Rather Layamon's last noun: Cotton Caligua: "Anglen to
fulste" = Cotton Otho (less archaically), "Bruttes ... for
to healpe."
On Sun, 2 Oct 2011 14:30:51 -0400
"James C. Nohrnberg" <[log in to unmask]> wrote:
> It's the occurrence of Argante's name in the (dire)
>situation at the end of Layamon's/Lawman's Brut that's
>suggestive--the fatally wounded and dying Arthur is
>speaking to his designated heir/legatee the boy
>Constantine. I have Eugene Mason's serviceable
>archaic-modern prose version to hand:
>
> "... I give thee here my kingdom, and defend thou my
>Britons ever in thy life, and maintain them [sic] all the
>laws that have stood in my days, and all the good laws
>that in Uther's days stood. And I will fare to Avalun,
>to the fairest of all maidens, to Argante the queen, an
>elf most fair, and she shall make my wounds all sound;
>make me whole with healing draughts. And afterwards I
>will come again to my kingdom, and dwell with the Britons
>with mickle joy." Even with the words there approached
>from the sea that was a short boat, floating with the
>waves; and two women therein, wondrously formed; and they
>took Arthur anon, and bare him quickly, and laid him
>softly down, and forth they gan depart. Then was it
>accomplished that Merlin whilom said, that mickle care
>should be of Arthur's departure. (Layamon's Brut: p.
>264 in Everyman's Lib., Arthurian Chronicles.)
>
> If Avalon, reached by boat, is a sempiternal isle of the
>dead or lost, then compare the situation in store for the
>Squire of Dames, as the cougar-like Argante's prey in FQ
>III.vii:
>
> But over all the countrie she did raunge
> To seeke young men to quench her flaming thrust,
> And feed her fancy with delightfull chaunge:
> Whom so she fittest findes to serve her lust
> Through her maine strength, in which she most doth
>trust,
> She with her bringes unto a secret Ile,
> Where in eternall bondage dye he must,
> Or be the vassal of her pleasures vile,
> And in all shamefull sort himselfe with her defile.
>(Stanza 50)
>
> Thus Spenser chooses legendary names for both twins, one
>from Arthurian legend, or the matter of Briton, and the
>other from Charlegmagne's peerage, or the matter of
>France. (I.e., phallic Ollyphant suggests Roland's
>(elephant-) horn Olifant.) And this is so even if
>Argante is "A corruption of the name Morgan, that of
>Arthur's faery sister," and Arthur's conveyance to Avalon
>is ultimately a Breton tradition. (So Roger Sherman
>Loomis.) The last word of The Brute is "Bruttes" -- re
>Arthur's return "to help the Brits," we might translate.
> Argante is being chased by Britomart.
>
> [Layamon, as I think I've somewhere elsewhere noted,
>also provides a kind of etiological tale for the name
>Uther Pendragon that gives us a possible ultimate or
>remote source for the Welsh hood ornament on Arthur's
>helmet. This relic-like effigy (or two such) is
>manufactured in honor of Merlin by Uther: "...ever since
>they called Uther, who for a standard bare the dragon,
>the name they laid on him, that was Uther Pendragon;
>Pendragon in British, Dragon's-head in English." (P. 168,
>EL vol. cit.) Uther's man Gorlois is also introduced
>hereabouts.]
>
> -- But back to Prof. N.'s Sunday Morning Service, at the
>altar of the Maytag with a chalice of Cheer.
>
>
>
> On Sun, 2 Oct 2011 11:52:06 -0400
> Anne Prescott <[log in to unmask]> wrote:
>> Dear list--for a note to the new Norton (yes! at last! a
>>preliminary MS is
>> due in four weeks and may even make it)--is there any
>>chance that Spenser
>> could have read Layamon? Or is the latter's queen
>>Argante's name just one of
>> those overlaps and coincidences? Argante's name does
>>recall brightness and
>> speed (now I know where the Argo may have got its name,
>>although it hardly
>> was the "white streak" that I'm told is what the Greeks
>>called our "blue
>> streek"). My classicist sister, whom I consulted on the
>>Greek, says that the
>> name reminds her of Narnia's White Queen but faster
>>moving. For me Argante
>> is too hot for that. I like the thought of her, though,
>>as a sort of comet
>> swooping down on incautious young men.
>> Andrew Hadfield and I are cutting back on
>>interpretative notes (it's a
>> new world since the Third Edition with more Google and
>>more ways to check up
>> on who says what about which passage), avoiding
>>identifying characters
>> before Spenser does, something that requires heroic
>>self-restraint, but we
>> do want to give as much basic information as we think
>>the kids who might use
>> the edition would need. And we've added MHT and RR,
>>dropping some to make
>> room. Sorry about the drops.
>> So: any reason to think Spenser might have known
>>about Layamon's nice
>> Argante (well, as a version of Morgan she may be only
>>sort of nice)? Or even
>> have heard of Layamon--and I do know I'm spelling him in
>>an ignorant modern
>> American way. All suggestion welcome, on or off list.
>>Anne.
>
> [log in to unmask]
> James Nohrnberg
> Dept. of English, Bryan Hall 219
> Univ. of Virginia
> P.O Box 400121
> Charlottesville, VA 22904-4121
[log in to unmask]
James Nohrnberg
Dept. of English, Bryan Hall 219
Univ. of Virginia
P.O Box 400121
Charlottesville, VA 22904-4121
|