This volume serves as an excellent introduction to the tradition of romances dealing with the matter of France-that is, Charlemagne and his Twelve Peers. Of the three groups of English Charlemagne romances, the Ferumbras group, the Otuel group, and detached romances, the editor has selected one of each: The Sultan of Babylon, The Siege of Milan, and The Tale of Ralph the Collier. This is a valuable introduction to Charlemagne romances and is accessible to beginners in Middle English because of contextualizing introductions and glosses for each text, as well as a helpful glossary.

Three Middle English Charlemagne Romances: The Sultan of Babylon, the Siege of Milan, and the Tale of Ralph the Collier (TEAMS Middle English Texts)

Literature & Fiction

TEAMS (Consortium for the Teaching of the Middle Ages)

Alan Lupack

Poetry

Medieval Institute Publications

The commentary of Rabbi Ezra ben Solomon of Gerona (d. ca. 1245) on the Song of Songs is one of the most important texts of the first clearly identified circle of Kabbalists, those operating in the Catalonian town of Gerona at the middle of the thirteenth century.

Commentary on the Song of Songs: And Other Kabbalistic Commentaries (Commentary Series)

Religion & Spirituality

Ezra Ben Solomon of Gerona

Seth Brody

Christian Books & Bibles

These texts will be of interest because they represent a kind of writing - at the intersection of ecclesiastical and secular power, drawing on the whole range of medieval Latin learning, yet written in vernacular verse - that is not found elsewhere in the European Middle Ages. In addition, they may be of use in teaching since, although relatively short, they illustrate a great number of characteristic medieval ways of writing and can be linked to a number of quite remarkable historical figures.

Sovereignty and Salvation in the Vernacular, 1050-1150: Das Ezzolied, Das Annolied, Die Kaiserchronik, vv. 247-667, Das Lob Salomons, Historia Judith ... (English and Middle High German Edition)

James A. Schultz

History & Criticism

This volume would comprise a great unit on anticlerical poetry in late medieval England, collecting Piers the Plowman's Crede, The Plowman's Tale, Jack Upland, Friar Daw's Reply, Upland's Rejoinder, and Why I Can't Be a Nun. These Middle English poems attack ecclesiastical corruption; most of the poems were written by disgruntled Lollards about clerics and friars in the late fourteenth or early fifteenth century. Piers the Plowman's Crede deals with a poor man trying to learn the Apostle's Creed from friars, who cannot teach him and only want his money; eventually the man can only learn the creed from Piers the Plowman. The Plowman's Tale casts an anticlerical tale in the mold of one of the Canterbury Tales. Jack Upland, Friar Daw's Reply, and Upland's Rejoinder comprise a debate over the hypocrisy of friars. Meanwhile, Why I Can't Be a Nun decries the sins of nuns in convents. These texts are well glossed and include introductions and copious notes, making them approachable for students of Middle English of any level of experience.

Six Ecclesiastical Satires (TEAMS Middle English Texts)

Humor & Entertainment

James, Dean

Humor

This volume makes accessible for students of the Middle Ages Middle English verses about heroic women from the Old Testament. Included are The Storie of Asneth, The Pistel of Swete Susan, The Story of Jephthah and his Daughter, and The Story of Judith. These poems exhibit the attitudes of Late Medieval England towards heroic women, and offer an unusually positive depiction of Judiasm. With extensive notes, glosses, and introductions, these verses are valuable to teachers and students of Middle English.

Heroic Women from the Old Testament in Middle English Verse: Asneth, Susan, Jephthah's Daughter, Judith (TEAMS MIddle English Texts)

Biographies & Memoirs

Russell A. Peck

Community & Culture

When Geoffrey Chaucer died in 1400, his massive project, the Canterbury Tales, lay unfinished and unpublished. This volume includes five works that aim to fill in the gaps in this incomplete masterpiece. The pieces presented here date from the fifteenth century and survive in at least one manuscript collection of Chaucer's tales: John Lydgate's Prologue to the Siege of Thebes, The Ploughman's Tale, The Cook's Tale, Spurious Links, and The Canterbury Interlude and Merchant's Tale of Beryn. These pieces of Chaucerian apocrypha have been collected into one student-friendly edition, including introductions, notes, glosses, and a glossary to accommodate students of all levels of experience in Middle English.

The Canterbury Tales: Fifteenth-Century Continuations and Additions: Lydgate's Prologue to the Siege of Thebes, Ploughman's Tale, Cook's Tale, Beryn (TEAMS Middle English Texts)

John M. Bowers

This volume serves as an excellent introduction to Middle English, Scottish poetry. Gavin Douglas's The Palis of Honoure is a dream poem from early sixteenth-century Scotland. It operates within the courtly tradition of Scottish poetry, establishing a dichotomy of earthly and heavenly things, instructing the audience in becoming more like the heavenly things in their comportment. This edition includes an ample gloss and notes, as well as an informative introduction and glossary, making it a perfect edition for use in classrooms of all levels.

Gavin Douglas: The Palis of Honoure (TEAMS Middle English Texts)

David Parkinson

Gavin Douglas

This edition contains two poems valuable to the study of satire of social abuses in the fourteenth century: Wynnere and Wastoure and The Parlement of the Thre Ages. Both combine two genres of medieval poetry: dream visions and poetic debates. As the editor observes, the poem's perspectives are truly dizzying: on the one hand, economics, politics, ethics and social relations are seen as an interrelated set of universal, timeless principles; on the other, they appear as actual, contingent conditions that have resulted from specific acts in history. The editions include notes, glosses, an introduction, and a glossary, making them accessible to beginning and advanced students in Middle English alike.

Wynnere and Wastoure and the Parlement of the Thre Ages (TEAMS Middle English Texts)

Warren Ginsberg

Professor Benson's edition of the Stanzaic Morte Arthur and the Alliterative Morte Arthure has been long out of print. Benson's edition of these important Middle English poems is here revised and updated by Professor Edward E. Foster, taking into account recent scholarship, to once again be available and accessible to students. The romances included here are two of the best, most significant Arthurian romances in Middle English, which complement each other in terms of style and content. While the Alliterative Morte Arthure belongs to the Alliterative Revival movement, replete with details of fourteenth century warfare, the Stanzaic Morte Arthur represents a briefer, quicker-paced, yet more sentimental English adaptation of the French Mort Artu. This edition-with contextualizing introductions, helpful glosses, plentiful notes, and useful glossary-comprises a great introduction to Middle English Arthuriana for students of the Middle Ages.

King Arthur's Death: The Middle English Stanzaic Morte Arthur and Alliterative Morte Arthure (TEAMS Middle English Texts)

Larry Dean Benson

Edward E. Foster

This fascinating first-person account of the visions experienced by the anchoress Julian of Norwich in May of 1373 is remarkable for its vivid prose and as an example both of early autobiographical writing in the vernacular and of a spiritual document. This practical edition includes a gloss, an introduction, notes, and a glossary, making it valuable to students of Middle English and medieval mysticism alike.

The Shewings of Julian of Norwich (TEAMS Middle English Texts)

Georgia R. Crampton

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Books by TEAMS (Consortium for the Teaching of the Middle Ages)