Chapter I: Front Matter

Transcriber’s Notes

Obvious typographical errors in punctuation have been silently corrected.

In particular, these typos were corrected:

Page cxxxii - corrected respcet to respect
Page 477 - corrected “feminine from” to “feminine form” in note 2677.
Page 481 - corrected “too” to “two” in note 390.
Footnote 1275 - Added “margin” to linenote for line 2052

The Corrigenda et Addenda have been corrected in place.

All other spelling and punctuation remains unchanged.

Italics are represented thus _italic_, superscripts thus y^n, bold thus =bold=.

THE COMPLETE WORKS

OF

JOHN GOWER

_G. C. MACAULAY_

* *
THE ENGLISH WORKS

HENRY FROWDE, M.A.

PUBLISHER TO THE UNIVERSITY OF OXFORD

LONDON, EDINBURGH, AND NEW YORK

THE COMPLETE WORKS

OF

JOHN GOWER

_EDITED FROM THE MANUSCRIPTS
WITH INTRODUCTIONS, NOTES, AND GLOSSARIES_

BY

G. C. MACAULAY, M.A.

FORMERLY FELLOW OF TRINITY COLLEGE, CAMBRIDGE

* *
THE ENGLISH WORKS

(CONFESSIO AMANTIS, PROL.--LIB. V. 1970)

‘O gentile Engleterre, a toi j’escrits.’

Oxford
AT THE CLARENDON PRESS
1901

Oxford
PRINTED AT THE CLARENDON PRESS
BY HORACE HART, M.A.
PRINTER TO THE UNIVERSITY

PREFATORY NOTE

The circumstances under which this edition was undertaken have already been stated in the Preface to the volume containing the French Works, where mention is also made of the editor’s obligations to many librarians and private owners of manuscripts.

At present it need only be said that the editor has become more and more convinced, as his work went on, of the value and authentic character of the text given by the Fairfax MS. of the _Confessio Amantis_, which as proceeding directly from the author, though not written by his hand, may claim the highest rank as an authority for his language.

It is hoped that the list of errata, the result chiefly of a revision made during the formation of the Glossary, may be taken to indicate not so much the carelessness of the editor, as his desire to be absolutely accurate in the reproduction of this interesting text.

The analysis of the _Confessio Amantis_ which is printed in the Introduction, was undertaken chiefly at the suggestion of Dr. Furnivall. With reference to this it may be observed that in places where the author is following well-known sources, the summaries are intentionally briefer, and in the case of some of the Biblical stories a reference to the original has been thought sufficient.

OXFORD, 1901.

CONTENTS

PAGE

INTRODUCTION vii

CONFESSIO AMANTIS:--

PROLOGUS 1

LIBER I 35

LIBER II 130

LIBER III 226

LIBER IV 301

LIBER V 402

NOTES 457