In preparing the text of this edition, all the available MSS. have been
consulted, the only two not examined being William Billyng's MS. and the
Brighton MS., which were formerly in the possession of private owners,
and have eluded all search for them. As exhaustive a search as was
possible has been made for other texts of the poem, but it has often
escaped cataloguing, and it is probable that other copies of the B
version, at least, exist.
The punctuation, inverted commas, and regular use of initial capitals in
the text are the Editor's. The MSS. vary in their use of capitals, the
same MS. being often inconsistent with itself, while the Cambridge text
frequently employs them for unimportant words in the middle of the line,
as p. 33, l. 45, Ar, &c. Capitals have been added in the case of all
proper names. Letters and words which are obscure or illegible in the
MS., or which appear to have been accidentally omitted, are enclosed in
square brackets, and a hyphen has been inserted where the MS. separates
a prefix or particle from the rest of the word. The MS. writings ff, þ,
[gh], v for u and vice versa, have been retained in the text, and [ll],
[th] expanded to ll{e}, th{e}, but it was not thought advisable to
expand m~, n~, to m{e}, n{e}, nor other letters such as d, r, g, when
written with a final flourish. Fifteenth-century scribes appear to have
used such flourishes at the end of the word rather as a matter of habit
than with any particular meaning, and the forms to which expansion of
them would lead, such as _one_, _onne_ for _on_, are frequently most
improbable. It was therefore thought better to ignore such flourishes,
or to indicate the persistent use of them by a footnote.
[Transcriber's Note:
The mid-paragraph characters are "ll" and "th", each with a single
stroke through both letters.]
As the conclusions arrived at in the Introduction with regard to the
relationship of the English and Latin versions in MS. Harl. 913, and the
verbal connexion with the _Soul and Body_ Dialogues, agree, to some
extent, with those indicated by Heuser, _Die Kildare-Gedichte_, pp.
176-80, it is only reasonable to state that the greater part of the work
upon the subject had been done, and a projected article upon it written
in reply to Professor Fiedler's in the _Modern Language Review_, before
I had any knowledge of Heuser's text, and that my conclusions had been
formed independently of his, though his have helped to strengthen and
confirm them. Moreover I owe his work a very real debt, since I first
learned from it of the existence of the Cambridge Text, which has been a
most important link in the building up of the general theory as to the
connexion between the different versions of the poem.
In conclusion, it is a pleasure to express thanks for kind and courteous
assistance to the authorities of the British Museum, the Public Record
Office, the Bodleian, Cambridge University Library and Lincoln Cathedral
Library; to the librarian of Lambeth Palace Library, to whom I am
indebted for the collation of the Lambeth text; to the authorities of
Magdalene College, Cambridge, for permission to copy and print the
Maitland text; to Lord Harlech for the loan of the Porkington MS.; to
Professor Fiedler for permission to use the Brighton text; to Professor
Priebsch, who pointed out the text in MS. Harl. 4486; to Miss Helen
Sandison, of Bryn Mawr College, U.S.A., for the discovery of the text in
the Appendix and for two of the Analogues, and to Professor Skeat for
valuable advice and suggestions. In particular this text owes much to my
Father, Sir James Murray of the _Oxford Dictionary_, who has read the
proofs, and in the midst of his own arduous work has always been ready
with help and advice, to my friend Miss K. S. Block, Lecturer in English
at the Royal Holloway College, and, above all, to Dr. Furnivall, in whom
all scholars and students of English mourn to-day the loss of a great
pioneer, and an ever-ready friend and adviser.
OXFORD,
_July_ 1910.
Since this was sent to press two other copies of the B version have come
to light at Cambridge, and have by kind permission been inserted on pp.
47, 48 as Appendix II:--
(B 19) MS. Trinity College R. 3. 21, fol. 33, v^o, a copy of the normal
B version in seven stanzas.
(B 20) MS. Trinity College B. 15. 39, fol. 170, which contains nine
stanzas of the expanded text preserved in MSS. Lambeth and Laud, and
appears to represent a distinct copy of the original of these two (see
Introd. p. xix).
[Footnote 1: A second Latin version of an _Erthe_ poem, together
with the same poem in Anglo-French, and in Middle English, occurs
on the back of a Roll in the Public Record Office, dating from the
time of Edward II (Ex^r. K. R. Proceedings, Bdle. 1; old No.
845/21), and in a 19th cent. transcript of this in MS. Brit. Mus.
Addit. 25478; it is given in the Appendix. Both the Latin and the
French appear to be translations or paraphrases of the English,
with an additional verse or two.]
[Footnote 2: The English text in the Appendix consists of nine
four-lined stanzas, and is distinct from either of the two current
versions of the poem. It appears to have been suggested by the
opening lines of A, and may be regarded as a single sub-type of A,
not affecting the main line of argument of the Introduction. (See
Appendix, p. 46.)]
[Footnote 3: This is repeated on each page of Bateman's text, and
is, perhaps, his own design.]
[Footnote 4: See Bateman's Preface.]
[Footnote 5: Probably not the author but the copier of the MS.:
see Notes.]
[Footnote 6: All the stanzas of the B version are four-lined
except MS. Porkington.]
[Footnote 7: v. Wanley's Catalogue.]
[Footnote 8: My attention was called to this MS. by the kindness
of Prof. Priebech.]
[Footnote 9: MS. Laud Misc. is not written throughout in metrical
lines, but the divisions of the stanzas, and, in most cases, of
the lines, are clearly indicated.]
[Footnote 10: The first leaf of this text has been torn out and
the verses in brackets are only conjectural.]
[Footnote 11: MS. Laud represents, in the main, the same version
as MS. Lamb., but the variant readings preclude the idea of its
being a copy of Lamb., unless the scribe deliberately tried to
modify his original on the lines of Harl. 4486 and Rawl. P. The
changes in the text (ll. 26, 27, 47: see Notes) show that it
cannot be the original of Lamb. It appears to be a transcript from
the same original made about the same date, or a little earlier
than the Lambeth text.]
[Footnote 12: Cf. MS. Brighton _nobley_.]
[Footnote 13: Cf. MS. Selden _delful_.]
[Footnote 14: The Latin and Anglo-French texts in the Appendix are
evidently renderings of the English poem which accompanies them.]
[Footnote 15: This is clearly seen in the Latin and French
versions in the Appendix where the Latin text uses _terra in
terra_, and the French _terre en terre_.]
[Footnote 16: Vernon MS. _to resten on_, Digby, _shal rest right
at_.]
[Footnote 17: Cotton MS. _þe rof þe firste_.]
[Footnote 18: Cf. Frendles ys þe dede (_Proverbs of Hendyng_,
l. 288).]
[Footnote 19: = heres þonkes, _of their own free will_.]
[Footnote 20: Compare with this the text in the Appendix which
begins:
Whanne eorthe hath eorthe wiþ wrong igete--
and in the French version:
Quant terre auera en terre large terre gayne.]
[Footnote 21: See the Appendix, p. 46.]
[Footnote 22: _Die Kildare-Gedichte_ (Bonn, 1904).]
[Footnote 23: See p. xxxiv above.]
[Footnote 24: The earliest known epitaphs in English date from the
fourteenth century.]
[Footnote 25: There is no record of this brass at the church of
St. Helen's, Bishopsgate.]
[Footnote 26: Dated 1590 by Ernest R. Suffling, _Epitaphia_
(1909), p. 382.]
[Footnote 27: A late instance of its use is given by Ch. Box
(_Elegies and Epitaphs_, Glouc. 1892) as found by him on the tomb
of a bricklayer, who died in 1837, aged 90:--
Earth walks upon Earth like glittering gold,
Earth says to Earth, 'We are but mould';
Earth builds upon Earth castles and towers,
Earth says to Earth, 'All is ours'!]
[Footnote 28: Printed from Grein-Wülcker, _Bibliothek der ags.
Poesie_, iii. 212.--(I know of a most noble guest in the
dwellings, hidden from men, whom fierce hunger cannot torment, nor
burning thirst, nor age, nor sickness [nor close-pressing death],
if the servant who shall [bear him company] in his course serves
him honourably: they, prospering, shall find abundance and bliss,
countless joys, allotted to them at home, but (they shall find)
sorrow, if the servant obeys his lord and master ill upon their
journey, and will not show him reverence, the one brother to the
other: that shall afflict them both, when they two depart,
hastening hence, from the bosom of their common kinswoman, mother
and sister.)]
[Footnote 29: Grein-Wülcker, iii. 105.--(The worm whose jaws are
sharper than needles, who first of all the worms in the grave
forces his way to him.)]