JOHN LYDGATE, PAYNE AND SOROWE OF EVYLL MARYAGE, SELECT BIBLIOGRAPHY
Manuscripts
Bodleian Library MS Digby 181 (SC 1782), fols. 7a-8b (sixteenth century).
Cambridge University Library MS Ff. 1.6, fols. 155a-156b (c. 1500).
British Library MS Harley 2251, fols. 45a-51a (1464-83).
Rome Engl. Coll. MS 1306 (also numbered 1127 and A. 347), fols. 80b-82a (1436-56).
Early Printed Edition
de Worde, Wynkyn (1509). [With introductory stanza from Cambridge University Library MS Dd. 4.54, fol. 229b.]
Editions
Collier, J. Payne, ed. The Pain and Sorrow of Evil Marriage: From an Unique Copy. In Early English Poetry, Ballads, and Popular Literature. Vol. 1. London: Printed for the Percy Society, 1965. Pp. 17-22. [Part 4.]
MacCracken, Henry Noble, ed. The Minor Poems of John Lydgate, Part II. EETS o.s. 192. London: Oxford University Press, 1934. Pp. 456-60.
Wright, Thomas, ed. The Latin Poems Commonly Attributed to Walter Mapes. London: Camden Society, 1841. [Contains Latin and French sources.]
Related Studies
Boffey, Julia. "Short Texts in Manuscript Anthologies: The Minor Poems of John Lydgate in Two Fifteenth-Century Collections." In The Whole Book: Cultural Perspectives on the Medieval Miscellany. Ed. Stephen G. Nichols and Siegfried Wenzel. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 1996. Pp. 69-82.
Renoir, Alan. "Attitudes Toward Women in Lydgate's Poetry." English Studies 42 (1961), 1-14.
Seah, Victoria Lees. "Marriage and the Love Vision: The Concept of Marriage in Three Medieval Love Visions as Relating to Courtship and Marriage Conventions of the Period." Ph.D. Diss., McGill University, 1978.
JOHN LYDGATE, PAYNE AND SOROWE OF EVYLL MARYAGE, NOTES
Abbreviations: Mac: Henry Noble MacCracken; MS: Bodleian Library MS Digby 181 (SC 1782), fols. 7a-8b; W: Wynkyn de Worde.
1-7 This first stanza derives from the Cambridge University MS.
14 Under the yoke and bondis of mariage. Each marital partner was obligated to fulfill certain requirements of married life, such as payment of the conjugal debt. Both wife and husband could demand sex from the other at any time with expectations of compliance. The word "husband" refers to a man's ties to his domestic environment, i.e., "bound" to the "house."
16 wedded without avysenesse. This phrase suggests that there is no coercion for the narrator to marry as might be the case in real life. Rather, he is compelled by romantic love.
18 Whom. MS: when.
19 ta lyved. MS: tallowed.
23 And gave. MS: Gave.
46 mater was well couth. MS: mater well couth.
62 Husbondes dare not theyre lustis well gaynsaye. MS: Husbondes dare not well gaynsaye. Mac's emendation.
64-70 This stanza derives from MS Harley 2251.
75 And this. MS: And thus.
83 fall into distresse. MS: full in distresse.
85 And yf so be he. MS: And if be he. Mac's emendation.
90 aventure at. MS: aventure or at.
93 and for mayné. MS: and mayne.
96-98 See the Wife of Bath's version of the adage:
Thow seyst that droppyng houses, and eek smoke,
And chidyng wyves maken men to flee
Out of hir owene houses; a, benedicitee! (III[D]278-80)
Compare also The Tale of Melibee, where Prudence refutes Melibee's charge that "thre thynges dryven a man out of his hous - that is to seyn, smoke, droppyng of reyn, and wikked wyves" (CT VII[B2]1085).
107 sondry pilgremages. Lydgate's persona seems to have someone like the Wife of Bath in mind, who has been three times to Jerusalem, as well as to Rome, Bologne, Compostela, and Cologne in search of company.
113-19 This stanza is substituted for four spurious stanzas according to MacCracken's EETS edition. A fifth stanza, not included in his account, appears in Wynken de Worde's printed edition. The five stanzas are as follows:
And of profyte they take but lytell hede,
But loketh soure whan theyr husbandes ayleth ought;
And of good mete and drynke they wyll not fayle in dede
What so euer it cost they care ryght nought;
Nor they care not how dere it be bought,
Rather than they should therof lacke or mysse
They wolde leeuer laye some pledge ywys.
It is trewe, I tell you yonge men euerychone,
Women by varyable and loue many wordes and stryfe;
Who can not appease them lyghtly or anone,
Shall haue care and sorowe all his lyfe,
That woo the tyme that euer he toke a wyfe;
And wyll take thought, and often muse
How he myght fynd the maner his wyfe to refuse.
But that maner with trouth can not be founde,
Therfore be wyse or ye come in the snare,
Or er ye take the waye of that bounde;
For and ye come there youre joye is tourned unto care
And remedy is there none, so may I fare,
But to take pacyens, and thynke none other way aboute
Then shall ye dye a martyr without ony doute.
Therfore you men that wedded be,
Do nothynge agaynst the pleasure of your wyfe,
Than shall you lyue the more meryle,
And often cause her to lyue withouten stryfe;
Without thou art unhappy unto an euyll lyfe,
Than, yf she than wyll be no better,
Set her upon a lelande, and bydde the deuyll fet her.
Therfore thynke moche and saye nought,
And thanke God of his goodnesse,
And prece not for to knowe all her thought,
For than shalte thou not knowe, as I gesse,
Without it be of her own gentylnesse,
And that is as moche as a man may put in his eye,
For, yf she lyst, of thy wordes she careth not a flye.
123 dredfull, peryllous serpent. MS: dredfull serpent.
127 Explicit. W: Finis. Here endeth ye payne and sorowe of evyll maryage. Imprynted at London in flete strete at the sygne of the Sonne, by me Wynkyn de Worde, W.