Poetry
The Testament of Cresseid
Robert Henryson · 1500
Synopsis
Cresseid, driven out by Diomede, returns to her father's house and shuts herself in an oratory. There she accuses Venus and Cupid of having betrayed her. The seven planetary gods descend to hold a tribunal: Saturn and the Moon pass sentence, and she wakes disfigured. She leaves the house by night and joins a leper house outside the walls, where she learns to beg at the roadside. One day, a company of horsemen returns from battle and passes in front of the lepers.
Context
The work presents itself as the sequel to an English book of the preceding century, by Geoffrey Chaucer: he had left his unfaithful heroine alive, without saying what became of her. Henryson writes the ending that was missing, in eighty-six stanzas of rhyme royal, the very stanza of his model. Seamus Heaney gave a modern English version of it in 2009, printed facing the Scots and accompanied by seven of the fables.
Who it is for
Six hundred lines in Scots, with an annotated edition indispensable. It is better to know who Cresseid is before opening it: the text does not explain.
Prizes and reception
The most widely read poem of early Scottish literature, and long printed under another poet's name.
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