Piers Plowman Electronic Archive Cambridge MS B.15.17 (W)
	Notes

Preface

1. Thomas Wright, ed. The Vision and the Creed of Piers Ploughman (London: Pickering, 1842; revised ed. 1856). For comment on Wright see Charlotte Brewer, Editing Piers Plowman: The Evolution of the Text (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1996), pp. 50-62.

2. W. W. Skeat, ed. The Vision concerning Piers the Plowman. Part 2. The "Crowley" Text; or Text B. EETS 38 (London: Oxford University Press, 1869), pp. viii-ix.

3. George Kane and E. Talbot Donaldson, eds. Piers Plowman: The B Version (London: Athlone Press, 1975; 2nd impression 1988), p. 214. For discussion of the language see M. L. Samuels, "Langland's Dialect." Medium Ævum 54 (1985): 232-47; reprinted in The English of Chaucer and his Contemporaries, ed. J. J. Smith (Aberdeen: Aberdeen University Press, 1989). For its relation to the language of Chaucer texts see M. L. Samuels, "Chaucer's Spelling," in Middle English Studies Presented to Norman Davis, ed. Douglas Gray and E. G. Stanley (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1983), pp. 17-37; reprinted in The English of Chaucer and his Contemporaries, ed. J. J. Smith (Aberdeen: Aberdeen University Press, 1989).

4. A. V. C. Schmidt, ed. William Langland, The Vision of Piers Plowman (London, Melbourne and Toronto: J. M. Dent, 1978; 2nd ed., 1995), and William Langland, Piers Plowman: A Parallel-Text Edition: vol. 1. Text (London & New York: Longman, 1995).

5. George Kane and E. Talbot Donaldson, eds. Piers Plowman: The B Version. London: Athlone Press, 1975; 2nd impression 1988, p. 214.

6. See A. I. Doyle, "Remarks on Surviving Manuscripts of Piers Plowman," in Medieval English Religious and Ethical Literature: Essays in Honour of George H. Russell, ed. Gregory Kratzmann and James Simpson (Cambridge: D. S. Brewer, 1986), p. 39.

7. See A. I. Doyle and M. B. Parkes, "The Production of Copies of the Canterbury Tales and the Confessio Amantis in the Early Fifteenth Century," in Medieval Scribes, Manuscripts and Libraries: Essays Presented to N. R. Ker, ed. M. B. Parkes and Andrew G. Watson (London: Scolar Press, 1978), pp. 163-210. See also A. I. Doyle, "The Copyist of the Ellesmere Canterbury Tales," in The Ellesmere Chaucer: Essays in Interpretation, ed. Martin Stevens and Daniel Woodward (San Marino, Cal. and Tokyo, 1995), pp. 49-67.

8. We have noted the following handful of errors in the Kane-Donaldson transcription of W. The correct reading is followed by the error: W4.147/KD4.145 — Lat vs. their Late; W5.178/KD5.177 — vnþende vs. their unþende; W8.124/KD8.128 — Where vs. their Wher; W10.56/KD10.54 — Thanne vs. their Than; W10.312/KD10.310 — gret vs. their great; W11.413/KD11.418 — aboute vs. their about; W12.265/KD12.265 — Pecok vs. their Pecock; W13.48/KD13.46 — comaunded vs. their co(m)maunded; W13.118/KD13.112 — Thanne vs. their Than; W14.68/KD14.62 — Crgo vs. their Ergo; W14.279/KD14.275 — p(ro)prely vs. their p(ro)perly; W15.129/KD15.123 — Sire vs. their Sir; W16.280/KD16.267 — vs vs. their us; W17.13/KD17.14 — þe vs. their the; W18.161/KD18.157 — firste vs. their first; W18.165/KD18.161 — þat vs. their that (correct in their apparatus); W18.402/KD18.391 — Thei vs. their They; and W20.254/KD20.255 — c(er)tein vs. their c(er)tain. Minor inconsistencies appear in W11.3, W13.259, and W13.330 where the ampersand normally written as <&> is resolved to et.

Introduction

2. A. I. Doyle, "Remarks on Surviving Manuscripts of Piers Plowman," in Medieval English Religious and Ethical Literature: Essays in Honour of George H. Russell, ed. Gregory Kratzmann and James Simpson (Cambridge: D. S. Brewer, 1986), pp. 35-48 (quotation on p. 39). In a letter of 23 November 1999, Dr Doyle informs Thorlac Turville-Petre that the "prolific Staffordshire scribe" is the Prick of Conscience "Lichfield Master," found in Oxford, Bodleian Library, Rawlinson A.389, London, British Library, Harley 1205, Manchester, John Rylands, Eng. 50, London, College of Arms 57, and Cambridge, Trinity College 383 (R.3.8), but Dr Doyle now thinks that this shows only that "scribes arrived simultaneously at similar modes of an anglicana formata."

3. Other manuscripts of the B Version with this explicit are C, C², G, L, M, O and Y.

4. A. I. Doyle, "Remarks on Surviving Manuscripts of Piers Plowman," in Medieval English Religious and Ethical Literature: Essays in Honour of George H. Russell, ed. Gregory Kratzmann and James Simpson (Cambridge: D. S. Brewer, 1986), p. 39.

5. Ralph Hanna III, Index of Middle English Prose, Handlist 1, A Handlist of Manuscripts in the Henry E. Huntington Library (Cambridge: D. S. Brewer, 1984), 12-13; Ralph Hanna III, "Notes toward a Future History of Middle English Literature: Two Copies of Richard Rolle's Form of Living," in Chaucer in Perspective, ed. Geoffrey Lester (Sheffield: Sheffield Academic Press, 1999), pp. 279-300.

6. On the Form of Living (sigla T² and H) see the edition by S. J. Ogilvie-Thomson (1988), Richard Rolle: Prose and Verse, EETS 293 (Oxford, 1988), pp. lii-lxv, esp. p. lx. In the earlier edition by Hope Emily Allen, Writings Ascribed to Richard Rolle (London, 1927), Allen overlooks the text of the Form of Living in W. On "Crist made to man" (sigla T and P) see the edition by Carleton Brown, Religious Lyrics of the XIVth Century (Oxford, 1924), no. 90 and p. 273.

7. This is 1.448 in The Form of Living, ed. S. H. Ogilvie-Thomson, Richard Rolle: Prose and Verse, EETS 293 (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1988).

8. See A. I. Doyle and M. B. Parkes, "A Paleographical Introduction," in The Canterbury Tales. Geoffrey Chaucer. A Facsimile and Transcription of the Hengwrt Manuscript, with Variants from the Ellesmere Manuscript, A Variorum Edition of the Works of Geoffrey Chaucer, vol. 1, ed. Paul G. Ruggiers (Norman, Okla., 1979), pp. xix-xlix; A. I. Doyle, "The Copyist of the Ellesmere Canterbury Tales," in The Ellesmere Chaucer: Essays in Interpretation, ed. Martin Stevens and Daniel Woodward (San Marino, CA: The Huntington Library, and Tokyo: Yoshudo, 1995), pp. 49-67.

9. See the foot of fol. 3r, WP.132-7 for the more formal style of this script in the text.

10. For a list of "Words Emphasized" in manuscripts of the B Version, see C. David Benson and Lynne S. Blanchfield, The Manuscripts of Piers Plowman: the B-version (Cambridge: D. S. Brewer, 1997). Those in W are listed on pp. 160-2, with comparative tables on pp. 238-313.

11. The single-lobed <a> is found in the Hengwrt-Ellesmere scribe's side-notes, but very rarely in the formal script of the text. Doyle and Parkes suggest that its presence in the text "may be due to inadvertence." See A. I. Doyle and M. B. Parkes, "A Paleographical Introduction," in The Canterbury Tales. Geoffrey Chaucer. A Facsimile and Transcription of the Hengwrt Manuscript, with Variants from the Ellesmere Manuscript, A Variorum Edition of the Works of Geoffrey Chaucer, vol. 1, ed. Paul G. Ruggiers (Norman, OK: Pilgrim Press, 1979), pp. xxxv-xxxvi.

12. The heading of Passus 7 (fol. 41r) is without the flourish.

13. For a study see Robert Adams, "The Reliability of the Rubrics in the B-Text of Piers Plowman," Medium Ævum 54 (1985), 208-31.

14. At W14.66 and W15.22 the paragraph is marked by a space followed by a rubricated letter rather than a paraph. At W2.9 a paraph has been inserted in error; there is no preceding space.

15. A. I. Doyle, "Remarks on Surviving Manuscripts of Piers Plowman," in Medieval English Religious and Ethical Literature: Essays in Honour of George H. Russell, ed. Gregory Kratzmann and James Simpson (Cambridge: D. S. Brewer, 1986), pp. 39-40.

16. See M. B. Parkes, Pause and Effect: An Introduction to the History of Punctuation in the West (Aldershot, 1992), and his comments on the diple, pp. 57-60, 303.

17. Montague Rhodes James, The Western Manuscripts in the Library of Trinity College, Cambridge, (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1900), i, pp. 480-1 (no. 359).

18. The superscript for <ra> represents <a> alone in walsyngh(a)m (W5.231).

19. Kane-Donaldson who did not expand looped <-g> were obliged to "emend" brugg to brugg(e) (KD5.592), and segg to seg(e) (KD20.310).

20. See Linguistic Description, 2.1.

21. See Linguistic Description, 2.4.1.

22. See Linguistic Description, 2.2.3.

23. The complete list of instances of <-p> with tilde is as follows: WP.78 Bisshop, WP.80 bisshop, WP.83 Bisshop, W2.209 felawship, W3.333 ship, W3.359 worship, W5.89 warp, W5.301 Bisshop, W5.371 warp, W6.152 bisshop, W10.308 werkmanship, W10.316 Anheep, W10.412 ship, W11.18 yeep, W11.24 felawship, W11.305 bisshop, W11.319 bisshop, W13.132 sop, W15.41 bisshop, W15.143 bisshop, W15.467 bisshop, W20.305 sharp, W20.318 bisshop, W20.326 bisshop.

24. It is worth observing that in his recent edition of Hoccleve, J. A. Burrow argues on metrical grounds that the strokes added to final letters in Hoccleve's holograph are not to be expanded, with the exception of Hoccleve's flourish after <r> and the barred <ll>. See Thomas Hoccleve's Complaint and Dialogue, ed. J. A. Burrow, EETS 313 (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1999), pp. l-li. Hoccleve's language is London English Type III, and so a little later than W, but scribal practice is the same in this respect. See M. L. Samuels, "Chaucer's Spelling," in Middle English Studies Presented to Norman Davis, ed. Douglas Gray and E. G. Stanley (Oxford, 1983), pp. 17-37. The chapter is reprinted in The English of Chaucer and his Contemporaries, ed. J. J. Smith (Aberdeen: Aberdeen University Press, 1989), pp. 23-37.

25. See A. I. Doyle, "The Copyist of the Ellesmere Canterbury Tales," in The Ellesmere Chaucer: Essays in Interpretation, ed. Martin Stevens and Daniel Woodward (San Marino, CA: The Huntington Library, and Tokyo: Yoshudo, 1995), p. 54.

26. Twelve manuscripts of the B Version highlight individual words by boxing, underlining or rubrication; see C. David Benson and Lynne S. Blanchfield, The Manuscripts of Piers Plowman: the B-version (Cambridge: D. S. Brewer, 1997), p. 17. There is considerable variation among the manuscripts in words so treated; see the comparative tables, pp. 238-313.

27. (n)

28. M. L. Samuels, "Some Applications of Middle English Dialectology," English Studies, 44 (1963), 81-94. The article is reprinted in Angus McIntosh, M. L. Samuels and Margaret Laing, Middle English Dialectology: Essays on Some Principles and Problems, ed. Margaret Laing (Aberdeen: Aberdeen University Press, 1989), pp. 64-80, esp. p. 70.

29. M. L. Samuels, "Langland's Dialect," Medium Ævum, 54 (1985), 232-47, p. 247, note 64. The article is reprinted in The English of Chaucer and his Contemporaries, ed. J. J. Smith (Aberdeen: Aberdeen University Press, 1989), pp. 70-85.

30. M. L. Samuels, "Chaucer's Spelling," in Middle English Studies Presented to Norman Davis, ed. Douglas Gray and E. G. Stanley (Oxford, 1983), pp. 17-37. The chapter is reprinted in The English of Chaucer and his Contemporaries, ed. J. J. Smith (Aberdeen: Aberdeen University Press, 1989), pp. 23-37. For recent comment see Jeremy J. Smith, "The Language of the Ellesmere Manuscript," in The Ellesmere Chaucer: Essays in Interpretation, ed. Martin Stevens and Daniel Woodward (San Marino, CA: The Huntington Library, and Tokyo: Yoshudo, 1995), pp. 69-86.

31. Throughout this section we have bracketed letters to represent optional elements. When two or more forms of a word occur, Samuels represents the less common variants within parentheses. Thus the spelling "((such(e)))" is very uncommon with or without final <-e>.

32. There is one instance of ȝit in Passus 3; the other twelve are in Passus 14-18.

33. For the term see Michael Benskin and Margaret Laing, "Translations and Mischsprachen in Middle English Manuscripts," in So Meny People Longages and Tonges, ed. Michael Benskin and M. L. Samuels (Edinburgh, 1981), pp. 55-106, esp. pp. 72-5.

34. See M. L. Samuels, "Langland's Dialect," Medium Ævum, 54 (1985), 232-47; reprinted in The English of Chaucer and his Contemporaries, ed. J. J. Smith (Aberdeen: Aberdeen University Press, 1989), pp. 70-85. See also M. L. Samuels, "Dialect and Grammar," in A Companion to Piers Plowman, ed. John A. Alford (Berkeley and Los Angeles, 1988), pp. 201-21.

35. There is one instance of hed (5.554); the plural has /e/: heddes 6.334, 20.186.

36. dronke 20.19 is pa. t. sg. subjunctive (OE drunke); Kane-Donaldson's emendation of the line involves an impossible switch of tense.

37. The one instance of croos (18.75) perhaps indicates lengthening. For the complex history of the word see OED s.v. cross sb.

38. fullen 10.60 is perhaps from ful adj., as MED suggests s.v. fullen v.(1).

39. See M. L. Samuels, "Langland's Dialect," Medium Ævum, 54 (1985), 241, 243; reprinted in The English of Chaucer and his Contemporaries, ed. J. J. Smith (Aberdeen: Aberdeen University Press, 1989), pp. 70-85.

40. Often shortened in Middle English.

41. See M. L. Samuels, "Langland's Dialect," Medium Ævum, 54 (1985), 241, 243; reprinted in The English of Chaucer and his Contemporaries, ed. J. J. Smith (Aberdeen: Aberdeen University Press, 1989), pp. 70-85.

42. The verb "win" is always spelt wynne.

43. M. L. Samuels, "Langland's Dialect," Medium Ævum, 54 (1985); reprinted in The English of Chaucer and his Contemporaries, ed. J. J. Smith (Aberdeen: Aberdeen University Press, 1989), pp. 70-85.

44. See the textual note to this line.

45. George Kane and E. Talbot Donaldson remark on W's "careful handling of final -e," in Piers Plowman: The B Version (London: Athlone Press, 1975, 2nd impression 1988), pp. 214-16, note 184, though in note 179 (p. 215) they overstate W's consistency.

46. Hoyt N. Duggan, "Langland's Dialect and Final -e," Studies in the Age of Chaucer 12 (1990), 157-91. And see the two studies by M. L. Samuels, "Langland's Dialect," Medium Ævum, 54 (1985), especially 243-4; reprinted in The English of Chaucer and his Contemporaries, ed. J. J. Smith (Aberdeen: Aberdeen University Press, 1989), pp. 70-85; and "Dialect and Grammar," in A Companion to Piers Plowman, ed. John A. Alford (Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press, 1988), pp. 217-18.

47. The form with <-es> is noteworthy here since it is followed by a word beginning with <s>. Nine B manuscripts read Iustice son.

48. The form is ascribed to the influence of Latin feminine genitives by Tauno F. Mustanoja, A Middle English Syntax, Part 1: Parts of Speech (Helsinki: Société Néophilologique, 1960), p. 72.

49. See M. L. Samuels, "Langland's Dialect," Medium Ævum, 54 (1985), 232-47; reprinted in The English of Chaucer and his Contemporaries, ed. J. J. Smith (Aberdeen: Aberdeen University Press, 1989), pp. 70-85. Kane-Donaldson emend he to he[o] twice in W18.170, where the Bx reading must represent a form of "she" since it refers to Rightwisnesse.

50. At 18.338 W shares the reading he with Hm, where all other manuscripts have plural þei. This is likely to be an error in the subarchetype; there is no reason to suppose that the reading is an archetypal form of "they." At 10.479 and 13.222 the scribe has written þe for þei, presumably in error.

51. Hence lordes is gen. sg.; cf. the reading of L with pl. grete lordes.

52. See Hoyt N. Duggan, "Langland's Dialect and Final -e," Studies in the Age of Chaucer 12 (1990), 157-91.

53. See M. L. Samuels, "Dialect and Grammar," in A Companion to Piers Plowman, ed. John A. Alford (Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press, 1988), p. 217.

54. In these lines 5.594-5 (KD5.575-6) Kane-Donaldson emend the second person plural pronouns to singular to match the singular pronouns of the surrounding passage.

55. The form derives from a contracted present of OE lēogan.

56. Contracted forms on stems ending in a dental consonant (e.g. bit, fynt, halt, etc.) are used in southern texts.

57. M. L. Samuels, "Dialect and Grammar," in A Companion to Piers Plowman, ed. John A. Alford (Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press, 1988), pp. 209, 216.

58. In 1.3 the <y-> prefix ycloþed is necessary for the metre of the b-verse, as most of the scribes recognise; in 13.277 (where it is again line-end) it is not, and seven manuscripts read clothed.

59. This manuscript, like Sb and Wb below, is not described in the above sources, but they are listed by Ralph Hanna, III in William Langland, Authors of the Middle Ages, 3 (Aldershot, Hants.: Variorum, 1993), p. 40.

60. This manuscript is not described in the above sources, but it is listed by Ralph Hanna, III in William Langland, Authors of the Middle Ages, 3 (Aldershot, Hants.: Variorum, 1993), p. 40.

61. This manuscript is not described in the above sources, but it is listed by Ralph Hanna, III in William Langland, Authors of the Middle Ages, 3 (Aldershot, Hants.: Variorum, 1993), p. 40.

62. Ralph Hanna, III, William Langland, Authors of the Middle Ages, 3 (Aldershot, Hants.: Variorum, 1993), p. 39.

Instructions

1. Sample codicological icon.

2. Sample paleographic icon.

3. Sample lexical icon.

4. Sample textual icon.

Abbreviations

1. This glyph is multivalent, written for <-ra->, <-ua->, and (once) <-a->.

2. This glyph is multivalent, written usually for <-ra-> or <-ua->. This is a nonce usage in this manuscript.

3. This glyph is multivalent, written for <-ra->, <-ua->, and (once) <-a->.