The Source for the ‘Remedia’ of the Parson's Tale

Abstract

The search for the sources on which Chaucer's Parson's Tale is based reached a stage of temporary finality when, in her contribution to Sources and Analogues of Chaucer's Canterbury Tales, Germaine Dempster summarized and refined the results of half a century of investigations. By then it had become clear that the outcome of Kate Petersen's earlier study had stood the test of over three decades and that, in consequence, the Parson's Tale may be considered as ultimately deriving from two Latin summae of the thirteenth century, that of Raymond of Pennafort (for the sections on Penitence) and that of Peraldus (for the treatment of the Seven Deadly Sins). At the same time, Mrs. Dempster recognized that neither summa is the immediate ancestor of the Parson's Tale, but that, for a number of reasons, the Tale must be thought of as immediately deriving from one or several intermediaries between it and the two ancestral summae. Although a number of Latin and vernacular religious manuals were suggested for such a role, none of them is really close enough to a substantial part of the Parson's Tale to be looked upon as a source or even a close analogue. Hence a mood of pessimistic resignation has settled on the whole question of sources, aptly summed up in Professor Bloomfield's account:The parallels given by scholars do not prove any direct borrowing on Chaucer's part. When we find close similarities, we find also that they occur in the most traditional details…. Miss Petersen's argument that the section on the chief sins comes from an adaptation of Peraldus' work seems to be little justified, except in the most general sense. Her parallels are not particularly impressive. The question must, at present and possibly forever, rest in abeyance.