The Sources and the Context of John Lydgate’s Commentary on the Virtues of the Mass

Abstract

This paper focuses on a passage about the so-called virtues of the mass from a verse treatise The Interpretation and Virtues of the Mass written by a 15th-century English poet John Lydgate. Lydgate’s text is analyzed in the light of other surviving English witnesses on the same subject matter composed from the end of the 14th to the beginning of the 16th centuries; on the other hand, it is compared with its Latin source. The research project examines what verb forms are used in the lists describing the virtues of the mass, what kind of logical-grammatical perspective the virtues are, therefore, placed in, and how the historical context might have played a role in the tradition of these lists. Lydgate’s rather short passage, in fact, turns out to have been grounded in the conflict of ideas and the confrontation of religious positions: numerous Middle English lists dedicated to the virtues of the mass, which started appearing almost independently of each other from the end of the 14th century, were probably a reaction to Lollard criticism, and Lydgate answered the challenge. Yet, although the authors of other texts on the virtues of the mass tended to use forms with the verb ‘shall’, Lydgate, as a scholar, followed his Latin source, which had been created before the appearance of the Lollard heresy, and transferred its grammar to his English text.