La nouele vint a chastel,
Au seneschal, qui n’est pas bel,
Qe cil qu’il auoit herbergé
Cinc de ses homes out tué.
[[1932.] Apparently corrupt. Perhaps is should be it. “That this strife—as to what it meant.”]
[2045.] That weren of Kaym kin and Eues. The odium affixed to the supposed progeny of Cain, and the fables engrafted on it, owe their origin to the theological opinions of the Middle Ages, which it is not worth while to trace to their authors. See Beowulf, ed. Thorpe, p. 8; and Piers Plowman, A. X. 135-156; answering to p. 177 of Whitaker’s edition. See also the Romance of Kyng Alisaunder:
And of Sab the duk Mauryn,
He was of Kaymes kunrede.
—l. 1932.
In Ywaine and Gawaine, l. 559, the Giant is called “the karl of Kaymes kyn,” and so also in a poem printed by Percy, intitled Little John Nobody, written about the year 1550.