Formulaic Diction and the Descent of a Middle English Romance

Abstract

ALTHOUGH in recent years there has been increasing recognition that the conventional diction so widespread in medieval literature is to some extent formulaic, that it represents the effect of oral tradition on the text, whether as a means of transmission or as a mere stylistic overlay, there has to my knowledge been little attempt to determine what evidence the presence of formulaic diction might offer as to the history of existing texts and the reliability of traditional means of textual editing. Such a study could be especially important to the understanding of works which are known to have been presented orally, such as the Middle English metrical romances. In this article I propose to examine the diction of all of the manuscripts of a single romance as it existed over a period of several centuries, in order to determine the extent to which oral variation may have affected the text. The Middle English metrical romance telling of the birth of Merlin, published by Ktslbing as Arthour and Merlin,. is known to exist in five manuscripts. These have generally been classified as including two versions of one romance, as follows: A) The Auchinleck Manuscript (Edinburgh, Advocates' Library Ms. 19.2.1), written c. 1330, containing 9938 lines, incomplete at the end. This version begins about the time of the birth of Merlin with the death of King Costaunce and the usurpation of the throne by his steward Fortiger, continues with the events surrounding the birth of Merlin and his prophecy of the fall of Fortiger, and goes on to relate Merlin's place in the reigns of Pendragon and Uter, the sons of Costaunce, and of Arthur, son of Uter. It ends with Arthur's battle with King Rion. It appears to be a translation of approximately the first half of the French prose version known as the Vulgate Merlin.2 The text is also found in Ms. Oxford, Bodley 21698 (Douce 124), a copy c. 1890 of the Auchinleck Manuscript. L) London, Lincoln's Inn, Hale 150, written probably in the first quarter of the fifteenth century. The romance there entitled The History of Merlin in a later hand presently contains 1882 lines, but it is missing one folio of about 112 lines. It begins as does A, but ends with the death of Fortager and the restoration of Pendragon as the rightful heir of King Costaunce. Following the text the scribe has written Explicit Merlyn. P) London, Brit. Mus. Add. Ms. 27879, the Percy Folio Manuscript, written c. 1650. The romance there entitled Merline contains 2379 lines and is divided into nine parts. The first seven of these correspond closely to the text of L; the last two are additional, conuing the story to the death of Pendragon and the coronation of Uter.