The Testament of Cresseid
(d) William Dunbar (1460–1520) is generally considered to be the chief of the Scottish Chaucerian poets. He was born in East Lothian, studied at St. Andrews University (1477), and went to France and became a wandering friar. Returning to Scotland, he became attached to the household of James IV, and in course of time was appointed official Rhymer. He died about 1520.
Dunbar wrote freely, often on subjects of passing interest; and though his work runs mainly on Chaucerian lines it has an energy and pictorial quality that are quite individual. Of the more than ninety poems associated with his name the most important are The Golden Targe, of the common allegorical-rhetorical type; The Thrissill and the Rois, celebrating the marriage of James IV and the English Margaret (1503); The Dance of the Sevin Deidlie Sins, with its strong macabre effects and its masterly grip of meter; The Twa Meryit Wemen and the Wedo, a revival of the ancient alliterative measure, and outrageously frank in expression; and The Lament for the Makaris, in short stanzas with the refrain Timor Mortis conturbat me, quite striking in its effect.
The following short extract reveals Dunbar’s strong pictorial quality and his command of meter.
Let see quoth he now wha begins:—
With that the foul Sevin Deidlie Sins
Beyond to leap at anis[63];
And first of all in dance was Pride
With hair wyld[64] back and bonnet o’ side,
Like to make vaistie wanis.[65]