘A brefe Comedy or enterlude concernynge the temptacyon of our Lorde and sauer Iesus Christ, by Sathan in the desart. Compyled by Iohan Bale, Anno M.D.XXXVIII.’

(ii) 1870. A. B. Grosart, Miscellanies of Fuller Worthies Library, vol. i.

Praefatio by Baleus Prolocutor. Then Incipit Comoedia. Bale has a final speech. The other Interlocutores are Iesus Christus, Satan tentator, Angelus primus, Angelus alter. The play calls itself an ‘Acte.’

[These three plays closely resemble each other. They were all written at Thorndon in 1538, and are markedly Protestant in tone. They were also all performed at Kilkenny, on Aug. 20, 1553.]

iv. Three Laws.

Editions.

(i) n.d. A Comedy concernynge thre lawes, of nature, Moses, and Christ, corrupted by the Sodomytes Pharysees and Papystes. Compyled by Johan Bale. Anno M.D.XXXVIII.

Colophon: Thus endeth thys Comedy [&c.]. Compyled by Johan Bale. Anno M.D. XXXVIII, and lately inprented per Nicolaum Bamburgensem.

(ii) 1562. Edition by Thomas Colwell.

(iii) A. Schröer, in Anglia, v. 137.

The play may have been written in 1538, but the allusions (ll. 2073, 2080) to King Edward and the Lord Protector show that it was revised after 1547. It is not, like (i), (ii), and (iii), a miracle-play, but a morality, and its Protestantism is far more advanced and polemical than theirs. It is 2,081 lines long, and has five Actus, with the usual Praefatio by Baleus Prolocutor. The other Interlocutores are Deus pater, Natura lex, Moseh lex, Christi lex vel Euangelium, Infidelitas, Idololatria, Sodomismus, Ambitio, Auaricia, Pseudodoctrina, Hypocrisis, Vindicta Dei, Fides Christiana. At the end is a note how ‘Into fyue personages maye the partes of thys Comedy be deuyded,’ and another for ‘The aparellynge of the six vyces or frutes of Infydelyte.’

v. King John.

Manuscript.

In possession of the Duke of Devonshire, found amongst papers probably belonging to the Corporation of Ipswich. Written in two hands, of which one is believed to be Bale’s.

Editions.

(i) 1838. Ed. J. P. Collier for Camden Soc.

(ii) 1890. Extract in Pollard, 146.

(iii) 1897. Manly, i. 525, from (i).

‘Kynge Johan’ contains 2,656 lines, but is divided into ‘ij playes,’ i.e. Acts. At l. 1119 is a reference to ‘the seconde acte’ and a ‘Finit Actus Primus.’ There are nineteen personages—Kynge Johan, Ynglond, Clargy, Sedycyon, Cyvyle Order, Stevyn Langton, Commynalte, Nobylyte, Cardynall Pandulphus, Pryvat Welth, Dissimulacyon, Raymundus, Symon of Swynsett, Usurpyd Power, The Pope, Interpretour (a presenter), Treasor, Veryte, Imperyall Majestye—but these are marked with brackets to show that they can be taken by nine actors. The play is strongly Protestant. It was doubtless written before 1548, as ‘Lib. 2. de Ioanne Anglorum Rege’ are included in Bale’s Scriptores list of that year. Collier, i. 123, quotes a deposition as to ‘an enterlude concernyng King John’ performed ‘in Christmas tyme [1538-9] at my Lorde of Canterbury’s’ which was certainly anti-Papal, and was probably Bale’s. But the extant text has undergone a later revision, for the prayer at the end is for Elizabeth. Fleay, Hist. of Stage, 62, conjectures that it was performed upon her visit to Ipswich in August, 1561. There was probably a single stage or pageant. The characters enter and go out. At l. 1377 Sedycyon speaks ‘extra locum’; at l. 785 is the phrase ‘Ye may perseyve yt in pagent here this hower.’

NICHOLAS GRIMALD.

Grimald was the son of a Genoese clerk in the service of Henry VII. He migrated from Christ’s College, Cambridge, to Oxford, where, after a short stay at Brasenose, he became Fellow and Lecturer first of Merton in 1540, then of Christ Church in 1547. To this period belong his Latin plays, and the bulk of his lyrics and other poems in Tottel’s Miscellany. He was widely read in theology and scholarship, and was chosen chaplain to Bishop Ridley, for whom he did much controversial work. Under Mary in 1555 he was imprisoned, but escaped by a recantation. He was dead before 1562. Bale, Scriptores (1557), i. 701, ascribes to him amongst other writings:—

Archiprophetae tragoediam. Famae comoediam. Christum nascentem. Christum redivivum. Protomartyrem. Athanasium, seu infamiam. Troilum ex Chaucero, comoediam.

Of these the first and fourth survive; of the others some can only be conjecturally put down as plays.

†1540. Christus Redivivus.

Editions.

1543. Gymnicus, Cologne. Christus redivivus. Comoedia tragica, sacra et nova. Authore Nicolao Grimaoldo.

1899. J. M. Hart, in Publications of the Modern Language Association of America, xiv. No. 3.

The dedication is dated, ‘Oxoniae, e Collegio Martonensi. Anno 1543’; but according to the account of the play given therein by the author, it was performed by the pubes of B. N. C. before he joined Merton.

1547. Archipropheta.

Manuscript.

Brit. Mus. Royal MS. 12 A. 46.

Edition.

1548. Gymnicus, Cologne. Archipropheta, Tragoedia iam recens in lucem edita. Autore Nicolao Grimoaldo.

The dedication is dated 1547. The play is divided into Acts and Scenes, and has choruses. It deals with the story of John the Baptist. Herford, 116, suggests a possible influence from the Iohannes Decollatus (1546) of Jakob Schöpper of Dortmund (Bahlmann, Lat. Dr. 93).

NICHOLAS UDALL.

[Authorities.—Bale, Scriptores (1557), i. 717; Ward, i. 254; Pearson, ii. 413; Kempe, 63, 90; S. L. Lee, s.v. Udall in D. N. B.; T. Fowler, Hist. of C. C. C. 370; Maxwell-Lyte, Hist. of Eton (3rd ed. 1899), 117; J. W. Hales, _The Date of the First English Comedy_, in Englische Studien, xviii (1893), 408; E. Flügel, _Nicholas Udall’s Dialogues and Interludes_, in Furnivall Miscellany (1901), 81.]

Life.

Nicholas Udall, Uvedale, Owdall, Woodall, or Yevedall, was born in Hampshire in 1505, and educated at Winchester and Corpus Christi College, Oxford, where he held an informal lectureship in 1526-8. He was an early Oxford exponent of Lutheran views. In 1532 he assisted Leland in preparing verses for the London pageants at the coronation of Anne Boleyn. From 1533-7 he was vicar of Braintree, Essex, and not improbably wrote the play of Placidas, alias Sir Eustace, recorded in 1534 in the churchwardens’ accounts. But from 1534 he was also head master of Eton. Thomas Cromwell’s accounts for 1538 include ‘Woodall, the schoolmaster of Eton, for playing before my Lord, £5’ (Brewer, xiv. 2. 334). In 1541 he left Eton, under an accusation of theft and other misbehaviour. But he found favour with Katharine Parr, Somerset, and Edward VI through literary and theological work, was made tutor to Edward Courtenay and obtained in 1551 a prebend at Windsor, and in 1553 the living of Calborne, Isle of Wight. He had not, however, so far committed himself on the Protestant side as to make it impossible to conform under Mary. He was tutor to Bishop Gardiner’s household, and either in 1553 or 1554 became head master of Westminster. Here he remained to his death in 1556. A letter of Mary in 1554 states that he had ‘at soondrie seasons’ shown ‘dialogues and enterludes’ before her, and requires the Revels office to provide him with ‘apparell’ for his ‘devises’ at the coming Christmas. The Revels accounts for the year mention ‘certen plaies’ made by him, but the items referring to them cannot be disentangled from those for masks given at the same Christmas. Bale does not mention Udall in the 1548 edition of his Scriptores, but in that of 1557 he gives a list of works ‘Latine et Anglice,’ including ‘Comoedias plures, Lib. 1,’ and adds that he ‘transtulit’ for Katherine Parr, ‘tragoediam de papatu.’ When Elizabeth was at Cambridge on Aug. 8, 1564, ‘an English play called Ezekias made by Mr. Udal’ was given before her by King’s College men (Nichols, Progr. of Eliz. i. 186).

Roister Doister.

Editions.

[1566-7. In this year the play was entered on the Stationers’ Registers to Thomas Hacket, and to this edition the unique copy, without title-page or colophon, presented in 1818 to the Eton College library, probably belongs.]

1818. Briggs.

1821. F. Marshall.

1830. Thomas White, in Old English Drama, vol. i.

1847. W. D. Cooper, for Shakespeare Society.

1869. E. Arber, in English Reprints.

1874. Hazlitt-Dodsley, iii. 53.

1897. J. M. Manly, ii. 3 (based on Arber).

1903. E. Flügel, in C. M. Gayley, Representative English Comedies, 105.

The play is divided into Actus and Scenae, and is called in a prologue, which refers to Plautus and Terence, a ‘comedie, or enterlude.’ The prayer at the end is for a ‘queene’ who protects the ‘Gospell.’ Probably Elizabeth is meant. This, however, must be later in date than that of the play itself, which has been fixed by Prof. Hales to 1553-4, on the ground that a passage in it is quoted in the third edition (1553 or 1554) of T. Wilson’s Rule of Reason, but not in the earlier editions of 1550-1 and 1552. Prof. Hales thinks that Udall was master of Westminster as early as 1553, and wrote it for the boys there. If Wilson’s date is 1554, the play may have been one of those given at court in the Christmas of 1553.

IV. LIST OF EARLY TUDOR INTERLUDES.

Pre-Controversial Moralities.

The dramatis personae are all abstractions, with an occasional moral type, such as Hickscorner, or a social type, such as a Taverner.

1. †1486-1501. Henry Medwall. Nature.

See s.v. Medwall.

2. †1513. Hickscorner.

[1501-35.] W. de Worde. Hyckescorner.

[1546-86.] J. Waley.

Fragments of unidentified editions are described by Greg, Plays, 139. On Jan. 15, 1582, the copyright was transferred from the late Sampson Awdeley to John Charlwood (Arber, ii. 405). Modern reprints are in Hawkins, vol. i; Hazlitt-Dodsley, vol. i; Manly, vol. i. There are 1,026 lines. Ten Brink, iii. 125, dates the play at about the beginning of the sixteenth century. Collier, ii. 227, and Ward, i. 119, place it in the reign of Henry VII, whose ship, the Regent, is named. Brandl, xxviii, notes that this is spoken of (l. 356) as sunk, which occurred in 1513. This is one of the ‘auncient Plays’ in Captain Cox, cxviii.

3. †1513-29. Youth.

[1546-86.] J. Waley. Thēterlude of Youth.

[1549-69.] W. Copland.

Greg, Plays, 141, mentions a fragment of a third edition. The play is printed in Hazlitt-Dodsley, vol. ii. There are about 1,200 lines. Collier, ii. 230; Ward, i. 126; Pollard, liv, put the date in Mary’s reign; Brandl, xxviii, early in that of Henry VIII. Passages are borrowed from Hickscorner. This is named in Captain Cox, cxviii.

4. †1517. John Rastell. The Nature of the Four Elements.

[1516-33.] John Rastell. A new interlude and a mery of the nature of the .iiii. elements declarynge many proper poynts of phylosophy naturall and of dyuers strange landys and of dyuers strannge effect and causis, which interlude, if the whole matter be played, will contain the space of an hour and a half; but if you list you may leave out much of the said matter, as ... and then it will not be past three quarters of an hour of length.

There are modern editions by Halliwell (Percy Soc. lxxiv), and in Hazlitt-Dodsley, vol. i, and extracts in Pollard, 97. There are about 900 lines. A note says ‘also, yf ye lyst, ye may brynge in a Dysguysinge,’ and a direction for the ‘dance’ or disguising shows that the stage was a ‘hall.’ The date is fixed by Collier, ii. 238; Ward, i. 126; Pollard, 205, on the ground that the discovery of America is said to be ‘within this twenty years’ and by ‘Americus’ (i.e. Amerigo Vespucci, 1497). The authorship has been doubted, apparently in ignorance of the ascription of it to Rastell by Bale, Scriptores (1557), i. 660 ‘Insignis his Cosmographus, de trium mundi partium, Asiae, Africae, et Europae descriptione, ingeniosissimam ac longissimam comoediam primum edidit, cum instrumentis & figuris, quam uocabat Naturam naturatam. Lib. 1. Exuberans diuinae potentiae gratia.’ The opening words quoted by Bale translate those of the play ‘Thaboundant grace of the power devyne.’ Probably Rastell was also the printer, although the unique and imperfect copy (B.M. 643, b. 45) has only a manuscript imprint.

5. †1541-8. John Redford. Wit and Science.

Printed by Halliwell (Shakespeare Soc., 1848) and Manly, vol. i, from Brit. Mus. Addl. MS. 15,233, which is imperfect at the beginning, but has the colophon ‘Thus endyth the Play of Wyt and Science, made by Master Jhon Redford.’

There are 1,059 lines. The final prayer is for the ‘Kyng and Quene.’ Brandl, lxxii, dates the play between 1541, when the ‘gaillard,’ which is mentioned, was first danced in England, and the death of Katharine Parr in 1548. It was adapted in more than one Elizabethan interlude; cf. Brandl, loc. cit.; J. Seifert, Wit- und Science-Moralitäten (1892); and p. 200, n. 2. Redford was at one time Master of the St. Paul’s song-school. The MS. also contains songs and fragments of other moralities by him.

Pseudo-Interludes: Disputations.

6. †1521. John Heywood. Love.

7. †1521-31. John Heywood. Witty and Witless.

8. †1521-31. John Heywood (?). Gentleness and Nobility.

See s.v. Heywood.

Pseudo-Interlude: Banns.

9. †1503. W. Dunbar. The Droichis Part of the Play. Printed in Dunbar’s Works (ed. J. Small, for Scottish Text Soc.), ii. 314.

One MS. is headed ‘Ane Littill Interlud of the Droichis Part of the [Play]’; another, and the fuller, ‘Heir followis the maner of the crying of ane playe.’ Both have at the end ‘Finis off the Droichis Pairt of the Play.’

There are 176 lines. The Droich (dwarf) enters to an ‘amyable audiens’ in Edinburgh, ‘to cry a cry.’ He calls himself ‘Welth,’ and bids

‘Ȝe noble merchandis ever ilkane Address ȝow furth with bow and flane In lusty grene lufraye, And follow furth on Robyn Hude.’

The piece is clearly a ‘banns’ for a May-game; cf. vol. i. p. 174. The S. T. S. editors (i. ccxxxiii), think it was written for the reception of Princess Margaret in 1503.

Pseudo-Interlude: Translation.

10. Necromantia.

[1516-33.] John Rastell. Necromantia. A dialog of the poet Lucyan, for his fantesye faynyd for a mery pastyme. And furst by hym compylyd in the Greke tonge. And after translated owt of the Greke into Latyn, and now lately translated out of Laten into Englissh for the erudicion of them, which be disposyd to lerne the tongis. Inter locutores, Menippus and Philonides.

R. G. C. Proctor, in Hand Lists of English Printers, Pt. ii, distinguishes two editions, one certainly, the other probably, printed by Rastell. Hazlitt, Manual, 164, describes the translation as ‘after the manner of an interlude.’ The Latin and English are in parallel columns, and Collier, ii. 280, who saw a fragment in the Douce collection, thought that it was ‘a modern Latin play, possibly by Rightwise.’ Bale, Scriptores (1557), i. 656, says that More translated Lucian’s ‘Menippum, seu Necromantiam, Dial. 1. Salue atrium, domusque uesti[bulum]’; but the reference is probably to the Latin version of this and other dialogues published in 1506.

Farces of Mediaeval Type.

11. †1521. John Heywood. The Pardoner and the Friar.

12. †1521. John Heywood. The Four Ps.

13. †1521-31. John Heywood. The Weather.

14. †1521-31. John Heywood. John, Tib and Sir John.

See s.v. Heywood.

Translation from Spanish.

15. Calisto and Melibaea.

[1516-33.] John Rastell. A new cōmodye in englysh in maner Of an enterlude ryght elygant & full of craft of rethoryk wherein is shewd & dyscrybyd as well the bewte & good propertes of women as theyr vycys & euyll cōdiciōs with a morall cōclusion & exhortacyon to vertew.

A modern reprint is in Hazlitt-Dodsley, vol. i. The dramatis personae are Calisto, Melibaea, Sempronio, Celestina, Parmeno. The play is a partial English version through the Italian of the Spanish Celestina (1492) of Fernando Rojas de Montalvan and Rodrigo Costa. A later translation is J. Mabbe, Celestina (1630), ed. J. Fitzmaurice Kelly in Tudor Translations; cf. J. G. Underhill, Spanish Literature in the England of the Tudors, 65, 375.

Translation from Classical Latin.

16. Terence. Andria.

[1516-33.] John Rastell (?). Terens in englyssh. The translacyon out of Latin into englysh of the furst comedy of tyrens callyd Andria.

Translations from Neo-Latin.

17. 1537. Thersites.

[1558-63.] John Tysdale. A new Enterlude called Thersytes. This Enterlude Folowynge Dothe Declare howe that the greatest boesters are not the greatest doers.

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