The Hymns and Carols of Christmas

Nunc Gaudet Maria

For Christmas

Words: English Traditional from the Sloane Ms. 2593, British Library, London

Music: Not Stated

Source: E. K. Chambers and F. Sidgwick, eds., Early English Lyrics (London: A. H. Bullen, 1907), #LV, p. 109

Mary is a lady bright ;
Sche hath a sone of meche might ;
Over all this word sche is light. 5
    Bona natalicia.

Mary is so fair and sote,
And her sone so full of pote ;
Over all this word he is bote.
    Bona voluntaria. 10

Mary is so fair of face,
And her sone so full of grace ;
In hevene he make us a place,
    Cum sua potencia.

Mary is bothe good and kinde ; 15
Evere on us sche hath mende,
That the fend schall us not schende,
    Cum sua malicia.

Mary is quene of alle thinge,
And her sone a lovely kinge. 20
God graunt us alle good endinge !
    Regnat del gratia.

Notes:

7. sote, sweet.
8. pote, power.
9. bote, profit.
16. mende, mind.
17. shende, ruin.

Editor's Note:

Copies of this carol on this site include:

Chambers and Sidgwick Notes to #LV, p. 349.

Printed Archiv cix. 48 ; Wright, W.C., 23.

7. Fehr, in Archiv as above, prints :—

‘Mary is so fayr of face and fote,'

The words ‘of face’, however, are deleted in the MS. and ‘fote’ is Fehr's error for ‘sote'.

Extended Citations:

Sloane 2593.
Sloane 2593. Paper, 5 3/4 x 4 1/2. Songs and carols, seventy-four in number, of which three are in Latin, and the rest in English. Mainly religious or moral, but some trivial and satirical. Wright considered it to be the song-book of a minstrel (cf. Eng. Poet. e. 1) ; the last folio bears the name ‘Johannes Bardel' or ‘Bradel,' written in the same hand as the rest of the MS. Wright traces one poem to 1362-9, but probably this and others were traditional when written down ; he dates the handwriting temp. Henry VI. According to Bradley-Stratmann, the MS. was written in Warwickshire at the beginning of the XV cent. Variants of some poems appear in Eng. Poet. e. i. Extracts in Ritson (1790), Wright, Carols (1836), and S.L.P., Rel. Ant., and Fehr in Archiv, cvii. 48; Edited complete by Wright for the Warton Club in 1856 ; and by B. Fehr in Archiv, cix. 33 ; who does not print poems extracted as above, but is ignorant of the Warton Club print. Source: Notes, pp. 303-304.

Extended Citations:

Extracts in:

  • Ritson (1790); 
    Joseph Ritson, ed., Ancient Songs, from the time of King Henry the Third to the Revolution. (London: J. Johnson, 1790). "Advertisement in 1829 edition says that this edition was printed in 1787, dated 1790, and published 1792."
  • [Ritson] (1829); 
    Joseph Ritson. ed,. Ancient Songs and Ballads, from the reign of King Henry the Second to the Revolution. 2 Vols. (London: For Payne and Foss by Thomas Davison, 1829).
  • Hazlitt-Ritson.
    Joseph Ritson, ed., Ancient Songs and Ballads From the Reign of King Henry the Second to the Revolution. Third Edition, revised W. Carew Hazlitt. (London: Reeves and Turner, 1877).

  • Wright, Carols (1836).
    Thomas Wright, ed., Songs and Carols Printed From A Manuscript in the Sloane Collection in the British Museum Preface signed Thomas Wright. (London: William Pickering, 1836). [Text, twenty pieces only, from Sloane 2593.]

  • Wright, S.L.P.
    Thomas Wright, ed., Specimens of Lyric Poetry, composed in England in the reign of Edward the First (Percy Society, 1842). [Texts from Harl. 2253.]
  • Wright, Rel. Ant.
    Thomas Wright and James Orchard Halliwell, eds., Reliquiæ Antiquæ. Scraps from Ancient Manuscripts, illustrating chiefly Early English Literature and the English Laguage. Vol. 2 of 2 vols. (1841, 1843).

  • Fehr in Archiv, cvii. 48;
    Bernhard Fehr, "Weitere Beiträge zur englischen Lyrik des 15. und 16. Jahrhunderts," in Alois Brandl and Adolf Tobler, eds., Archiv für das Studium der Neueren Sprachen und Litteraturen. CVII Band / Volume 107. (Braunschweig: George Westermann, 1901), p. 48. With excerpts from Sloane 2593, Sloane 1212, Sloane 3501, Harley 541, Harley 367, & Harley 7578.

Edited complete by:

  • Wright for the Warton Club in 1856 ;
    Thomas Wright, ed., Songs and Carols from a Manuscript in the British Museum of the Fifteenth Century (Warton Club, 1842). (Texts from Sloane 2593);

  • B. Fehr in Archiv, cix. 33; who does not print poems extracted as above, but is ignorant of the Warton Club print.
    Bernhard Fehr, "Die Lieder der Hs. Sloane 2593," in Alois Brandl and Adolf Tobler, eds.,  Archiv für das Studium der neueren Sprachen und Litteraturen. Band CIX. (Braunschweig: George Westermann, 1902), pp. 33-72.

Archiv, cix. 48;
Bernhard Fehr, "Die Lieder der Hs. Sloane 2593," in Alois Brandl and Adolf Tobler, eds., Archiv für das Studium der neueren Sprachen und Litteraturen. CIX Band / Vol. 109. (Braunschweig: George Westermann, 1902), mary is a lady bryzt, p. 48.

Wright, W.C., 23.
Thomas Wright, ed., Songs and Carols from a Manuscript in the British Museum of the Fifteenth Century (Warton Club, 1842), Mary Is A Lady Bry3t, p. 23. (Texts from Sloane 2593);

See also Thomas Wright, ed., Songs and Carols Printed From A Manuscript in the Sloane Collection in the British Museum Preface signed Thomas Wright. (London: William Pickering, 1836). [Text, twenty pieces only, from Sloane 2593.]

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