Clerkly Allusiveness: Griselda, Xanthippe, and the Woman of Samaria

Description: Iconographic associations of Mary and Griselda have proved problematic in attempts to read ClT as allegory; however, if we hear in the "annunciation passage" a larger range of allusion--both secular and patristic--the allegorical force of the Marian imagery recedes into a background of references to other exemplary women.; Like a verbal "pentimento," the Samaritan woman shows through patient Griselda, so that the woman setting down her water pot at the lord's call represents "every wight, in his degree."