Laurence Minot

Laurence Minot (1300? – 1352?) was an English poet. Nothing definite is known of him. It has been suggested that he was a cousin of Thomas Minot, Archbishop of Dublin 1363–1375. If this is so, he came from a family from the north of England. He may have been a soldier. Eleven poems are attributed to him, all of which appear uniquely in London: British Library, MS Galba E. ix. In them, he celebrates in northern English and with a somewhat ferocious patriotism the victories of Edward III over the Scots and the French.

Quotes

• In this dale I droupe and dare
  For dern dedes that done me dere.
  Of Ingland had my hert grete care
  When Edward founded first to were.
  The Franche men war frek to fare
  Ogaines him with scheld and spere,
  Thai turned ogayn with sides sare,
  And al thaire pomp noght worth a pere.
  • 'Lithes and I sall tell yow tyll/the bataile of Halidon Hyll', The Poems of Laurence Minot, 1333–1352, eds. Thomas Beaumont James and John Simons (1989), p. 26

• Ihesu, for thi woundes five,
  in Ingland help us to have pese.
  • 'Lithes and I sall tell yow tyll/the bataile of Halidon Hyll', The Poems of Laurence Minot, 1333–1352, eds. Thomas Beaumont James and John Simons (1989), p. 29

• Skottes out of Berwik and of Abirdene,
  At the Bannok burn war ye to kene,
  Thare slogh ye many sakles, als it was sene
  And now has king Edward wroken it, I wene,
  It es wrokin, I wene, wele wurth the while;
  War yit with the Skottes, for thai er ful of gile.
  • 'Now for to tell yow will I turn/of the batayl of Banocburn', The Poems of Laurence Minot, 1333–1352, eds. Thomas Beaumont James and John Simons (1989), p. 29

• Whare er ye, Skottes of Saint Johnes toune?
  The boste of yowre baner es betin all doune;
  When ye bosting will bede, sir Edward es boune
  For to kindel yow care and crak yowre crowne:
  He has crakked yowre croune, wele worth the while;
  Schame bityde the Skottes, for thai er full of gile
  • 'Now for to tell yow will I turn/of the batayl of Banocburn', The Poems of Laurence Minot, 1333–1352, eds. Thomas Beaumont James and John Simons (1989), p. 29

• Oure king and his men held the felde
  Stalwortly, with spere and schelde
  And thoght to win his right,
  With lordes and with knightes kene
  And other doghty men bydene,
  That war ful frek to fight.
  • The Poems of Laurence Minot, 1333–1352, eds. Thomas Beaumont James and John Simons (1989), p. 35

• Men may rede in romance right
  Of a grete clerk that Merlin hight;
  Ful many bokes er of him wreten,
  Als thir clerkes wele may witten;
  And yit in many prive nokes
  May men find of Merlin bokes.
  • 'How Edward at Hogges unto land wan/and rade thurgh France or ever he blan', The Poems of Laurence Minot, 1333–1352, eds. Thomas Beaumont James and John Simons (1989), p. 43

• Merlin said thus with his mowth,
  Out of the north into the sowth
  Suld cum a bare over the se
  That suld mak many man to fle;
  And in the se, he said ful right,
  Suld he schew ful mekill might;
  And in France he suld bigin
  To mak tham wrath that er tharein
  • 'How Edward at Hogges unto land wan/and rade thurgh France or ever he blan', The Poems of Laurence Minot, 1333–1352, eds. Thomas Beaumont James and John Simons (1989), p. 43

• Fro Philip the Valais was sir David sent
  All Ingland to win fro Twede unto Trent
  • 'Sir David had of his men grete loss/with sir Edward at the Nevil cross', The Poems of Laurence Minot, 1333–1352, eds. Thomas Beaumont James and John Simons (1989), p. 52

• The Scottes with thaire falshede thus went thai obout
  For to win Ingland whils Edward was out.
  For Cuthbert of Dorem haved thai no dout;
  Tharfore at Nevel cros law gan thai lout,
  Thare louted thai law and leved allane:
  Thus was David the Bruse into the toure tane.
  • 'Sir David had of his men grete loss/with sir Edward at the Nevil cross', The Poems of Laurence Minot, 1333–1352, eds. Thomas Beaumont James and John Simons (1989), pp. 53-54

Quotes about Minot

• It is rare for poems such as these, however topical in their own time, to live on to engage the interests of later readers.
  • J. A. W. Bennett, Middle English Literature (1986), p. 395

• His direct historical value is small; though he preserves now and then a curious detail which has escaped the contemporaneous English Chroniclers, he adds little to our store of facts about the wars of the third Edward. But he is the abstract of the spirit of his time, its undoubted bravery, its glitter, its savagery, its complete absence of pity for the conquered. The greatest merit of his poems lies in their warm and spontaneous expression of national feeling. His predecessors in the political poem had attacked abuses, exposed grievances, or written in the service of a faction. He is the first to speak in the name of the English nation just awakened to a consciousness of its unity and strength.
  • Joseph Hall, 'Introduction', The Poems of Laurence Minot, ed. Joseph Hall (1887), p. xiii

• The creative imagination and poetical fancy which distinguish Chaucer, who, considering the general barbarism of his age and country, may be regarded as a prodigy, admit, it must be acknowledged, of no competition; yet, if the truth may be uttered without offence to the established reputation of that preeminent genius, one may venture to assert that, in point of ease, harmony, and variety of versification, as well as general perspicuity of stile, Laurence Minot is, perhaps, equal, if not superior, to any English poet before the sixteenth, or even, with very few exceptions, before the seventeenth, century
  • Joseph Ritson, Poems on Interesting Events in the Reign of King Edward III (1795), p. xiv