Further Evidence for the Spelling `Wyclyf'

Abstract

A VALUABLE addition to the sources listed by Professor S. Harrison Thomson in his article 'Wyclif or Wyclyf' (English Historical Review, October, 1938) upon which he bases a critical study of the spelling of Wyclyf's name, is the register of William Courtenay, Archbishop of Canterbury. Wyclyf was well known to Courtenay. Not only had Courtenay, while Bishop of London, been most active in combating Wyclyf, but as archbishop he called and personally presided over the council convened in the late spring of 1382 to determine the legitimacy of various theses promulgated by the reformer. The trial marked one of the high points of Wyclyf's eventful career. Therefore Wyclyf's name as it appears in the official record of this council's pronouncements is of first importance in a consideration of the problem of its correct spelling. The passage in Courtenay's register which describes the trial has been published by Wilkins (Concilia, iii, 157-173); but Wilkins' transcription is not accurate to the letter. He disregarded variations of the name and spelled it uniformly according to his own notion of what was correct, which was Wycliff. It is therefore necessary to go back to the original manuscript, which is housed in the Lambeth Palace Library, for a more exact signature. There is little doubt that this is the actual record of the trial as made during or soon after the proceedings. Abundant evidence is supplied by the register itself to substantiate this view. The first clue employed in the dating of mediaeval manuscripts is that afforded by the handwriting of the document. The script of Courtenay's register is neither pure fourteenth nor fifteenth century but, in the tendency of curves to become pointed and in the use of occasional flourishes, represents a step from the conservatism of the former to the carelessness of the latter. It may accordingly be roughly assigned to the transitional years between the two periods. Fortunately the manuscripts provide other evidence, which lends itself to more objective interpretation, to prove them to be a contemporary record of the above-mentioned trial. The entire register of Archbishop Courtenay is contained in one volume, with the exception of about fifty folios which are included with the records of Bouchier, Morton, and Dean. It was not written by one hand. Unmistakable differences in the script indicate that several clerks acted as the archbishop's secretaries in recording the official agenda of his court. Three of these clerks have inserted their signs manual. An elaborate one on the bottom of the first folio has inscribed in its base the name 'Hornby.' To the right of the drawing is notice to the effect that 'I, William Hornby, notary of the reverend father William, by the grace of God Archbishop of Canterbury, . . . have at different -times and in different places written this register of the same archbishop, to a large part with my own hand or caused it to be written by others .... ' This note is found on the first folio of the register. On the twenty-fifth folio begins the account, Nota Processus contra Hereticos. The ten folios following and part of the eleventh contain the official archiepiscopal account of the trial and of the steps which