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PREFACE

The triple labour involved in editing three independent works in one volume will, it is hoped, serve as an excuse for some of the shortcomings of the present publication. Under the circumstances it has been impossible to make the work as definitive as might have been the case with a single text. For example, while I have been able to print the three existing manuscript texts of King Horn, of the other two poems, the textual material is not nearly so complete.

The texts, it is hoped, are accurately printed. The credit for this is due, in large measure, to Dr. Furnivall,--who has read with the MSS. the proofs of all the British Museum texts,--and to the proof-readers at Oxford and Cambridge. The notes to King Horn represent a good deal of labour, and may, I trust, prove useful. The glossary, though not so complete as that in Wissmann's excellent critical edition of King Horn, is intended to fit the volume, and to supply explanation of words and uses of words not intelligible to ordinary readers of Early English Texts.

It is my pleasant duty to acknowledge assistance from various quarters. I am indebted to the libraries of the British Museum and Cambridge University, and the Bodleian library at Oxford for the use of manuscripts; also to the Duke of Sutherland for permission to copy the text of Floris and Blauncheflur from the manuscript in his private library; also to the Cornell University library for conveniences placed at my disposal in the preparation of this volume. I must also acknowledge timely words of advice from Prof. J. M. Hart, notes on Layamon from Dr. B. S. Monroe, and assistance in proof-reading by Prof. W. Strunk, jr. But above all I must acknowledge the less apparent work of Dr. Furnivall in preparing the texts for press, a work the amount of which one who has not edited for the E.E.T.S. is not likely to realize.

G. H. M. K.

INTRODUCTION.

KING HORN.

? 1. SETTING OF THE STORY.

Standing apart from these largely conventionalized tales are the stories of Havelok and King Horn. These are supposed to have been among the first products of the second growth of English story. They seem to preserve, more than the other, later romances, their primitive traits, and are hence usually classed as English, or Germanic, in origin.

? 2. VERSIONS.

But with all this difference of detail, the story in its essential elements is the same in the two versions. Wissmann, in the introduction to his critical edition, says, "der franz?sische roman weist kein einziges notwendiges bindeglied, keinen sch?nen altert?mlichen zug auf, den das englische gedicht, King Horn nicht enthielte; dieses dagegen hat trotz seines geringen umfanges, eine reiche von alten, wahrhaft poetischen motiven jenem voraus." And further, "aus alle dem ergibt sich, dass K. H. keine bearbeitung des franz?sischen romans sein kann." Wissmann's further conclusions, however, are less tenable, when he continues: "das umgekehrte verh?ltniss dagegen ist nicht nur denkbar, sondern bis zu einem gewissen grade sogar notwendig; eine ?ltere quelle als das lied von King Horn f?r R. H. vorauszusetzen sind wir durch nichts berechtigt."

Limited space forbids a thorough-going comparison of the two versions. The essential elements of the story are in each case nearly the same. In the French version again Horn the prince with his companions is set afloat from Suddenne in an open boat, arrives in Bretaigne, is hospitably received by King Hunlaf, is loved by the princess Rigmenil, from whom he receives a magic ring, is betrayed by Wikele, one of his companions, and is exiled from Bretaigne. He takes ship for Westir, the court of King Godreche, and is well received by the king and his two sons. He distinguishes himself in all things, and is loved and wooed by the princess Lemburc. But after delivering the Irish kingdom from an African invasion, he is recalled by a messenger to Bretaigne, where, after vanquishing his rival Modun in a tournament, he rescues Rigmenil and himself plays the part of bridegroom at the wedding prepared. He then repairs to Suddenne, and after ridding his father's kingdom of the invaders, is warned in a dream of Wikele's second treachery, and returns again just in time to save his bride from a forced marriage with Wikele. With the death of Wikele and the establishment of Horn's loyal friend Haderof in Ireland and of Horn and Rigmenil in Suddenne, the French story ends.

The identity of the two versions is, however, by no means complete. The more condensed version presents some traits not to be found in R. H. We may mention: Horn's farewell to his boat, 139 ff.; Rimenhild's assistance in bringing about the dubbing of Horn, 435 ff.; Rimenhild's dream, 651 ff.; Horn's charge to Athulf to care for Rimenhild, 743 ff.; the drowning of the messenger from Rimenhild to Horn, 968 ff.; the palmer's account of Rimenhild's grief, 1035 ff.; Athulf's watching from the tower, 1091 ff.; Horn's fictitious tale to Rimenhild of his own death, 1175 ff.

If the subject matter in the two versions is different, the style is far more so. The simple, condensed, somewhat archaic manner of K. H. stands in marked contrast to the sophisticated style of the French romance. The difference is perhaps that to be expected between two versions, one intended for English-speaking, the other for French-speaking people. But the difference is perhaps more largely that between ballad and romance. In K. H. the author gives no evidence of himself directly or indirectly, whereas Thomas, the author of R. H., continually addresses his public in the second person and directly introduces his personal opinion. The incidents which in K. H. are condensed almost to unintelligibility, in R. H. are liberally supplied with motives and explanations. The character of Rimenhild in K. H., almost wild in its naturalness, suggests somewhat one of the female divinities of Germanic mythology. Rimel, of the French romance, is an eminently sophisticated, almost modern young woman who understands the arts of coaxing and of coquetry.

All this, Stimming concludes, is an unmistakable evidence of the later time of R. H.'s composition. Granting the truth of this conclusion, the difference of treatment in the two versions is also no doubt in part due to the difference in the public for which each version was intended, and also still more, perhaps, to the difference in function of the two works. It must be noted that K. H. is a popular ballad-like poem perhaps of the kind referred to in R. H., while the French R. H. is an artificial and conventionalized romance of prowess and love.

That the ballad-like version K. H., simple, even primitive in matter, in manner, and in metrical form, should have been derived from the sophisticated, artificial romance, R. H. deserves little consideration. On the other hand that the artificial romance should have been derived from the simple ballad-like story, incomplete in its record of details, is even more unworthy of consideration, though quite probably Thomas, the French romancer, may have been to some extent influenced by this English version, with which he was probably acquainted, as we may infer from the following passage:

R. H. 2783-2801.

The Scottish ballads of Hind Horn , as said above, emphasize only one element of the original story, namely, the separation of Horn and the princess, and their reunion through the agency of the magic ring. The story in Hind Horn agrees more closely with H. C. than with R. H. or K. H., and seems to rest, along with H. C., on a northern version of the story.

? 3. ELEMENTS OF THE STORY.

? 4. TOPOGRAPHY.

? 5. STYLE.

On the whole, then, we see that the language of King Horn is much less influenced, than one would expect, by older English models. The language of the second growth of story seems to have fallen into new conventional moulds quite independent of the older tradition.

? 6. VERSIFICATION.

As we have seen, the phraseology of King Horn shows relatively little trace of influence by the older English traditional stereotyped forms of expression. In this respect if Layamon is the link connecting native English poetry with the past, King Horn is the link joining to the newer traditions of poetry, which were forming. For, as we have seen, if King Horn has some phrases in common with Layamon, these are the modern forms of expression more often than the phrases rooted in the older English tradition. And, as we have seen, while King Horn has relatively little of phraseology inherited from the past, it has a multitude of stereotyped phrases in common with the poetry of contemporary and later composition . In the same way in versification, if Layamon is the link connecting with the Anglo-Saxon mode of versification, King Horn is the link connecting with the newer mode, of Romance or mediaeval Latin origin.

The exact theory of the versification of King Horn remains yet to be established. Luick in his article in Paul's Grundriss offers the very ingenious hypothesis that in the 'beginnings of English as well as of German rimed verse, we have before us the coming to light again of the primitive Teutonic measured song verse.' This hypothesis, though ingenious and plausible, does not admit of verification, and it is perhaps safer to adhere to the view of Schipper , who sees in Layamon's verse the direct traditional descendants of the OE. types, and in King Horn a further development of the versification of Layamon.

We see then, probably, in the versification of King Horn a transitional stage in the development of native English metre, connecting, as we have seen, more closely with the future than with the past. It was probably the occurrence in each verse of two syllables marked from the other syllables by a stronger stress, that gave rise to a feeling of uniformity in rhythm. This tendency toward uniformity in rhythm was fostered by the regular introduction of rime, for since the riming syllable naturally bore one of the two verse accents, and since the riming syllables in two riming verses would occupy the same relative position, hence in a riming verse the second of the two verse accents must balance with that in the other verse of the pair, and the balance established between the second pair of accents would naturally lead to a complete balance between the two verses. In other words the two verses would be levelled to the same rhythm.

The regular introduction of rime was, no doubt, attended by the gradual loss of alliteration, which would cease to be significant as marking the verse accent, since it could hardly be made to fall regularly on the same syllable with the rime, and would hence be merely an unorganic adornment of the verse. As the position of the two verse accents came to be a fixed one, there seems to have been a tendency by raising some of the syllables bearing merely a logical stress, to rhythmic importance, thus to bring about a verse with regular measure.

The native forms must have been influenced by this close association with foreign forms.

? 7. DIALECT.

From a consideration of the phonology of the poem Wissmann concludes that, "Im Allgemeinen ist der Charakter des Vocalismus ein s?d?stlicher, der jedoch von dem kentischen in vielen Punkten sich unterscheidet. Die gr?sste Wahrscheinlichkeit hat Essex als Gegend der Entstehung f?r sich." A further investigation reveals to me no reason for dissenting from this view. Some of the more prominent features of the phonology are as follows:

? 8. MANUSCRIPTS.

The English story of King Horn is preserved in three MSS.

The Cambridge MS. is written in a very plain book-hand, apparently of the latter half of the 13th century. The folios are written in double columns, and occasionally, since the lines are short, two lines are joined in one. The initial letters are written a little apart from the rest, and are marked with strokes of red.

This text of King Horn is the one printed by Lumby in the first edition of the present volume.

The MS. is written in double columns on parchment, and probably dates back to 1325. The texts of Horn and Havelok are written in a fine book-hand. The lives that are appended are written in a later, much less formal hand.

This text of King Horn is printed by C. Horstmann in Herrig's Archiv, 1872, pp. 39-58.

This text of King Horn has been printed by J. Ritson .

We thus see that for the preservation of King Horn we are indebted to a fragment of a collection of stories, a southern collection of legends, to which have been appended Havelok and Horn, a genuine literary collection probably made in Herefordshire by an Anglo-Norman.

Of these MSS. no one is derived from either of the others. To indicate their interrelations, I will borrow the diagram of Wissmann expressing the result of his studies in this matter.

FLORIS AND BLAUNCHEFLUR.

? 1. INTRODUCTORY.

? 2. HISTORY.

The story of Floris and Blauncheflur is probably an oriental product, and shows many traces of Byzantine influence. It was one of the first of these oriental tales to be retailed in the Occident and had a wide circulation in all the countries of western Christendom, from Spain and Italy to the Scandinavian North. Its route from East to West it is not easy to trace with certainty, though the Crusades were quite probably the means of its importation. Further than this it is not easy to determine. The Proven?als, whose active part in the Crusades is well known, may have been the agents, or, as is so often the case with the oriental tales, it may have been imported in a Latin dress.

The history of the story in the West is complicated on account of the puzzling multiplicity of versions among which it is sometimes exceedingly difficult to determine the interrelations. The clue to the difficulty was early hinted at by Sommer , and more recently the matter has been very thoroughly explained by Herzog in his investigation of the subject. Herzog points out that there are to be distinguished in the Occident, two distinct general versions of the story. In the first of these, #A#, seems to be preserved the story in its original and genuine form. The second of these versions, #B#, seems to be a remodelling of the original version in the attempt to adapt to common folk a story in its existing form intended for higher circles of society. For this purpose slight allusions in #A#, are expanded in #B# into striking incidents. To bring out into strong light the injustice of Floris's father and the final triumph of true love, supernatural and horrible elements and episodes are introduced. Since these new elements are of a kind common in other Byzantine tales, it is concluded that the remodelling of the story had already taken place before the importation from the East.

Version #A#, on the other hand, seems first to have been imported into France, the great jobbing nation of the Middle Ages in all sorts of romantic stuffs and materials. From France it was early retailed to Germany, to England, to Scandinavia, and, possibly, to Italy. From Germany in turn it was re-exported into Bohemia. Version #A# was without doubt the first to become known, since we find it not only in the Old French, but in the Germanic versions springing from a French source, in an unperverted state. All the different versions of #B#, on the other hand, have been very noticeably influenced by #A#, indicating that the arrival of #B# was after #A# had become established and well known.

Among the troubadours of Provence the story of Fl. and Bl. was early known and popular, as one must judge from the very frequent allusions. There is, however, no proof of the existence of a Proven?al romance.

? 3. ENGLISH VERSION.

The English poet has not expanded and amplified by the addition of further details or by the introduction of personal reflections, as the German Fleck has done. He has presented the essential features of the love story as it impressed him, in a condensed form to be sure, at the same time without bareness or baldness. Unlike the adapter of the Low Rhenish condensed version, he has preserved the original order of incidents, and has usually preserved faithfully the smallest details that have any essential bearing on the plot.

Some idea of the English writer's fidelity to the details and even to the phraseology of his French original, and of his method of translating, may be gained from the following parallel passages:

? 4. DIALECT.

From these criteria, which seem to be the best available, we may infer that Fl. and Bl. belongs further north than King Horn. Further, the inflections seem to point to the Eastern rather than to the Western Midland, so that we may feel fairly safe in attributing Fl. and Bl. to the East Midland.

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