Part 1 (1/2)

Erthe Upon Erthe.

by Various.

INTRODUCTION

THE TWO VERSIONS OF THE POEM 'ERTHE UPON ERTHE'.

The Middle English poem of _Erthe upon Erthe_ is one which occurs fairly frequently in fifteenth-century MSS. and even later. It was a favourite theme for Commonplace Books, and was frequently inserted on the spare leaves at the beginning or end of a ma.n.u.script. From the many texts of the poem which have survived, and from the fact that portions of it continued to be inscribed on walls and tombstones up to the beginning of the nineteenth century, a wide popularity may be deduced. The extant versions, moreover, point to a knowledge of the poem throughout the greater part of England, as well as in the south of Scotland. The grimness of the motive, based on the words _Memento h.o.m.o quod cinis es et in cinerem reverteris_, allies the text both with the earlier group of poems relating to _The Soul and the Body_, and with the more or less contemporary _Dance of Death_, but whereas the two latter groups can claim a popularity which extended over western Europe, _Erthe upon Erthe_ exists only in Middle English texts, and in one parallel Latin version.[1] It is, indeed, difficult to see how the play upon the word _earth_ on which the poem depends could have been reproduced with equal success in any language outside English, and the Latin version is distinctly inferior in this respect. There would seem, therefore, to be good reason for the a.s.sumption that _Erthe upon Erthe_ is of English origin, belonging to the same cla.s.s of literature as the English versions of the _Soul and Body_ poems.

The earliest texts of the poem known to be extant are found in MSS.

Harleian 2253 and 913, both dated about the beginning of the fourteenth century. The two texts vary greatly in length--MS. Harl. 2253 consists of four lines as against seven six-lined stanzas in MS. Harl. 913--and the latter text has the parallel Latin rendering mentioned above, but they coincide so far as they go, and appear to represent a thirteenth or fourteenth-century type of the poem, which may be called the A version.[2]

Another poem of the same kind, which differs considerably from the A version, but is, in all probability, closely connected with it in origin, is common in fifteenth-century MSS. I have traced eighteen texts of this version, dating from the fifteenth to the seventeenth century, all of which represent or are based upon the same common type, though individual transcribers appear to have expanded the theme according to their own taste. Such additions may easily be distinguished, since they seldom succeed in maintaining either the grim simplicity, or the fundamental play upon the word _earth_, which characterize the genuine portions of the poem. This common fifteenth-century type may be called the B version.

Lastly, a single fifteenth-century MS. (Cambridge University Library, Ii, 4. 9) has preserved a text of the poem in which some attempt seems to have been made to combine the A with the B version. This text may be called the C version, or Cambridge text.

In the following pages an attempt has been made to justify the premises in part laid down already, and to show that the A and B versions may be traced back to a common source, and that this source was not only confined to England, but was itself English.

MSS. OF THE POEM 'ERTHE UPON ERTHE'.

The following is a list of the ma.n.u.scripts in which the poem occurs:--

MSS. of the A Version:

1. MS. Harl. 2253, fol. 57, v^o, dated c. 1307. Four lines inserted between a French poem on the Death of Simon de Montfort, and an English poem on the Execution of Simon Fraser. Printed by J. Ritson, _Ancient Songs and Ballads from the Reign of K. Henry II to the Revolution_, p. 13 (1790), by E. Flugel, _Anglia_, xxvi.

216 (1903), and by W. Heuser, _Die Kildare-Gedichte_ (_Bonner Beitrage zur Anglistik_, xiv. 179) (1904). (See the facsimile opposite the t.i.tle-page.)

2. MS. Harl. 913, fol. 62, r^o (c. 1308-1330). Seven six-lined English stanzas alternating with seven of the same purport in Latin. Printed by T. Wright, _Reliquiae Antiquae_, ii. 216 (1841), by F. J. Furnivall, _Early Eng. Poems and Lives of Saints_, p. 150 (printed for the Philological Society, Berlin, 1862), and by W. Heuser, _ibid._, p. 180.

MSS. of the B Version:

1. William Billyng's MS. (dated 1400-1430). Five four-lined stanzas, preceded by the figure of a naked body, rudely drawn, having a mattock in its right hand, and a spade at its feet. At the end of the poem is a p.r.o.ne figure of a skeleton accompanied by two draped figures.[3] Printed by W. Bateman, _Billyng's Five Wounds of Christ_, no. 3 (Manchester, 1814),[4] 'from a finely written and illuminated parchment roll, about two and three-quarter yards in length: it is without date, but by comparing it with other poetry, it appears to have been written early in the fifteenth century; the illuminations and ornaments with which it is decorated correspond to those of missals written about the reign of Henry V; the style may therefore fix its date between the years 1400 and 1430. The author[5] gives his name and mark at the bottom of the roll.' Reprinted from Bateman's text by J. Montgomery, _The Christian Poet_, edit. 1 and 2, p. 45 (1827), edit. 3, p. 58 (1828).

2. MS. Thornton (Lincoln Cath. Libr.), fol. 279 (c. 1440). Five stanzas[6] without mark of strophic division. Printed by G. G.

Perry, _Religious Poems in Prose and Verse_, p. 95 (E.E.T.S., No.

xxvi, 1867, reprinted 1889, p. 96), and by C. Horstmann, _Yorks.h.i.+re Writers (Richard Rolle of Hampole)_, i. 373 (1895).

3. MS. Selden supra 53, fol. 159, v^o (c. 1450). Six stanzas (strophic division indicated in the first two), written in a different hand on the back of a spare leaf at the end of the MS.; stanza 5 of the usual B version omitted. Quoted by H. G. Fiedler, _Modern Language Review_ (April 1908), III. iii. 221. Not printed before.

4. MS. Egerton 1995, fol. 55, r^o (William Gregory's Commonplace Book, dated c. 1430-1450, cf. J. Gairdner, _Collections of a London Citizen_. Camden. Soc. 1876 n.s. xvii). Seven stanzas without strophic division. Not printed before.

5. MS. Harl. 1671, fol. 1*, r^o (fifteenth century). Seven stanzas written in the left-hand column on the fly-leaf at the beginning of the MS., which consists of a 'large Theological Treatise, imperfect at both ends, which seemeth to have been ent.i.tuled ”The Weye to Paradys”'.[7] The upper portion of the leaf contains a poem in praise of St. Herasmius. Not printed before.

6. MS. Brighton, fol. 90, v^o (fifteenth century). Seven stanzas.

Printed by Fiedler, _M. L. R._ III. iii. 219, from the last leaf of a MS. formerly seen by him in possession of an antiquary at Brighton, and containing a Latin treatise on the seven Sacraments.

7. Stratford-on-Avon Inscription (after 1450). Seven stanzas, formerly on the west wall of the nave in the Chapel of the Trinity at Stratford-on-Avon, cf. R. B. Wheler, _Hist. and Antiq. of Stratford-on-Avon_, p. 98: 'against the west wall of the nave, upon the south side of the arch was painted the martyrdom of Thomas a Becket, whilst kneeling at the altar of St. Benedict in Canterbury Cathedral; below this was represented the figure of an angel (probably St. Michael) supporting a long scroll, upon which were written the following rude verses: Erth oute of erthe,' &c.

'Beneath were two men, holding another scroll over a body wrapt in a winding sheet, and covered with some emblems of mortality with these lines: Whosoo hym be thowghte,' &c. (v. Note on p. 36).

These paintings were probably added in the reign of Henry VII, when the Chapel was restored by Sir Hugh Clopton (died 1496), who built New Place opposite the Chapel in 1483. They were discovered in 1804 beneath a coating of whitewash, and were copied and engraved, but have since been more than once re-coated with whitewash, and all trace of the poem has now disappeared.