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A Hitherto Unnoticed Middle English Manuscript of the Seven Sages

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  02 December 2020

Arthur S. Napier
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Extract

In the very exhaustive and thorough account of the Middle English versions of the Seven Sages by Dr. Killis Campbell, which appeared in these Publications, XIV, pp. 37 f., I see that the Bodleian MS. has escaped notice. As I believe that no one has hitherto called attention to this version, it may be worth while to give a brief account of it here. I came across it some years ago whilst working through a number of the Rawlinson MSS. in the Bodleian Library. The MS. in question bears the press mark MS. Rawl. Poet. 175 (New Catalogue 14667) and is a parchment MS. of the middle of the 14th century, The Seven Sages occupying fol. 109-131b. This Rawlinson version is in the Northern dialect and agrees very closely indeed with MS. C (Cotton Galba E. IX); in fact in the portions which I have examined, these two MSS. agree almost word for word, as the following specimen and collations show. To give some idea of the MS. I here append (1) 11. 1-128 in full, (2) the readings from the Rawlinson MS. which differ from MS. C in the Avis story, and (3) the readings from the Rawl. MS. which differ from MS. C in the last portion of the whole (ll. 3913-4002). Contractions are denoted by italics.

Type
Research Article
Information
PMLA , Volume 14 , Issue 4 , 1899 , pp. 459 - 464
Copyright
Copyright © Modern Language Association of America, 1899

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References

Note 1 in page 459 The C version of these lines is printed in Weber, Metrical Romances, iii, 3-8.

Note 2 in page 459 The C version of this story will be found printed in full by Petras, Ueber die mittelenglischen Fassungen der Sage von den sieben weisen Meittern, Breslau, 1885, p. 56. In printing the variants I disregard mere differences of spelling.

Note 3 in page 459 The C version of this last portion is in Weber, iii, p. 149.

Note 1 in page 462 e is no longer there.

Note 1 in page 463 So the ms.

Note 2 in page 463 Cp. Petras, p. 56.

Note 3 in page 463 The numbering of the lines is that of Petras.

Note 1 in page 464 Cp. Weber, iii, p. 149.

Note 2 in page 464 These variants from the printed texts exceed in number the real variants from the mss. According to Dr. Killis Campbell's copies and collations of the mss. the variants noticed by Professor Napier in 2420, 2455, 2462, 2474, 2478, 2479-80, 2492, 2515, 2516, 2520, 2525, 2534, and 2538 are to be attributed to the faults of Petras's text of the Avis; and Weber's text is to be held accountable for the variants 3927, 3939, and 3957. This note is added with the kind permission of Professor Napier.—J. W. B.