The Wife of Bath's Prologue
Folio 71v
2 of 20 folios
The transcription of the Wife of Bath's Prologue was created by Orietta Da Rold and has no relationship to the transcription which appears on the Cambridge University Press CD-ROM.
Thow seist rigħt as wormes / shenden a tree
Rigħt so a wyf / destroyetħ hire husbonde
This knowen they / that ben to wyues bonde
Lordynges rigħt thus / as ȝe han vnderstonde
380
Bar I stifly / myne olde husbondes on honde
That thus they seiden / in here dronkenesse
And al was fals / but that I tok wytnesse
On Iankyn / and on my nece also
O lord the peyne / I dide hem and the woo
385
Ful giltlees / by goddes swete pyne
For as an hors / I coude byte and whyne
I coude pleyne / and I was in the gilt
Or elles often tyme / I had ben spilt
Who so that first cometħ to the mylle / first he grynt
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I pleyned first / so was oure werre I stynt
They weren ful glad / to excuse hem ful blife
Of thyng / of whiche / they gilten neuere in here lyue
Of wenches wold I beren hem on honde
Whan that for seke / they mygħt vnethes stonde
395
Ȝet tikeled I his hert / for that he
Wende / that I of hī had / so gret chierte
I swor that al my walkyng / out be nygħt
Was for to aspien / wenches that he digħt
Vnder that colour / had I many a myrthe
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For al swicħ wyt / is ȝeuen vs in oure birthe
Disceite / wepyng / spynnyng / god hath ȝeuen
To wommen kyndely / while that they moun lyuen
And thus of on thyng / I auaunt me
At the ende / I had the beter / in icħ degree
405
Be sleigħt or force / or sum maner thyng
As by contenuel murmur / and grucchyng
Namely a bedde / there had they myschaunce
There wold I chide / and do hem no plesaunce
I wold no lengere / in the bed a byde
410
If that I felt / his arme al ouer my syde
Til that he had mad / his raunsou vn to me
Than wold I suffren hī / to doon his nycete
And þerfore to euery man / this tale I telle
Wynne who so may / for aƚƚ is for to selle
415
Witħ empty hond / men moun noone haukes lure
For wynnynge wold I / al his lust endure
And make me / a feyned appetit
And ȝet in bacoū / had I neuere delit
That made me / þt euere / I wold hem chide