1 84 Chaucer and Henry, Earl of Derby 



But if Froissart was of the company, why should not Chaucer 

 have been ? In their capacity as court-poets, both must have been 

 on a somewhat similar footing. Chaucer had written mere 

 poetic trifles, and Froissart had made no more than sketches 

 for his great historical work. What he had done was to com- 

 pose 'de beaux dittiers et tretties amoureuse* for Philippa 

 (d. 1369), Edward IIFs queen; and as these consisted largely 

 of 'ballades, virelais, et rondeaux' (see, for example, the Paradys 

 d' Amour), so Chaucer speaks* of having made 'balades, roundels, 

 virelays,' or, as Gower says^ : 



in the floures of his youthe, 

 In sondri wise, as he wel couthe, 

 Of ditees and of songes glade, . . . 

 The lond fulfild is overal. 



That Chaucer knew Froissart is rendered probable by their 

 common affection for Blanche, wife of John of Gaunt (cf. Book 

 of the Duchess with Buisson de Jonecc 241-250), and by the fact 

 that Chaucer, at the beginning of the Book of the Duchess (i-io), 

 written within a year or so of Lionel's marriage, imitates the 

 beginning of Froissart's Paradys d'Amoiir,^ and derives the 

 name 'Eclympasteyre'* from Froissart's 'Enclimpastair.'^ 



The companionship of the two on this journey has been assumed 

 by notable scholars. Thus Kervyn (i.* 166) : *Le hasard avait 

 reuni aux fetes de Milan les esprits les plus eminents du XIV® 

 siecle, a qui trois langues, trois litteratures durent leurs progres 

 et leur avenir, Petrarque qui assouplit la langue encore inculte 

 et rude de Dante, Froissart qui rendit egalement plus elegante, 

 plus rapide celle de Villehardouin et de Joinville, Chaucer que 

 Pope [Spenser], son imitateur, appelle le createur du pur 

 anglais.' And the Froissart scholar is followed by Petit de 

 Julleville (Hist Lang, et Litt. Fr. 2. 347) : 'Deux poetes sont du 

 cortege', etc. Add Encyc. Brit., nth ed., 11. 244. 



(7) Chaucer (Squire's Tale 191-3) presents 'a stede of 

 Lumhardye' as the model of a war-horse : 



^ L. G. W. 411 : 423. 

 ^ Conf. Ani.^ 2943-5, 2947. 



'Sandras, Etude sur G. Chaucer, p. 295; cf. Kittredge, in Eng. Stud. 

 26. 321. 

 ^Bk. Duch. 167. 

 ^ Paradys 28 ; cf . Hammond, p. 364. 



