briankessler@nowhereatall.net

http://www.nowhereatall.net

20 May 1999

• My Commentary on the Tale
• Appendix -- A Tale of Reynart the Fox
• Endnotes
• Sources and Links

We are given no portrait of the priest who tells this tale. The General Prologue only cites him as one of three priests accompanying the Prioress and another Nun. ("Another Nonne with hir hadde she, / That was hir chapeleyne, and preestes three." ⁽¹⁾)

Chaucer's Nun's Priest begins his tale by describing the circumstance of a "povre wydwe" who is never even given a name. He announces "This wydwe, of which I telle yow my tale," but once he finishs describing her and the circumstances to which she lived, he does not return to her except to mention her during the chase scene ("This wely wydwe and eek hir doghtres two / Herden thise hennes crie and maken wo"). While this prolonged description of the widow and her cottage "prepares us for the great chase scene", Sanders prods us to "remember that the medieval church (and the other tellers' tales) has had some things to say about poverty and wealth." ⁽²⁾

. . . The portrait of the poor widow is, indeed, completely irrelevant to the plot of the beast fable (with multiple digressions) that follows. If we fail to remember that the Canterbury Tales is not an anthology of short stories, that is perhaps all we can say, maybe not realizing that by such words we are criticizing Chaucer's competence as a writer. There is a reason for everything that is in the work, as well as for a lot of what is not there. There are more ways than one of being coherent. The widow's life is described in very great detail. Her cottage is 'narwe,' it stands beside a grove in a dale (grove have been discussed above, this world is known as a 'vale of tears'). Her life is 'ful symple' because her income is 'litel' and she has no husband to get money from (the Tales are full of mercenary marriages). Indeed, her revenue is of a very special kind: 'swich as god hir sente' and she is very careful how she uses it. Here is someone entirely dependant on divine providence for her survival, like Custance in her years at sea, or like the Old Testament prophets, and she too is not disappointed. She is not alone, she shares what little she has with her daughters, like the Widow of Zarephath (I Kings 17) or the Widow of II Kings 4. She is not a purely idealized symbol, though, and her food does not come by direct delivery from Heaven; she has cows and a sheep like anyone else. The narrator may be suggesting 'indirect reported speech' in the line 'Ful sooty was hir bour and eek her halle' because the implied amusement at the idea of seeing her one room (without a chimney for the smoke from the fire) where she sleeps and eats, as a noble house's private bedroom and dining hall is most properly hers: she regrets nothing. Her food is correspondingly plain and meagre ('sklendre') and the narrative spends several lines on stating what it does not contain: all the delicacies that the good eaters of the General Prologue enjoy! As a result she never suffers from 'repleccioun' and indeed enjoys excellent health, again expressed by the diseases of over-indulgence (gout and apoplexy) that she does not suffer from. The secret of her good health? 'Atempree diete... And exercise and hertes suffisaunce' but it should not be thought that she goes jogging; hard work every day in her garden and dairy is her secret. She is a truly happy woman, for heart's contentment is true happiness and it only comes when all passions are stilled. Very unlike the Wife of Bath, who wants satisfaction, not contentment, and will not remain a widow one second longer than she has to. If the Pardoner's riotours are destroyed in part by their drinking, she is safe because 'No wyn ne drank she.' The food she eats is milk, bread, bacon and sometimes an egg, again seen as a royal banquet in amused tones: 'Her bord was served moost with whit and blak' in a kind of riddle following on from the 'white and red' of the wine she feels no need of. That is all we ever learn of the 'sely widwe' except that she and her daughters lead the chase after the fox near the end, to no effect. She is so humble that we know the name of her sheep and of her dogs, but not hers. Yet she is so happy we might call her blessed among women. Anthony of Taize, Brother, Chaucer and Religion, (Sogang University, Seoul), http://ccsun7.sogang.ac.kr/~anthony/Religion.htm

Even though the widow and her two daughters are introduced first in the tale, they are never named. The first character of whom we learn the name is "a sheep that highte Malle." The name "Malle" is hypocoristic (a pet name) of "Mary" ⁽³⁾, which is "derived from the Hebrew name Miriam meaning rebellion or from the Latin stella maris meaning star of the sea. Mary also has been attributed with the meaning exalted of God." ⁽⁴⁾ But Malle is not hereafter discussed in the tale.

After this introduction, the Nun's Priest's Tale becomes a variation of the French Roman de Renart tales, written between 1174 and 1205. "A portion of the Roman de Renart, entitled Renard and Ysenfrin the Wolf, contains many parallels to the Nun's Priest's Tale. It's reasonable to assume that Chaucer's audience was familiar with the Renard stories, much in the same way that the story of Cinderella would be known by an American audience. When a well-known folktale is told, we listen for the familiar parts of the frame. Because we know how the story is going to end, the importance lies in the teling. The variations within the frame express the distinct character of the storyteller." ⁽⁵⁾

The hero of this tale is the cock called Chantecleer, who carries the same name as his analog from the tale of "Reynard the Fox". Chaucer tells us "of crowyng nas his peer". "This is the perfect opening for romance in which the heroic central character is usually introduced as the 'best' of his kind. However, in this context the description pokes fun at the heroic tradition on two counts - 'crowyng' is not heroic, and it is not particularly astonishing that Chauntecleer does it well - it is the natural thing that roosters do. . . . The tale moves on to describe Chauntecleer using a classic descriptive technique of a poet lover. The cock is described from head to toe with the gorgeous colours of jewels and flowers. It is absurd when applied to Chauntecleer, because it is usually used to describe a beautiful young woman. Ironically the description fits Chauntecleer perfectly, evoking the vainly strutting beauty of this beast. That this kind of heraldic, reductive description can be used successfully on a rooster highlights its formulaic use in the romance by foregrounding the technique - making the formula seem almost more striking than the description." ⁽⁶⁾

Chaucer next tells us of seven hens, "whiche were his sustres and his paramours." "Chaucer's invocation of the incestuous nature of the chicken run makes the very idea of courtly love seem ridiculous." ⁽⁷⁾

According to Gravdal, the concern with incest in the Middle Ages was initially marriage between people who were closely or distantly related. The obsession with sexual incest present in our culture today was not found in literature until later in that period. In 1215, a French scholar described incest as marriage with any person up to the fourth degree of relation: either a fourth cousin of the person or the fourth cousin of a godmother's cousin. The greatest concern with incest stemmed from the legal ramifications of inheritances. "A great deal of scholarship has described the legal concern with incest in the Middle Ages," Gravdal said. "(There was) an explosive proliferation of stories about incest in 13th century French literature," Gravdal said. This proliferation grew from the instruction manual for new priests that the Christian priests developed. They described the sin of incest and what the penance would be for those who confessed to this sin. In this context, incest was considered to be nuclear family sexual incest. The regulation was based upon the teachings of the book of Leviticus in the Old Testament. The instruction manuals described the penalties against mothers, sons and daughters should incest occur, but did not list any penalties against the father because at that time he was the official head of the family. Eventually incest was mentioned less in church manuals. At the same time, legal records about northern France from the 13th century show no cases of nuclear family sexual incest, only incest arising from marriages between relations deemed too close by authorities. By this point, however, authors had become interested in incest and it became a popular literary topic. "Poetic discourse was obsessed about nuclear family incest, while the legal discourses said little about it," Gravdal said. The literature of the time portrayed incest as a sin, but also showed it to be socially productive. "These romances show incest to be socially productive ... incest is the problem, but also the solution," Gravdal said. Deaver, Danielle, Columbia professor speaks about incest in Middle Ages, http://www.ogb.wfu.edu/back_issues/1996_Spring/3-28-96/News/n.incest.html (8)

The "faireste hewed on hir throte / Was cleped faire damosyle Pertelote". Of this favoured mate, we are informed, "Syn thilke day that she was seven nyght oold/ That trewely she hath the herte in hoold/ Of Chauntecleer". Friedman comments, "The comedy of people falling in love at the age of seven days ... pokes fun not so much at Chauntecleer and his dame as at the whole convention of love at first sight."

The tale opens with philosophical arguments on the truth of dreams, after Chauntecleer wakes from a nightmare. Hale notes "In an important article, Robert A Pratt summarized effectively this earlier scholarship and analysed Chaucer's substantial use of the discussion of dreams in Robert Holcot's Super sapientiam salomonis ⁽⁹⁾ (c. 1334-6), a commentary on the apochryphal Book of Wisdom. ⁽¹⁰⁾" ⁽¹¹⁾

Despite Chauntecleer's arguments that his dream should be heeded, Chauntecleer allows himself to be tricked into capture by "daun Russell the fox", Chaucer's analog to Reynart. It has been suggested that this is because either reason is useless to a beast ⁽¹²⁾ or in mock of an aristocracy who prides themselves on a book learning that they do not use ⁽¹³⁾.

Chauntecleer escapes the fox by cleverly tricking Russell into opening his mouth to gloat at his pursuers, but not before Pertelote "wilfully into the fyr she sterte / And brende hirselven with a stedefast hearte," leaving Pertelote the sole casualty of the story.

1. All reference's to Chaucer in the original Middle English (unless otherwise indicated) are from Chaucer, Geoffrey, author, Larry D. Benson and F.N. Robinson, eds., The Riverside Chaucer: Third Edition, (Houghton Mifflin Company: Lawrenceville, New Jersey 1987), pp. 26, 253-261. Re: "preestes thre," there seems to be some debate as to whether this should mean three priests, or whether this is a counting of the Prioress, the Second Nun, and one Priest. See Riverside, p. 806. Return

2. Sanders, Arnie, Chaucer: Canterbury Tales, "Cook's Fragment", (Goucher College, Spring 1999), http://faculty.goucher.edu/eng330/chaucernuns_priest.htm Return

3. Scott, Brian M., Feminine Given Names in A Dictionary of English Surnames: Part Three: The Names H-Z, (Talan Gwynek, Fause Losenge Herald Extraordinary, 1994), http://www.sca.org/heraldry/laurel/reaneyHZ.html Return

4. Bradley, Sarah, "Girls' Names and Definitions," http://dspace.dial.pipex.com/town/plaza/ge75/girls.htm#M Return

5. Umberger, Jacqueline Renard the Fox and the Nun's Priest's Tale: A Comparison, http://www.public.iastate.edu/~syager/analogue.html . See also Tale of Renart the Fox, below. Return

6. Cupitt, Cathy, "I ne kan nat bulte it to the bren": A fruitful fruitless search for the One True Meaning in The Nun's Priest's Tale, (27 May 1998), http://www.geocities.com/Area51/Hollow/2405/nunspriest.html . For a comparison of Chauntecleer wth his analog, Chanteclere, see also Umberger, ibid. Return

7. Cupitt, ibid. Return

8. See also Jong, Mayke de, celibacy&propery&incest&various Gregories, http://www.uni-heidelberg.de/subject/hd/fak7/hist/e3/gen/mediev-l/log.started941117/mail-3.html and Spiritual affinity, http://oak.cats.ohiou.edu/~baxter/hist381/terms/spiritua.htm
On a tangent note, I have discovered the following record of a legal case involving incest. It is of possible additional interest because part of Marabel's sentence was an actual pilgrimage to St. Thomas at Canterbury.

John Marabel, a married man, is cited of adultery and incest with Alice, daughter of Robert de Wywell, daughter of the said John's wife. The man appears and admits (his sin). The woman is not found. And John is forbidden from coition with either the mother or the daughter in future, unless the mother, who is the wife, seeks the debt and he pays it with sadness. And he will have as penance to make a pilgrimage with bare feet to St. Mary at Lincoln, to St. Thomas [Becket] at Canterbury, and to [St. Thomas Cantilupe] at Hereford and to beatings in penitential fashion round the church and round the marketplace of Grantham. And he will forswear the sin and suspect locations for the said Alice under pain of 40/-. It is later held that the same John on his pilgrimage would take much from his said wife, (so) the penance was changed so that he will fast on bread and water as long as he lives every fourth and sixth week, unless work or sickness prevents this... We John warn thee, the aforesaid John, once, twice and a third time that you, having been parted for good from your wife, will eject the said Alice from your company within the next six days under pain of greater excommunication which is now (pronounced) most firmly on your person in these writings if you should disdain to carry out the aforegoing. [1347. Lincoln Dean and Chapter, A/2/24, fo. 72v, courtesy Poos.] Halsall, Paul, Medieval Sourcebook: Manorial Marriage and Sexual Offense Cases , (Jan 1996), http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/source/manor-marr1.html

Return

9. ". . .a popular commentary on the Bible, arranged for the use of students and preachers in a series of lectures. Holcot (d.1349) was a Dominican doctor of theology at Oxford; he was a pupil of Ockham and is believed by some to be the true author of the PHILOBIBLON, written at the request of Richard de Bury." Karmiole, Kenneth, Rare Book Miscellany 1, (Bookseller, Inc.), http://abaa-booknet.com/catalogs/karmicat/1-1.html Return

10. 'Some Latin Sources of the Nonnes Preest on Dreams', Speculum, lii (1977), 538-70. [Footnote Hale's.] Return

11. Hale, David G., "Another Latin Source for the Nun's Priest on Dreams," Notes and Queries (N&Q: Oxford, England, March 1989), 36:1, p. 10.
The Book of "Wisdom, a defense of the Jewish way of life, is one of the books of the Apocrypha; in the Septuagint and Vulgate it is included in the Old Testament. The book is ascribed to King Solomon and stands in the same intellectual tradition as such earlier collections of proverbial wisdom as Proverbs and the Book of Sirach - hence its full title, the Wisdom of Solomon. The work was actually written in Greek about 75 BC or perhaps as late as AD 40. Its author was an Alexandrian Jew who was attempting to strengthen the religious commitment of the Hellenistic Jewish community and, if possible, to convert the Gentiles. His work falls into three parts: chapters 1 - 5 stress the superiority of the pious and wise over the godless; chapters 6 - 9 praise personified Wisdom; and chapters 10 - 19 illustrate the marvels of Wisdom, with examples drawn from Israel's history." Roberts, J J M, Wisdom, Book of: A book in the Old Testament Apocrypha, http://mb-soft.com/believe/txs/wisdom.htm
See also "Book of Wisdom," The Catholic Encyclopedia, http://www.knight.org/advent/cathen/15666a.htm . The text of the Book of Wisdom may be found at http://www2.combase.com/~westilson/wisdo.htm
For more about the philosophical debate, see also Furr, Grover, The Nun's Priest's Tale and Nominalism: A Preliminary Study, (Montclair State University, 13 December 1997), http://www.shss.montclair.edu/english/furr/npt.html Return

12. Cupitt, ibid. Return

13. ??? - I can't find my source. He / she is out there somewhere, I promise. The link is probably somewhere below.