Digital Index of Middle English Verse: No. 950

DIMEV 950

IMEV 583

NIMEV 583

By west under a wild wood side / In a land…

Mercy Passes all Things — sixteen 12-line stanzas with refrain, ‘Mercy passeth alle thinge’

Subjects: mercy

Versification: — twelve-line — ababababbcbc

Manuscript Witnesses:

1.Source: Oxford, Bodleian Library Eng. poet. a.1 (SC 3938) [Vernon MS], f. 407ra-407rc

First Lines:

BI west vnder a wylde wode syde
In a launde þer I was lente…

Last Lines:

…Bi fore þi face þat we mai sai
Now Merci passeþ alle þinge

Facsimiles:

Doyle, I. A., ed. The Vernon Manuscript. A Facsimile of Bodleian Library, Oxford, MS Eng. poet.a.1, with an introduction by A. I. Doyle. Cambridge: D. S. Brewer, 1987.

Scase, Wendy, and Nick Kennedy, eds. A facsimile edition of the Vernon manuscript: Oxford, Bodleian Library, MS. Eng. Poet. A. 1. Oxford: The Bodleian Library, 2011.

Editions:

Varnhagen, Hermann. “Die kleinere gedichte der Vernon und Simeon handschrift.” Anglia 7 (1884): 280-315: 282-7.

Furnivall, Frederick James, ed. The Minor Poems of the Vernon Manuscript, Part 2. EETS o.s. 117 (1901; repr. 1973): 658-63.

Brown, Carleton Fairchild, ed. Religious Lyrics of the XIV Century. Oxford: Clarendon, 1924. 2nd ed., rev.: G. V. Smithers, Oxford, 1952: 125-31.

Luria, Maxwell Sidney, and Richard L. Hoffman, eds. Middle English Lyrics. New York: Norton, 1974: 162-6.

2.Source: London, British Library Addit. 22283 [Simeon], ff. 128vb-129ra

First Lines:

BI west vnder a wilde wode syde
In a launde þer I was lent…

Last Lines:

…Byfore þi face þat we may say
Now Merci passeþ alle þing

Attributed Title: Explicit a songe of Merci (f. 129ra)

Facsimiles:

Digital Facsimile of British Library MS Add. 22283 (‘Simeon’). 2014; http://www.bl.uk/manuscripts/FullDisplay.aspx?ref=Add_MS_22283.

Editions:

Furnivall, Frederick James. Early English Poems and Lives of Saints. Transactions of the London Philological Society 1858; Pt. 2, Berlin, 1862: 118-24.

3.Source: London, British Library Addit. 31042 [London Thornton Manuscript], f. 123v

Editions:

Brunner, Karl. “Handschrift British Museum Additional 31042.” Archiv für das Studium der neueren Sprachen und Literaturen 132 (1914): 316-27: 323-7.

priven: verb To deprive (sb.) of (sth.), deny (sb. sth.); ppl. prived, bereaved, bereft of, deprived of; without; (b) ~ of (from), to deprive (sb. of sth.), deny (sth. to sb.), exclude (sb. from sth.); prived of (from), deprived of (sth.), bereft of; lacking, without; ben of god priving, be a robber of goods; (c) to depose (sb.), dismiss; ~ of (from), deprive (sb.) of (power, kingdom, etc.), remove or dismiss (sb.) from (office or position); (d) to take (sth.) away; prevent (sth.), deny, oppose; weaken (the body); -- also without obj. MED