'And what is friendship but a name,
A charm that lulls to sleep;
A shade that follows wealth or fame,
And leaves the wretch to weep?'
Zenobia.
3437. Cenobia. The story of Zenobia is told by Trebellius Pollio, who flourished under Constantine, in cap. xxix. of his work entitled Triginta Tyranni; but Chaucer no doubt followed later accounts, one of which was clearly that given by Boccaccio in his De Mulieribus Claris, cap. xcviii. Boccaccio relates her story again in his De Casibus Virorum, lib. viii. c. 6; in an edition of which, printed in 1544, I find references to the biography of Aurelian by Flavius Vopiscus, to the history of Orosius, lib. vii. cap. 23, and to Baptista Fulgosius, lib. iv. cap. 3. See, in particular, chap. xi. of Gibbon's Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, where the story of Zenobia is given at length. Palmyra is described by Pliny, Nat. Hist. lib. v. cap. 21. Zenobia's ambition tempted her to endeavour to make herself a Queen of the East, instead of remaining merely Queen of Palmyra; but she was defeated by the Roman emperor Aurelian, A.D. 273, and carried to Rome, where she graced his triumph, A.D. 274. She survived this reverse of fortune for some years.
Palimerie. Such is the spelling in the best MSS.; but MS. Hl. reads—'of Palmire the queene.' It is remarkable that MS. Trin. Coll. Cam. R. 3. 19 has the reading—'Cenobia, of Belmary quene,' which suggests confusion with Belmarie, in the Prol. A. 57; but see the note to that line. It occupied the site of the ancient Tadmor, or 'city of palmtrees,' in an oasis of the Great Syrian desert. It has been in ruins since about A.D. 1400.
3441. In the second ne in, the e is slurred over; cf. nin, Sq. Ta., F. 35.
3442. Perse. This (like l. 3438) is Chaucer's mistake. Boccaccio says expressly that she was of the race of the Ptolemies of Egypt; but further
on he remarks—'Sic cum Persis et Armenis principibus, vt illos urbanitate et facetia superaret.' This may account for the confusion.