Today | News | Books | Recipes Adventure | Science Fiction | Ghost stories | Poetry | Children | History Booke Rerum Romanarum in the second century. In relating the battle of Actium, he says:--'Prima dux fugae regina, cum aurea puppe _ueloque purpureo_, in altum dedit. Mox secutus Antonius: sed instare uestigiis Caesar. Itaque nec praeparata in Oceanum fuga, nec munita praesidiis utraque Ægypti cornua, Paraetonium atque Pelusium, profuere: prope manu tenebantur. Prior ferrum occupauit Antonius. Regina ad pedes Caesaris prouoluta tentauit oculos ducis: frustra. Nam pulchritudo intra pudicitiam principis fuit. Nec illa de uita, quae offerebatur, sed de parte regni, laborabat. Quod ubi desperauit a principe, seruarique se triumpho uidit, incautiorem nacta custodiam, in Mausoleum se (sepulcra regum sic uocant) recipit: ibi maximos, ut solebat, induta cultus, in differto odoribus solio, iuxta suum se collocauit Antonium: admotisque ad uenas serpentibus, sic morte quasi somno, soluta est.'--Florus, Epit. Rerum Romanarum, lib. iv. c. 11. 662. Chaucer (following Florus) has hastened the catastrophe. Antony stabbed himself at Alexandria, in the following year, B.C. 30. See Sh. Plut. 221; Ant. and Cleop. iv. 14. 102. 672. _Shryne_; for 'solio' in Florus; cf. l. 675. Plutarch says only that Cleopatra 'did sumptuously and royally bury him with her own hands'; Sh. Plut. p. 224. Afterwards, however, she 'crowned the tomb with garlands and sundry nosegays, and marvellous lovingly embraced the same'; Sh. Plut. p. 227. But see the account by Florus, in the note to l. 655. 677. _Dede cors_, dead body; as in l. 876. Chaucer uses _cors_ of the living body, as, e.g. in Sir Thopas, B 2098. 678. Chaucer seems to think that Florus meant, 'in sepulcrum [suum] se recipit ... iuxta Antonium.' 679. Shakespeare follows closely the account in Plutarch, except that he makes mention of _two_ asps, whereas Plutarch mentions but one, called by Sir Thos. North 'an aspick'; Sh. Plut. p. 227. However, Florus uses the plural _serpentibus_. Cf. Cower, C. A., iii. 361. 681. Cf. Cleopatra's lament in Sh. Plut. p. 226; Ant. and Cleop. iv. 15. 59; v. 2. 283. 691. Pronounce _unreprovable_, as _unréprovábl'_. 694. _Sene_, evident. Note that this is an adjective (A.S. _gesýne_), and not the past participle; cf. l. 2655, and note. See also ll. 340, 741, and my note to the Balade against Women Inconstaunt, l. 13. 696. _Naked._ It looks as if Chaucer took _induta_ (note to l. 655) to mean 'not clothed.' Perhaps he read it as _nudata_. 702. _Storial sooth_, historical truth. The old editions actually put the comma after _storial_ instead of after _sooth_; and modern editors have followed them. Surely the editors, in some passages, have never attempted to construe their own texts. II. THE LEGEND OF THISBE. Chaucer follows Ovid, Metamorph. iv. 55-166; and frequently very closely. The reader should compare the Latin text throughout. For example, Ovid begins thus:-- 'Pyramus et Thisbe, iuuenum pulcherrimus alter, altera, quas Oriens habuit, praelata puellis, contiguas habuere domos, ubi dicitur altam coctilibus muris cinxisse Semiramis urbem.' In Golding's translation, fol. 43, back, thus:-- 'Within the town (of whose huge walles so monstrous high and thicke, The fame is giuen Semiramis for making them of bricke) Dwelt hard together two young folke in houses ioynde so nere, That under all one roofe well nie both twaine conuayed were. The name of him was Pyramus, and Thisbe call'd was she; So faire a man in all the East was none aliue as he. Nor nere a woman, mayde, nor wife in beautie like to her.' This at once explains the allusion to Semiramis, the celebrated but mythical queen who was said to have surrounded Babylon with walls of fabulous strength, having a deep ditch outside them. See Orosius, as translated by King Alfred, in Sweet's A.S. Reader, fourth ed. pp. 28, 29. Gower tells the same story, and likewise follows Ovid; C. A. i. 324. 718. _Estward_; evidently from Ovid's 'Oriens'; see above. 722. The first foot consists of the single syllable _Mai-_. 725. _Naso_, i.e. Ovid; really named Publius Ouidius Naso. 726. _Réport_; accented on the _e_. _Y-shove_, pushed (into notice); cf. l. 1381. 727. 'Tempore creuit amor'; Met. iv. 60. 730. 'Sed uetuere patres'; id. 61. 735. 'As (to quote the proverb) cover up the glowing coal, and the hotter the fire becomes.' Ovid has--'Quoque magis tegitur, tanto magis aestuat ignis'; 64. _Wry_ is in the imperative mood, singular. Cf. Troilus, ii. 538-9. 741. _Sene_, visible; see note to l. 694. _Dere y-nogh a myte_, even in a slight degree; lit. '(to an extent) dear enough at a mite.' A singular use of the phrase. Cf. 'dere ynogh a leek'; Can. Yem. Ta., G 795; 'not worth a myte'; id., G 633. 742. 'Quid non sentit amor?' Met. iv. 68. 745. 'In a tone as low as if uttering a confession.' A curious medieval touch. Ovid says, 'murmure ... minimo'; 70. 756. 'Inuide, dicebant, paries, quid amantibus obstas?' 73. 763. _Holde_, beholden. 'Nec sumus ingrati'; 76. 773. Chaucer practically transposes the offices of Phoebus and Aurora. 'Postera nocturnos Aurora remouerat ignes, solque pruinosas radiis siccauerat herbas'; 82. 782. _And for_, and because, &c. 783. _For_ stands alone in the first foot. Cf. l. 797. 784. 'Conueniant ad busta Nini, lateantque sub umbra Arboris'; 88. Ll. 786, 787 are explanatory, and added by Chaucer. Ninus, the supposed founder of Nineveh, was the husband of Semiramis. Cf. Shak. Mid. Nt. Dr. v. 1. 139. 786. Lounsbury (Studies in Chaucer, i. 403) says that the pt. t. of _herien_ is _heried-e_, with final _e_. But the form is right; _héried-e_ is hardly pronounceable, and the final _e_ is naturally dropped when the accent is thrown so far back. The forms of the past tenses of weak verbs are variable; whether they take a final _e_ or not often depends on the form of the stem. See Ten Brink, Chaucer's Sprache, § 194. 797. _Y-wimpled_, covered with a wimple, or cloth covering the neck and fitting close round the face, chiefly worn by nuns. Another medieval touch. Ovid has 'adopertaque uultum'; 94. See note to l. 813. 798-801. These four lines are mainly original, and quite in Chaucer's own manner. Ovid has merely 'fallitque suos.' 803. 'Audacem faciebat amor'; 96. 804. _She gan her dresse_, she settled herself, lit. directed herself. Lat. 'sedit.' 810. _Rist_, riseth; pres. tense, as in l. 887. So _arist_, Man of Law's Tale, B 265. 811. _With dredful foot_; so again in Kn. Ta., A 1479. 'Timido pede fugit in antrum'; 100. See _Dreadful_ in Trench, Select Glossary; and cf. ll. 109, 404 above. 813. 'Dumque fugit, tergo uelamina lapsa reliquit'; 101. 'For fere, and let her wimple falle.'--Gower, Conf. Amant. i. 326. 814-6. These three lines are original. _Sit_, sitteth. _Darketh_, lies close. 'The child than _darked_ in his den'; Will. of Palerne, 17; 'drawe [drew] him into his den, and _darked_ ther stille'; id. 44. And again in the same poem, ll. 1834, 2851. 823-31. Considerably expanded from the Latin:-- 'Serius egre |