A chascun homme quelqu'il soit, Car plus d'assetz q'oneste vie 20155: Lessont au ferme le putage Reçoit le gaign de leur errour.] v. 657. 58: ffor in his purs | he sholde ypun ysshed be Purs is the Erchedekenes helle ... Mirour 20180: ta penance || Serra del orr; ib. 20199 ff. Ne sai ce que la loy requiert Mais merveille est de ce q'il quiert und die gleichen gedanken in der Vox Lib. III. c. 3, v. 189 ff.: Praesul in orbe gregem curare tenetur egentem Ipse videns maculas ungere debet eas: Sed si magnates praesul noscat maculatos, Illos non audet ungere, namque timet: Si reliqui peccent, quid ob hoc dum solvere possunt, Ipse gregis loculos mulget, trahit in tribulosque Causae quo lana vulsa manebit ei. Quod corpus peccat peccantis bursa relaxat, 1) Auch die freres leben von den sünden "her fostringe is synne", Ploughm. Crede 699 ff. Sic iteranda modo Venus affert lucra registro Dum loculus praegnat satis, impraegnare licebit. . . [v. 223:] Non tamen est lacryma [wie bei Christus und der ehebrecherin modo quae delere valebit, Crimen si bursa nesciat inde forum: Bursa valet culpam, valet expugnareque poenam [Zu den hierzu bereits bei Sk. angeführten Wycliffestellen (besonders 35. 496. 517), vgl. Wycl. How Satan &c 213: lecherie... longep to iurdiccion of prelatis; nepeles gif þei han money of pes lecherous peues pei schullen lie in here cursed synne fro zeer to zeer, ze be al here lif gif þei paien moche & redily; derselbe Works ed. Arnold 3, 166: sith be streyt covenaunt pei sellen tyme of synnyng, pat pus longe schal he not be lettid for so myche money: ib. 320: somenors sumtyme suffren hem to meyntene hem in wrongis for Vgl. ferner Ploughm. Tale v. 669: money. A simple fornicacioun Twenty shillings he shall pay; And than have an absolucioun And al the yere usen it forth he may! [und ib. 351: all the whyle his purse woll blede]. Zu v. 639 ff. vgl. Wycliffe Office of Curates 156: he pat can cracken a litil latyn in constories of hepene mennus lawe & worldly prestis lawe & can helpe to anoie a pore man bi knackis or chapitris, is holden a noble clerk & redy & wyse.] XI. § 42. v. 817. we wol reuled been at his deuys || In heigh and lough; vgl. die erklärung aus Tyrwhitt bei Sk.; de halt en bas ist bei Gower Mirour 69 (: Pecché fuist source de les mals, || Tornant les joyes en travals, || De halt en bas changeant les lieux &c) wohl in anderem sinne zu nehmen; vgl. Du Cange s. v. alte et basse supremo jure, souverainement (Hugo de Lezignan 1242: nos et terram = 508 EWALD FLÜGEL, GOWER'S MIROUR DE L'OMME ETC. nostram alte et basse ipsius Domini Regis supposuimus voluntati; Carpentier erklärt es: omnino, prorsus, entièrement, quoi que ce soit); vgl. ferner beispiele dieses rechtsausdruckes bei Rymer 3, 4, 158 (1399): in alto et basso vos submiseritis &c. Aehnlich wohl auch Ploughm. Tale 1375: In hy ne in low, ne in no degre. STANFORD UNIVERSITY, CAL., EWALD FLÜGEL. THE WAKEFIELD MYSTERIES. The place of representation. Although much has been written in recent years upon the subject of the English Mysteries, and especially upon the four great collections known as the Coventry, Chester, York and Towneley (or Widkirk) Mysteries, little or nothing has been done to elucidate the question as to where the last named plays were represented. The object of this paper will be to show that there are important reasons for believing. that they were performed in Wakefield, and should therefore be called "The Wakefield Mysteries'. This conclusion is 'prima facie' a reasonable one, considering the fact that all the other great English Cycles are connected with important towns, and it may also be supported by a variety of evidence, partly external and partly derived from the text of the plays itself. Yet since the first publication of the plays under the auspices of the Surtees Society in the year 1836, 1) no attention has been paid to this question, and in the recent edition of the Early English Text Society 2) nothing has been added to the remarks made by the previous editor of the text. The only manuscript of these mysteries which is known to exist was discovered in the possession of the Towneley family early in the 19th century, and after passing through the hands of various gentlemen by sale under auction and otherwise, it was acquired by Mr. Bernard Quaritch in 1883, 1) The Towneley Mysteries, London 1836, Nichols and Son. 2) The Towneley Plays, George England and A. W. Pollard, London 1897, Kegan Paul, Trench, Trübner & Co. and now remains in the possession of his executors. It is unfortunately in an incomplete condition: and it must have contained originally more than the 32 plays which are now to be found in it: for twelve leaves are apparently lost between the first and second plays, two more are missing at the end of the fourth, two more at the end of the seventeenth, and twelve more at the end of the twenty-ninth. These missing leaves would provide room for four or five additional plays of the average length, as well as for the lost portions of the incomplete ones. The dialect used in the plays is that of the North of England, with some forms belonging to the East Midlands interspersed here and there; and in the thirteenth play a 'Southern tooth' is adopted for a definite purpose for a few lines only. When we turn to the special subject which is to be discussed in this paper, it will at once be seen from the following quotations what uncertainty has prevailed, and is still prevailing, in the minds of writers upon the question of the place of representation. Professor Ten Brink 1) says - "The country fair, held once a year at Woodkirk, in the neighbourhood of Wakefield, may have been still more important than these towns': (he refers to York, Leeds & Beverley) 'according to a happy hypothesis, Woodkirk fair was the place where the Guilds of Wakefield and other neighbouring districts enacted those Corpus Christi Plays which have become so famous under the name of the Towneley Mysteries'. Mr. J. A. Symonds 2) likewise adopts the view that the Towneley Plays belong to Woodkirk, which he identifies with Widkirk 'the Widkirk, Chester and Coventry plays abound in local references, and illustrate the dialects of their several districts'. 1) English Literature II, 256. 7, translation by W. C. Robinson 1893. It will be shown later that there were two annual fairs at Woodkirk. 2) Shakspere's Predecessors in the English Drama p. 108. |