Digital Index of Middle English Verse: No. 3815

DIMEV 3815

IMEV 2375

NIMEV see 3412

Now welcome summer with thy sun soft

A roundel (‘Qui bien aimé a tard oubliè’) inserted in two MSS of Chaucer’s Parlement of Foules (5373) between stanzas 97 and 98 — thirteen lines

Subjects: roundels; birds, as narrators; birds; songs

Versification: — four-line — abba

Manuscript Witnesses:

1.Source: Oxford, St John’s College 57, f. 235v

Transcription:

Seynt Valentyn þat art full hiȝe on lofft
Thus syngen smale foulis for thy sake
Wele have þey cause forto glat offt
Sith eche of hem recoverid hath his make
fful blesfull may they syng when þey wake

Note: One incomplete stanza only, inserted between stanzas 97 and 98 of Chaucer’s Parliament of Fouls; introduced by stanza 97: ‘But furst were chosen foulis forto syng / As yeer be yeer was alwey hir vsaunce / To syng a ryndell at hir departyng / To do nature honour & plesaunce / The note I trowe was made in ffraunce / The wordis were such as yee may here fynde / The next vers as I have nowe in mynde’, and followed by stanza 98: ‘And with the showtyng when þe song was doon…’.

Editions:

Furnivall, Frederick James, ed. A Parallel-Text Edition of Chaucer’s Minor Poems. 3 vols. Chaucer Society 1st. ser. 21, 57, 58. London: Trübner, n.d. repr. New York and London: Johnson, 1967.

2.Source: Cambridge UK, Cambridge University Library Gg.4.27 (Part 1a), f. 490v

First Lines:

Nowe welcome somore with sonne softe
That hast thes wintres wedres ovire shake…

Last Lines:

…Sethe ech of hem recordede hathe hys make
fful blisseful nowe they ben when they wake

Note: Inserted as penultimate stanza to Parlement of Fowles by another hand of the fifteenth century in space left for insertion by original scribe.

Facsimiles:

Parkes, Malcolm B., and Richard Beadle. “Introduction.” Poetical Works. Geoffrey Chaucer. A Facsimile of Cambridge University Library MS Gg.4.27. 3 vols Cambridge: D. S. Brewer, 1979 (vol. 1); 1980 (vols. 2-3).

Editions:

Furnivall, Frederick James, ed. A Parallel-Text Edition of Chaucer’s Minor Poems. 3 vols. Chaucer Society 1st. ser. 21, 57, 58. London: Trübner, n.d. repr. New York and London: Johnson, 1967.

Skeat, Walter William, ed. The Complete Works of Geoffrey Chaucer. 7 vols. Oxford: Clarendon, 1894-7: 1.359.

Chambers, Edmund Kerchever, and Frank Sidgwick. Early English Lyrics…. London: Buller, 1907, 1911 et seq: 20.

Robinson, F. N., ed. The Works of Geoffrey Chaucer. Oxford: Clarendon, 1933; 2nd ed. 1957: 362; 1957; 318.

Davies, Reginald Thorne. Medieval English Lyrics: a critical anthology. London, 1963; Evanston, IL: Northwestern UP, 1964: 132-3.

Sisam, Celia, and Kenneth Sisam, eds. The Oxford Book of Medieval English Verse. Oxford: Clarendon, 1970: 311.

3.Source: Oxford, Bodleian Library Digby 181 (SC 1782), f. 51v

First Lines:

Nowe well come somer with thy sonne softe
That hast this wynter wedirs ouer shake…

Last Lines:

…Sith eche of them recouered hath his make
ffull blisfully they synge and endles ioy þei make

Note: Fragment: 7 lines only; inserted as penultimate stanza to Parlement of Fowles.