THE WEDDING OF SIR GAWAIN AND DAME RAGNELLE: NOTES
1 As I have mentioned in the introduction to the text, the scribe's letter forms are often interchangeable, and strokes ambiguous. Often transcription will therefore be somewhat arbitrary. Where the scribe's forms are clear, I have reproduced them in my readings; where they are unclear, I have opted for forms closer to modern conventions of spelling. This has resulted in some inconsistencies, such as a mix of spellings like his and hys. In general, I have regarded final flourishes as meaningless, and so given, for example, knyght and with (in agreement with Madden and Hartwell) in preference to knyghte and withe (the usual readings in Sumner, Whiting, and Sands). In cases of double l with a stroke, I have retained a final e (i.e., welle, fulle, Ragnelle). These ambiguities of writing practice are not uncommon in medieval and Renaissance vernacular manuscripts, and the scribe certainly did not regard them as affecting the meaning of the text in any essential way. Consequently I have not recorded in these notes all the instances where spelling differs from edition to edition because the scribe's forms can legitimately be read in a variety of ways. Ragnelle has been edited more times than most other Middle English romances; I have benefitted greatly by consulting these earlier editions, and at the same time I have had to make choices among confusing, confused, and sometimes contradictory readings. These differences among editions have the effect of making the text of Ragnelle seem even more unpredictable in its orthography than it actually is. This has been complicated by attempts at editorial "normalization"; this is especially the case with Sands (likely the best known print of the poem), where standardization is itself inconsistent, and new spellings and word forms are added to the manuscript's readings. The present edition tries to offer a readable text that leaves the manuscript readings unaltered wherever possible. I have modernized spellings, giving "j" for "i," "u" for "v" and "w," "v" for "u" and "w," and "w" for "u" and "v" in accord with current usage.
Abbreviations: R = Rawlinson MS, M = Madden, S = Sumner, W = Whiting, Sands = Sands, H = Hartwell. See Select Bibliography for these editions.
11 belovid by that. R: belovid that; M adds by for sense, which I follow.
16 Ingleswod. The story is set in Inglewood Forest, near Carlisle (see lines 127, 132, 325) in Cumberland, in northwest England, on the border of Scotland. Inglewood Forest (whose Anglo-Saxon name, meaning "the wood of the Angles," suggests an English settlement in contested British territory) ceased to exist in the nineteenth century. Its mention connects Ragnelle with the settings for Avowyng (line 65) and Awntyrs (line 709). The Tarn Wathelene (mentioned in Avowyng, Awntyrs, and Marriage) was located within Inglewood Forest; see Awntyrs, line 2 and note. For these tales of Sir Gawain, the woods and lakes of Inglewood and the environs of Carlisle were locales with strong Arthurian and marvelous associations.
26 houndes. R: goundes; M reads as houndes, H reads as hounds; S, W emend to g[r]oundes.
43 theron. R: deron. The manuscript reading has presented a puzzle to editors. Most have taken deron (see line 26) to mean "covertly," though such a spelling is not, so far as I know, attested elsewhere. Again, deron might seem a past participle of derien, "to wound," though, likewise, no spellings resembling deron occur. I have taken it therefore as a case in which the scribe substitutes d for th; other instances occur at lines 176 (oder), 196 (anoder), 383 (Neder), 386 (furder), and so on, though in all of these cases the scribe substitutes d for a voiced, intervocalic th, not for an initial unvoiced sound. I take the line to mean that the wounded deer fell down on the spot. To read this as a form of derne would suggest either that the deer fell blindly into a thicket, or fell into a blind thicket (which concealed Sir Gromer).
47 serve welle. R: vell. The scribe writes s with -er abbreviation stroke over the letter, followed by well with a stroke through the ascenders. M reads serve well, which makes good sense in this context; I follow scribal spelling of this reading as in S, W. H reads sirvell, and emends to quell.
48 grasse. S derives the meaning of this word from the Old English word for "grass," and is followed by W. Sands calls it "a puzzling line," and, following S, suggests the deer touched the grass (i.e., died). It seems certain, however, that this scene is an "assay," in which the hunter measures the deer's fat (grasse, meaning grease or fat) as a preliminary to the ritualized "breaking" or butchering of the animal. Such scenes occur in Gottfried von Strassburg's Tristan, in which the hero proves his royal identity by demonstrating his knowledge of the ritual, and in the Middle English Parlement of the Thre Ages and Sir Gawain and the Green Knight. Instructions for the assay are given in several hunting manuals; see notes to lines 1325 ff. of Sir Gawain and the Green Knight in the Tolkien-Gordon-Davis edition, where the "gres" of the "fowlest" deer is two fingers in breadth. H also notes this connection, as does Susan Dannenbaum [Crane] in her note on the line (Explicator 40 [1982], 3-4).
62 Gromer Somer Joure. H reads Jourer (with expanded abbreviation) and emends to Jour. The name seems less connected with chivalry than with folklore. Malory in the Morte Darthur names Sir Gromore Somyr Joure (or Sir Gromoreson in the Winchester manuscript) among the faction of twelve knights who align themselves with Gawain's brothers Mordred and Aggravayne in the ambush of Lancelot (see Works, p. 1164, and also pp. 343, 346, 1148). Among the others in the faction are Sir Gyngolyne, the son of Sir Gawain and (according to the present romance) Ragnelle (see line 799). In Turke (see text and notes at lines 320 ff. in this volume), Sir Gawain transforms the pagan "Turk" by beheading him, and he becomes Sir Gromer. But here his dangerousness, his sudden appearance deep in the woods, and his name would seem to connect Sir Gromer Somer Joure to the festivities of midsummer's day and night, and to the spirits and the "great and ugly gyants marching as if they were alive" associated with this occasion in England through the sixteenth century (George Puttenham, The Arte of English Poesie, ed. Gladys Doidge Willcock and Alice Walker [Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1936], p. 153). In this respect, he shares some traits with the Green Knight, in Greene Knight (text and notes in this volume) and still more with the eerie intruder of Sir Gawain and the Green Knight, who exhibits striking similarities to the participants at celebrations of the agricultural year. The name Gromer may simply be a version of "groom," i.e., "man," as in "bridegroom" (compare line 50, where this term is applied to Sir Gromer), or a derivative from "gram," "angry." In Marriage, the lady tells Gawain that her wicked stepmother not only cast a spell on her, but "witched my brother to a carlish" shape (line 179). In Ragnelle, there's no evidence that Sir Gromer is bewitched, and he is without doubt a knight, as Arthur's greetings and descriptions make clear. See also note on Gyngolyn, line 799 below.
75 I have the nowe att avaylle. For the use of this phrase to express triumph, see OED, "avail," sb., 1b.
77 defye. The word defy carries a quasi-technical meaning in the context of chivalric honor; it implies a public challenge, which is simultaneously a denunciation and a demand for open, physical vindication of one's honor, and is therefore quite the opposite of what Sir Gromer Somer Jour does here. See MED, "defien" v. 1, 2.
80 whate thou most crave. Arthur's offer to Sir Gromer anticipates the riddle the latter poses to the King - to name "whate wemen love best" (line 91). In the same way, Sir Gromer's remark - "Thy lyfe is in my hand" (line 107) is directly echoed in Ragnelle's identical claim (line 256).
86 certeyn. M, S, W, Sands: certayn.
91 best in feld and town is written into margin; this hypermetrical tag may be part of a lost line.
96 fremde. R: frende; M reads fremde, which I follow.
104 endyng. R: end; I emend for the sake of rhyme.
128 huntyng. W misprints hyntyng.
149 By Mary flower. This is an elliptical phrase, meaning, "Mary, flower among women," or "flower of womanhood."
172 lese. R: leve; M reads lese. H reads R as lose, but follows M's emendation, as I do.
194 they. R: the; M reads they, which I follow.
212 faylle. R: ffayd; M reads faylle, which I follow.
235 her. R: he; M reads her, which I follow.
256 ff. Ragnelle's warning here precisely repeats the boast her brother, Sir Gromer, had made to Arthur at line 107 and so emphasizes the parallel between the compacts into which the king is forced. See also line 80 and note.
266 Yf I help the nott, thou art butt dead. R: Butt I warn the yf I help the nott, thou art butt dead; I follow M in omitting the phrase repeated from previous line, as a probable copyist's error.
273 Whate is your desyre, fayre Lady. Arthur's question ironically solicits from Ragnelle a concrete reply to the enigma Sir Gromer has set for him. In fulfilling her desire for Gawain, Arthur presumably obtains the answer to what all women desire, and answers Sir Gromer's challenge as well (see lines 467-72).
280 a knyght to wed. The line involves a pun: a knight to marry, and a knight as pledge of good faith ("to wed"). See OED, wed sb., 2a.
293 Alle lyethe in hym alon. In making individual consent - rather than family or state interests, or priestly authority - the ultimate basis for a valid marriage, the poem reflects central doctrinal positions taught from the twelfth century; see R. H. Helmholz, Marriage Litigation in Medieval England (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1974). Ragnelle makes the same point, concerning her own right to choose, at line 310.
302 sewer. S (followed by Sands) glosses this word adverbially, as "surely," but it seems more likely a form of the verb sure, "to assure": through me Gawain may save your life, or assure that your death comes about.
314 lore. R: lore fowll; I follow M in omitting the final word, which seems a confused rhyme.
316 ther is a byrd men calle an owlle. The precise import of this line is unclear; it may be that a part of the text is missing here. In echoing herself from line 310, Ragnelle seems to mean owlle to refer both to her own monstrousness (the owl was chiefly a negative symbol in late medieval writings) and to her natural rights as a human being, or to her repellent appearance and her assertion that she is in reality a Lady (line 315).
319 Dame Ragnelle. The name is otherwise unknown in Arthurian romance. In Patience, a poetic version of the Jonah story usually attributed to the author of Sir Gawain and the Green Knight, the gentile sailors on whose ship the Hebrew prophet tries to escape from the Lord curse him by "Ragnel" (line 188), apparently intended to be taken as the name of a pagan god or devil. See the note in J. J. Anderson's edition (Manchester, 1969), p. 59. In the Digby play of Mary Magdalen a heathen priest and his servant perform a comic exorcism in broken Latin, and then call on the gods "Ragnell and Roffyn" (line 1200; Late Medieval Religious Plays of . . . Digby 133, ed. Donald C. Baker and others, EETS o.s. 283 [Oxford, 1982], p. 64). The Chester play of "Balaam" has that gentile prophet invoke his gods "Ruffyn and Reynell" (line 213); the latter is given as "Ragnell" in one manuscript. Likewise, the Chester play of "Antichrist" has Antichrist call for aid:
Helpe, Sathanas and Lucyfere!
Belzebubb, bould batchellere!
Ragnell, Ragnell, thou art my deare! (lines 645-47)
(The Chester Mystery Cycle, ed. R. M. Lumiansky and David Mills, EETS s.s. 3 [Oxford, 1974], pp. 87 and 434; see also commentary by the same editors, EETS s.s. 9 [Oxford, 1986], pp. 69 and 347.) This widespread equivalence between the name Ragnelle and an exotic pagan god or devil may be echoed in Gawain's intentionally exaggerated comparison of Ragnelle to "a fend" and "Belsabub" (lines 344-45), or Arthur's reference to "the fende" (line 725), by which he may mean that he takes Ragnelle to be an evil spirit. In Marriage, the lady does not have a name, but she says her stepmother "witched me" so that "I must walke in womans liknesse, / Most like a feeind of hell" (lines 181-82). These associations may have made Ragnelle seem more spectral and frightening for a late medieval audience (like the ghost of Guenevere's mother in Awntyrs), and may have increased the ambiguity that surrounds her in the poem.
342 ff. Gawain's vow to "wed her and wed her agayn" out of friendship and fealty to Arthur gives the motive of male chivalric loyalty precedence over romantic personal love, and makes clear how women operate in romance as the intermediate term in the bonds between men.
366 itt. M supplies it before shalle as necessary for grammar and sense; the present emendation follows M's suggestion, though the spelling has been brought into accord with the scribe's convention.
419 Ye goo fulle nyse, I wolle nott lye. H emends the line to echo more fully Chaucer, Wife of Bath's Tale (line 931): "He gooth ful ny the sothe, I wol nat lye." This resemblance is one of the most striking evidences of direct connection between the two versions of the story.
439 welle. M, S, W, Sands emend to well.
440 shake. S takes the word to mean distance, and is followed by Sands. H rearranges lines 440-42, so that shake becomes a verb, "to go" (compare shoke, line 740). But the phrase seems clearly adverbial, a variation on the still-current idiom, "no great shakes," and means "quickly"; see OED, "shake," sb. 1, 1.
456 alle. R: ale; M reads all; I follow S, W in preserving the usual spelling.
476 her. R: he; M reads her, which I follow.
499 that ye have. Sands misprints that he have.
508 wolle ye have. W misprints wolle y have; Sands misreads welle ye have.
525 ff. Ragnelle here addresses Arthur.
528 us togeder. Sands misreads un togeder.
536 God have mercy. R: Godhavemercy, written as one word.
548 ff. The description of Ragnelle here complements the initial portrait (lines 231 ff.) in its extravagant hideousness, though the specific details are sometimes at odds ("Her nek long," line 238, as against no neck at all, line 555, for example).
562 thorowe. S glosses this word as "thoroughly," and Sands and H reproduce this. It is certainly a form of throw, meaning a specific time, an interval, or an occasion; see OED, throw sb. 1.
564 fowlle maye. R: fowlle; M inserts lady for rhyme and sense, followed by S, W, Sands. I follow H's insertion of maye, which duplicates the rhyme at lines 715-16 and better maintains the meter.
571 ye. R: we; I emend for the sake of sense.
592 thre thowsand mark. R: thre mlle mark. I have expanded the abbreviation (a form of Latin mille). The figure (about two thousand pounds) signifies not a specific amount, but simply the extravagance of Ragnelle's clothing.
612 Al. W: All.
635 for Arthours. Sands misreads of Arthours.
644 he. R: she; M reads he, which I follow.
650 ar. W: are.
652 ie. R: ien (plural); M reads ie, which I follow.
656 ff. The choice offered by Ragnelle - "fayre on nyghtes" (line 659) or "fayre on days" (line 661) - is the same in Marriage and in Gower's "Tale of Florent" (See G. C. Macaulay, Confessio Amantis in The English Works of John Gower, EETS e.s. 81, Vol. I [Oxford, 1900], I.1411 ff.) The choice in the Wife of Bath's Tale is "foul and old" and "true, humble wyf" or "yong and fair" and "take youre adventure" on sexual faithfulness (lines 1220 ff.). Chaucer's version makes more explicit the conflict embedded in the other three versions, namely public vs. private male enjoyment of the lady's sexual attractions. The happy ending allows the hero (putting it crudely) to have his cake and eat it too.
659 nyghtes. R: nyght; M reads nyghtes, which I follow.
672 lese. R: lose; M reads lese, followed by S, W, H.
677 do as ye lyst. Gawain's disposing himself to Ragnelle's desire brings to convergence a crucial array of themes and verbal echoes in the poem. By this accord, Ragnelle has sovereynté (line 697), which breaks the spell; Ragnelle had said to Arthur that women most desire sovereynté, and Arthur in turn had promised her fulfillment of her "desyre" (line 400). This knowledge of women's "rewlle" had given Arthur "rule" over Gromer (lines 470, 472), whose own desire of Arthur was to know "what wemen love best" (line 91). When Gawain has given "her sovereynté every delle" (line 776), Ragnelle puts her desire at his will (line 784), just as Arthur (at Ragnelle's wish) makes peace with Gromer (lines 811 ff.).
691 nygramancy. This use of a learned word to give credibility to the magical transformation is repeated in Carle, line 405, suggesting that even specialized Latin terms might be appropriated for specific functions within the popular romances.
716 maye. R: mayd; M reads maye, followed by S, W, H.
722 Syrs. R: syr; M reads syrs, followed by S, W, H.
730 incerteyn. Previous editors have taken in certeyn as two words (meaning "without doubt"), partly because of the slight gap between them in the manuscript. Such a space often occurs between components that modern print conventions present as unbroken words (i.e., be fell, line 15, be think, line 66, I wys, line 354), just as separate forms are joined (Almen, line 612). The form incertain is unusual but not rare, and makes good sense as specifying the state of mind of the royal entourage at this point. See OED, incertain, and MED, incertain(e).
737 goon. Sands reads gon, perhaps emended for sake of rhyme.
743 here. R: hed; M (followed by S, W, Sands, H): her; I adjust spelling for scribal convention.
759 is a fayre. Sands misprints is faire.
761 help. R: held; so M, S, W, Sands. I emend to the common idiom on the basis of sense, as does H.
773 The responsibility of Ragnelle's stepmother for her enchantment links the romance to traditions of domestic intrigue and intergenerational, interfamilial hostility characteristic of fairy tales. Marriage and Gower's "Tale of Florent" also assign the responsibility to the "Stepmoder for an hate" (Macaulay [see note on line 656 above], Confessio Amantis I.1844), while the Wife of Bath's Tale seems to imply that the lady acts on her own.
799 Gyngolyn. Sir Gawain's son (French Guinglain) is the hero of the Middle English romance Libeaus Desconus (the Englishing of "Le bel inconnu," The Fair Unknown), which survives in six different versions (ed. M. Mills, EETS 261 [Oxford, 1969]). In the romance, the hero is begotten by Gawain "be [by] a forest syde" (line 9); his mother, who is unnamed, rears him in secret, not revealing his identity, "For douute of wykkede loos" (line 17) - for fear of shame attaching itself to her or to her son. The Lambeth version contains a title: "A tretys of one Gyngelayne . . . that was Bastard son to sir Gaweyne" (ed. Mills, p. 75). In Malory, "sir Gyngalyn, Gawaynes sonne" is defeated by Tristram in his madness (Works, pp. 494-95); in the climactic action of the story, syr Gyngalyne makes one of the twelve accompanying his uncles Mordred and Aggravayne in the ambush of Lancelot (Works, p. 1164). Among the other knights in this group are Gawain's other sons, Florence and Lovell (who, according to Malory, "were begotyn uppon Sir Braundeles syster"; Works, p. 1147, and see Jeaste line 320 and note), Sir Galleron of Galway (see Carlisle, line 43 and Awntyrs, line 417 and note), and Sir Gromore Somyr Joure, the antagonist of the present romance whom Malory's Gawain brings to the Round Table. As Malory notes, all of Lancelot's antagonists "were of Scotlonde, other ellis of sir Gawaynes kynne, other wel willers to his bretheren."
805 Gawain's unflagging devotion here contrasts with his behavior in French stories, where he tirelessly pursues knightly adventure, as in Chrétien de Troyes' Yvain; in the latter poem, Gawain's taste for exploits disrupts the hero's love of his lady. As a coward (line 808) ironically recalls line 12 above, "For cowardes were everemore shent"; Ragnelle's transformation has also changed the nature of chivalric virtue, or at least the court's view of it.
810 mervaylyd. S, W read movaylyd and emend to present reading; I follow M, H in transcribing as m with superior abbreviation stroke.
Arthoure the Kyng. R: kyng Arthoure; M reads Arthoure the kyng, which I follow.
832 This reference to Gawain's many liaisons obliquely recalls his reputation as roué in French romance, which appears in Jeaste as well.
838 born. Sands misprints boren.
844 besett with gaylours. The claim that the composer of Ragnelle is imprisoned recalls Malory's description of himself as "a knyght presoner," and his request that readers "praye for me . . . that God sende me good delyveraunce" (Works, pp. 180, 1260). Field (see Select Bibliography, above) suggests that Malory may have been the author of this poem.
847 Royalle. R: Ryoall.