And the Word was made flesh: III

December 27th, 2014Blog;

A Lytyll compilacion declaryng when men kysse in Churche stoone or erthe Tymbre or Iron. What they shuld remembre therby.

O deuout pepyll whyche kepe an obseruaunce
Lowly in churche to kysse stoone or tre,
Erthe or yron, haue in remembraunce
What they do meane, take the moralyte;
Erthe tokeneth furst the pure humanyte
Of Cryst Iesu, the stone hys sepulture,
The spere of steele, the sharpe nayles thre,
Made large his woundes, remembryd in scripture.

Thynke on the crosse, made of four dyuerse trees.
As Clerkes seyn, of Cedyr and Cypresse,
To hygh estates and folkes of lowe degrees
Cryst brought in pease, the Olyfe bereth wytnesse;
The Cedre aloft, contemplatyf swetnesse,
Graue all these sygnes depe in thy memory,
And howe hys passion was groundyd on mekenesse,
Geyne cruell Sathan to make vs haue vyctory.

These .iiij. fygures combynyd into oon,
Put in thy mynde for a memoryall,
Erthe and yron, iiij trees and the stoon,
To make vs fre where as we were thrall,
Beholde the baner vyctoryous and royall,
Crystes crosse as standard of most pryse,
Thynke howe the thyef for mercy dyd call,
Tawght by thys tre the way to paradyse.

Your hertes ey lyft vp in-to the Est,
All yowre body and knees boweth downe,
When the preest seyth Verbum caro factum est,
With all your inward contemplacion,
Your mowthe furst crossyd of hygh deuocion,
Kyssyng the tokenes rehersyd here toforn,
And euer haue mynde on Crystes passion
Whyche for your sake weryd a crowne of thorne.

John Lydgate (c. 1370-1451)

One Response to “And the Word was made flesh: III”

  1. William Bellamy Says:
    January 3rd, 2015 at 22:47

    A THANK YOU LETTER.

    Thank you for this delightful Christmas offering. Hoc erat in votis.

    The focus is upon the word made flesh, as for example in Lydgate’s complex poem.

    A sensitive reading of the overt dimension of the text of Lydgate’s poem reveals the thematic importance of the word “word”. For example, each of the words Erthe, yron, trees, and stone is presented (in a sense, meta-textually) as an instantiation of verbum caro factum est. Each is potentially a word in the sense of both word and Word. (Poetic decorum prohibits the direct invocation of either the word “word” or the word “Word”).

    In the covert dimension of the text, however, the thematic predominance of the word “word” is specifically identified in concealed anagrammata figuratae, each taking the form of WORDE. The poem is imbued throughout with WORDE anagrammata, which are set in expolitio in the manner illustrated in the Rhetorica ad Herennium in relation to the otherwise un-stated word ROMA.

    The numerous WORDE anagrammata are also associated with single anagrammata of the words LOGOS, VERBUM, and SYGNE. Together these covertly uttered words are found to form a correlative group of four. Each is again – aptly – a word in the sense of Word.

    The GOD and DEVIL anagrammata in the Lord’s Prayer (James) are similarly concealed, the respective anagrammata being set in chiasmus, and introduced by the prompt in “Hallowed by thy name” (i.e. the overtly un-stated word GOD):

    Thy kingdom come – Giue us Our daily breaD : DEliuer us from eVIL – Thine is the kingdom

    Similarly framed DOMIMUS and SATANUS anagrammata are found to be set in chiasmus in the corresponding passage in the Latin of Jerome’s Vulgate. (The Graeco-Roman poetic, with its inherent anagrammatism, died out in the general purification of the dialect of the tribe in the European Enlightenment).

    The groups of four in Lydgate’s comprise a reference inter alia to Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John. This reference is specifically identified in the APOSTLES anagramma which spans lines 14-19.

    Queries welcome at wjb34@cam.ac.uk

    WILLIAM BELLAMY

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