As to the plan and date of the de Nugis, nothing can be clearer than that there is no plan, and that the work was jotted. down at various times, as the fancy struck the author. He himself says (1402) Hunc in curia regis Henrici libellum raptim annotaui scedulis'. He undertook it, he says, at the instance of one Galfridus (131), who had asked him (1812) to put down in writing sayings and doings hitherto unrecorded, or anything conspicuously remarkable that had come to his knowledge. Wright (p. x) will have it that Galfridus had asked him to write a poem, but I think the 'poetari' of 1782 and the 'philosophari' of 13 are synonymous, and merely signify literary composition. At any rate Map, on p. 18, assumes that he is doing in this work what he had been requested to do. There are numerous and discrepant notes of time in the book, which I will attempt to collect. Dist. I. ix. 52. adhuc nunc post mortem suam (sc. Henrici II). After 1189. xi. 1525. anno primo coronacionis nostri regis Henrici. Possibly in Henry II's lifetime. xii. 164. Portingalensis rex qui nunc uiuit. The king is not 1820 894. Gilbert Foliot, bishop of London, 1163-87. xiii. 19. Gischard of Beaulieu, father of Imbert, 'cui nunc cum filio suo conflictus est.' xv. 21. In or just after 1187. Doubtful to me. xxii. 3320. Reginald, bishop of Bath: after 1174. xxvi. 3422. The Lateran Council: 1179. xxvii. 5520. Gilbert of Sempringham, 'qui adhuc superest centennis aut eo amplius.' He died 3 Feb., 1189. xxviii, xxix. 5610, 19. Henry II is spoken of as alive. Dist. I.xxx. 58. William, archbishop of Rheims (1176-1202), told a story to Map. Dist. II. ii. 65. Map told a story to Hamelin, abbot of Gloucester (d. 1179). iii. 6521. Map was present at Limoges in 1173. 6529. Johannes Albaemanus, at that time (1173) bishop of Poitiers, 'qui nunc est Lugdunensis archiepiscopus.' He was translated to Lyons in 1181, and resigned in 1193. This, then, was written down after 1181. vii. 69. Girard la Pucelle began his teaching career at Paris in or about 1160. xviii. 8520 etc. The chronology of this chapter is badly confused, but it appears to have been written after 1185: Lucius III (d. 1185) seems not to be the reigning pope (8614). xxiii. 9513. Map knew Thomas à Becket as chancellor: i.e. before 1162. xxvii. 9927. Gilbert Foliot is bishop of London (1163-87): also 15828 xxviii. 19. 'In the time of Roger, bishop of Worcester': Roger died in 1180. Dist. IV. i. 1393 sqq. Map 'wrote this page' at Saumur in June, 1182 (really 1183). Wright (pp. ix-x) misrepresents this passage: 'he says that he is writing on St. Barnabas's day (the 11th of June), the same day on which the young king Henry died in 1182, evidently looking back to that event as being some time past.' But what Map really says is that Henry died at Martel, 'mense quo hanc paginam apud Salmurum scripsi, die S. Barnabe apostoli, anno... 1182 (sic) et sue natiuitatis 27°.' The plain meaning is that Henry died on June 11, and Map heard of it at Saumur later on in the same month. The year is wrong in the text. 13931. ' hodie,' Henry II has commanded the young king's 1354 body to be moved from Le Mans to Rouen. The Chron. Rothomagense, cited by Stubbs on Benedict of d Peterborough, i. 304, dates the burial at Rouen on July 22. Thomas Agnellus (in Rad. de Coggeshall, Rolls, p. 270) says that the body lay at Le Mans for thirty-four days. Map seems to be writing before the actual removal of the body, but after the order had been given. This will suit the end of June or beginning of July, 1183. Dist. IV. ii. 14026. Map wrote this book by fits and starts at the court of Henry II. v. 15828. Gilbert Foliot is now very old and nearly blind. xi. 1832. nunc hodie . . . electus est Lucius papa successor succeeded in 1181. Lucius III xiii. 18614, 18 etc. The first year of Henry II appears to be long past. Dist. V. iii. 20615. The year 1187 is mentioned. 21812. Henry II 'qui nunc regnat' before 1189. 225. Reminiscences of 1179 when Map was on the way to the Lateran Council. vi. 23710 89. Written after the death of Henry II who had reigned thirty-six years. 23820. Geoffrey Plantagenet is archbishop of York: he became so in 1191. His quarrels with his canons have begun. 241. Richard I is king. The murder of the Marquis of Montferrat (Conrad, not Boniface) was in April, 1192. 24117. Henry II seems to be still living. 243. Richard I'qui nunc regnat'. 24618 etc. Geoffrey Plantagenet is perhaps not yet archbishop. vii. 2531899. regis nostri... Henricum secundum dico.' Before 1189. Thus the earliest personal reminiscence recorded by Map seems to be the conversation with Thomas Becket as Chancellor, an office which Becket resigned in 1162.1 The latest incident is the murder of the Marquis of Montferrat in 1192. Parts of Dist. I date from before 1185 (cap. xii): in or just after 1187 (cap. xv); before 1189 (cap. xxvii). Of Dist. II we can only say that it was written after 1181. In Dist. III there appears no indication of date. Dist. IV was in part written in 1183 (cap. i), and in part in 1181 (cap. xi). It also contains the Epistle of Valerius, which we know to have been an earlier work of Map's. This distinction, then, has some claim to be regarded as prior to the others in date. Dist. V was written partly before Henry II's death (capp. v, vii), and partly in or after 1192. When I say written', I mean 'put into its present form'. Allowance must be made for revision and for insertions of incidents later than the main body of the text. The remarks about Richard I on pp. 241, 243 (and probably those about Geoffrey Plantagenet on p. 238), have some appearance of being insertions of this kind; for we see that part of the chapter in which they occur is of earlier date than the events which they record. The date of compilation, then, may be placed in the years 1181 to 1192 or 1193. The plan, as I have said, is to seek. Beginning with an invective, as it may be called, against court life, Map groups round that the stories of Herla and of the king of Portugal. The idea of 'making a good end' by retiring from the court to live in peace, suggests the stories of monks who left the cloister. Then comes a break. The news of the capture of Jerusalem by Saladin leads him 1 Unless we insist on the words (2371) Vidimus inicia regni sui', which may take us back to 1154. d 2 to a lament on the vices of the age. Is there a hope that all the religious activities of the monastic orders, old and new, can avail to palliate these? Forthwith he is launched upon a disquisition on the origin and decline of all the orders of his day, including the military. He devotes most of his space to his bêtes noires, the Cistercians, and has begun to recapitulate, when, at 564, there is a marked and sudden break. After a single sentence about the Carthusians, he says in effect: 'After all, all the numerous ways of following the simple life in externals seem ineffective. King Henry dresses splendidly but is humble of heart.' This mention of Henry II suggests the topic of that king's zeal against heretics. Heretics are the topic of the next few pages. The story of three remarkable hermits, dragged in rather awkwardly, leads over into Distinction II, whereof the first seven chapters deal with good men of his own time. The next real break begins, I think, with cap. viii. The Welsh are quite suddenly introduced, and a Welsh folk-tale brings with it several other stories of the same kind. The tales of Gado and of the Byzantine emperors, which come next, seem quite detached; but that of Gillescop (cap. xix) affords a natural means of return to the topic of the Welsh, and this to a second series of folk stories. The tale of the Three Counsels (unfortunately imperfect) is not led up to by any transition from the previous chapter, but the note which follows it does serve to introduce Distinction III, which consists simply of a short preface and four romantic stories. Distinction IV, as we have seen, has some claim to be regarded as the earliest portion of the work. It may have been intended at one time to stand first in order. The prologue is compatible with this idea: and twice (14029, 14210) the work is spoken of as a 'libellus'. The salient feature, too, is the Epistola Valerii, now first, perhaps, emphatically claimed by Map as his work; a piece which has very much the appearance |