(like utwith = without) originally peculiar to the Northern dialect. See the Glossary, and the note to l. 2159 below (p. 202).
1805. coomen; so in E. Hn.; comen in Pt. Cp. But it is the past tense = came. The spelling comen for the past tense plural is very common in Early English, and we even find com in the singular. Thus, in l. 1807, the Petworth MS. has 'He come,' equivalent to 'coom,' the o being long. But herieth in l. 1808 is a present tense.
1814. nexte, nighest, as in Kn. Ta. A. 1413. So also hext = highest, as in the Old Eng. proverb—'When bale is hext, then bote is next,' i. e. 'when woe is highest, help is nighest.' Next is for neh-est, and hext is for heh-est.
1817. newe Rachel, second Rachel, as we should now say; referring to Matt. ii. 18.
1819. dooth for to sterve, causes to die. So also in l. 1823, dide hem drawe = caused them to be drawn.
1822. Evidently a proverb; compare Boeth. bk. iv. pr. 1. 37-40 (vol. ii. p. 93); and note to P. Plowman, C. v. 140.
1826. The body occupied the place of honour. 'The bier, if the deceased had been a clerk, went into the chancel; if a layman, and not of high degree, the bearers set it down in the nave, hard by the church-door'; Rock, Ch. of our Fathers, ii. 472. He cites the Sarum Manual, fol. c.
1827. the abbot; pronounced thabbòt. covent, convent; here used for the monks who composed the body over which the abbot presided. So in Shakespeare, Hen. VIII, iv. 2. 18—'where the reverend abbot, With all his covent, honourably received him.' The form covent is Old French, still preserved in Covent Garden.
1835. halse; two MSS. consulted by Tyrwhitt read conjure, a mere gloss, caught from the line above. Other examples of halse in the sense of conjure occur. 'Ich halsi þe o godes nome' = I conjure thee in God's name; St. Marherete, ed. Cockayne, p. 17. Again, in Joseph of Arimathie, ed. Skeat, l. 400—
'Vppon þe heiȝe trinite · I halse þe to telle'—