itinerarium-hic:I found a nice little play on the motto of the Order of the Garter in John Skelton’s
itinerarium-hic:I found a nice little play on the motto of the Order of the Garter in John Skelton’s “The epitaffe of the moste noble [and] valyaunt Iasper late duke of Beddeforde” (1496, printed by Richard Pynson):“That fraunce and englonde vere byfore.Armys of both quarteryd.And with hony soyte was garteryd.Se howe he is nowe marteryd.Alas for sorowe therfore.Alas for sorowe therfore.”The motto of the Order of the Garter is “Honi soit qui mal y pense” (“Shame on him who thinks ill of it”). The motto is famously appended to Sir Gawain and the Green Knight:[London, British Library, Cotton Nero MS A.x (art. 3), fol. 124/128v]Jasper Tudor (Siasbar ab Owain ap Maredudd ap Tudur ap Goronwy) was the uncle of Henry VII and orchestrated his rise from young Harri Tudur to king of England. Jasper was also a Knight of the Garter and, on his death, Skelton wrote this tribute to him. (Skelton was forever trying to curry favor with the king, though Erasmus apparently was not a fan.)Here are the title pages of Skelton’s pamphlet:[Images were scanned by the Pepys Library at Cambridge University]The woodcut on the left side is from Wynken de Worde’s print shop and also appears in his pamphlet edition of Margery Kempe’s Book:[Wynken de Worde, A shorte treatyse of contemplacyon by our lorde Ihesu cryste / or taken outof the boke of Margerie kempe of lyn̅, fol. 4v; image is from the Margery Kempe Project facsimile] -- source link
#jasper tudor#henry vii#margery kempe