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One question that splits critics is whether the Merchant's tale is a fabliau. [citation needed] Typically a description for a tale of carnal lust and frivolous bed-hopping, some would argue that especially the latter half of the tale, where Damyan and May have sex in the tree with the blind Januarie at the foot of the tree, represents fabliau.
As Dunbar belongs to the latest medieval phase, his work is quite far from that of Chaucer’s. Although Dunbar's The Tretis includes many ironic gestures that recall the Wife of Bath and The Merchant's Tale, he utilizes a much wilder humor than Chaucer. Dunbar is even credited with the first printed use of the word “fuck.”
Pilgrim – The designation of each pilgrim in the General Prologue, commonly accepted alternate designation within the name of their Tale, and membership in group of pilgrims if any. The pilgrims' names link to their Tales' articles. GP (General Prologue) – This column lists the order in which each character is mentioned in the General Prologue.
The frame story of the poem, as set out in the 858 lines of Middle English which make up the General Prologue, is of a religious pilgrimage. The narrator, Geoffrey Chaucer, is in The Tabard Inn in Southwark, where he meets a group of 'sundry folk' who are all on the way to Canterbury, the site of the shrine of Saint Thomas Becket, a martyr reputed to have the power of healing the sinful.
The strong likelihood that Henryson employed Christian numerology in composing his works has been increasingly discussed in recent years. [4] [5] Use of number for compositional control was common in medieval poetics and could be intended to have religious symbolism, and features in the accepted text of the Morall Fabilliis indicate that this was elaborately applied in that poem.
The story is an example of a class of stories, popular at the time, known as the "miracles of the Virgin" such as those by Gautier de Coincy.It also blends elements of common story of a pious child killed by the enemies of the faith; the first example of which in English was written about William of Norwich.
The Hengwrt Chaucer manuscript is an early-15th-century manuscript of the Canterbury Tales, held in the National Library of Wales, in Aberystwyth.It is an important source for Chaucer's text, and was possibly written by someone with access to an original authorial holograph, now lost.
It is not clear whether these are sincere declarations of remorse on Chaucer's part or a continuation of the theme of penitence from The Parson's Tale.It is not even certain if the retraction was an integral part of the Canterbury Tales or if it was the equivalent of a death bed confession which became attached to this his most popular work.