69. dolven, buried; 'because they (the poor) always crave an alms, and never make an offering, they (the priests) would like to see them dead and buried.'
69. legistres, lawyers; 'legistres of bothe the lawes,' P. Plowm. B. vii. 14.
71. 'For then wrong and force would not be worth a haw anywhere.' Before plesen something seems lost; perhaps read—'and [thou canst] plesen,' i.e. and you can please no one, unless those oppressive and wrong-doing lawyers are in power and full action.'
74. ryme, rime. The reference is not to actual jingle of rime, but to a proverb then current. In a poem by Lydgate in MS. Harl. 2251 (fol. 26), beginning—'Alle thynge in kynde desirith thynge i-like,' the refrain to every stanza runs thus:—'It may wele ryme, but it accordith nought'; see his Minor Poems, ed. Halliwell, p. 55. The sense is that unlike things may be brought together, like riming words, but they will not on that account agree. So here: such things may seem, to all appearance, congruous, but they are really inconsistent. Cf. note to l. 52 above.
79. beestly wit, animal intelligence.
99. cosinage, those who are my relatives.
104. behynde, behindhand, in the rear. passe, to surpass, be prominent.
109. comeden is false grammar for comen, came; perhaps it is a misprint. The reference is to Gen. ix. 27: 'God shall enlarge Japheth ... and Canaan shall be his servant.' The author has turned Canaan into Cayn, and has further confused Canaan with his father Ham!
112. gentilesse; cf. Ch. Boeth. bk. iii. pr. 6. 31-4; C. T., D 1109.
116. Perdicas, Perdiccas, son of Orontes, a famous general under Alexander the Great. This king, on his death-bed, is said to have taken the royal signet-ring from his finger and to have given it to Perdiccas. After Alexander's death, Perdiccas held the chief authority under the new king Arrhidaeus; and it was really Arrhidaeus (not Perdiccas) who was the son of a tombestere, or female dancer, and of Philip of Macedonia; so that he was Alexander's half brother. The dancer's name was Philinna, of Larissa. In the Romance of Alexander, the dying king bequeaths to Perdiccas the kingdom of Greece; cf. note to bk. iii. c. ii. l. 25. Hence the confusion.