Scottish Text Society publications > Old series > Kingis quair

XXX
INTRODUCTION.
usage occurs in st. 65, where we should read, “ With new-e
fresch-e suete and tender grene”; the e in sziete being elided
before the following vowel. Other examples are seen in
large (77), strange (135), hye (154), strange (163), lawe (164),
newe (165), gude (185). To these add longe (154), faire (178),
miswritten long and fair respectively. I think we should
also read rounde in st. 159, 1. 2, to complete the line, but I
omitted to observe it soon enough to suggest it in the text.
It may be observed that the final -e is, however, permissible
in some of these words—viz., in the French words large,
strange, and in the word newe, which was naturally dissyl¬
labic ; but the forms hye, lawe, glide, longe, faire, as here
used, are hardly defensible. They are not only not Northern ;
they are not even Chaucerian. The worst example of a
false concord occurs in the first line of st. 117 : “And quhen
I wepe, and stenten othir quhile.” It will be observed that
the form stenten is absolutely required for the scansion ; yet
it is a plural form, just as if we should use the expression
ego amamus in writing Latin. Yet it is quite explicable;
it is a translation into Chaucerian language of the Northern
word styntis; for, in the Northern dialect, the phrases I
stintis and we stintis were once equally correct.
{g') Chaucer uses a final e to denote an adverbial use;
this is unknown to the Northern dialect. I do not find
many examples. Still we have newe, newly (8), longe, a
long while (164), faire, fairly (180). So also the adverbial
phrase at the last (98) is miswritten for at the laste, so com¬
monly written atte laste in MSS. of Chaucer.
(//) Chaucer makes the adverb twi-es (twice) a dissyl¬
lable ; accordingly, the scansion shows that twise in st. 25
is a mistake for twies ; see the footnote.
(f) Chaucer makes the word ey-en (eyes) dissyllabic;