THE EPISTLE OF OTHEA TO HECTOR
[Illustration:
OTHEA DELIVERS HER EPISTLE TO HECTOR.
_Harley MS. 4431_, FOL. 97b.
]
The Epistle of Othea to Hector
OR
THE BOKE OF KNYGHTHODE
_Translated from the French of Christine de Pisan_
_With a Dedication to Sir John Fastolf, K.G._
BY
STEPHEN SCROPE, ESQUIRE
EDITED
FROM A MANUSCRIPT IN THE LIBRARY OF
THE MARQUIS OF BATH
BY
GEORGE F. WARNER
_M.A., D.Litt., F.S.A., Assistant Keeper of MSS. British Museum_
LONDON
J. B. NICHOLS AND SONS, PARLIAMENT MANSIONS
VICTORIA STREET, S.W.
1904.
LONDON
J. B. NICHOLS AND SONS, PARLIAMENT MANSIONS
VICTORIA STREET, S.W.
TO
THE PRESIDENT AND MEMBERS
OF
The Roxburghe Club
THIS VOLUME
Is Dedicated and Presented
BY THEIR OBEDIENT SERVANT
BATH
LONGLEAT, MARCH, 1904
The Roxburghe Club.
MCMIV.
LORD ALDENHAM.
PRESIDENT.
DUKE OF DEVONSHIRE, K.G.
DUKE OF BUCCLEUCH, K.T.
DUKE OF NORTHUMBERLAND, K.G.
DUKE OF SUTHERLAND, K.G.
MARQUESS OF BATH.
EARL OF PEMBROKE AND MONTGOMERY.
EARL OF CRAWFORD, K.T.
EARL OF ROSEBERY, K.G.
EARL COWPER, K.G.
EARL OF CARYSFORT, K.P.
EARL OF POWIS.
EARL BEAUCHAMP.
EARL BROWNLOW.
EARL OF CAWDOR.
EARL OF ELLESMERE.
EARL OF CREWE.
THE LORD BISHOP OF SALISBURY.
LORD ZOUCHE.
LORD WINDSOR.
LORD AMHERST OF HACKNEY.
HON. ALBAN GEORGE HENRY GIBBS.
RIGHT HON. ARTHUR JAMES BALFOUR.
RIGHT HON. MOUNTSTUART GRANT DUFF, G.C.S.I.
SIR WILLIAM REYNELL ANSON, BART.
SIR THOMAS BROOKE, BART.
SIR JOHN EVANS, K.C.B.
SIR EDWARD MAUNDE THOMPSON, K.C.B.
CHARLES BUTLER, ESQ.
INGRAM BYWATER, ESQ.
GEORGE BRISCOE EYRE, ESQ.
ALFRED HENRY HUTH, ESQ., _Treasurer_.
ANDREW LANG, ESQ.
CHARLES BRINSLEY MARLAY, ESQ.
JOHN MURRAY, ESQ.
EDWARD JAMES STANLEY, ESQ.
HENRY YATES THOMPSON, ESQ.
REV. EDWARD TINDAL TURNER.
VICTOR WILLIAM BATES VAN DE WEYER, ESQ.
W. ALDIS WRIGHT, ESQ.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
CONTENTS
INTRODUCTION.
ERRATA.
THE EPISTLE OF OTHEA TO HECTOR; OR THE BOKE OF KNYGHTHODE.
GLOSSARY.
INDEX.
[Illustration:
THE EPISTLE OF OTHEA, TEXT XX.
_Longleat MS. 253_, FOL. 22b.
]
INTRODUCTION.
The English version here printed for the first time of Christine de
Pisan’s “Épître d’Othéa la deesse à Hector” is taken from a MS. which is
believed to be unique, and which, if not actually the original, can be
very little removed from it. The volume of which it forms a part is
numbered MS. 253 in the valuable library of the Marquis of Bath at
Longleat, but how or when it found its way thither it is impossible to
say. There is little doubt, however, that it was acquired at least as
early as the time of Thomas Thynne, first Viscount Weymouth, who died in
1714, and it is not unlikely that it has been at Longleat ever since the
house was built by Sir John Thynne in the latter part of the 16th
century. It is a small vellum folio, 9¾ inches by 7, in modern binding,
and in its present state it consists of ninety-five leaves, the first
seventy-five of which are occupied by the work in question and the
remainder by an English poem or series of poems, probably also
translated from the French, in which love is compared with the growth of
a tree. The hand appears to be the same throughout and of a date about
the middle of the 15th century. As may be seen from the page here
reproduced (_cf._ p. 33), it is fairly neat and regular, but it is
hardly the hand of a professional book-scribe, the type being that more
commonly found in correspondence and business documents of the period.
As to ornament, there is none whatever; for, although blank spaces were
left for rubrics and initials, and in a few instances apparently for
miniatures as well, for some reason they were never filled in. But the
deficiencies of the MS. in this respect are of less practical importance
than the mutilation inflicted later upon the text. In the main article,
and consequently in this edition of it, there are two lacunæ, one of a
single leaf (p. 13) and the other of a whole quire of eight (p. 53),
while the supplementary matter has been shorn both of its first leaf and
of an unknown number at the end. Nor is the mischief confined to the
loss of these portions of the text. Probably, as in the case of another
work by the same translator,[1] there was a colophon which would have
given interesting particulars of the origin of the whole MS., and
unfortunately this also has perished. As the translator has been
identified and as specimens of his handwriting are available for
comparison,[2] the question whether the copy is in his autograph is
easily decided in the negative, but beyond this little can be
ascertained of its history. For reasons which will appear further on it
is a tempting supposition that it is the “Boke de Othea, text and
glose ... in quayers” (_sc._ quires), which is included in an “Inventory
off Englysshe boks” belonging to John Paston the younger (?) in the time
of Edward IV. (after 1474).[3] If, however, the latter MS. in its turn
was identical with the “Othea pistill” which one William Ebesham wrote
for Sir John Paston at a cost of 7sh. 2d. about 1469,[4] it contained no
more than forty-three leaves. In the margin of f. 75b is an entry, made
about 1500, of a certificate of the banns of marriage, real or
imaginary, of William Stretford and Joyce Helle, the certifying minister
being William Houson, curate; and from scribblings on f. 50 and
elsewhere it may be inferred that at a later date in the 16th century
the MS. was in the hands of a certain William Porter, who, to judge from
the nature of his entries, was perhaps a scrivener’s clerk. There is
more decisive evidence of ownership in the signature “Jo. Malbee” on the
first page, written towards the end of the 16th century under the moral
distich:
“Viue diu, sed viue Deo; nam viuere mundo
Mors est. Hæc vera est viuere vita Deo.”
The same page also contains the initials J. M., probably meaning John
Malbee, together with the old library mark, ix D. 72.
Before commenting upon the English translation something must be said of
the original “Épître d’Othéa” and the remarkable woman who was its
author.[5] In no sense was Christine de Pisan French by birth. Her
father Thomas de Pisan, or de Boulogne, was, as she tells us,[6] a
native of Bologna, and he may reasonably be identified with Tommaso di
Benvenuto di Pizzano, who was Professor of Astrology there between 1345
and 1356.[7] Later he obtained the salaried office of State Councillor
at Venice, where also he married, and where Christine, probably the
eldest of his three children and the only girl, was born in 1364.[8] It
was shortly after her birth that he was prevailed upon by the French
king Charles V. to remove to Paris, and the fact that Louis the Great of
Hungary was equally anxious to attract him to Buda shows how widely the
fame of his learning and science had spread.[9] For fifteen years he had
no cause to regret his change of country, for Charles not only made him
his physician and astrologer with handsome emoluments, but treated him
altogether with marked distinction. Christine, who with her mother
joined him at the end of 1368, was thus brought up at the most brilliant
and intellectual court of the time, and when, at the early age of
fifteen, she was married to Étienne du Castel in 1379, her ties with it
were further strengthened by her husband’s appointment as secretary to
the king. This prosperity was rudely interrupted by the premature death
of Charles V. on 16th September, 1380. In her own words, “Or fu la porte
ouverte de noz infortunes, adonc faillirent à mon dit père ses grans
pensions.”[10] Thomas de Pisan in fact was growing old and out of
fashion; with the loss of his place at court and its prestige he soon
fell into neglect, and when in a few years he died, his wife and two
sons were left dependent upon his daughter and son-in-law. Happily the
latter still retained his post under the new king, and if he had lived
all might have gone well, though possibly in that case Christine’s
latent powers would never have been called into activity. As a climax,
however, to her misfortunes Étienne du Castel was carried off by an
epidemic at Beauvais in 1389, and she thus found herself a widow at
twenty-five with three children besides others[11] to support out of
what little she could rescue from the claimants to her husband’s estate.
Curious details of the protracted lawsuits and other troubles by which
she was harassed during the next few years are given in several of her
works; but it is enough to say that her tenacity and force of character
carried her safely through until she made for herself a literary
position which for one of her sex was probably without precedent.
Excepting a few short pieces anterior perhaps to her husband’s death,
she appears to have begun writing poetry as a solace in her widowhood.
Such pathetic effusions as “Seulete suy et seulete vueil estre” and “Je
suis vesve, seulete et noir vestue,”[12] with others in a similar
strain, could hardly fail to excite sympathy, and she was thus
encouraged to utilize her pen for procuring more material support. At
the end of the 14th century all that an author struggling with poverty
had to depend upon was the patronage and munificence of the great, and
it may therefore have been mainly to suit the taste of those to whom she
looked for favour and assistance that she composed the lighter and more
amatory of the “Ballades,” “Lais” and “Virelais,” “Rondeaux” and “Jeux à
vendre,” which were the earliest, and not the least charming, of her
poems. Besides Charles VI. and his queen, the Dukes of Berry, Burgundy,
and Orleans, and other princes, nobles, and great ladies of the French
court, it is interesting to find among her warmest patrons the English
Earl of Salisbury,[13] who came on an embassy to Paris in December,
1398. The theory that it was for him that she made the collection of her
“Cent Ballades” rests on little, if any, foundation, but his friendly
regard for her is shown by his having taken her elder son Jean du
Castel, then thirteen, to England, in order to educate him with a boy of
his own of similar age. By her own account, as it appears,[14] this was
at the time of the marriage of Isabella, daughter of Charles VI., to
Richard II., which took place at Calais on 4th November, 1396, so that
she may have become acquainted with the earl during a previous visit to
Paris, or while he was in France with Richard, who crossed over for the
marriage as early as 27th September. If he had not met a tragic fate on
7th January, 1400, in an abortive attempt in favour of his deposed
sovereign, Christine herself might have followed her son. At the same
time Salisbury was not the only nor most influential admirer of her
talent on this side of the Channel. After his death the usurper Henry
IV. himself took charge of the boy and tried to induce her to settle in
England, and it is to her credit that loyalty to the earl’s memory among
other reasons made her obdurate. In order, however, to get back her son
she feigned compliance until he was sent to fetch her, when she kept him
with her and remained in France.[15]
Before this she had entered on the second stage of her literary career,
to which the “Épître d’Othéa” most probably belongs. In 1399 she
resolved to attempt longer and more serious poems, animated by a more or
less definite moral purpose, and she began by preparing herself for this
task by a strenuous course of study, as nearly encyclopædic in character
as was then possible, though there is no reason to suppose that she was
acquainted with Greek authors except through Latin translations. But her
earliest poems of any length, issued between 1399 and 1402, were still
of the nature of “Dits d’Amour.” Such, for example, were the “Épître au
dieu d’amour” and the “Dit de la Rose,” the “Débat de deux amants,” the
“Dit de Poissy,” with its lively account of her visit in 1400 to Poissy
Abbey, where her daughter was a nun, and the idyllic “Dit de la
pastoure.”[16] The first two of these poems were written in defence of
women against the aspersions of Jean de Meun in the “Roman de la Rose”
and his school, and they involved her in a protracted controversy, in
which with the valuable support of Jean Gerson she fully held her own.
The moralizing element is much more strongly developed in the “Chemin de
long estude,”[17] and the “Mutation de Fortune,”[18] which were composed
in 1402 and 1403. In the earlier of these somewhat prolix, but withal
extremely interesting, works Christine is conducted by the Sibyl
Amalthea through the known world,[19] and then ascends with her as far
as the fifth heaven. After recounting these experiences she proceeds to
inculcate doctrines of right and justice by means of an elaborate
allegory, in which Raison, Sagesse, Noblesse, Chevalerie, and Richesse
play the leading parts, room being also found for a glowing eulogy of
Charles V. In the “Mutation de Fortune” she again indulges her taste for
allegory, but in place of geography and astronomy other sciences have
their turn. The introduction, which is rich in personal interest, deals
with her father’s life and her own and then leads up to her dream or
vision of the great “Chastel de Fortune.” This castle is in fact the
world, and those who lodge in it are the various classes of mankind, who
from pope and king downwards are vividly characterized; while the
subjects painted on the walls of the hall give occasion for summaries of
philosophy and of universal history to the birth of Christ, followed by
allusions to more recent events and by another tribute to the virtues of
Thomas de Pisan’s royal patron. On 1st January, 1403–4, Christine
presented this poem as a new-year’s gift to Philip, Duke of Burgundy,
brother of Charles V. The immediate result was a commission to write the
late king’s life, and although the duke himself died on 27th April
following, she completed this task within the year, sending a copy to
his elder brother John, Duke of Berry, on 1st January, 1404–5.
The “Livre des fais et bonnes meurs du sage roy Charles V.” is the best
known and in many respects the most valuable of all her writings,[20]
and it also marks the beginning of the period when she practically
abandoned verse in favour of prose. Though full of interesting details,
the work is not so much a regular biography as an appreciation of the
king’s character from the point of view of an enthusiastic partisan. To
some extent Charles V. realized Christine’s ideal of chivalry, and in
her discursive way she seized her chance to enforce by his example the
paramount necessity to a ruler of a sound education and virtuous
principles, with covert reflections no doubt upon the political
rivalries and dissolute morals which under the unhappy circumstances of
his successor’s mental disease were bringing ruin upon France. Of her
remaining works “La Vision,”[21] which appeared later in 1405, is of
peculiar interest for its self-revelation. It was apparently meant as a
reply to those who, on the ground of her sex and foreign origin,
questioned her right to pose as an authority on French history and
morals; but with a frank recital of her chequered fortunes and a defence
of her position she mixes up a curious allegory on the mighty power of
“Dame Opinion” and a discussion on the comfort to be derived from
philosophy. To quote a simile which she more than once applies to
herself,[22] “petite clochete grant voix sonne”; and this may certainly
be said of two ambitious treatises written seemingly about 1407. One of
them is the well-known “Livre des faits d’armes et de chevalerie,”[23]
which is nothing less than an attempt to teach the whole art of war,
grounded largely upon Vegetius and other authorities, but not without
shrewd and pertinent observations of her own; while in the other,
entitled “Le Corps de Policie,” she takes up the subject of civil
government, more particularly with regard to the education of princes
and the duties and mutual relations of the several orders in the state.
The “Cité des Dames”[24] and its complement the “Livre des Trois
Vertus”[25] deal on the contrary with subjects which fell less
disputably within her natural sphere. As we have seen, she had already
championed her sex in verse. In coming forward again in its defence, but
this time in prose, she went further, taking upon herself to lay down
rules of guidance for women of all ranks, which she effectively did by
allegory as well as by precepts and by historical examples.
In all these works her aims were moral rather than political. But
although, considering her relations with the leaders of the contending
factions, it is not surprising that she abstained from decisively taking
a side, there is no doubt that she was profoundly moved by the growing
miseries of her adopted country. As early as 1405 she addressed to the
queen, Isabella of Bavaria, a letter[26] strongly advocating peace, and
five years later she returned to the subject in a passionate appeal[27]
to the princes generally and the Duke of Berry in particular. The “Livre
de la Paix,” the different parts of which were composed respectively in
1412 and 1413 in connexion with the transient pacifications of Auxerre
and of Pontoise, is of less restricted scope.[28] It was dedicated by
Christine to the youthful Dauphin, Louis, Duke of Guienne, and after an
earnest exhortation to harmony it is expanded into a formal treatise on
the virtues that go to form the perfect prince, Charles V. providing her
as usual with an ever ready example. This appears to have been the
latest, as it is one of the most important, of her prose works; for
although possibly some of her religious verses were composed in the
interval, so far as is known she maintained an unbroken silence until
1429, when the triumphs of the Maid of Orleans drew from her a poem
ringing with patriotic fervour,[29] her joy at the approaching
deliverance of France being no doubt all the greater because its
promised saviour was a woman. What her feelings were when these hopes
were again deferred can only be imagined, for nothing more is heard of
her. In the opening lines of her poem she states that she had then been
eleven years in a convent,[30] but she omits to give its name, and the
date and the place of her death thus alike remain unidentified.
Of all her works the one with which we are here specially concerned
presents perhaps most difficulty with regard to date. In the best
copies, as in Harley MS. 4,431,[31] it is headed “Ci commence lepistre
Othea la deesse, que elle envoya a Hector de Troie _quant il estoit en
laage de quinze ans_,” for which reason, coupled with its dedication to
Louis, Duke of Orleans, it has been too hastily assigned to 1386,[32]
when Louis himself was of that age. Against this date it is almost
enough to urge that Christine was then only twenty-two years old, and
from all that we know of her she was not in the least likely to have
begun authorship so early with a long didactic treatise mostly in prose;
but, apart from this, Louis was not made Duke of Orleans until 4th June,
1391, so that the work could not have been addressed to him, as it is,
under that title five years before. Another theory, that, although
dedicated to Louis, it was designed for the edification of his son and
heir Charles[33] is not open to the same objections; for, as the future
poet-duke was born in 1391, the date would then be 1406, at which time
Christine was in full career as a moralist and prose-writer, with strong
views, as may be seen in her “Fais et bonnes meurs du sage roy Charles
V.”, on the subject of chivalrous qualities. On the other hand, if the
facts were as supposed, in addressing the work to the father she would
hardly have failed to make some explanatory reference to the son. Her
omission to do so therefore makes this theory hardly less untenable than
the other. It is more likely that the date lies between these two
extremes. The significance of the dedication may easily be overrated. It
was Christine’s habit to send her works with a separate dedicatory
preface to her several patrons as new-year’s gifts for no other reason
probably than the hope of a tangible acknowledgment, and we know in fact
that other copies of the “Épître d’Othéa” were sent both to Charles VI.
and the Duke of Berry.[34] If it is necessary to look for some
particular youth of fifteen to whom she wished to play the part of a
moral instructress, he may perhaps be found in her own son, for whom on
another occasion she wrote the “Enseignemens Moraux.”[35] Jean du Castel
was probably of the required age about 1400, so that in this case the
work represents, as it well may, the first-fruits of the studies in
which she immersed herself shortly before, and its date moreover exactly
accords with its position in her own collections of her works, where it
comes after the “Dit de Poissy” (1400) and before the “Chemin de long
estude” (1402).[36]
Although without any claim to be reckoned among the best of her works,
it is at least admirable in motive. Ostensibly it is addressed by the
Goddess of Prudence or Wisdom to her _protégé_ Hector with the object of
inciting him to the attainment of true knighthood by the practice of
virtue, the name of the goddess being clearly no more than the Greek
vocative ὦ θεά, commonly used in Homer in speeches addressed to
Athena.[37] The plan of the work is somewhat peculiar. The epistle
proper, which purports to be Othea’s own, is in verse, and is divided
into a hundred “textes,” each of which after the first five consists of
a single quatrain. These hundred “textes” serve as a medium for
instilling into the mind of the pupil as many moral precepts or rules of
behaviour, wrapped up in an allusion to some story from mythology, from
the history of Troy or, very rarely, from other sources, without the
least regard for chronological propriety. Othea indeed anticipates the
charge of anachronism by claiming at the outset (p. 6) the divine
prerogative of prophecy, by which means she obviates the incongruity of
drawing lessons for Hector from the circumstances of his own death (p.
105), from the story of Cyrus and Queen Tomyris (p. 63), and even from
the vision of Christ shown by the Sibyl to the Roman emperor Augustus
(p. 113). Perhaps the most glaring anachronism is the reference to the
fate of “Thune” (p. 110). It has been suggested in a note on the passage
that this is a corruption in the MSS. for “Thyre” or Tyre; but the rhyme
both in the French and English versions requires “Thune,” and possibly
the allusion is to the much vaunted expedition of Louis, Duke of
Bourbon, against Tunis in 1391. If so, this is a single instance of a
reference to an event in more recent times. The “textes,” however, are
not left to stand alone, being invariably followed by a “glose” and an
“allégorie,” both of which are in prose and often of some length. The
bulk of the work therefore is really a commentary by Christine herself
upon Othea’s supposed teaching. Thus, in the “glose” she amplifies and
explains the allusion in the “texte,” and as a rule points its
application by a maxim from an ancient philosopher; and, having done
this to her own satisfaction, she next dilates in the “allégorie” on its
more spiritual meaning, which she illustrates by a passage from one of
the Fathers or some later theologian, and finally by a more or less
appropriate verse from Scripture. These last citations are from the
Latin Vulgate, and from the fact that the translator omits them it may
be inferred that he was either ignorant of Latin or intended to supply
them from the Wycliffite English version. In this way Christine works
through the Virtues and Vices, the Articles of the Creed, the Ten
Commandments, the properties and influences of the seven planets, and so
forth; and the whole forms a curious and ill-assorted medley, which is
not without interest as a reflection of the taste of the time, but which
contains, it must be confessed, little either to attract or to edify the
modern reader.
No critical edition of the original work has yet appeared, and the
preface to a translation is hardly the place in which to enter minutely
into its composition. Apart, however, from the Latin Vulgate and the
theological writers whose names may be found in the index, there are
three sources from which the matter appears to be mainly derived.
Christine’s classical mythology, it is clear, comes almost entirely from
the Metamorphoses of Ovid, but whether she had recourse to the original
or to a moralized mediæval adaptation is a question not so easily
determined. There is a work of the latter kind in French verse and of
prodigious length, fourteen MSS. of which are known, including one in
the British Museum (Add. MS. 10,324). By some misunderstanding it was
formerly attributed to Philippe de Vitry, Bishop of Meaux (1351–1362).
Modern criticism, however, has proved that it was really written by
Chrétien Legouais, a Friar Minor, for the queen of Philip IV., Jeanne de
Champagne, who died in 1305.[38] There was a copy in the library of
Christine’s patron, the Duke of Berry,[39] but it was apparently
acquired in 1403, after the “Épître d’Othéa” was written. Although it is
quite possible that she had a direct knowledge of this poem, she is more
likely to have used a moralized prose paraphrase of the Metamorphoses by
the Benedictine Pierre Bersuire, who in his second edition, written at
Paris in 1342, laid Legouais under contribution. Bersuire wrote in
Latin, which language Christine certainly understood, and how soon his
work appeared in French it is difficult to say. In the Berry Library
there were three MSS. of the Metamorphoses apparently in vernacular
prose,[40] any one, if not all, of which may have been Bersuire in a
French version. There is also a French prose version in Brit. Mus. Royal
MS. 17 E. iv. in company with the “Épître d’Othéa” itself, but the MS.
is not earlier than the latter part of the 15th century. This version is
closely connected with that printed at Bruges in 1484 by Colard Mansion,
who supposed the original author to have been, not Bersuire, but Thomas
Waleys or de Galles. The two are, however, not quite identical, and the
former possibly represents an older version, which Mansion revised for
printing. But whatever the particular form of Ovid’s Metamorphoses which
Christine utilized, her naive interpretations of his mythological tales
are no doubt largely her own. In this respect she was certainly not in
advance of her age. In the usual euhemeristic fashion she regarded the
classical deities and demigods as men and women who by the “prerogative
of some grace” had raised themselves above their fellows and were for
this reason accorded divine honours; or, on the other hand, they were
mere inventions of the poets, who, for instance, by inverting the
process by which the planets were named from the gods, made gods of the
planets. A fair sample of her method may be seen in the story of Perseus
(p. 15). This hero, whose name, by the way, our English translator
changed into that of the better known Arthurian Sir Perceval, was a
“moult vaillant chevalier,” his steed Pegasus was “bonne renommée” or
fame, which carried his name into all lands, and his deliverance of
Andromeda teaches the aspirant to knighthood the duty of relieving all
women in distress. So much may be learnt from the “glose”; but in the
“allégorie” Pegasus becomes the spiritual knight’s good angel, “qui fera
bon rapport de lui au jour de jugement,” while Andromeda is his soul,
which he frees from the power of the fiend.
With regard to the many personages and incidents from Trojan history
introduced into the work, Christine’s authority was evidently a French
prose romance which in a 15th century copy in the British Museum (Add.
MS. 9,785) is entitled “La vraye ystoire de Troye.” Its origin has been
traced in an instructive article by M. Paul Meyer entitled “Les
premières compilations françaises d’histoire ancienne.”[41] It appears
to be founded upon the well-known romance of Troy in French verse by
Benoît de Ste. More and to have been composed before 1287, and it was
employed, instead of Dares Phrygius as was previously the case, in the
second edition of the compilation known as the “Histoire ancienne
jusqu’à César.” There is, however, no reason to doubt that what
Christine worked from was the “Vraye histoire” itself.
The third authority of which she habitually made use was of a different
character, supplying her, not with mythological or legendary tales, but
with moral maxims, one of which, as we have already remarked, she
generally quoted at the end of each “glose.” These maxims are derived
from a singular work known as “Dicta Philosophorum,” and consisting of
long strings of apophthegms attached to the names of various ancient
sages. They begin with Sedechias, of whom it is said “primus fuit per
quem nutu Dei lex precepta fuit,” and besides Homer, Solon, Hippocrates,
Pythagoras, Diogenes, Socrates, Plato, Aristotle, Alexander of Macedon,
and Ptolemy, they include Hermes Trismegistus and such strange and
evidently corrupted names as Tac, Salquinus (or, as it is written in
some MSS., Zaqualquin), Rabion (or Sabion), Assaron, Longinon,
Magdarges, Texillus (or Thesillus) and others, some of which have a
distinctly oriental appearance. The Arabic original in fact exists in a
work written by Abu-’l-Wafá Mobasschir ibn-Fátik al Káïd, an emir of
Egypt, in 1053.[42] Sedechias appears there as Adam’s son Seth, and some
other of the above names may be dimly recognized in Sab, ancestor of the
Sabæans, Lókman, Maháda Gis, and Basilius. From the heading of the Latin
version in the MS. from which it has been published,[43] it seems that
the work was first translated from Arabic into Greek, and then again
from Greek into Latin, the last version being by John de Procida, famous
for the prominent part he took in the revolution which freed Sicily from
Charles of Anjou and the French in 1282. Christine de Pisan, however,
apparently employed a popular French version made from the Latin for
Charles VI. by one of his chamberlains, Guillaume de Tignonville, who
was afterwards Provost of Paris (1401–1408) and died in 1414. As a copy
of it at Paris was written in 1402,[44] it was certainly completed
before then, and the probability is that it preceded the “Épître
d’Othéa” by several years. It possesses a special interest from the fact
that an English version of it had the honour of being the first book
actually printed in this country. This was the famous _Dictes and
Sayengis of the Philosophres_, which Anthony Wydeville, second Earl
Rivers, translated from a copy of De Tignonville’s work lent to him when
he was going on a pilgrimage to Compostella in 1473, and which Caxton
issued from his newly established press at Westminster in 1477.[45]
Neither of them seems to have been aware that another English version
was in existence, which dated from 1450.[46] This is still preserved in
two MSS. in the British Museum, but has never been printed. The late
15th century copy in Add. MS. 34,193 (ff. 137–201) has the advantage of
being complete, but it bears no evidence of origin, having neither title
nor preface and ending merely with the words “Hic est finis libri
moralium philosophorum.” Harley MS. 2,266, on the contrary, though it is
mutilated at the beginning and elsewhere, fortunately has the following
colophon:
“This boke byfore wretyn is callid in Frensh lettris Ditz de
Philisophius and in Englysh for to sey the doctryne and þe wysedom
of the wyse auncyent philysophers, as Arystotle, Plato, Socrates,
Tholome and suche oþer, translatid out of laten in to frensh to
(_sc._ for) kyng Charles the vi^{te} of Fraunse by Wyllyam
Tyngnovyle, knyght, late provest of the cyte of Parys, and syth now
late translatyd out of frensh tung in to englysh the yere of oure
Lord m^lccccl. to (_sc._ for) John Fostalf, knyght, for his
contemplacion and solas by Stevyn Scrope, squyer, sonne in law to
the seide Fostalle. Deo gracias.”
The truth of the statement here made may be accepted without hesitation,
nor is its interest confined to the translation of the “Dis des
Philosophes” to which it is attached, for, as will be seen below, it
also materially helps to determine the similar origin of the English
version of Christine de Pisan’s “Épître d’Othéa,” which we now have to
consider.
If the rubricator had done his work, no doubt the “Epistle of Othea to
Hector” would have had this title prefixed in conformity with the MSS.
of the French original. As it is, the text begins abruptly without a
word of heading three lines from the bottom of the first page, and the
only preliminary indication of its nature is furnished by the
inscription “The Booke of Knyghthode,” written, apparently by a somewhat
later hand, on the old vellum cover, which now serves for a fly-leaf.
This alternative title is peculiar to the English version, and is
extracted from the translator’s dedicatory preface, to which source we
are also indebted for a clue to his identity and the knowledge of the
circumstances under which the translation was made. The anonymous
patron, “noble and worshipfull among the ordre of cheualrie,” to whom
the preface is addressed was obviously a person of some consequence. He
was of knightly rank and had won great renown in France and
elsewhere[47] abroad, having spent most part of his life in “dedys of
cheualrie and actis of armis.” He was now, however, sixty years of age,
and was compelled by failing strength to seek retirement, and he is
thereupon somewhat pointedly reminded that it behoved him to devote the
remainder of his days to conflict with those spiritual enemies that war
against the soul. If this were all, it might have applied to more than
one veteran of the protracted French war which began in 1415; but, when
the writer goes on to speak of himself (p. 2) as “I, yowre most humble
son Stevyn,” there can hardly be a doubt that, as in the case of the
above-mentioned translation of the “Dis des Philosophes,” we have to do
with that famous old warrior Sir John Fastolf, K.G., and his stepson[48]
Stephen Scrope, esquire.
The briefest summary of Fastolf’s military career[49] will suffice to
show how closely it accords with the writer’s description. Son of a
Norfolk squire and born in or about 1378, he appears to have begun
active service early in the reign of Henry IV. with that king’s second
son, Thomas, afterwards Duke of Clarence. In 1401, though a mere lad of
fourteen, Thomas of Lancaster, as he was then called, was appointed his
father’s Lieutenant in Ireland. Fastolf was in his train there in 1402,
if not before, and on 14th April, 1406,[50] he had from him a grant of
the office of joint Chief Butler of Ireland during the minority of the
Earl of Ormonde. He was still in Ireland when he married Millicent,
daughter of Robert, Lord Tiptoft, and widow of the Deputy Lieutenant,
Sir Stephen Scrope. The marriage took place on 13th January, 1409, only
four months after the death (4th September, 1408) of the lady’s first
husband,[51] whose son and heir Stephen was a minor ten or twelve years
old at the time.[52] Besides other advantages, it gave Fastolf the
control over lands of his wife and stepson in Yorkshire, at Castle Combe
in Wiltshire, and elsewhere, and he seems to have exercised it with
little regard to any one’s interest except his own. His earliest service
in France probably dated from 1412. He figures in the long muster-roll
of esquires who joined the expedition under Clarence in August of that
year,[53] and before its close he had become Lieutenant of the castle of
Bordeaux.[54] With the accession of Henry V. his energy and undoubted
talent for war found ample scope. His contract in June, 1415,[55] to
serve the king with ten men-at-arms and thirty archers was speedily
followed by Henry’s invasion of France and the siege of Harfleur.
Evidently it was not long before he attracted notice, for when the town
surrendered on 22nd September he was at once put in command of it under
the king’s uncle, Thomas Beaufort, Earl of Dorset.[56] This did not
prevent him from displaying his prowess a month later at Agincourt; and
he was again active in the sieges of Caen and Rouen and in other
operations during Henry’s second invasion of Normandy in 1417–1419.
Hardly any name in fact of secondary rank more frequently recurs in the
chronicles and documents of the war for a quarter of a century. Already
knighted before 29th January, 1415–6,[57] he was made a knight banneret
in 1423 and a Knight of the Garter in 1426; and, only to mention a few
of the posts conferred upon him,[58] in 1420 he was made Governor of the
Bastille of St. Antoine at Paris, in 1422 Master of the Household to
John, Duke of Bedford, Regent of France, and in 1423 Lieutenant of
Normandy and Governor of Anjou and Maine. In the minor battles and
sieges which made up so much of the desultory warfare of the time he was
everywhere conspicuous. On 2nd March, 1423, with the Earl of Salisbury,
he recovered Meulan; on 17th August, 1424, he shared in the victory at
Verneuil and took the Duke of Alençon prisoner; on 11th October in the
same year he captured Sillé le Guillaume, from which he acquired the
title of baron; on 2nd August, 1425, again with Salisbury, he received
the surrender of Le Mans[59]; and on 12th February, 1429, when in
command of a convoy of much needed supplies for the English camp before
Orleans, he signally defeated a far stronger force of French and Scots
at Rouvray St. Denis in the famous “Battle of the Herrings.” Up to this
point, so far as is known, he had met with almost uninterrupted success;
but after the advent of Jeanne Darc had caused the raising of the siege
of Orleans, when the English were routed and Lord Talbot was taken
prisoner at Pataye on 18th June following, he barely succeeded in
escaping from the field. Unfortunately for his fame with posterity, the
charge of cowardice on this occasion made against him in Monstrelet’s
Chronicle was repeated by Hall and Holinshed and has been perpetuated in
the “First Part of Henry VI.”[60] The effect of the charge at the time
was, however, transient at most, and there is no need to dwell upon it
here, either on its own account or in its bearing upon the question
whether he was the original of Shakespeare’s Sir John Falstaff. It is
contradicted by the chronicler Wavrin, who fought in the battle under
him, and it is out of keeping with his whole career; moreover, Talbot,
who was his bitterest accuser, was already on ill terms with him and,
having flouted his advice just before the battle, in his chagrin at
defeat was perhaps only too ready to make him a scapegoat. The Regent
Bedford’s action in the matter is significant; for, although Fastolf was
at first badly received by him, after a formal inquiry he was again
taken into favour and the Garter, of which he is said to have been
deprived, was restored to him in spite of Talbot’s protests. Nor was
less use made of his services afterwards. Thus, between 1430 and 1434 we
find him Lieutenant of Caen and of Alençon and Captain of Fresnay, and
in 1431 he relieved Vaudemont and captured the Duke of Bar. As late as
1435 he is spoken of as Governor of Anjou and Maine,[61] and until the
Duke of Bedford’s death on 14th September of that year he continued at
the head of his household, being so described both in a list of the
Regent’s retinue in 1435 and in a highly interesting report on the
conduct of the war which he himself drew up about the same time.[62]
Bedford’s confidence in him to the last is also clear from the fact that
he named him one of the executors of his will. Notwithstanding the loss
of so powerful a patron and his own advancing years, Fastolf was plainly
in no hurry to put off his armour; for, with the exception of occasional
visits to England as before, he remained abroad for at least five years
longer. His retirement is generally fixed in 1440, but there is evidence
of his being in Maine in the following year.[63] On 12th May, 1441, the
Duke of York, Bedford’s successor as Regent, granted him a yearly
pension of £20 for his services,[64] and probably therefore it was not
very long before or after that date that he finally turned his back upon
the country from whose unhappy distractions he had won fame and fortune.
It is at this stage of his life that we get a glimpse of him in the
dedication of the “Epistle of Othea.” From its language this was written
soon after he finally returned home; in fact it gives his age, no doubt
somewhat loosely, as sixty, whereas even in 1440 he was probably
sixty-two. During the greater part of the period which elapsed before
his death on 5th November, 1459, he seems to have resided chiefly in
Southwark, where he was within easy reach of a summons to the King’s
Council, of which he was a member; and there is something attractive in
the picture which Stephen Scrope’s words suggest of the war-worn old
soldier beguiling his leisure with literary studies. Nor are the
“Epistle of Othea” and the “Sayings of the Philosophers” the only two
translations made at his “commaundement” and for his “contemplacion and
solas.” In 1481 Caxton printed an English version, rendered from the
French of Laurence de Premierfait, of Cicero’s “De Senectute.”[65] On
the question of its authorship I shall have some remarks to make further
on; but meanwhile it deserves notice that its preface states that it
“was translated and thystoryes openly declared by the ordenaunce and
desyre of the noble auncyent knyght Syr Johan Fastolf of the countee of
Norfolk banerette, lyuyng the age of four score yere, excercisyng the
warrys in the Royame of Fraunce and other countrees, ffor the diffence
and vnyuersal welfare of bothe royames of englond and ffraunce by fourty
yeres enduryng, the fayte of armes hauntyng, and in admynystryng justice
and polytique gouernaunce vnder thre kynges, that is to wete Henry the
fourth, Henry the fyfthe, Henry the syxthe, and was gouernour of the
duchye of Angeou and the countee of Mayne, Capytayn of many townys,
Castellys and fortressys in the said Royame of ffraunce, hauyng the
charge and saufgarde of them dyuerse yeres, ocupyeng and rewlynge thre
honderd speres and the bowes acustomed thenne, and yeldyng good acompt
of the forsaid townes castellys and fortresses to the seyd kynges and of
theyr lyeutenauntes, Prynces of noble recomendacion, as Johan regent of
ffraunce Duc of Bedforde, Thomas duc of excestre, Thomas duc of clarence
& other lyeutenauntes,” etc.
At the same time, there was another side to Fastolf’s character, which
is revealed in that mine of curious information on the social life and
manners of the time, the well-known _Paston Letters_. Through his
intimacy with John Paston,[66] who was ultimately his executor and
principal heir, many of his private letters and papers are there
preserved, and they certainly do not exhibit him in a favourable
light.[67] Hot-tempered, arbitrary and rapacious, harsh and mean to his
dependents, an exacting creditor and a rancorous litigant, he was the
reverse of Chaucer’s type of the “verray perfight, gentil knight.”
Wealthy as he was and childless, he was still bent on making gain,
partly no doubt to pay for the building of his great castle at Caister
in Norfolk, the ruins of which may still be seen. No one perhaps knew
him better or had suffered more from his hard dealing than his stepson.
Some years later than the present work Stephen Scrope drew up a formal
statement of his wrongs,[68] in which he not only complained that in the
disposal of his wardship Fastolf had bought and sold him “as a beast,”
but even charged him with being the cause of illnesses which had marked
him for life[69] and with having at a later period used him so scurvily
that he was compelled to sell his manor of Hever in Kent and take
service with the Duke of Gloucester. Apparently this sign of
independence did not meet Fastolf’s views, for he soon managed to get
him into his own retinue, and, as the other admits, at this time he
showed him “good fatherhood,” employing him at Honfleur and elsewhere,
probably in a civil capacity,[70] until he returned home in pique at
some slight. Fastolf’s dealings with regard to Scrope’s inheritance are
somewhat obscure, but by some arrangement he contrived to secure Castle
Combe for life.[71] As Lady Fastolf died in 1446, her son by her first
marriage, to whom it should have then come by right, was thus kept out
of it for thirteen years longer, only enjoying it from his stepfather’s
death in 1459 until his own in 1472. But in spite of differences the two
were apparently not altogether on bad terms; otherwise neither this
translation nor that of the “Dis des Philosophes” would have been made,
and still less would Scrope have spoken of Fastolf as he here does. His
language indeed is something more than respectful and laudatory. While
he fully endorses Wavrin’s description of Sir John as “moult sage et
vaillant chevallier,”[72] there is a tone of humility which makes it
difficult to realize that the writer was upwards of forty years of age
and at least Fastolf’s equal by birth. The nature of their relations may
be gathered from a singular letter to the latter about 1455 from Sir
Richard Bingham, Justice of the King’s Bench, whose daughter Stephen
Scrope had recently married.[73] In imploring help for him the writer
says[74]:
“... My saide son is and hath be, and will be to hys lifes ende,
your true lad and servaunt, and glad and well willed to do that
myght be to your pleaser, wirschip and profit, and als loth to
offend yow as any person in erth, gentill and well disposid to every
person. Wherfore I besech your gode grace that ye will vouchesafe
remember the premissez, my saide sons age, his wirschipfull birth,
and grete misere for verrey povert, for he hath had no liflode to
life opon sithen my lady his moder deed, safe x. marc of liflode
that ye vouched safe to gife hym this last yer, and therffore to be
his good maister and fader. And thof he be not worthy to be your
son, make hym your almesman, that he may now in his age life of your
almesse, and be your bedeman, and pray for the prosperite of your
noble person....”
The result of this appeal, and of more to the same effect, is not
recorded, but that Fastolf could be gracious enough in words is evident
from the only letter from him to Scrope which is included in the _Paston
Letters_,[75] written on 30th October, 1457. It is addressed,
“Worschepeful and my right wel beloved sone,” and, after thanking him
for his “good avertismentys and right well avysed lettres,” begs him to
recommend to his father-in-law, Justice Bingham, a suit in which the
writer was interested, and the tone throughout is unexceptionable. There
is, however, another letter in the _History of Castle Combe_ (p. 270),
written from Calais, and, according to the editor, about 1420, which is
not so amiable. After Scrope’s second marriage he and his stepfather no
doubt lived apart, but at the time when the “Epistle of Othea” was
translated they were probably under the same roof, and as late as 1454,
when Caister Castle was completed and Fastolf was about to take up his
residence there, it is expressly stated that Scrope would live with
him.[76]