Hengwrt Chaucer manuscript

The Hengwrt Chaucer manuscript, also Hengwrt Chaucer, is an early 15th century illuminated manuscript. It is believed to be the earliest extant copy of Geoffrey Chaucer's The Canterbury Tales. It is held in the National Library of Wales, Aberystwyth, referred to as MS. Perniarth 392 D and usually abbreviated as Hg. Together with the Ellesmere Chaucer manuscript it is considered to be the closest to the original text of The Canterbury Tales. The manuscript is named after the residence of Colonel Robert Baughan, one of its owners, who lived at Hengwrt in Wales.

Significance of the Hengwrt Chaucer

Although the Hengwrt Chaucer is less attractive than the Ellesmere Chaucer, it has emerged as a superior manuscript of The Canterbury Tales. The Hengwrt Chaucer was first published in Furnivall’s parallel text in 1868, but it only drew increasing attention since John M. Manly and Edith Rickert's collection and study of all the Canterbury Tale manuscripts, published in 1940.

The Manly and Rickert's project

In 1924 Manly and Rickert, colleagues at the University of Chicago, started a project for a new edition of The Canterbury Tales. Their goal was to produce a text, which would come close to what Chaucer's holograph might have looked like. To achieve that they wanted to track down as many manuscripts as possible, and make copies of them with the then available technology of the photostat, in order to compare them all. Procuring the manuscripts was not an easy task. Many of them were still in private collections and their owners had to be approached to allow Manly and Rickert access to their libraries. Both American scholars were granted access to the British Museum and many owners send their manuscripts there for examination and photostatting. Manley and Rickert also searched for copies of The Canterbury Tales mentioned in wills, library book lists and sale catalogues. They uncovered a number of manuscripts and pages, including the Merthyr fragment, related to the Hengwrt. In analysing all the information available they sought to determine what Chaucer actually wrote.
While Manly and Rickert's efforts have revealed much information about the nature of the production of the extant manuscripts, they did not reach their initial goal. The final result of the collation of all known manuscripts was that they descended from no common ancestor. Yet the research of Manly and Rickert revealed the superiority of the Hengwrt Chaucer manuscript as a witness.

The language

The Hengwrt manuscript was copied in a standardised variety of London English, which was common at the end of the 14th and the early 15th century, although it does not show the same degree of uniformity as does present-day standard written English. That period was characterised by a huge degree of dialectal variation in the written record. According to Chaucer himself:

"And for ther is gret diversite

In Englissh and in writyng of oure tonge"

(Troilus and Criseyde V 1793-1794)

Research has led academics to conclude that the Hengwrt and the Ellesmere Chaucer manuscripts, amongst others, were copied by the same scribe. This scribe, at first known as Scribe B, was tentatively identified in 2004 by professor Linne Mooney as Adam Pinkhurst. The Hengwrt Chaucer however shows a greater degree of spelling variation than the Ellesmere Chaucer, a variation that appears to derive from the copytext and possibly from Chaucer's holograph. As such the Hengwrt manuscript best preserves elements of Chaucer's own spelling practices. After a more careful inventory and editorial preparation of the contents of Chaucer's poem, the scribe then copied the Ellesmere manuscript, which shows evidence of careful linguistic editing and regularisation. Even the order of the tales was changed.

The dating

It is generally assumed that the Hengwrt Chaucer manuscript was copied around 1400, Chaucer’s probable year of death. Professor Michael Louis Samuels, an authority on Middle English, ventures the date circa 1402-1403. Professor Ralph Hannah of Kebble college in Oxford however, suggests that the manuscript was copied during Chaucer's lifetime, and that it can possibly be dated before 1400. Since the digitisation of the Hengwrt Chaucer, new research is emerging, particulary about erasures in the margins of the manuscript. This may prove that it dates indeed from Chaucer’s own lifetime.

Sources and references

• Manly, John M., and Edith Rickert, eds. The Text of the Canterbury Tales: Studied on the Basis of All Known Manuscripts. 8 vols. Chicago: Univ. of Chicago Press, 1940.
• Elizabeth Scala, "Editing Chaucer", in: Steve Ellis Chaucer An Oxford Guide (2005). New York United States: Oxford University Press. Inc. ISBN 0-19-925912-7