transcends their appreciation of facts. Similarities in the alliterative poems may be due (1) to the common use of a traditional stock of alliterative phrases, (2) to the imitation of one alliterative poet by another, a possibility that must be given particular attention, because the sudden renewal of interest in a form of verse too much neglected indicates the likelihood of a kind of literary contagion, and the rise of a 'school' of poets, and (3) to common authorship. The frequent disagreement of scholars and other writers about the authorship of many of the most important alliterative poems of the period gives rise to the mistaken impression that the alliterative poetry is a vast chaos of works so similar in style and conception that nothing definite can ever be decided about the composition or relations of any of them. This is not true. The gay but rather thin prettiness of William of Palerne is utterly different from the wealth of details chronicled in the smooth and even verse of Morte Arthur, and the style of neither of these poems is in any way comparable to the vigorous freshness of the lines of the Gawain-poet. And he, in turn, is as easily distinguished from the author (or must we say authors?) of Piers Plowman as Chaucer from Gower. But if there are striking differences in the style of the poets of the alliterative school, there are also striking resemblances in details which make it possible to distinguish within the group as a whole certain smaller groups in which the poems stand in more or less close relationship. It is important, then, to determine what little we can concerning the relations of the Gawain-poet to the other Middle English poets who used the same form of verse. In the first place, there is no indication that the author of Purity was familiar with any of the three earliest alliterative poems in Middle English, the Alexander fragments A and B, William of Palerne, and Joseph of Arimathie. Beyond a few common alliterative phrases, there is nothing to show any connection between them and the works of the Gawain-poet. With certain of the later poems Purity has more in common; some of the more striking resemblances to Morte Arthur,1 The Destruction of Troy,2 and The Sege of Jerusalem,3 are mentioned in the notes. But, in general, these resemblances, too marked to be traceable to similar dialects or common poetic tradition, are insufficient actually to prove direct borrowing on either side, though one may strongly suspect it. That the relationship, whether direct or indirect, between these poems and Purity is closer than that between such a poem as William of Palerne and Purity is certain, but to define it further is difficult until the dates of all these poems shall have been more definitely determined. That all of them, Gawain included, were written by different authors has now been established beyond doubt.* Yet it is plain from the numerous parallels between Morte Arthur and The Destruction of Troy that there is some intimate connection between them, as is sufficiently evident from a comparison of the similar passages pointed out in Panton and Donaldson's edition of the latter poem.5 Still 1 See notes on 11. 838, 1411, 1452, 1689, and cf. Pur. 269-72 and Morte Arthur 2111. 2 See notes on 11. 838, 1193, 1426, 1777, and cf. Pur. 1456, Destr. Troy 3169; Pur. 239, Destr. Troy 634, 11745. 3 See notes on 11. 473, 867, 1456, and cf. Pur. 1413, Sege 849, 1174; and esp. Pur. 1423, Sege 854. It seems to me very likely that the author of the Sege was acquainted both with Morte Arthur and with the Gawain-poet. * Trautmann, Angl. 1. 120 ff.; Reicke, Untersuchungen über den Stil der Mittelenglischen Alliterierenden Gedichte Morte Arthur, The Destruction of Troy, The Wars of Alexander, The Siege of Jerusalem, Sir Gawayn and the Green Knight (Königsberg, 1906); and MacCracken's summary of the Huchown controversy, Publ. Mod. Lang. Ass. 25. 507-34. 'EETS. 39 and 56; cf. Neilson, Huchown, pp. 53-8. The resemblances between the two poems misled the editors (Preface, pp. xvii ff.) into believing that they were both by one poet. Brandes (Engl. Stud. 8. 410) also defended this view, in spite of Trautmann's refutation (Angl. 1. 126-7), but this possibility was disposed another intersecting group is formed by Morte Arthur, The Awntyrs of Arthure, and Huchown's Pistell of Susan. Since there are cogent reasons for refusing to attribute the first two of these poems to Huchown, the similarities should probably be explained as due to imitation or unconscious borrowing. With The Awntyrs of Arthure the circle of relationship comes round once more to the Gawain-poet, since it is possible that the author of the Awntyrs was imitating Gawain in his hunting-scene. Even more certain is some kind of relationship between the Gawain-poet and the two poems, perhaps by the same author, The Parlement of the Three Ages and Winner and Waster, but this is a matter which needs further investigation. 4 Of the longer poems of the alliterative school, it is The Wars of Alexander (Alex. C.), however, which bears the most marked resemblance in vocabulary and phraseology to the works of the Gawain-poet. Bradley was the first to take note of this connection, and suggested that it was to be explained by identity of authorship. But this explanation was completely refuted by Henneman, who showed that there were irreconcilable differences in the dialect, which is demonstrably more Northern in The Wars, since it of beyond all doubt by Reicke's dissertation (see above); cf. also MacCracken, pp. 528-9. 1 Cf. Lübke, The Awntyrs of Arthur at the Tarn-Wathelan (Berlin, 1883), pp. 30 ff.; Reicke, p. 6. MacCracken, who argues forcibly against Huchown's authorship, nevertheless dismisses altogether too summarily (p. 528) the resemblances pointed out by Amours (Scottish Alliterative Poems: Scott. Text. Soc. 27. lx-lxv). 'Amours, pp. 332 ff. 3 Cf. Gollancz's preface to his separate edition of The Parlement of the Three Ages (London, 1915), and Neilson, Huchown, pp. 71-3. * Gollancz, who edited both poems for the Roxburghe Club, 1897, believes so; but Bradley (Athen., 1903, 1. 658) thinks The Parlement may be imitative of Winner and Waster. в Untersuchungen über das Mittelenglische Gedicht 'Wars of Alexander' (Berlin, 1889), pp. 30-6. contains many Northern words not used by the Gawainpoet; in metrical usage, where the most obvious among many differences is the practice of running the same alliteration through a number of lines in The Wars; and finally in style1 and general literary merit, not to mention the late date generally assigned to The Wars of Alexander. The fact that many very unusual words are common to the Gawain-poet and The Wars may well be explained by assuming that the two poets wrote in neighboring dialects. The Wars, it should be noted, has many words in common with Morte Arthur and The Destruction of Troy which are not used by the author of Gawain, and its dialect is therefore in all probability geographically intermediate between that of Morte Arthur and Gawain. But there are other similarities between The Wars and the works of the Gawain-poet which cannot, I think, be explained either by common alliterative tradition or by dialectal proximity. The most striking of these is the only one mentioned by Bradley, whose comment I quote: 'In the "Wars of Alexander," 1. 1154, the reading of the Ashmole MS. is þe pure populande hurle. passis it umbi. In his note to the passage, the editor says that “Hurle is shown by the alliteration to be an error, for purle or perle (as in Dublin MS.)." He has apparently overlooked the fact that the poem called "Patience" has the same peculiar phrase, and in the form which he condemns as incorrect. In 1. 319 the poet makes the prophet Jonah say þe pure poplande hourle playes on my heued. The law of the alliterative verse does not require us to adopt the reading of the Dublin MS., as three stave-rimes are a * Cf. Neilson, p. 73, for parallels between Gaw. and The Wars. sufficient number for a line. There are often four, but this is not at all imperative. The line immediately preceding that quoted from the "Alexander" contains a non-alliterating substantive as the last word of the first hemistich: be Wawis of þe Wild see. apon the wallis betis. I therefore believe that hurle is the true reading, and that the perle of the Dublin MS. is a corruption due to the wish to complete the alliteration.' The fact that such a singular and otherwise unexampled phrase occurs in these two poems, since it cannot be explained, as Bradley assumed, by common authorship, must be due to borrowing from one by the other. I mention here, besides the passages quoted in the notes,1 some of which are very remarkable, a few other important similarities between Purity and The Wars of Alexander, which corroborate the assumption of imitation: Pur. 952 þunder-prast. Alex. 554 thonere thrastis. (These are the only examples of this poetic expression cited by NED. s. v. threst.) Pur. 1046 As any dom my3t Pur. 1626 Of sapyence þi sawle Alex. 5297 It ware a daynte to deme for any duke oute. Alex. 4292 Pat is to say, all þe syn at solp may þe saule.2 Alex. 1843 pe conquirour of ilka cost.3 Alex. 415 How he my3t compas & kast. Alex. 3725 3oure saule sa ful of sapient. 1 See notes on 11. 1, 473, 665, 1209, 1402. Alex. 1393 must certainly be explained as a borrowing from Pur. 665. 2 The resemblance here is the more striking if we compare the way in which the author of Alex. B. (335-6) paraphrased this same passage: ‘alle manir þingus þat mihte vs soile wip sinne.' 3 None of the alliterative combinations here given are to be found in Fuhrmann's study, nor have I included any that I could find elsewhere. |