Incidental Hagiographic References in the Canterbury Tales
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INCIDENTAL HAGIOGRAPHIC REFERENCES IN THE CANTERBURY TALES by DAVID KEVIN BELL (Under the Direction of Katharina Margit Wilson) ABSTRACT When fully examined, Chaucer’s numerous references to incidental saints in The Canterbury Tales serve to enrich the meaning of the rhetorical context in which they occur. Although, at first glance, these references may appear arbitrary to today’s reader or perhaps even irrelevant to the Tales, they actually hold great significance and often enhance one’s understanding. Chaucer’s audience most likely understood the function of these hagiographic references based on a thorough familiarity with the legends of the saints. Saints and their legends were ubiquitous in medieval culture, ranging from their prominence in Mass readings and visual depictions in stained glass windows to pilgrimages to their shrines and relics. Their mere mention in the Tales would have triggered a whole host of concrete associations, specific character traits, and iconographic recollections related to their colorful legends and pictorial representations. With the advent of collections of saints’ lives like Jacobus de Voragine’s Legenda Aurea and The South English Legendary in the late thirteenth century, hagiography reached an unprecedented level of popularity by the fourteenth century. Chaucer’s incidental references to such saints as Frideswide, Neot, and Cuthbert, point to their legends, which, when explored, serve the purpose of enhancing and subverting a tale’s meaning, typically through such elements as ironic contrast, wordplay, comic relief, and double entendre. The Legenda Aurea and other sources, including the South English Legendary, are valuable resources in one’s effort to recover a portion of the meaning Chaucer most certainly encoded into The Canterbury Tales via incidental hagiographic references. INDEX WORDS: Chaucer, hagiography, legenda aurea, saints INCIDENTAL HAGIOGRAPHIC REFERENCES IN THE CANTERBURY TALES by DAVID KEVIN BELL B.S., GEORGIA COLLEGE, 1986 MPA, UNIVERSITY OF GEORGIA, 1988 M.A., UNIVERSITY OF GEORGIA, 1995 A Dissertation Submitted to the Graduate Faculty of The University of Georgia in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY ATHENS, GEORGIA 2007 © 2007 DAVID KEVIN BELL All Rights Reserved INCIDENTAL HAGIOGRAPHIC REFERENCES IN THE CANTERBURY TALES by DAVID KEVIN BELL Major Professor: Katharina M. Wilson Committee: Ronald L. Bogue James H. McGregor Jonathan Evans Joseph Berrigan Electronic Version Approved: Maureen Grasso Dean of the Graduate School The University of Georgia December 2007 v DEDICATION To Jessica, Aidan and Sherrod, with all my love. vi ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS I would like to acknowledge the following individuals for their contributions to my graduate studies at the University of Georgia. First, my deepest thanks to Katharina Wilson for her unwavering support, intellectual guidance, encouragement, and friendship over the years. My admiration for your erudition, benevolence, and graceful manner is boundless. This dissertation would not have been possible without your direction. Thank you for sparking my interest in medieval literature, hagiography, and literary scholarship. Many thanks to Ron Bogue for his thoughtful advice, input, and editorial suggestions, which greatly improved this study. I owe a debt of gratitude to Jim McGregor both for his seminars on Renaissance literature and for convincing me to pursue graduate work in Comparative Literature in 1990. To Joe Berrigan, words can hardly express how much I appreciate your candor and humor, often inseparable, not to mention our shared love of the saints. To Jonathan Evans, I extend my appreciation to you for your thoughtful attention to my studies in Anglo-Saxon language and literature. Finally, to my beautiful family, Jessica, Aidan and Sherrod, thank you for your love and patience while I withdrew from your midst, like a desert father, for what seemed like an eternity, to write in my cell in Georgia’s library. I hope the wait was worth it. I could not have done it without you. vii TABLE OF CONTENTS Page ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS........................................................................................................... vi CHAPTER 1 INTRODUCTION TO INCIDENTAL HAGIOGRAPHIC REFERENCES............1 CHAPTER 2 REVIEW OF SCHOLARSHIP ON INCIDENTAL HAGIOGRAPHIC REFERENCES, ALLUSIONS AND OATHS IN THE CANTERBURY TALES.........................9 1891: Chaucer’s Prioress’s Greatest Oath ......................................................................12 1907: Two Chaucer Cruces .............................................................................................13 1926: St. Ambrose and Chaucer’s Life of St. Cecila ........................................................14 1933: Harry Bailey’s Corpus Madrian ............................................................................15 1942: That Precious Corpus Madrian..............................................................................16 1943: ‘Seint Julian He was’..............................................................................................18 1945: Four Chaucer Saints...............................................................................................18 1957: The Prioress’s Greatest Oath Once More..............................................................20 1959: Hir Gretteste Ooth: The Prioress, St. Eligius, And St. Godebertha......................22 1964: Absolon and St. Neot ..............................................................................................24 1975: The Miller’s Tale: By Seinte Note .........................................................................26 1976: Essays on Chaucer’s Saints....................................................................................27 1978: Chaucer’s Nicholas and Saint Nicholas.................................................................31 viii 1983: Chaucer’s Beard-Making ......................................................................................33 1985: Dismemberment, Dissemination, Discourse: Sign And Symbol In The Shipman’s Tale ....................................................................................................................................34 1986: Hagiographic (Dis)play: Chaucer’s The Miller’s Tale ........................................36 1997: Chaucer’s St. Anne Trinity .....................................................................................38 2000: Chaucer’s Imaginable Audience and the Oaths of the Shipman’s Tale.................39 2000: Chaucer and St. Kenelm .........................................................................................42 2003: Gerveys Joins the Fun: A Note on Viritoot in the Miller’s Tale ...........................43 CHAPTER 3 AN OVERVIEW OF CHAUCER'S LIKELY HAGIOGRAPHIC SOURCES ......45 A Brief History on the Readings of the Saints.....................................................................48 Jacobus de Voragine and the Legenda Aurea.....................................................................52 The South English Legendary ............................................................................................58 Other Sources: Bede, Caxton, and Bokenham...................................................................62 The Venerable Hagiographer: Bed and the Cuthbert Vita................................................63 Osbern Bokenham and St. Anne’s Vita..............................................................................64 William Caxton's Translation of the Legenda Aurea.........................................................66 CHAPTER 4 A SURVEY OF SAINTHOOD FROM THE FIRST CENTURY THROUGH THE EARLY MIDDLE AGES .............................................................................................................69 The Definition of Saint.......................................................................................................69 Martyrs and Confessors: Imitatio Christi Part 1...............................................................70 St. Stephen and the Paradigm of Self-Sacrifice .................................................................73 ix Asceticism: Imitatio Christi Part 2 ...................................................................................75 St. Anthony: The Model Ascetic........................................................................................77 The Rise of the Cult of the Saints: Miracles And Intercession ..........................................80 Chaucer and the Cult of the Saints ....................................................................................88 CHAPTER 5 INCIDENTAL SAINTS, HAGIOGRAPHIC OATHS, ALLUSIONS AND REFERENCES IN THE CANTERBURY TALES.......................................................................90 CHAPTER 6 CONCLUSION.....................................................................................................205 BIBLIOGRAPHY........................................................................................................................207 APPENDIX..................................................................................................................................212 1 CHAPTER 1 INTRODUCTION TO INCIDENTAL HAGIOGRAPHIC REFERENCES Hagiographic references have a ubiquitous presence throughout The Canterbury Tales. From the pilgrims' journey to venerate the relics at the shrine of St.Thomas à Becket in Canterbury to the ninety-seven references to saints in The Parson’s