User:CarrieBerg/The Tale of the Wyf of Bathe

By Geoffrey Chaucer.

Here biginneth the Tale of the Wyf of Bathe.

In tholde dayes of the king Arthour,

Of which that Britons speken greet honour,

Al was this land fulfild of fayerye.

The elf-queen, with hir joly companye,

Daunced ful oft in many a grene mede;

This was the olde opinion, as I rede.

I speke of manye hundred yeres ago;

But now kan no man see noon elves mo.

For now the grete charity and prayers

Of lymytours and other holy freres,

That serchen every lond and every streem,

As thikke as motes in the sonne-beem,

Blessinge halles, chambers, kitchenes, boures,

Citees, burghes, castles, hye toures,

Thropes, bernes, shipnes, dayryeres,

This maketh that ther been no fayeryers.

For ther as wont to walken was an elf,

Ther walketh now the lymytour him-self

In undermeles and in morwenings,

And seyth his matins and holy thinges

As he gooth in his lymytacioun.

Wommen may go saufly up and doun,

In every bush or under every tree;

There is noon other incubus but he,

And he ne wol doon hem but dishonour.

And so bifel that this king Arthour

Had in his hous a lusty bacheler,

That on a day cam rydynge fro ryver,

And happed that, allone as she was born,

He saugh a mayde walkynge hym biforn,

Of whiche mayde anon, maugree hir heed,

By verray force, he rafte her maydenheed;

For whiche oppressioun was swich clamour

And swich pursute unto the king Arthour,

That dampned was this knight for to be deed

By cours of lawe, and sholde han lost his heed -

Paraventure, swich was the statut tho -

But that the queen and other ladies mo

So longe preyeden the king of grace,

Til he his lyf him granted in the place,

And yaf him to the queen al at hir wille,

To chese, whether she wolde him save or spille.

The queen thanketh the king with al hir might,

And after this thus spak she to the knight,

Whan that she saugh hir tyme, upon a day:

"Thou standest yet," quod she, "in swich array

That of thy lyf yet hastow no suretee.

I grante thee lyf, if thou kanst tellen me

What thing is it that wommen most desyren?

Be war, And keep thy nekke-boon from yren.

And if thou kanst nat tellen it anon,

Yet wol I yefe thee leve for to gon

A twelf-month and a day to seche and leere

An answere suffisant in this matere.

And suretee wol I han, ere thou pace,

Thy body for to yelden in this place.

.:.:.:.:.:.

Here's where I'll be stopping, yes the tale continues on and on, but this gets the listeners up to the most important part: the beginning of the quest. I might add part of the quest, but this I all I'm planning on memorizing, as of now.

Troublesome lines that trip the tongue:

But now kan no man see noon elves mo. --- The double negative tripped me up. And the slang "more." Would this make Chaucer an Original Gangsta?

And he ne wol doon hem but dishonour. --- Sentences thankfully, are no longer like this! Again, this is a double negative, and doubly confusing.

That of thy lyf yet hastow no suretee. --- Hastow? What kind of word is that!

Yet wol I yefe thee leve for to gon --- Eek!!! All the "e's"!!! Alliteration at it's worst...

Middle English isn't as hard as you may first think it is. A lot of the words are the same as English today, the spelling was just much, much looser. There were no rules yet, so words can be spelled any way the author wanted to write them. Even so, there are some major differences. So, here is a list of words you may not recognize (courtesy of The Riverside Chaucer):

lymytour - friars

serchen - haunt

boures - bowers, a.k.a. bedrooms

thropes - villages

bernes - barns

shipnes - shipyards

dayryeres - dairies

undermeles - late morning, from 9 to 12

morwenings - morning, dawn

lymytacioun - territories

saufly - safely

ryver - hawking for waterfowl

maugree hir heed - against her will

paraventure - perhaps, by chance

yaf/yeve - gave/give

suretee - first mention: security, second mention: pledge

seche - search

leere - learn

yelden - surrender