????: The work of AN UNKNOWN EDITOR OF The Wife of Bathes Tale : a tale of The Canterbury Tales, by Geoffrey Chaucer (original written circa 1484), page or verse number unknown
The day was come that homward must he turne;
And in his way it happed him to ride,
In all his care, under a forest side,
Wheras he saw upon a dancè go
Of ladies foure and twenty, and yet mo:
Toward this ilke dance he drow ful yerne,
In hope that he som wisdom shuldè lerne;
But certainly, er he came fully there,
Yvanished was this dance, he n’iste not wher;
No creäture saw he that barè lif,
Save on the grene he saw sitting a wif,
A fouler wight ther may no man devise.
????: Michael Murphy [Ed.], Troilus and Criseyde by Geoffrey Chaucer: A Reader-Friendly Edition put into Modern Spelling, book Ⅴ, verses 22{1}, 30{2}, 33{3}, 82{4}, 93{5}, and 195{6}(original written between the years of 1374–1386)
{1}And n’ere it that we be so near the tent
Of Calchas, which that see us both may,
I would of this you tell all mine intent,
But this ensealed is till another day.
Give me your hand; I am and shall be ay,
God help me so, while that my life may dure,
Your own, aboven every creäture.
{2}And there his sorrows that he spared had
He gave an issue large, and “Death!” he cried,
And in his throes frénetic and mad
He curseth Jove, Apollo, and Cupid,
He curseth Bacchus, Ceres, and Cyprid,
His birth, himself, his fate, and eke Natúre,
And, save his lady, every creäture.
{3}How should I thus ten days full endure
When I the first night have all this teen?
How shall she do eke, sorrowful creäture,
For tenderness how shall she eke sustain
Such woe for me? O! piteous, pale, and green,
Shall be your fresh womanlic face
For languor ere you turn unto this place.
{4}Full pale y-waxen was her bright face,
Her limbs lean, as she that all the day
Stood when she durst, and looked on the place
Where she was born, and where she dwelled had ay;
And all the night weeping, alas! she lay.
And thus despaired out of all cure,
She led her life, this woeful creäture.
{5}Criseyd mean was of her statúre.
Thereto so shaped of face, and eke of cheer,
There mighten be no fairer creäture;
And often times this was her mannér
To go y-tressed with her haires clear
Down by her collar, at her back behind,
Which, with a thread of golde, she would bind.
{6}Through which I see that clean out of your mind
1878: ANONYMOUSLY WRITTEN MIDDLE ENGLISH POETRY, Adam Davy’s 5 Dreams about Edward II. The Life of St. Alexius. Solomon’s Book of Wisdom. St. Jeremie’s 15 Tokens before Doomsday. The Lamentacion of Souls. Edited from the Laud Ms. 622 in The Bodleian Library by F. J. Furnivall, pp28 (Mercy, Lord, I calle and crye, lines 153–156){1} & 42 (To thé, Lord! I calle and cry, lines 61–64){2}