Chaucer's Mission to Florence in 1^/2 39 



2. Chaucer bore arms, which were formerly to be seen upon 

 his tomb.^ 



3. The designation of 'Sir' is given to him ca. 1560 in 

 Sloane MS. 314 (Spurgeon, p. 95); by Legh, 1562 (97); by 

 Whetstone, 1576 (113) ; by Greene, 1590 (131) ; in 1590 (132) ; 

 in 1592 (137-8); by Peacham, 1622 (197); by FouHs, 1635 

 (211); by Baker, 1643 (222); by Gayton, 1654 (229); by 

 Jones, 1659 (237) ; by Gayton, 1663 (240) ; by Aubrey, 1669-96 

 (245) ; by Ramesey, 1669 (246), and in Dryden's patent as poet 

 laureate, 1670 (247), etc. 



X. CHAUCER'S MISSION TO FLORENCE IN 1372 



No one seems ever to have conjectured what was the errand 

 on which Chaucer was dispatched to Florence. What service 

 could the Florentines render Edward III, in the existing state 

 of his affairs? He would hardly have sent Chaucer to negotiate 

 concerning the establishment of a Florentine quarter in some 

 English port, since they only incidentally and individually traded 

 to foreign ports ; and for a similar reason he would not have 

 been in quest of galleys. Besides, why should such a mission be 

 secret, since for these objects Edward sent public embassies to 

 Genoa, and openly declared the reasons why they were sent? 

 In relation to distant countries, what interest did Florence 

 peculiarly represent ? No one needs to be told that it was banking 

 and the coinage of money. The florin was a standard measure 

 of value, and the Bardi were known throughout Western Europe. 

 Now that Edward was at this time in dire need of money is 

 beyond question. In 1371 Parliament demanded £50,000 from 

 the parishes of England, and the clergy were induced to vote 

 £50,000 more.^ But these sums were as nothing in comparison 

 with the amounts lost or wasted by the government. Off La 

 Rochelle, on June 24, 1372, 20,000 marks, with which Guichard 

 d'Angle, fellow-commissioner with Chaucer in 1377 and 1378, 

 was to pay Edward's soldiers in Guienne, went down in a founder- 



* Hammond, pp. 20, 47. 

 "■Diet. Nat. Biog. 17. 66 



