Comments

1. The 2 and the 3 pers. sg. Pres. Indic. forms often display a mutated root vowel: hesihst (cf. hesēon), hecnæwþ (cf. cnāwan), ytt (cf. etan).

2. One of the peculiarities of late WS texts is the appearance of the letter y in place of the original i, as in ys, lycihe, wirihnys, ytt, etc.

3. This text, like other late OE manuscripts, shows the confusion of vowels in unstressed inflexions: bētsaþ, not blētseþ (s. 10); handlaþ, not handleþ (s. 12)

The canterbury tales Prologue

Original Version

1 Whan that Aprille with his¹ shoures soote²

The droughte² of March hath perced to the roote,

And bathed every veyne in swich licour³,

Of which vertu³ engendred is the flour;

5 Whan Zephirus⁴ eek with his swete breeth

Inspired hath in every holt and heeth

The tendre croppes, and the yonge sonne⁵

Hath in the Ram⁶ his halve cours y-ronne.

And smale foweles maken melodye,

10 That slepen al the nyght with open ye –

So priketh hem nature in here courages –

Thanne longen folk to goon on pilgrimages,

And palmeres for to seken straunge strondes⁷,

To ferne halwes⁸, couthe in sondry londes;

15 And specially, from every shires ende

Of Engelond to Caunterbury they wende⁹.

The hooly, blisful martir¹⁰ for to seke,

That hem hath holpen, whan that they were seeke;

Bifil that in that seson on a day

20 In Southwerk¹¹ at the Tabard¹² as I lay,

Redy to wenden on my pilgrymage

To Caunterbury with ful devout corage,

At nyght were come into that hostelrye

Wel nyne and twenty in a compaignye

25 Of sondry folk by aventure y-falle

In felaweshipe, and pilgrimes were they alle,

That toward Caunterbury wolden ryde.

The chaumbres and the stables weren wyde,

And wel we weren esed atte beste¹³.

30 And shortly, whan the sonne was to reste,

So hadde I spoken with hem everichon,

That I was of her felaweshipe anon,

And made forward erly for to ryse,

To take oure wey ther, as I yow devyse.

Comments

1. his – the neuter gender, corresponds to modern English its.

2. In speech the final -e was dead or dying in Chaucer's time, but it continued to be used in verse. Hence in reading Chaucer's verse you have to pronounce many of the final -e sounds of words, but not all. The final -e is not pronounced if it occurs before a vowel or before an h. It is often dropped after an unstressed syllable and in two-syllable unstressed words (were – [wer], hire – [hir] etc). Otherwise the final -e is usually pronounced. In the following passage we have marked all the cases where to our opinion -e should be dropped:

With hym ther was his sone, a yong Squier,

A lovyere, and a lusty bacheler,

With lokkes crulle, as they were leyd in presse.

3. When the French words were first borrowed into English they retained a French pronunciation but gradually they were adopted to the English speech habits. The words of more than two or three syllables kept their original stress longer. In Chaucer's poetry the pronunciation of such words often fluctuates, they may be stressed one way or the other. Here is the pronunciation of some French loanwords you meet in the text as they must have sounded in Chaucer's days: licour [li'ku:r], nature [na'tju:r], corages [ku'ra:dZqs], specially [spesi'ali], seson [se'zON].

4. Zephirus (from Greek) 'the west wind known as the messenger of spring'.

5. the yonge sonne – the sun runs one half course in the sign of the Ram in March, and the second half course in April;

6. Ram 'The Ram, or Aries; one of the zodiacal constellations, and the zodiacal sign entered by the sun on 21 March'.

7. strange strondes 'foreign lands'.

8. ferne halwes 'distant shrines'.

9. they wende 'they go' – Present plural of wendan.

10. the holy blisful martir – refers to Thomas à Becket, archbishop of Canterbury, He opposed the king's measures against the privileges of the church and was slain in Canterbury by the king's knights. He met his death with splendid courage in his own cathedral. His shrine became the most famous in Christendom. Thomas à Becket was canonized in 1173 and his festival is observed on 7 July.

11. Southwerk – a central borough of London on the south bank of the Thames.

12. The Tabard – an inn in Southwerk; A tabard was a short surcoat open at the sides and having short sleeves or none, worn by a knight over his armour, and emblazoned with his armorial bearings.

13. weren esed atte beste 'were very well lodged'.