356 Wisconsin Academy of Sciences, Arts, and Letters, 
THE INFLUENCE OF FRENCH FARCE ON THE 
TOWNELEY CYCLE OF MYSTERY PLAYS 
Louis Wann 
Of the three or four main problems that confront the student 
of the Towneley cycle of English mystery plays, by far the 
most interesting and at the same time the most difficult of so¬ 
lution is that concerned with the many influences that went to 
their composition. It is true that the more obvious actual sources 
of most of the plays have by this time been fairly well deter¬ 
mined, and the successive labors of Davidson, Hohlfeld, Pollard, 
Cady, Craig, and others^ have made possible at least a reason¬ 
ably approximate estimate of the manner in which this import¬ 
ant cycle as a whole was developed. Yet not a little remains 
to be done. For it is of that very group of plays which give 
Towneley its peculiar power and interest that we know the 
least concerning the influences which contributed to their mak¬ 
ing. Of the three now generally recognized stages in the evolu¬ 
tion of the cycle (the liturgical stage, the York stage, and the 
Wakefield stage), it is the last period, when the '' genius of Wake¬ 
field^’placed the stamp of his originality upon the cycle, about 
which are in doubt. The peculiar status of this group of plays, 
concerning which we at once desire the most and possess the 
least knowledge, is readily apparent from a brief resume of the 
special classes of sources to which the plays of the cycle are 
indebted. 
The sources of Towneley divide themselves naturally, almost 
inevitably, into three main classes, corresponding, in a rough 
way, with the three main stages in the development of the cycle 
^ To the general school of opinion represented by Pollard belong also, al¬ 
lowing for minor differences, Bunzen, Gayley, and Chambers. 
