Page:Alexander and Dindimus (Skeat 1878).djvu/15

 INTRODUCTION

An Essay on Alliterative Poetry, written by myself, and prefixed to vol. iii of the Percy Folio MS, ed. Hales and Furnivall, I have explained that there are no less than three poems (all fragmentary) in alliterative verse on the subject of the Romance of Alexander the Great. These I denote by the letters A, B, and C; they are as follows.

A. A fragment preserved in MS. Greaves 60, in the Bodleian library, beginning—"Yee þat lengen in londe · Lordes and ooþer." This was edited by me for the E.E.T.S. in 1867, being printed in the same volume with William of Palerne, pp. 177-218. It has never been printed elsewhere.

B. A fragment preserved in MS. Bodley 264, beginning—"Whan þis weith at his wil · weduring hadde." This was edited by Mr. Stevenson for the Roxburghe Club in 1849, and is now reprinted in the present volume.

C. A fragment preserved in MS. Ashmole 44, in the Bodleian library, of which a portion is also found in MS. Dublin D. 4.12. It begins—"When folk ere festid & fed · fayn&#x34F;&#x304; wald þai here," and was also printed by Mr. Stevenson at the same time and in the same volume; without, however, collation with the Dublin MS., which is of later date than the Ashmole MS.

It will be understood that the remarks I have now to make relate to fragment B only, unless the contrary be expressed.

There is but one copy of fragment B, and it is imperfect both at the beginning and the end. The portion preserved has been handed down to us in rather a curious way. The MS. in which it