Though mentioned by every compendious grammar, the stylistic figure of litotes has been the subject of few specialized treatments for the individual languages. Of these, two are outstanding longo intervallo: Carl Weyman's learned and apparently exhaustive treatise entitled Studien über die Figur der Litotes, which deals with the phenomenon in Latin literature; and Alfred Hübner's Die mhd. Ironie oder die Litotes im Altdeutschen abounding in subtle and thought-provoking suggestions based on a vast material, but not well organized.

Richard Morris, in editing the Blickling Homilies, called attention to a passage in the xviith Homily which presents striking resemblances to the description of the mere of Grendel in Beowulf, “of which [in his opinion] it is probably a direct reminiscence.” Though almost sixty years have passed since this resemblance was pointed out, during this whole period it has received scant attention from students of Old English, being either ignored altogether or dismissed with only brief discussion.

Zwischen Runenforschung und germanischer Religionsgeschichte besteht—trotz der grossen sachlichen Verschiedenheit der beiden Forschungsgebiete—eine ziemlich enge Interessengemeinschaft, die sich keineswegs nur auf magische Inschriften in Runencharakteren, ihre Lesung, Deutung und Datierung erstreckt. Eine sozusagen organische Verbindung, die über das rein Inhaltliche weit hinausgeht, wird dadurch hergestellt, dass das Rätsel der Entstehung der Runenschrift von zwei Hauptproblemen der germanischen Religionsgeschichte nicht getrennt werden kann, nämlich (1) der Geschichte des Wodan-Odinkultes, und (2) der Frage der Beeinflussung des germanischen Runenzaubers durch fremdländische magische Systeme.

A number of noted scholars from Jacob Grimm to Streitberg have treated this topic. The latter in his Gotisches Elementarbuch (1920) summarizes, under the corresponding heads of the syntactical part of his grammar, the results of the various investigators. I intend in this paper to make an annotation here and there to their statements. And since I have noticed that some critics waver as to where to draw the exact demarcation line, I shall start with a definition of the matter under present consideration, following in part Grimm's Deutsche Grammatik.

These terms all indicate a monetary unit of uncertain value and obscure origin, but Du Cange is doubtless correct in assuming that the French, Anglo-Saxon, and Latin forms are related. The earliest occurrence of mancus (or mances) in England dates from 848; the Latin mancus is found on the Continent as early as 814. The authorities are agreed that the Anglo-Saxon form came to Britain from the Continent. For me the main point of interest in this discussion is Old French mangon, best known through its first occurrence—in the Chanson de Roland:

Tenez m'espee, meillur nen at nuls horn,
Entre les helz ad plus de mil manguns.

Godefroy defines it as a “sorte de monnaie d'or: il fallait deux besantz pour faireun mangon.” This estimate of value was certainly taken from the fabliau of Guillaume au Faucon:

Dist la dame, “Or avez faucon;
Deux besans va'ent un mangon.”

After the introduction of Christianity the use of runic characters diminished considerably in continental Europe. While in the times of King Chilperich and Venantius Fortunatus the runic script still played a rôle in public life, it fell into disuse in subsequent periods in central Europe, a fact which is deplored by Otfried in his introduction to the Gospels: Res mira, tam magnos viros, sapientia latos, sanctitate praeclaros, cuncta haec in alienae linguae gloriam transferre et usum scripturae in propria, lingua non habere. It will, therefore, be of interest to discover an unpublished runic inscription in CLM. 13067, a codex belonging to the eleventh or the twelfth centuries. It must be regarded as quite an unusual occurrence to see here the runic characters transcribing a Latin sentence and taking the place of a Hebrew inscription.

Re-enforcement of negation by the application of words or phrases denoting small value or amount was not unknown in Latin, and was a practice that naturally carried over into the Romance languages. In referring to terms thus employed in Romania, grammarians do not always quote sources or cite the earliest text in which a term appears; to remedy this deficiency for early Italian, where necessary and possible, is the purpose of the present discussion, as well as to list additional terms that previous investigators have overlooked.

Diese Arbeit stellt sich die Aufgabe, die in den Grundzügen der Fabel aufs engste verwandten Graldichtungen Crestiens und Wolframs auf ihre Behandlung der epischen Zeit hin zu untersuchen. In erster Linie muß es sich darum handeln, die in jeder der beiden Dichtungen tatsächlich obwaltenden Zeitverhältnisse ins Klare zu stellen. Die zeitliche Aufeinanderfolge der erzählten Ereignisse und die Zeitdauer sowohl der einzelnen Abschnitte wie der Gesamthandlung prägen sich nämlich nicht ohne weiteres dem Gedächtnis des Lesers ein. Zumal von dem Punkte an, wo die Erzählung sich gabelt und streckenweise die Laufbahn eines zweiten Helden ins Auge faßt, um dann wiederholt zum Titelhelden zurückzukehren, geht auch dem aufmerksamen Leser die Uebersicht leicht verloren. Wie sich im Lauf dieser Arbeit herausstellen soll, hat manches schiefe Urteil und manche vorschnelle Hypothese der Forschung unklare Vorstellungen über den epischen Zeitverlauf mit zur Voraussetzung.

In the critical writing of the last few decades Chaucer's Troilus and Criseyde has been described prevailingly as a psychological novel. Our most influentual interpreters, that is to say, draw our attention primarily to the subtle exhibition of psychology in the personages of the poem, and to the resemblance of the descriptive background to what we ordinarily call real life. By emphasizing these aspects of the Troilus they bring it into association with our modern novel. Representative of this view are such expressions as the following:

“Our first great psychological novel”; “A great psychological novel”; “An elaborate psychological novel”; “The first novel, in the modern sense”; “Its spirit and temper is that of the modern novel”; “A page out of the book of modern everyday life”;6 “[Chaucer's] first and greatest adventure into the world of every day”; “[What Chaucer adds to the Filostralo] is what we roughly call reality…. one has a sense of ordinary life going on”; “Troy is mediaeval London”; “[The Troilus] is not a romance”; “[In the Troilus Chaucer] leaves all romantic convention behind.”

Inviting the reader to exercise his own imagination with the aid of hints and cues rather than putting his meaning in prosaic terms, the meditative author of Piers Plowman takes one of the well-known roads of poetical composition. He stands with the poets who find it more to their liking to hint than to assert. On this account their work becomes relatively difficult to interpret. Time further adds to the obstacles implicit in their technique. Hence many of the controversies of scholars and the justification for what may at first glance seem a wasteful commentary. One cannot expect to leap suddenly to an understanding of so subtle and complex an allegory as Piers Plowman. Only through honest controversy and repeated effort is marked progress to be made.

In none of the scholarly treatments of the texts of Piers Plowman have I seen the theory advanced that the A-text is a contraction or an abridgment, for any purpose whatsoever, of the B- or C-texts. I take it that B is an enlargement of A, and that C is a revision of both. A, therefore, is the seed, whereas the other two are second thoughts, either of the A poet or of others, and it makes little difference which. If the three texts were written by one man, it is important to know what his original purpose was before one discusses his afterthoughts. If the poets are three, it is still important to know what he meant and planned who gave an idea to his followers.

The present paper, though it has a bearing upon the problems of comparative literature, does not deal directly with literary works themselves, but is confined to the study of a single rhetorical figure which made its appearance more than two thousand years ago and still lingers in folk rimes of the present day. This rhetorical figure, which is striking enough to be easily identifiable, can be traced all the way from the Orient to Western Europe and thus serves as a floating straw to mark the currents and eddies in the stream of literary tradition.

In this paper I shall trace Spenser's career in Ireland during the uncertain years, 1584–89, We know that the poet during this period was clerk of the Council of Munster, that he acted as secretary to the president of the province, and that he almost certainly, like his successor Richard Boyle, the Earl of Cork, “attended the Lord President in all his employments.”

As an Italian scholar has said, Dante's “rime pietrose” are a “questione pietrosa.” The rime pietrose—Pietra or Petra poems—are, strictly speaking, a small group of poems in which there is word-play on the lady's name and disposition. One thinks of Shakespeare's “Will” sonnets. Barbi allots to the Petra group one sestina, one sestina “doppia,” two canzoni, and a doubtful sonnet. Other critics would add more poems as being similar in mood and motive. D'Ancona, conceiving la Pargoletta, la Petra, la Donna Gentile, and Lisetta as “una persona in diversi atteggiamenti,” would include in one cycle nearly all Dante's lyrics not addressed to Beatrice. Certain others would identify la Petra with one other of Dante's ladies. Thus Zenatti, Santi, Misciatelli identify her with la Pargoletta; Serafino identifies her with Gentucca. At the other extreme, Federzoni rejects the idea of a Petra group altogether.

One of the many treasures of the Newberry Library in Chicago is the valuable philological library of Prince Louis-Lucien Bonaparte. In this large collection is a German translation of Thomas a Kempis's famous devotional work, Imitatio Christi. This volume (Incunabulum 1699) Ein ware nachuolgung Cristi was printed by Anthonius Sorg in Augsburg in 1486, and according to Victor Collins in An Attempt at a Catalogue (London 1894), 478, is the first known German translation. At the end of the book are 66 pages of German manuscript to which the attention of the editors was called by Professor James Taft Hatfield. They are indebted also to Dr. Pierce Butler, formerly of Newberry Library, who has kindly put the manuscript at their disposal for further examination.

No other product of the Elizabethans' attempts to improve and heighten the style of their writings is quite so remarkable as the ornate and jingling prose which goes under the name of Euphuism. Its unique character and great popularity have caused many to discuss the problems of its origin, but no satisfactory specific source has so far been discovered. The old theories of Landmann and Feuillerat, who suggested, respectively, that the style was the result of the imitation of Guevara, and of the imitation of the classics, have now been abandoned. In their place the theory now generally accepted is the one put forward by Professor Croll, who said that Euphuism was merely one manifestation of the general medieval tradition, continued into the sixteenth century, of writing patterned prose. Professor Croll demonstrated completely and finally the ultimate origins of the style; but Euphuism is a unique and special variety of schematic prose, and the steps by which the simple and frequently varied patterns of medieval writings came to be elaborated into the stiff, formalistic structure of Euphuism, with all its wealth of learned similes and recondite allusions, has not been explained.