Introduction:

I. Manuscript Description of G (CUL MS Gg.4.31):

I.1 Date:

xvii. See Ralph Hanna III, William Langland. Authors of the Middle Ages 3 (Aldershot: Variorum, 1993), 39; George Kane and E. Talbot Donaldson, eds, Piers Plowman. The B Version: Will's Visions of Piers Plowman, Do-Well, Do-Better and Do-Best. An Edition in the form of Trinity College Cambridge MS B.15.17, Corrected and Restored from the Known Evidence, with Variant Readings, rev. ed. (London: Athlone Press; Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press, 1988), 8, and, for further discussion, see I.4 and III.3.

I.2 Language:

With the exception of Latin quotations, all items are in English.

I.3 Previous Descriptions:

For previous descriptions see C. David Benson and Lynne S. Blanchfield, The Manuscripts of Piers Plowman: the B-version (Cambridge: D. S. Brewer, 1997), 40-43 and 129-136; Kane and Donaldson, The B Version, 8; Walter W. Skeat, ed., The Vision of William Concerning Piers the Plowman together with Vita de Dowel, Dobet et Dobest secundum Wit et Resoun by William Langland: Part II: The 'Crowley' Text; or Text B, EETS 38 (London: N. Trubner, 1869), xxiii; A Catalogue of the Manuscripts Preserved in the Library of the University of Cambridge (Cambridge: CUP, 1979), Gg-Kk.177; Marie-Claire Uhart, "The Early Reception of Piers Plowman" (PhD diss., University of Leicester, 1987), 262; description by M. R. James, available on request at Cambridge University Library.

I.4 Technical Description:

Paper ff.ii+106+ii. Front leaves and end leaves folio, marked i-iv in pencil. The first front-leaf and the second end-leaf have a watermark (a coat of arms), cf. Heawood, 655 and 662, present in the 1677 edition of Walter Raleigh's History of the World.N See Edward Heawood, Watermarks mainly of the 17th and 18th Centuries (Hilversum: Paper Publications Society , 1950), I.79. The main difference is in the orientation of the writing (I (?) DVRAND), present in a box below the coat of arms in Heawood: for this writing to appear the correct way up in G's front- and end-leaves the coat of arms has to be viewed upside down. In addition, the coat of arms as it appears in G contains only one (somewhat residual) fleur de lis rather than two. Since G was given to Cambridge University in 1656 by Robert Morgan,NSee description by M. R . James. it seems likely that the manuscript was rebound and provided with endleaves after that date.NThe account of the watermark as it appears in Benson and Blanchfield, who state that the waterwheel watermark appears in the flyleaves, is thus incorrect (and is not, in fact, what Kane and Donaldson say). See Benson and Blanchfield, Manuscripts, 41. Moreover, given the watermark date, it seems unlikely that the title, The Prophecies of Piers Plowman, which appears on the verso of the second front-leaf, can have been written at the same time as the remainder of the manuscript; and it was therefore probably not, despite Benson and Blanchfield's suggestion (Manuscripts, 42), written by "WH" (on whom see further I.10 and I.12). The main body of the text is thicker paper, quarto, with watermark, waterwheel with teeth + three oak leaves, cf. Briquet 13396 (1514),N In C. M. Briquet, Les filigranes: dictionnaire historique des marques du papier, dès leurs apparition vers 1282 jusqu'en 1600 (New York: Hacker, 1985). Heawood 4025 (1579), Heawood 4024 (undated). Of these three, the last is closest to G's watermark: like the mark in G, it lacks the stems with berries present in the Briquet, and the tail on the wheel, present in Heawood 4025. Heawood 4024 is a copy of a watermark in Michael Beazeley's collection of tracings of watermarks found in the manuscripts of the library of Canterbury Cathedral (2 vols, now BL Additional MSS 38637 and 38638)NThese tracings were made 17th July, 1896-24th May, 1900. and dates, according to Beazeley, from 1544 (see volume 1 items 245 and 246, and note 117 in Beazeley's accompanying notebooks). These twin watermarks as traced by Beazeley resemble the watermarks found in G in some detail (for instance, one twin has a drooping oak leaf, one does not).NA more detailed description of the watermarks is as follows: Line watermark, two versions (twins). Dimensions of Version A: 35x29mm.; since the manuscript is sometimes grubby, the relationship between the watermarks and the chain lines is not always easy to see.  However on f.4, viewed from the mould side, the watermark overlaps the chain line on either side of it: 28 [1+26+2] 26, with distances to the chain lines on either side of 28 (l) and 26 (r) mm. On f.30, the watermark appears to overlap slightly less [1+26+1] (f.43) suggesting the possibility of twins. 23 laid lines per 20mm. Distance between the chain lines varies between 28 and 29mm. I am grateful to Orietta Da Rold for advice on all aspects of paper manuscripts. Each quire is made up of a number of complete sheets (varying from two in quire 2 to four in quire 3), but the half sheets must have been cut before the quires were formed since, for example, in the case of quire 1, the two middle sheets (ff.4+7 and 5+6) both have watermarks, while the two outer sheets (cutout+f.11 and ff.1+10) both lack watermarks. Original foliation in ink (ff.1-101) sometimes cropped, together with modern foliation in pencil, normally making good losses due to cropping but sometimes in addition to the original (see, e.g., ff.7, 22, 23, 24). Size: 170x250mm. Heavy trimming: see, e.g., the loss of material added at the top of the page on f.25v.  Written space, (1): 232-240mm x 135-153mm., excluding the heading on f.1r; (2): 163mm x 225mm, excluding headings and explicits (this includes marginal summaries on the right and folio references on the left); (3): 125-135mm.x 200-210mm., excluding headings and explicits.Throughout, the only visible ruling is the writing frame (top and bottom rulings often difficult to see); in (1) the scribe frequently runs over the right-hand edge of the frame, and occasionally (as on f.87) over the left-hand edge; in (2) both the right-hand and left-hand edges are frequently overwritten. Written in a single column: (1) 33-45 lines; (2) 26-36 lines; (3) 28 lines (except on the final page). The paper used for (3) is cleaner and the material is more carefully centred (the lines, of course, are shorter). For marginalia see below.

I.5 Collation:

ii+112 (1 cut out), 28, 316, 4-812, 912 (12 missing)+ii. Quire signatures: A-I. No visible catchwords or leaf signatures.

I.6 Contents:

• 1. ff.1-101 William Langland, Piers Plowman, the B text, IMEV 1459.
• 2. ff. 101v-103 "þe table off pyers plowman."  Table of contents, printed in Benson and Blanchfield, Manuscripts, 133-35.NFor detailed discussion of this table, see Bryan P. Davis, "The Prophecies of Piers Plowman in Cambridge University Library MS Gg.4.31," Journal of the Early Book Society for the Study of Manuscripts and Printing History 5 (2002), 15-36, and Judith A. Jefferson, "Divisions, Collaborations and other topics: the table of contents in Cambridge University Library, MS Gg.4.31" in John A. Burrow and Hoyt N. Duggan, eds, Medieval Alliterative Poetry: Essays in Honour of Thorlac Turville-Petre (Dublin:Four Courts Press, 2010), 140-152.
• 3. ff.104-105v "A goodly preaer," IMEV 532 ed. Carleton Brown, Religious Lyrics of the Fifteenth Century (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1952), 86-9, from Huntington MS HM 501 (with collations from this manuscript).

I.7 Handwriting:

One hand, early 16th-century Secretary (often careless, especially as far as minims are concerned)NSee notes to G.1.36, G.1.167, G.1.199, G.1.200 etc. for the main body of the text of all items.  The same hand writes the rubricated sections, though these are in a different, more careful script; e.g. a forwards rather than a backwards facing <e>, regular use of lower case <i> (which otherwise normally appears as <I> or <y>), <d>, <h>, <l> and <b> without loops etc. As Benson and Blanchfield point out, these scripts are sometimes mixed in the marginal notes, while the final explicit of the "A goodly preaer" on f.105v is written in the main ink but uses the script of the rubricated sections.NBenson and Blanchfield, Manuscripts, 132 and 42. The two scripts are also sometimes mixed in the main body of the text, as, for example, at the top of f.49v.

I.8 Punctuation:

In (1) the virgule is used regularly to indicated the midline break in the later section of the text, less frequently near the beginning. Missing virgules are inserted later in brown ink, apparently by the main scribe (see discussion at IV.1.7). Double points (like colons) are used in the rubricated sections and points, double points and double virgules are regularly used at the end of rubricated passages. Rubricated lines are frequently bracketed together. Curved brackets, sometimes indistinguishable from virgules, are used to highlight names etc. (see the highlighting of chastyte etc. at the bottom of f.24v) and important items are occasionally highlighted by means of a double point on either side (see, e.g. :pacientes vi[n]cunt: on f.61v). Double points, as well as the occasional virgule, are used to indicate the midline break in (3) and stops, double points and what appear to be commas (possibly resulting from the influence of printing practice) appear at line ending.

I.9 Corrections:

For discussion of corrections to the text, see II.1.

I.10 Decoration and Presentation:

Latin material, whether part of the text or an explicit/incipit, appears in red in the text of Piers Plowman, though not in the table of contents or in "A goodly preaer." Some names (Iesus, dauid, Iudas which appear in what is otherwise Latin material) are also in red. In the table of contents, marginalia by WH (see I.12) is underlined in red on f.103, as is the word profycy (f.102v). Capital letters are infrequent: proper nouns do not normally begin with a capital and nor does the first word of the line.  Decorated capitals, however, mark the beginning of chapters.These, together with the signs which link the table of contents to material in the text, may have been added by WH rather than by the main scribe: WH often decorates capital letters in his marginalia with small curved niches or cups (see ff.69v and 72v), decoration which resembles that found on the capital letters at the beginning of the chapters (see, in particular, the capital <L> at the beginning of Visio chapter 17 (f.24r)), and A. I Doyle has suggested that this second group of decorated capitals may well have been provided by WH.NSee Kane and Donaldson, The B Version, 8.  The chapter capitals in turn resemble the capitals used to link the table references to prophecy to the relevant sections of the text; see especially the capital <S> on ff.2v and 101v and compare with the similar <S> at the beginning of the second chapter of Dowell (f.34v).NFor a more detailed account of WH's involvement, see Jefferson, "Divisions, Collaboration and other topics," 148-50.

I.11 Provenance:

Owned and annotated, apparently at the time when the manuscript was being prepared, by "WH" (see I.10 and I.12). There is no further trace of the manuscript until it was acquired by CUL as a gift from Robert Morgan in 1656 (M.R. James).

I.12 Marginalia:

Marginalia appear in the hand of the main scribe (on f.2v þe profycy | off þe catt, on f.3v mater ecclesia etc.) and in two other hands. Marginalia made by hand 2 are sometimes signed "WH" (see ff. 69v and 72v and the marginal note to the table of contents on f.103).  This hand is very similar to that of the main scribe. WH seems to have been involved in the preparation of the manuscript: the red underlining of WH's note on f.103 suggests, as Benson and Blanchfield observe,NBenson and Blanchfield, Manuscripts, 132. that his marginal additions may have been made at the time of writing or rubrication, and he also appears to have added the title at the beginnning of the Visio.  Benson and Blanchfield suggest that "WH" should perhaps be identified with the main scribe,NBenson and Blanchfield, Manuscripts, 42. but this seems unlikely. Quite apart from the fact that WH initials his contributions and therefore appears to wish to distinguish them from the original scribe's marginalia, there are the following differences: WH uses a double-lobed <a>, the original scribe an <a> with a single lobe; WH uses a form of <y> with no gap between the right hand side of the bowl and the descender, whereas the <y> used by the original scribe consistently has such a gap; WH consistently spells "prophecy" with medial <ph>, whereas the original scribe (when not actually copying) consistently uses an <f>;  WH's abbreviation for "folio" is fol, whereas the original scribe consistently uses fo; and finally, as we have seen, the original scribe makes only restricted use of capitals, whereas WH uses two capitals (a capital <R> and a capital <B>) in the course of five marginal notesNff.69v and 103. (and see also the comment Nota in primo passu de do better for Clarkes ad signum w h on f.106v which, though not initialled in the same way, also appears to be by this particular scribe). Later marginal comments on passages dealing with clerical wrongdoing are made in a sixteenth-century italic hand (see ff.42v, 44v, 72v).

I.13 Binding:

Blind-tooled, late 17th century (Kane and Donaldson, The B-Text).  The binding of the spine has been renewed; according to a note on the first fly-leaf, repairs were carried out by Douglas Cockerell and Son of Letchworth in July 1962.  The title on the spine now reads Piers Plowman, with Gg.4.31 at the bottom. An earlier title, The Prophecies of Piers Plowman, together with the letter G and the numbers 4 and 31, has been cut out of the discarded binding and stuck onto the end pastedown.

II. The Text and its Correctors:

II.1 Corrections:

II.1.1 Corrections Made by the Original Scribe:

As noted above (I.7) one scribe was responsible for the transcription of both the main body of the text and the rubricated sections. Occasionally a correction to the main text will be made in the rubricating ink or a correction to the rubricated section will be made in the original grey ink. So at G.20.439 he is added above the line with a caret mark but then crossed out in red ink, while at G.15.309 sanitas is written in red ink and ti (to give sanitatis) added above the line in grey ink. The scribe who made the original transcription also made, in fact, a considerable number of corrections. Where these are in the original ink and thus appear to have been carried out at the time of the original transcription, they have been recorded as corrections by hand1. Later corrections, in the same hand but in brown ink, have been recorded as corrections by hand1.1.NThe identification of the brown ink corrector with the original scribe is based mainly on comparison of scripts where such corrections are substantial (see, e.g., the - admittedly cropped - line added at the top of f.31v), but there is other suggestive evidence such as the treatment of superscript <a>: compare, for instance, the use of superscript <a> by the original scribe at G.8.189 (f.32 l.33) with that of the brown ink corrector at G.6.342 (f.20v l.36). Moreover, as will become clear in the course of this discussion, the types of correction carried out in the two inks are often very similar. The use of a single rather than a double-lobed <a> for corrections such as that at G.2.86 (added all) further suggests that this particular corrector is the original scribe, rather than WH (for whom see Introduction I.10 and I.12). WH seems, in fact, to have carried out corrections which post dated the <u> to <v> corrections (see Introduction II.1.2).

II.1.1.2 Corrections by Hand1:

The majority of changes made by hand1 are corrections of minor transcription errors such as those caused by misreading (looped letters in particular cause trouble).NSo at G.2.58 <f> is written then crossed out and replaced by <h>, the initial letter of husbandrye and see also corrections at G.3.158 (k > l), G.5.121 (ch > cl), G.7.10 (b > l), G.8.117 (h > l). Occasionally hand1 appears to delete material simply because it is slightly blotted, as at G.1.172 (deleted <pl-> followed by play) and at G.2.16 (deleted to rewritten). Very occasionally he will make an alteration which shows him considering the meaning of the text. Thus at G.15.335 he writes synne, which is the correct reading, but then replaces it with well (which makes more immediate sense). Hand1 also, however, makes two types of correction which are particularly interesting: spelling alterations and corrections which suggest the influence of more than one exemplar.

II.1.1.2.1 Spelling Changes:

See, for example, G.1.64 sryue > shryue, and similar corrections at G.1.89, G.4.44, G.6.312, G.6.423; G.2.36 drynge (?) > drynke, and see also G.2.187 no-thynk > no-thyng, G.16.124 thyngethe > thynkethe; G.2.108 meryer > myryer; G.2.136 hytt > ytt; G.2.178 weyun > weyen; G.3.48 tonhe > tonge ("tongue"); G.3.68 syuyll > cyuyll, and see also the similar correction at G.3.144; G.4.196 robedest > robbdest; G.6.140 lymytours > lymytovrs, and see also the similar correction at G.14.375; G.6.151 lywen > lybben > lyven.NFurther examples include the following: G.6.229 hucce written then <cce> overwritten with <k> followed by < kerye > giving hukkerye; G.6.281 he ("high") > hye ; G.6.354 y[h]ys (="his"); G.6.477 robber > robbere; G.6.477 redder > reddere; G.6.581 coem (pl. vb.) > covm; G.6.601 hys (= "is") > ys, and see also G.12.311; G.6.663 mast > meyst; G.7.1 bote > but; G.7.14 kynnyth > kennyth; G.7.64 breed ("bread") > breyd; G.7.328 meye ("may" pl.) >mowe; G.8.56 thyse ("these") > thyese; G.8.94 I-nohe > I-noghe; G.10.31 shape > shappe; G.10.45 trugh ("through") > thrugh; G.10.113 leuelode > lyuelode and see also G.16.562 leuen > lyuen; G.10.168 conceptyoun > conceptyon; G.10.176 pair- > payre; G.11.81 pestelence > pestylence; G.12.21 wole > wyle; G.12.80 babtyzyng > baptyzyng and see also G.17.260 babtyst > baptyst; G.12.392 wettnessythe > wyttnessythe; G.13.78 clarge/clargee > clargye (the <y> is written over the first <e> but it is not clear whether the final <e> was already present); G.13.267 wenge > wynge; G.13.288 fure > fyre; G.14.171 hete > heate; G.14.247 treght > trewght and see also G.19.125 trethe > trewthe; G.14.366 sleythes > sleygthes; G.14.372 ploughe > plought; G.14.434 lycyfers > lvcyfers; G.15.76 sayeth > sayethe (see note to this line); G.15.96 fayte ("faith") > fayhte; G.16.47 speche >speeche; G.16.82 pomp > pompe (see note to this line); G.16.135 lemmans > lemmanes (this alteration restores the line final dip, but the G scribe's practice elsewhere does not suggest that this was particularly important to him); G.16.437 flesse > flesshe, and see also charyssyng altered to charysshyng at G.5.119; G.16.503 reioyce > reIoyce; G.16.543 wonyen > wonnen; G.17.83 profete > prophete; G.17.104 koug{..} > couthe; G.18.99 word > world; G.19.309 lenghed > lengthed; G.19.389 hend ("end") >end; G.20.329 byhend > byhynd; G.21.131 eyre ("ear") > yeyre; G.21.156 sone ("soon") > soone.

Some of these changes may be corrections of errors rather than spelling alterations, or may simply reflect a desire to copy accurately. In general, however, the alterations seem to show a desire to replace less standard with more standard forms (word > world at G.18.99, for instance). A number of such alterations affect possibly original Midlands or West Midlands forms.NFor further discussion of West Midlands relicts in the text, see III.4.3. Thus fure ("fire") > fyre (G.13.288; see LALME 1, Dot Map 412); -ng(- (in words such as "drink," "think") > ‑nk(- (G.2.36 etc.; see LALME 4.321); lybben > lyven (G.6.151; see LALME 1, Dot Map 468).NFor treatment of this word, see the note at III.4.3.6. If the spellings of "come" at G.6.581 (coem > covm) are intended to indicate a long vowel, then the original <oe> may also be Western.NFor variation between ME ŭ and ō, see E. J. Dobson, English Pronunciation 1500-1700, 2 vols (Oxford, Clarendon Press, 1957), §18. For spellings of "good" with <oe> see Angus McIntosh, M. L. Samuels and Michael Benskin, A Linguistic Atlas of Late Medieval English, vol.4 (Aberdeen: Aberdeen University Press, 1986), 139. However, <oe> was also a spelling used by Dutch compositors whom Caxton, for instance, employed; see Vivian Salmon, "Orthography and Punctuation," in Roger Lass, ed., The Cambridge History of the English Language, vol.3 1476-1776 (Cambridge: CUP, 1999), 24. The form bote (altered to but at G.7.1) is also found widely in the West Midlands (see LALME 4, item 91),NThe form does, however, also occur in Northern dialects such as those of Lancashire and Yorkshire (see Dobson, English Pronunciation, §196). as are forms of "is" with initial <h> (G.6.601, see LALME 1, Dot Map 136), and note also alteration to -yen infinitives such as wonyen (> wonnen at G.16.543; see LALME 4.324). The Southern and Midlands form wole is altered to wyle at G.12.21.NThere are 35 instances of the singular verb wole in the text beside 64 with medial <y>. Not all spelling changes affect Midlands or West Midlands forms, however. There are, for instance, signs that the scribe found Northern dialect forms in his exemplar and that these too were sometimes replaced with a more standard form.NNote, however, the change from meryer to myryer (G.2.108), which replaces a southerly with a more northerly form, and likewise the alteration of shape to shappe (G.10.31) (see III.4.1). Thus he ("high") > hye (G.6.281; see LALME 1, Dot Map 440, 4, item 149),NAt G.3.34 hand1 alters hey ("high") to he but this does not necessarily mean that he is being inconsistent. The following word, in this particular instance, is heyuen (the scribe writes hey he heyuen) and the alteration therefore appears to be a matter of eyeskip followed by correction rather than a spelling change. while I-nohe (G.8.94, altered to I-noghe) appears to be an isolated Yorkshire form (LALME 4, item 113). Chyldes (G.1.35, altered to chylderen) is also probably Northern (according to the OED the plural in -s descends from ONorthumbrian cildas; the forms cited are from the Lindisfarne Gospels and the Towneley Plays), while forms of "length(en)" in lengh- (altered to length- at G.19.309) are also common in the North, though they can also be found in Devon, Hereford, Gloucester and Wiltshire (LALME 4, item 43). Lowering of short ĭ to ě, as in wenge, wettnessythe (G.13.267, G.12.392) could be characteristic of either the South West or the North (Dobson, English Pronunciation, §80).N"Wing" would originally have had e cf. ON vængr but the e would have been raised to i before ng; see Joseph Wright and E. M. Wright, An Elementary Middle English Grammar (Oxford: OUP, 1923), §132. The form trugh ("through") altered to thrugh at G.10.45 is recorded by LALME in Devon and NME and trughe is recorded for Nottinghamshire (LALME 4, item 54). For the treatment of forms in <ss> for /∫/ and <sr> for /∫r/, see III.4.1.

A number of changes appear to be due to the date of the transcription. Note, for instance, the use of <y> to indicate a long vowel in corrected breyd (G.7.64),NFor further discussion of this digraph, see III.2 and III.4.1 below. as well as the alteration of hete to heate at G.14.171 (although this particular digraph is used only sporadically),NFor further discussion of this aspect of the scribe's spelling, see III.2. of speche to speeche at G.16.47, and of sone ("soon") to soone at G.21.156. The alteration of what would have been huccerye to hukkerye at G.6.229 presumably reflects the fact that <c> followed by <e> has become a digraph for /s/,NFor the replacement of <s> by <ce> in the later corrections of this scribe, see II.1.1.3.2 while the use of consonant+ <e> to indicate a long vowel and of a double consonant to indicate a short may well be the reason for the change from robedest to robbdest at G.4.196. It is difficult to make a judgment about the reason of the change from koug{..} to couthe (G.17.104) on the basis of the distribution of these forms in Middle English,NSee LALME 4, item 91. Forms in <k> are very widespread. but this too may be at least partly a matter of the development of a spelling convention (the use of <c> for /k/ except where the following letter was an <e> or and <i>). The change of hytt to ytt (G.2.136) also probably results from date since the form without <h> supplanted the earlier form in the standard language in the 15th century,NWright, Middle English Grammar, § 374. Wright notes, however, that hit remained (and still remains) in Northumbrian and Scottish. and the same may well be true of the change of conceptyoun to conceptyon (G.10.168; see OED s.v. conception).

A number of alterations may simply be a matter of improving the clarity of the text. Thus minims are occasionally altered to other letters (e.g. pair- > payre at G.10.176, lymytours > lymytovrs at G.6.140). This may also be the motivation for the alteration of reioyce to reIoyce at G.16.503, although it is possible that this spelling reflects the beginning of the distinction between <i> and <j>.NAccording to Scragg, the first division between <i> and <j> occurred in the sixteenth century, although there was still confusion between these letters for some time after that date; see D. G. Scragg, A History of English Spelling (Manchester: Manchester University Press, 1974), 81. Görlach dates the functional distinction between the two letters to 1630-40; see Manfred Görlach, Introduction to Early Modern English (Cambridge: CUP, 1991), 48. The alteration of kynnythNPresumably with Late ME rising, see Dobson, English Pronunciation, §77. to kennyth at G.7.14 may also reflect a scribal desire for clarity, but this could just be a matter of wishing to employ the more standard form. Occasionally the scribe appears to restore the spelling of the French or Latin original, thus pestelence > pestylence and pomp > pompe, profete > prophete (G.11.81, G.16.82, G.17.83).NFor the last of these, however, see discussion at I.12.

II.1.1.2.2 Manuscript Relationships:

A small number of corrections involve erroneous readings found in other B manuscripts or readings found in A or C. Thus at G.21.62 so (as Bx) > so sore (BF reads sore), while at G.18.296 askethe > lakkethe (the latter is the reading of Bx; "asketh" is the reading of all C manuscripts). However, such instances are not numerous enough or convincing enough to suggest relationships and could almost always be explained as coincidental variation (often involving the updating of obsolete forms), and it is not therefore possible to draw any very firm conclusions from this evidence.

II.1.1.3 Corrections by Hand1.1:

A number of changes are also made by the original scribe in a different (brown) ink (hand1.1). Such changes appear to have been made at a time when the scribe, having completed the original transcription, was able to concentrate more closely on details such as spelling, as well as on other editorial matters.

II.1.1.3.1 Correction of Error and Change of Meaning:

Many of hand1.1's alterations are simply corrections of scribal errors, see, e.g., the addition of a line at the top of the page (G.8.149), the addition of all at G.2.86 and the alterations of thy to the (G.2.103), was to way (G.3.217), clere to clerke (G.4.3) and come to comen (G.14.271). Editorial intervention to clarify meaning is also not uncommon. Very occasionally, this may hint at the views of the corrector, as at G.8.187 dynglyche > dynglycher, thus adding emphasis: Dowell is not only a good thing, but it is actually better than papal pardons. Usually, however, such intervention arises either from misunderstanding of the original or from confusion caused by a transcription errror. Sometimes such changes restore the original meaning. Thus at G.8.170 the original scribes writes danyell seyde þe kyng for Bx Daniel seyde sire Kynge, an error which results in a change of speaker, but hand1.1 corrects this by adding to: danyell seyde [to] þe kyng. More often than not, however, such interventions either result in or compound error. A number of such emendations result from the failure to understand particular words. Thus to > dyd at G.1.129 (due to misunderstanding of "lowed"); emme > envye at G.1.224; meane ("meinie") > menne at G.11.98;NThe OED lists menne as a possible spelling of "meinie" but it is not G's usual form (see G's readings at G.2.109, G.4.24, G.17.245) and it seems likely that the corrector is confused (partly by the loss of he earlier in the line, which deprives the verb of its subject). at G.6.453 flatt > fell flatt (according to the OED the use of "flat" to mean "dashed" had died out by the end of the fourteenth century); at G.8.196 tryennales ("three years' worth of indulgence," a word not recorded as a noun after the fourteenth century) > tryenttales ("30 requiem masses"). At G.14.161 the original transcription has loume for Bx laumpe, and this is altered to lovnge (presumably "long"). At G.17.57 the original transcription reads theeve for Bx threve ("bundle") and hand1.1 alters this to Feve ("a few"). At G.18.344, the corrector fails to recognise contrarye as a verb and adds a preceding definite article. At G.19.281, queyntyce (which according to the OED does not survive the fifteenth century) is altered to qveyntance. At G.20.255, the corrector alters þe prys neyte ("the best animal") to þe pryce of þe neyte (i.e. he doesn't understand the phrase and interprets pryce as "price"). Failure to pay attention to the overall context results in the mistaken addition of not at G.3.121 (mede [not] a mulyer). A number of errors result from the influence of the adjacent text. Thus at G.4.17 kyng > kyndlye (picked up from two lines above).NFor Kane and Donaldson's interpretation of the alteration involved, see the note to this line. At G.20.30 hand1.1 alters wynnethe to wonnethe (presumably influenced by wonnethe at G.20.34), while at G.6.239 he adds erroneous afore (presumably influenced by therfore at the end of the previous line).NKane and Donaldson record this as part of the original transcription, but the ink is clearly brown rather than grey. Elsewhere, hand1.1 makes improvements to the text, clarifying or making it more emphatic, or attempting to make sense of earlier transcription errors: G.1.66 adds not; G.2.70 adds to;NSee also the addition of to at G.2.81. This latter alteration brings G into line with a number of B manuscripts as well as most A and C manuscripts, but it seems quite likely that the brown ink corrector acted independently. G.3.22 belyed hyr to > alyed hyr wyth (given the erroneous use of "her" for "him" by almost all B manuscripts including G, belyed to does not make sense); G.3.204 the (misreading of <ye>) altered to they. At G.7.70, the original transcription has asken for Bx alkyn, and an attempt is made to make sense of this by altering the reading to as ffor. At G.12.407, most B manuscripts read quod I but G reads quod It: once again, this does not make sense and the corrector adds <he> (resulting in quod he It). At G.19.307 the original transcription reads doones (as BLO) for Bx done ("make of," "kind of") and the corrector alters to doomes.

II.1.1.3.2 Spelling Changes:

The number of spelling changes made by hand1.1 is considerable; spelling changes made at the time of the original transcription are only spasmodic by comparison. However, the motivation behind the two sets of changes appears to be similar. Thus a considerable number of hand1.1's alterations appear to be motivated by a desire to improve the text's clarity. He attempts to remove, for instance, the possibility of minim confusion (including possible confusion between <n> and <u>) by systematically altering <u> to another letter,NFor corrections made for this purpose by hand1, see II.1.1.2.1 above. most frequently to <v>: see, e.g., G.1.5 maluerne > malverne; G.1.11 meruelous > mervelovs, sweuene > swevene; G.1.14 tour > tovr; G.1.16 dredefull > dredefvll; G.1.20, G.1.23 and G.1.25 putten > pvtten.NIt will be clear from these examples that the distinction between the vowel and the consonant plays no part in these alterations (and would not be expected to do so since the two letters were not normally phonetically distinguished until the seventeenth century; see Görlach, Early Modern, 48). However, alteration to <o> is also reasonably common, see, e.g., G.3.119, G.4.69, G.4.89, G.4.170, G.4.306 suyche > soyche; G.2.73 suche > soche; G.1.130, G.3.39, G.3.170 shuld > shold (though note also changes to <v> at G.1.37, G.1.79, G.1.82 etc.); G.7.270 supper > sopper.NPossibly as a result of French influence, cf. OF soper beside super. Occasionally <u> is altered to another letter. Thus at G.21.80, fluxes > flyxes (following the French pronunciation), while at G.19.120 burde > byrde. An attempt is apparently made to alter all examples of <u>, and the scribe as a consequence, occasionally alters an <n> by mistake, so at G.1.192 renke > revke, at G.1.221 mynores > myvores, at G.6.158 monthes > movthes etc. The letter <w> is also occasionally altered to <v> as at G.9.6, G.9.26, wysse > vysse.NNote also the alteration of ruwth to rveth at G.5.110.

Other corrections may reflect changes in spelling conventions, or at least a recognition of the need for such conventions (for similar changes by hand1, see II.1.1.2.1). Thus, where /s/ at the end of a word is integral to that word (i.e. where it does not represent, for instance, a plural inflexion), the spelling is regularly altered from <s> to <ce>. Thus movs > movce, ons / ones > once / onece, elles > ellece (G.1.181, G.1.213, G.5.88, G.19.362).NThe desire to make such a distinction is still reflected in modern spelling, though <se> is perhaps more commonly used for this purpose than <ce> (purse, worse, dense etc.). See discussion by Görlach, Early Modern, 47. The convention that <c> followed by <e> = /s/ presumably provided part of the motivation for the spelling change at G.20.473 where vycer > vykerr. Occasionally (and not surprisingly) the scribe makes an error. Thus pryces (G.19.270, an error for "princes") is altered to pryncece (a misreading of the masculine plural as a feminine singular). Items which already have, for example, -sse, and which presumably had such a reading in the scribe's exemplar, are not subject to alteration (see, for example, wyckednesse (G.9.98) and compare with falssnes which is altered to falssnece at G.17.160). Confusion about spelling conventions is suggested by the fact that at G.21.14 caas becomes cace, suggesting that final -e was considered to provide an adequate indication of a long vowel, although such <e>s are presumably not considered to be indicators of length in the case of words such as solace (altered from solas at G.13.151), or in pryncece and falssnece cited above. Confusion about the function of final <e> as an indicator of vowel length may also be the reason for the addition of <y> at G.3.224 where poundemale > povndemayle (assuming that the <y> is present to indicate a long vowel).NAnd note also G.11.30, delene > deleyne. Since delene is a plural verb, the addition of <y> here is presumably an error caused by the fact that the word ends in a single consonant + <e>, something which suggested to the scribe a preceding long vowel. For similar alterations by hand1, see II.1.1.2.1, and for further discussion of the G scribe's spelling practice see III.2.

Spelling modernizaton is also evident in the change of coniured to conIvred at G.16.14 (for a similar alteration by hand1, see above, II.1.1.2.1 paragraph 4), in the change of coppe to cvppe at G.11.318 (the OED suggests that spellings with <o> died out at the end of the fifteenth century),NSee also G.14.111 and note. At G.4.22 the brown ink corrector (i.e. presumably hand1.1) alters coupes first to cvvpes and then to cvppes. A similar correction (coope (?) > covpe) is made in black ink at G.6.342, presumably at the time of writing. and in the alteration of moste (vb.) to mvste at G.7.296, G.8.116, G.10.15, G.14.181 etc.NAccording to the OED, forms in <o> do not survive the fifteenth century, though Wright records such forms for Ulster and Somerset in the post-medieval period (Joseph Wright, The English Dialect Grammar (Oxford: OUP, 1905), §169). At G.13.187 and G.19.207, mot(t)e is altered to mvste. Consonant doubling is clearly employed to indicate short vowels.NSee further III.2. In the case of "son" it seems likely that the spelling found in the scribe's exemplar was the etymologically correct <sone>: this is the original spelling at G.2.5 and G.2.167 and it appears sporadically up to the end of G passus 10 after which the form is consistently <sonne>. Where only a single <n> is present in the original transcription the brown ink corrector regularly (though not invariably) adds a macron over the <o> (see G.2.5, G.2.167, G.6.657, G.9.27). Doubling of consonants also occurs in "boat," where the vowel has presumably been subject to Late Middle English / Early Modern English shortening,NThe form bottes ("boats") appears in the 1523 translation of Froissart made by Sir John Bourchier, Lord Berners, for which see H. C. Wyld, A History of Modern Colloquial English, 3rd ed. (Oxford: Basil Blackwell, 1953), 255, while Dobson (English Pronunciation, §33) records ŏ in "boat" in Wharton. although note that written double <o> is still present (boot[t]e, G.9.30, G.9.31, G.9.36 etc); and see also the doubling of <t> in wot[t] (G.4.339), woot[t]e (G.19.210, G.19.211), mat[t]yn[ce] (G.6.462), met[t]e (G.9.3), moot[t]e (G.20.355), ga[t]ten (G.21.154). At G.1.117 comune > commvne, while at G.20.473 vycer > vykerr, the doubling of <r> presumably indicating a short second vowel.NNote also G.2.70 where letture ("hinderer") is altered to letterr.

Further spelling (and other minor) corrections by hand1.1 include:

G.1.193 conynges > conynes; G.1.196, G.3.41 srewe > shrewe; G.2.206 seluen > selve (and see also G.3.128); G.3.163 westmyster > westmynster (and see also G.21.130 and G.21.285); G.4.48 whe ("we") > wee; G.4.241 o ("one") > on; G.4.267 amales > annales (minim added); G.6.89 werpe (preterite) > werped; G.6.400 rutte (preterite) >rvtted; G.6.639 systren > systres; G.9.87 broke (pp.) >broken; G.12.409 knowe > knowen; G.9.96 haly (infinitive) > hale; G.11.35 wolye > holye.NFurther examples are as follows: G.11.430 raunceunde (?) > ravnseonyde (see note to this line); G.12.14 heyghes ("eyes") > heyghtes (see note to this line); G.13.60 byt > byd; G.17.191 thynge > thyngees; G.19.64 dyme > dymme (added macron); G.19.157 wenyme ("venom") > wenome; G.19.169 rennyng > rvnnyng; G.19.178 wat > what; G.19.178 he ("she") > she; G.19.187 suster > syster; G.19.193 vnlouke > vnlocke; G.20.96 wyles ("stratagems") > whyles; G.20.158 woote > wootethe; G.21.160 sleughe > slovgthe, G.21.214 sleuthe > slovthe, G.21.371 slewthe > slowthe; G.21.160 wexe (pret.) > wexed.

As was the case with the hand1 spelling alterations, less standard forms (including dialect forms) are regularly replaced by more standard. Thus West Midlands he for "she" (LALME 1, Dot Maps 11 and 16) and suster for "sister" (LALME 1, Dot Map 412) are altered to she and syster (G.19.178 and G.19.187),NSamuels suggests, however, that the form used by Langland for "she" may well have been heo rather than he. The latter would clearly fulfill the demands of the alliteration equally well, but Samuels points to the survival of the non-Eastern form heo in Eastern A and B manuscripts (M. L. Samuels, "Langland's Dialect," in The English of Chaucer and his Contemporaries: Essays by M. L. Samuels and J. J. Smith, ed. J. J. Smith (Aberdeen: Aberdeen University Press, 1988), 72 and 81, note 16). while the original spelling wolye (altered to holye) also seems likely to have been western.NThe /w/ on-glide developed before both ō- and hō- (see Wyld, History, 306-8). Although the evidence is not entirely clear, Wyld suggests the possibility that such forms are mainly western. Woly occurs without correction at G.1.190, G.14.426, G.16.455, G.19.402. Southern and Midlands wat becomes what (G.19.178),N<w> rather than <wh> was used in these areas for words with weak sentence stress (see Karl Brunner, An Outline of Middle English Grammar, trans. Grahame Johnston (Oxford: Basil Blackwell, 1963), §32, Note 2). The alteration of wyles ("stratagems") to whyles at G.20.96 is presumably an error. and the back spelling whe ("we") is altered to wee. The verb haly ("haul, draw") is regularised to hale, in line with the original OF (according to the OED, forms in <y> do not survive the fourteenth century) and modernisation of strong preterites also occurs: werpe is altered to the weak werped, rutte becomes rvtted and wexe (G.19.134) becomes wexed,NThe OED evidence suggests that the strong preterite werpe died out at the end of the fifteenth century, while wexe died out at the end of the fourteenth. while further normalisation of inflexions includes the alteration of the present tense verb woote to wootethe (G.20.158), and of the plural nouns systren and thynge to systres and thyngees .NThis last alteration (at G.17.191) could conceivably reflect the influence of B manuscripts other than COC2YBR, but an independent change seems equally likely. The past participles broke and knowe become broken and knowen.NForms with -n are, of course, standard in Modern English for these verbs. The change of vnlouke to vnlocke (G.19.193) is also a modernisation since, according to the OED forms in -ou- (<OE -ū-; forms in -o- are Scandinavian) did not survive the fourteenth century,NThe brown ink corrector is not consistent in his treatment of this word since at G.19.250 louke > lovke, i.e. all he notices at this point is the <u>. and updating is also evident in the changes of rennyng to rvnnyng (G.19.169),NSee OED run, v. A.II.9. β and γ. o ("one") to on,NAccording to the OED (one A.1.δ), the form without <n> died out in the fifteenth century. of wenyme > wenome (G.19.157),NThough forms in <i> persisted until the sixteenth century, they were gradually replaced by forms in <o> (see OED venom n.). and probably of westmyster to westmynster.NThe MED accepts westmyster as a possible form; the OED treats it simply as an error.

For Hand1.1 corrections involving the addition of virgules, see IV.1.7.

II.1.1.3.3 Manuscript Relations:

Once again, although some corrections involve readings found in other B manuscripts or in A or C (see, e.g., G.2.36 deylytable [as Bx] > deylectable [as BC2H]; G.20.64 feythly [as Bx] > feythfully [as CMcVcAcFcNcN]), such correspondences are not numerous enough to suggest manuscript relationships and can usually be explained as coincidental variants.

II.1.2 Further Corrections:

A number of corrections appear to have been made neither by the original scribe at the time of writing nor by the same scribe at the time when he made his <u> to <v> corrections. Thus at G.2.80 hand1.1 alters courbed to covrbed but this is then crossed out and replaced with crouched (also in brown ink). The use of <u> rather than <v> in this second alteration may itself suggest that hand1.1 was not responsible, but in any case the script, and in particular the elaborate initial <c>, is not hand1.1's usual form, but resembles instead that use by the scribe who wrote the comment "Nota in primo passu de do better to Clarkes ad signum w h" on f.106v.NAnd see also the (duplicating) quire signature at the foot of f.20r. This scribe appears to be the same as the scribe who initialled the marginalia on ff.69v, 72v and 103, i.e. WH (for whom see further Introduction I.10 and I.12). Brown ink corrections in a similar script occur at G.2.110 (where the form of the added <&> differs from that employed by hand1.1), G.2.184 (hand1.1 would normally employ an abbreviation rather than yogh for the added plural inflexion), G.3.68 (sey ("saw") > seyd to; note the angular script and the backward-facing <s> in the addition), G.4.110 and G.4.117 (hennes > from hennes and kyng > kyng he; once again, compare with the script on ff. 69v and 106v), G.4.113 and G.6.626 (ye > yea and In > In after; in both cases, note the double-lobed <a>). A number of black ink corrections may also have been carried out by WH. See, e.g., the correction from byn to be at G.4.46, the correction from heye to in hie cost at G.4.48, the correction from hys to here at G.4.158 and the addition of bothe at G 7.179. It should be said, however, that it is often difficult to distinguish one hand from another, particularly because corrections are normally comparatively minor (in the main of a single letter or, at most, a word), and it is therefore likely that corrections have sometimes been misattributed.

A group of black ink changes appear to have been made in a third hand, possibly that of the annotator who provided the marginalia on ff.42v, 44v, 72v, and 96v and who has added the words ipsa papa at G.21.54. See, for example, the change of mede master to may mede master at G.3.150, of mastred to mede mastred at G.3.156, of many to manye at G.6.644, and of backes to Bagges at G.11.374, as well as the correction of revkes (earlier renkes) to renkes at G.13.57. Note particularly the forward facing <e>s, and the form of the caret marks and <g>s. The alteration of come to came at G.14.22 also appears to have been carried out by this particular annotator (it is certainly a very careful and controlled alteration), and see also the change of manere to manerere at G.13.159 (the whole word has been re-outlined in black ink and the otiose abbreviation mark is particularly carefully formed).

Other alterations are simply too minor for it to be possible to be absolutely certain who was responsible, though ink colour can often suggest possibilities.

One or two of these alterations suggest relationships with particular manuscripts or versions: the alteration of backes to Bagges at G.11.374 suggests a possible relationship with BC2, while the addition of bothe at G.7.179 brings G into line with BF and with AVHa. On the whole, however, changes which appear to have been made by hands2 and 3 mainly seem to be designed to clarify, while the remaining alterations are usually either minor or, in the case, for instance, of those at G.3.150 and G.3.156 are corrections of errors of omission.

II.2 Affiliations:

II.2.1 Relationships to other B Manuscripts:

II.2.1.1 Textual Divisions:

The divisions of the text in G are as follows (all except the first of these and the additions made in the margin on f.32v are in red ink):

As Robert Adams has observed,NRobert Adams, "The Reliability of the Rubrics in the B-Text of Piers Plowman," Medium Aevum 54 (1985), 208-231 (210). G shares the division between Dobet and Dobest at the end of KD passus 19 (G passus 20) with Cr, C, Y, (B) (which is basically what would be expected from G's textual affiliations within the main body of the text, see below), and G likewise shares the classification of KD passus 15 (G passus 16) as the first passus of Dobetter with C, Y, (B).NIn L, Cr and W,  though KD passus 15 begins with rubrics stating that this is the end of Dowell and the beginning of Dobetter, KD passus 16 is nevertheless described as the first passus of Dobetter. KD passus 15 may thus, as Calabrese, Duggan and Turville-Petre suggest, be thought of as the Prologue to Dobetter (thus repeating the pattern found in the Visio), or the rubrics may, as Burrow suggests, draw our intention to an important transition within the passus. See Michael Calabrese, Hoyt N. Duggan and Thorlac Turville-Petre, eds, The Piers Plowman Electronic Archive vol. 6: San Marino, Huntington Library MS HM 128 (Hm, Hm2) (Woodbridge: D. S. Brewer for SEENET and the Medieval Academy of America, 2008), I.7.1; J. A. Burrow, "The Structure of Piers Plowman B XV-XX: evidence from the rubrics," Medium Aevum 77 (2008), 306-12. G is unusual, however, in categorising the Prologue as passus 1, a pattern which only occurs elsewhere in C2, where the heading Passus Primus is a later addition. The transition from Visio to Dowell is also most closely shared with C2 (again as the result of later annotation in the latter), since these are the only two manuscripts which explicitly state that the Visio ends at this point and Dowell begins.NDowell begins at this point in a number of manuscripts, but references to the Visio continue (see L Cr W Hm Y Bm Bo Cot). This may suggest some relationship between the two manuscripts but, since the C2 annotations in question were made in the mid sixteenth century, it is difficult to be sure of the direction of influence. Calabrese, Duggan and Turville-Petre have also noted that there are correspondences between the headings in G and the rubricated headings in Hm, in particular the classification of passus 8, 9, 10 as passus 1, 2, 3 of Dowell and that of passus 15, 16, 17, 18 as passus 1, 2, 3, 4 of Dobetter, something which once again provides additional evidence for a relationship indicated elsewhere (see below).NCalabrese, Duggan and Turville-Petre, eds, Piers Plowman Electronic Archive, vol.6, I.7.1.

II.2.1.2  Relationships to other B Manuscripts within the Body of the Text:

Kane and Donaldson (The B Version, 21) list the numbers of errors which G shares with one other manuscript as follows:

• GF 142
• GC2 66
• GS 65
• GCr 47
• GH 42
• GHm 38
• GC 18
• GY 16
• GR 14

The number of errors shared with F may seem suggestive,NFor further possible evidence of a relationship with F, see note to G.2.39. but, in the light of the strong evidence for a genetic relationship between R and F on the one hand and Cr and S on the other, Kane and Donaldson consider the first, third and fourth of these clusters of agreement to result from coincidental error, and, this being the case, they find it difficult to argue in favour of a relationship in those instances where there are fewer agreements (The B Version, 37 and note 46). The relationships of G in the early part of the manuscript (up to the end of G passus 8) are in fact difficult to determine since the evidence is often uncertain (Kane and Donaldson, The B Version, 62 and note 96). In G passus 9-18, Kane and Donaldson posit the relationship <G [Y(OC2)][C(BmBoCot)]> and in G passus 19-21 the relationship <O.Y.[GC2][C(BmBoCot)]> (The B Version, 62).

The dismissal of relationships beween G and individual manuscripts other than C2 may not, however, always be correct. Readings present in the second and third Crowley editions but not in the first, for instance, provide evidence for the consultation of a G-related manuscript by Crowley,NR. Carter Hailey, "Robert Crowley and the editing of Piers Plowman (1550)," Yearbook of Langland Studies 21 (2007), 143-170 (161-2). and the fact that Crowley clearly had access to such a manuscript raises the possibility that some of the shared GCr1 readings may also have been more than coincidental. It is, in particular, worth noting that Cr1 frequently shares G errors resulting from mistaken spelling corrections made by hand1.1 (i.e. where he mistakenly alters <n> to <v>). See, e.g., G.1.192 renke] revke G by correction, reuke Cr; G.4.171 mened] meved G by correction, meued Cr; G.13.170 Renke] revke G by correction, reuk Cr; G.14.17 Leneth] leyvethe G by correction, Leueth Cr1, Leaueth Cr2,3 and note similar correspondences at G.6.263, G.6.401, G.8.198, G.15.114, G.16.175, G.18.351, G.19.2, G.19.284. Of course, it is possible that these are coincidental errors, but such erroneous readings do tend to occur at the same points in the text in both G and Cr and, in combination with other shared readings, they are suggestive: if these readings have been influenced by G, then Crowley must have consulted a manuscript which, if not G itself, must, at the very least, have been descended from G.NIn support of the possibility that these may be coincidental variants, note, however, the Cr reading troweth for troneth at G.2.133 and the Cr reading leue for lene at G.2.182 where G could not be the source (in the first case G reads coroned and in the second lene).

Carter Hailey's list of corrections bringing the readings of Cr2 and/or Cr3 into line with those of other B manuscripts including G does not extend beyond the end of the Visio but such corrections in fact persist throughout the text. Those resulting in correspondence with unique G readings are as follows:

• a) new correspondences in Cr2,3; in each case the lemma corresponds to the majority B reading (not necessarily the reading of Bx) while the variant is that of G and the later Crowley editions (in the spelling of G): G.11.297 men] off men GCr2,3, G.11.299 Byttere] bytterly, G.12.34 stode] & stoode, G.13.218 þat] þe, G.13.224 clere] fayre, G.13.283 vix] vir, G.14.94 þus] þis, G.14.98 Auereys] aueryze, G.16.28 an] In, G.16.361 lifte] lyst, G.16.560 as in] en.
• b) new correspondences occurring only in Cr2: G.12.124 scicientes (Cr1,3 W Hm sicientes)] scientes GCr2, G.14.112 by] to, G.19.343 persone] lyknes.
• c) new correspondences occurring only Cr3: G.15.143 afore] before GCr3, G.16.557 þat] as, G.20.299 his] to hys, G.21.145 relyed] reyled.

Similarly, corrections made to Hm by the rubricator regularly correspond to readings found in G (see, e.g., G.1.142 nisi studet] studeat nisi GHm, G.4.259 amen] amen dico vobis, G.6.505 for a] att þat, G.6.570 hewe] hyne), making it clear that a G-related manuscript was available to the Hm rubricator and may have been available to the original scribe,N See also note to G.4.354. although the time gap between the copying of the Hm text and its rubrication raises some doubts about this.NFor the time scale, see Calabrese, Duggan and Turville-Petre, eds, Piers Plowman Electronic Archive, vol.6, I.6. For further information on corrections to Hm and for correspondences to G readings in corrected passages, see Thorlac Turville-Petre, "Putting it Right: the Corrections of Huntington Library MS Hm 128 and BL Additional MS 35287," Yearbook of Langland Studies 16 (2002), 41-65 (48).

Not noted by Kane and Donaldson is the similar relationship with M.NEric Eliason, Thorlac Turville-Petre and Hoyt N. Duggan, eds, Piers Plowman Electronic Archive, vol.5: London, British Library MS Additional 35287 (M) (Woodbridge: D. S. Brewer for SEENET and the Medieval Academy of America, 2005), II.4. There are a number of places where the M corrector alters the reading to correspond to that of G (G.5.101 so ofte] offt GM, G.7.208 ful ille] yll, G.12.189 so other] other, G.19.357 I] þou; G's reading here results from a correction), suggesting that the M corrector might have consulted a G-related manuscript. Occasionally, similar corrections may suggest a relationship with other manuscripts. At G.6.181, for instance, the Bm corrector alters his original reading of to or, the latter agreeing with G and see also the Bm alteration resulting in agreement with G's tyll at G.6.354. The evidence here, however, is not sufficient for a relationship to be certain.

Finally, as observed above, the number of errors which G shares with manuscript F is also suggestive. However, as Kane and Donaldson observe, one of the most noteworthy examples (GF poeple for Bx pryues at G.3.180) could result from shared knowledge of the A version (and see also GF tellethe for Bx witnesseth at G.4.279). Moreover, a high proportion of GF shared errors could easily be coincidental, and it is worth noting that these include many errors which can be paralleled elsewhere by isolated G readings. Compare, for instance, the shared GF omission of "quod" clauses at G.7.176, G.8.131, and G.13.27 with G variants at G.6.240, G.6.261, G.6.490 etc.NSimilarly, the shared GF misreading of Wex at G.15.84 is paralleled by an isolated G reading at G.19.4, and the shared GF omissions of initial And at G.6.472, G.11.335 and G.13.244 are paralleled by isolated G readings at G.1.23, G.1.31, G.1.95, etc. Therefore, although a relationship between G and F cannot be completely discounted, it remains unproven.NKane and Donaldson's list of shared variants is occasionally misleading.  See, e.g., note to G.11.241.

II.2.2 Relationship with the A and C Versions:

In a considerable number of cases, unique G readings are shared with A and/or C and such readings are listed at the end of this section. Not all such correspondences suggest a relationship. A high proportion are at least conceivable coincidental readings. Sometimes such readings result naturally from language change.NFor Kane and Donaldson's treatment of ac variants, see their Introduction, The B Version, 18, note 13. Instances where Bx ac appears in G and one or more A and/or C manuscripts as but have not been included in the lists given below for this reason: ac died out during the sixteenth century and, as a result, G regularly (and often uniquely) alters to but even in places where neither A nor C has such a reading (see, e.g., G.6.309, G.10.58, G.13.29, G.13.84, G.13.126, G.13.240). For further examples of shared readings likely to result from language change, see G leyue for Bx  lete (G.7.278), G loked for Bx waited (G.8.155), G symplenes for Bx symplete (G.11.175).NLet = "to quit, abandon, forsake" is infrequent after the early fifteenth century (OED let v.1 I.5); wait = "to keep watch, to look intently" does not survive beyond the end of the of the fifteenth century (OED wait v.1 I.4); while simplety = 'simplicity" dies out at the beginning of the fifteenth. Other instances where date, as well as the use of an obvious easier reading may have resulted in coincidental GA readings include men for Bx ledes (G.4.98), blabber for Bx baber (G.6.192), nowe for nouthe (G.11.51), and synnes for coupe (G.6.308).  Moreover, many shared readings involve substitutions common elsewhere in G where there is no corresponding A or C reading. This is the case, for instance, with G's use of neuene for Bx nempne (G.2.21), a variant which at this point also occurs in AE but which can also be found independently in G at G.3.181, G.6.331, G.6.340 and G.17.19.  The loss of initial And, too, is common in the shared variants but also occurs, without any equivalent AC reading, at G.2.163, G.2.169, G.6.11, G.6.87, G.10.42 etc.  The choice between other and or (= "or" or "either") is probably a matter of dialect (see LALME 4, items 111 and 198), and in any case the shared GA and/or C readings are invariably the commoner form (or = "or", other = "either"; see G.2.177, G.7.254, G.8.103, G.14.329).  The spelling errors G shares with A and C (items II.2.3.2.9 and II.2.3.3.8) are perfectly plausible coincidental misreadings (misreading of <k> and long <s>, misordering of letters, misnumbering of minims).

Nevertheless, in the case of A in particular, the evidence does seem to suggest a relationship.  Kane and Donaldson invoke the concept of shared GF memory of A to account for the GF reading at G.3.180 (poeple for Bx pryues),NKane and Donaldson, The B Version, 31. and there is certainly evidence to suggest a link between A and G which is independent of other B manuscripts, in particular, a number of shared GA readings involving major category words (items II.2.3.2.5 and II.2.3.2.6 below): G.2.8 kepe for Bx wilne, G.2.101 asketh þe for  Bx wolden al, G.3.187 thys meyny for þise men/ þes oþere etc., G.4.46 baud after  for brokour als, G.4.84, rysen for rychen, G.5.143 helpe for saue, G.8.148 better for moche more, etc.NSome other types of reading can also suggest a relationship. See, e.g., the shared GARVJA reading couple (subjunctive) for couplest (G.11.170). The matter is less clear, however, in the case of C, since the vast majority of shared GC readings, including those involving major category words could be coincidental.NSo at G.4.347 the reading leefe could result from shared anticipatory error, at G.6.468 the use of heythen for hennes could be a matter of dialect (see LALME 4, item 148), at G.6.512 mother is a likely easier reading for dame as are lose for tyne at G.12.36 and lyght for leye at G.18.280, while coincidental misreadings could well account for the variants at G.7.66, G.14.64, G.18.220 (pylgrymes for pylgrymage, moned for morned, walken for waken). Still, there are a few shared GC readings which might perhaps suggest a relationship: Inowe for at wille (G.11.10), looue for laude (G.12.109), nother for manere (G.14.397).  No two of these appear in the same C version manuscript or manuscripts, so what these readings seem to suggest is a succession of scribes consulting different C manuscripts.

As far as the relationship between G and A is concerned, the evidence for a relationship with a particular A version manuscript is also conflicting. At first sight a relationship with AD seems likely; see readings at G.2.190 (sheued for Bx cheyned), G.7.311 (G cleremeyne, AD chermayn for Bx clerematyn), G.9.46 (chapman for champioun). In fact, however, all these could be interpreted as coincidental misreadings, especially so in the case of the last because of its echo of G.1.64. ARa or AHa is suggested by the reading at G.7.243 (bygge for Bx bidde), with Ha, given readings elsewhere, a more likely candidate than Ra.NRa lacks line G.3.11 where G shares the A reading rynges (Bx golde wyre) and at G.8.148 Ra shares the Bx reading moche more (cf. the GAx reading better). The other possibility is a relationship with the manuscript group ATChH2 as suggested by the G reading at G.4.84 (rysen for Bx rychen).NFor this grouping, see George Kane, ed., Piers Plowman. The A Version: Will's Visions of Piers Plowman and Do-Well. An Edition in the Form of Trinity College Cambridge MS R.3.14, rev.edn. (London: Athlone Press; Berkeley and Los Anglese: University of California Press, 1988) 85-6.  There is something appealing about this particular possibility since these three manuscripts are all AC combinations and the use of one or other of them might explain the paucity of any sort of overlap between G and C in the early sections of the poem.NIn G passus 2, for instance there are only 5 shared GC readings, compared with 23 shared GA readings.  It is true that there are places in this passus where B is closer to A than to C thus making overlap with the former somewhat more likely, but the difference is insufficient to explain the discrepancy. In the first 210 lines of G passus 12, by contrast, there are 14 shared GC readings. No significant shared GC readings occur in the earlier passus. The shared GCTChH2 reading looue for laude at G.12.109 supports this suggestion (though note that H2 alters to laude). The evidence is, however, so slight that no firm conclusion is possible.NThe possibility of a relationship with one or other of two further AC manuscripts (Wa and N) also arises: at G.3.219, G reads  many mery, a combination of B manye and AWa meri, while between G.15.126 and G.15.127 a line has been omitted (see KD.14.120), and this omission is also shared with CN.  In neither case, however, is there much in the way of evidence for a relationship both with A and with C, while in the case of the shared GCN omission, the fact that CN omits two lines at this point (the equivalents of KD.14.119 and 14.120) provides an added complication, suggesting that G's relationship, if any, with C would have to be with an ancestor of this manuscript (the loss of the equivalent of KD.14.119 probably occurred after the loss of KD.14.120 since the first line does not really make sense without the second).

Given the far stronger evidence in the earlier part of the text for a relationship with A rather than C, it seems likely that any significant unique G readings from this earlier section which appear in both A and in C probably reflect a relationship with the former rather than with the latter. If we accept this, then it becomes clear that there are places where significant correspondences between A and G occur in clusters of two or more. Thus there is a cluster of such agreements in G passus 2 (at G.2.8, G.2.97, G.2.133, G.2.193) and a further cluster in passus 3 (G.3.4, G.3.8, G.3.11, G.3.187; note especially the first three of these), together with two correspondences in G passus 4 (at G.4.46 and G.4.84).  Of course, the G scribe may simply have been particularly well acquainted with the A version of these particular passus, but the possibility arises that he actually had the A text open for comparison at this stage of his transcription (these are, after all, passus where comparison of A and B would not be particularly problematic).

In any case, whether or not he actually checked against the A text, the G scribe was clearly acquainted with this particular version. Knowledge of C on the other hand, though it seems possible, is less certain.

II.2.3 G Readings Shared with the A and/or C Versions:NPlaces where Kane and Donaldson emend to the G reading are marked with an asterisk.

The G readings given here normally only include corrections when these were made at the time of writing. Given that hand1.1's corrections can result in error (where the letter <n> is read as a <u> and altered to <v>, for instance), their inclusion would only obscure the relationships between G and the A and C versions. Where, exceptionally, such a correction is cited, this is made explicit.

II.2.3.1 Unique G Readings Shared with both A and C:

II.2.3.1.1 Omission/addition of minor category words (included here are frequently used adjectives and adverbs such as all):

G.1.23 some] GARaUEWaCPEcRcMcVcAcQScFcNc, And some L & r.; G.1.72  wel] L & r., om. GAUJCSc; G.2.125* some3] GAmost C most, and somme L & r; G.2.174* an (= "on")] L & r., om. GAxCx; G.3.192* told] GAxCx, it tolde L & r.; G.4.105* kyng] G(though note that G has then in the b-verse)Amost Cmost, kynge þanne L & r.;  G.4.120 she] GAVANCMc, For she L & r.;  G.4.125* In trust] GAxCx, Truste L & most; G.4.126* teychyth] GARaDUChLaWaCFcGc, she techeth L & r.; G.5.47 betwene] GAUVJEACMcFc, And bitwene L & r.; G.6.10 I] GARaUH2JEWaC, For I L & most;  G.6.129 am] GAKHCxYcUcDc, am but L & r.; G.6.130 that] GAUCPEcRcMcVcAcQScFcKcGcNc, And þat L & r.; G.6.351* att þe] GAmost CPEcRcVcAcQKc, at his L & r.; G.6.355 then] GADVHaJEACPEcRcMcVcAcQScKcGcNc, And þanne L & r.; G.6.603* shall þou] GAxCall, shal ʒe L & r.; G.7.20 men] GARaHaWaC, of men L & r.; G.7.53 but] GAmostCx (but the C line differs considerably from that of the BA), But if L & r.; G.7.127* we] GAallCp, For we L & most; G.7.294 and] GAHaAWaNMaC, And eke L & r.; G.7.309 tho] GARaAWaNMaHaCPEcRcMcVcAcQKcGcNc, And þo L & most; G.8.4 hys] GARaUChKCxP2Rc, for his L & r.; G.8.104 euer] GAUChVHaWaHCP2Gc, for euer L & most; G.8.117 I] GARaANCPEcRcMcVcAcQFcKcGcNc, For I L & most; G.8.117 þe] GAJAWaHCUcKc, it þe L & r.; G.8.120* In] GAxC, Al in L & most; G.8.161 pensyfe] GAUJCPEcRcMcVcAc, ful pensyf L & r.; G.9.2 to] GAWaCP2, for to L & r.; G.11.4 &] GAmostCRc, And al L & most; G.11.179 I] GADJAMaCPEcRcMcVcAaQScZFcKcGcNc, for I L & most; G.11.204 theologye] GAA, Ac theologye L & most.

II.2.3.1.2   Replacement of one minor category word by another (definition as above):

G.1.67* vp] GAmostC, wel L & most; G.2.39 no] GAChCBm, Ne L & most; G.2.39* the lygham] GAxCx, þi likam L & most; G.2.176* off (Altered to <o> by hand1.1)] GAxCMc, in L &. r.; G.2.177 or] GAWaCDc, other L & r.; G.5.110 of] GAVENCDcPEcRcVcAcNc, on L & r.; G.5.112 off] GAVJLaNCDcGc, on L & r.; G.6.459 before] GAH2VMaCPRcMcVcAcNc, to-fore L & most; G.6.619 I] GARaVWaNC, And L & r.; G.7.306 ney] GADKMaChC(except for Cp), nere L & most; G.8.103 other] GAChHaJHCP2PEc, Or L & most; G.10.178 In2] GAVAKCMc, on L&r..; G.11.469 fro] Gby correctionADCDc.  At G.1.75 G reads & raught hym for L & r. And rauʒte with, cf. AU which has both him and with.

II.2.3.1.3   Variation in tense:

G.1.60 & glosen] G, Gloseth AD, Glosys AE,  And gloseþ CP2Mc, Glosed L & r.; G.1.60 lykythe] GALaDVHaECP2Mc, lyked L & r.; G.1.225 cryen] GAmostCP2Mc, crieden L & most; G.6.532 blusteren] GARaDJUNCRc, blustreden L & most; G.8.21 sware] GAAVCxNc(But see note to this line), swere L &r.

II.2.3.1.4  Variation in word order:

G.1.230* I sagh] GAxC, rev. L & most; G.6.462 masse & matyns] GAUH2VEKNMaCP2, matines and masse L & r.; G.9.125* hym teyche] GAmostCMcFc (though the C line differs considerably from that found in BA), teche hym L & most.

e)  Omission, addition or alteration of prefixes or suffixes:

G.1.71 falsnes] GAxCx, falshed  L & most; G.4.33 knoen] GAH2CPEcRcQ, Iknowe AVHaWaCVcAcScFc,  biknowen L&r.; G.7.157* he bosted] GAdLA, abosted L & most.

f)  Omission/addition of "quod" clauses:

G.3.20* hath] GAmostC(not Cp), quod she hath L & most; G.4.119* yff] GAmostCmost (The earlier part of C's a-verse, however, differs from that of BA), quod þe kynge ʒif L & most; G.5.139* selffe] GAxCP2, self quod he L & r.; G.6.313 gossep] GAEANHCx, gossib quod she L & most.

g)  Singular for plural or vice versa:

G.2.188* dede] GAr.Cp, dedes L & r.; G.11.23 gest] GAH2JWaMaCP2EcRcMcVcAcQScZFcKcGcNc, gestes L & r.

II.2.3.1.5   Replacement of one major category word with another:

G.1.217 here hereafter] GARaVCxP2CotBmBoUcDcNc, here after L & r.; G.2.42 sett] GAmostCMc (though this has other differences), seith L & most (but note setth BC); G.2.97 trespacers] GAxCPEcRcMcVcAcQScFc, transgressores L & most; G.2.193* herder] GAxCx, auarousere L & most; G.3.4 kenne2] GATH2LaCP2Mc, knowe L & r.; G.3.8* wonderslyche] GAxCx (All C manuscripts except Nc have some form of wonder - but many combine this with rich or richly), wortheli L & most; G.4.64 men] GAEAKMaCYcMc, folke L & r.; G.6.308 synnes] GATDChH2WaMaCMc, coupe L & most; G.6.332 cast] GAChHaMaHCGc, hitte L & r.; G.6.336 romed] GAH2CVcAcQSc, rouned L & most; G.6.368 access] GAx(though note that A's a-verse is not quite the same), accesse aftur CI, accidie L & most; G.7.181 nye] GAEMaNVHaKHCP2DcPEcRcMcVcAcQSc, nere L & r.; G.7.278 leyue] GAKMaA, lete L & most; G.8.26 mesylye] G, meseles AChHaKWaCDc, myseyse L & most; G.8.155 loked] GAVWaCP2, waited L & r.; G.9.81 handys] GAWa RaU, hand F, londe L & most.

II.2.3.1.6   Omission/addition of major category words:

G.4.263 permutacyon] GAVJEWaMaCFc, permutacioun apertly L & r.; G.8.209 be] GAAWa, om.CQ, be founde L & r.; G.11.157 mekenes] GAJAHCall but YcUcDc, mekenesse man L & r.

II.2.3.1.7   Addition of inflexion:

G.7.70 craftyes] G (by correction) AHaVCQGcKcNc (and see G.4.226), crafty L & r.; G.6.467 lakken] GAH2HaCDc, lakke L  & r.

In addition, the following unique G variants correspond to readings found either in A or in C but not in both:

II.2.3.2 Readings Found in A:

II.2.3.2.1  Omission/addition of minor category words:

G.1.31 some] GARaH2JEWa,  And somme L & r.; G.1.218 baxters] GAJMa, Baxsteres & L & most; G.2.22 reyson &] GAJ, resoun L & most; G.2.77 þe thye] GAJMa, þe L & most;  G.2.102* ne] GAx, ne for L & r.; G.2.110* the trught] GAmost, treuthe L&r.; G.2.134 seyd2] GAWaN, seide ere L & most; G.2.210 better] GAUE,  is bettere L & most; G.2.211 lenge] GAmost, lenge þe with L & most; G.3.230 helden] GAN, helden hym L & most; G.3.235 all they] GAN, Alle L & most; G.4.87 certeyne] GAVHaJ, ful certeyne L & r.; G.4.91 regratyers] GADWa, þe regrateres L & most; G.4.158 Forthe] GALa, forth here L & most; G.4.210* a] GAseveral, to a L & most; G.5.28 þe] GARaLa, in þe W & most; G.5.115 rewthe for to] GAHa, no reuthe to L & most; G.5.195 off] GAEWaN, of owre L & most; G.6.3 off] GAH2WaMa, of my L & r.;  G.6.6 myght no] GAA, ne myʒte L & most; G.6.31 hyr] GAEWa, Þat hire L & most; G.6.114 off] GAx, And of L & r.; G.6.130 I may me not] GAWaN, I ne may me L & r.; G.6.310* hym] GAx(the a-verse in A is generally longer than in G, since most manuscripts have a subject - some form of she), hym wiþ þat L & most; G.6.315 a]GAMa, and a L&r.; G.6.457 but] GAEKWa, þat L & most; G.6.483 cryste] GAHaEAWa, cryst ʒete L & r.; G.6.574 Leue] GAWa, &Yogh;e leue L & r.; G.6.590* so] GAmost, And so L & most; G.6.634 þen] GAWa, And þanne L & most; G.6.648* but] GAmost, And but L & r.; G.7.52* thowe] GAx, þat þow L & most; G.7.58* whyle] GAmost, þe while L & most; G.7.67 to] GAUMa, me to L & most; G.7.88 wryte] GAVHaMaH, do wryte L & r.; G.7.202 gaue] GARaA, And ʒaf L & r.; G.7.273 not] GARaHa, nouʒt for L & most; G.7.313 but] GAJ, But of L & most; G.8.19 graunte] GARaU, hem graunte L & most; G.8.139 but] GAA, And but L & r.; G.8.161* for] GA, also for L & most; G.9.48 thogh] GAJK, And þowgh L & most; G.9.77 do] GAUVJA, and do L & most; G.9.111 wytt] GAH, But witte L & most.; G.10.178 Iangelyng] GAK, and ianglyng L & most; G.11.435 to the] GAKWa, to L&r.; G.11.465 & þe] GAUChWa, and L & r.

II.2.3.2.2  Replacement of one minor category word by another:

G.1.211 theym] GAE, it L & most; G.1.215 hys] GAUE, here L & r.; G.2.44 thy] GAVHaKWa, ʒowre L & r.;  G.2.45 In] GAHa, of L & most; G.2.77 þe thye] G, þi A, þe L & most (KD emend to the A reading); G.2.137 In] GAMa, on L & most; G.2.210 &] GACh, þat L & most; G.2.211 but] GAHa, now L & most; G.3.108 vn-to] GAE, to L & r.; G.3.129 thees] GAVHaEWaNMa (A's word order, however, differs),  Þe L & most; G.3.135 shuld] GAVHa, wolde L & r.; G.3.139* yff] GATDChH2VHaE, þouʒ L & most;  G.3.148 þes] GAHaE, þe L & most; G.4.217 hys] GAU, here L & most; G.4.232 maner] GAWa, manere of L & most; G.4.298* to] GAVHaLaEAMa, ayein L & r.; G.5.60 off] GAVHaA, for L & most; G.6.46 wyll] GAmost, shal L & most; G.6.570 but he] GAE, þat he ne L & most; G.6.625 off] GAVLaEAWaMaH, and L & r.; G.7.9 shold] GAMa, shal L & r.; G.7.30 att (x2)] GAEA, to L & r.; G.7.123 yff] GAUE, þough L & r.; G.7.260 yff] GA, and L & r.; G.7.299 then] GAWaN, þo L & r.; G.8.3 he] GAAN, And L & r.; G.8.103 þe] GACh, his L & most; G.8.116 þen] GAA, þo L & r.; G.8.205 a-fore] GAN, bifor L & most; G.8.207 þi] GAA, þe L & most.; G.8.208 &] GAN, ne L&r.; G.9.37 then] GAU, And þanne L & r.; G.10.10 hyr] GATH2AH, þis L & most; G.10.168* a] GAx, As L & most; G.10.169 as] GATRaDChH2, þat L & r.; G.10.199 In] GAMa, on L & most; G.11.51 nowe] GAJH, nouthe L & most; G.11.428 thes] GAUA, þe L & r.

II.2.3.2.3  Variation in word order:

G.2.49* woreshyp therwyth cesar the kyng] GAmost, þer-with worschip þe kyng Sesar L & most (Note also the BH reading worchepe with þat sesar þe kyng); G.2.54 do ye] GALaV, ʒe done L & r.; G.3.236 durst no mo] GAD, na mo durst L & most; G.6.393 hyr hated] GAHa, hated hir L & r.; G.7.26 sweyte & swynke] GAUWa, swynke and swete L & r.; G.7.86 am I] GAE, I am L & r.;

II.2.3.2.4   Change in tense or mood or person:

G.1.28 held] GAJ, holden L & r.;  G.2.79 dured] GAVMa, dureth L & most; G.2.85 are] GARa, art L & r.; G.2.90 do] GAJWa, doth L & most; G.3.181 shuld] GAK, Shul L & most; G.6.103* haylsed] GAmost, halsyd H, hailse L & most; G.7.271 hathe] GATAWa, haue L&r.; G.8.151 lokedest þou] GAK, lokestow L&r.; G.11.170* couple] GARaVJA, couplest L & most.

II.2.3.2.5  Addition/omission of major category word:

G.2.109* hys] GAx, his mene L & r.; G.3.129 noyen offt] GAJ, noyeth L & most; G.3.219 many mery] G, meri AWa, manye L & r.; G.6.6 further] GAA, fether a foot L & most; G.7.117 heruest] GAWa, heruest tyme L & r.; G.7.211 my] GAAMaH, my blody L & most.

II.2.3.2.6  Replacement of one or more major category words:

G.1.82 perycyoners] G, pore peple of þe parissh Amost, poraille L & most; G.2.8* kepe] GAmost, wilne L & most;  G.2.21 neuene] GAE, nempne L & most; G.2.101* asketh þe] G, aske þe Amost, wolden al L&r.; G.2.133 coroned] G, crowneþ AHaKWaV, crownen A DCh, troneth L & most; G.2.190 sheued] GAD, cheyned L & most; G.2.196 sheued] GAD, cheyned L & most;  G.3.11 rynges GA, golde wyre L & most; G.3.123 lord] G, oure lord AHa, god L&r.; G.3.187* all thys meyny] GAmost (the A spellings of meinie vary and include mene, meyne, meyney, meyny, and mayne.  AEAMa read men), alle þise men LCrWHmR, alle þes oþere MCOC2Y, all þe oþere F, all oþer H; G.4.46* baud after] GAall, brokour als L & most; G.4.84 rysen] G, risen vp ATChH2, rychen L & r.; G.4.98 men] GARaUVHaWaMa, ledes L & most; G.5.143* helpe] GA, saue L & r.; G.6.192 blabber] GAKE, baber L & r.; G.6.231 fals] GAVHaA, wicked Cr & most; G.6.480 my dedes ylle] G, my euell dede AE, þat I did so ille L & most; G.6.538 appulles] GANH2, ampulles L & r.; G.6.578 wyle] GAVHaLaAWaMa, tyme L & r.; G.6.632 prykketh] G wil prike AWa, pokeþ M & most; G.7.57 quod] GALaKWa, seyde L & r.; G.7.243 bygge] G, begge ARaHa, bidde L & most; G.7.311 cleremeyne] G, chermayn AD, clerematyn L & most; G.8.148 teychyd] G, tauʒte AVHaRaA, kenned L & r.; G.8.148* better] GAx, moche more L & most; G.9.46 chapman] GAD, champioun L&r.

II.2.3.2.7  Omission/addition/change of prefix/suffix:

G.2.173 myghty] GAAMa, miʒtful L & most; G.4.305 ryse] GAA, arise L & r.; G.6.5 feyntnes] GAE, feyntise L & most; G.7.84 bygge] GAN, abugge L & r.; G.7.237* hoote] GAmost, bihote L & most; G.11.175 symplenes] GARaMaHA, symplete L & most.

II.2.3.2.8  Singular for plural or vice versa:

G.1.49 lyuys] GAUE, lyf L & r.; G.3.184 lyers] GAKE, lyer L & r.; G.7.288 gryses] GAJ, grys L & most.

II.2.3.2.9  Spelling error:

G.4.267 amales] G, amules ACh, amaleke L & r..

II.2.3.3 Readings found in C:

II.2.3.3.1 omission/addition of minor category words:

G.1.108 for to] GCEcFc, to L & most; G.1.204 I] GCmost, it I L & r.; G.2.32 dormiamus] GCPEcRcMcVcAcQScFcGcNc(Uc), dormiamus-que L & r.; G.2.160 meyre] GCMcFc, Maire is L & r.; G.3.106 wyth] GCFc, Wiþ al L & r.; G.5.98 man] GCSc, man of me L & most; G.6.196 as] GCPEcRcMcVcAcQScFcKcGcNc, And as L & r.; G.6.275 art] GCVcAcKcGcNc, art an L & r.; G.6.419 my] GCPEcRcMcVcAcQFcKcGcNc, an (= "and") my L & r.; G.6.521 repent] GCMc, repente hem L & r.; G.6.555 plouman] GCSc, a plowman L & most; G.6.630 be] GCPEcRcMcQScFcKcGcNc, Ac be L & most; G.7.278 fysyke] GCP2, his phisik L & r.; G.8.26 amend] GCall but Mc, And amende L & r.; G.10.180 but] GCx, but if L & r.; G.12.60 sweete] GCN, so swete L & r.; G.11.80 &] GCPScFcGc, and in L & r.; G.11.322 þer] GCVcAc, þer hij L & most; G.12.12 too GCDcMc, hir two L & r.; G.12.41 shall] GCPEcRcMcQScZFcKcGcNcN, Ne shal L & most; G.12.139 but] GCPEcRcMcVcAcQScZFcKcGcNc, But if L & r.; G.12.142 mekenes] GCCh, mekenesse hir L & most; G.12.162 lordes] GCTH2, ʒe lordes L & most; G.12.424 ryse] GCP2Nc, to ryse L & most; G.13.130 an] GCCh, it an L & most; G.13.161 non] GCUcNc, her none L & most; G.13.182 þen] GCMcN, & þanne L & most; G.13.282 &] GCWaN, þo and L & r.; G.13.282* to] GC, for to L & r.; G.14.10. helpe] GCP2Wa, shulde helpe L & most; G.14.173 att any] GCChRc, eny L & r.; G.14.261 fayle] GCTCh, hym faille L & r.; G.15.59 so] GCWaN, Bi so L & r.; G.15.112 et laudabimus] GCGcCh, laudabimus L & r.; G.15.211 att] GCChRcZFcNc, atte L & r.; G.15.222 rekne off] GCDc, rekene L & r.; G.15.243 non] GCCh, her none L & most; G.15.257 thogh] GCPEcRcVcAcQZWaFcGcNcN, And þough L & r.; G.15.310 paasse] GCDc, þe pas L & most; G.16.25 for] GCZFcCa, And for L & r.; G.16.48 so] GCDcWa, by so L & most; G.16.380 but] GCChFcN, and but L & r.; G.16.512 yn þe twice] GCVcAc, in L & most; G.16.592 þem by] GCQ, hem L & r.; G.17.31* potentia] GC, þat is potencia L & most; G.17.69 here] GC, Here now L & r.; G.17.267 pleyeng there] G, þere pleyinge CN, pley[i]nge M & most; G.17.285 and y] GC, I L & most; G.18.63 gan] GCP2PEcRcVcAcQZWaFcGcNc, gan hym L & most; G.18.142 forthe] GCDcRcMcFcNc, it forth L & r.; G.18.201 as2] GCP2TH2WaN, is as L & most; G.18.219 gladen] GCIGc, gladieth nouʒte L & r.; G.18.337 to a] GCAcNc, To L & r.; G.19.5 to] GC, to a L & r.; G.19.10 pyers] GCN, to Piers L & most; G.19.15 cryed] GCP2VcAcN, cryde a L & most; G.19.40 were] GCP2, þei were L & r.; G.19.46 maken] GCP, maken it L & r.; G.19.198 yff] GCDcPEcRcMcVcAcGcN, If þat L & r.; G.19.296 att] GCChN, atte L & r.; G.19.373 growe] GCFcN, growe ay L & most; G.19.382 then] GCPEcRcMcVcAcQZWaFcGcNc, And þanne L & r.; G.19.415 hence] GCMc, fro hennes L & r.; G.20.192 to punnysshe] GCWa, punysshen L & most; G.20.274 bryng] GCWaGc, hym brynge L & r.; G.20.306 doctours] GCxYcP2K, þis doctours L & most; G.20.385 that] GCKN, and þat L & r.; G.20.415 releques] GCK, þe reliques L & most; G.20.432 they] GCP2KGc, þat þei L & r.; G.21.16 to] GCP2DcCh, so to L & r.; G.21.121 &] GCDc, & to L & r; G.21.219 so] GCDcChWa, bi so L & most.

II.2.3.3.2 Replacement of one minor category word by another:

G.1.28 &1] GCBmFc,  As L & r.; G.1.125 the] GCBmDcFcNc, þi L & r.; G.2.32 enim] GCCotBoAcGc, eum L & r.; G.2.165 off] GCxIP2CotBmBoUcDc, in L & r.; G.4.18 thy2] GCRc, þe L & r.; G.4.54 no] G, now CNc, nouʒt L & r.; G.6.493 so] GCxYcIP2UcDcKcGcNc, euere L & r.; G.6.521 off] GCmost, on L & r.; G.6.525 then] GCFc, Þat L & most; G.8.194 then] GCVcAc, Þat L & r.; G.10.152 ther] GCNcN, Here L & most; G.10.190* þe] GCall but DcN, hym L & r.; G.11.29 suyche ] GCMcN, whiche L & r.; G.11.82 þes] GCall but DcVcAc, þe L & most; G.11.145 watt þat] GCFcNc, what L & most; G.12.25 here] GCPEcRcMcVcAcQScZFcKcGcNc, þer L & most; G.12.118 þat] GCDcRc, her L & most;  G.12.308 afore] GCChN, byfor L & r.; G.12.312 þe] GCx, his L & r.; G.12.317 a-fore] GCN, bifor L & r.; G.12.381 þou] GCNc, þe L & r.; G.12.411 there] GCEc, here L & r.; G.13.201 yn] GCx, of L & r.; G.13.204 not] GCKNcN, neither L & r.; G.14.433 þem] GCGc, þo L & r.; G.15.61 there the] GCx, Darstow L & r.(this assumes that G's there is a form of dare); G.15.310 þe] GCT, ʒe L & r.; G.16.48 he] GCUcN, I L & most; G.16.81* yn] GCx, and in-to LMCrWHm, and COC2YB, into RF; G.16.194 þer] GCGc, þe L & most; G.16.377 or] GCall but  P2PEcMc, ne L & r.; G.16.586 þei] GCFc, ʒet L & most; G.17.283 wyth] GCGc, for L & r.; G.18.4 he] GCGc, I L & r.; G.18.127 and] GCCh, As L & most; G.18.201 þe fyste] GCx, a fuste L & r.; G.18.239 for] GCZWa, And L & r.; G.18.243 yff] GCFc, and L & r.; G.18.278 &] GCTH2, or L & r.; G.19.35 hym (1)] GCP, it L & r.; G.19.67 a-noþer] GCP2Uc, her other L & most; G.19.118 by] GCGc, in L & r.; G.19.250 hym] GCKChMc, her L & r.; G.19.283 wyth] GCMcN, by L & r.; G.20.142 fro] GCN, of L & r.; G.20.143 to] GCGcNc, and L & r.; G.20.428 or] GCWaFc, & L & r.; G.21.10 &] GCP2RcVcAcQScZ, ne L & r.; G.21.39 thes] GCSc, his L & r.; G.21.67 all] GCZ, and alle CCh, and L & most; G.21.174 þe] GCTH2Ch, þat L & r.; G.21.238 &] GCDcChRc, or L & r.; G.21.300 full] GCRc, wel L & r.; G.21.356 off] GCCh, to L & r.

II.2.3.3.3 Variation in word order:

G.6.417 luke or Iohn] GCMc, Iohan & lucas L & most; 7.221 hathe deserued ytt] GCP2, it hath deseruid L & most; G.14.386 I had] G CPEcRcMcVcAcScFcKcGcNc, Hadde I M & most; G.15.261 noght be] GCTH2ChQ, be nouʒte L & most; G.15.299 fals weyghtes] GCUcWaFc, weghtes fals L & most; G.16.578 hym to stroye] GCP2, to stroyen hym L & most; G.18.258 ne cane] GCUcMcGcN, can nouʒte L & most.

II.2.3.3.4 Addition/omission of major category words: :

G.2.179 aliis remecietur] GCBmQSc, remecietur L & r.; G.3.205 preaer] GCMc, preyere I hote L & r.; G.5.67 lord] GCx, lorde þe kynge L & most; G.6.299 thow] GCP2, þer-with þow L & most; G.6.490* god] GC, god quod he L & most; G.7.42 pore] GCSc, pore men L & r.; G.12.116 come] GCN, plenere comen L & r.; G.12.117 rome] GCFcN, go rowme L & most; G.14.396 man me conforte] G, man confort me CEcRcMcVcAcQScFcKcGcNc, me conforte L & r.; G.19.28 Iewes] GCP2Ch, quod I iuwes L & most.

II.2.3.3.5 Replacement of a major category word with one or more major category or minor category:

words: G.4.347 leefe] GCmost, lyne L & most; G.6.126 sharpe] GCYcEcKcGcNcDc, schrape L & most; G.6.380 ones] GCQScFc, nones L & most; G.6.468 heythen] GCRc, hennes L & r.; G.6.512 mother] GCPEcRcMcVcAcQScFcKcGcNc, dame L & r.; G.7.66 pylgrymes] GCRcKc, pylgrymage L & most; G.8.71 good] GCVcAc, soth L & r.; G.11.10 Inowe] GCFc, at wille L & most; G.12.22 shew] GCIAcZ, suwe L & r. (but see note to this line); G.12.36 lose] GCDcGc, tyne L & r.; G.12.109* looue] GCTH2Ch, laude L & most; G.12.226 lere] GCN, lerne L & r.; G.14.64 moned] GCN, morned L & r. ; G.14.397 nother] GCDc, manere L & r.; G.16.55 a-lone] GCFcN, one L & most; G.17.286 wyttelyche] GCEc, wightlich L & most; G.18.220 walken] GCTH2, waken L & most; G.18.280 lyght] GCCh, leye L & most; G.18.326 smodre] GCIUcDc, smolder L & r.; G.20.121 syght] GCZWa, liʒte L & r.; G.20.162 wyghtes] GCDcWa, wyes L & most; G.20.344 off] GCN, quod L & r.; G.21.80 forrunners] GCMcNc, foreioures L & r.; G.21.84 forgoers] GCP2KScFc, forageres L & most; G.21.137 god] GCK, criste L & r.

II.2.3.3.6 Loss of impersonal construction:

G.1.173 he wrath hym] GCEc, he wrath CrF, him wrattheth L & r.

II.2.3.3.7 Variation in tense or mood:

G.4.18 wedden] GC(apart from Cp), be wedded L & r.; G.12.130 coueyte] GCP2McWaFcN, coueyted L & r.; G.15.239 wrestelethe] GCTH2, wrastel L & r.; G.16.296 nedethe] GCP2ChAc, neded L & r.; G.17.281 sholde] GCP2, shal L & r.; G.19.378 thrusted] GCK, þrestes L & most; G.20.257 harrowed] GCP2UcDcChWa, to harwe L & r.; G.20.406 came] GCP2, come L & r.;  G.21.159 tonged] GCPRcMcQScZWaNcFc, tonge L & most; G.21.234 haue chosen] GCZWa, chese Bx; G.21.331 wyll] GCKWaNc, wolde L & r.

II.2.3.3.8 Shared spelling errors:

G.7.89 die] GCRc, dei L & r.; G.10.114 minientur] GCRc, minuentur L & most; G.11.328 prestinum] GCNc, pristinum L & r.; G.16.583 pheudo] GCN, pseudo L & r.

II.2.3.3.9 Variation in spelling:

G.21.51 meruyouslyche] G, merueously CDc, meruaisly CCh, merueillously L & most.

II.2.3.3.10 Singular for plural and vice versa:

G.1.203 colores] G (by alteration by hand1.1) Cmost, coler L & r.; G.3.68 wylles] GCMc, wille L & r.;G.6.425 lyue] GCx, lyues L & r.; G.14.324 backes] GCEc, bakke L & r.; G.16.16 places] GCChMc, place L & r.; G.16.362 artes] GCH2, arte L & most; G.18.143 fynger] GCTH2ChMcWa, fyngres L & r.; G.18.194 maner] GCx, maneres L & r.; G.19.224 sorowes] GCChN, sorwe L & r.; G.21.231 patrymones] GCDc, patrimoigne L & r.

II.2.3.3.11 Omission/addition/change of prefix or suffix:

G.12.96 falsheyde] GCN, Falsenesse L & most; G.12.400 shamed] GCCh, aschamed L & r.; G.14.394 awayte] GCx, wayten L & r.; G.15.246 ytt perethe] G, he periþ CN, appereth L & most; G.17.53 downe] GCTChMcGcH2, adown L & r.; G.18.283 wytte] GCWaNc, Inwyt L & most; G.19.195 gynnyng] GCN, bygynnynge L & most; G.20.19 dradde] GC, adradde L & r.; G.20.296 dradde] GCT, adradde L & r.; G.21.200 wreke] GCRc, Awreke L & r.

II.2.3.3.12 Omission of line:

G and CN both omit a line between G.15.126 and G.15.127 (i.e. KD.14.120).

II.2.3.3.13 Variation in case: :

G.17.90 sanctus] GC, sancti L & r.

III Linguistic Description:

The dialect of G is not discussed either by Doyle or by Hanna, and Samuels simply observes that G is one of three B manuscripts which show "varying degrees of dialect mixture and indeterminacy."NA. I. Doyle, "Remarks on Surviving Manuscripts of Piers Plowman," in Gregory Kratzmann and James Simpson, eds, Medieval English Religious and Ethical Literature: Essays in Honour of G. H. Russell (Cambridge: D. S. Brewer, 1986), 35-48; Ralph Hanna III, William Langland, 39; M. L. Samuels, "Langland's Dialect," in J. J. Smith, ed., The English of Chaucer and his Contemporaries: Essays by M. L. Samuels and J. J. Smith (Aberdeen: Aberdeen University Press, 1988), 70-85 (84).  G is, or course, a very late manuscript, and, as a result, not all linguistic items have the same dialect significance as they would have in a manuscript of the fourteenth or early fifteenth centuries. This is true, for instance, of forms of they or their with initial <þ-> or <th->, of forms using <y> for thorn, and of forms indicating loss in significance of final <-e>.  There are, in addition, clear signs of the introduction of new spelling practices, including, for instance, ways of indicating vowel length. Although the use of these is by no means consistent, they have inevitably resulted in increased standardisation, which, once again, restricts the number of forms available for dialect analysis. Nevertheless, something of G's dialect history can be determined from relict forms, while the G scribe's own preferred forms still include a number indicative of dialect, sufficient for it to be possible to place the manuscript with reasonable certainty.

III.1 Inflexions:

As far as inflexional morphology is concerned, the following points are worth noting:

III.1.1 Nouns:

In nouns the plural inflexion is normally -<es>, less commonly -<ys>, with a limited number of forms in -<n>: oxen (G.20.251), peasone (G.7.305; but see peyse at G.7.199), shoone (G.15.343) and, most commonly, eyne, eyene (G.1.74, G.3.92, G.6.111, G.6.136 etc.). Some  uninflected plurals have been lost (see, e.g., G thynges for remaining manuscripts' þing at G.10.30, G yeres for most manuscripts' ʒere at G.14.3, G wynters for remaining manuscripts' wyntre at G.13.3).

III.1.2 Adjectives:

The use of final -e on adjectives appears to be random, i.e. it does not appear to be used to indicate either a plural or a definite inflexion (thus good men G.17.9, a goode pope G.6.168).

III.1.3 Pronouns:

Pronouns show the following developments:

• III.1.3.1 The form of the third person singular feminine is normally she.  Forms in h-, presumably found in G's exemplar, are occasionally retained, as at G.6.315 (with CrYCBL), G.10.56 (general, possibly alliterating),NThere is some confusion in the tradition as to the sex of Anima, but see G's use of the possessive hyr ("her") in the following line. G.12.112 (with YOC2CBF), G.12.353 (with YOC2CB).  Their rarity, however, suggests that these were not the G scribe's preferred form.NNote also the hyper-correction at G.15.322.  In spite of the reading at G.10.56, alliteration on /h/ does not in general appear to influence the G scribe (see, e.g., readings at G.2.74, G.4.29).
• III.1.3.2 The genitive of the third person singular masculine pronoun is normally hys; forms without <h> occur occasionally (see, e.g., G.13.257).
• III.1.3.3 The form of "it" is normally ytt, though It occurs once at the beginning of the line (at G.4.55),NLine initial capitals (like all capitals) are unusual in G, and the expected form would be ytt as at G.2.38, G.2.88, G.2.143. while at G.1.10 an attempt is apparently made to alter In to Itt, but this is then crossed out and relaced with yt.  Forms with initial h- occur only rarely (at G.7.306, G.8.51 and G.17.151); at G.2.136, initial <h> is written and then apparently crossed out at the time of first writing.NAccording to the OED (s.v. it, pron.), forms in <h-> died out in standard English during the sixteenth century.
• III.1.3.4 The nominative of the second person plural is normally ye but you, though most frequently used for the oblique case, does also appear as a nominative (as at G.2.180, G.5.148, G.6.580, G.7.10, G.7.132) and the percentage of nominatives in you gradually increases as the text progresses. Although the OED cites examples from as early as the fourteenth century, nominative use of you did not become common until the sixteenth, and Barber suggests that its encroachment was not rapid until the 1540s.NCharles Barber, Early Modern English (London: André Deutsch, 1976), 204. By Shakespeare's time, you was the normal form.NBarber, Early Modern English, 205. As Görlach observes (Introduction, 85), the change may have been partly influenced by the reverse vowel patterns of thee and thou, as well as by the fact that ye and you shared a weak form, /jə/.
• III.1.3.5 Forms of the third person plural pronoun regularly appear with initial þ- or th- rather than h-, (see G they for most manuscripts hij or hy at G.2.58; G theym for most manuscripts' hem, him at G.2.70; G theyr for remaining manuscripts her(e), hir(e) at G.1.30).  Where the G scribe does use a form in h-, it seems possible that this may simply be an error (see, e.g., G.6.254, where the use of hyr may, given the material omitted in G, reflect the scribe's failure to understand the passage). At this date, the use of forms in þ- or th- is not significant from the point of view of dialect. Note also what appear to be occasional weak forms in the/þe (e.g., at G.6.150, G.6.195, G.12.235, G.17.58).NSee also the back spelling "they" for "the" at G.11.415.
• III.1.3.6 Though forms of the reflexive pronoun in "-self" are normally singular (hym‑selffe G.1.70, thy‑selffe G.2.144 etc.) the distinction between singular and plural is not consistent, thus theym-selfe (G.10.123), theym-selfen (G.1.117), my‑selue (G.3.23), theym‑selue (G.1.163), theym‑seluen (G.1.59), thy‑seluen (G.2.24).  There is one isolated example of what would later become the standard plural form in -s: vs‑selue[es] (G.8.142), where the abbreviation for -es has apparently been added by the original scribe as part of his programme of spelling corrections (see II.1.1.3.2).

III.1.4 Verbs:

As far as verbs are concerned, the following points are of interest:

• III.1.4.1 In the present indicative, the second person singular appears as -est, the third person as -eth(e. There are, surprisingly, hardly any examples of  third person -s inflexions, and where these do exist they are also present in other manuscripts (see, e.g., lothes (G.1.155), which has an -s inflexion in R and C as well as in G).
• III.1.4.2 The present plural inflexion is normally ‑e(n: dystroyen (G.1.22), thryuen (G.1.32), maken (G.1.36), dryue (G.1.224), but there are occasional, presumably residual, examples in -eth, see, e.g.,  worcheth (G.4.75). Given the G scribe's practice as far as final -e is concerned (see III.2) it is difficult to be certain that such an -e was always intended as an inflexion (it may, for instance, sometimes be present to indicate the length of the preceding vowel, or it may sometimes simply be random), but it seems likely that, at this date, the -en and -eth forms must have been relicts, perhaps deliberately retained by the scribe because they were considered particularly suitable for poetry.NSee Barber, Early Modern English, 244. For similar retention by Crowley, see distroyen in the line corresponding to G.1.22. It is worth noting, in this context, that the single example of a plural verb to occur in the Table of Contents (grow on f.103r) has a zero ending.
• III.1.4.3 Both present participles and gerunds normally appear with ‑yng(e, but ‑eng(e is used where the body of the verb ends in <y>: thus flyeng (G.9.54), buryeng (G.12.80),  dyenge (G.12.171). There are no examples of -ande or -inde endings.
• III.1.4.4 Infinitives normally end in ‑e(n, as in to hunte & dyggen vp‑on (G.4.317-318), occasionally in zero (to play, G.4.315).  Once again, the G scribe's general treatment of final -e makes it difficult to make a judgment as to the significance of the -e endings, but, given G's date, the ‑en endings are likely to be relicts and corrections restoring such readings (as at G.12.409) simply motivated by a desire to reproduce the form of the examplar (such endings are also reproduced in Cr: see, e.g., Cr meten in the line corresponding to G.1.11).  The scribe uses no such endings in the Table of Contents, where infinitives end in either -e or in zero (thus reyng and meynpryse on f.101v; make and shew on f.102;  helpe and reason on f.102v; lyve, stoppe, show, make, resort, beleve on f.103).
• III.1.4.5 Past participles of strong verbs end in -e(n: thus wroken (G.3.196), wroke (G.19.402). The y‑ past participle prefix is sometimes retained (y-maked G.1.14; y-wroke, G.21.201), but is also regularly omitted (thus broght  at G.1.175 where all remaining manuscripts apart from Cr1 read ybrouʒt or ybouʒt). Occasionally this prefix causes confusion (thus ye blessed for yblissed at G.1.78).NBy the sixteenth century, the prefix was only used as a deliberate archaism, as in Spenser (OED s.v. y-, prefix).

III.2 Spelling:

The spelling practices found in G differ from those of the remainder of the Piers manuscripts in ways to be expected from a text produced in the sixteenth century.

• The use of thorn has clearly been influenced by the practice of printers: it is written as <y>, and is normally only used in combination with superscript letters (<y>t for "that," <ye> for "the" etc).NSee Scragg, History, 2; Görlach, Early Modern, 45.  Given the likely influence of printing practice, the use of the letter <y> for thorn no longer has dialect implications. Medial use of thorn is extremely unusual, but note a-noþer at G.19.67 (with abbreviation for - er), neþer at G.6.405 (with superscript -er). This ensures that it cannot be confused with <y>=/j/ and, where errors lead to the possibility of such confusion, the scribe is at pains to correct them.NSee, e.g., the alteration of <ye> to <ye> at G.4.351. The correct reading is "ye" not "the."  Yogh for /j/ is used very rarely: medially in byʒonde (G.4.111, G.5.130), fernȝere (G.6.442) and panʒers (G.16.295), and as the initial letter in a limited number of words: ʒemen v. (G.10.214), ʒe(y)me n. (G.11.204, G.18.13), ʒepelyche (G.16.193) and ʒerne (G.7.304). Given the date, it seems likely that none of the four words with initial yogh was particularly familiar to the scribe (all seem to have died out at some time during the fifteenth century), and he may therefore simply have had no alternative spelling available in his own repertoire, and have copied whatever was present in his exemplar.NSometimes, presumably, that exemplar would have had a spelling in y-; see, e.g., the G reading yerne at G.7.112. The G scribe's failure to recognise particular words with initial yogh is further suggested by the G variants euene for ʒerne at G.6.432, seme for ʒeme at G.9.52, yeres for ʒerne at G.21.284.  The use of <ʒ> to represent /z/ is also comparatively restricted.  Occasionally it is used for the plural inflexion (commandementʒ at G.16.78, prouynceʒ at G.16.591), but this, though common in other Piers manuscripts, is unusual in G. Medially <ʒ> = /z/ is used most commonly in foreign words and particularly in names (saraʒenes, oʒias, naʒarethe).  Elsewhere, medial use appears to be inherited and is eventually discontinued; so doʒene and doʒynne (G.5.39 and G.6.323) but dowsen (G.21.161), baptyʒe(d and baptyʒyng (G.12.79, 80, 81, 82), but baptysed (G.17.260).
• The letters <u> and <v> still function as one grapheme: in the initial transcription, <u> is normally used medially and <v> initially.NFor the later wholesale replacement of <u> by <v> see II.1.1.3.2. 
• Final -e is used in positions where there is no historical reason for it (the third person singular verbal inflexion is regularly - ethe, for instance and for adjectival use see III.1.2). Clearly such -es no longer perform their Middle English roles and they are as a result available for other spelling functions (see below). Where its use makes no difference to the pronunciation of the preceding vowel, final -e appears to be optional: bodye (G.2.63) beside body (G.12.76), kynd wytt (G.1.114) beside kynde wytte (G.13.50), faste (G.5.23) beside fast (G.5.83) (both adverbs and both at line end).
• Various strategies are employed to indicate vowel length.NFor scribal corrections for this purpose, see II.1.1.3.2.  Note, for instance, the distinction between damme ="damn" (G.6.480) and dame = "woman" (G.6.37, G.6.160, G.6.161 etc), between dyne = "eat" (G.1.226, G.6.77, G.6.398) and dynne = "noise" (G.19.127), between wryte= "write" (G.6.247, G.7.88, G.10.40 etc.) and wrytt =" writ" (G.1.190, G.2.73, G.2.130 etc.), god = "god" (G.1.43, G.2.47, G.2.50 etc.) and good = "good" (G.1.226, G.3.134, G.3.157 etc.), sone = "soon" (G.4.47, G.4.57, G.4.114 etc.) beside sonne for "sun" and "son" (G.1.1, G.1.13, G.5.47 etc.), red = "red" beside reede = "advise" (G.1.228, G.2.175).  Although some of these spelling patterns were probably present in the scribe's exemplar, it seems unlikely that this was the case with all of them. Spellings of "son" as sonne do not normally appear in the remaining B manuscripts (with the exception of Cr, which has clearly been influenced by G rather than vice versa).NSee Hailey, "Robert Crowley," 143-170 and especially 161-170.  Not surprisingly, the scribe fails to be completely consistent and instances of "son" in sone do appear occasionally, as, for instance, at G.6.502.  It will be evident from these examples that long vowels were often indicated by a following single consonant + <e>, while a double consonant was used to show a preceding short vowel. Long vowels could also be indicated by doubling: blood beside blode for "blood" (G.13.287, G.2.155) and saake beside sake (G.10.94, G.4.190).NThe use of <aa> is rare, however: the only other examples are agaaste (G.20.289) and paasse (G.15.310). and, in the case of the descendant of ME /ę:/, by the digraphs <ey> and <ea>, thus beanes and beynes for "beans" (G.7.198, 7.300).NOccasionally, the reflex of ME /e:/ will also be represented by <ey>, as in beythe (G.8.70, G.11.457).  At the beginning of the text, the majority of words with <ea> spellings are those which are common to both Anglo-Norman and English (reason, treasure, treacle etc.),NAs Scragg observes, the grapheme <ea> was borrowed from twelfth-century English by Anglo-Norman scribes, who used it to represent /ę:/, and was then later returned to English by such scribes. It was therefore naturally the case that this grapheme was to begin with used most often in words which were common to Anglo-Norman and English (Scragg, History, 48-9). and it seems possible that these spellings were already present in the scribe's exemplar, but the number of instances of <ea> in words of English origin (deale, beanes, heale, deade, cleane, greatly etc.) increases as the text progresses, although it remains the case that other forms of indicating the length of the vowel are more common. In the Table of Contents there are more examples of <ea> than <ey> spellings, but only one of these (teame) appears in a word of English origin and continued scribal uncertainty about which spelling to use is suggested by the Table form greyate="great" (f.103).NNote, however, that the scribe does occasionally make corrections from <e> to <ea> at the time of writing, as in he[a]te ("heat") at G.14.171. Spelling confusion resembling that in greyate is occasionally evident elsewhere, see, e.g., Iosepfhe (G.8.175). Moreover, as the above examples suggest, spelling is by no means consistent.  The digraph <ee> can be used for the reflexes of both ME close and ME open <e> (greene, been (pp.), deethe = "death," beeste= "beast"), although the former is more common. Monosyllabic words with a short vowel may or may not end in a double letter (butt, but; y-blessed beside y-blessedd).  A spelling indicating a long vowel may be followed by a double consonant (fleydde beside fledde), while some double consonants appear in places where you would not expect them (hoppe for "hope," chosse for "choose" inf.) and others are not to be found in places where you would (glade beside gladde adj., cane beside canne and can for the verb "can").NSome spelling variations, however, may reflect possible alternative pronunciations. Thus agenst and ageynst may well represent forms with and without shortening of the vowel (see Dobson, English Pronunciation, § 26), while the spellings bredde and breyde for "bread" probably represent forms with and without shortening before a final consonant (Dobson, English Pronunciation, § 30). The frequent occurrence of spellings such as blasse for "blaze," apposse for "appose," arysse for "arise," easse for "ease," pleasse for "please" suggests the possibility that some attempt is being made to distinguish /s/ from /z/, but, if so, the scribe does not succeed in being consistent (see, for instance, lasse and lesse for "less," glasse for "glass').NFor the restricted use of yogh for [z], see III.2 above. That the scribe was concerned to distinguish between /s/ and /z/ is clear from his later spelling changes of <es> and <s> to <ce>, see II.1.1.3.2.   Word boundaries, too, vary considerably (aloft beside a-lofte, another beside an-other and a-nother).
• For scribal alteration of reioyce to reIoyce at G.16.503 and of coniured to conIured at G.16.14, see II.1.1.2.1. and II.1.1.3.2. For wholesale spelling modernizations by hand1.1 (i.e. the original scribe making later corrections), see II.1.1.3.2.

III.3 Date:

Although, at the beginning of the poem, the G scribe is using the <ea> digraph much less than Crowley (in the KD Prologue, Crowley uses <ea> spellings 27 times to G's 4), by the final passus the distinction is by no means as great (Crowley 82, G 58), although the remaining mismatch, combined with the fact that the G scribe is still far more inclined to use such spellings in words of French origin rather than in native words, suggests a somewhat earlier (though not much earlier) date for G.NIt seems unlikely that print as opposed to manuscript practice can explain this difference. The digraph <ea> was commonly used by scribes in the fifteenth century (Scragg, English Spelling, 48), first in words common to Anglo-Norman and English, later in native words with ME /ę:/, but it was not normally used in early printing (Caxton does not use it, for instance), and it was only during the sixteenth century that manuscript spelling practices were taken over by printing houses, with the result that, by the 1550s the <ea> grapheme was common in printed material (Scragg, English Spelling, 66-67).  It is also noticeable that <oa> spellings are not used by G (so boor(e for "boar," cote for "coat," groote, grote for "groat," loofe for "loaf" etc.).  However, since <oa> spellings are not normally used by Crowley either (the exception is boast for G's boost at G.4.320,), this is not particularly helpful. The frequent use of nominative you rather than ye suggests the 1540s (see III.1.3.4 above). For further evidence on date see discussion of watermarks at I.4.

III.4 Dialect:

III.4.1  Northern Forms:

A number of forms suggest a Northern connection:

• III.4.1.1 bees for the imperative plural of the verb "to be" (G.2.176)
• III.4.1.2 the one instance of It cited above (III.1.3.3) (LALME 4, item 7)
• III.4.1.3 occasional examples of ere for "are" (G.2.21, G.2.71, G.11.469, see LALME 4, item 17)
• III.4.1.4 one example of thrught="through" (G.3.155; see LALME 4, item 54), and one of saght ="saw" (G.3.17, see LALME 4, item 211)
• III.4.1.5 gyffe for "to give" (G.6.53, G.13.119; with spelling <ff> rather than <v> reflecting the early loss of pronounced final -e, with consequent unvoicing of /v/ to /f/
• III.4.1.6 forms with <s> for /ʃ/ and <sh> for /s/ (byquass- G.19.253), shewe for "sow" (G.16.368), blysshethe for "blesses" (G.12.296), wysshen for wyssen= "tell" (G.6.551), syngled for shyngled (G.10.151), and see also charyssyng emended to charyss[h]yng at the time of writing (G.5.119), and likewise flesse altered to flesshe (16.437)NFor the East Midlands and Northern provenance of such forms, see Brunner, Outline, §38, Dobson, English Pronunciation, § 373.
• III.4.1.7 the early presence of <sr> for [ʃr] (srowdes G.1.2 etc.)NSee Dobson, English Pronunciation, §392, Joseph Wright, English Dialect Grammar (Oxford: OUP, 1905), §338.
• III.4.1.8 reflexes of OE/o:/ in <ou>, suggesting the possibility of the pronunciation /u:/: bloude (G.4.206 - later altered to bloode, apparently by the original scribe - and G.6.507), floude (G.13.167).
• III.4.1.9 double <p> in shap[p]e (G.10.31; altered from shape, apparently at the time of writing), assuming that this indicates a short vowel.NSee II.1.1.2.1.  Dobson records that forms with the short /a/ are found only in Levins (a Northerner) and Poole (for whom it is a Northernism).NDobson, English Pronunciation, §6.
• III.4.1.10 the regular alteration of forms in nempn- to forms in neuen-; the latter (though sometimes used by Chaucer in rhyme position) is of Scandinavian origin.NA further instance of Northern influence may be the appearance of deyd for "death" (G.15.115).  Forms with <d> for usual <th> were standard in the North, though not confined to it, and may result from Scandinavian influence (see OED s.v. death, n).

However, as the example of charyss[h]yng suggests, there is evidence that not all these forms were acceptable to the G scribe. A number, such as bees, gyffe, It(t, thrught, are either isolated examples or occur extremely rarely. Words with <sr> for / ʃr/ do not persist after G passus 6 and, even where they do occur, are usually corrected by the scribe either at the time of writing (s[h]ryue G.1.64, G.1.89, sr- > s[h]ryuen G.6.312) or later (s[h]rewe G.1.196 and G.3.41).NSee II.1.1.2.1 and II.1.1.3.2.  Forms in ar(e for "are" are more common than forms in er(e, and the former are used in the Table of Contents.  The use of neuen- for "name" persists throughout the text, but the scribe appears to have copied this form without full understanding, since, when he makes his later spelling corrections, he invariably alters it to neue[v]-, nyue[v]- etc.NSee G.2.21, G.3.181, G.6.340 etc. A similar spelling error affects renk(e ("man"), which is invariably altered to re[v]k(e. The use of vowel plus <y> to indicate a long vowel (see III.2) may possibly suggest a Northern connection,NSee Görlach, Early Modern, 59. As Görlach observes, the early loss of dipthongs in the North freed i/y to be used to indicate vowel length. A spelling which might suggest such a loss of a dipthongs is pleden for "played" at G.1.20, but this is an isolated example and may well reflect either the retention (at what is, after all, a very early stage in the text) of a Northern form from the scribe's exemplar, or a misunderstanding: if putten earlier in the line is read as a present rather than a preterite, then it would be natural to read pleden as the present tense of the verb "to plead" ("wrangle"?). Note also the AV reading Pleden and the CUcDc reading Pledoun. but it is worth noting that this normally only occurs in the combination <ey> (it is very unusual to find instances of <ay> or <oy> where the <y> might be present to indicate length)NIn words such as doyth="does," the <y> is simply part of the inflexion (cf. the regular G form doethe). The one instance of doyethe (G.10.98) probably just reflects a merger of the two forms.  Note, however, laythe for "loath"(G.13.248) together with  sayterday (G.6.14, and for possible long a see Dobson, English Pronunciation, §23), and the alteration of poundemale to povndemayle at G.3.224 (see II.1.1.3.2). and that <ey> forms in words such as "meat" have been recorded by LALME for a number of Southern counties.NLALME 4.317.  The counties in question are Berkshire, Buckinghamshire, Hampshire, Hereford, Hertfordshire, Kent, Warwickshire and Worcestershire. Note also forms of "hear" in hey- and hei- in Kent, Warwickshire, Essex and Somerset (LALME 4, item 144) and heyuon ("heaven") in Warwickshire (LALME 4, item 145).  <ey> spellings are also common in those of the Cely letters which were written by Richard Cely the younger, who lived in London, but, since he also makes use of a number of Northern forms (such as <qw(h)> for <wh> and at for that), it difficult to be certain what to make of this. See Alison Hanham, ed., The Cely Letters: 1472-1488, EETS OS 273 (1975), xxiii, Asta Kihlbom, A Contribution to the Study of Fifteenth Century English, (Uppsala: Uppsala Universitets Årsskrift, 1926), 66-7.  As Dobson observes, the use of <ei> or <ey> for ME /ę:/ can be satisfactorily explained as an example of inverted spelling due to the common use of the spelling <ei> and the pronunciation /ę:/ in words adopted from French (receive etc.), since in Anglo-Norman the diphthong ei was monopthongised to /ę:/ and both pronunciations passed into English (Dobson, English Pronunciation, §115, Note 4 and §131). For the use of the digraph <ea> in Anglo-Norman words, see above III.2 In general, the distribution of Northern forms and the fact that many are clearly not acceptable to the scribe suggests that, while G may have had an ancestor with Northern connection, the G scribe himself was not a Northerner.NFor further examples of corrections made to Northern forms by the original scribe, see II.1.1.2.1.

III.4.2  Southern and Midlands Forms:

In fact, the evidence suggests a Southern or Midlands rather than a Northern provenance:

• III.4.2.1 OE and ON /a:/ normally appear as <o> or <oo>: fro/froo, bone(s, bootte ("boat"), grope, mo ("more"), more, abroode, foo ("foe"), aroos(e/arose, boore ("boar"), both(e, brode/broode ("broad"), goo- ("to go"), gost(e, hoole ("whole"), hoome(s ("home(s"), loofe ("loaf"), non/noon ("none"), ootes/otes ("oats"), rode ("rode"), roper, sore/soore, stone(s, stroke, thos ("those"), wo ("woe"), woote. OE /a:/ + w appears as <ou> in  soule.NAnd note also Table sole for "soul" a spelling which the OED dates as sixteenth century. Zachrisson, however, records <ol> spellings in words with Middle English ow+l not only in the Paston Letters and the Cely Papers, but also in the Rotuli Parliamentorum of Henry VI. See R. E. Zachrisson, Pronunciation of English Vowels, 1400-1700 (Göteborg: Wald, Zachrissons Boktryckeri A.B., 1913), 83. Before lengthening groups, Anglian /a:/, WS and Kentish /ea:/  appears as <o> in old(e, cold(e, bolde, folde, holde-, told(e (beside one example of toolde), sold(e, womb, though note the isolated example of <a> in baldelyche at G.15.227 (also found in the B manuscripts M and L). Forms where lengthening of /a/ was followed by late thirteenth/early fourteenth-century shortening also appear with <o>: long(e, among(e. The exceptions are forms where <a> has become the present day spelling: land, hand, stand (where forms in <a> had already ousted those in <o> during the ME period),NThere are 8 examples of lond(- beside 37 of land(-, 6 examples of stond beside 15 of stand(-. and lamb (with extension of the vowel from the plural). This pattern of <o> forms for ME /o:/ persists in the Table of Contents.  The fact that the preterite of the Class I verb "to shrive" appears in the final section of the Table with an <a> (shrave) is probably an example, not of a Northernism, but of hyper-correction due to the social repercussions attendant on the changes in the pattern of vowel gradation in verbs of Classes IV and V.NSee M. L. Samuels, Linguistic Evolution (Cambridge: CUP, 1972), 172-3. As Samuels observes, sixteenth-century forms such as bore and broke (replacing the earlier Class IV and V preterites bare and brake) probably entered the language initially in dialect and colloquial register, and as a reaction many speakers would not only take pains to preserve the conservative forms of these particular words but would also tend to avoid all preterites in ō, including those of Class I. Although the G scribe normally retains the <o>/<oo> forms in such verbs (aroose G.6.339; wroote G.11.179, G.12.388, G.15.332, G.16.481), forms in with long a were nevertheless likely to be familiar to him.
• III.4.2.2 OE and ON /o:/ is normally spelled <o> or <oo>: booke/boke, goose, loke/looke ("look"), blode/blood(e, broke/brooke ("brook"), brother, cokes ("cooks"), cokeslane, dome/doome, floode, foode, foote, hood(e, hooke, mother, mone/moone ("moon"), moneth, non(e/noon(e, other, rooffe, roote (once rote), shoone, shoope/shop(e ("created"), sone/soone ("soon"), tooles, totheaches,  forsooke (once forsoke), stoode (once stode).  Even in the case of words such as "blood" and "flood" where, as we have seen <ou> spellings do occur, the usual spelling is with <o> or <oo>. Moreover, although the presence of other Northern forms tends to suggest Northern influence here (and thus a /u:/ pronunciation), it is in fact possible that such <ou> spellings indicated not a long vowel but a variant pronunciation with a short vowel. For Early Modern shortening in such words, see Dobson, English Pronunciation, §36. As Dobson notes, in the sixteenth and possibly even in the fifteenth centuries, the fact that many words from OF were spelled with <ou> but were pronounced with /u/  resulted in the use of the grapheme <ou> for /u/ by shortening (Dobson, English Pronunciation, §158, note 2). A number of <ou> spellings for Middle English long o from the early fifteenth century onwards are listed by Zachrisson.NPronunciation, 77.
• III.4.2.3 There are no examples of Northern forms of "such," "which," etc. with <k> rather than <ch> and no examples of <qu>/<qw> for <wh>. The use of forms for "think" in <k> simply reflects the fact that this was the normal spelling by the sixteenth century and the one example of thenche (G.6.291) is therefore a relict. Forms of "church" in <k> (kyrk(e) can usually be traced back to Langland and the demands of alliteration (see, e.g.,  G.4.60, G.6.1, G.6.106).
• III.4.2.4 The verb "to work" appears as worch- (LALME 1, Dot Map 315).
• III.4.2.5 "much" appears with medial <o> (LALME 1, Dot Map 103).
• III.4.2.6 As part of his later spelling corrections, the scribe alters forms of "should" in <u> to forms in <o> (see II.1.1.3.2), something which suggests that the latter was a familiar form (LALME 1, Dot Map 159).
• III.4.2.7 The adverb "then" persistently appears as tho/þo beside then (LALME 1, Dot Map 185).
• III.4.2.8 The usual form for "less" is lasse beside less frequent lesse (LALME 1, Dot Map 456).
• III.4.2.9 The letter <w> is used for <v> in words of French origin (wale for "vale," walew for "value," wanesshed for "vanished," weneme for "venom," weneson for "venison," wengeance for "vengeance" etc.).NSee Dobson, English Pronunciation, § 374, Richard Jordan, Handbook of Middle English Grammar: Phonology, translated and revised by Eugene Joseph Crook (The Hague: Mouton, 1974), § 300.  Jordan suggests that the change from <w> to <v> in these words began in the South East Midlands at the end of the fourteenth century and spread north to Norfolk, but adds that such forms clearly also spread through Kent and East Sussex, while Wright also records them in Essex (Wright, Dialect Grammar, §281). Wyld records instances in the Cely Papers and the Paston Letters as well as in William Gregory's Chronicle (Wyld, History, 292-3).

The evidence thus once again suggests that the G scribe was not a Northerner.NThe fact that the third person singular present indicative inflexion is always -<th(e>, never -<s> has not been offered as evidence here, since, in Early Modern English, the choice of inflexion was normally made on grounds other than dialect (-<eth>, for instance, was the more formal variant; see Görlach, Introduction, 88-9). Nevertheless, the fact that no -<s> endings appear is, at the very least, consistent with a southern provenance.

III.4.3  West Midlands Forms:

There are occasional traces of what appear to be West Midlands relicts (though these are not necessarily all Langland's own).  Many are isolated or infrequent examples:

• III.4.3.1 One example of the preterite singular of the verb "to drink" in <o> (dronke at G.14.65), beside usual forms of OE and ON /a/ or /o/ before a nasal in <a> (can, man, ran, began, wanne, and, many).
• III.4.3.2 Forms of class II weak verbs and related nouns etc. in <y>:NSuch forms do, however, also appear in other areas in the South, see LALME 4.324. louye (G.12.331),NBut note G forms without <y> where most manuscripts do have <y> spellings at G.12.19, G.12.55, G.12.113, G.12.175 etc. lyuyers ("people who live") (G.13.128), tholye(d (G.12.395, G.14.268, G.19.74), shony (G.6.171). That these are not the scribe's preferred forms is clear from the correction at G.16.543 where wonyen is altered to wonnen at the time of transcription (see II.1.1.2.1).
• III.4.3.3 Forms in <y> for "thus" (LALME 4.315). It is difficult to be certain that some of these have not simply been misread as examples of "this" but in a number of cases (e.g. at G.16.148, G.16.302, G.19.415, G.20.156) such misinterpretation seems unlikely.NNote also the back spellings "thus" for "this" at G.14.85, G.20.173. At G.11.259, the scribe clearly interprets his exemplar form in <i> as "this" with consequent omission of the pronoun "it."
• III.4.3.4 Forms of "little" with <ul> (lytull(e beside more usual lytle) (LALME 1, Dot Map 464).
• III.4.3.5 Forms of "first" in <u> (furst(e; 46x beside 5 examples with <y>).NAs Lass observes, it seems unlikely that sixteenth-century spellings of words like "first" with <u> are genuine examples of the NURSE merger (by which "stir," "turn" and "earth" all ended up with the same vowel), since examples are limited to those words which had /u/ <OE y. See Roger Lass, "Phonology and Morphology," in Roger Lass, ed., The Cambridge History of the English Language: 1476-1776 (Cambridge: CUP, 1999), 112, and also Dobson, English Pronunciation, § 82.  These persist throughout the text, and there are two examples at the very beginning of the Table of Contents. After this, however, the Table has forms in <y>, and it therefore seems likely that this was the G scribe's preferred spelling. Note also one example of "birth" with <u> beside one with <y>, murthe (5x) beside myrthe(s (14x), one example of spure ("enquire"), and one of the verb "to shut" in <u> beside one in <e>. The word "church" normally has <u> (occasionally <e>), but this is the regular form by this date.NSee Dobson, English Pronunciation, §82. With these exceptions, however, forms with OE /y/ and /y:/ appear with <y> or, occasionally <e>.NThus OE, ON /y/ appears as <y>/<e> in brygge, brydges, bygg- and begg- ("to buy"; and note the correction of bugger to bygger G.11.315, apparently made by the original scribe at a later date), dyd(e, kysse(n, kyssyng, kyst, kynne(s, kyns, synne(s, fylled, dynne, dynt(es, hylles and hillys, kyng(es, kechyn(n)e, kernell, lyst (from lysten "to please"), lystenethe, left(e (adj.), mylner, pytt, rygge and ryggbones, styrre and styrryd, thynke (seem), thynne, merye (9x) and meryest (1x) beside one example of myrrye. OE, ON /y/ before lengthening clusters appears as <y> in byrde ("lady"), kynd(e, mynde.  OE, ON /y:/ appears with <y> in "fire" (and note fure altered to fyre as part of the original transcription at G.13.288), brydall and brydeale, myse ("mice"), hyde(n ("to hide"), lyes ("lice"), pryde, hyre ("hire"), fyst ("fist"; fust at G.14.319 is an error for furst), lythe ("to listen").
• III.4.3.6 Forms of the verbs "to lie" and "to say" and "to buy" in <gg> probably also reflect the original (LALME 1, Dot Maps 506 and 507).  Where such forms appear in other B manuscripts, G normally retains them, though note G sey for the majority reading in <gg> at G.12.301, G ley for most manuscripts legge ("wager") at G.3.35.NForms of the verb "to live" with <bb>, by contrast, cause problems. At G.1.222 the scribe simply omits the word libbyng, while at G.6.151 he misreads and writes <lyw>, attempts to correct by overwriting and finally deletes the whole thing and writes lyven.
• III.4.3.7 Forms of the conjunction ere ("before") in ar(e (G.6.20, G.6.53, G.6.461, G.6.468).NSee Samuels, "Langland's Dialect," 79.
• III.4.3.8 Occasional forms of "she" in h- (see III.1.3.1 above). Where such forms are retained, they appear as he rather than heo, although the latter was probably Langland's form.NSamuels, "Langland's Dialect," 72 and 81, note 16.
• III.4.3.9 One example of they for "the" (G.4.10; see LALME 4, item 1 and p. 315).

Such forms as these are clearly relicts.NFor the alterations made to West Midlands forms by the original scribe, see II.1.1.2.1.  Many may have been present in Langland's original, but, if Langland's form for "she" was indeed heo, the G relict form he suggests an intermediate layer of West Midlands copying preceding the copy which introduced the Northern dialect forms.

III.4.4 The G Scribe's Dialect:

The G scribe, in any case, appears to have come from an area south of the Wash.  Given the number of forms which change during the course of the transcription, it is further clear that he is only happy to retain forms which are at the very least part of his passive repertoire.  As a result, a form such as "first" with <u>, which, though gradually replaced by forms in <y> in the Table of Contents, is nevertheless retained throughout the transcription of the poem itself, must be assumed to be familiar to the scribe, and this suggests that he is unlikely to have come from the East Midlands or from the western part of Suffolk (LALME 1, Dot Map 417).  Forms of French loan words in <v-> with initial <w-> (see III.4.2.9 above) suggest the east rather than the west of the remaining area, while forms of the verb "to work" in worch- suggest that Norfolk is unlikely (LALME 1, Dot Map 315). Within the remaining eastern area, the use of forms in segh- for "saw," combined with forms of "hundred" in -th and forms of "earth" with initial y- (LALME 4, item 211; LALME 1, Dot Map 454; and LALME 4.319) suggest an area slightly to the North of London, a placement which is supported by the retention of forms of "say" and "lie" in <gg> (LALME 1, Dot Map 506),NSuch forms, however, were presumably by now outdated and therefore part of the scribe's passive rather than active repertoire. and by the use of forms in thogh- for "though" (LALME 4, item 32).  Note, however, that the form soych- for "such" (which was presumably familiar to the scribe (this is the form which he adopts in his spelling corrections, replacing suych-) occurs just south of London in Surrey (LALME 4, item 10).   

IV. Editorial Method:

IV.1 Transcription of the Manuscript:

IV.1.1 Abbreviations:

The following abbreviations have been expanded:

• A loop with a tail for <es> (G.1.3).
• A forward facing curve for <er> (G.1.12), occasionally for <re> (G.10.85).
• Superscript <t> in þ(a)t, w(y)t(h) and in words ending in -m(en)t (G.1.28, G.1.34, G.2.162).
• Superscript <u> in þou (G.2.5).
• Superscript <ch> in wych="which" (G.3.110).
• A mark curving backwards over the final <u> etc. for final <m> or <n> (G.1.39, G.1.64).
• A superscript horizontal line over the middle of a word and sometimes at the end for <n> or <m> (G.1.41, G.1.61, G.1.141).
• A bar through the descender of <p> for <par> or <per> (G.1.68, G.1.151).
• A slanting line through the tail of long <s> for <ser> and <syr> (G.1.95, G.3.116).
• A curved line through the descender of <p> for <pro> (G.4.148).
• <q> plus superscript <d> for <quod> (G.1.167)

All these are standard and no record of the form of the abbreviation is offered in the transcription or the tagging. However, the scribe's use of superscript <a> as an abbreviation mark is idiosyncratic and is therefore treated differently. There is no example in G of superscript <a> being used to represent <ra> (as is often the case in the other manuscripts). Instead, in G, except in the case of error, <ra> is always written out in full (grace G.2.80; trauell G.1.120 etc.) It seems likely, however, that superscript <a> was present in at least one of the G scribe's exemplars, but that he failed to understand its significance; note, for instance the occurrence of guntethe for grauntethe at G.12.100 and grede with superscript <a> for gradde in most manuscripts (G.17.80),NG's use of portren for purtraye at G.4.62 and of sharpe for schrape at G.6.126 may also result from such a misunderstanding, though it should be noted that the first is present in one, the second in several C version manuscripts and that in any case the fact that the MED records portred as a possible past participle form suggests that G's may have been an acceptable infinitive. as well as the regular use of otiose superscript <a> in conjunction with written <ra> (thus graauntyth at G.3.157, bytraaye at G.11.136, graace at G.20.28).NAccording to Petti, the use of superscript <a> for <ra> was rare in the Renaissance. See Anthony G. Petti, English Literary Hands from Chaucer to Dryden (London: Edward Arnold, 1977), 24. The fact that such words have written <ra> in spite of the scribe's apparent failure to understand the abbreviation suggests that he may have had access to more than one exemplar. In such cases the superscript letter is recorded as part of the transcription on the grounds that the scribe presumably found it in one of his exemplars and must have wished to record it, even though (or perhaps because) he did not fully grasp its function. The scribe does, in addition, use superscript <a> as an abbreviation mark for a number of other letters or combinations of letters in accordance with Latin practice. Thus at G.4.156 "Iesu" is written Ihua, at G.6.150 "spiritualte" is written spaualte. In such cases, the form of the abbreviation is recorded in the tagging.NSee also the traditional abbreviation quemqam for quemquam at G.15.297, but note miaam for misericordiam at G.6.293. A problem arises with the words "grant" and "covenant," which frequently end in <a>+2 minims+<t>, with a superscript <a> over the minims. It is possible that the superscript <a> here is otiose and that, like the examples given above, it simply records an abbreviation (whether for <ra> or <au>) which was present in the scribe's exemplar but which is no longer necessary. However, it is noticeable that, when superscript <a> is not used, the scribe's spelling of "grant" is almost invariably graunt,N The one exception is granted at G.4.173. i.e. he provides four minims, whereas in cases where superscript <a> is present, he normally writes only two. This suggests that the scribe may have interpreted superscript <a> here as an abbreviation mark for <n> and it has been therefore expanded as such in the transcription both of "grant" and of "covenant" (for which there is a similar pattern, although the numbers are smaller).

Special problems also arise with flourishes and bars which could possibly be taken to indicate final -<e>

a) There are three cases of long <r> plus flourish (at G.3.68, G.4.158, and G.6.269). Since this is a very small number, it is difficult to draw any very firm conclusions as to scribal intention, but this combination has nevertheless in each case been expanded to <re> on the grounds that "their" and "her" with final -<e> are certainly possible (the latter is unusual in this manuscript, but see G.4.127). It should be noted, however, that it may well be the case that none of these examples was in fact the work of the original scribe. In the first two cases the <r> and the flourish are very definitely later additions and, although the third case is not as clear, it seems possible that here too there may well have been later correction: the <r>+flourish appears to have been squashed in, leaving no space between words (see notes to these lines).

b) In the case of <d> with a tail, the evidence suggests that the flourish is otiose. Not only does such a flourish regularly appear in positions where it would not be expected (almost invariably, for instance, on "quod"), but elsewhere the expansion to <de> would destroy the distinction between long and short vowels which the scribe goes to some pains to maintain: "god" appears as <god>+flourish, or as <god>, "good" appears as <gode>, <good> or <goode>. In each of the following cases, "god" appears with a flourish on final <d>:

but god to all gode men suyche wrytyng defendyth (G.4.64)

more to good þen to god þe gome hys loue cast (G.14.358).

c) The tail on <ff> occurs most frequently on off and yff, i.e in positions where final <e> would not normally be expected,NThere are two examples of þer-offe at G.17.5 and G.17.243, but these are the only other instances. and since <ff> almost invariably occurs with either final <e> or with a flourish,NThere are exceptions to this (see, e.g., Off at G.10.76 and off at G.11.50) but these are unusual. it seems clear that the flourish is otiose.

d) The bar through final <ll>, on the other hand, though frequent, is not invariable and does often occur in places where a final <e> would be historically appropriate, as on the noun wyll< OE willa (G.1.150), on the plural adjective small (G.1.147), and on the infinitive tyll (G.1.120 ). It is difficult, nevertheless, to argue in favour of expansion. Even in cases where such an <e> would be appropriate, evidence concerning the G scribe's practice is mixed: the noun "will" does sometimes appear with written final <e> but it can also appear with final <ll> without bar (as at G.6.607, G.9.94, G.9.125); plural adjectives such as "all" can appear both with written <e> and with neither bar nor <e> (as at G.1.58, G.1.103); infinitives, though they frequently do appear with final <e>, can also appear without inflexional ending (to know G.1.122, to lett G.1.186 and note especially to kyll at G.2.67, ending in <ll> without a bar). In addition, such bars regularly occur in places where final <e> would have no historical justification: see the preterite singular befell+bar (G.1.6), the singular indefinite adjective all+bar (G.1.178, G.1.185), and the singular verb shall+bar (G.1.184, G1. 202, G.3.36, G.3.174 etc.). Neither the preterite singular verb "fell" nor singular "shall" ever appears with written final <e>. Finally, it is worth noting that it is possible for barred <ll> to be followed by a written <e>, as at G.6.65 (Peronelle). Consistent expansion to <lle> would not therefore accord with the G scribe's practice, and the bar has been treated as otiose.

IV.1.2 Letter forms:

As far as the forms of individual letters are concerned, allograph forms such as long <s> and sigma <s> or long <r> and two-shaped <r> have not been distinguished. In the case of yogh, where one letter is used to represent more than one sound, the velar spirant and /j/ have been recorded as yogh (<ʒ>) and the sibiliant has been recorded as <z>. Thus myʒte (reading of manuscripts other than G, G.2.165), ʒerne (G.7.304), ʒemen (G.10.214), but dozene (G.5.39), forbyzyne (G.9.29), sarazenes (G.12.123).

IV.1.3 Capitalization:

Capitalization is that used by the scribe and by whoever provided the litterae notabiliores (see I.10 and notes). Such capitalization is, in any case, minimal. Lines, for instance, do not normally begin with a capital letter. The digraph <ff> as been recorded as <F> where it occurs at the beginning of a word. Capital <I> has been recorded as <I> whether or not it indicates an <I> or <J>/<j>.

IV.1.4 Punctuation, Word Spacing and the treatment of Proper Nouns:

Scribal punctuation (consisting mainly of virgules and, in the Latin sections, double points, like a colon, with the occasional single point) has been retained. It is not always easy to distinguish a point from a mark caused by lifting the pen from the paper (this is particularly so in the rubricated sections) and where there is any doubt the matter is discussed in a paleographic note.

The word divisions found in the manuscript have been followed as far as possible. Where two elements of a single word are separated by a space, they are linked by a shadow hyphen <->. Thus for-wandred (G.1.7). Where two words are run together, both the original and the regularized form are supplied, as in <orig>shalbe<orig><reg>shal be</reg> (G.2.178). Proper nouns have been treated as English unless they have Latin inflexion. Thus cesar at G.2.49 is treated as English but reddite cesari at G.2.53 is tagged as Latin. The problems which arise in other manuscripts at G.11.329 and G.14.55 are not present in G, since G lacks the English inflexion which other manuscripts give to beatus vir.

IV.1.5 Scribal Misspellings:

Scribal misspellings have been recorded with a <sic> tag and corrected with a <corr> tag.

IV.1.6 Ornamentation:

Forms of highlighting which reflect the scribe's interpretation of the text (rubrication of Latin, boxing of important words) have been tagged so that they appear as part of the transcription. Boxing is not, however, tagged when it results from the fact that the line is too long and wraps round, i.e. where it is simply being used to indicate which words belong to which line. In such cases, the boxing is recorded in a codicological note. G's boxing is usually incomplete. The display will show a complete box, but in fact G's boxes rarely have more than three sides.

IV.1.7 Scribal Corrections:

Scribal corrections made at the time of writing have, wherever possible, been distinguished from those made by the original scribe at a later date and those made by other hands (hands 2 and 3).NFor corrections made by hands 2 and 3, see Introduction II.1.2. This is not always an exact art, and where it is impossible to determine the corrector, such corrections are recorded as being by handx. Even where identification of the scribe seems possible, corrections are normally minor (the change of a letter, the addition of a short word) and it is quite possible that some have been misattributed. The original scribe clearly made a considerable number of later corrections in brown ink (see discussion at II.1.1. and II.1.1.3) and since these persist throughout the text it has been assumed, unless there is contradictory evidence, that brown ink corrections where the hand is difficult to distinguish (for instance, the addition of a large number of virgules) have also been made by the original scribe as part of this programme of corrections. The alternative is to assume two very persistent correctors, employing very similar shades of ink. It is also the case that the later insertion of virgules makes good a lack in the earlier stages of the original transcription which does not persist into the last few passus, i.e. the corrections result in a more consistent transcription, and it is easy to imagine that the scribe, having realised towards the end of his transcription that he had been in the habit of omitting virgules, went back later to correct this fault in the earlier passus. Virgules which have been added to separate words (e.g., after a correction which involves added letters), and which have no significance as metrical or punctuation marks, have, however, been recorded, not as part of the text, but in paleographic notes. As far as other corrections are concerned, where erased text is legible, this is recorded within the deletion tags. Where it is illegible, this has been indicated with one punctus per deleted character.

IV.2 Style Sheets:

Using XML markup, this edition offers four different views of the text accessible through four different style sheets: Scribal, Diplomatic, Critical, and AllTags.

The Scribal style sheet's presentation of the text represents as closely as possible both the readings and features of the manuscript text as well as the most information about editorial interventions.

The Diplomatic style sheet suppresses all notes, marginalia not by hand1, hand1.1 or hand2, and indications of error or eccentric word division. Its text is otherwise identical to that presented in the Scribal style sheet.

The Critical style sheet is designed to indicate the text as it was intended to appear after correction. Since the text displayed is a reconstructed, putative text, it lacks the color features that appear in the more nearly diplomatic transcriptions of the manuscript. Italics are used for Latin and French words and phrases in this style sheet. Eccentric word divisions are silently, at least in the surface display, corrected in this style sheet. That is, gowe appears as go we. A reader who wishes to find all such divisions can still search for them in the views provided by the Scribal and AllTags style sheets as well as in the underlying XML text.

The AllTags style sheet, as its name implies, is intended to display the full content of markup in XML tags. References to the Athlone B text have been supplied for the convenience of readers.

IV.3 Annotations and Treatment of Textual Variants:

IV.3.1 Annotations:

Four sets of annotations are provided — codicological, lexical and linguistic, paleographic and textual.

Codicological notes draw attention to physical features of the manuscript and to later additions in the margins. These notes are marked with a red, superscript <C>.

Paleographic notes comment on letter forms, particularly where these are ambiguous. These notes are marked with a red, superscript <P>.

Lexical notes comment on lexical ambiguities and are marked with a red superscript <LX>.

Linguistic notes comment on items of linguistic interest. They are marked with a red superscript <LG>.

Textual notes supplement the information on textual relationships provided in the apparatus tags (see Treatment of Textual Variants below) and may, in addition, provide information about the relationship with the A and C texts. These notes are marked with a red, superscript <T>.

IV.3.2 Treatment of Textual Variants:

All instances of textual variants in which three or fewer B manuscripts share G's reading are recorded in the apparatus tags. Instances where four B manuscripts share G's reading are recorded only where these manuscripts do not belong to the β4 section of the stemma. Unique and original G readings showing agreement with A and/or C are listed in the Introduction (at II.2.2), and such readings are therefore not normally recorded in the notes. However, where corrected readings or readings which G shares with one or more B manuscripts show agreement with A and/or C which is particularly interesting, such correspondences are recorded in the textual notes. In general, B text variants are not normally recorded unless they are substantive. However, spellings which may or may not indicate a substantive variant are recorded (see, e.g., G.17.246, where, given the G scribe's inconsistent use of double and single consonants, the G reading bleden may or may not indicate substantive variation from the Bx reading Bledden) together with some non-substantive variants which are of linguistic interest (the use or otherwise of the y- past participle prefix, extension of an -es ending to previously uninflected plurals). On the other hand, dialect variants which are very persistent (such as those involving variation between <s> and <sh> spellings (and vice versa) are only recorded where it seems likely that there may have been a genuine misunderstanding. Manuscripts are cited in the following order: G L M Cr W Hm C G O C2 Y B R F. Where a shared reading in a particular manuscript (say L) results from later correction the reading cited is normally taken from the manuscript next in order.

V. List of Manuscript Sigils:

For The Piers Plowman Electronic Archive we have introduced a list of sigils that depart in some respects from the sigils used since Skeat's editions. Changes have been made to eliminate ambiguities inherent in the older sigils which, to a considerable degree, reflect the sequence of the discovery of the relationships among them. If we were to use the traditional sigils, we would court ambiguity in an electronic text with identical sigils representing different manuscripts and different sigils identifying single manuscripts. British Library Additional 10574, for instance, has no sigil at all for the A text, is B's Bm, and C's L. We have chosen to represent each manuscript with a unique sigil.

For descriptions of the B manuscripts see George Kane and E. Talbot Donaldson, eds., Piers Plowman: The B Version, Will's Visions of Piers Plowman, Do-Well, Do-Better and Do-Best: An Edition in the Form of Trinity College Cambridge MS B.15.17, Corrected and Restored from the Known Evidence, with Variant Readings, rev. ed. (London, Berkeley and Los Angeles, 1988), 1-15; A. I. Doyle, "Remarks on Surviving Manuscripts of Piers Plowman," in Medieval English Religious and Ethical Literature: Essays in Honour of G. H. Russell, ed. G. Kratzmann and James Simpson (Cambridge, Eng., 1986), 35-48; and C. David Benson and Lynne S. Blanchfield, The Manuscripts of Piers Plowman: The B-Version (Cambridge, Eng., 1997).

1. B Manuscripts:

2. A Manuscripts:

3. C Manuscripts:

4. BA Splice:

5. AC Splices:

6. ABC Splices:

VI.  Bibliography:

VI.1 Editions:

Adams, Robert, Hoyt N. Duggan, Eric Eliason, Ralph Hanna III, John Price-Wilkin and Thorlac Turville-Petre, eds. The Piers Plowman Electronic Archive, Vol 1: Corpus Christi College, Oxford MS 201 (F). Ann Arbor, Mich.: SEENET and the University of Michigan Press, 2000.

Brewer, Charlotte, and A. G. Rigg, eds. Piers Plowman: A Facsimile of the Z-Text in Bodleian Library, Oxford, MS Bodley 851. Cambridge: D. S. Brewer, 1994.

Brown, Carleton Fairchild, ed. Religious Lyrics of the Fifteenth Century. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1952.

Burrow, J. A., ed. Thomas Hoccleve's Complaint and Dialogue. EETS 313. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1999.

Calabrese, Michael, Hoyt N. Duggan and Thorlac Turville-Petre, eds. The Piers Plowman Electronic Archive, Vol.6: San Marino, Huntington Library MS HM 128 (Hm, Hm2). Woodbridge: D. S. Brewer for SEENET and the Medieval Academy of America, 2008.

Duggan, Hoyt N. and Ralph Hanna III, eds. The Piers Plowman Electronic Archive, Vol. 4: Oxford, Bodleian Library, MS Laud Misc. 581 (L). Woodbridge: D. S. Brewer for SEENET and the Medieval Academy of America, 2004.

Eliason, Eric, Thorlac Turville-Petre, and Hoyt N. Duggan, eds. The Piers Plowman Electronic Archive, Vol. 5: London, British Library MS Additional 35287 (M). Woodbridge: D. S. Brewer for SEENET and the Medieval Academy of America, 2005.

Hanham, Alison, ed. The Cely Letters: 1472-1488. EETS OS 273 (1975).

Heinrichs, Katherine, ed. The Piers Plowman Electronic Archive, Vol.3: Oxford, Oriel College, MS 79 (O). Woodbridge: D. S. Brewer for SEENET and the Medieval Academy of America, 2004.

Kane, George, ed. Piers Plowman: The A Version: Will's Visions of Piers Plowman and Do-Well, An Edition in the Form of Trinity College Cambridge MS R.3.14 Corrected from Other Manuscripts, with Variant Readings, rev. ed. London: Athlone Press; Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press, 1988.

Kane, George, and E. Talbot Donaldson, eds. Piers Plowman. The B Version: Will's Visions of Piers Plowman, Do-Well, Do-Better and Do-Best. An Edition in the Form of Trinity College Cambridge MS B.15.17, Corrected and Restored from the Known Evidence, with Variant Readings, rev. ed. London: Athlone Press; Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press, 1988.

Pearsall, Derek, ed. William Langland: Piers Plowman. The C-Text. 2d ed. Exeter Medieval English Texts and Studies. Exeter: University of Exeter Press, 1994.

Rigg, A. G., and Charlotte Brewer, eds. Piers Plowman: The Z Version. Studies and Texts 59. Toronto: Pontifical Institute of Mediaeval Studies, 1983.

Russell, George, and George Kane, eds. Piers Plowman. The C Version: Will's Visions of Piers Plowman, Do-Well, Do-Better and Do-Best. An Edition in the Form of Huntington Library MS HM 143, Corrected and Restored from the Known Evidence, with Variant Readings. London: Athlone Press; Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press, 1997.

Schmidt, A. V. C., ed. The Vision of Piers Plowman: A Critical Edition of the B-Text Based on Trinity College Cambridge MS B.15.17. London, Melbourne, and Toronto: J. M. Dent & Sons Ltd.; New York: E. P. Dutton & Co., 1978; 2d ed., London: J. M. Dent & Sons, Ltd.; Rutland, Vermont: Charles E. Tuttle Co., 1995.

———, ed. Piers Plowman: A Parallel-Text Edition of the A, B, C and Z Versions: Vol. 1. Text. London and New York: Longman, 1995.

Skeat, Walter W., ed. The Vision of William Concerning Piers the Plowman together with Vita de Dowel, Dobet, et Dobest, Secundum Wit et Resoun by William Langland: Part II. The "Crowley" Text; or Text B. EETS, OS 38. London: N. Trübner, 1869.

———, ed. The Vision of William Concerning Piers the Plowman, in Three Parallel Texts together with Richard the Redeless. 2 vols. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1886.

Turville-Petre, Thorlac and Hoyt N. Duggan, eds. The Piers Plowman Electronic Archive, Vol.2: Cambridge, Trinity College, MS B.15.17 (W). Ann Arbor, Mich.: SEENET and the University of Michigan Press, 2000.

VI.2 Studies:

Adams, Robert. "The Reliability of the Rubrics in the B text of Piers Plowman," Medium Ævum 54 (1985): 208-231.

———. "The Kane-Donaldson Edition of Piers Plowman: Eclecticism's Ultima Thule," TEXT 16 (2006): 131-141.

Barber, Charles. Early Modern English. London: André Deutsch, 1976.

Benson, C. David, and Lynne S. Blanchfield, with acknowledgements to the work of Marie-Claire Uhart. The Manuscripts of Piers Plowman: the B-version. Cambridge: D. S. Brewer, 1997.

Brewer, Charlotte. Editing Piers Plowman: The Evolution of the Text. Cambridge Studies in Medieval Literature 28. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1996.

Briquet, C. M. Les filigranes: dictionnaire historique des marques du papier, dès leurs apparition vers 1282 jusqu'en 1600. New York: Hacker, 1985.

Brunner, Karl. An Outline of Middle English Grammar. trans. G. K. W. Johnston. Oxford: Basil Blackwell, 1963.

Burrow, J. A. "The Structure of Piers Plowman B XV-XX: evidence from the rubrics," Medium Aevum 77 (2008): 306-12.

A Catalogue of the Manuscripts Preserved in the Library of the University of Cambridge. Cambridge: CUP, 1979.

Davis, Bryan P. "The Prophecies of Piers Plowman in Cambridge University Library MS Gg.4.31." Journal of the Early Book Society for the Study of Manuscripts and Printing History 5 (2002): 15-36.

Dobson, E. J. English Pronunciation 1500-1700. 2 vols. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1957.

Doyle, A. I. "Remarks on Surviving Manuscripts of Piers Plowman." In Medieval English Religious and Ethical Literature: Essays in Honour of George H. Russell. Ed. Gregory Kratzmann and James Simpson, 35-48. Cambridge: D. S. Brewer, 1986.

———. "The Manuscripts." In Middle English Alliterative Poetry and its Literary Background. Ed. David Lawton, 88-100. Cambridge: D. S. Brewer, 1982.

Duggan, Hoyt N. "Notes on the metre of Piers Plowman: Twenty Years On." In Approaches to the Metres of Alliterative Verse. Ed. Judith Jefferson and Ad Putter, 159-186. Leeds Texts and Monographs, New Series 17, 2009.

Görlach, Manfred. Introduction to Early Modern English. Cambridge: CUP, 1991.

Hailey, R. Carter. "Robert Crowley and the Editing of Piers Plowman (1550)." Yearbook of Langland Studies 21 (2007): 143-170.

Hanna III, Ralph. William Langland. Authors of The Middle Ages: English Writers of the Late Middle Ages 3. Aldershot and Brookfield, Vermont: Variorum, 1993.

Heawood, Edward. Watermarks mainly of the 17th and 18th Centuries. Hilversum: Paper Publications Society, 1950.

Jefferson, Judith A. "Divisions, Collaboration and other topics: the table of contents in Cambridge, University Library, MS Gg.4.31." In Medieval Alliterative Poetry: Essays in Honour of Thorlac Turville-Petre. Ed. John A. Burrow and Hoyt N. Duggan, 140-152. Dublin: Four Courts Press, 2010.

Jordan, Richard. Handbook of Middle English Grammar: Phonology. trans. and rev. by Eugene Joseph Crook. The Hague: Mouton, 1974.

Kane, George. Piers Plowman Glossary: Will's Visions of Piers Plowman, Do-Well, Do-Better and Do-Best, A Glossary of the English Vocabulary of the A, B, and C Versions, as presented in the Athlone editions. London and New York: Continuum, 2005.

Kihlbom, Asta. A Contribution to the Study of Fifteenth-Century English. Uppsala: Uppsala Universitets Årsskrift, 1926.

Lass, Roger. "Phonology and Morphology." In The Cambridge History of the English Language, Vol.3: 1476-1776. Ed. Roger Lass, 56-186. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1999.

Lewis, Robert E. and Angus McIntosh. A Descriptive Guide to the Manuscripts of the "Prick of Conscience." Medium Ævum monographs n.s. 12. Oxford: The Society for the Study of Mediæval Languages and Literature, 1982.

McIntosh, Angus, M. L. Samuels and Michael Benskin. A Linguistic Atlas of Late Medieval English. 4 vols. Aberdeen: Aberdeen University Press, 1986.

Petti, Anthony G. English literary hands from Chaucer to Dryden. London: Edward Arnold, 1977.

Prinz, Otto, ed., with the assistance of Johannes Schneider. Mittellateinisches Wörterbuch. Munich: C. H. Beck, 1967.

Salmon, Vivian. "Orthography and Punctuation." In The Cambridge History of the English Language, Vol.3: 1476-776. Ed. Roger Lass, 13-55. Cambridge: CUP, 1999.

Samuels, M. L. Linguistic Evolution. Cambridge: CUP, 1972.

———. "Langland's Dialect." Medium Ævum 54 (1985): 232-47 with corrections at Medium Ævum 55 (1986): 40. Reprinted in The English of Chaucer and his Contemporaries. Ed. J. J. Smith, 70-85. Aberdeen: Aberdeen University Press, 1989.

———. "Dialect and Grammar." In A Companion to Piers Plowman. Ed. John A. Alford, 201-221. Berkeley, Los Angeles and London: University of California Press, 1988.

Scragg, D. G. A History of English Spelling. Manchester: Manchester University Press, 1974.

Turville-Petre, Thorlac. "Putting it Right: The Corrections of Huntington Library MS. Hm 128 and BL Additional MS. 35287." Yearbook of Langland Studies 16 (2002): 41-65.

Uhart, Marie-Claire. "The Early Reception of Piers Plowman." Ph.D. diss., University of Leicester, 1986.

Warner, Lawrence. "An Overlooked Piers Plowman Excerpt and the Oral Circulation of Non-Reformist Prophecy, c.1520-55." Yearbook of Langland Studies 21 (2007): 119-142.

Wright, Joseph. The English Dialect Grammar. Oxford: OUP, 1905.

——— and E. M. Wright. An Elementary Middle English Grammar. Oxford: OUP, 1923.

Wyld, H.C. A History of Modern Colloquial English, 3rd ed. Oxford: Basil Blackwell, 1953.

Zachrisson, R.E. Pronunciation of English Vowels, 1470-1700. Göteborg: Wald, Zachrissons Boktryckeri A.B., 1913.

VI.3 Abbreviations: