NOTES TO GROUP D.
The Wife of Bath's Prologue.
There is nothing whatever to connect this Prologue with any preceding Tale. In MS. E. and most others, it follows the Man of Law's Tale, which cannot be right, as that Tale must be followed by the Shipman's Prologue. Curiously enough, that Prologue does follow the Man of Law's Tale in the Harleian MS., but the Wife of Bath's Tale is made to follow next, in place of the Shipman's Tale.
In MS. Pt., and several others, the Wife's Prologue follows the Merchant's Tale; such is the arrangement in edd. 1532 and 1561. This is possible, as the Merchant's Tale ends a Fragment, and the Wife's Prologue begins one; but it is easier to fit the lines at the end of the Merchant's Tale to the Squire's Prologue. In the Royal MS. 18. C. 2, and in MSS. Laud 739 and Barlow 20, there is an attempt to introduce the Wife's Prologue by some spurious lines which are printed in vol. iii. p. 446. I just note that we have a genuine Epilogue to the Merchant's Tale (see E. 2419-2440); which is quite enough to put the above lines out of court.
MS. Ln. has a different arrangement. It gives eight spurious lines at the end of the Squire's Tale, and then four more spurious lines to link them with the Wife's Prologue; see vol. iii. p. 446.
In the Ellesmere MS. there are numerous quotations in the margin, as will be noted in due course. In the Essays on Chaucer, pp. 293, the Rev. W. W. Woollcombe has shewn that the passages which seem to be taken from John of Salisbury are really taken from Jerome, whom John copied, verbally, at some length. I may add, that I came independently to the same conclusion; indeed, it becomes obvious, on investigation, that such was the case. Chaucer's chief sources for this Prologue are: Jerome's Epistle against Jovinian, and Le Roman de la Rose. I quote the former (frequently) from Hieronymi Opus Epistolarum, edited by Erasmus, printed at Basle in 1524.
1. auctoritee, authoritative text, quotable statement of a good author. 'Though there were no written statement on the subject, my own experience would enable me to speak of the evils of marriage.' Cf. the
character of the Wife in the Prologue, A. 445-476. Lines 1-3 are imitated from Le Rom. de la Rose, 13006-10.
6. So in A. 460, with she hadde for I have had; see note to that line.
7. The alternative reading (in the footnote) does not agree with l. 6. MS. E. is quite right here. Probably MS. Cm. would have given us the same reading, but it is here mutilated.