"Rayling rhyme" may also be related to what Gascoigne in Certayne Notes calls "riding rhyme" in the 16th century's misunderstanding of sound changes since Chaucer.  You will recall that Gascoigne considers "riding rhyme," or rough verse, appropriate for comic effect.

Susanne

On Fri, Nov 11, 2011 at 2:41 AM, andrew zurcher <[log in to unmask]> wrote:
Hi Paul,

This alliterative collocation definitely has a Skeltonic attitude about it. See the opening of 'Colyn Cloute':

What can it auayle
To dryue forth a snayle
Or to make a sayle
Of an herynges tayle
To ryme or to rayle...

And see the 'Garlande or chapelet of laurell', at about line 1360 (I quote from the EEBO transcription of the 1523 printed edition):

The nacyoun of folys he left not behynde
Item apollo that whirllid vp his chare
That made sum to surt and snuf in the wynde
It made them to skip to stampe and to stare
whiche if they be happy haue cause to be ware
In ryming and raylyng with hym for to mell
For drede that he lerne them there A. B. C. to spell

These peerless passages prompted Puttenham to pass his famous sentence on Skelton:

'Such were the rimes of Skelton (vsurping the name of a Poet Laureat) being in deede but a rude rayling rimer & all his doings ridiculous, he vsed both short distaunces and short measures pleasing onely the popular eare: in our courtly maker we banish them vtterly.' (Arte of English Poesie, 1589, Book II, ch. ix)

I've not done a proper search, though, and I'm sure others will provide better examples.


andrew


Andrew Zurcher
Queens' College
Cambridge CB3 9ET
United Kingdom
+44 1223 335 572

hast hast post hast for lyfe