173. Chaucer has here mistranslated the Latin. It is not said that the Via Appia (which led out of Rome through the Porta Capena to Aricia, Tres Tabernae, Appii Forum, and so on towards Capua and Brundusium) was situated three miles from Rome; but that Valerian is to go along the Appian Way as far as to the third milestone. 'Vade igitur in tertium milliarium ab urbe uia quae Appia nuncupatur.' See the South-E. Legendary, l. 37.
177. Urban. St. Urban's day is May 25. This is Urban I., pope, who succeeded Calixtus, A.D. 222. Besides the notice of him in this Tale, his legend is given separately in the Legenda Aurea, cap. lxxvii. He was beheaded May 25, 230, and succeeded by Pontianus.
178. secree nedes, secret necessary reasons; Lat. 'secreta mandata.'
181. purged yow, viz. by the rite of baptism.
186. seintes buriels, burial-places of the saints; Lat. 'sepulchra martirum.' It is worth observing, perhaps, that the form buriels is properly singular, not plural; cf. A. S. byrigels, a sepulchre, and see the examples in Stratmann. In P. Plowman, B. xix. 142, the Jews are represented as guarding Christ's body because it had been foretold that He should rise from the tomb—
'þat þat blessed body · of burieles shulde rise.'
The mistake of supposing s to be the mark of a plural was easily made, and the singular form buriel was evolved. This mistake occurs as early as in Wyclif's Bible, IV Kings xxiii. 17; see Way's note in Prompt. Parv. p. 37, note 1. Consequently, it is most likely that Chaucer has made the same mistake here. The South-E. Legendary (see note to l. 120) says that Urban dwelt 'among puttes and burieles.'
There is here a most interesting allusion to the celebrated catacombs of Rome; see Chambers, Book of Days, i. 101, 102.
lotinge, lying hid. In MS. E., the Latin word latitantem is written above, as a gloss. This was taken from the Latin text, which has—'intra sepulchra martirum latitantem.' Stratmann gives six examples
of the use of lotien or lutien, to lie hid. It occurs once in P. Plowman, B. xvii. 102.