The Project's Lineation System

5 The Project’s Lineation System N. F. Blake The Canterbury Tales project, which has as its aim the computerisation of all the fifteenth-century witnesses of the poem so that the different versions may be compared, must have a lineation system which allows this to happen without prejudging what the textual development of the poem may have been. It needs to break the poem down into those elements which formed blocks in the poem’s copying in the fifteenth century. At the same time it is helpful to keep any new lineation as close as possible to the ones which are now in use without being confused with them and which is also readily understandable by those who have to use it. The present systems include the Fragment numeration, available in either the letters A to I or the Roman numerals I to X, and the Section numeration which uses the Arabic numerals from 1 to 12.1 These systems were designed for what editors assume may have been the original form of the poem and so are not suitable in themselves to record all the lines in all the different witnesses extant. It may not be possible to devise an alternative system which meets the aims outlined above, but we propose to use the following one which we hope goes some way towards doing so. The poem will be divided into units consisting of the customary links and tales. Each of these will be treated as a separate unit for lineation purposes since this will allow for the various changes in structure which the poem underwent during its textual development to be charted without presupposition. In this respect the new system differs significantly from those now used. Each tale unit will include what is related by the teller of the tale together with what may be divided off in some manuscripts as the tale’s prologue or epilogue provided, firstly, that the prologue or epilogue does not close or open another tale and, secondly, that it is attached to the tale with which it is associated in all extant witnesses which appear to be copying the complete poem. Thus the prologues to The Wife of Bath’s Tale and The Pardoner’s Tale and the conclusion to The Pardoner’s Tale will be treated as part of their respective tales for lineation purposes; but the envoy to The Clerk’s Tale will form a separate link since it is not attached to the tale in a few manuscripts. Even though the Friar and the Pardoner appear in The Wife of Bath’s Prologue and the Host in the epilogue To the Pardoner’s Tale, this will not affect the way they are treated. Parts of the poem treated as tale units include The General Prologue and The Retraction since these are usually treated by scholars as having the same standing as tales, although they are strictly part of the pilgrimage frame and not narratives. The tale units will naturally include all tales added to the poem during the fifteenth century whether they are currently thought to be by Chaucer or not, for everything which is included in fifteenth-century witnesses of the poem has to be transcribed into computer form.2 Naturally the complete textual history of THE CANTERBURY TALES PROJECT OCCASIONAL PAPERS II, 1997, 5-14 6 Canterbury Tales Project Occasional Papers II the poem can be determined only if all parts of the poem are included in the computer data. It is not appropriate to make assumptions about the textual development before all the evidence has been transcribed. Each tale unit (i.e. the tale and any other elements taken as part of the tale for lineation purposes) will be abbreviated by two capital letters, usually the first two letters of the title of the pilgrim who tells that tale. Thus KN means the Knight and PL the Ploughman,3 and each indicates the tale ascribed to that pilgrim together with any further pieces taken together with the tale as part of the unit for lineation purposes. Where this system could lead to confusion because two pilgrims share the first two letters, e.g. Friar and Franklin, one will keep the first two letters and a different abbreviation will be found for the other. The choice of letters in these cases will normally reflect current abbreviation practice. Thus FR is used for the Friar and FK for the Franklin, PA for the Parson and PD for the Pardoner. A tale which is known by its title rather than by its pilgrim teller is abbreviated by T and the first letter of the tale title, thus TT is The Tale of Thopas, TG The Tale of Gamelyn, and TB The Tale of Beryn (which in this case also includes its prologue.) Where a pilgrim has a name which contains more than one word, as is true of the Wife of Bath, that pilgrim is abbreviated to two letters referring to the whole title so that WB means Wife of Bath and ML means Man of Law. Since the Second Nun is referred to in some manuscripts simply as the Nun, she is abbreviated as NU. It needs to be stressed that these abbreviations refer to what for lineation purposes is attributed to that pilgrim or tale in the poem; the actual extent of each tale unit is detailed in the list of abbreviations which is attached at the end of this article. Each tale unit and link will be numbered from line 1, and this numbering follows whatever manuscript is chosen as the base of that particular unit. For many tale units and links this base will be the Hengwrt manuscript (Hg) which is both early and shorter than most other manuscripts. For other tales and links, what is an early version is chosen to be the base for lineation purposes; for example, Corpus Christi College Oxford MS 198 (Cp) will be chosen as the base for CY. Naturally the choice of manuscript as the base may be regarded as controversial, but it is meant to be pragmatic. The lineation system cannot be based on current systems since they do not contain all the text from all witnesses and since they may prejudice users of the computer data to a particular view of the text and its development. There appear to be two possible choices for the basic lineation. The first is to choose early texts (i.e. from manuscripts which have been dated early by palaeographers) which in almost all cases contain fewer lines and passages than the texts found in those manuscripts which can be dated later in the fifteenth century. Pieces not found in these early manuscripts have to have as a base whatever witness they are found in first from a chronological perspective or in some cases uniquely. For example, as the fifteenth-century version of PL is found only in Christ Church Oxford MS 152 (Ch), naturally it must use Ch as its base for its lineation system. The second is to gather all parts of the poem together and to arrive at a lineation system which reflects all lines found in all fifteenth-century witnesses of the poem. The second system is difficult to implement because it would entail 7 making a choice among the different versions of a single line which are found in various manuscripts. It would also entail transcribing all the witnesses before one could start to devise a lineation system to make sure that one had included everything found in all the witnesses. On the other hand, it is relatively easy to choose an early manuscript and to record its lines as a lineation system, because the early manuscripts have been studied and edited most often. Following this procedure, a lineation system can be devised from the beginning of the transcription process. Furthermore, it is usually clearer to indicate lines which are additional to the base rather than those omitted from it, because scholars will not have to puzzle whether something has been omitted from the transcription in error. Consequently, there are advantages in having a shorter text such as that found in Hg as the base for most of the text. However, although Hg is normally followed scrupulously as far as the lineation process is concerned, there are a few instances where it has not been reproduced exactly. Where the scribe of Hg has left a gap in his copying for whatever reason and the gap has been filled, even if by a later hand, then the lineation system will include the missing line or lines. This happens in ME at what are 5:61-2 and 5:986 in the Section numeration (or E1305-6 and E2230 in the Fragment numeration), where gaps have been left by the scribe of Hg and these have been filled later. Instances of this happening are rare. Where the rhyme scheme or even the source suggests that something may have been omitted in Hg, there is no line number provided if there is no gap in Hg. This occurs, for instance, in TT at 10:805 in the Section numeration (B2/1995 in the Fragment numeration), where a line of the text may be missing because of the rhyme and stanza scheme. But not only is there no indication of a missing line in Hg, many other early manuscripts do not include a line here. It would be wrong to indicate a missing line here through the numeration, even though that is one possible solution, since the unanimity of the early manuscripts suggests that there was no line at this point in the archetype—something which may have been done deliberately by Chaucer as part of the telling of TT. The prose naturally causes more problems since there is no easy way to break up the lines. As it happens, the traditional line numbering of the prose texts produces lines which are a little too long for most computer screens to handle as single lines. Despite this small technical disadvantage, we have decided to replicate the traditional prose lineation in our computer version, adjusted to the principles already outlined above. Where passages are missing in the prose in Hg, the line numbers reflect this, for what have been interpreted in the past as missing lines receive no numbers in our lineation. Where Hg or the base manuscript contains part of the line, but not necessarily the complete line, in the traditional lineation, we have given the remaining words the appropriate line number, even though the result is a truncated line or lines. This happens, for example, in TM at what in the Section lineation is 10:1335-6 (Fragment lineation B2/25256.) Our intention has been to follow what is considered under current ideas to be the chronology of the extant witnesses: the base for any unit is normally the manuscript in which that unit occurs for the first time in the transmission process according to the dating of the manuscripts by palaeographers. Not unnaturally, palaeographers are not always agreed as to dates, but the general New Lineation System 8 Canterbury Tales Project Occasional Papers II lines are clear enough. We accept Hg as the earliest manuscript, even though some have suggested that Cp may be earlier. Line 1 will always be the first line of the English of the tale unit or link. If there is a heading for that unit it will receive the line number 0 even though it may in some instances extend over more than one line. We transcribe as part of the normal lineation process only those parts of the witness which are within the main body of the text. Thus we transcribe a Latin quotation, such as that which occurs within the text at the beginning of KN and the subheadings which indicate a section of a unit, but we do not transcribe as part of the substantive text glosses written over the line or in the margin, or subheadings or titles written in the margin; they will be transcribed separately. The headings indicating the various sections of KN are transcribed, but not the names of the pilgrims in the margin of GP or the glosses in whatever language written in the margin of any tale. But the glosses and other marginalia will be numbered in accordance with the system outlined here as they are transcribed separately. The Latin quotations and section headings within the main body of the text in a unit do not receive a number in the line sequence since they are treated as though they are additions. Additions are signalled by a slash and numbering starting with 1 added to the number of the line which the addition follows. Thus the Latin quotation at the beginning of KN will be numbered KN0/1 etc. The subheadings indicating a subsection of the text are numbered in the same way. For example, in CL the introductory heading ‘The prohemie of the clerkys tale of Oxenford’ is numbered CL0; the next heading ‘Here bigynneth the tale’ is numbered CL56/1; and the first section break is numbered CL196/1 for ‘Explicit prima pars’ and CL196/2 for ‘Incipit pars secunda.’ This allows KN1 to be the first line of the Knight’s Tale unit and is equivalent to A859 (Fragment numeration) and 1:861 (Section numeration.) A variant of a line is signalled by a slash and lower-case letters starting with a immediately after the line number to which it is a variant. It is not anticipated that this type of variation will occur frequently. Glosses and other marginalia are indicated by gl without a slash added to the line number against which the gloss or marginalia is added. If there should be more than one gloss to a given line, the line-number plus gl will be followed by a slash and numbers starting at 1. The links are treated separately and will be indicated quite arbitrarily through a capital L and a number, to give L1, L2, L3 etc. A link is a part of the poem in which the Host appears and which normally closes one tale and opens another. If a part of the pilgrimage frame simply opens or closes a single tale and is always linked with that tale in all manuscripts (i.e. it is not treated by the scribes as a detachable unit), it is regarded as part of that tale unit for lineation purposes, as already indicated. Many links are allocated to different pilgrims as the order of the tales changed. Where this happens all versions of a link will be regarded as a single link no matter with which pilgrims it is associated; and this is one reason why the links are given arbitrary numbers like L1 and L2. What is the SQ-ME link in some manuscripts is the SQ-FK link in others, but both are treated as the same link which has an arbitrary number, in this case L20. Links which are divided in the manuscripts into an endlink for one tale and a headlink for another tale are treated as a single link if the manuscripts always keep them 9 together whenever they occur. Links which unite the same two tales, but which are quite different links, as is true of some forms of the CO-TG link, are treated as separate links for lineation purposes. The number a link is given will reflect the order found in many manuscripts and will allow for different links uniting the same two tales to have consecutive numbers. Each link will be numbered from 1 onwards in accordance with the base text, which will be either Hg or some early or only manuscript in which it occurs in accordance with the procedure outlined for the tale units. Thus L1:1 will be the first line of Link 1 which will in fact be the KN-MI link; it is equivalent to A3109 (Fragment numeration) and 1:3105 (Section numeration.) The above procedures can be illustrated as follows. Additions to the base text are indicated by adding a slash followed by 1, 2, 3 etc after the line number of the base text which the addition follows. Thus KN100/1 means the first line of an addition after KN100, KN100/2 the second line of that addition, and so on. If a line is a variant of a line in the base text rather than an addition and needs to be signalled as such, it will be indicated by using a lower-case letter rather than a number after the slash. Thus KN100a means a variant to the line which appears in the base text as KN100 and KN100b would be a second variant line to KN100. Equally KN100/1a indicates a variant of line KN100/1. Where lines which are found in the base text are omitted in a witness, this will be indicated through the lineation system which will omit these numbers. If KN105 and KN106 are omitted in one manuscript, the line numbering will in that transcription go from KN104 to KN107. Equally KN100/2 followed immediately by KN100/5 would mean that the additional couplet KN100/3-4 was not found in that particular witness. A gloss which occurred opposite or above a word in KN100 would be represented as KN100gl. If there were two glosses to KN100, one would be numbered KN100gl/1 and the second KN100gl/2. It is hoped that this system will prevent confusion with existing lineation systems which use either a single capital letter, capital Roman numeral or Arabic numerals alone and with the sigla of various manuscript witnesses which take the form of a capital and a lower-case letter. It is assumed that FK for Franklin is sufficiently distinctive not to be confused with F for Fragment F or with Fi for the Fitzwilliam manuscript. Since the division of the poem into fragments with their single capital letters only extends as far as the letter I, there should be no confusion with L which indicates a link. The project team is anxious to hear of reactions to this lineation scheme from other scholars who are invited to pass on any views they might have to the author. Lineation of the Tales in the Poem Sigla Lines Section Lineation Fragment Lineation Comment GP 1-858 1:1-638 A1-252 Hg base unless l:639-40 om A252ab om otherwise stated 1:641-860 A253-858 New Lineation System 10 Canterbury Tales Project Occasional Papers II Sigla Lines Section Lineation Fragment Lineation Comment KN 1-2244 1:861-3104 A859-2680 A2671-2 om A2683-2778 A2779-82 om A2717-3108 MI 1-666 1:3181-3846 A3187-3720 A3721-3722 om A3723-3854 RE 1-404 1:3913-4316 A3921-4324 CO 1-58 1:4357-4414 A4365-4422 Tale incomplete WB 1-1238 2:l-l238 D1-44 Includes the prologue D44a-f om D45-574 D575-584 om D585-608 D609-612 om D613-618 D619-626 om D627-716 D717-720 om D721-1264 FR 1-364 2:1275-1638 D1301-1664 SU 1-586 2:1683-2268 D1709-2294 ML 1-1064 3:99-1162 B1/99-1162 Headlink not in Hk, Ph2 SQ 1-664 4:1-664 F9-672 Tale incomplete ME 1-1174 5:1-1174 E1245-2418 5:61-2, 986 incomplete in Hg FK 1-908 6:1-908 F709-1454 Includes what is later prologue F1455-1456 om F1457-1492 F1493-1498 om F1499-1624 NU 1-552 7:1-552 G1-552 Includes what is later prologue CL 1-1169 8:1-1169 E1-1169 Includes the prologue; WB stanza not in 24 mss; Envoy not in Bo1, Ph2, Hk PH 1-286 9:1-286 C1-286 PD 1-640 9:327-966 C329-968 Includes prologue and endlink SH 1-434 10:1-434 B2/1191-1624 PR 1-238 10:453-690 B2/1643-1880 Includes what is later prologue TT 1-206 10:712-804 B2/1902-1994 11 Sigla Lines Section Lineation Fragment Lineation Comment TM 1-918 10:967-1061 B2/2157-2251 10:1062-3 om B2/2252-3 om 10:1064-1432 B2/2254-2262 10:1433-4 om B2/2623-4 om 10:1453-1888 B2/2625-3078 MO 1-768 10:1991-2758 B2/3181-3196 Adam stanza not in Hg and other B2/3197-3204 om mss B2/3205-3956 NP 1-626 10:2793-3418 B2/4011-4636 Excludes endlink not in Hg and other mss MA 1-258 11:105-362 H105-362 Headlink not in Bo2, D1 etc PA 1-1006 12:75-551... I75-1080 477-end missing in Hg; Ha4 as base for 477-end RT 1-12 12:1081-1092 I1081-1092 RT missing in Hg and Cp; Ha4 as base CY 1-762 Not in Hg C720-1481 Cp as base TG 1-902 Not in Hg Not in El Cp as base TB 1-4024 Not in Hg Not in El Includes prologue; Nl as base (only CT witness) PL 1-140 Not in Hg Not in El Includes prologue; Ch as base (only CT witness) Links in the Tales and their Lineation Sigla Lines Section Lineation Fragment Lineation Tales linked & comments Base ms L1:1-76 1:3105-3180 A3109-3154 KN-MI Hg A3155-3156 om A3157-3186 L2:1-66 1:3847-3912 A3855-3920 MI-RE Hg not in Ph2 L3:1-40 l:4317-56 A4325-64 RE-CO Hg not in Bo1, Ha5, Hk, Ps or Ph2 L4:1-4not in Hg not in El CO endlink (2 mss) Ra1 L5:1-2not in Hg not in El CO-TG (13 mss) Pw L6:1-4not in Hg not in El CO-TG (1 ms) La L7:1-98 3:1-98 B1/1-98 ML headlink Hg not in Hk and Ph2 Bo1 omits 57-96 New Lineation System 12 Canterbury Tales Project Occasional Papers II Sigla Lines Section Lineation Fragment Lineation Tales linked & comments Base ms L8:1-28 not in Hg B1/1163-1190 ML endlink (35 mss) Cp Links variously to WB, SQ, SH L9:1-9not in Hg not in El WB headlink (1 ms) La L10:1-36 2:1239-1274 D1265-1300 WB-FR Hg ME-FR (Hk) L11:1-44 2:1639-1682 D1665-1708 FR-SU Hg L12:1-4not in Hg not in El SU endlink (9 mss) Pw L13:1-43 8:1170-1212 E1170-1212 WB stanza not in 24 Hg mss; CL envoy not in Bo1, Ph3 and Hk L14:1-78:1213-1219 E1212a-g CL Host stanza (23 Hg mss) can be linked with L13, L15 or L18 L15:1-32 not in Hg E1213-1244 ME headlink not in Ha4 30 mss, replaced by L20 in 2l mss L16:1-16 not in Hg not in El ME-WB (Bw, Ld2,Ld2 Ry2) L17:1-30 not in lineation E2419-2440 ME-FK (3 mss) Hg + added later in F1-8ME-SQ (18 mss) Hg Cl-FK (2 mss) F1-8 occurs twice in To L18:1-14 not in Hg not in El CL-FK (10 mss) Pw ME-FK (1 ms) adapted from L17 and often added to L14 L19:1-8not in Hg not in El SQ endlink (1 ms) La L20:1-36 not in lineation F673-708 SQ-FK (12 mss) Hg + added later in SQ-ME (21 mss) Hg TM-FK (Ph3) L21:1-40 9:287-326 C287-296 PH-PD Hg C297-298 om not in 5 mss C299-328 Manly-Rickert claim two authorial versions L22:1-12 not in Hg not in El PD-SH (14 mss) Bo1 TG-SH (4 mss) CL-SH (1 ms) L23:1-6not in Hg not in El SH headlink (1 ms) La L24:1-18 10:435-452 B2/1625-1642 SH-PR Hg not in Ha3, He and Nl 13 Sigla Lines Section Lineation Fragment Lineation Tales linked & comments Base ms L25:1-21 10:691-711 B2/1881-1901 PR-TT Hg PD-TT (Mm, Ph3,Pw) PR-FK (Gl) ML-TT (To) not in Nl, Ra3,Tc1 L26:1-4not in Hg not in El TT headlink (1 ms) Tc1 L27:1-4not in Hg not in El TT endlink (Bo1,Ph3)Bo1 added to L29 L28:1-48 10:919-966 B2/2109-2156 TT-TM Hg TT-PD (Nl) TT-MA (Bo2) L28:48/1-2 in Tc1 L29:1-102 10:1889-1990 B2/3079-3180 TM-MO Hg PR-MO (Gl, Mm, Ph3) not in Lc, Mg, Ra3 L30:1-34 10:2759-2792 B2/3957-3960 MO-NP (many mss Hg B2/3961-80 om add L30:4/1-20) B2/3981-4010 SU-NP (Ad3) FK-NP (Mm) PD-NP (Tc1) not in Bo2, Gl, Ra3 L31:1-26 not in Hg B2/4637-4652 NP endlink (10 mss) Dd Often adapted to introduce NU L32:1-6not in Hg not in El NU headlink (Ad1, En3 Cn, En3, Ma) added to L31 L33:1-166 not in Hg G554-719 NU-CY (44 mss) Cp CO-CY (Ad3) PD-CY (Nl) CL-CY (Gl) not in Bo2, He, Hg, Ra3, Sl2 or Tc2 L34:1-14 not in Hg not in El CY-PH (20 mss) Pw FK-PH (Ha5 varies [Ha5] last six lines) L35:1-16 not in Hg not in El CY-PH (1 ms) La L36:1-104 11:1-104 H1-104 MA headlink (45 Hg mss) sometimes added to L31. Fi replaces 3-104 with 36:2/1-8 L37:1-74 12:1-74 I1-74 MA-PA (39 mss) Hg CY-PA (Ch, Ad3) FK-PA (Gl, Ra3, Tc1) New Lineation System