General Prologue
The "General Prologue" is the first part of The Canterbury Tales by Geoffrey Chaucer. It introduces
the frame story, in which a group of pilgrims travelling to the shrine of Thomas Becket in Canterbury
agree to take part in a storytelling competition, and describes the pilgrims themselves. The
Prologue is arguably the most familiar section of The Canterbury Tales, depicting traffic between
places, languages and cultures, as well as introducing and describing the pilgrims who will narrate
the tales.[1]
The first lines from the General Prologue at
the opening folio of the Hengwrt
manuscript
Illustration of the knight from the General
Prologue. Three lines of text are also
shown.
The Tabard Inn, Southwark, around 1850
Synopsis
The frame story of the poem, as set out in the 858 lines of Middle English which make up the
General Prologue, is of a religious pilgrimage. The narrator, Geoffrey Chaucer, is in The Tabard Inn in
Southwark, where he meets a group of 'sundry folk' who are all on the way to Canterbury, the site of
the shrine of Saint Thomas Becket, a martyr reputed to have the power of healing the sinful.
The setting is April, and the prologue starts by singing the praises of that month whose rains and
warm western wind restore life and fertility to the earth and its inhabitants.[2] This abundance of life,
the narrator says, prompts people to go on pilgrimages; in England, the goal of such pilgrimages is
the shrine of Thomas Becket. The narrator falls in with a group of pilgrims, and the largest part of
the prologue is taken up by a description of them; Chaucer seeks to describe their 'condition', their
'array', and their social 'degree'. The narrator expresses admiration and praise towards the pilgrims'
abilities.[3]
The pilgrims include a knight; his son, a squire; the knight's yeoman; a prioress, accompanied by a
nun and the nun's priest; a monk; a friar; a merchant; a clerk; a sergeant of law; a franklin; a
haberdasher; a carpenter; a weaver; a dyer; a tapestry weaver; a cook; a shipman; a doctor of physic;
a wife of Bath; a parson and his brother, a plowman; a miller; a manciple; a reeve; a summoner; a
pardoner; the Host (a man called Harry Bailey); and Chaucer himself. At the end of this section, the
Host proposes that the group ride together and entertain one another with stories. He lays out his
plan: each pilgrim will tell two stories on the way to Canterbury and two on the way back. Whoever
has told the most meaningful and comforting stories, with "the best sentence and moost solaas"
(line 798) will receive a free meal paid for by the rest of the pilgrims upon their return. The company
agrees and makes the Host its governor, judge, and record keeper. They set off the next morning
and draw straws to determine who will tell the first tale. The Knight wins and prepares to tell his
tale.[4]
Structure
The General Prologue establishes the frame for the Tales as a whole (or of the intended whole) and
introduces the characters/storytellers. These are introduced in the order of their rank in accordance
with the three medieval social estates (clergy, nobility, and commoners and peasantry). These
characters are also representative of their estates and models with which the others in the same
estate can be compared and contrasted.
The structure of the General Prologue is also intimately linked with the narrative style of the tales.
As the narrative voice has been under critical scrutiny for some time, so too has the identity of the
narrator himself. Though fierce debate has taken place on both sides, (mostly contesting that the
narrator either is, or is not, Geoffrey Chaucer), most contemporary scholars believe that the narrator
is meant to be Chaucer himself to some degree. Some scholars, like William W. Lawrence, claim
that the narrator is Geoffrey Chaucer in person.[5] Others, like Marchette Chute for instance, contest
that the narrator is instead a literary creation like the other pilgrims in the tales.[6]
Chaucer makes use of his extensive literary and linguistic knowledge in the General Prologue by
interplaying Latin, French, and English words against each other. French was considered a
hierarchal, courtly, and aristocratic language during the Middle Ages, whereas Latin was the
language of learning. The opening lines of The Canterbury Tales show a diversity of phrasing by
including words of French origin like "droghte," "veyne," and "licour" alongside English terms for
nature: "roote," "holt and heeth," and "croppes."[7]
Sources
John Matthews Manly attempted to identify pilgrims with real fourteenth-century people. In some
instances, such as the Summoner and the Friar, he attempts localization to a small geographic area.
The Man of Law is identified as Thomas Pynchbek (also Pynchbeck), who was chief baron of the
exchequer. Sir John Bussy, an associate of Pynchbek, is identified as the Franklin. The Pembroke
estates near Baldeswelle supplied the portrait for the unnamed Reeve.[8]
Sebastian Sobecki argues that the General Prologue is a pastiche of the historical Harry Bailey's
surviving 1381 poll-tax account of Southwark's inhabitants.[9]
Jill Mann argued that the descriptions of pilgrims representing a spectrum of social roles is best
understood as standing in the tradition of medieval Estate satire.[10] Stephen Rigby observed the
General Prologue as commenting on medieval social inequality, noting that Chaucerians are divided
in their interpretations of Chaucer's outlook: some see Chaucer as defending the social order; others
argue that he meant to criticize it; and others still hold that he intended to leave it open to the
reader's interpretation.[11] On such interpretations, the pilgrims are less likely to correspond to
historical individuals and more likely to be versions of representative 'types': the friar, for example,
being a figure out of existing anti-fraternal literature.[12][13]
Translation
The following are the first 18 lines of the General Prologue. The text was written in a dialect
associated with London and spellings associated with the then-emergent Chancery Standard.
First 18 lines of the General Prologue
Sense-for-sense translation into
Word-for-word translation Modern English
Original in Middle English: [14]
into Modern English with a new rhyme scheme (by Nevill
Coghill)[15]
Whan that Aprill, with his shoures When [that] April with his showers
When in April the sweet showers fall
soote sweet
The droghte of March hath perced to The drought of March has pierced to And pierce the drought of March to the
the roote the root root, and all
The veins are bathed in liquor of such
And bathed every veyne in swich licour, And bathed every vein in such liquor,
power
Of whose virtue engendered is the As brings about the engendering of the
Of which vertu engendred is the flour;
flower; flower,
Whan Zephirus eek with his sweete When Zephyrus eke with his sweet When also Zephyrus with his sweet
breeth breath breath
Inspired hath in every holt and heeth Has inspired in every holt and heath, Exhales an air in every grove and heath
The tendre croppes, and the yonge Upon the tender shoots, and the young
The tender crops; and the young sun
sonne sun
Hath in the Ram his halfe cours His half course in the sign of the Ram
Has in the Ram his half-course run,
yronne, has run
And smale foweles maken melodye, And small fowls make melody, And the small fowl are making melody
That sleep away the night with open
That slepen al the nyght with open eye That sleep all the night with open eye
eye,
(So Nature pricks them in their (So nature pricks them and their heart
(So priketh hem Nature in hir corages);
courages); engages)
Thanne longen folk to goon on
Then folks long to go on pilgrimages Then folk long to go on pilgrimages,
pilgrimages
And palmeres for to seken straunge And palmers [for] to seek strange And palmers long to seek the stranger
strondes strands strands
To ferne halwes, kowthe in sondry To far-off hallows, couth in sundry Of far off saints, hallowed in sundry
londes; lands; lands,
And specially from every shires ende And, specially, from every shire's end And specially from every shires' end
Of Engelond, to Caunterbury they Of England, down to Canterbury they
Of England, to Canterbury they wend,
wende, wend
The hooly blisful martir for to seke The holy blissful martyr [for] to seek The holy blissful martyr, quick
That hem hath holpen, whan that they That has helped them when [that] To give his help to them when they
were seeke. they were sick. were sick.
In modern prose:
When April with its sweet showers has pierced March's drought to the root, bathing every vein in
such liquid by whose virtue the flower is engendered, and when Zephyrus with his sweet breath has
also enlivened the tender plants in every wood and field, and the young sun is halfway through Aries,
and small birds that sleep all night with an open eye make melodies (their hearts so goaded by
Nature), then people long to go on pilgrimages, and palmers seek faraway shores and distant saints
known in sundry lands, and especially they wend their way to Canterbury from every shire of
England to seek the holy blessed martyr, who helped them when they were ill.[16]
Gallery of the pilgrims
The Knight The Squire The Prioress The Second Nun
The Nun's Priest The Monk The Friar The Merchant
The Clerk of Oxford The Sergeant of Law The Franklin The Cook
The Shipman The Physician The Wife of Bath The Parson
The Miller The Manciple The Reeve The Summoner
The Pardoner Chaucer The Canon's Yeoman
{not part of the
original prologue but
added at the end of
the Tales}
References
1. Scala, Elizabeth (2017). "The General Prologue: Cultural Crossings, Collaborations, and
Conflicts" ([Link]
edu/gp1/) . The Open Access Companion to the Canterbury Tales. Archived from the original
([Link] on 2023-12-16. Retrieved 2024-02-07.
2. Christ, Carol, et al. The Norton Anthology of English Literature: Volume 1, W.W. Norton &
Company, 2012. pp. 241-243.
3. "The narrator, in fact, seems to be expressing chiefly admiration and praise at the superlative
skills and accomplishments of this particular group, even such dubious ones as the Friar's
begging techniques or the Manciple's success in cheating the learned lawyers who employ
him". Christ, Carol, et al. The Norton Anthology of English Literature: Volume 1, W.W. Norton &
Company, 2012. pp. 243.
4. Koff, Leonard Michael (1988). Chaucer and the Art of Storytelling ([Link]
ooks?id=I0w56KWBIw0C&pg=PA78) . U of California P. p. 78. ISBN 9780520059993.
Retrieved 9 October 2012.
5. Lawrence, William W. (1950). Chaucer and the Canterbury Tales ([Link]
aucercanterbur0000unse/page/28/mode/2up) . New York: Columbia University Press. p. 28.
"On the pilgrimage to Canterbury he not only introduces himself in person—one of the
commonest devices of the medieval storyteller—but gives himself an important part in the
action and makes himself constantly felt, not as a narrator, but as Geoffrey Chaucer in person."
6. Kimpel, Ben (1953). "The Narrator of the Canterbury Tales". ELH. 20 (2): 77–86.
doi:10.2307/2872071 ([Link] . JSTOR 2872071 ([Link]
[Link]/stable/2872071) .
7. Wetherbee, Winthrop (2004). Geoffrey Chaucer: the Canterbury tales (2nd ed.). Cambridge:
Cambridge University Press. ISBN 978-0-511-16413-2. OCLC 191935335 ([Link]
[Link]/oclc/191935335) .
8. John Matthews Manly (1926). Some New Light on Chaucer (New York ([Link]
m/read/815997/some-new-light-on-chaucer) . Henry Holt. pp. 131–57.
9. Sobecki, Sebastian (2017). "A Southwark Tale: Gower, the 1381 Poll Tax, and Chaucer's The
Canterbury Tales" ([Link] (PDF). Speculum. 92
(3): 630–660. doi:10.1086/692620 ([Link] . S2CID 159994357
([Link] .
10. Mann, Jill (1973). Chaucer and medieval estates satire; the literature of social classes and the
General Prologue to the Canterbury Tales. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
ISBN 052120058X.
11. Rigby, Stephen H. (2014-11-13), Minnis, Alastair; Rigby, Stephen H. (eds.), "Reading Chaucer:
Literature, History, and Ideology" ([Link]
1913419?redirectedFrom=fulltext) , Historians on Chaucer: The 'General Prologue' to the
Canterbury Tales, Oxford University Press, p. 11,
doi:10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199689545.003.0001 ([Link]
o%2F9780199689545.003.0001) , ISBN 978-0-19-968954-5, retrieved 2025-02-22
12. Geltner, Guy (2014-11-13), Minnis, Alastair; Rigby, Stephen (eds.), "The Friar" ([Link]
[Link]/book/12357/chapter-abstract/161926682?redirectedFrom=fulltext) , Historians on
Chaucer: The 'General Prologue' to the Canterbury Tales, Oxford: Oxford University Press,
pp. 156–69, doi:10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199689545.003.0009 ([Link]
prof%3Aoso%2F9780199689545.003.0009) , ISBN 978-0-19-968954-5, retrieved 2025-02-22
13. Campbell, William H. (2025-02-18). "Plesaunt was his absolucioun? Friars and Light Penances
in English History and Literature" ([Link] . Open
Library of Humanities. 11 (1). doi:10.16995/olh.16931 ([Link]
1) . ISSN 2056-6700 ([Link] .
14. This Wikipedia translation closely mirrors the translation found here: Canterbury Tales
(selected) ([Link] . Translated by Vincent
Foster Hopper (revised ed.). Barron's Educational Series. 1970. p. 2 ([Link]
s/canterburytaless0000chau/page/2) . ISBN 9780812000399. "when april, with his."
15. Gleason, Paul (2002). "Don DeLillo, T.S. Eliot, and the Redemption of America's Atomic Waste
Land" ([Link]
weet+showers+fall+++++And+pierce+the+drought+of+March+to+the+root,+and+all%22&pg=P
A131) . Underwords. Joseph Dewey, Steven G. Kellman and Irving Malin. Rosemont
Publishing & Printing Corp. p. 131. ISBN 9780874137859.
16. Sweet, Henry (2005). First Middle English Primer. Evolution Publishing: Bristol, Pennsylvania.
ISBN 1-889758-70-1.
External links
Chaucer, Geoffrey. " The Canterbury Tales: The General Prologue" ([Link]
edu/work/Chaucer/chaucer-prologue) . The Complete Works of Geoffrey Chaucer, Clarendon
Press, 1900 . Literature in Context: An Open Anthology.
[Link] . Accessed: 2024-01-
05T[Link].228Z
"General Prologue", middle-english hypertext with glossary and side-by-side middle english and
modern english ([Link]
Side by side Translation into Modern Verse - Illustrated ([Link]
0600/[Link] at the Wayback Machine (archived
September 8, 2017)
Modern Translation of the General Prologue and Other Resources at eChaucer ([Link]
com/home/echaucer/modern-translations/general-prologue-translation/) Archived ([Link]
[Link]/web/20191022110247/[Link]
s/general-prologue-translation/) 2019-10-22 at the Wayback Machine
"Prologue to The Canterbury Tales" – a plain-English retelling for non-scholars. ([Link]
[Link]/redShalfleet/[Link])
