It will therefore suffice to give a very brief
account of each.
VII. _Cursor Mundi_, or _Cursor o Werld_, i.e. Over-runner of the
World; so called because it rehearses a great part of the world's
history, from the creation onwards. It is a poem of portentous length,
extending to 29,655 lines, and recounts many of the events found in
the Old and New Testaments, with the addition of legends from many
other sources, one of them, for example, being the _Historia
Scholastica_ of Peter Comestor. Dr Murray thinks it may have been
written in the neighbourhood of Durham. The specimen given (pp. 69-82)
corresponds to lines 11373-11796.
VIII. _Sunday Homilies in Verse_; about 1330. The extracts are taken
from _English Metrical Homilies_, edited by J. Small (Edinburgh, 1862)
from a MS. in Edinburgh. The Northern dialect is well marked, but I do
not know to what locality to assign it.
X. Richard Rolle, of Hampole, near Doncaster, wrote a poem called
_The Prick of Conscience_, about 1340. It extends to 9624 lines,
and was edited by Dr Morris for the Philological Society in 1863.
Pages:
27
28
29
30
31
32
33
34
35
36
37
38
39
40
41
42
43
44
45
46
47
48
49
50
51