Chaucer -- Troilus and Criseyde -- The Myth of Modern Progress

Began reading Troilus and Criseyde in my Chaucer class and
it is incredible. I can’t believe I have never read this or been told about
this work of Chaucer’s before this! It is so beautifully done. It’s an epic, a
romance, and a humor. Like I said, it is
incredible and enjoyable to read.
I love some of the themes and how forward thinking it is, or
maybe it isn’t so forward thinking, maybe it is just that we are constantly
told the modern has progressed and yet we read such works as these that makes
one realize that people, art, and culture haven’t changed/progressed as much as
we might like to think…
For example:
The dialogue is really entertaining and I can see people
having the same sort of conversations today, granted, not using such beautiful
turns of phrase:
"How hastow thus unkyndely and longe
Hid this fro me, thow fol?" quod Pandarus.
"Paraunter thow myghte after swich oon longe,
That myn avys anoon may helpen us."
"This were a wonder thing," quod Troilus;
"Thow koudest nevere in love thiselven wisse.
How devel maistow brynge me to blisse?"
(I.617-623)
Troilus basically saying “dude, how the devil are you going
to help me when you couldn’t help yourself in love” made me laugh and think of guys
I know today and how they interact.
And later Pandarus mentions how Troilus has mocked love:
For thow were wont to chace
At Love in scorn, and for despit him calle
`Seynt Idiot, lord of thise foles alle.'
(I.908-910)

Another example is Criseyde’s reluctance to marry:

Not unlike the Wife of Bath and the old woman in The Romaunt of the
Rose, Criseyde believes men, notably husbands, can be restrictive to their
wives, controlling, and jealous, and she values her freedom from such domestic
tyranny.

"I am myn owene womman,
wel at ese --
I thank it God -- as after myn estat,
Right yong, and stonde unteyd in lusty leese,
Withouten jalousie or swich debat:
Shal noon housbonde seyn to me
`Chek mat!'
For either they ben ful of
jalousie,
Or maisterfull, or loven
novelrie.”
(II.750-756)

Of which to telle in short is myn entente
Th' effect, as fer as I kan understonde.
She thanked hym of al that he wel mente
Towardes hire, but holden hym in honde
She nolde nought, ne make
hireselven bonde
In love; but as his suster,
hym to plese,
She wolde fayn to doon his herte an ese.
(II.1219-1225)

Aleppo -- 1138 Earthquake

So today in history in 1138 the Aleppo (Syria) earthquake happened which caused 230,000 deaths. The United States Geological Survey considers it the 3rd deadliest earthquake in history.

Ok, so, I would never have even given this little fact a second thought if I hadn't been at my Medieval Middle East History class last night and my Professor began talking about the Sunni Revival Period (11/12th cent.). She mentioned that with the revival of the Sunni's, Baghdad began to fall and the power center started to shift West, to cities like ALEPPO, Cairo, and Granada/Cordoba.

It makes sense then why this would have been an especially devastating earthquake at this time. It occurred just when Aleppo was growing and benefiting from the Revival and shift west.

St. Augustine -- Cuiusdam Ciceronis

In translating Augustine's third book you cone across his comments on Cicero's book Hortensius,

"inter hos ego inbecilla tunc aetate discebam libros eloquentiae, in qua eminere cupiebam fine damnabili et ventoso per gaudia vanitatis humanae. et usitato iam discendi ordine perveneram in librum cuiusdam Ciceronis, cuius linguam fere omnes mirantur, pectus non ita. " (III.4)


Augustine is talking here about how at a tender age he discovered an eloquent book (the Hortensius)

...and now in the ordinary course of study I had reached in the book of a certain Cicero..."

One of the comments on this flippant way of mentioning Cicero (as if people wouldn't know that there was one and only one Cicero that mattered) was that Augustine was trying to distance himself from the paganism of Cicero. In a way, he was saying "I know he is a pagan but maybe we can just overlook that for now..."

I'm not sure yet if I agree with this. He uses an awful lot of classical "pagan" quotes and allusions in his works to make me think he thought any less of them for being pagan. I don't know that he would apologize for their being pagan. Perhaps he was just being sarcastic?

Chaucer -- The Wife of Bath -- Children? Literate?

Some of my notes from my Chaucer class today:

In the Last Will and Testament of Edmund Denny (handout) it states that if the wife marries again the property goes to Denny and her's son. So, if the Wife of Bath had had children, she might not have been able to accumulate the wealth she did by the fifth husband This may be a good argument for her not having children. Especially since she married Janekyn for love and not for money, she must have been independently wealthy from some of her husbands. I guess she could have still had children, maybe from an earlier marriage, but then not from the others. She would have still had wealth and yet lost some from one husband to one of her children. Were all the Wills made like this? Maybe she could have still had children and yet kept the money? Especially if they were all younger children. But I don't think it makes sense with her character that she would have had children.

The question of whether she was literate I think is still up in the air. I lean towards her not being. First, Janekyn read to her from the "Book of Wicked Wives." Second, she did tear the book and then order him to throw it in the fire. I'm not sure, as angry as she was at the book, she would have condoned this if she was literate.

I've been reading Chaucer, don't know why I've never read him in the original Middle English before. It's a struggle to get through the language sometimes but it certainly adds a new depth to the stories. I really like the Dream Vision tales, especially the Book of the Duchess:

One of my favorite sections is when the dreaming man (Chaucer?) first comes upon the Black Knight mourning in the forest during the hunt. One of the things I really was struck by throughout the entire story was the repetition of "heart" (hert, herte, hart), at times meaning "heart" and at other times meaning "hart" and once meaning "hurt".

And I herde goynge bothe up and doun Men, hors, houndes, and other thyng;

And al men speken of huntyng,

How they wolde slee the hert with strengthe,

And how the hert had upon lengthe

So moche embosed -- y not now what. (lines 348-353)

445	I was war of a man in blak,
	That sat and had yturned his bak
	To an ook, an huge tree.
	"Lord," thoght I, "who may that be?
	What ayleth hym to sitten her?"
450	Anoon-ryght I wente ner;
	Than found I sitte even upryght
	A wonder wel-farynge knyght --
	By the maner me thoghte so --
	Of good mochel, and ryght yong therto,
455	Of the age of foure and twenty yer,
	Upon hys berd but lytel her,
	And he was clothed al in blak.
	I stalked even unto hys bak,
	And there I stood as stille as ought,
460	That, soth to saye, he saw me nought;
	For-why he heng hys hed adoun,
	And with a dedly sorwful soun
	He made of rym ten vers or twelve
	Of a compleynte to hymselve --
465	The moste pitee, the moste rowthe,
	That ever I herde; for, by my trowthe,
11	-ch 467 Hit was gret wonder that Nature
	Myght suffre any creature
	To have such sorwe and be not ded.
470	Ful pitous pale and nothyng red,
	He sayd a lay, a maner song,
	Withoute noote, withoute song;
	And was thys, for ful wel I kan
	Reherse hyt; ryght thus hyt began:
475	"I have of sorwe so gret won
	That joye gete I never non,
	Now that I see my lady bryght,
	Which I have loved with al my myght,
	Is fro me ded and ys agoon.
	"Allas, deth, what ayleth the,
	That thou noldest have taken me,
	Whan thou toke my lady swete,
	That was so fair, so fresh, so fre,
485	So good that men may wel se
	Of al goodnesse she had no mete!"
	Whan he had mad thus his complaynte,
	Hys sorwful hert gan faste faynte
	And his spirites wexen dede;
490	The blood was fled for pure drede
	Doun to hys herte, to make hym warm --
	For wel hyt feled the herte had harm --

Hieronymus Bosch -- Seven Deadly Sins

"Superbia" Sin -- Note the little wolf-like demon holding up the mirror for the woman to see herself

One of the four last things "Death of a Sinner" where an angel and demon are weighing the man's soul



Hieronymus Bosch -- c.1500
"The Seven Deadly Sins and the Four Last Things"

Hieronymus Bosch

"The Garden of Earthly Delights" Hieronymus Bosch c. 1500 (Dutch)

Surprising abstract triptych that is reminiscent (at least to me) of the Dante's hellish horrors