Such yarns would
be most attractive to "lewd" or illiterate men--
"For lewde men y undyrtoke
On Englyssh tunge to make thys boke:
For many ben of swyche manere
That talys and rymys wyl blethly[1] here,
Ye gamys and festys, and at the ale."[2]
[1] Gladly, blithely.
[2] From beginning of Handlyng Synne, by Robert Mannying of
Brunne.
The need of multiplying manuscripts of these poems
would not be greatly felt. The reciter would be obliged
to learn them off by heart; he need not, and often did
not, possess written versions of the poems he recited. And
even literate men, as Bishop Grosseteste, preferred to
listen to these gestours, rather than to read the narrative
themselves. Therefore, any estimate we may form of the
number of manuscripts of romances in existence at any
time in the fourteenth century, for example, would give
not the smallest idea of the extent to which these tales
were known.
Section V
The medieval collector of books sometimes, and the
monastic librarian nearly always, took care that his library
was strong in hagiology and history. He felt the need of
books which would tell him of the past history of his church
and of the lives of her greatest teachers.
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