And of many other jestes,
And namely, whan they come to festes;
Ne of the life of Bevys of Hampton,
That was a knight of gret renoun,
Ne of Sir Gye of Warwyke,
All if it might sum men lyke, &c.
I cite these lines to shew the species of tales related by the ancient Gestours, and how much they differed from what we now call jests.'
The word geste here means a tale of the adventures of some hero, like those in the Chansons de geste. Cf. note to l. 2123 below. Sometimes the plural gestes signifies passages of history. The famous collection called the Gesta Romanorum contains narratives of very various kinds.
2038. royales, royal; some MSS. spell the word reales, but the meaning is the same. In the romance of Ywain and Gawain (Ritson, vol. i.) a maiden is described as reading 'a real romance.' Tyrwhitt thinks that the term originated with an Italian collection of romances relating to Charlemagne, which began with the words—'Qui se comenza la hystoria el Real di Franza,' &c.; edit. Mutinae, 1491, folio. It was reprinted in 1537, with a title beginning—'I reali di Franza,' &c. He refers to Quadrío, t. vi. p. 530. The word roial (in some MSS. real)
occurs again in l. 2043. Kölbing remarks that the prose romance of Generides is called a royal historie, though it has nothing to do with Charlemagne.