Interpretative Etymologies in Translations of the “Golden Legend.”

Author / Editor
Rydel, Courtney.

Title
Interpretative Etymologies in Translations of the “Golden Legend.”

Published
Medieval Translator/Traduire au Moyen Age 16 (2017): 289-302.

Description
Explores how vernacular translators of Jacobus de Voragine’s “Legenda Aurea” lend theological authority to their works by appropriating or emulating the onomastic etymologies in Jacobus’s work. Includes discussion of Chaucer’s close following of Jacobus—the first instance on English—in his etymologizing of “Cecile” in SNP 8.85ff., describing how Chaucer’s presentation emphasizes Cecilia’s “good works and charity” and his own work of translation.

Chaucer Subjects
Second Nun and Her Tale
Sources, Analogues, and Literary Relations