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This attribute controls the content of the description and og:description elements. | THE COURT OF LOVE.
"The Court Of Love" was probably Chaucer's first poem of any
consequence. It is believed to have been written at the age, and
under the circumstances, of which it contains express mention;
that is, when the poet was eighteen years old, and resided as a
student at Cambridge, -- about the year 1346. The composition
is marked by an elegance, care, and finish very different from
the bold freedom which in so great measure distinguishes the
Canterbury Tales; and the fact is easily explained when we
remember that, in the earlier poem, Chaucer followed a beaten
path, in which he had many predecessors and competitors, all
seeking to sound the praises of love with the grace, the
ingenuity, and studious devotion, appropriate to the theme. The
story of the poem is exceedingly simple. Under the name of
Philogenet, a clerk or scholar of Cambridge, the poet relates
that, summoned by Mercury to the Court of Love, he journeys
to the splendid castle where the King and Queen of Love,
Admetus and Alcestis, keep their state. Discovering among the
courtiers a friend named Philobone, a chamberwoman to the
Queen, Philogenet is led by her into a circular temple, where, in
a tabernacle, sits Venus, with Cupid by her side. While he is
surveying the motley crowd of suitors to the goddess,
Philogenet is summoned back into the King's presence, chidden
for his tardiness in coming to Court, and commanded to swear
observance to the twenty Statutes of Love -- which are recited
at length. Philogenet then makes his prayers and vows to
Venus, desiring that he may have for his love a lady whom he
has seen in a dream; and Philobone introduces him to the lady
herself, named Rosial, to whom he does suit and service of love.
At first the lady is obdurate to his entreaties; but, Philogenet
having proved the sincerity of his passion by a fainting fit,
Rosial relents, promises her favour, and orders Philobone to
conduct him round the Court. The courtiers are then minutely
described; but the description is broken off abruptly, and we are
introduced to Rosial in the midst of a confession of her love.
Finally she commands Philogenet to abide with her until the
First of May, when the King of Love will hold high festival; he
obeys; and the poem closes with the May Day festival service,
celebrated by a choir of birds, who sing an ingenious, but what
must have seemed in those days a more than slightly profane,
paraphrase or parody of the matins for Trinity Sunday, to the
praise of Cupid. From this outline, it will be seen at once that
Chaucer's "Court of Love" is in important particulars different
from the institutions which, in the two centuries preceding his
own, had so much occupied the attention of poets and gallants,
and so powerfully controlled the social life of the noble and
refined classes. It is a regal, not a legal, Court which the poet
pictures to us; we are not introduced to a regularly constituted
and authoritative tribunal in which nice questions of conduct in
the relations of lovers are discussed and decided -- but to the
central and sovereign seat of Love's authority, where the
statutes are moulded, and the decrees are issued, upon which
the inferior and special tribunals we have mentioned frame their
proceedings. The "Courts of Love," in Chaucer's time, had lost
none of the prestige and influence which had been conferred
upon them by the patronage and participation of Kings, Queens,
Emperors, and Popes. But the institution, in its legal or judicial
character, was peculiar to France; and although the whole spirit
of Chaucer's poem, especially as regards the esteem and
reverence in which women were held, is that which animated
the French Courts, his treatment of the subject is broader and
more general, consequently more fitted to enlist the interest of
English readers.
(Transcriber's note: Modern scholars believe that Chaucer was
not the author of this poem)
The poem consists of 206 stanzas of seven lines each; of which,
in this edition, eighty-three are represented by a prose
abridgement.
With timorous heart, and trembling hand of dread,
Of cunning* naked, bare of eloquence, *skill
Unto the *flow'r of port in womanhead* *one who is the perfection
I write, as he that none intelligence of womanly behaviour*
Of metres hath, <1> nor flowers of sentence,
Save that me list my writing to convey,
In that I can, to please her high nobley.* *nobleness
The blossoms fresh of Tullius'* garden swoot** *Cicero **sweet
Present they not, my matter for to born:* <2> *burnish, polish
Poems of Virgil take here no root,
Nor craft of Galfrid <3> may not here sojourn;
Why *n'am I* cunning? O well may I mourn, *am I not*
For lack of science, that I cannot write
Unto the princess of my life aright!
No terms are dign* unto her excellence, *worthy
So is she sprung of noble stirp* and high; *stock <4>
A world of honour and of reverence
There is in her, this will I testify.
Calliope, <5> thou sister wise and sly,* *skilful
And thou, Minerva, guide me with thy grace,
That language rude my matter not deface!
Thy sugar droppes sweet of Helicon
Distil in me, thou gentle Muse, I pray;
And thee, Melpomene, <6> I call anon
Of ignorance the mist to chase away;
And give me grace so for to write and say,
That she, my lady, of her worthiness,
Accept *in gree* this little short treatess,* *with favour* *treatise
That is entitled thus, The Court of Love.
And ye that be metricians,* me excuse, *skilled versifiers
I you beseech, for Venus' sake above;
For what I mean in this ye need not muse:
And if so be my lady it refuse
For lack of ornate speech, I would be woe
That I presume to her to write so.
But my intent, and all my busy cure,* *care
Is for to write this treatise, as I can,
Unto my lady, stable, true, and sure,
Faithful and kind, since first that she began
Me to accept in service as her man;
To her be all the pleasure of this book,
That, when *her like,* she may it read and look. *it pleases her*
When [he] was young, at eighteen year of age,
Lusty and light, desirous of pleasance,
Approaching* full sad and ripe corage,<7> *gradually attaining
Then -- says the poet -- did Love urge him to do
him obeisance, and to go "the Court of Love to
see, a lite [little] beside the Mount of Citharee."
<8> Mercury bade him, on pain of death, to
appear; and he went by strange and far countries
in search of the Court. Seeing at last a crowd of
people, "as bees," making their way thither, the
poet asked whither they went; and "one that
answer'd like a maid" said that they were bound to
the Court of Love, at Citheron, where "the King
of Love, and all his noble rout [company],
"Dwelleth within a castle royally."
So them apace I journey'd forth among,
And as he said, so found I there truly;
For I beheld the town -- so high and strong,
And high pinnacles, large of height and long,
With plate of gold bespread on ev'ry side,
And precious stones, the stone work for to hide.
No sapphire of Ind, no ruby rich of price,
There lacked then, nor emerald so green,
Balais, Turkeis, <9> nor thing, *to my devise,* *in my judgement*
That may the castle make for to sheen;* *be beautiful
All was as bright as stars in winter be'n;
And Phoebus shone, to make his peace again,
For trespass* done to high estates twain, -- *offence
When he had found Venus in the arms of Mars, and hastened to
tell Vulcan of his wife's infidelity <10>. Now he was shining
brightly on the castle, "in sign he looked after Love's grace;" for
there is no god in Heaven or in Hell "but he hath been right
subject unto Love." Continuing his description of the castle,
Philogenet says that he saw never any so large and high; within
and without, it was painted "with many a thousand daisies, red
as rose," and white also, in signification of whom, he knew not;
unless it was the flower of Alcestis <11>, who, under Venus,
was queen of the place, as Admetus was king;
To whom obey'd the ladies good nineteen <12>,
With many a thousand other, bright of face.
And young men fele* came forth with lusty pace, *many <13>
And aged eke, their homage to dispose;
But what they were, I could not well disclose.
Yet nere* and nere* forth in I gan me dress, *nearer
Into a hall of noble apparail,* *furnishings
With arras <14> spread, and cloth of gold, I guess,
And other silk *of easier avail;* *less difficult, costly, to attain*
Under the *cloth of their estate,* sans fail, *state canopy*
The King and Queen there sat, as I beheld;
It passed joy of *Elysee the feld.* *The Elysian Fields*
There saintes* have their coming and resort, *martyrs for love
To see the King so royally beseen,* *adorned
In purple clad, and eke the Queen *in sort;* *suitably*
And on their heades saw I crownes twain,
With stones frett,* so that it was no pain, *adorned
Withoute meat or drink, to stand and see
The Kinge's honour and the royalty.
To treat of state affairs, Danger <15> stood by the
King, and Disdain by the Queen; who cast her eyes
haughtily about, sending forth beams that seemed
"shapen like a dart, sharp and piercing, and small and
straight of line;" while her hair shone as gold so fine,
"dishevel, crisp, down hanging at her back a yard in
length." <16> Amazed and dazzled by her beauty,
Philogenet stood perplexed, till he spied a Maid,
Philobone -- a chamberwoman of the Queen's -- who
asked how and on what errand he came thither.
Learning that he had been summoned by Mercury, she
told him that he ought to have come of his free will,
and that he "will be shent [rebuked, disgraced]"
because he did not.
"For ye that reign in youth and lustiness,
Pamper'd with ease, and jealous in your age,
Your duty is, as far as I can guess,
To Love's Court to dresse* your voyage, *direct, address
As soon as Nature maketh you so sage
That ye may know a woman from a swan, <17>
Or when your foot is growen half a span.
"But since that ye, by wilful negligence,
This eighteen year have kept yourself at large,
The greater is your trespass and offence,
And in your neck you must bear all the charge:
For better were ye be withoute barge* *boat
Amid the sea in tempest and in rain,
Than bide here, receiving woe and pain
"That ordained is for such as them absent
From Love's Court by yeares long and fele.* many
I lay* my life ye shall full soon repent; *wager
For Love will rive your colour, lust, and heal:* *health
Eke ye must bait* on many a heavy meal: *feed |