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The Double Problem of Sir Degaré

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  02 December 2020

William C. Stokoe Jr.
William C. Stokoe Jr.*
Affiliation:
Wells College, Aurora, N. Y.
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Extract

There is no doubt that the Middle English romance Sir Degaré (hereafter abbreviated SD) enjoyed an early success; four manuscripts of the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries, two later manuscripts, and three sixteenth-century prints survive.1 Modern criticism of it, however, shows striking contrast. Introducing the version in Bishop Percy's Folio MS., Hales wrote: “The romance is, in our opinion, of more than ordinary merit. It possesses the singular charm of brevity and conciseness; does not impair or destroy its power by the endless diffuseness and prolixity which are the besetting disfigurements of that branch of literature to which it belongs.”2 J. E. Wells agrees: “The materials are wrought into a coherent whole without digression or unnecessary explanation… . All in all, the poem deserves the popularity that its repeated reprinting in the sixteenth century indicates it to have enjoyed” (p. 135).

Type
Research Article
Information
PMLA , Volume 70 , Issue 3 , June 1955 , pp. 518 - 534
Copyright
Copyright © Modern Language Association of America, 1955

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References

1 Auchinleck MS. (1330–40), Cbg. Univ. Lib. MS. Ff. n. 38 (15th c), Egerton MS. 2862 (ca. 1400), Rawlinson MS. F. 34 (15th a); Douce MS. 261 (ca. 1564), Percy MS. (Brit. Mus. Add. 27879, ca. 1650); and quartos by Copland, de Worde, and John King (mid-16th c). See John Edwin Wells, A Manual of the Writings in Middle English, 10501400 (New Haven, 1916), p. 134 and Supplements.

2 J. W. Hales and F. J. Furnivall ed. (London, 1868), iii, 19.

3 Sire Degarre: A Study of a Mediaeval Hack Writer's Methods, Texas Univ. Stud, in Eng., No. 11 (1931), p. 5 and n. 1.

4 Sire Degaré: A Study of the Text and Narrative Structure, Princeton Stud, in Eng., No. 11 (1935), p. 86.

5 MLN, iii (1938), 153 ff.

6 Sire Degarre, Englische Textbibliothek, ed. J. Hoops, No. 19 (Heidelberg, 1929).

7 Middle English Metrical Romances (New York, 1930), pp. 287–320. Although this is the best text in which to read the story, in citations, quotation, and comparisons made below I have used Schleich's edition because his line numbering is more convenient for referring to variants in the several texts.

8 “The Auchinleck MS and a Possible London Bookshop of 1330–1340,” PMLA, lvii (1942), 608, n. 53.

9 “Story Patterns in Some Breton Lays,” Medium Mvum, xxii, ii (1953), 79 f.

10 Sohrab and Rustem: The Epic Theme of a Combat between Father and Son, Grimm Library, No. 14 (London, 1902).

11 Laura A. Hibbard (Loomis), Mediœval Romance in England (New York, 1924), p. 301; see also n. 32 below.

12 P. 84; note, however, that Faust admits it may be a translation of an OF original, p. 64, n. 21.

13 Schleich, p. 21.

14 Faust, p. 22, cites the unpubl. diss. (Chicago, 1923) by Muriel Eothwell Carr, “Sire Degarrée: A Middle English Metrical Romance Edited from the MS, etc.,” pp. 37–45.

15 Cf. 11. 35, bayne=two; 39, mynnyng=morninge (xii monthys, R); 97, apert=stowt; 251, dede vp = leyd up; 340, 360, dintes = strokes; 449, iustep=rydeth; 458, staleworp = doughtye (myghty, R); 474, iuste=ffight; 506, pert=fayyr; 530, beren=dassh; 753, palefrai= liakney; 890, rauisse=do uylony; 935, tosprong = barst; 950, brondes brist = styjff strokys; 1062 aumenere = pawtener.

16 I give as readings of Z here, as elsewhere, the reading of one or more of ERWCpKD and P when they agree and when none of them agrees with A or C.

17 E.g., 11. 80, 104, 170, 196, 255, 256, 309, 329 ff, 337, 361, 407, 444, 445, and 455 are a few of those in A which have the double negative construction not in Z.

18 Some of those to be found in Z and not in AC : without doute, as ryght it wolde, at the laste, anone ryght, also perde, ryght sone, in a stonde, without lesynge, iwys, withouten more, in dede, with all, withouten fayle, as I you tell, anone full ryght, for to se, more and some, truelye, perdie, and sothe to say, loude and stylle, in sothe.

19 E.g., U. 10,16,93,154,191, 596,635, 761, 766,799, 809,912,914,997.

20 Schleich's abbreviated textual notes make it difficult to establish the pronunciation of the name in Z, and not all the texts are complete. A tabular comparison of A with Cp and P, however, will show the difference:

De-gar-(é) A Cp P

Trisyllable 39 13 3

Dissyllable 3 39 50

Rimes “-e” all 9 0 (?)

“ ”-ore“ 0 5 all (?)

Def. 11. 2 5 15

P and Cp (ed. E. V. Utterson, Select Pieces of Early English Popular Poetry [London, 1825], i, 114–155), like the other texts after Z also use Sir before the name before the hero is knighted and use it elsewhere more often than does A; see Faust, p. 34, who reviews Miss Carr's discussion of the name in establishing the grouping of E with the other texts.

21 A lanyard or strap for attaching parts of armor. OED, s.v. “lainer.” I have checked the reading in the Auchinleck MS. and find it clear (cf. Schleich's text and note to 1. 571). This unusual detail, the tangling of a jouster's harness (the king “mi3t flit nother fer ne ner” 572), it seems to me, also shows the author's care: Degaré “as God almi3ti wold” (537) wins by a freak accident and not an accurate thrust which a complete novice would be unlikely to accomplish.

22 Arthurian Tradition, p. 229, and s.v. “Brkriu's Feast” in “Index of Names and Titles.”

23 “Index,” s.v. “Empty castle,” “Yellow man,” “Women, castle (isle, land) of.”

24 Walter H. French, whose help I gratefully acknowledge, first suggested that I compare the texts for evidence of a redactor's work; see my unpubl. diss. (Cornell, 1946), “The Work of the Redactors of Sir Launfal, Richard Cœur de Lion, and Sir Degaré.”

25 See, e.g., the arguments on relative dating of similar stories in “The Sources of Sir Launfal: Lanval and Graelent,” PMLA, ixm (1948), 392–404.

26 Of 1073 lines (in the French and Hale text) only 91 deal with the meeting of the parents; 10 times as much space is devoted to Degaré‘s adventures as to his parents’ union. In Sir Launfal, on the contrary, all 1044 lines are devoted to the love story.

27 French and Hale, ME Metrical Romances, pp. 345–350.

28 Arthurian Tradition, pp. 42 f, 44 f. 47 f.

29 Cf. the courtly love passages in Marie's Lanval with those in the English version “The Sources of Sir Launfal,” pp. 394–402.

30 P. 80. Earlier commentators mention the sword in connection with the Hildebrand story; Potter, p. 52; Hibbard, pp. 301–305.

31 Cross and Slover, pp. 29 f.; see also Loomis, p. 327.

32 Laura Hibbard Loomis, “Chaucer and the Breton Lays of the Auchinleck MS,” SP, xxxviii (1941), 15 f., nn. 4, 6.