Walls, Kathryn.
American Notes and Queries 16 (1977): 34.
Dame Patience sitting "upon an hil of sond" (PF, 242-43) may come from the second recension of Deguileville's "Pelerinage de la vie humaine" where the persistence of an ant in reaching the top of a sand hill might be thought of as the active…
Keenan, Hugh T.
American Notes and Queries 16 (1978): 66-67.
The 29 pilgrims may allude to Becket's feast day, December 29. The etymology of "Thomas" in Mirk's "Festial" as "alle mon" corresponds to the representative range of pilgrims and sounds like the Knight's description. Readers might add this…
Rude, Donald W.
American Notes and Queries 16 (1978): 82-83.
Two references by Stephen Hawes to Chaucer (along with Gower and Lydgate) not noted by Spurgeon are contained in "The Comforte of Hope." The unique copy of this work, printed by Wynkyn de Worde about 1512, is in The British Library.
Taylor, Ann M.
American Notes and Queries 17 (1978): 18-19.
In Criseyde's debate on whether to take Troilus as a lover (2.598-812), the word "thought" occurs fourteen times, the most dense usage in the poem, reflective of Criseyde's practice of thinking before acting. In contrast, "thought" in Troilus' case…
Roth, Elizabeth.
American Notes and Queries 17 (1978): 54-55.
Fisher's reading "wight" (1977) in WBT 117 is preferable to Donaldson's "wrighte." FranT 867-72 contains phrasing which is reminiscent of Fisher's proposed meaning of WBT 117: "And created by so wise a Being."
Pearcy, Roy J.
American Notes and Queries 17 (1979): 70-71.
The likelihood that Chaucer in ShT was consciously punning on "cousin"/"cozen" is increased by the appearance of such a pun in a "ronde" which belongs to a special subgroup of "chansons de mal marie(e)."
Crider, Richard.
American Notes and Queries 18 (1979): 18-19.
Chauntecleer's citation of Daniel (NPT 7.3128-29), frequently taken to refer to Daniel 7, more pertinently refers to Daniel 4 where Nebuchadnezzar relates a dream similar to Chauntecleer's and to the dreams Chauntecleer cites. This dream and its…
Dane, Joseph A.
American Notes and Queries 19 (1981): 134-35.
Just as the theme of memory pervades HF, so Chaucer's recounting of the "Aeneid" in book 1 begins with both detail and accuracy and ends in hasty paraphrase. Chaucer's lines 143-48 translate the opening sentence of the "Aeneid" accurately, save for…
Test, George A.
American Notes and Queries 2.5 (1964): 67-68.
Adduces the testimony of modern archer, Robert P. Elmer, corroborating that peacock feathers are high quality material for fletching, and a notion thought to underlie Chaucer's reference in the GP description of the Yeoman (1.104).
Bleeth, Kenneth A.
American Notes and Queries 20 (1982): 130-31.
In adapting the fourth "question d'amore" of the "Filocolo" into the story of FranT, Chaucer changed the task from a flowering garden in January to "remoeve alle the rokkes" from the Brittany coast. Chaucer may have derived this idea from Ovid's…
Acker, Paul.
American Notes and Queries 21 (1982): 2-4.
Sumner Ferris (AN&Q 9:71-72) sees a pun on the name "Wade" in MerT 1684: "lat us waden out of his mateere." More probably the image is one of wading with difficulty out of a stream. The MerT allusion to "Wades boot" is a metaphor for "the (male)…
Vasta, Edward.
American Notes and Queries 22 (1984): 126-28.
Characteristics of the Reeve suggest stereotypes of a medieval devil: his beardlessness, Northern origin, phlegmatic character, and sharp wit. He fits all six literary types of the Devil in Hannes Varter's "The Devil in English Literature."
Benson, C. David.
American Notes and Queries 22 (1984): 62-66.
The Physician's being "grounded in astronomye," i.e., astrology, is not a slighting gibe at his abilities. The publication of Nicholas of Lynn's "Kalendarium" (ed. Sigmund Eisner, Chaucer Library) offers "convincing evidence that Chaucer intended no…
Regan, Charles Lionel.
American Notes and Queries 22 (1984): 97-99.
Chaucer's reference in RvT 4096 to "make a clerkes berd" (i.e., "cheat") may be echoed a few lines later in the oath "by seint Cutberd" (line 4127), suggesting terms for shaving and castration.
Wallace, David.
American Notes and Queries 23 (1984): 1-4.
In his adaptation of Boccaccio in TC, Chaucer Latinizes his source, pretending to follow the classical "Lollius." The same tendency may be observed in vocabulary, as Chaucer adds several words of Latin origin to the lexicon, glossing them with the…
Berkhout, Carl T.
American Notes and Queries 23 (1984): 33-34.
A reference in Matthew Parker's "De antiquitate britannicae ecclesiae" (1572) to Clare Hall, Cambridge, as "vocatum in Chaucero in fabula de Reve the soller Halle" (cf. RvT 3990).
Rude, Donald W.
American Notes and Queries 23 (1985): 4-5.
Two references in John Jones's sixteenth-century "The Arte and Science of Preserving Bodie and Soule in Healthe, Wisedome, and Catholike Religion" praise Chaucer's English language and ParsT.
Pearcy, Roy J.
American Notes and Queries 23 (1985): 64-68.
Only one analogue, Jean Bodel's "Gombert et les deus clers," includes after the cradle story a "moralitas" against the danger of harboring strangers (in Bodel, friars). The moral of RvT, spoken by the Cook (CkP 4331), recalls the passage.
Wright, Constance S.
American Notes and Queries 24 (1986): 68-69.
A new text offered for these lines returns to the manuscript reading of "he" for Robinson's "she" in line 882, and with different punctuation. The new text resembles more closely the lines of Ovid that Chaucer is paraphrasing.
Arntz, Sister Mary Luke, S.N.D.
American Notes and Queries 3.10 (1965): 151-52.
Suggests that in TC 1.531-32 Troilus is referring to Tristan as a much-rhymed-about fool in love, adducing evidence of general familiarity with Tristan's foolishness in John Gower, Robert Mannyng, and PF.
Mullany, Peter F.
American Notes and Queries 3.4 (1964): 54-55.
Suggests that the assigning of "Pilates voys" to the Miller (MilP 1.3124) may be due in part to the apocryphal notion that Pilate was the son of a miller's daughter, as recorded in the "Legenda Aurea."
