§ 37. The Man of Lawes Tale. The Words of the Host and the Prologue together contain 133 lines, so that the Tale itself begins with l. 134. We can easily see, from the style and by the metrical form, that this Tale is a piece of Chaucer's early workmanship, and was revised for insertion among the Tales, with the addition of a Prologue and four stanzas[[107]], about 1387.
Tyrwhitt has drawn attention to the fact that a story, closely agreeing with the Man of Lawes Tale, is found in Gower's Confessio Amantis, Book II (ed. Pauli, i. 179-213). The expression 'som men wolde seyn,' in ll. 1009 and 1086, led him to suppose that Chaucer took the story from Gower; but this expression can be otherwise explained (see notes to the lines)[[108]], and the borrowing seems to have been the other way, as will appear if the question be handled with the necessary care.
Before comparing Chaucer's Tale with Gower's, it is first of all necessary to observe that, for the most part, they drew their materials from a common source; a fact which has been completely proved by Lücke[[109]], who clearly shews that each of the poets preserves details which the other omits. Their common original is found in the Life of Constance, as narrated in the Anglo-Norman Chronicle of Nicholas Trivet, written about A.D. 1334. Mr. Thomas Wright, in his edition of the Canterbury Tales, pointed out that Trivet's Chronicle contains the original of the story as told by Gower. That it also contains the original of the story as told by Chaucer is evident from the publications of the Chaucer Society. Trivet's version of the story was edited for that Society by Mr. Brock in 1872, with an English translation, and a careful line-by-line analysis of it, shewing clearly the exact extent to which Chaucer followed his original. The name of the publication is 'Originals and Analogues of some of Chaucer's Canterbury Tales,' published for the Chaucer Society; Part I, 1872; Part II, 1875. To this I am indebted for much of the information here given[[110]]. It appears that Nicholas Trivet was an English Dominican friar, who died some time after 1334. A short account of him in Latin, with a list of works ascribed to him, is to be found in Quetif and Echard's Scriptores Ordinis Praedicatorum[[111]], tom. i. pp. 561-565; and a notice in English of his life and some of his works, in the Preface to T. Hog's edition of Trivet's Annales. Mr. Brock notices eighteen of his works, amongst which it will suffice to mention here (a) his Annales ab origine mundi ad Christum (Royal MS. 13 B. xvi, &c.); (b) his Annales sex Regum Angliae, qui a comitibus Andegavensibus [counts of Anjou] originem traxerunt (Arundel MSS. 46 and 220, Harl. MSS. 29 and 4322, &c.); and (c) his Anglo-Norman Chronicle, quite a distinct work from the Latin Annales (MS. Arundel 56, &c.). Of the last there are numerous copies, MS. Arundel 56 being one of the best, and therefore selected to be printed from for the Chaucer Society. The heading runs thus:—'Ci comence les Cronicles qe Frere Nichol Trivet escript a dame Marie, la fille moun seignour le Roi Edward, le fitz Henri'; shewing that it was written for the princess Mary, daughter of Edward I, born in 1278, who became a nun at Amesbury in 1285. The story of Constance begins on leaf 45, back. Gower follows Trivet rather closely, with but few omissions, and only one addition of any importance, about thirty lines long. 'Chaucer tells the same story as Trivet, but tells it in his own language, and in much shorter compass. He omits little or nothing of importance, and alters only the details.... Chaucer's additions are many; of the 1029 lines of which the Tale consists, about 350 are Chaucer's additions. The passages are these:—ll. 190-203; 270-287; 295-315; 330-343; 351-71; 400-10; 421-7; 449-62; 470-504; 631-58; 701-14; 771-84; 811-9; 825-68; 925-45; 1037-43; 1052-78; 1132-41' (Brock).
As to these additions, I have already shewn (in § 36) the origin of ll. 421-7, 771-7, 925-31, and 1135-1141. It is worth notice that the following passages have also very much the appearance of being added, by way of commentary, at the time of revision; viz. 190-203, 295-315, 358-371, 449-462, 631-658, 701-714, 827-868. They form no essential part of the story, whilst, at the same time, some of them are of high excellence.
Tyrwhitt pointed out that much the same story is to be found in the Lay of Emarè (MS. Cotton, Calig. A. ii, fol. 69), printed by Ritson in the second volume of his Metrical Romances. He observes: 'The chief differences are, that Emarè is originally exposed in a boat for refusing to comply with the desires of the Emperour her father; that she is driven on the coast of Galys, or Wales, and married to the King of that country. The contrivances of the step-mother, and the consequences of them, are the same in both stories.' In the Romance of Sir Eglamour (Thornton Romances, ed. Halliwell, p. 154), the heroine is sent to sea in a ship by herself.
Mr. Thomas Wright further observes: 'The treachery of King Ælla's mother enters into the French Romance of the Chevalier au Cigne, and into the still more ancient Anglo-Saxon romance of King Offa, preserved in a Latin form by Matthew Paris. It is also found in the Italian collection, said to have been composed in 1378, under the title of Il Pecorone di Ser Giovanni Fiorentino (an imitation of the Decameron), gior. x. no. 1. The treason of the Knight who murders Hermengilde is an incident in the French Roman de la Violette, and in the English metrical romance of Le Bone Florence of Rome (printed in Ritson's collection); and is found in the English Gesta Romanorum, c. 69 (ed. Madden)[[112]], joined, in the latter place, with Constance's adventure with the steward. It is also found in Vincent of Beauvais[[113]], and other writers.' The tale in the Gesta Romanorum is called 'Merelaus the Emperor' (MS. Harl. 7333, leaf 201), and is printed in the Originals and Analogues (Chaucer Society), Part I, pp. 57-70. Mr. Furnivall adds—'This tale was versified by Occleve, who called Merelaus "Gerelaus;" and Warton quotes Occleve's lines describing how the "the feendly man" stabs the Earl's child, and then puts the bloody knife into the sleeping Empress's hand—
For men shoulde have noon othir deeming
But she had gilty ben of this murdring.'
See Warton, Hist. Eng. Poetry, ed. 1871, i. 296.
See the whole story in Hoccleve's Works, ed. Furnivall, p. 140. In the Originals and Analogues, Part I. pp. 71-84, is also printed an extract from Matthew Paris, Vita Offae Primi, ed. Wats, 1684, pp. 965-968, containing the story of 'King Offa's intercepted Letters and banished Queen.'