This legend is mentioned in the carol of the Carnal and the Crane. In the hurry of the flight the Virgin Mary dropped these pieces of money and the other gifts. They were found by a shepherd, who kept them by him, and in after years, being afflicted by some disease incurable by mortal aid, applied to our Saviour, who healed him, and he then offered these gifts at the high altar. They were subsequently paid to Judas by the priests as the reward of his perfidy. There are two reasons given for his requiring thirty pieces of money: one that he considered he had lost thirty pieces by the box of precious ointment not having been sold for 300 pence, of which he would have purloined the tenth part; and the other, that having been sent by our Saviour, on Holy Thursday, with this amount of money, to provide for the last supper, he fell asleep in the way and was robbed. In the midst of his distress the rich Jew, Pilate, met him, and he then agreed to betray his master for the amount he had lost.
In one of our ancient chronicles there is a legend of the life of Judas, before he became an apostle, very similar, in many respects, to the well-known history of Œdipus, which need not be repeated here. When, smitten by remorse, he returned the money to the priests, and destroyed himself: they applied half in purchase of the potter’s field, and with the other half bribed the soldiers who guarded the sepulchre to say that the disciples came by night and stole the body of our Saviour. After this, having performed their mission, they were dispersed, and all traces of them lost. They were made of the purest gold, the term pieces of silver used in some parts of our translation with reference to them, being, according to the history, merely a common or generic name for money, like argent in French; on one side was a king’s head crowned, and on the other some unintelligible Chaldaic characters, and they were said to have been worth three florins each.
There are many old manuscript histories of these kings in existence, at the Museum and elsewhere, one of which resolves the whole story into alchemy; and early printed histories, as by Güldenschaiff, in 1477, and Wynkyn de Worde, in the beginning of the sixteenth century. Some account of particularly splendid feasts on Twelfth Day have been mentioned in the foregoing pages.
Their names were occasionally used as a term of adjuration, which, in former times, whatever may be case now, was a mark of respect. Diccon, in that quaint production ‘Gammer Gurton’s Needle,’ of which the plot and catastrophe would rather astonish a modern audience, says to Dame Chat,—
“There I will have you swear by oure dere lady of Bullaine,
Saint Dunstone and Saint Donnyke, with the Three Kings of Kullain,
That ye shall keep it secret.”
I will now conclude this chapter with the ‘Star Song,’ before referred to—
“We come walking with our staves
Wreathed with laurel,
We seek the Lord Jesus, and would wish
To put laurel on his knees;
Are the children of Charles the King,
Pater bonne Franselyn, Jeremie.
We did come before Herod’s door, &c.
Herod, the king, came himself before, &c.
Herod then spake with a false man’s heart, &c.
Why is the youngest of three so swart? &c.
Altho’ he is swart, he is well be known, &c.
In orient land he has a throne, &c.
We all came over the lofty hill, &c.
And there saw we the Star stand still, &c.
Oh, Star! you must not stand still so, &c.
But must with us to Bethlehem go, &c.
To Bethlehem, the lovely town, &c.
Where Mary and her child sit down, &c.
How small the child, and how great the good, &c.
A blessed New Year that gives us God, &c.
