Publisher's Synopsis
Excerpt from Specimens of Early English Metrical Romances, Chiefly Written During the Early Part of the Fourteenth Century, Vol. 3 of 3: To Which Is Prefixed an Historical Introduction, Intended to Illustrate the Rise and Progress of Romantic Composition in France and England
Pilpay or Bidpai. These, indeed, as far as I know, were never translated in their original state by our English minstrels: but there is a third work, equally Of oriental origin, and Of not less celebrity than either Of the foregoing, which has furnished us with an English metrical romance, named in the Cotton ms. The Proces of the Sevyn Sages, or, to use the more familiar and popular title of the prose transla tion, The Seven Wise Masters and it may be reasonably expected that the analysis of this romance Should be preceded by ahistory Of the different forms under which it has been succes sively exhibited.
This, however, is a matter of extreme intri cacy, and which has never been completely in vestigated, excepting by Mr Douce, who, by pursuing the hints thrown out by Mr Tyrwhitt, Mr Warton, &c., has traced a great part Of the materials employed by our early fabulists to their remotest sources, and to whose notes I have been obliged for all the information which I can venture to Offer on this Obscure and ditfi cult subject.
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