The First Draft of Percy's Reliques

Abstract

Thomas Percy's Reliques of Ancient English Poetry (1765) was early recognized as a prime mover of the revolution in literary taste that occurred in the later eighteenth century. The compilation had stimulated, according to Jeffrey, the “first revulsion” to the older literature. Wordsworth did not think there was “an able writer in verse of the present day” who would not willingly acknowledge his obligations to the Reliques. It had “absolutely redeemed” English poetry. Of Percy's enormous contribution to ballad scholarship proper, one need hardly quote testimony. It is no wonder, then, that literary scholars have gone to such inordinate pains to unravel the complicated editorial history of this (for its time) ambitious work. Since the publication in 1867-68 of Percy's principal source, the precious Folio MS., almost too much has been written about Percy's textual manipulations. Curiosity has been no less lively as to Percy's criteria for admitting ballads and songs to his collection, the guiding purpose behind his arrangement, and the sources of the scholarly data that went into his able headnotes and essays. Excellent hints on these matters abound in Percy's correspondence with the syndicate of scholars that assisted him during the years he was putting together his ballad book—Edward Lye, Thomas Astle, James Grainger, William Shenstone, Dr. Johnson, Richard Farmer, Thomas Warton, Sir David Dalrymple; and though otherwise undistinguished, these letters have been making their way into print for over a hundred years, until they now constitute a shelf of sober volumes. “Shenstone's billets,” the slips on which Percy's most influential mentor rated the contents of earlier poetical miscellanies, were edited twice in two years; no less than five recent studies have been devoted to the cancels and late alterations in the first edition of the Reliques.