Anonymous, Sir Gawain and the Carl of Carlisle

Wajih Ayed (University of Sousse)

Ed. by Natalie Hanna, University of Liverpool, Sebastian Sobecki, Rijksuniversiteit Groningen
The Literary Encyclopedia. Volume 1.2.1.02: English Writing and Culture: High and Late Medieval, 1066-1485.
Vol. editors: Kate Ash-Irisarri (University of Edinburgh), Rory Critten (Université de Lausanne), David Fuller (University of Durham), Natalie Hanna (University of Liverpool), Hugh Magennis (Queen's University Belfast), Jamie McKinstry (University of Durham), Sarah Peverley (University of Liverpool), Sebastian Sobecki (Rijksuniversiteit Groningen)

Dates

First circulation or publication c. 1400

Places

England (Country of Origin; Publication/ performance)

Genres and Modes

Poetry (any)

Resources

Sir Gawain and the Carle of Carlisle (henceforth, Carlisle) is a late medieval popular verse romance which was probably composed in the northwest of England around 1400 and copied by an anonymous scribe in the second half of the fifteenth century (Hahn 83; Kurvinen 28). Carlisle survives in a single manuscript witness, Brogyntyn MS ii.1, kept in the National Library of Wales. The poem is 660 lines long, and it is composed in tail-rhyme stanzas, with a generally regular rhyme scheme of aab ccb ddb eeb. This Arthurian romance exists in another variant text, namely The Carle of Carlisle (henceforth, Carle), a 500-line sixteenth-century poem composed in rhyming couplets and preserved in t…

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3194 words

Citation: Ayed, Wajih. "Sir Gawain and the Carl of Carlisle". The Literary Encyclopedia. First published 07 May 2021 [https://staging.litencyc.com/php/sworks.php?rec=true&UID=39394, accessed 25 April 2024.]

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