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Here folweth the Prologe of the Clerkes Tale of Oxenford.
‘SIR clerk of Oxenford,’ our hoste sayde, | |
| ‘Ye ryde as coy and stille as dooth a mayde, | |
| Were newe spoused, sitting at the bord; | |
| This day ne herde I of your tonge a word. | |
| I trowe ye studie aboute som sophyme, | 5 |
| But Salomon seith, “every thing hath tyme.” | |
| For goddes sake, as beth of bettre chere, | |
| It is no tyme for to studien here. | |
| Telle us som mery tale, by your fey; | |
| For what man that is entred in a pley, | 10 |
| He nedes moot unto the pley assente. | |
| But precheth nat, as freres doon in Lente, | |
| To make us for our olde sinnes wepe, | |
| Ne that thy tale make us nat to slepe. | |
| Telle us som mery thing of aventures;— | 15 |
| Your termes, your colours, and your figures, | |
| Kepe hem in stoor til so be ye endyte | |
| Heigh style, as whan that men to kinges wryte. | |
| Speketh so pleyn at this tyme, I yow preye, | |
| That we may understonde what ye seye.’ | 20 |
| This worthy clerk benignely answerde, | |
| ‘Hoste,’ quod he, ‘I am under your yerde; | |
| Ye han of us as now the governaunce, | |
| And therfor wol I do yow obeisaunce, | |
| As fer as reson axeth, hardily. | 25 |
| I wol yow telle a tale which that I | |
| Lerned at Padowe of a worthy clerk, | |
| As preved by his wordes and his werk. | |
| He is now deed and nayled in his cheste, | |
| I prey to god so yeve his soule reste! | 30 |
| Fraunceys Petrark, the laureat poete, | |
| Highte this clerk, whos rethoryke sweete | |
| Enlumined al Itaille of poetrye, | |
| As Linian dide of philosophye | |
| Or lawe, or other art particuler; | 35 |
| But deeth, that wol nat suffre us dwellen heer | |
| But as it were a twinkling of an yë, | |
| Hem bothe hath slayn, and alle shul we dyë. | |
| But forth to tellen of this worthy man, | |
| That taughte me this tale, as I bigan, | 40 |
| I seye that first with heigh style he endyteth, | |
| Er he the body of his tale wryteth, | |
| A proheme, in the which discryveth he | |
| Pemond, and of Saluces the contree, | |
| And speketh of Apennyn, the hilles hye, | 45 |
| That been the boundes of West Lumbardye, | |
| And of Mount Vesulus in special, | |
| Where as the Poo, out of a welle smal, | |
| Taketh his firste springing and his sours, | |
| That estward ay encresseth in his cours | 50 |
| To Emelward, to Ferrare, and Venyse: | |
| The which a long thing were to devyse. | |
| And trewely, as to my Iugement, | |
| Me thinketh it a thing impertinent, | |
| Save that he wol conveyen his matere: | 55 |
| But this his tale, which that ye may here.’ | |
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