[528] Beginning of the "Shipmannes Tale."
[529] "Vie de Marianne," Paris, 1731-41.
[530] Book i. chap. 81, Luce's edition.
[531] The canonisation took place shortly after the death of the archbishop, 1170-73. There is nothing left to-day but an old marble mosaic, greatly restored, to indicate the place in the choir where the shrine used to be.
[532] A map of the road from London to Canterbury, drawn in the seventeenth century, but showing the line of the old highway, has been reproduced by Dr. Furnivall in his "Supplementary Canterbury Tales—I. The Tale of Beryn," Chaucer Society, 1876, 8vo.
[533] "E forse a queste cose scrivere, quantunque sieno umilissime, si sono elle venute parecchi volte a starsi meco." Prologue of "Giornata Quarta."
[534] "Pardoner's Tale," ll. 904, 920, 931.
[535] The setting of the tales into their proper order is due to Bradshaw and Furnivall; see Furnivall's "Temporary Preface" for the "Six-text edition of Chaucer's Canterbury Tales," Chaucer Society, 1868. The order, subject, and originals of the tales are follows:—
1st Day. London to Dartford, 15 miles.—Tale of the Knight, history of Palamon and Arcyte, derived from Boccaccio's "Teseide."—Tale of the Miller: story of Absolon, Nicholas and Alisoun the carpenter's wife, source unknown.—Reeve's tale, imitated from the French fabliau of Gombert and the two clerks (above, p. 155); same tale in Boccaccio, ix. 6, from whom La Fontaine took it: "le Berceau."—Cook's tale, unfinished; the tale of Gamelyn attributed by some MSS. to the Cook seems to be simply an old story which Chaucer intended to remodel; it would suit the Yeoman better than the Cook (in "Complete Works," as an appendix to vol. iv.).
2nd Day. Stopping at Rochester, 30 miles.—Tale of the Man of Law: history of the pious Constance, from the French of Trivet, an Englishman who wrote also Latin chronicles, &c., same story in Gower, who wrote it ab. 1393.—Shipman's tale: story of a merchant of St. Denys, his wife, and a wicked monk, from some French fabliau, or from "Decameron," viii. 1.—Tale of the Prioress: a child killed by Jews, from the French of Gautier de Coinci.—Tales by Chaucer: Sir Thopas, a caricature of the romances of chivalry; story of Melibeus, from a French version of the "Liber consolationis et consilii" of Albertano of Brescia, thirteenth century.—Monk's tale: "tragedies" of Lucifer, Adam, Sampson, Hercules, Nebuchadnezzar, Belshazzar, Zenobia, Pedro the Cruel, Pierre de Lusignan king of Cyprus, Barnabo Visconti (d. 1385), Hugolino, Nero, Holofernes, Antiochus, Alexander, Cæsar, Crœsus; from Boccaccio, Machault, Dante, the ancients, &c.—Tale of the Nun's Priest: Story of Chauntecleer, same story in "Roman de Renart" and in Marie de France.