9. The song is a translation of Petrarch’s 88th Sonnet, which
opens thus:
“S’amor non e, che dunque e quel ch’i’sento.”
10. If maugre me: If (I burn) in spite of myself. The usual
reading is, “If harm agree me” = if my hurt contents me: but
evidently the antithesis is lost which Petrarch intended when,
after “s’a mia voglia ardo,” he wrote “s’a mal mio grado” = if
against my will; and Urry’s Glossary points out the probability
that in transcription the words “If that maugre me” may have
gradually changed into “If harm agre me.”
11. The Third of May seems either to have possessed peculiar
favour or significance with Chaucer personally, or to have had a
special importance in connection with those May observances
of which the poet so often speaks. It is on the third night of
May that Palamon, in The Knight’s Tale, breaks out of prison,
and at early morn encounters in the forest Arcita, who has gone
forth to pluck a garland in honour of May; it is on the third
night of May that the poet hears the debate of “The Cuckoo and
the Nightingale”; and again in the present passage the favoured
date recurs.
12. Went: turning; from Anglo-Saxon, “wendan;” German,
“wenden.” The turning and tossing of uneasy lovers in bed is,
with Chaucer, a favourite symptom of their passion. See the
fifth “statute,” in The Court of Love.
13. Procne, daughter of Pandion, king of Attica, was given to
wife to Tereus in reward for his aid against an enemy; but
Tereus dishonoured Philomela, Procne’s sister; and his wife, in
revenge, served up to him the body of his own child by her.
Tereus, infuriated, pursued the two sisters, who prayed the
gods to change them into birds. The prayer was granted;
Philomela became a nightingale, Procne a swallow, and Tereus
a hawk.
14. Fished fair: a proverbial phrase which probably may be best
represented by the phrase “done great execution.”
15. The fair gem virtueless: possessing none of the virtues
which in the Middle Ages were universally believed to be
inherent in precious stones.
16. The crop and root: the most perfect example. See note 29
to the Knight’s Tale.
17. Eme: uncle; the mother’s brother; still used in Lancashire.
Anglo-Saxon, “eame;” German, “Oheim.”
18. Dardanus: the mythical ancestor of the Trojans, after whom
the gate is supposed to be called.
19. All the other gates were secured with chains, for better
defence against the besiegers.
20. Happy day: good fortune; French, “bonheur;” both “happy
day” and “happy hour” are borrowed from the astrological
fiction about the influence of the time of birth.
21. Horn, and nerve, and rind: The various layers or materials
of the shield — called boagrion in the Iliad — which was made
from the hide of the wild bull.