I take it that these lines were written in 1385, at the very time when the author learnt that his friend Chaucer was at work upon a new poem which he meant to be a great work, viz. the Legend of Good Women. This poem Venus might well claim as being written by her own clerk, as a testament of love, containing legacies of bright examples set by Love's martyrs; and, just as Gower wrote his own poem as a 'shrift,' Chaucer was writing his as a 'penance' (Leg. Good Women, 491) at the command of Cupid (437, 548), a command which was given at his court (352). We can readily understand how Venus could speak of Cupid's court as being her own court; it makes no practical difference.
It remains to shew (with Lücke) that Chaucer and Gower both knew Trivet, and that Gower's language sometimes resembles Chaucer's rather than Trivet's.
The former proposition is soon settled. Where Trivet says, 'et ferri tiel coup en le haterel le feloun' (p. 23, l. 30), Chaucer has, 'A hand him smoot upon the nekke-bon' (669); but Gower omits to mention the 'nekke-bone,' which translates haterel. This shews that Chaucer used Trivet's text. On the other hand, Gower mentions Knaresburgh (i. 191), which he found in Trivet, whilst Chaucer says nothing about it; see note to B 729.
As to the instances in which one poet has copied the other, whilst at the same time Trivet does not suggest the phraseology which they employ, Lücke gives twenty-seven examples in Anglia, xiv. 183. Some of these are rather far-fetched and doubtful, and not many of them are very clear; but their cumulative evidence sufficiently proves the fact. I shall only adduce the clearer cases.
'Ch.' means Chaucer, and 'G.' is Gower. I correct Pauli's spelling.
Ch. B 430:—
Ben al to-hewe and stiked at the bord.
G. i. 182, l. 29:—
Endlong the bord as they be set
Trivet merely says that they killed all the Christians.